#Debt reduction ways

[reinforcefinance]

Bad debt is a financial burden that can affect individual person and as well as businesses . By understanding the reasons behind bad debt and exploring practical solutions, we can take good decisions to minimize its impact on our financial well-being. 

In this article, we are going discuss the concept of bad debt. its causes and effective solutions.  

[boreal-sea]

Look.

I have made you a chart. A very simple chart.

People say "You have to draw the line somewhere, and Biden has crossed it-" and my response is "Trump has crossed way more lines than Biden".

These categories are based off of actual policy enacted by both of these men while they were in office.

If the ONLY LINE YOU CARE ABOUT is line 12, you have an incredible amount of privilege, AND YOU DO NOT CARE ABOUT PALESTINIANS. You obviously have nothing to fear from a Trump presidency, and you do not give a fuck if a ceasefire actually occurs. You are obviously fine if your queer, disabled, and marginalized loved ones are hurt. You clearly don't care about the status of American democracy, which Trump has openly stated he plans to destroy on day 1 he is in office.

EDIT:

Ok fine, I spent 3 hours compiling sources for all of these, you can find that below the cut.

I'll give at least one link per subject area. There are of course many more sources to be read on these subject areas and no post could possibly give someone a full education on these subjects.

Biden and trans rights: https://www.hrc.org/resources/president-bidens-pro-lgbtq-timeline

Trump and trans rights: https://www.aclu.org/news/lgbtq-rights/trump-on-lgbtq-rights-rolling-back-protections-and-criminalizing-gender-nonconformity

The two sources above show how Biden has done a lot of work to promote trans rights, and how Trump did a lot of work to hurt trans rights.

Biden on abortion access: https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/08/politics/what-is-in-biden-abortion-executive-order/index.html

Trump on abortion access: https://apnews.com/article/abortion-trump-republican-presidential-election-2024-585faf025a1416d13d2fbc23da8d8637

Biden openly supports access to abortion and has taken steps to protect those rights at a federal level even after Roe v Wade was overturned. Trump, on the other hand, was the man who appointed the judges who helped overturn Roe v Wade and he openly brags about how proud he is of that decision. He also states that he believes individual states should have the final say in whether or not abortion is legal, and that he trusts them to "do the right thing", meaning he supports stronger abortion bans.

Biden on environmental reform: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/10/07/fact-sheet-president-biden-restores-protections-for-three-national-monuments-and-renews-american-leadership-to-steward-lands-waters-and-cultural-resources/

Trump on environmental reform: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/climate/trump-environment-rollbacks-list.html

Biden has made major steps forward for environmental reform. He has restored protections that Trump rolled back. He has enacted many executive orders and more to promote environmental protections, including rejoining the Paris Accords, which Trump withdrew the USA from. Trump is also well known for spreading conspiracy theories and lies about global climate change, calling it a "Chinese hoax".

Biden on healthcare and prescription reform: https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2023/06/09/biden-administration-announces-savings-43-prescription-drugs-part-cost-saving-measures-president-bidens-inflation-reduction-act.html

Trump on healthcare reform: https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/07/politics/obamacare-health-insurance-ending-trump/index.html

I'm rolling healthcare and prescriptions and vaccines and public health all into one category here since they are related. Biden has lowered drug costs, expanded access to medicaid, and ACA enrollment has risen during his presidency. He has also made it so medical debt no longer applies to a person's credit score. He signed many executive orders during his first few weeks in office in order to get a handle on Trump's grievous mishandling of the COVID pandemic. Trump also wants to end the ACA. Trump is well known for refusing to wear a mask during the pandemic, encouraging the use of hydroxylchloroquine to "treat" COVID, and being openly anti-vaxx.

Biden on student loan forgiveness: https://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/biden-harris-administration-announces-additional-77-billion-approved-student-debt-relief-160000-borrowers

Trump on student loan forgiveness: https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamminsky/2024/06/20/trump-knocks-bidens-vile-student-loan-forgiveness-plans-suggests-reversal/

Trump wants to reverse the student loan forgiveness plans Biden has enacted. Biden has already forgiven billions of dollars in loans and continues to work towards forgiving more.

Infrastructure funding:

I'm putting these links next together because they are all about infrastructure.

In general, Trump's "achievements" for infrastructure were to destroy environmental protections to speed up projects. Many of his plans were ineffective due to the fact that he did not clearly outline where the money was going to come from, and he was unwilling to raise taxes to pay for the projects. He was unable (and unwilling) to pass a bipartisan infrastructure bill during his 4 years in office. He did sign a few disaster relief bills. He did not enthusiastically promote renewable energy infrastructure. He created "Infrastructure Weeks" that the federal government then failed to fund. Trump did not do nothing for infrastructure, but his no-tax stance and his dislike for renewable energy means the contributions he made to American infrastructure were not as much as he claimed they were, nor as much as they could have been. Basically, he made a lot of promises, and delivered on very few of them. He is not "against" infrastructure, but he's certainly against funding it.

Biden was able to pass that bipartisan bill after taking office. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Plan that Trump tried to prevent from passing during Biden's term contains concrete funding sources and step by step plans to rebuild America's infrastructure. If you want to read the plan, you can find it here: https://www.whitehouse.gov/build/guidebook/. Biden has done far more for American infrastructure than Trump did, most notably by actually getting the bipartisan bill through congress.

Biden on Racial Equity: https://www.npr.org/sections/president-biden-takes-office/2021/01/26/960725707/biden-aims-to-advance-racial-equity-with-executive-actions

Trump on Racial Equity: https://www.axios.com/2024/04/01/trump-reverse-racism-civil-rights https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-37230916

Trump's racist policies are loud and clear for everyone to hear. We all heard him call Mexicans "Drug dealers, criminals, rapists". We all watched as he enacted travel bans on people from majority-Muslim nations. Biden, on the other hand, has done quite a lot during his term to attempt to reconcile racism in this country, including reversing Trump's "Muslim ban" the first day he was in office.

Biden on DEI: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/06/25/executive-order-on-diversity-equity-inclusion-and-accessibility-in-the-federal-workforce/

Trump on DEI: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-tried-to-crush-the-dei-revolution-heres-how-he-might-finish-the-job/ar-BB1jg3gz

Biden supports DEI and has signed executive orders and passed laws that support DEI on the federal level. Trump absolutely hates DEI and wants to eradicate it.

