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Watch a trans man explain why Starbucks' new health care plan means so much to him.

Starbucks has a pretty solid track record with the LGBTQ community, and its latest announcement shows why.

Since 2012, the coffee chain has included certain transition-related medical treatments for trans employees in its health insurance packages. And at the end of June 2018, it announced an expansion of that plan.

The policy previously listed certain transition-related procedures — such as laser hair removal, facial feminization surgeries, breast reductions or augmentations, and hair transplants — as cosmetic and therefore not covered by insurance. The new employee health care package will cover those, and that's a pretty huge deal for their trans workers.


Starbucks flies a Pride flag above its corporate headquarters in Seattle. Photo via Starbucks Newsroom.

How exactly did Starbucks come to these decisions? It's simple, really: It asked experts for help.

The company reached out to the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), the go-to source for trans-related standards of care, to better understand trans people and their health needs. According to the company's press release, they are the first group to work directly with WPATH on shaping corporate policy. Not everybody understands trans issues or trans health and might be inclined to lump those types of transition-related procedures in with "cosmetic" exclusions. That's why it's so important that Starbucks took the extra step to consult experts.

Tate Buhrmester, a Starbucks employee of 15 years and the manager of one of its Austin, Texas, stores, is a living example of what happens when you provide people with access to care they need.

"It makes trans people feel like they are people, like they matter and their health matters," said Buhrmester, a trans man (meaning that he was assigned female at birth and transitioned to male), in a video on the company's website.

Buhrmester has been a Starbucks employee for 15 years. Photo by Mike Kane/Starbucks Newsroom.

Some may ask why a company should worry about policies that would only affect 0.6% of the population. The better question to ask is why not?

As a case study on the city of San Francisco's 2001 decision to include transition-related care in its insurance coverage shows, trans-inclusive policies have virtually zero effect on the cost of premiums. Researchers also found that trans employees were happier, healthier, and more productive as a result. There's no downside.

"The approach was driven not just by the company’s desire to provide truly inclusive coverage, [but also] by powerful conversations with transgender partners about how those benefits would allow them to truly be who they are," said Starbucks' vice president of benefits, Ron Crawford. "I view this as a diagnosis with a treatment path. You have to think of it from an equity perspective."

With the federal government's increasingly hostile approach to trans people — including a decision to reinterpret a section of the Affordable Care Act's nondiscrimination clause so as to give insurance companies the ability to categorically exclude trans coverage — it's on states and employers to set an example for the world and make this type of care the standard.

Buhrmester and his wife, Katherine, appear in the Starbucks video. Photo by Mike Kane/Starbucks Newsroom.

When one company takes a stand for doing what's right, others often soon follow. For vulnerable populations like trans people, that's the hope.

Sometimes, companies will follow suit because they see that it's the right thing to do. Other times, they follow the new model as a way of keeping their compensation packages consistent with their competitors. Whatever the case is, this could have a ripple effect, changing the lives of trans people for the better.

Not all trans people will use the services offered by this new insurance (just as not all employees will use coverage for a broken leg or treatment for heart disease), but it's still included in everyone's policies. But what this does, in addition to providing critical care, is send a message that trans people matter to the company as much as any other employee.

Good on you, Starbucks. Thanks a latte!

Watch Tate Buhrmester explain why this move means so much to him in Starbucks' powerful video below.

Joy

Homeless man catches family's two children and dogs dropped from burning apartment building

"He was right underneath and he was like 'Yes, throw your daughters out, I'm going to catch them, I'm going to get them.'"

Man catches entire family as they jump from burning building.

House fires are devastating for families. In a matter of minutes, you could lose all of your belongings and a place to live, or worse, you could lose loved ones. A family in Phoenix, Arizona, recently found themselves facing the reality of their own home in flames. Claudia Jimenez told CBS News that she woke up trapped in her burning apartment with her two daughters, with nothing to do but yell for help in the hopes that someone would hear her.

