The Anti-Trans Disinformation Pipeline

For all the terrible disgusting things about Matt Walsh, I have to be honest and say that I'm REALLY annoyed by how he says "elegal." Nice to have a petty reason to hate him to add to the list.

I actually saw/watched this on the YouTube channel, because I ran into Jessie when she was on some panels at Rose City Comic-Con, so I decided to check out her channel, this one video was enough to convince me to join her Patreon (it's at a lower level right now because of my budget, but I have little doubt that it will go up from here)... Thank you Jessie for wading through all the muck that you must have had to deal with to get this made, best wishes for your break (because we all need them), and I will be waiting to see you on the other side!

Rick Sjolin (BearGriz72)

I'm glad to hear it!

Becky Sparks

Thanks Juls <3

Jessie Earl

Thank you Adrenalyn

Jessie Earl

Thank you Dezzy <3

Jessie Earl

agreed

Jessie Earl

<3 I am planningg on it as soon as I finish this last Walsh video thank god

Jessie Earl

Blair White never ceases to amaze me. Her schtick always blows my mind. How can someone be THAT self-hating?

L

Sure it could be great to do a separate video memorializing Dani, but also in your video’s context in our collective opinion (ie. Libre Spirits is a collective), Jessie comes across as less than empathetic in this video by just quickly mentioning Dani and moving on, as if Dani’s life and the way Kiwi Farms, Redux, Blair White and Matt Walsh used Dani’s life and death instrumentally to “score points” vs. the trans community was not horrendous. In other words, sure make another video on Dani, but in this video don’t fail to acknowledge their life and death as important and their further victimización by Kiwi Farms, Redux, White, Walsh and what we’ll call the “wrong wing.” Black Lives Matter ✊🏿

Libre Spirits Collective

I respectfully disagree. Dani Sommerville doesn't need to be in this any more than what is needed in this video because the allegations aren't about him. I believe that Jesse showed the right amount of respect for this person considering the already sensitive topic and editing more information into this video wouldn't really be in good taste in my opinion. (A separate video may be more appropriate.)

Marron S

Mostly well done, as usual. One thing though, we would like you to have an additional short portion that memorializes Dani (the person who actually did pass away). You mention them about 1 hour in, but do not say anything on their behalf and just keep moving. It seems uncharacteristically non-empathetic compared to most of your videos. We would request one additional edit to remedy this.

Libre Spirits Collective

Wow, this was both difficult and amazing! Thank you for doing this work. I have a lot of feelings about this, but I want to think about it some more. It's bringing up the anger and feelings of helplessness that I felt in the situation with Kira. I don't like seeing people's humanity used to dehumanize them. I want to support people who are oppressed and abused, but I feel wrong about using people who are oppressed and abused themselves as targets.

Juls K

(A little sidebar on the monkeypox thing: from news I've been following it seems some of that previous experience with pandemics and good vaccination rates have really knocked back that virus outbreak. Particularly in the gay mens' community. (And one thing there is it's not somethng that *needs* sex to transmit, it's a close contact thing, and I suspect that for a while it made normally-safe dance club behaviors a big vector: the virus seemed to blow up and burn out (relatively speaking) rather preciptiously. At a guess, the communities most conspicuously affected have adjusted to the threat pretty well, actually, but I thought I should highlight that in this case it's not just a matter of safe *sex* when it comes to precautions, while that's still out there, there's other important stuff like close contact on the dance floor, hand-washing, minding *laundry* even, etc. I don't think I've seen anything definitive on why the threat seems to have decreased a lot but it's apparently still out there, for anyone that has more active nightlife etc. :)

OliveD

Jessie this is an amazing piece of work. Thank you for bringing these difficult issues to our attention, especially with your trademark nuance. One small note about anger - your anger is justified. No one is inherently angry. Anger has its place & its function. Yes sometimes it acts as a "secondary emotion" to mask even more challenging ones, for example sadness, until we are ready to deal with them. But it is also an important & necessary emotion in its own right. Anyway. I hope you are feeling some catharsis in getting this video out. xo