Biden on criminal justice reform: https://time.com/6155084/biden-criminal-justice-reform/

Trump on criminal justice reform: https://www.vox.com/2020-presidential-election/21418911/donald-trump-crime-criminal-justice-policy-record https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/05/trumps-extreme-plans-crime/678502/

From pardons for non-violent marijuana convictions to reducing the federal government's reliance on private prisons, Biden has done a lot in four years to reform our criminal justice system on the federal level. Meanwhile, Trump has described himself as "tough on crime". He advocates for more policing, including "stop and frisk" activities. Ironically it's actually quite difficult to find sources about what Trump thinks about crime, because almost all of the search results are about his own crimes.

Biden on military support for Israel: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/biden-obama-divide-closely-support-israel-rcna127107

Trump on military support for Israel: https://www.vox.com/politics/353037/trump-gaza-israel-protests-biden-election-2024

Biden supports Israel financially and militarily and promotes holding Israel close. So did Trump. Trump was also very pro-Israel during his time in office and even moved the embassy to Jerusalem and declared Jerusalem the capitol of Israel, a move that inflamed attitudes in the region.

Biden on a ceasefire: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2024/06/05/gaza-israel-hamas-cease-fire-plan-biden/73967659007/

Trump on a ceasefire: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-israel-gaza-finish-problem-rcna141905

Trump has tried to be quiet on the issue but recently said he wants Israel to "finish the problem". He of course claims he could have prevented the whole problem. Trump also openly stated after Oct 7th that he would bar immigrants who support Hamas from the country and send in officers to American protests to arrest anyone supporting Hamas.

Biden meanwhile has been quietly urging Netanyahu to accept a ceasefire deal for months, including the most recent announcement earlier in June, though it seems as though that deal has finally fallen through as well.

[robertreich]

The Truth About Trumponomics

Trump and Republicans want to wreck your bank account. Here are 5 things you need to know about Trumponomics.

1.Trump wants tax cuts for the rich, at your expense.

Trump’s tax cuts for the rich and big corporations added about $1.7 trillion to the national debt, with few benefits trickling down to the middle class — in fact, it raised taxes for more than 10 million American families.

Now Trump and Republicans want to make the tax cuts for the rich permanent, blowing up the debt even further. And then they’ll use that debt to justify this:

2. Trump would cut Social Security and Medicare — programs you’ve been paying into!

In every year of his presidency, Trump submitted a budget that tried to cut Social Security and Medicare. And he knows that’s the only way he can even begin to pay for extending his tax cuts for the rich.

3. Trump and his allies are pro-junk fee.

When the Biden administration issued a rule capping credit card late fees at $8, Sen. Tim Scott, a Trump surrogate, tried to overturn it in the Senate. And then a Trump-appointed judge issued a temporary injunction that blocked the rule from taking effect. Eliminating that rule would cost American families an estimated $10 billion a year.

And when the Biden administration required airlines to issue automatic refunds for canceled flights, Trump’s allies in Congress fought to block that too.

When Trump was in office, his administration fought against efforts to rein in airline junk fees.

Corporations nickel and diming us like this makes inflation worse. If Trump gets back in the White House, buckle up for more junk fees.

4. Trump would send health care costs soaring.

Republicans have committed to repealing the Inflation Reduction Act, which would strip Medicare of the ability to negotiate drug prices, and let Big Pharma send the price of insulin and other life-saving medicines back through the roof.

And Trump is still fixated on repealing Obamacare, with no plan to replace it.

TRUMP: Obamacare is a disaster. We’re gonna do something about it.

That would strip coverage from tens of millions of Americans, drive up premiums, and let insurers charge more or deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions.

5, If you’ve got student debt, you’re out of luck with Trump.

In contrast to President Biden, who’s canceled more than $160 billion of student debt so far, Trump is against student debt relief. In his first term, he tried to eliminate the popular Public Service Loan Forgiveness program for people like teachers and nurses, and he’s called the idea of debt relief “unfair.”

What’s unfair, is how student debt hurts not just the roughly 40 million Americans burdened by it, but the entire economy, since Americans with debt have less money to spend, are less likely to start a business, less likely to buy a home, and more likely to rely on government assistance.

The MAGA agenda would make nearly every aspect of your life more expensive, while making the richest Americans even richer.

Teddy Roosevelt’s economic plan was called the Square Deal. Franklin Roosevelt’s was the New Deal.

What Trump is offering is simply a Raw Deal.

[starrycassi]

Today in Jean and Neil's bestfrienderism. With a side of Andrew being Andrew. And domestic Andreil.

.

Jean is having a panic attack.

Well, not quite. It's not a full blown attack, yet. But it is close. Very, very close. He is thirty. He is alive. He is Jean Moreau and he has endured so, so much. He is, somewhat, free. As free as the cattle are in a pasture. As free as the shrimp are to the breeding pond.

He has a wonderful husband. He is reconnecting with Kevin. He visits Cat and Laila whenever their schedules allow them the time to do so. He has a dog — well, he technically has three. Charbon is his, and his alone. She is a wonderful Black Labrador that Dobson appointed him. The other two, Caramelo and Dulce, (both named by Catalina, of course) are his and his husband's.

Charbon is moving as soon as he's clawing at his neck. She knows what to do. She knows what to do.

"-breathe. In, and out. Com'on, Jean. It ain't hard. In, and out. You're, like, an athlete. In, and out. You don't even smoke. In, and out. Drew? Water, yes. In, and out."

That's, unfortunately, not the voice of a cybernetically enhanced service dog. It's a different type of animal. Neil Josten.

He manages to make his brain claw around, trying to find where his hand is (in his neck, of course) and puts it up, flipping the bipedal cockroach off.

.

Jean doesn't have a panic attack. Thanks, Charbon.

He's still on the edge. He plays with the dog's ears, floppy and bendy. She seems content to let him do so. They're all on the floor. The two cats are in Neil's lap. Andrew is in the kitchen.

"Breathing okay? Didn't break a rib, did you?"

Jean flips Neil off again.

