#Advantages of Substack

[jolenes-book-journey]

What Is Substack And How Can Authors Use It

Substack has emerged as a prominent platform for authors seeking to publish newsletters and share podcasts. It offers a streamlined approach to content distribution, but it’s essential to weigh its advantages and disadvantages to determine if it’s the right fit for your author. Jolene’s on Substack with her Publication called “The Indie Author’s Guide to Writing, Publishing, and Thrivin” Continue…

[jstor]

hi jstor, quick question, what do i do with all the regret that's slowly choking me? i'm an academic at heart in a world where i'm no longer in academia, and i'm not thriving one bit 🫠 had to turn down a place in a phd program 2 yrs ago & now it's my biggest regret in life. you've given people such compassionate advice, so maybe you can help? research/writing is my passion & i miss having the space to indulge it & keep learning!

Hi there, thanks for reaching out with such a heartfelt question. It takes a lot to express this sort of sentiment publicly and we appreciate that you trust us enough to ask.

The regret you're feeling is natural, considering so much of your identity and passion lies in your research and writing. Your friendly JSTOR mod has also been struggling with feeling unmoored outside of academia, and I've been wondering myself if I should work my way back somehow or create a structure of my own.

The good news is that you can actually create a structure of your own! Many scholars contribute to their fields independently, so it may be worth considering a personal research project that you can work on at your own pace (which has its advantages). Public libraries often provide access to academic databases like JSTOR, and your alma mater might have resources available to alumni. Communities and forums online are a good way to reach others who are feeling similar and doing similar things.

Your writing also doesn't have to stop! If it's not your only focus it may go quite a bit slower, but many journals accept submissions from independent researchers. In addition, platforms like Medium and Substack may allow you to self-publish some of your work. You could even look into pitching guest posts for relevant publications!

It doesn't have to be a permanent goodbye to academia either. Does your alma mater welcome guest lecturers, or are there any community workshops in your area? These are some ways you could share your passions with others. Plus, academia will always be there–if an opportunity arises for you to return and it aligns with your circumstances, you can.

This is by no means exhaustive, so I do hope that anyone from the community who would like to share insights does so in the replies. Wishing you the best of luck, wherever you may go from here!

[nerdyrevelries]

I have very strong opinions on what type of social media users all of the characters in Little Women would be.

Marmee runs the Facebook page for her neighborhood. You know, the one where people can post about lost pets, barbeques, and give people heads up that there's going to be some reno going on on their house.

Meg is the biggest social media user of the bunch. Prior to marriage, she has a Pinterest board full of fantasies for her someday wedding and she follows multiple cottagecore influencers. After she becomes a mother, Meg gets really into mommy bloggers to the point where her family has to have an intervention because she's wearing herself out trying to make baby food from scratch because she's been convinced it's the only way to make sure her kids grow up with every advantage. She will also cry over Marie Kondo videos on YouTube because she can't manage to have a perfect, uncluttered life with two active toddlers. She is unfortunately very susceptible to seeing the perfect life other people present on social media and assuming that the projected image is an achievable reality and she is failing when she doesn't measure up to it. Luckily, John is very kind and understanding and helpful about this. (He's not much of a social media user at all.)

Jo has a Substack for her writing and a Tumblr where she posts and talks about writing and follows other people who talk about writing.

Beth is a social media enigma. She has a Pinterest where she only has private boards for saving music, and she lurks but does not have an account on a forum for musicians. She otherwise has no social media presence.

Amy doesn't post a ton on her social media. She has an Instagram where she occasionally posts photos of her art or a pretty flower she saw that day. However, she is constantly getting tagged in other people's social media posts as she frequently shows up in pictures on other people's social media. She's very much of the opinion that she wants to be out there living life rather than just posting about it.

I regret to inform you that Laurie has a pranks channel on YouTube and TikTok. He eventually does stop running it after his character growth, at which point he switches to using his social media platform to highlight aspiring artists and musicians and provide philanthropy and outreach.

Professor Bhaer has a presence in academic publications. Outside of that, he enjoys writing reviews of obscure public domain media on the Internet Archive.

[seafoamreadings]

ch ch ch changes

i'm tentatively planning to close down my etsy by the end of the year. i'm coming to realize that my real calling when it comes to these things is predictive astrology for the masses. i will still be doing readings here and there because i love to do those and am good at that too! but i am tired of etsy and its fees and some of the demographic who's been going for my etsy readings lately (obviously i love my clients but some people on there are just passing through, see that i keep my prices low, and try to take advantage of my kindness and my pisces mars falls for it every time lol). meanwhile if i do posts for everyone they are purely channeled out of my little brain for exactly who wants them - you can hang out with me or you can just not and i don't have to deal with anyone who doesn't like it! plus i think the quality is actually better. anyway, i'm exploring some avenues for listings for people who still want those. i am now on both venmo and cashapp as well. but etsy just ain't doing it for me these days. if you love etsy and want a reading from there these next couple months are the time to do it. i especially need the time away from draining clients as i develop my scientific career alongside this calling. it takes a lot of energy and i never have a lot of that at once. otherwise the best way to support me now is on patreon! and if that's not your style i have the ko-fi up, i'm working on a substack, and also like i said checking on yet more~

meanwhile i am very very open to any ideas you all have, since you on this blog are my biggest love <3

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Kerry Eleveld at Daily Kos:

Republicans have two distinct media advantages as November approaches: a propaganda machine on the right that creates and amplifies disinformation and a presidential candidate so flawed and broken that his outrageous behavior barely registers among corporate media anymore. Matt Gertz, senior fellow at Media Matters for America, illustrated how the media environment benefits Donald Trump by pointing to his remarks earlier this month that his administration would "root out" his political opponents that "live like vermin within the confines of our country." Gertz contrasted this month's coverage of Trump's Nazi-esque language against the wall-to-wall coverage in 2016 of then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton referring to Trump's "basket of deplorables." In the first week following Clinton's gaffe, network news outlets spent 54 minutes on her comments. Meanwhile, they only devoted three minutes to Trump's "vermin" comments. The disparity on cable news was far worse, with 1,662 mentions of "deplorables" throughout the first week versus 191 mentions of "vermin."

Trump has lowered the bar so far that the relentless amount of garbage he spews barely causes a blip in corporate media coverage. At the same time, the right-wing propaganda machine routinely fabricates and disseminates controversies to its audiences. Perhaps the most recent example was the easily debunked falsehood that the FBI sought to assassinate Trump when it searched his Mar-a-Lago residence for presidential records he had deliberately refused to return to the National Archives. The bifurcated media treatment of Trump versus that of President Joe Biden incontrovertibly benefits Republicans this election cycle, as journalist Greg Sargent pointed out on The Daily Blast.

