Melanie Penner
@drmelpenner.bsky.social
Dev Peds at Holland Bloorview, clinician scientist studying better services for autistic children/youth. Hogging the aux and skipping the slow songs.
Reposted by Melanie Penner
Reposted by Melanie Penner
Should also add that right before she quit, Marjorie Taylor Greene passed a bill through the House to ban gender-affirming care for minors. She is not a moderate. She is still super right wing. She just felt Trump no longer could accomplish her goals.
“Our side has been trained by Donald Trump to never apologize and to never admit when you’re wrong.” Read the inside story of how Marjorie Taylor Greene went from zealous Trump cheerleader to his loudest Republican critic: nyti.ms/3Lbzi88
December 29, 2025 at 5:40 PM
Should also add that right before she quit, Marjorie Taylor Greene passed a bill through the House to ban gender-affirming care for minors. She is not a moderate. She is still super right wing. She just felt Trump no longer could accomplish her goals.
Reposted by Melanie Penner
post a perfect album from the
90s that isn't Nirvana, Pearl Jam
Soundgarden, or Alice In Chains
90s that isn't Nirvana, Pearl Jam
Soundgarden, or Alice In Chains
September 8, 2025 at 12:23 AM
post a perfect album from the
90s that isn't Nirvana, Pearl Jam
Soundgarden, or Alice In Chains
90s that isn't Nirvana, Pearl Jam
Soundgarden, or Alice In Chains
One of the blessings of 2025 has been a cavalcade of amazing new rock music. Thanks to all those who got me through with a bit more joy: PUP, @ekkoastral.bsky.social, Ryan Davis, Wednesday, Turnstile, First Day Back, Lambrini Girls, Wet Leg, Deftones (who I had slept on since the late 90s!)
December 27, 2025 at 12:52 AM
One of the blessings of 2025 has been a cavalcade of amazing new rock music. Thanks to all those who got me through with a bit more joy: PUP, @ekkoastral.bsky.social, Ryan Davis, Wednesday, Turnstile, First Day Back, Lambrini Girls, Wet Leg, Deftones (who I had slept on since the late 90s!)
Reposted by Melanie Penner
This is the poster child for how broken the media is right now. Almost every story is some reductive version of "she got a zero from a trans teacher for quoting the bible" which is not close to the reason she got a zero. All the details were there from the onset, just ignored.
The University of Oklahoma fired an instructor for failing a student who wrote a reaction paper without having read the text she was supposed to react to.
By definition she failed to satisfy the requirements of the assignment—which she publicly disclosed before the decision to fire the instructor.
By definition she failed to satisfy the requirements of the assignment—which she publicly disclosed before the decision to fire the instructor.
Adding on to the clip @parkermolloy.com found where the dumbass OU student admits she just rushed through the assignment.
This isn't an issue of a trans instructor trying to force students to adhere to their worldview...it's a moron student half-assing an assignment and trying to shift blame.
This isn't an issue of a trans instructor trying to force students to adhere to their worldview...it's a moron student half-assing an assignment and trying to shift blame.
December 24, 2025 at 8:05 PM
This is the poster child for how broken the media is right now. Almost every story is some reductive version of "she got a zero from a trans teacher for quoting the bible" which is not close to the reason she got a zero. All the details were there from the onset, just ignored.
Reposted by Melanie Penner
I remember as a little kid listening to "Pepper" by the Butthole Surfers and thinking "I don't really understand what's going on in this song I bet it's messed up grown up stuff I'll understand later" and now I'm nearly 40 and still have no idea what the song is supposed to be about.
December 1, 2025 at 9:44 PM
I remember as a little kid listening to "Pepper" by the Butthole Surfers and thinking "I don't really understand what's going on in this song I bet it's messed up grown up stuff I'll understand later" and now I'm nearly 40 and still have no idea what the song is supposed to be about.
Reposted by Melanie Penner
This is not the first time RFK Jr or his fellow anti-vax travelers conducted a study they knew would harm or kill children in low-income countries. It is a dehumanizing, colonialist model of manufacturing evidence: sacrificing foreign kids for political pseudoscience.
www.notus.org/health-scien...
www.notus.org/health-scien...
