Thursday Links

1. A Michigan school is refusing to allow a transgender student to be homecoming king.  Even though this student received the most votes, he is listed in the school’s records as female, and therefore the school administration says he is ineligible.  Personally, I hope the school gets idiot-slapped for this.  But I keep thinking to myself, those kids elected an openly transgender student as their homecoming king.  I can’t imagine that happening when I was in high school 20 years ago.  Change is a slow thing, but this gives me hope … for the kids, if not for the adults.

2. The Sorting Hat: Which Kind of Activist Are YouYonmei‘s piece explores the different approaches to confrontation and activism, and touches a bit on what I talked about in Anger vs. Reason.  Only Yonmei uses Harry Potter references, and came up with a much more entertaining post.

3. Getting Published is Not a Crap Shoot.  I’ve said this before, on many occasions.  Writer Beware says the same thing.  I take this as official proof that I’m right, so from now on, anyone who refers to publishing as a lottery, crap shoot, or any other gambling metaphor shall immediately be booted in the head.

4. Empire Strikes Back Chess Set, by icgetaway.  Because it is awesome.  This is a sequel to his Star Wars chess set, which I linked to a while back.  Click the pic or link for the full photo set on Flickr.