The mom's screams were answered by Joe Hollins, a homeless man who was camping nearby with his wife. Hollins didn't hesitate to try to find a way to help. With no way out and the fire department still nowhere on the scene, Jimenez had to trust the stranger who was standing below.

"He was right underneath and he was like 'Yes, throw your daughters out, I'm going to catch them, I'm going to get them,'" Jimenez told CBS.

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Sorry, Labradors. After 31 years, America has a new favorite dog.

The American Kennel Club has crowned a new favorite.

via Pixabay

A sad-looking Labrador Retriever

The sweet-faced, loveable Labrador Retriever is no longer America’s favorite dog breed. The breed best known for having a heart of gold has been replaced by the smaller, more urban-friendly French Bulldog.

According to the American Kennel Club, for the past 31 years, the Labrador Retriever was America’s favorite dog, but it was eclipsed in 2022 by the Frenchie. The rankings are based on nearly 716,500 dogs newly registered in 2022, of which about 1 in 7 were Frenchies. Around 108,000 French Bulldogs were recorded in the U.S. in 2022, surpassing Labrador Retrievers by over 21,000.

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The video posted by Ohio mom, Karlie Smith (unbreakablemomma on TikTok), has received nearly 600,000 views and has over 1,850 comments.

“Call me cheap, call me whatever, but if we’re going out to a restaurant, I’m packing my kid a meal," Smith, 21, said in her post. "I do this for many reasons. On Friday nights, my family and I get together, and tonight, we’re getting food out. My son is not getting food out.”

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Man rewatches shows from his childhood and his recaps of the bonkers storylines are priceless

Rob Anderson's hilarious recaps of shows like "Mighty Ducks," "Beethoven," and "7th Heaven" might make you wonder how they got made in the first place.

@hearthrobert/TikTok

These plots makes zero sense.

While there are no doubt some timeless classics from our childhood that remain every bit as amazing as we remember, many are straight-up cringey upon a later viewing. Really, it’s to be expected as societal viewpoints change…sort of a marker of how far we’ve collectively come.

And so, what do we do with these problematic pieces of old-school pop culture? Well, we can certainly update them to better reflect a more modern attitude, but that also comes with a set of potential problems. Or we could simply never watch them again. Certainly an option given all the content out there. But then we might miss an opportunity to better understand what seemed to work for the mainstream then, and why it doesn’t work now.

And then there’s the third option—allow ourselves to be entertained by their cringiness.

That’s certainly the route taken by Rob Anderson. Over on TikTok, Anderson has taken ultra-popular movies and television shows from his childhood and given them hilarious recaps capturing how absurd some of the storylines are.
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Woman decides that she is the love of her life and marries herself at her retirement home

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77-year-old woman decides she's the love of her life and marries herself.

We joke about marrying ourselves or a platonic friend if some arbitrary amount of time has passed without a proposal from an imaginary suitor. And sure, some people do wind up marrying a friend in more of a business arrangement, but it's not very common that someone follows through with marrying themselves.

Dorothy "Dottie" Fideli, decided that she was going to break the mold. The 77-year-old sat down and thought about all of the things she had done in life and who was with her the entire time cheering her on. It was an easy answer: herself. She was her biggest cheerleader, the person who always showed up and the love of her life, so Fideli made the plan to marry herself.

On a beautiful May day, friends and family gathered in the O’Bannon Terrace Retirement Community, where Fideli is a resident, to witness the ceremony.

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12-year-old Texas girl saves her family from carbon monoxide poisoning

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Carbon monoxide is called a silent killer for a reason. Many people don't realize they're experiencing carbon monoxide poisoning before it's too late. The gas is colorless and odorless and tends to have a sedating effect that causes people to sleep through the fatal poisoning. Having carbon monoxide detectors is one of the most effective ways to identify the gas before it's too late to get out of the house, but not every home has one.

A little girl in Fort Worth, Texas, experienced a terrifying encounter with the deadly gas, but her quick actions saved her entire family. Jaziyah Parker is being held up as a hero after she realized something was wrong with her family members and called for help.

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