"I take that as a no. But we did do a RCP training course, you know? Aaron was being a little bitch about me being 'death-prone' or whatever. So you wouldn't even have died. Not on our watch"

"Pretty sure RCP is not the standard solution to panic attacks, junkie" Andrew says, sounding bored, while he walks into the room, tray in his hands. "Panic attacks, also, don't really kill people that often. He would've fainted, at worst"

"Should be standard. Gets the heart right again, does it not?"

Andrew drops the tray to the floor. Only, he doesn't drop it. The jug full of ice and water is intact, as is the glass right next to them. Jean serves himself a glass, drowning it as quickly as possible. It stings. It helps, with the whole "I hate my throat" thing. Harm reduction, Dobson called it.

"You're such a fucking idiot" Andrew says, before reaching down to tug Neil's hair. Neil looks up, their eyes lock, and Jean feels so disgusted that he almost forgets why he's on the floor, to start with. Can they be any less PDA-inclined?

Then again, Jeremy and him are worse. So.

There's silence. And, then, "Jean. We could find a way"

Jean is confused. Andrew, clearly, is not. Jeremy and him love each other, but even theh can admit that there's no other couple with such a level of telepathy as the Josten-Minyard one. It's quite off-putting.

" 'We' sounds like a lot of people" Andrew complains, his tone one of slight annoyance. Regardless, he drops down next to Neil. One of the cats migrates to his lap. He absentmindedly scratches its head, just like he did Neil.

"I'm not following"

They both look at him like he's an imbecile. In return, he glares.

"To get you out of the contract" Neil clarifies. Except, that doesn't clarify anything. Jean Moreau, even as a free man, belongs to the Moriyamas. Not the Nest, or Riko, anymore. It's as much freedom as anyone like him can wish for. Jean Moreau has, is and will endure.

Yes, he hyperventilates whenever the topic of children comes up. Because Jeremy wants kids. A big, happy, loving family. Jean, unfortunately, wants the same.

He doesn't want kids as much as he fears his debt. Their future. His work. Their worth.

Andrew made the offhand comment of Aaron's twins coming to visit next week. About how it seems that the whole group of "Neil's friends" are eager to overpopulate the world with mini nuisances and how he pitied the teachers that had to ever work with such offspring. How it feels like they're the only ones sane enough to avoid such a burden. He didn't mean anything by it. That didn't stop Jean from spiraling. Intent and reaction are, often, not the same thing.

"I stress that you should just get the Care Bear to replace you. He likes Exy. He likes you. Surely we can guilt him into agreeing"

"Non," he answers immediately. They've had this conversation. Jeremy has offered. Jean has refused. It is enough, that one of them is tainted by the Moriyamas. Jeremy's life is not and has never been perfect, but Jean refuses to add a whole ass mafia deal to that.

Andrew shrugs, unapologetically. Jean is not offended. Andrew is a no-nonsense kind of man. A "straight to the point" kind of man. He, probably, thinks that his suggestions are helping, somehow.

"There has to be another way." Neil muses, looking at the ceiling. "We already negotiated with Ichirou, once. Maybe time's made him softer? He's got kids, now. Fatherhood softens people up. Or so I hear."

"Your father tried to kill you. At least thirty times. Almost succeeded half of those, too" Jean reminds him, trying to stay out of the whole family conversation. Neil has never been one for careful sentences. He doesn't mean anything by it. Then, again, intent and reaction.

"It's his personality. He brings out the worst in people" Andrew adds, interlocking his pinky with Neil's pinky, before leaning in and giving him a quick kiss on the cheek. Gross.

"Rude. Also, Ichirou is way more level headed than Nathan. We could try, at least."

"Absolutely no, you neuron-lacking flea."

"Over my dead body, Josten."

"Again, rude. You two never let me have any fun. Kevin is influencing you too much, I swear."

Jean doesn't feel like thinking about Kevin, so he takes out one of the bobby pins in his hair and throws it at Neil's face. Andrew snorts. Charbon looks at the interaction with curiosity. So does Neil.

There is silence, again. For a while. And, then, "Neil will play Exy until he can't, anyways" Andrew points out.

Jean is confused. Neil, clearly, is not. He looks at Andrew with such an open expression of vulnerability and worry, that Jean has to look away.

"Drew, you know that-"

"I said 'life', didn't I? Same team. Same house."

"Five years ago."

"Haven't changed my mind."

"Still. I know you hate it."

"As much as I hate you. I've put up with you this long. I will handle it."

"Are you two always this fucking cryptic? Jesus Christ"

They share a look. Andrew nods. Neil hesitates. Andrew pokes him in the ribs.

"Andrew is willing to make a deal. We- we talked about it, some years ago, when Kevin had that skating accident. It's, uh, a backup plan. Asking Ichirou to pass the contract down."

"For a price." Andrew adds. As if that isn't the most unhinged, crazy and stupid thing Jean has ever heard them say. And God knows that that's a very high list.

"You're joking with me."

"Do I look like a fucking clown, Moreau?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. I will not pass down my burden to you. Plus, it is, surprisingly, a decent plan. There is no other goalie out there who is making more money than you. Ichirou would be stupid if he didn't agree. Which means that you have to keep that option open. Neil is constantly looking for new ways of getting himself killed. I will not tolerate having you, either of you, on the chopping block for me. Not if I can help it"

He is angry. Do they think so selfish? So entitled? So uncaring? He feels nauseous. Charbon puts her paws on his chest, licking his face. He shouldn't feel offended, but he does. They don't mean anything by it. Intent, reaction.

"I'm already involved with our dear asian Shobhuza. Pretty sure he doesn't like me, already."

"Non. Absolutely no. Don't even- no. No. Are you listening to me? Never."

They glare at each other. Years ago, Jean would fold, Andrew's gaze reminding him too much of handcuffs and needles. He doesn't.

"Dramatic" Neil mutters in singsong. They glare at him, now. He has the audacity to giggle.

"We'll figure something out." he says, so sure of himself. How can someone so short be so full of confidence, Jean will never know.

"Even if we don't," Andrew adds, with something close to warmth in his tone, "surely the two of you can survive without passing on those dreadful genes of yours for a few more years"

"We were thinking of fostering" he murmurs, softly. So softly that he's unsure if they heard him or not. Andrew freezes, midway through petting his cat. Neil's eyes widen. Charbon gives a friendly bark.