CDC to Fund Controversial Study in West Africa on Infant Hepatitis B Vaccines
The study prompted swift outcry from scientists in the U.S. who say it’s “unethical.”
www.notus.org
December 19, 2025 at 5:46 PM
This is not the first time RFK Jr or his fellow anti-vax travelers conducted a study they knew would harm or kill children in low-income countries. It is a dehumanizing, colonialist model of manufacturing evidence: sacrificing foreign kids for political pseudoscience.
www.notus.org/health-scien...
www.notus.org/health-scien...
Reposted by Melanie Penner
the full speech is something to see & is one of the reasons it is good to have a trans member of congress
youtu.be/5LqVMCW4e0c?...
youtu.be/5LqVMCW4e0c?...
Rep Sarah McBride on the steps of the Capitol
YouTube video by David Steinglass
youtu.be
December 17, 2025 at 9:12 PM
the full speech is something to see & is one of the reasons it is good to have a trans member of congress
youtu.be/5LqVMCW4e0c?...
youtu.be/5LqVMCW4e0c?...
Reposted by Melanie Penner
Another poison pill buried in Mark Carney’s budget: a repeal of a reduced postage rates for books and shipments between libraries.
Libraries across the country are sounding the alarm for what it would mean for the viability of another essential public institution.
Libraries across the country are sounding the alarm for what it would mean for the viability of another essential public institution.
Libraries say budget proposal to end shipping program would be 'catastrophic | CBC News
Libraries across Canada say a proposed change in the federal budget bill would end their ability to ship books at
reduced rates, threatening interlibrary loan programs and possibly forcing the closure...
www.cbc.ca
December 15, 2025 at 5:34 AM
Another poison pill buried in Mark Carney’s budget: a repeal of a reduced postage rates for books and shipments between libraries.
Libraries across the country are sounding the alarm for what it would mean for the viability of another essential public institution.
Libraries across the country are sounding the alarm for what it would mean for the viability of another essential public institution.
Reposted by Melanie Penner
SCOOP: Simon Fraser University insists that its new medical school, the first to open in Western Canada in 55 years, is so new and different that its collective agreement with the SFU Faculty Association doesn't apply.
Read more @pressprogress.ca
pressprogress.ca/sfu-medical-...
Read more @pressprogress.ca
pressprogress.ca/sfu-medical-...
SFU Wants Only Non-Union Faculty at New Medical School
Simon Fraser contends that the med school is so new and different that its existing collective agreement with university faculty doesn't apply
pressprogress.ca
December 11, 2025 at 4:21 PM
SCOOP: Simon Fraser University insists that its new medical school, the first to open in Western Canada in 55 years, is so new and different that its collective agreement with the SFU Faculty Association doesn't apply.
Read more @pressprogress.ca
pressprogress.ca/sfu-medical-...
Read more @pressprogress.ca
pressprogress.ca/sfu-medical-...
Reposted by Melanie Penner
fwiw: The autistic people and the families of autistic people I spoke were still angry/hurt/fearful several weeks after that Trump/RFK, Jr., press conference.
That was a blip on the news cycle for a lot of people. Not for people who were directly affected by Trump/RFK's verbiage and policies.
That was a blip on the news cycle for a lot of people. Not for people who were directly affected by Trump/RFK's verbiage and policies.
Lisa Murkowski gets snippy when I ask her about Trump using the "R-word"
"I'm not going to comment on that. There's so much important stuff going on."
Me: It's a slur
Murk: Absolutely it's an awful slur. It's an awful slur for people with disabilities, and he just shouldn't be doing it."
"I'm not going to comment on that. There's so much important stuff going on."
Me: It's a slur
Murk: Absolutely it's an awful slur. It's an awful slur for people with disabilities, and he just shouldn't be doing it."
December 10, 2025 at 1:03 AM
fwiw: The autistic people and the families of autistic people I spoke were still angry/hurt/fearful several weeks after that Trump/RFK, Jr., press conference.
