In another curious fluke of congruence, Tumblr’s announcement came a week after The American Conservative (TAC) published an essay by Rod Dreher called “ Andrea Long Chu’s Fake Vagina,” responding to several essays by Chu after her controversial New York Times op-ed about gender confirmation surgery and mental health.
(In what one hopes is only a macabre twist of fate, the December 17 deadline falls on the 16th annual International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers.)
Sex workers and erotic artists were quick to condemn the ban, noting in particular the inevitable economic devastation such measures would exact on those doing survival sex work and for whom their accumulated Tumblr followers and customers can (and often do) make the difference between eating and going hungry.