Andrew and Neil look at each other. Do they ever do anything else?

"We'll find a way," Andrew says. Promises. Begs. Asks. Neil nods, gaze heavy with duty. They hold hands. Neil squeezes. Andrew squeezes back.

Jean feels like he might have another panic attack. How can they be so reckless? For him, out of all people?

Then, again, he would do the same. Sacrifices and promises.

Is there any other way to live?

[mariacallous]

Climate denial may be on the decline, but a phenomenon at least as injurious to the cause of climate protection has blossomed beside it: doomism, or the belief that there’s no way to halt the Earth’s ascendant temperatures. Burgeoning ranks of doomers throw up their hands, crying that it’s too late, too hard, too costly to save humanity from near-future extinction.

There are numerous strands of doomism. The followers of ecologist Guy McPherson, for example, gravitate to wild conspiracy theories that claim humanity won’t last another decade. Many young people, understandably overwhelmed by negative climate headlines and TikTok videos, are convinced that all engagement is for naught. Even the Guardian, which boasts superlative climate coverage, sometimes publishes alarmist articles and headlines that exaggerate grim climate projections.

This gloom-and-doomism robs people of the agency and incentive to participate in a solution to the climate crisis. As a writer on climate and energy, I am convinced that we have everything we require to go carbon neutral by 2050: the science, the technology, the policy proposals, and the money, as well as an international agreement in which nearly 200 countries have pledged to contain the crisis. We don’t need a miracle or exorbitantly expensive nuclear energy to stave off the worst. The Gordian knot before us is figuring out how to use the resources we already have in order to make that happen.

One particularly insidious form of doomism is exhibited in Kohei Saito’s Slow Down: The Degrowth Manifesto, originally published in 2020 and translated from Japanese into English this year. In his unlikely international bestseller, Saito, a Marxist philosopher, puts forth the familiar thesis that economic growth and decarbonization are inherently at odds. He goes further, though, and speculates that the climate crisis can only be curbed in a classless, commons-based society. Capitalism, he writes, seeks to “use all the world’s resources and labor power, opening new markets and never passing up even the slightest chance to make more money.”

Capitalism’s record is indeed damning. The United States and Europe are responsible for the lion’s share of the world’s emissions since the onset of the Industrial Revolution, yet the global south suffers most egregiously from climate breakdown. Today, the richest tenth of the world’s population—living overwhelmingly in the global north and China���is responsible for half of global emissions. If the super-rich alone cut their footprints down to the size of the average European, global emissions would fall by a third, Saito writes.

Saito’s self-stated goals aren’t that distinct from mine: a more egalitarian, sustainable, and just society. One doesn’t have to be an orthodox Marxist to find the gaping disparities in global income grotesque or to see the restructuring of the economy as a way to address both climate breakdown and social injustice. But his central argument—that climate justice can’t happen within a market economy of any kind—is flawed. In fact, it serves next to no purpose because more-radical-than-thou theories remove it from the nuts-and-bolts debate about the way forward.

We already possess a host of mechanisms and policies that can redistribute the burdens of climate breakdown and forge a path to climate neutrality. They include carbon pricing, wealth and global transaction taxes, debt cancellation, climate reparations, and disaster risk reduction, among others. Economies regulated by these policies are a distant cry from neoliberal capitalism—and some, particularly in Europe, have already chalked up marked accomplishments in reducing emissions.

Saito himself acknowledges that between 2000 and 2013, Britain’s GDP increased by 27 percent while emissions fell by 9 percent and that Germany and Denmark also logged decoupling. He writes off this trend as exclusively the upshot of economic stagnation following the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy in 2008. However, U.K. emissions have continued to fall, plummeting from 959 million to 582 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent between 2007 and 2020. The secret to Britain’s success, which Saito doesn’t mention, was the creation of a booming wind power sector and trailblazing carbon pricing system that forced coal-fired plants out of the market practically overnight. Nor does Saito consider that from 1990 to 2022, the European Union reduced its emissions by 31 percent while its economy grew by 66 percent.

Climate protection has to make strides where it can, when it can, and experts acknowledge that it’s hard to change consumption patterns—let alone entire economic systems—rapidly. Progress means scaling back the most harmful types of consumption and energy production. It is possible to do this in stages, but it needs to be implemented much faster than the current plodding pace.

This is why Not the End of the World: How We Can Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable Planet by Hannah Ritchie, a data scientist at the University of Oxford, is infinitely more pertinent to the public discourse on climate than Saito’s esoteric work. Ritchie’s book is a noble attempt to illustrate that environmental protection to date boasts impressive feats that can be built on, even as the world faces what she concedes is an epic battle to contain greenhouse gases.

Ritchie underscores two environmental afflictions that humankind solved through a mixture of science, smart policy, and international cooperation: acid rain and ozone depletion. I’m old enough to remember the mid-1980s, when factories and power plants spewed out sulfurous and nitric emissions and acid rain blighted forests from the northeastern United States to Eastern Europe. Acidic precipitation in the Adirondacks, my stomping grounds at the time, decimated pine forests and mountain lakes, leaving ghostly swaths of dead timber. Then, scientists pinpointed the industries responsible, and policymakers designed a cap-and-trade system that put a price on their emissions, which forced industry into action; for example, power plants had to fit scrubbers on their flue stacks. The harmful pollutants dropped by 80 percent by the end of the decade, and forests grew back.

The campaign to reverse the thinning of the ozone layer also bore fruit. An international team of scientists deduced that man-made chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) in fridges, freezers, air conditioners, and aerosol cans were to blame. Despite fierce industry pushback, more than 40 countries came together in Montreal in 1987 to introduce a staggered ban on CFCs. Since then, more countries joined the Montreal Protocol, and CFCs are now largely a relic of the past. As Ritchie points out, this was the first international pact of any kind to win the participation of every nation in the world.

While these cases instill inspiration, Ritchie’s assessment of our current crisis is a little too pat and can veer into the Panglossian. The climate crisis is many sizes larger in scope than the scourges of the 1980s, and its antidote—to Saito’s credit—entails revamping society and economy on a global scale, though not with the absolutist end goal of degrowth communism.