[...]

Generally speaking, Republicans who are open to voting for Biden don't believe he stole the 2020 election and were horrified by the violent insurrection attempt, so revisiting that concern is a worthwhile endeavor.  However, if you're talking to voters who are primarily worried about the economy and inflation, it might be better to phrase the question as “who do you think will fight for you?” Democrats are the ones cracking down on price-gouging corporations by capping bank fees and insulin prices, while Trump is promising corporations another $2 trillion tax cut. Younger voters might be the most difficult to reach of all the potential swing voters. As Dan Pfeiffer, former Obama senior adviser on strategy and communications, wrote on Substack Tuesday, TikTok is hurting Biden, especially among young people who are the platform’s primary users. Trump’s right-wing influencers are outgunning progressive firebrands such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on a platform that is featuring political news even as other social media platforms de-emphasize it. 

The corporate media has a pro-Trump (and pro-GOP) bias, and there are ways to combat such bias.

[papenathys]

SUBSTACK ALERT!

On today's newsletter essay, I speak about nostalgia: its advantages and pitfalls, about memory-making and historical archiving, and about writing inspirations gleaned from my Bengali childhood in Kankurgachi, North Kolkata. Features an old apartment, a baby photo, a grandfather, a mad bull named Gondogol and the titular lake from my 2024 trans sapphic poetry collection, There Used to Be a Lake Here Once.

[lesmisletters-daily]

Sums Deposited With Laffitte

Les Mis Letters reading club explores one chapter of Les Misérables every day. Join us on Discord, Substack - or share your thoughts right here on tumblr - today's tag is #lm 1.5.3

On the other hand, he remained as simple as on the first day. He had gray hair, a serious eye, the sunburned complexion of a laborer, the thoughtful visage of a philosopher. He habitually wore a hat with a wide brim, and a long coat of coarse cloth, buttoned to the chin. He fulfilled his duties as mayor; but, with that exception, he lived in solitude. He spoke to but few people. He avoided polite attentions; he escaped quickly; he smiled to relieve himself of the necessity of talking; he gave, in order to get rid of the necessity for smiling. The women said of him, “What a good-natured bear!” His pleasure consisted in strolling in the fields.

He always took his meals alone, with an open book before him, which he read. He had a well-selected little library. He loved books; books are cold but safe friends. In proportion as leisure came to him with fortune, he seemed to take advantage of it to cultivate his mind. It had been observed that, ever since his arrival at M. sur M., his language had grown more polished, more choice, and more gentle with every passing year. He liked to carry a gun with him on his strolls, but he rarely made use of it. When he did happen to do so, his shooting was something so infallible as to inspire terror. He never killed an inoffensive animal. He never shot at a little bird.

Although he was no longer young, it was thought that he was still prodigiously strong. He offered his assistance to any one who was in need of it, lifted a horse, released a wheel clogged in the mud, or stopped a runaway bull by the horns. He always had his pockets full of money when he went out; but they were empty on his return. When he passed through a village, the ragged brats ran joyously after him, and surrounded him like a swarm of gnats.

It was thought that he must, in the past, have lived a country life, since he knew all sorts of useful secrets, which he taught to the peasants. He taught them how to destroy scurf on wheat, by sprinkling it and the granary and inundating the cracks in the floor with a solution of common salt; and how to chase away weevils by hanging up orviot in bloom everywhere, on the walls and the ceilings, among the grass and in the houses.

He had “recipes” for exterminating from a field, blight, tares, foxtail, and all parasitic growths which destroy the wheat. He defended a rabbit warren against rats, simply by the odor of a guinea-pig which he placed in it.

One day he saw some country people busily engaged in pulling up nettles; he examined the plants, which were uprooted and already dried, and said: “They are dead. Nevertheless, it would be a good thing to know how to make use of them. When the nettle is young, the leaf makes an excellent vegetable; when it is older, it has filaments and fibres like hemp and flax. Nettle cloth is as good as linen cloth. Chopped up, nettles are good for poultry; pounded, they are good for horned cattle. The seed of the nettle, mixed with fodder, gives gloss to the hair of animals; the root, mixed with salt, produces a beautiful yellow coloring-matter. Moreover, it is an excellent hay, which can be cut twice. And what is required for the nettle? A little soil, no care, no culture. Only the seed falls as it is ripe, and it is difficult to collect it. That is all. With the exercise of a little care, the nettle could be made useful; it is neglected and it becomes hurtful. It is exterminated. How many men resemble the nettle!” He added, after a pause: “Remember this, my friends: there are no such things as bad plants or bad men. There are only bad cultivators.”

The children loved him because he knew how to make charming little trifles of straw and cocoanuts.

When he saw the door of a church hung in black, he entered: he sought out funerals as other men seek christenings. Widowhood and the grief of others attracted him, because of his great gentleness; he mingled with the friends clad in mourning, with families dressed in black, with the priests groaning around a coffin. He seemed to like to give to his thoughts for text these funereal psalmodies filled with the vision of the other world. With his eyes fixed on heaven, he listened with a sort of aspiration towards all the mysteries of the infinite, those sad voices which sing on the verge of the obscure abyss of death.

He performed a multitude of good actions, concealing his agency in them as a man conceals himself because of evil actions. He penetrated houses privately, at night; he ascended staircases furtively. A poor wretch on returning to his attic would find that his door had been opened, sometimes even forced, during his absence. The poor man made a clamor over it: some malefactor had been there! He entered, and the first thing he beheld was a piece of gold lying forgotten on some piece of furniture. The “malefactor” who had been there was Father Madeleine.

He was affable and sad. The people said: “There is a rich man who has not a haughty air. There is a happy man who has not a contented air.”

Some people maintained that he was a mysterious person, and that no one ever entered his chamber, which was a regular anchorite’s cell, furnished with winged hour-glasses and enlivened by cross-bones and skulls of dead men! This was much talked of, so that one of the elegant and malicious young women of M. sur M. came to him one day, and asked: “Monsieur le Maire, pray show us your chamber. It is said to be a grotto.” He smiled, and introduced them instantly into this “grotto.” They were well punished for their curiosity. The room was very simply furnished in mahogany, which was rather ugly, like all furniture of that sort, and hung with paper worth twelve sous. They could see nothing remarkable about it, except two candlesticks of antique pattern which stood on the chimney-piece and appeared to be silver, “for they were hall-marked,” an observation full of the type of wit of petty towns.