That was a blip on the news cycle for a lot of people. Not for people who were directly affected by Trump/RFK's verbiage and policies.
That was a blip on the news cycle for a lot of people. Not for people who were directly affected by Trump/RFK's verbiage and policies.
Reposted by Melanie Penner
"are you enjoying duo mobile" does a hamburger enjoy being made of quarks. does a fish enjoy linear time. does the mountain enjoy the first taste of a cup of hot chocolate when you get back to the ski lodge. your question means nothing to me. i couldn't enjoy duo mobile even if i tried
December 3, 2025 at 7:36 PM
"are you enjoying duo mobile" does a hamburger enjoy being made of quarks. does a fish enjoy linear time. does the mountain enjoy the first taste of a cup of hot chocolate when you get back to the ski lodge. your question means nothing to me. i couldn't enjoy duo mobile even if i tried
Reposted by Melanie Penner
We're back on this again? We're back on this again. Fine.
1) Accommodations are fine and good because they create a predictable process for students who need help and for professors to understand how to accommodate their needs in a predictable way
1) Accommodations are fine and good because they create a predictable process for students who need help and for professors to understand how to accommodate their needs in a predictable way
Even by the standards of The Atlantic, this is an extraordinarily weak evidence base for an article.
Data from a tiny handful of schools that isn't measuring the variable at issue and a few thin, secondhand anecdotes.
www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...
Data from a tiny handful of schools that isn't measuring the variable at issue and a few thin, secondhand anecdotes.
www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...
December 2, 2025 at 10:52 PM
We're back on this again? We're back on this again. Fine.
1) Accommodations are fine and good because they create a predictable process for students who need help and for professors to understand how to accommodate their needs in a predictable way
1) Accommodations are fine and good because they create a predictable process for students who need help and for professors to understand how to accommodate their needs in a predictable way
Reposted by Melanie Penner
Learned depression laced today and a bit obsessed!
November 29, 2025 at 11:08 PM
Learned depression laced today and a bit obsessed!
Reposted by Melanie Penner
If you only read one piece memorializing Alice Wong, it should be this one.
If you're interested, this tribute to Alice Wong was written by one of the people who knew her best
www.thenation.com/article/soci...
www.thenation.com/article/soci...
A Tribute to an Oracle, Alice Wong
Alice had the ability to look to the future and a world where laws and attitudes did not keep disabled people poor, pitied, and isolated.
www.thenation.com
November 29, 2025 at 12:35 PM
If you only read one piece memorializing Alice Wong, it should be this one.
Imagine seeing this and then having to go about your day as an autism scientist
[stares into abyss]
[stares into abyss]
"Runctitiononal features"? "Medical fymblal"? "1 Tol Line storee"? This gets worse the longer you look at it. But it's got to be good, because it was published in Nature Scientific Reports last week: www.nature.com/articles/s41... h/t @asa.tsbalans.se
November 28, 2025 at 1:32 PM
Imagine seeing this and then having to go about your day as an autism scientist
[stares into abyss]
[stares into abyss]
Reposted by Melanie Penner
In which Zack Budryk perfectly captures the feeling many #ActuallyAutistic people feel in this particular moment of RFK Jr.'s resurgence: We felt like we were turning the corner on autism acceptance. And now we are seeing that door closed off.
www.welcometohellworld.com/i-will-not-g...
www.welcometohellworld.com/i-will-not-g...
I will not give up that which I have tasted
Promotion of the myth
www.welcometohellworld.com
November 25, 2025 at 11:54 PM
In which Zack Budryk perfectly captures the feeling many #ActuallyAutistic people feel in this particular moment of RFK Jr.'s resurgence: We felt like we were turning the corner on autism acceptance. And now we are seeing that door closed off.
www.welcometohellworld.com/i-will-not-g...
www.welcometohellworld.com/i-will-not-g...
Reposted by Melanie Penner
1. A landmark study was just published in The Journal of Pediatrics.
It found a 68% reduction in suicidality for trans youth getting HRT.
It also found only 7 of more than 400 stopped taking HRT... and of those that did, 4 still identified as gender-diverse.