Ritchie doesn’t quite acknowledge that a thoroughgoing restructuring is necessary. Although she does not invoke the term, she is an acolyte of “green growth.” She maintains that tweaks to the world’s current economic system can improve the living standards of the world’s poorest, maintain the global north’s level of comfort, and achieve global net zero by 2050. “Economic growth is not incompatible with reducing our environmental impact,” she writes. For her, the big question is whether the world can decouple growth and emissions in time to stave off the darkest scenarios.

Ritchie approaches today’s environmental disasters—air pollution, deforestation, carbon-intensive food production, biodiversity loss, ocean plastics, and overfishing—as problems solvable in ways similar to the crises of the 1980s. Like CFCs and acid rain, so too can major pollutants such as black carbon and carbon monoxide be reined in. Ritchie writes that the “solution to air pollution … follows just one basic principle: stop burning stuff.” As she points out, smart policy has already enhanced air quality in cities such as Beijing (Warsaw, too, as a recent visit convinced me), and renewable energy is now the cheapest form of power globally. What we have to do, she argues, is roll renewables out en masse.

The devil is in making it happen. Ritchie admits that environmental reforms must be accelerated many times over, but she doesn’t address how to achieve this or how to counter growing pushback against green policies. Just consider the mass demonstrations across Europe in recent months as farmers have revolted against the very measures for which Ritchie (correctly) advocates, such as cutting subsidies to diesel gas, requiring crop rotation, eliminating toxic pesticides, and phasing down meat production. Already, the farmers’ vehemence has led the EU to dilute important legislation on agriculture, deforestation, and biodiversity.

Ritchie’s admonishes us to walk more, take public transit, and eat less beef. Undertaken individually, this won’t change anything. But she acknowledges that sound policy is key—chiefly, economic incentives to steer markets and consumer behavior. Getting the right parties into office, she writes, should be voters’ priority.

Yet the parties fully behind Ritchie’s agenda tend to be the Green parties, which are largely in Northern Europe and usually garner little more than 10 percent of the vote. Throughout Europe, environmentalism is badmouthed by center-right and far-right politicos, many of whom lead or participate in governments, as in Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Serbia, Slovakia, and Sweden. And while she argues that all major economies must adopt carbon pricing like the EU’s cap-and-trade system, she doesn’t address how to get the United States, the world’s second-largest emitter, to introduce this nationwide or even expand its two carbon markets currently operating regionally—one encompassing 12 states on the East Coast, the other in California.

History shows that the best way to make progress in the battle to rescue our planet is to work with what we have and build on it. The EU has a record of exceeding and revising its emissions reduction targets. In the 1990s, the bloc had the modest goal of sinking greenhouse gases to 8 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-12; by 2012, it had slashed them by an estimated 18 percent. More recently, the 2021 European Climate Law adjusted the bloc’s target for reducing net greenhouse gas emissions from 40 percent to at least 55 percent by 2030, and the European Commission is considering setting the 2040 target to 90 percent below 1990 levels.

This process can’t be exclusively top down. By far the best way for everyday citizens to counter climate doomism is to become active beyond individual lifestyle choices—whether that’s by bettering neighborhood recycling programs, investing in clean tech equities, or becoming involved in innovative clean energy projects.

Take, for example, “community energy,” which Saito considers briefly and Ritchie misses entirely. In the 1980s, Northern Europeans started to cobble together do-it-yourself cooperatives, in which citizens pooled money to set up renewable energy generation facilities. Many of the now more than 9,000 collectives across the EU are relatively small—the idea is to stay local and decentralized—but larger co-ops illustrate that this kind of enterprise can function at scale. For example, Belgium’s Ecopower, which forgoes profit and reinvests in new energy efficiency and renewables projects, provides 65,000 members with zero-carbon energy at a reduced price.

Grassroots groups and municipalities are now investing in nonprofit clean energy generation in the United States, particularly in California and Minnesota. This takes many forms, including solar fields; small wind parks; electricity grids; and rooftop photovoltaic arrays bolted to schools, parking lots, and other public buildings. Just as important as co-ownership—in contrast to mega-companies’ domination of the fossil fuel market—is democratic decision-making. These start-ups, usually undertaken by ordinary citizens, pry the means of generation out of the hands of the big utilities, which only grudgingly alter their business models.

Around the world, the transition is in progress—and ideally, could involve all of us. The armchair prophets of doom should either join in or, at the least, sit on the sidelines quietly. The last thing we need is more people sowing desperation and angst. They play straight into the court of the fossil fuel industry.

[reality-detective]

I see a lot more of this 👇 kind of stuff and if you think about it: Remember the movie "V for Vendetta" it was rated ; R that came out in 2005? It was repeated frequently - "Remember, Remember the 5th of November"

Trump has said multiple times; "November 5th will be the greatest day in American history."

I'm just trying to connect some dots. I have no way of actually knowing the timeline, so I ask myself questions and knowing what I know and see a lot of things like this 👇 It's just a hunch and it kinda makes sense.

Military Intelligence follows the Julian Calendar

· Trump created the fake Biden presidency to expose globalist crime and corruption on a massive scale.

· The Emergency Broadcast System will introduce martial law until fair and transparent elections can be held.

· Three Days of Darkness: Planned cyber attacks on everything—Internet down, communications cut, power grid possibly shut off.

· 10 Days of Disclosure: A single website, one web channel, broadcasting the truth eight hours a day, in a loop.

· NESARA/GESARA debt forgiveness will be implemented—freedom from the Deep State's chains.

· The military will ensure that the masses get the food they need.

· QFS will be put in place to crush the financial elites.

· A 95% reduction in the corrupt government—we will finally be free from the parasites.

· Federal Reserve? Dead. IRS? Taken over by the new U.S. Treasury.

· A new tax system: only a 14%-17% tax on new items—no taxes on food, medicine, or wages. If you buy a used car, no taxes because whatever bought it brand new already paid said taxes. Finally, real financial relief for the people.

· Maritime Law will be thrown out, replaced by Common Law. No more tyranny in disguise.

You know the election is going to be a disaster, it's no secret they are tampering with the early voting and we are watching in real time that they are already committing treason. Is that the day a soft martial law goes into effect? If memory serves me, after the official announcement of NESARA there has to be an election 120 days later. Elections used to be in April and I don't know when it was moved to November. And if I were to guess, I would say it was to affect voter turnout with the colder weather.