Nevertheless, people continued to say that no one ever got into the room, and that it was a hermit’s cave, a mysterious retreat, a hole, a tomb.

It was also whispered about that he had “immense” sums deposited with Laffitte, with this peculiar feature, that they were always at his immediate disposal, so that, it was added, M. Madeleine could make his appearance at Laffitte’s any morning, sign a receipt, and carry off his two or three millions in ten minutes. In reality, “these two or three millions” were reducible, as we have said, to six hundred and thirty or forty thousand francs.

[greatrunner]

It is a truth universally accepted that when critiquing anything regarding AO3/OTW, reactionaries enter the building, and critical thinking and discernment gets locked out.

Nia Ola (on Substack) attempted to raise the alarm about AO3's changes in Terms of Service. This bit in particular:

Nia Ola: "[...]AO3 just updated their terms and conditions so that the only way you can use the site now is that you consent to them taking your data (so, works that you've written, distributed, saved, bookmarked, etc, everything) and give that data and information to the government."

In my time reading Terms and Conditions of Service, websites claiming that they're "duty bound" to provide data uploaded to the site to the govt, depending on jurisdiction, is not a surprise. You will not be informed or told by the site(s) when the government accesses/obtained your information. All on the pretense that it would "interfere with an ongoing investigation".

It isn't dissimilar to the one I've read here for Tumblr. The bit that says (legalese-y) that anything you post on the site can be used as evidence (IIRC) if it becomes "necessary."

But as usual, the AO3 brigade worked like hell to shout them down. Folk focused a lot on how OTW made their TOS "easier" to understand. They claimed Nia Ola was spreading misinformation. Most have gone as far as quibbling with her phrasing, "giving your information to the government" (which they would be doing) based on their personal interpretation of her meaning.

After making the video (they posted on TikTok) private, Nia Ola continued to encourage people to use security measures like VPNs and secure Browsers (they mentioned Firefox; I'm sure others are recommending Tor, Brave, and lesser-known browsers with better security features than Edge or Chrome) and to back up information they didn't want to lose.

Is it an explicit consequence of the election? Probably not. AO3/OTW knows entirely that they're hosting grimy shit on their website and refuse to do anything about it. AO3/OTW, like other websites, are "all-ages". Meaning OTW knows kids as young as 13 (and lets face it, younger) are using AO3. If the US or any other country decides it's politically advantageous to go after them, AO3/OTW is gonna cover their asses and throw you under the bus.

Point-Blank-Period.

That said, I think it would be irresponsible to exclude the election as a factor altogether. Organizations (govt or otherwise) are hang-wringing about rustling conservative feathers, and censoring themselves to avoid the wrath of a Trump Admin.

KOSA and COPPA are still in play. And there's the bill targeting non-profits to consider that's likely (and did) to pass not long after it got shot down.

When Tumblr wanted the favor of the Apple Store and their advertisers, they targeted sex worker blogs and fashion and art bloggers (primarily Black/non-Black). Then, they created an AI flagging system that still doesn't work.

When enough people (and advertisers) made enough noise about the NC-17 content that FanFiction (dot net) hosted on their site (at the height of its popularity, mind you)? They made a choice that allowed the website to survive and eliminate the target on their back. Both were financially motivated, yes, but if it's a choice of annexing content to stay online or getting shuttered?

AO3 will not be an exception. It's already embracing that "Obeying in Advance" phrase y'all are in love with right now.

Nia Ola is not the only one raising the alarm or alarmed by this decision. In your haste to fall on the sword for an organization that does not care about you, try not to make an ass of yourself by dog-piling people with experience regarding the consequences of data collection stemming from policies meant to criminalize sexual content, yeah?

This will continue unless we establish actual policies, education, and protections to prevent the mass surveillance of adult spaces under the pretense of "decency" and "protecting children." Additionally, we must address the ongoing elimination of healthy and safe spaces for children.

Because in our govt's haste to claim their concern for children, the corporations they serve have been demolishing child spaces and media online to save a couple of bucks (Cartoon Network's website comes to mind), and pushing children into adult spaces. And if they're not pushing kids into adult spaces, they're inviting adults into so-called kid spaces to increase their profits (Roblox and its attempts to become anything but a game for children, to say nothing of their monetization of the ideas that kids make).

Until our culture/society overhauls its approach to sex education, divorced from white supremacy, the actual intention of creating spaces that aren't sex-negative and don't prey on uninformed children will probably always exist in short bursts.

That means our politic has to rid itself of the reactionary ilk that (a) demonizes all things sexual and (b) refuses to practice discernment and critical thinking in their so-called sex-positive spaces. Both are why places like AO3 manifest and then ultimately help no one.

And it does not help anyone that reactionary AO3 loyalists will always fight to keep conversations about the site politically and socially stunted and unchanging.

Not all censorship and moderation is or should be sex-negative or censorious to the point of infantilizing. But, if the goal is maintaining free speech and freedom of expression (as we like to think of it vs how the govt allows it), it cannot be to the detriment of itself or for the sake of it (i.e., anti-censorship is not the answer any more than autocratic censorship is).

[local-philocalist]

Entry to your 20s, advice to the 20-year-old women

Four pieces of advice for the twenty-year-old women from a twenty-something year old woman.

1. Move Your Body

I cannot stress this enough, if you can, please move your body! Move your joints and build your muscles. The doctors, scientists and our parents were unfortunately right, the older one becomes, the weaker they get. If you want to still be able to run around in your fifties, sixties, etc. You need to start the habit now. Get a routine, start working out, try a sport, attempt a dance class, and get active in general.

I’ve recently gotten a gym membership and have begun pilates once or twice a week. Although at first, my muscles were burning, my body soon got used to it and I found my stamina and flexibility improving.

However, you don't need to spend money on a gym membership or Pilates to get fit. You can take a run around your local park, start a sports team with your friends, or try a YouTube workout from the comfort of your home. There are so many different ways to stay fit without emptying your pockets.

2. Eat Your Vegetables

I understand that some people are genuinely picky eaters and their parents never took the initiative to introduce different textures and flavours healthily. Thus this has followed into adulthood and are now unable to eat anything outside the same four meals.