Transgender care saves lives.
It found a 68% reduction in suicidality for trans youth getting HRT.
It also found only 7 of more than 400 stopped taking HRT... and of those that did, 4 still identified as gender-diverse.
Transgender care saves lives.
Study In The Journal Of Pediatrics Finds Trans Youth Care Lowers Suicidality, Few Detransition
The groundbreaking study found that suicidality dropped for transgender youth receiving hormone therapy by nearly 70%, with only 7 patients of 432 discontinuing treatment.
www.erininthemorning.com
November 24, 2025 at 11:01 PM
1. A landmark study was just published in The Journal of Pediatrics.
It found a 68% reduction in suicidality for trans youth getting HRT.
It also found only 7 of more than 400 stopped taking HRT... and of those that did, 4 still identified as gender-diverse.
Transgender care saves lives.
It found a 68% reduction in suicidality for trans youth getting HRT.
It also found only 7 of more than 400 stopped taking HRT... and of those that did, 4 still identified as gender-diverse.
Transgender care saves lives.
“Anti-vaxxers are often characterized as misinformed…But that doesn’t give the people I met at the conference enough credit for the agency they exercise in their lives, or for how sincerely they hold their beliefs.” 🎁 🔗 www.nytimes.com/2025/11/25/o...
Opinion | I Went to an Anti-Vaccine Conference. Medicine Is in Trouble.
www.nytimes.com
November 25, 2025 at 11:52 AM
“Anti-vaxxers are often characterized as misinformed…But that doesn’t give the people I met at the conference enough credit for the agency they exercise in their lives, or for how sincerely they hold their beliefs.” 🎁 🔗 www.nytimes.com/2025/11/25/o...
Reposted by Melanie Penner
Feels like a good time to reshare this one
August 28, 2025 at 11:27 AM
Feels like a good time to reshare this one
Thinking about the dangerous and chaotic messaging about autism and acetaminophen still circulating in the world. Careless words from careless men, followed by a walk back that got far less coverage.
www.reuters.com/business/hea...
www.reuters.com/business/hea...
www.reuters.com
November 16, 2025 at 6:56 PM
Thinking about the dangerous and chaotic messaging about autism and acetaminophen still circulating in the world. Careless words from careless men, followed by a walk back that got far less coverage.
www.reuters.com/business/hea...
www.reuters.com/business/hea...
Reposted by Melanie Penner
1/ Egalitarianism should begin at home. I link to this article by @bencasselman.bsky.social in light of the communications between Larry Summers and Jeffrey Epstein that have just been released. The released emails and the fact of friendship are vile.
www.nytimes.com/2021/02/23/b...
www.nytimes.com/2021/02/23/b...
For Women in Economics, the Hostility Is Out in the Open (Published 2021)
www.nytimes.com
November 15, 2025 at 4:32 PM
1/ Egalitarianism should begin at home. I link to this article by @bencasselman.bsky.social in light of the communications between Larry Summers and Jeffrey Epstein that have just been released. The released emails and the fact of friendship are vile.
www.nytimes.com/2021/02/23/b...
www.nytimes.com/2021/02/23/b...
What a profound loss. Rest in power, Alice.
Alice Wong, a writer and activist who was born with muscular dystrophy and who fought relentlessly for equal rights and access for people with disabilities, died on Friday. She was 51. nyti.ms/4r9WqEr
November 15, 2025 at 10:45 PM
What a profound loss. Rest in power, Alice.
Reposted by Melanie Penner
If you have to get permission to teach in your area of expertise from people who are definitionally not qualified to adjudicate your expertise then you are no longer working at a university.
You’re working at a state propaganda factory.
You’re working at a state propaganda factory.
COLLEGE STATION, Texas (AP) — Texas A&M adopts policy requiring professors to get OK from school president to discuss certain race and gender issues.
November 13, 2025 at 11:48 PM
If you have to get permission to teach in your area of expertise from people who are definitionally not qualified to adjudicate your expertise then you are no longer working at a university.
You’re working at a state propaganda factory.
You’re working at a state propaganda factory.