The World IS About To Change 🤔

[batboyblog]

I feel like some people can't be/refuse to be educated, or they're deliberately being obtuse because they're trolls, psyops, or they just fell for the trolls and psyops. But its still good to point out where they're wrong and to give actual, you know, facts, for the benefit of other people reading who might actually be reachable.

yeah, I mean I usually ignore them because usually its bad faith and when a post is getting hundreds even thousands of notes in a day you just can't keep up with the 10-20-ish people who say something, particularly if its in the tags because thats just hard or fighting in the replies which always feels weird

But I was in a bad mood and in general seeing the same either bad faith or straight up don't know comment over and over and over again is very annoying

the "lol Joe Biden didn't do anything about Student loans!" one is pretty annoying since Biden has forgiven well over 100 BILLION dollars worth of student loan debt, so like he has done a lot on student loan debt. I'm not a big deal but I remember I did one of my "what Biden did this week" posts and it had the student loan debt forgiveness for people who got defrauded by the Art Institutes, and a few people added their stories of being defrauded and being in debt to AI for years and the one that'll stay with me was an older guy who went to try to get a new degree to get a job in a different field kinda late in the game, his 50s or 60s and of course didn't get the jobs he hoped for because scam college and saying how he thought he'd die in debt and it was all gone, all forgiven. So just like people flippantly dismissing a very real life changing thing is very annoying

there are a few other very common annoying ones "why didn't he do this when he controlled congress before!" well he was busy passing the biggest climate change bill any government on earth has ever done, investing in our Infrastructure for the first time since before Reagan was President (Reagan 😒) listen Biden passed 4 of the biggest most transformationally progressive bills the US has seen since LBJ

American Rescue Plan

Bipartisan Infrastructure Law

CHIPS and Science Act

Inflation Reduction Act

on top of which he passed the first gun control law out of congress in 30 years, and other things, like the Respect for Marriage Act to protect gay marriage, or making Juneteenth a federal holiday (the first new federal holiday since MLK day in 1983)

SO! thats why he didn't do the things he wants to do in his next term he was busy doing equally (and in the case of climate change more important) things and thats why we should all be hopeful if Joe Biden is President with a Democratic Congress he'll get most if not ALL the things on his agenda done, because he's fucking good at this, we haven't had a President this good at pushing bills through Congress and using every switch and lever of the federal government to make major progressive change since LBJ or FDR, I guess his big mistake was naming it something boring like "Inflation Reduction Act" and not something sexy like "New Deal" or "Great Society"

sorry to go off on a tare there, but its just frustrating to see 40 (out of tens of thousands really) posts saying the same dumb shit and having no real way to respond

[freetheshit-outofyou]

Rather than finding a better way to tax "We The People", maybe and I'm just talking crazy here, maybe we hold the freaking Government to a budget, with a locked in growth at the COLA increase they give to the elderly/Veterans each year? We are looking at the problem from the bottom of and empty glass and trying to get more out of it. We, and how much in taxes we pay are not the problem, the open pocket book the government has is. No more continuing resolutions, only solid budgets passed with debt reduction baked in. I want them to shut the government down, until a budget is approved. I want the government to explain to the Citizens why they can't pay their bills so we can't pay ours. I say that as a retired government employee, on SSD, living on a fixed income. I have more to lose up front than many. Like I said, crazy talk.

[my-autism-adhd-blog]

Hi everyone,

I got an inbox asking to share some tips for financing when you’re autistic. I found a helpful guid from the National Autistic Society:

Budgeting

The first step to managing your money is to work out a budget and stick to it. Budgeting will help you:

* keep track of what you are spending

* help you to avoid going overdrawn on your bank account by spending money that you don't have

* decide whether you can afford to buy something that you would like

* deal with debt by planning repayments that you can manage

* work out how much money you may have to save. 

Bank, building society or post office accounts

Most people now have one of these types of account. The benefits of these are: 

* it will keep your money safe

* you can pay bills more simply by direct debits or standing orders

* internet banking is now widely available. This reduces the need to visit banks and other services that autistic people may find difficult

* benefit payments can only be paid into an account

* you can have a debit card, making it easier to pay for purchases and you can shop online 

* you may be able to earn interest on the money you have

* you can pay bills by direct debit or standing order, which are sometimes rewarded by a reduction in what you pay for services

* you can use your cashpoint card to access money easily from cash machines in the UK and sometimes abroad

* your bank or building society may be able to give you an overdraft or loan.

Debit, credit and store cards

There are a number of different cards that you can use to make a payment. These include:

* cashpoint and debit cards

* credit cards

* store cards.

Borrowing money, making payments and debt

It's easy to think of a loan or overdraft as free money, but it’s actually expensive as you have to pay back the original amount plus interest. Try to only borrow money when you need to and repay it as soon as you can. There are many ways of borrowing money, including:

* borrowing money from family or friends

* having an overdraft

* taking out a personal loan or secured loan

* applying for a credit card.

The full article will be below, as it goes into more detail. I hope this helps many of you.

National Autistic Society

[lizbethborden]

I think the point these people make is that thinking that Harris is better than Trump is an illusion. They're two sides of the same coin, funding cop cities, funding racist anti immigration programs, funding Israel's genocide in Gaza, spreading dangerous islamophobic antisemitic misogynistic etc rhetoric. Trump is just doing it in a vulgar style. Harris has been vice president for a while now and her administration has not undone much of the work of Trump, when it hasnt prolonged or amplified it. So I think lots of people are feeling defeated, disillusioned, and like they are being manipulated when the 'at least she's not Trump' argument is brought forth. If she's not Trump, but signs off on the same policies and budgets, and represses protests the same way, there is no difference on the ground. Also I think more people are becoming radicalized and hope for a global change - third party candidates, the people's revolution, whatever. It's a rejection of the establishment altogether rather than rejecting just one - I understand the frustration but I can't fault people who refuse to participate in a system that they feel is working against them regardless of the outcome.

I take issue with a lot of the framing of this response.