I also understand I cannot say too much as someone who can eat almost anything but as a reformed vegetable hater I do have a little bit to offer. To live a long, healthy life vegetables are a necessity. So if you find yourself unable to eat certain vegetables, I would suggest cooking the vegetables differently, or incorporating ingredients you enjoy in your meals, think outside the box!

There are many articles about breaking picky eating, as adults we should try to expand our tastebuds, there's so much food to enjoy in this life. Nobody likes to be the person ordering chicken fingers at a Michelin restaurant.

3. Feed Your Brain

[edited: the previous paragraph has been published on my personal substack as a full piece; I've rewritten and changed this section for publication and privacy purposes].

I urge young women to nurture their brains; you are so blessed to be in a society and world where education is so accessible for women. If you live in the West, take advantage and don't feed into the propaganda of "I'm just a girl". Women are being minimised, and I don't want young ladies falling down the rabbit hole of this recent no-purpose lifestyle that's advertised.

Looks are essential, and don't get me wrong, I know attraction still plays a huge part in society, but it isn't the only important thing. It's not cute to be ignorant, lack life skills and use social media concepts like "I'm just a girl" as excuses. Stupidity isn't hot, so while it's okay to indulge in media consumption, find yourself hobbies outside of that and put in the effort to grow intellectually and further yourself.

4. High Self-esteem Will Protect You

Most of my girlfriends are in the dating field, and from the stories they tell me its clear these men are crazy. Good discernment is needed and for you to trust your discernment you need a healthy level of self-worth.

I’m not just talking about romantic interest, in general, high self-esteem will take you far in life. From romantic partners to career paths, when you know your value and do not settle, that translates to every crevice of your life. People treat you with more respect, you're likely to find yourself in fewer abusive scenarios and get better opportunities in your place of work.

Nothing good comes from beating yourself down and letting others treat you horribly. Overall your twenties can be fun but also filled with anxiety so take it step-by-step, don't beat yourself up and remember comparison is the thief.

[spiderfreedom]

Politics is for power - towards radfem organizing

There is a lot of amazing radfem theory on here but it usually stays within our circles. Now the nature of Tumblr is that within 5 years, it will inevitably leak out somewhere else, but we must speed that up.

The major people who would be sympathetic to our cause are gender critical feminists. Not all of them, but some of them would definitely be interested in some of our arguments. We should find gender criticals who we think might be interested in some of our arguments and start communicating with them. A lot of gender critical women are on Substack. We can comment on their pages with extra resources, Substack writers are usually grateful for more material to reference. We can subscribe to them (if you have the money) and contact them directly with experiences that they can then further write about on their platforms.

It’s time we become active political forces. Any successful political movement requires action on multiple different fronts. We need to reach out to influential people. We also need to be active on social media as active as the enemy is. If you can’t post publicly with your current account, then make a new one using a new email and start posting. Don’t just post about radfem stuff but post about other things. We are full human beings, and radical feminism is just part of us, and we need to show the world that. Use your accounts (use emails from gmail or protonmail or other email services) and then post on Instagram, TikTok, Reddit, etc. Because this is not your main account, do not be afraid of being banned. We are fighting a digital war as much as anything else. We are fighting things like Sh1n1gam1 Eyes which literally try to censor us. We know people like our ideas when they don’t know it’s coming from us. Take advantage of that.

If you have money, donate to people you trust in and believe in. I strongly recommend AGAINST working with conservatives or Republicans. In the long run, they always pervert our arguments, and it ends with most people not trusting us. Working with conservatives is NOT realpolitik or pragmatics, it is short term satisfaction at the cost of long term control. There are more of them than there are of us, which means they are the ones who have the power to control the narratives on their platforms.

Finally, if you are lucky enough to have real life radical feminist networks near you, take advantage of that! If you are good at organizing in real life, try to start one near you. We need a real division of labor to cover short term tactics and long term strategy. Your city may have a local feminist group that is working on something like violence against women. This is worth getting involved in. It will take a while to build up large institutions that we can use for long term strategy.

Whether you have a thriving local scene or can only do digital activism, there is a role you can play. You don’t have to stop posting theory, but let your imagination soar - how can you take theory beyond radblr? How do we do the work of long term convincing people? There are a lot of motivated and intelligent people in this scene. It’s time for the next big wave of feminist organizing.

[invisibleicewands]

“In every room I go into, every office, every institution, people tell me, this is what we’re doing to encourage more working-class writers.  They reel off all the things they’re doing, and it sounds impressive, it sounds amazing. And you think: if all these people are doing all this, WHY ARE THINGS NOT CHANGING FASTER? WHAT IS GETTING IN THE WAY?”

Under the hot, bright lights of a packed-out auditorium at the 2024 London Book Fair, Michael Sheen is getting angry. His is an unthreatening, crowd-rousing kind of angry, but still, in an appropriate way – he’s mad.

The actor and philanthropist is speaking on a panel convened to discuss A Writing Chance, the programme co-founded by the actor with New Writing North and Northumbria University that helps working-class writers enter the writing industries. So far, the programme has been successful. The theme emerging on the panel is, if changes have been made in some areas, what’s holding things back in others? And what cultural changes might have to come before we solve the problem?

“You have to admit there’s a fundamental conflict between the system that’s set up, and what we’re trying to achieve,” says Michael. “I don’t know what the whole answer to that is, other than revolution.”

It says a lot about the mood in the room – and, we suspect, the rest of the country – that the laughs prompted by this conclusion feel rather approving. We firmly believe that elites have been hogging and hoarding opportunity for too long now. The support for A Writing Chance confirms that many, many people agree.

The initiative was launched in 2021, with 11 unpublished writers awarded places on a programme of support and mentoring. One, Tom Newlands, publishes his first novel this summer; another, Maya Jordan, signed a deal at the book fair. A new cohort will be selected soon, with the programme now supported by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, Michael Sheen, the Charlotte Aitken Trust, Faber & Faber, The Daily Mirror, Substack, Audible, with research supported by AHRC, Northumbria University, Bath Spa University and York St John University.

For the London Book Fair panel, Michael is joined by Professor Katy Shaw from Northumbria University, plus Tracey Markham, head of UK at Audible, Farrah Storr, head of writer partnerships at Substack, and the Huddersfield-based novelist Sunjeev Sahota. Katy and Michael begin by reflecting on the successes of the first completed programme: writers emboldened and published, policymakers in the Houses of Parliament briefed and, most importantly, great writing exemplifying the talent out there waiting to be discovered. “What came in was just way beyond anything we had hoped for really,” says Michael. “And there was a sense of revelation, the feeling you were seeing into worlds that have just been closed off, into experiences I had never thought about.”

