for more on these matters, here are some past posts, with links to other past posts: from 2022 and earlier; from earlier this year.

i’ve just received a notice from Callen-Lorde Community Clinic (known to new yorkers as “big gay health”) asking me to sign a “SPECIFIC INFORMED CONSENT FOR GENDER AFFIRMING HORMONE THERAPY – ESTROGENS” form (pix/alt-text below).

i will not be signing it.

this is adapted from what I wrote to the Callen-Lorde leadership, and what i posted elsewhere:

this new “informed consent” form is either (1) pre-emptive compliance with the regime’s demand for a list of trans people receiving medical care; (2) an ill-thought-out and utterly useless attempt at ass-covering against the regime by creating exactly the documentation they want; (3) a scare tactic to push trans people off HRT.

the form’s list of side effects of exogenous estrogen is based on research that was not done on trans women, and is in many cases outdated. it is framed in ways that directly use the language and scare-tactics of the anti-trans far right.

this is a conscious and disgusting betrayal of Callen-Lorde’s trans patients. that’s true whatever the motives behind it, whatever imaginary game of fuck-you-dimensional chess the clinic’s leadership and lawyers think they’re playing.

you resist genocidal policies by refusing to do anything that even vaguely complies with them, not by doing what they tell you – and especially not by doing what they tell you and pretending it’s non-compliance.

here is where you can find a list of the people in charge at Callen-Lorde (though without contact information for any of them). the only person i found on social media (a very shallow search) willing to admit to their job at CL is Executive VP for Research & Education asa radix: @asaradix.bsky.social

give them all a piece of your mind.

tell them not to collaborate with the regime & its anti-trans allies. tell them to yell at our mayor (who has so far done nothing to protect trans health, despite specific policy and funding promises) to have their backs.

and remind them we can see them.

remember:

“informed consent” gatekeeping is just regular gatekeeping whenever the doctors and other “experts” in charge decide it is – including trans “expert” gatekeepers.

you can’t identify yr way out of a structural relationship.

you can’t 501c yr way out of a structural relationship.

this underscores why we (trans ppl, but also others) need full-scale autonomous healthcare structures to have secure, sustainable access to health care. and why it’s a damn good thing the starting point for that has been HRT compounding and redistribution.

if you want estrogen, there is a project near you who can hook you up. ask a trans woman who’s a punk, or an anarchist, or both. and remember: the fearmongering about sources of HRT is the same as the fearmongering against HRT. more on all that here.

take care of your sisters & siblings.

refuse to collaborate with the regime. as keguro macharia asks: “how are you imagining freedom today? how are you practicing freedom today?”

and as margaret killjoy writes: “love comes before tear gas like ozone comes before a storm.”

the state will not protect us. even your favorite politician.

the 501Cs will not protect us.

we will protect and free ourselves.

autonomous trans healthcare now! and nothing less.

and because we cannot be free unless all of us are free:

abolition now! and nothing less.