First of all, it's not Harris' administration; it's Biden's. I'm not going to argue she has no agency as a political actor, but the way the system works is that he is the central driver of action and policy. Arguing that she, personally, should have accomplished more is frankly silly, both when 1) they HAVE accomplished quite a lot and 2) where they have struggled to accomplish goals, it is often because of deadlocks in the legislative branch, where Republicans hold a majority in the House and Democrats only the slightest majority in the Senate (and considering one of their number is Joe Manchin, it kind of doesn't count).

To the point that they HAVE accomplished a lot:

Established the Office for Gun Violence Prevention and signed anti-gun violence legislation into law

Passed the Inflation Reduction Act, which has significant climate change and drug price provisions

Approved literal billions in debt relief for people with student debt, with still more to come

Signed an executive order to regulate AI usage and to scrutinize use of AI for potential discriminatory effects

Passed the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, allocating over $400 billion for infrastructure works

Pushed protections for consumers re: airline travel and its exorbitant fees and delays, via DoT and Pete Buttigieg

Achieved a 3.5% unemployment rate, which is the lowest in 50 years

Harris also has, explicitly, called for a ceasefire in Gaza and in fact had her intended statements about the humanitarian crisis there "watered down" by officials, ostensibly so that she didn't seem to be breaking away from Biden's approach to Israel and the genocide. I am not going to argue that the Biden-Harris administration is perfect, does no wrong, or does not have significant responsibility for dangerous, violent policies and political actions. That's the nature of Western government and it would be deeply offensive to suggest otherwise. But to suggest that they're just Trump but more polite is inaccurate and honestly shows a significant degree of political ignorance. Also very odd to suggest that a Black woman is like, equally as racist as Trump?

Moreover, the head-in-the-sand, I-would-prefer-not-to, "the revolution will come soon so no worries :D" approach is simply not helpful in the day-to-day. So, I, for one, absolutely can fault people who choose not to participate in the actions that will have significant effects on the day-to-day governance of the country in which they live. If the idea is to sit around and complain until all the oligarchs get beheaded, nothing will get done. This is the exact attitude taken during the 2016 election, which actually got Trump elected and resulted in the policies that killed large numbers of people during COVID, exacerbated racist and islamophobic violence, and nearly led to a white supremacist Christian nationalist coup that overthrew the government. If you're fine with that, good for you. I, personally, am not.

[battleangel]

Jeff Goldblum warning us in Jurassic Park that cloning dinosaurs is raping mother nature was apparently an instruction manual and not a warning.

"Colossal Biosciences, a biotechnology company founded in 2021, is working to genetically resurrect the woolly mammoth by combining its genes with Asian elephant DNA. The company's goal is to create a hybrid species, called a "mammophant", that will look and behave like a woolly mammoth. Colossal plans to use cloning techniques similar to those used to create Dolly the sheep in 1996, inserting genetically edited cells into an elephant egg that would then be gestated by a surrogate elephant. The company has said it intends to complete the project by 2027."

Exploitative KKKapitalism = Eating like 💩 in the neighborhood! "Studies have shown that the prevalence of fast-food restaurants is positively correlated with the percentage of Black residents in urban neighborhoods in the U.S. Similar trends have been found for liquor stores."

$Anything for a Dollar$

"While dollar stores can fill a need in low-income neighborhoods, they are often regarded as predatory businesses that harm communities more than they benefit them, due to very low wages, displacing other grocery options while failing to sell fresh food, store design that increases the rate of armed robberies, and OSHA and FDA violations that put customers and employees at risk."

Who Needs Fresh Food?

"There are no fresh vegetables, fruits, or meats in most dollar stores. And yet, as limited as their offerings are, dollar stores are now feeding more Americans than Whole Foods is, and they’re multiplying rapidly. Since 2011, the number of dollar stores nationwide has climbed from about 20,000 to nearly 30,000. There are now more dollar stores than Walmart and McDonalds locations combined."

Dollar Tree Customers = Permanent Underclass

"In their latest annual reports, Dollar General and Dollar Tree say they have identified thousands of new locations for dollar stores. The two chains are planning to expand their combined empires to more 50,000 outlets."

“Essentially what the dollar stores are betting on in a large way is that we are going to have a permanent underclass in America,” Garrick Brown, a researcher with the commercial real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield, told Bloomberg last year.

“The economy is continuing to create more of our core customer,” Dollar General chief executive Todd Vasos told investors last year.

"More than one-third of American adults, and 48 percent of African American adults, are obese."

13% of the US population is Black, and 48% of Black Americans are obese.

"Look at the pharmaceutical companies. In my neighborhood, there is a fast-food restaurant on every block, from Wendy’s to Kentucky Fried Chicken to Popeye’s to Little Caesar’s Pizza. Now drugstores are popping up on every corner, too. So you have the fast-food restaurants that of course cause the diet-related diseases, and you have the pharmaceutical companies there to fix it."

"If you give people access to really good food and a living-wage job, someone is going to lose money. As long as people are poor and as long as people are sick, there are jobs to be made. Follow the money."

"I talk about power, and how power is a drug and power over people is a drug and it’s hard to give up."

"A substantial body of evidence indicates that diet, toxic metals, food additives, insufficient nutrients, food allergy, lack of exercise can all contribute to criminal behavior. Evidence is mounting that a good diet makes a positive difference when working with some offenders."

"Our estimates imply that the 42% drop in the natural gas price in the late 2000s, mostly driven by the shale gas boom, averted 12,500 deaths per year in the United States."

"Participants (60.55%) experienced unexpected or increased medical expenses (17.69%), job loss (13.64%), pay reduction (11.85%), and death of a family member (9.09%). Pay reduction and increased debt were associated with moderate hunger; death of a family member, pay reduction, and increased debt were associated with severe hunger."

Lung Cancer to Avoid Severe Hunger

"In unadjusted models, annual household income <$15,000, non-urban residence, lack of health insurance, unstable housing, heavier food pantry reliance, fair or poor adult health, adult anxiety, and adult smoking to reduce hunger pangs were all positively associated with VLFS-C."

Fast Food = Fast Death

"Survey respondents had 8 ± 7 fast-food outlets within 2 miles of their home. Individuals living in close proximity to fast-food restaurants had higher BMIs, and lower fruit and vegetable consumption."

Happy Meal = Psychiatric Distress & Violence

"Consumption of fast food has been linked to psychiatric distress, violent behaviors, and impulsivity in adolescents."