Ideas about how to give working-class writers more confidence and access to publishing are peppered through the hour-long conversation: a creative curriculum in schools; intervening with gifted people at younger ages, like sports coaches; encouraging more people to take advantage of digital platforms, even if printed-book authorship remains the ultimate goal. Around halfway through, Sunjeev makes a brilliantly clear-eyed analysis of what being working class really means, and how it relates to identity politics. At the same time, he provides a devastatingly simple explanation of why working-class writers need support.

“Publishing is an elite space, but it’s quite a diverse space in terms of people’s racialised or sexualised identities. However, it’s not at all diverse it comes to people’s economic backgrounds, or family income. Indeed, many of the non-white people I encounter in publishing are often from just as comfortably-off backgrounds as their white counterparts.

The creative industries, he says, have tended to treat class as being another cultural identity, as if class should be considered in the same way that we might talk about race, gender, or sexuality. “But I think a more universal, class-first politics will do more for the weakest members across all identities than any identity-first kind of politics. I find that taking an identity-first approach just tends to benefit the elites within the identities.”

Lest anyone doubt the existence of a market for work originating outside the elites, the extremely upbeat Tracey is on hand to reassure them. Audible attracts a notably diverse audience, with large black and Asian listenerships, and a high proportion of young men. To satisfy this audience, the old-style audiobook, with its middle- and highbrow titles and Received Pronunciation narration, has been overhauled in favour of books more suited to audience tastes, and accents.

“Our customers really want accents! We spend a lot of time working with voice agents to widen access to the audio-narration industry. I think what’s super-important now is that your accent is not prohibitive – if you have a Welsh accent, say, that doesn’t mean you can only read stories set in Wales.”

Tracey stresses there is “so much more to be done” to widen socio-economic diversity in the whole publishing industry. But although it might still be a case of taking “baby steps”, a wonderful thing about books is their power to drive change elsewhere. “You know, it’s hard to explain to someone that’s not from the UK how much your accent kind of signifies to people when they first meet you. And with voice, we can kind of break down a lot of those barriers, and actually encourage it and welcome [diversity].”

There’s a similar note of flexibility and responsiveness to audience needs in Farrah’s account of what Substack offers. The relationship between digital and print is always evolving, and in her vision, it’s a question of the one complementing the other. Printed books still have more prestige than publication on digital platforms, but the latter can help offset the material challenges associated with the former, she argues. Echoing Sunjeev, she points that “the problem for people from a working-class background is that your advance gets paid in separate lump sums. People feel, I don’t have a regular income, I can’t make this work, I might end up falling out of the writer ecosystem.

“So, on Substack, we say, well, okay, you’re writing the book, but you’re probably going to have thousands of words leftover. So just put them on Substack and talk about the novel at the same time.”

Lots of people she works with end up making liveable incomes and building readerships for their work, which ultimately is what keeps them in the game. It’s a reminder that we shouldn’t necessarily define “writing” as the production of traditional forms such as novels and plays.

No one at this event – the queue for which was so long that dozens were unable to squeeze inside – believed all the barriers facing working-class writers would be dismantled any time soon.  Few, though, can have left without believing that A Writing Chance has begun the job – and that that job is worthwhile.

Wrapping up, Michael recalls someone from the inaugural group who told him that in their community, becoming a writer seemed about as likely as becoming an astronaut.

“They said that there was no chance of it. They said, ‘I didn’t know anybody else who lived where I live who was a writer, so I didn’t know how to begin, or where to start. It was like saying I want to go into space.’ But that changed for them.

“And of course, now, there are all these wonderful spacemen.”

[vomitdodger]

SOLID.

From Dr. Malones substack on why he’s voting for Trump/Vance. No doubt Dr Malone will now get another round of censorship, doxxing, name calling etc etc. Portion of his substack below:

The prior administration of Donald Trump did not impose the “vaccine” mandates, but the Biden-Harris administration did.

Donald Trump's administration rejected the WHO. The Biden-Harris administration reinstated WHO funding and developed and promoted the WHO sovereignty-destroying “pandemic treaty” and “International Health Accord” updates.

The administration of Donald Trump did not deploy years of COVID-related psychological bioterrorism and disaster cronyism in the US and the world, but the Biden-Harris administration did.

The administration of Donald Trump did not conspire with and coerce corporate media and big tech to censor, propagandize, and deploy a myriad of military-grade psychological warfare methods and weapons on US citizens. The Biden-Harris administration did.

The administration of Donald Trump did not arbitrarily and capriciously abandon allies, advanced equipment and US Soldiers in Afghanistan. The Biden-Harris administration did.

The administration of Donald Trump did not prosecute, capitalize, and propagandize an unnecessary war in Ukraine to advance global imperialist objectives. The Biden-Harris administration did.

The administration of Donald Trump did not sacrifice and cripple European populations and industry at the alter of its Ukrainian fantasies. The Biden-Harris administration was complicit in blowing up the Nordstream pipelines and then deployed propaganda to prevent discussion or consequences for its illegal aggression.

The administration of Donald Trump took multiple specific actions to reduce illegal immigration. The Biden-Harris administration actively facilitated unlawful immigration.

The Trump administration did not jail domestic political opponents or otherwise weaponize the government and the judiciary. The Biden-Harris administration has honed that banana republic strategy into an art form.

The Trump administration did not actively pit Americans against Americans. The Biden-Harris administration cynically did so to gain a short-term advantage during a midterm election.

I can provide example after example to make this point.

Harris-Walz, like Biden-Harris before them, like Obama-Biden before that, actively promote and support the “New World Order” and ”Great Reset”. They have acted to enforce this by the development and deployment of a massive, global #PsyWar censorship-industrial complex. In fact, after leaving office, Obama became one of the leading advocates for the suppression of free speech.

In contrast, Donald Trump has consistently taken on the propaganda and lying, which is characteristic of modern corporate media throughout the Western world.

Harris-Walz clearly support the further development of a Marxist Surveillance state in which both the first and second amendment of the US Bill of Rights are to be considered optional and negotiable.

Four or more years under a Harris-Walz administration will place all freedom-loving people under the yoke of a Woke, social engineering nightmare that will tear our society and nation apart, sap our energy, and destroy our productivity and innovative spirit.

Four or more years of a Harris-Walz administration will be the last phase before transitioning North America to submitting to a poseur, self-appointed "one world government" led by WEF/UN and supported by a network of global public-private partnerships.