Adrenalynn

Hey Jessie. I'm coming to the end of this video. It's important reporting on an issue which relies on not being scrutinized. I hear the anger in your voice here in the conclusion, and the exhaustion. I've been here as you have researched this story, and had to examine some hideously toxic material in the doing of it. I want you to know that I appreciate all this hard emotional labor that you've done on behalf of the community and in the service of truth. I'm sorry it's been so hard to do. Your work is worthwhile, and it *matters*. You are loved, and this community is a brighter and better place because you have given the gift of raising your voice in support. Be well friend.

SuperDezzy

The other point I wanted to make is that you were exceedingly fair to both Eli and her accusers in this video, and I respect that completely. The fact that you asked for her side and she was reasonably forthcoming with her responses, providing receipts even when they did not exonerate her completely, and accepting responsibility for her mistakes and poor choices, reflects well on her overall, that she's trying to be a good person, that she's not been perfect, and is continually trying to be better. So many people made bad choices and hurt people when they were 18-20 and went on to learn and grow into better people. A different kind of person might not have talked with you or owned her part of it as much as she did. That's just my take on it. But thank you for being so diligent in getting to as much truth as you were able to and I hope it's not taken too much of a toll on your mental health.

Emily Myers Corrigan

Holy actual fuck, MW is a disgusting excuse for a human being. Even if he was 100% correct in his accusations of "drug dealing" etc, Eli's university is not accountable to the general public or any media personality regarding how they handle accusations like this, and his threats and attempted blackmail of the staff there are just...deplorable, and barely skirt the line of legality. I hope that he eventually suffers consequences proportional to the harm he has done.

Emily Myers Corrigan

GIRL, if I may quote Kyle Broflovski in Matt Walsh's general direction for a moment, "Holy shit dude!" I lost track of the number of times I'd cussed at him just during the first half hour of this video. I can't even begin to imagine how emotionally and psychologically draining it is to do a deep dive like this, and that's not even getting into the rest of the video here. I sincerely hope you're taking enough time for self care. <3 <3 >3

Becky Sparks

<3 <3 <3 I don't have the energy to respond to all this but... truly, thank you

Jessie Earl

Jesse... Before I say anything else, I want you to know that the care you take to get things right, to demonstrate the complexities and nuance of a situation, mean a LOT to me. I believe that one of the biggest problems with our current media landscape is how much is cut out of a story in order to make it "simple" "accessible" or "black and white" for the target audience. We have to be able to confront what is happening around us in all the layers that go with it, not just the easiest or the first thing we come across. That being said, I want to go ahead and expound a little on what you said about saving anger for those who use it for their agenda. It's people who take situations like this and deconstruct them to create a narrative designed to bolster their own power that truly deserve our ire. They know exactly what they are doing. They are not honest brokers of information or warriors for righteous causes. They are power-hungry people who care more about consolidating their support and shoring up their narrative than they do for the actual consequences of their actions on real people. The architects of the movement to strip people of rights they have or deny others rights they should have by scapegoating them so that they remain at the forefront of a culture war that has long since ceased to be about reasonable people disagreeing - if it ever was that - and turned into a means by which the avaricious can cling to their own authority, political or moral. Those people deserve our anger. But anger doesn't have to dehumanize them. They are still human beings and we can recognize that death threats, doxxing and the methods of our opponents are not right. We don't have to engage in them. I think most of us refrain from going that way, and it's important to bear in mind that the means we use to do a thing matters; the differences in our methods *matter*, as much as our goals. Don't feel bad for being angry when you see people hurting other people deliberately, callously, for their own benefit. Your anger is warranted. You take that anger and attempt to use it constructively, to reach an audience with as much truth and nuance as you can find. That's admirable. It tells us that you are in control of your anger, it does not rule you. Let's hope the rest of us can do as well as you do in dealing with our own responses.