I get so many feels about this. Black's leaving feels like a loss. British politics these days are almost uniformly transphobic, and sometimes even homophobic. Labour have jolted hard right in just the course of a couple years, nosing right behind the Tories, with barely a difference between the two parties in terms of LGBTQ policy.

Queer people in the United States often look to the UK with fear in our eyes, wondering if and when that sort of process will happen here.

Will the Democratic Party eventually become as transphobic as Labour? We have reason to believe that probably won't happen, but then ... nobody would have believed it of Labour a few years ago.

So, to see a strong ally leave Westminster is hard. But her personal reasons for leaving are certainly relatable. Who wouldn't sympathize with somebody who wants to live in a more supportive personal world, who has been fighting for years and is tired of tolerating personal disrespect based on political fear mongering?

I've read some of the press attacks you referred to, and in many cases "vicious" is a very fair term for describing how the press have treated Black - despite her general equanimity and the very reasonable points she makes.

Holding up in that kind of severely toxic environment must be intensely difficult.

I hope she gets some well deserved rest and emerges as a force to reckoned with in some other societal way.

Giving her brilliance and dedication, I have little doubt that she will.