This new self-appointed, unelected socialist-corporatist global governance will prosecute more forever wars as it seeks to defeat any State that does not buy into its socialist-corporatist (Fascist) Great Reset/New World Order.

This decision is not subtle. Do not let the trolls and chaos agents convince you otherwise with their constant siren calls of “what about this” and “what about that”. Look deeper. Who are these anonymous avatars that are constantly sowing seeds of doubt. They are almost always low complexity, low connectivity bots and trolls. They manipulate your thoughts and drain your commitment. Synthetic false flag operators whispering in your ear, seeking to either cause you to doubt your own intuition, or to dissuade you from acting, dissuade you from voting.

Are they people that you have known and interacted with for these past years? And if not, is there an indication that they have in some way passed independent validation as actual humans?

Focus on the big picture. Do not be distracted by the manufactured noise.

Please listen to me. Be aware that you are now surrounded by an active psychological warfare battle zone. You are constantly subjected to efforts to manipulate what information you are allowed to see, what voices you are allowed to hear, and what feelings you are allowed to feel. It has become extremely difficult to distinguish friend from foe and truth from lies.

Your only guide is your mind and soul, your conscience, and perhaps the council of the few you know -based on years of experience- will speak truthfully to you. Be still. Listen to that internal voice. It will tell you what is real and what is fake. It is your best guide for navigating this modern surreal psychological battlefield where the chattering of posers and false flag operations constantly bombard you.

[undergroundusa]

HARRIS ACCEPTS DEBATE INVITE FROM FRIENDLY CNN WITHOUT AN OPPONENT

"Vice President Kamala Harris has accepted CNN’s invitation to debate Donald Trump for a second time ahead of the November election — despite the latter’s insistence that he doesn’t see a “need” to face-off again…Trump has repeatedly accused the moderators of the Sept. 10 ABC News debate of sabotaging his attempts to refute Harris — and even said he would refuse to debate Harris a second time under the same circumstances."

And who would moderate this debate, Bernie Sanders and the corpse of Chairman Mao? Trump would have to have lost his mind to want to give the mainstream media complex another shot at running interference for Harris.

The simple fact of the matter is this: Harris's performance in the last debate garnered her no significant bump, even with ABC News providing an unfair advantage. In fact, it created more questions about her refusal to provide any substantive information on her policy than it cleared up, furthering the reality-based perception that she is an empty suit, fully unprepared to be the president.

So, sorry, Mr. Plouffe, take your debate invitation and introduce it to your anus. Until your candidate sits down with unfriendly interviewers who will present challenging questions beyond "what's your favorite color," you and your 30% of Democrats that wish the bullets hit Trump can suck it.

[mitigatedchaos]

"Writing? In 2024?"

Monday, April 29, 2024

(~2,400 words, 12 minutes)

@northshorewave Re: this publishing post:

I've read through the post that was linked, and an earlier related post by the same author that preceded it.

Her position is that the traditional publishing industry is essentially buying books as lottery tickets, paying for most of them using the few big winners they can't predict.

NorthShoreWave - The personal qualities of NSW specifically.

LLMs - Is AI a threat right now? Mostly as spam.

How Many Readers? - One famous book had 3,000 readers on an email list before its Amazon e-book debut, and went on to traditional publishing.

Funding Options - Many authors and artists are currently using subscription services. Some reasoning and numbers are provided.

Illustrations - Should you use illustrations? This lengthy section does a bit of fundamentals analysis of posting to suggest that maybe, you should.

Interaction - Reader replies are one method by which a post will spread.

Search - The people who want to read your story can't read it if they don't know about it. Writing a good book is essential, but only half the battle.

Some thoughts for you:

1 - NorthShoreWave

You implicitly asked if we had discussed your story in detail before, but the answer is that we hadn't. I have a sense of what you're trying to accomplish based on what I've observed of your character. While you think of yourself as seething, I think you're actually wise, compassionate, self-aware, and able to view things from multiple perspectives. A significant number of people are much worse at practicing at least one of these virtues. On its own, that's not enough to write a best-seller, but I think it does provide you with an advantage.

2 - LLMs

Based on my experiments (see @mitigatedai for some logs), I wouldn't worry about competition from AI. For you, the chief issue caused by AI will be spam. AI moves sideways (different text) and downwards (less meaning). I may tell LLMs to "combine Inspector Gadget and Death Note," but...

Do I actually use the information provided? No.

3 - How many readers do you need?

From one of those publishing posts, to get a sense of the number of readers you need...

Andy Weir first published The Martian as a serial for his own blog, then as a self-published novel on Amazon, then as a traditionally published novel with Random House. “I had an email list with about 3,000 people on it, so, initially, the audience was roughly that much,” he tells me. “When I first posted it to Amazon, I didn’t do anything to market or publicize it. All I did was tell my readers it was available there.” The book was on Amazon for five months, at a price point of 99 cents, and he sold 35,000 copies before Random House bought the rights in February of 2014.

Note that being a provocative firebrand doesn't necessarily mean you'll sell copies. Some politicians with tremendous name recognition failed to move copies of their books.

4 - Funding Options

I don't recommend using a Kickstarter to publish your book at this time or in the near future. You just don't have the name recognition, but also, Slashdotter Caimlas (who I don't know, so I don't know how trustworthy he is) wrote:

I'm personal friends with a number of authors who publish books in one of several subgenres. Mostly, they rely on Amazon's Kindle Unlimited: some of them are prolific enough that their book sales account for most of their income, simply based on peoples' reading of their works. Mostly, unless people want a piece of history or something they can reference, folks seem to hate having clutter. Fiction that sells isn't usually, primarily sold as a hardcopy book anymore, I don't believe - short of the kinds of books that end up at the end of the grocery store isle or in an airport novelty store.

A lot of publishing is done online these days, often through subscription services such as Substack (for essays) or Patreon. (Kindle Unlimited is also a subscription service, costing $12/mo.) As an example, the webcomic Spinnerette has a Patreon (bringing down $3.3k/mo), and then runs Kickstarter campaigns for print runs (volume 8 raised $27k).

To give you an estimate, Spinnerette's Patreon has only 536 subscribers, and pulls down $3.3k/mo, but you probably haven't heard of it. El Goonish Shive, which I'm confident you have heard of, brings in $3.6k/mo on 2.4k subscribers. The famous Kill Six Billion Demons has ~5.4k subscribers, bringing down ~$8.4k.

