Notices by ⚡🔌ℂlaire 𝔻anielle ℂassidy☀️ (lasermistress@mstdn.social)

Got some soldering done today 🦋

Once a year I manage a women & queer run electronics camp called There U Glow, centered around teaching femmes & queers about addressable LEDs and making space to feel less misogyny for a moment as skilled technicians.

This is a badge we teach people to solder with ⚡🦋.

There is more info and context at https://thereuglow.club/ if that is fun for you 💖 I'll also be posting about this this spring as we gear up to happen again.

Badge designed by @drc3p0 🔥

"‘Not Everyone Can Leave’: Survival Advice from Trans Teens in Texas

Media attention often focuses on trans teens fleeing the anti-trans states they’re living in. But what about those who can’t leave?"

https://www.texasobserver.org/survival-advice-trans-teens-texas/

"Even as we wake up this November to the heavy reality of what a second Trump presidency and both chambers of Congress red means for LGBTQ+ communities—along with refugees, Palestinians, and the Earth itself—we cannot forget that for the past three years, even under a Biden/Harris administration, Christofascist and white nationalist movements in Texas and other red states have already been inflicting state terror on trans and nonbinary youth."

"As such, these unheard stories from young trans people unable to flee Texas now hold urgent lessons for all of us about how to resist by existing, in the face of fascistic movements seeking to deny so many communities the right just to be alive."

Taking a moment to bask in how far I've come. How life has actually gotten appreciably better.

(even if it was so agonizingly incremental that I didn't feel dopamine from any noticed change and that's probably why I don't remark on it more 🤣😅)

This is noticeable in how I peacefully navigated a genocidal holiday in my groove, with antifa friends who make me laugh, buying myself ultra-comfortable bralettes, woman-owned boutique makeup and other beautiful things on sale.

I choose this life 💖.

If you are hearing the message to build and foster community right now, and you feel a bit lost, may I suggest centering women and queer folk?

This is not a monolith (women, particularly white, are often awful), and zero bioessentialism here.

But women and queer folk are deeply socialized to keep social fabric together. We have lifetimes of experience, skill. We've held community, nations, the whole of humanity together for ages.

Just..pay the fuck attention. Learn. Be amazed. Help. For once.

Oh holy shit. In 2016 on election night I posted, jokingly, that I was duel American/Canadian and available for marriage. That thread became a flashpoint overnight and was one of my most commented on posts ever. In there, someone mentioned Maple Match, the Canadian dating site. On a whim, I looked it up today.

It still exists.

And here is where it's at now 🥺😂🥰

https://www.maplematch.com/

Had an hour before going to a show last night so I slapped some electronics on a hat. I'm heckin stoked on the effect.

Interestingly, I have to place my 18650 battery at the front inside of the hat because the halo tilt doesn't allow for it at the back. *Gestures at physics*

I'm using a Pixelblaze LED controller from @wizard (wirelessly controlled on my iPad), and micro COB LEDs that are in my LED guide:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/180WD4LogMjx8FmKcFc0dmlTEKJ1Xa7dIHlEhSLMOAxA/edit

#LEDs #WearableTech #ActuallyAutistic

This account is where I vent a lot of rage about systemic oppression and the insanity of the tech industry.

But I want to be clear:

Trans folks have saved my life and my career over and over. I love every one.

Queer and neurospicy cultures have saved me and given me a hopeful path forward.

Men, even "bad" men (false concept) are people, and deserve humanity like anyone else.

I rage loudly because I'm in a safer place than I once was.

I am grateful and possess deep love.

Thank you.

You know those super hardshell extra sharp crunchy fruity candies with the ooey-gooey sweet liquid filling?

That's my whole personality.

#tech

So, when I talk to men I tend to gently introduce concepts around how I fight oppression in technical space, particularly patriarchy.

And they tend to, inevitably, unconsciously? center their pain around how classism oppresses them.

Because class is the vector of oppression that cis white men understand.

What really gets me though is how BLIND they are to other vectors.

I get that, I'm slower at pointing out racism.

But I SEE it. It is MADDENING how BLIND most men choose to be.

#patriarchy

Every time I sit down to solder I hear a chorus of voices from every guy who has ever seen or heard me mention soldering and *immediately* given me unsolicited advice, suggestions how I could do better, immediate critique or (truly) offered to do it *for me*.

Which has been 90% of my interactions with men about soldering. Which is OFTEN.

I IGNORE this, in my my OWN HEAD, EVERY time I sit down to do my JOB.

It's not imposter syndrome. It's systemic oppression. It's insane.

#patriarchy #tech

Having a fine time at ToorCamp this time.

But before I forget, or shove it down deep, I want to mention something that happened

In my own city, in my local hackerspace.

At an afterparty for Teardown

An admin of the space said to me:

"Wow, you have such a nice flat belly, good and thin"

And, when I went mute from shocked discomfort,

"It's just nice to have someone actually attractive in here for once"

There was more

I'm just still speechless. The anger too raw

I want people to know tho

Now, I know how men view me. How they view anyone they consider an attractive object to pursue. I've lived my *life* in this body.

I've also fought tooth and nail to be seen as skilled, capable, expert. I focus on that.

But I *know* this man's outer dialogue is a massive amount of how most men quietly see me, especially in this regressive fucking industry.

And then people tell me "he's a nice guy". And "I've never seen him do that!"

It's the gaslighting that will make me give up.

Autism facts I did *not* know:

- The first person to ever be diagnosed autistic died *last year.*

- Autism and ADHD were considered fully mutually exclusive, in the DSM-5, until *2013*, and comorbidity rare for a while after.

- Research shows ~50-80% of Autistic folks show ADHD traits, and ~30-40% of ADHD folks show Autistic traits.

- The Monotropism questionnaire, which blows previous unified research and theories away, came out last summer.

Sources below.

#actuallyautistic #audhd

@scetron have any names for those "places"?

Genuine question: Could I get a job where I primarily design lasercutting vectors? A good job, decent pay, stable, maybe remote, all that.

I'm *wicked* good at it with almost a decade experience. I just hadn't considered it as a primary vocation somehow. Probably because I don't have and didn't intentionally pursue a graphic design degree.

More context is I'm a hardware hacker and electronics PM.

How and where do I even look for this kinda gig?

#GetFediHired #jobhunting #lasercutting

💖 🥺 my friend gave me this ya'll.

(Insert philosophical, introspective, emotional rant about how hard I've worked to change myself and it's changed the world around me and the company I keep and I'm starting to get to see it)