In Patreon terms, a good foothold to try for might be 100 subscribers at $3/mo each, with an initial focus on getting to 50.

5 - Illustrations

You've posted some drawings. They have some character, showing that you have the basic aptitude to develop the skill if you applied yourself to regular practice. However, the proportions are too far off to attract much attention (except as a stylistic choice, which, I can tell, it is not).

This blog tends to break things down into their abstract fundamentals for analysis. I promised myself I wasn't going to do that here, but eh, we'll do just a bit.

To quote one of the publishing articles...

“People tend to buy the books that are already really popular,” Deahl says. “They look at the bestseller list to see what they want to buy and that reinforces this tiny amount of books at the top. It’s a very top-heavy system. The tricky thing in publishing is success begets success. But it’s really hard to create that spark.”

Let's stop to think about this.

a. Banter - Fame

There is one layer to this that you can't do much of anything about, which is that people will watch the same shows their friends watch in order to have something to talk about with their friends.

b. Investment - Background

However, there is another layer over which you have more influence. It's very easy to make a quick judgment of a movie based on its visuals, or a short trailer. It's also relatively easy to judge short songs, since they're only a few minutes long (but I don't find myself doing this often).

In order to judge a book, you have to read the text and process it. You can't make a snap judgment off a single picture, because you have to read the text first to produce the mental picture.

This website does have viral text posts, but they're like...

You seem to have fundamentally misunderstood me, Anon.  Go read all 5,640 posts again.

Some of these posts can get a bit long, but it's usually a back-and-forth where each individual post is short. Often, they'll mix in images, or memes.

People supposedly read at 200 words per minute. Based on that estimate, this blog's most viral post of all time can be read in 5 seconds. That's about the same amount of time someone would spend looking at a jpeg.

That doesn't mean people don't enjoy effortposts. They will follow a blog upon encountering a good effortpost! They just don't like or reblog them.

I think you already know this part, but for "acceptable" length for reblogging, it's usually best to keep it under one "Tumblr page," meaning around one screen length on desktop, or around 200-300 words. I've talked about this part before, but if the reader can see the end of the post, it feels like less of an investment to read the post, and reblogging it won't fill up a friend's Tumblr dash.

Obviously that's tough for long-form fiction, because it has to load more context about the characters in order to establish the stakes. (Unless it's fan fiction, where the audience already knows the characters.)

c. Investment - Strategy

As you know, this blog will sometimes post political cartoons and other illustrations as part of its general stream of content.

The obvious strategy is just to have some nice-looking character images or images of scenes from the story. It can be "read" faster, so it's more shareable.

I think that strategy suffers from a weakness in that it's easy to just look at the image and disregard the text. This would reduce your fiction blog to an art blog - and it is not an art blog.

Therefore, I would like to gently suggest - and keep in mind, I do not have any published novels - a different potential approach. This proposal is speculative, and this technique is not widely used.

Do you know that famous Rockwell painting, Breaking Home Ties? Rockwell is a master of telling a story with just a single still-frame painting.

Rockwell has to tell the whole story in one picture, because that's the medium he's got to work with. This limits how much story he can tell. As an author, you don't have to limit yourself to what can be told in just one image, because you have the text.

This strategy would involve a two-step maneuver.

First, the image at the top of the post communicates the essentials that the reader needs to know about the characters through the composition of the scene (so that they don't need to read background material), as well as various subtle details, while raising questions, also through the use of details/etc, to increase the viewer's curiosity.

Fortunately for the viewer, second, the questions raised by the image are answered in the text right below it.

The post would form an entry point into a network of related posts; tags for particular characters could be linked at the bottom, or links to other posts in the sequence.

Secondary characters would be ideal for this, because you can manipulate their scenarios/context/character to fit the short format, while your overall project will focus on the main characters and thus have a greater, long-term narrative investment for appropriately larger payoff.

As I wrote in my post on 'text wall memes,' people will read text in an image, and they'll even reblog it, but it's contextual. So again, this is speculative, but it should be feasible. It's a matter of creating the appropriate context.

d. Investment - AI Art

I don't think you should use AI-generated art. Yes, people will be able to tell, but the even bigger problem...

Compare this AI knockoff to Norman Rockwell's original Girl with Black Eye.

The expression is wrong. The pose is different. This is a completely different story from the one Rockwell was telling! The prompteur 'borrows' the right 25% of the image from Norman's original because he can't reproduce it. And what is that random white cloth on the left side of the image?

There is a significant reduction in the amount of intention in the image. Putting it back in involves working over the image, repeatedly, usually with inpainting, and often working against what's in the AI's training data, forcing it to pull from more and more improbable parts of the distribution (until eventually, there's no matching data in the training at all; you have to get out and draw it yourself).

I'm going to borrow a post of my own here from 2019.

This isn't oriented towards the strategy I've described, and it only got 21 notes, but note the teacup with steam and tea bag tag, the obscured flag in the background, and the Youtube-style video tracker on the bottom. The combination of the special effect, text that looks like a subtitle, and video tracker imply that the image is a screenshot from a streaming anime.

The character is casually (as indicated by the cup of tea) sitting at a computer desk (as indicated by the faintly sketched keyboard and hand position for a mouse). What's that flag in the background? It certainly doesn't belong to any extant country. (In fact, as the artist, I'll tell you - it's based on an O'Neill Cylinder.)

Obviously this art is very much just a sketch in quality terms. An AI rendering usually looks much fancier. However, an AI would not put that detail in.

e. Investment - Technical Skills

However, I will suggest the use of software if you go this route. (Or the hiring of an artist, but that could get expensive.)

Your issue is with proportions. Lots of people have trouble with proportions. (You also have trouble with hands. Lots of people have trouble with hands.)

One way to deal with this is to just train. You'd be surprised at how fast you improve if you draw from realistic sources such as photographs an hour a day for a year, even if it's just a quick sketch. You probably aren't willing to do so. You have other things to worry about, including writing.

However, you could use posing software. You could save the proportions of several characters and position them throughout the scene, as well as having a grid for the ground and potentially other props to help with positioning of items like lamp posts or the edges of buildings. (I've experimented with posing software a bit myself.)

Dan Shive (of El Goonish Shive) does not use posing software as far as I know, but he has used 3D software. Although his style is cartoonish, one thing people like about him is that he does put effort in at improvement, and the quality of his work has improved substantially. (That was actually the inspiration for the second part of the "in 2028, Hollywood runs out of ideas and adapts El Goonish Shive" post.)

6 - Interaction

Though shorter posts tend to go more viral, I find that posts which someone can reblog and share their opinion tend to show up a lot in my top posts (as long as they're only about one tumblr page long). The MOON PRISON poll is a good example of something that's approachable and neutral, but fits heavily with the themes of my blog, but other posts may take a political position that invites disagreement, resulting in discourse, and get reblogged that way. (You may also remember the silly Swift Pill poll.)

I don't recommend courting disagreement on purpose. Not only is this bad for the social environment, but it tends to make people go crazy.

7 - Search

I think you've probably noticed some of this already and are working with it (posting short excerpts, initial art). Most of this is, again, speculative. This is all just information for your consideration.

Writing a good book is the first problem. Getting the readers who would enjoy the book to find it in such a noisy environment is the second problem. I think you can do it, but if your trajectory isn't currently looking as good as you want (e.g. # followers on your story's sideblog), I would recommend expanding your strategy so that you're in a good position when the book itself is ready to launch.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Pamela Garfield-Jaeger

Published: May 13, 2024

The following is an excerpt from my new book, "A Practical Response to Gender Distress, Tips and Tools for Families”, available on Amazon.

New personal pronouns can seem harmless and fun, and they are considered inclusive by many people, such as teachers and medical professionals. However, it can be dangerous to tell young children that they can use any pronoun they want. As a seasoned mental health professional, let me explain some reasons why the use of new personal pronouns is harmful for developing children.

1. It’s the first step of being pulled into an ideology that can lead to dangerous and irreversible medical interventions. If a child is given praise for identifying as a different gender and called by a different pronoun or name from an early age, it’s more difficult to reverse that course as the child gets older and deeper into the ideology. The stakes get higher.

2. Alternate pronouns instruct children not to accept who they are, but to seek attention for being something they aren’t. This message is the exact opposite of what traditional feminists have been trying to give to little girls for years, which is to love and embrace themselves as girls. This is a harmful message to all young people during an impressionable time while they are forming their sense of self.

3. This practice is harmful to the small percentage of children who struggle with genuine gender dysphoria and need appropriate attention. If large numbers of children are using alternative pronouns for fun, leverage, or power, how can we know who needs the appropriate support? Many of these dysphoric children have sexual or other trauma in their histories, and they need to be addressed.

4. The introduction of a new pronoun is the first step in dividing children from their families. Families who don’t agree, or who simply have questions, often get torn apart over this ideology. Even families who initially agree with the premise of different gender identities later learn that their children are being groomed to view their own family as an enemy.

In the Substack “Parents With Inconvenient Truths About Trans,” a mom drafted an essay titled “How it Started: How Gender Ideology Has Ruined Our Right to a Family Life.”

Specifically, the mother writes: “Don’t get me wrong, it started off fun and interesting. Pride marches, badges, posters, music, and flags. So many flags! Then the lockdown happened. I started intensely researching and I, a lifelong, radical, alternative woman and feminist did not like what I was learning. ... I am not denying anyone’s existence, we are still loving supportive parents, but I regret not realizing sooner what was going on. ... It became clear, despite all the support and information and discussions, that things were not improving, and we compromised and permitted them to use their new names at school.”

Using a new pronoun and new name divides children from their most important support system—their families—and aligns them instead with adults (such as teachers and therapists) who do not care about them in the same way.

5. Changing pronouns prevents children from forming authentic social connections. If they are pretending to be something they aren’t just to fit in or get attention, children can’t form healthy relationships.

6. Unchecked self-identification gives the message that anyone can enter private, vulnerable spaces. At best, allowing people to arbitrarily choose gender, or reinforce the concept that gender is fluid, makes many girls uncomfortable when they have to share their private spaces with people they wouldn’t otherwise. At worst, this opens a window for predatory boys and men who may take advantage. Unfortunately, these incidents have indeed happened. There was a publicized case in 2021 in Loudoun County, Virginia, where a high school boy who identified as a girl raped two girls in school bathrooms. The school attempted to cover up the incident.

7. Choosing new pronouns provides an incredible sense of power. Under these new rules, not only can the child not be questioned about their choice, but they can also then wield that power over anyone whom they choose. This is especially enticing for a child who has a trauma history and already feels very powerless. Unfortunately, this type of power is not good for a floundering teen who needs guidance and structure.

8. The notion of gender fluidity divorces children from reality, which is the goal in any “critical” theory. If a child can choose to be an obvious “wrong” gender, what reality do they have to accept? “Neopronouns” (or made-up words) are becoming more popular among young people and are blurring the lines between imagination and reality. The New York Times validated neopronouns in an article dated Aug. 12, 2023, titled “A Guide to Neopronouns, From ae to ze.” The article states that neopronouns include terms such as “xe” and “em,” and some of them even date back several centuries, when they were introduced by writers as a solution for referring to subjects without referring to gender. Other fictitious pronouns such as “frog/frog-self,” “peach/peach-self,” “ghost/ghost-self,” and other whimsical identities are being acknowledged as serious in certain circles.

9. Changing pronouns encourages narcissism. This gives a message to the child that the world revolves around them, that their perspective is more important than everyone else’s, and that the child can dictate their own terms.

10. Pronouns create social anxiety. Children feel pressured to choose a new pronoun, making them feel locked into an impulsive choice. In addition, with peers changing identities often, this is also a source of anxiety. The policing of the pronouns creates tremendous social pressure and division among youth.

Many people often think, “It’s just a pronoun.” But consider how chaotic and confusing it is for children who are growing up in a world where reality is being changed at every moment, teachers and friends are demanding speech, girls don’t feel safe, the people they care about are being divided, and they are being led to a path to a lifetime of medicalization.

As George Orwell said, “There is no swifter route to the corruption of thought than through the corruption of language.” Children need structure, and they look to adults to provide that for them.

==

"it's just a prayer. What could it hurt to participate?"

It's not rude or impolite to not participate in a ritual for a belief you don't hold. It is rude and impolite, not to mention authoritarian, to demand others participate in a ritual for a belief they don't hold.

And once again, you don't have pronouns. The language has pronouns for you. You don't get your own pronouns any more than you get your own verbs or your own conjugations.

[drunkwhenimadethis]

Writing my Substack entry, listening to Sade - Cherish the Day, intermittently reading an esoteric astrology PDF. "...under the potent impression of Taurus, which at this stage of development feeds his ardent desire for the many material advantages of physical incarnation and of constant worldly undertakings..." I love when desire is transmuted into aspiration, that is what this winter is about for me