"The analysis found that liquor stores are disproportionately located in predominantly black neighborhoods, even after controlling for census tract socioeconomic status."

"At equal levels of poverty, Black neighborhoods had the fewest supermarkets."

[2hoothoots]

i was having a chuckle to myself last night about Gristol, and how his plans are basically:

Restore Ford Cruller's memory

Find Maligula

???

Profit

but then... of course they are, right? this is Gristol we're talking about. Fatherland Follies drives home again and again that he's still operating on a child's logic, a warped and reductive version of the world that he never bothered to grow out of. both of his memory vaults center on the images of his childhood, this idealized version of the past that he clings to no matter what. and that's still how he remembers Maligula, too - as this saviour figure, who rushes in to help him when he's in trouble.

[ID: Two slides from Gristol's memory vault, Glory to Grulovia! Left: Gristol clings to Maligula's back as she summons waves to sweep away his assailants. Right: Gristol and Maligula waving from a balcony as the people cheer. Gzar Theodore brandishes a dagger in the background.]

like so much else, Maligula represents a return to this idyllic childhood - to the peace and simplicity of his youth, when he was free from worries and responsibilities. in his mind, he doesn't need to make any further plans - once Maligula's back, everything will go back to normal. Maligula will make everything better.

...is what i thought, but then i remembered this line:

[Screenshot source. ID: Gristol, in Truman's body, bows on his hands and knees in front of the newly-awaked Maligula. The caption reads: "Yes, High Priestess! I am here to correct the mistakes made by my father!"]

and that's kind of interesting, right?

to be clear: this happens directly after Maligula sees Helmut-in-Gristol's-body, and recognises him. her line before this is:

"Little Gzesaravich! Have you come to pay for your father's sins?"

my first thought was that Gristol hadn't expected to still be in Truman's body by the time he managed to find Maligula, and this was him trying to placate her and buy some time until he could explain the situation. but watching the cutscene back, that's clearly not what's happening here. Gristol is answering as himself, and his response of throwing himself to his knees before her is, as far as i can tell, genuine.

so what is going on here?

in Fatherland Follies, there's this line in the ride narration that stuck out to me:

"Why didn't the Gzar help Maligula in her time of need? No one knows, but historians agree - it is Gzar Theodore's biggest failure."

other lines mention Gzar Theodore's "mistake", and it's wording Gristol himself echoes in the screencap above. evidently, he believes that his father abandoned Maligula, leaving her to her fate at the hands of the Psychonauts, and it was that mistake that lead to them being driven out of the country - that mistake which he seeks to correct. maybe he even feels like he has a debt to repay to her for his family turning their backs on her all those years ago.

the 'High Priestess' thing, though - that's kinda weird, and threw me for a loop the first time i played the game. it took me until my second playthrough to connect the dots, and remember how the room in the Lady Luctopus - Gristol's room - was full of Delugionist scribblings and symbols.

[Screenshot source. ID: left, the walls of the hidden backroom in Gristol's hotel suite, covered in scrawlings of eyeballs and Maligula's name. Right, the pinboard from the hidden backroom. On its surface are photographs and newspaper clippings connected by pieces of string.]

i mean, look at this stuff! he had a whole conspiracy board and everything!

we learn very little about the Delugionists and their beliefs as a whole during the game, but i think drawing the connection here suggests two important things. one: that Gristol was in deep with this stuff. i don't know how he linked up with them - maybe via old family connections, or just good old-fashioned digging (we know he's skilled at worming his way into peoples' good graces, after all) - but it seems likely that he's begun to internalise their ideas, maybe even warping his own memories of events. and two: the Delugionists themselves are, if you'll pardon the pun, pretty far off the deep end.

like... i understand why PN2 didn't go heavy on the "mass-murderer cult worship" aspect of things, in the end, but man this is such a tantalising glimpse into the wider mythos around Maligula. Gristol is proud and haughty and thinks himself above everyone else; the fact that his first reaction seeing Maligula is to throw himself to the ground at her feet says so much about the way he's come to see her. he's not just trying to bring back Maligula, his childhood bodyguard. he's trying to bring back Maligula, the High Priestess of the deluge, the semi-mythical figure whose supporters believe even death couldn't stop. he doesn't even flinch at the way she confronts him, and maybe it's because he's bought in so completely to this deified figurehead, this idea of Maligula; more a living force of nature than a person. and it all comes back to the same place: an abdication of responsibility, not just to the person who protected him when he was little but to this avatar of floods and destruction. Maligula will make everything better.

i'd write more about my thoughts on the Delugionists but that'd be taking a hard turn into speculation, and this is already kind of long and rambling so i'd better end it here. but what an unexpected and evocative line, right? it's some of the only stuff we have to go off of regarding the Delugionists as a whole, but i think it does such a good job of hinting at the wider story - at teasing another layer to the mythos surrounding Maligula, one whose ripples we see throughout the game but which never quite breaches the surface.

[possiblyunhinged]

Look, I know I harp on about this, but until the middle-class left actually wakes up to class consciousness, we're going to keep seeing the working class drawn to the far right.

If that wasn't made clear by not only our own election but by the other war-mongering country with all the money and no fucking sense.

It baffles me that so many don’t see themselves as part of the problem, then turn around and bring up stereotypes—like crushed velvet sofas or the way people talk—and mock them. When I went to university, people didn’t even assume I was working class because of how I spoke. The way the middle class talks about us is disgusting.

While I don’t agree with the politics that some people lean into, I understand why they get there. Thanks to the hellhole that is Facebook, I know a lot of my old classmates are moving in that direction—and they’re not mindless or ignorant. They’re hurt, abandoned, and ignored by the political system.

We're not in 'normal' times. We’re seeing a rise in far-right, fascist politics, and yet there's so much pearl-clutching on this site from people who seem disconnected from the suffering of working people—waiting for healthcare, drowning in debt (which kills fyi), millions of kids in poverty. It's infuriating seeing people discourage voting or act like harm reduction doesn’t matter.

Harm reduction may not be perfect, but it’s something—and instead of just complaining about the lack of alternatives, why not be the alternative?

You can complain all you want that these "shouldn’t be the only options." But right now, they are. And those who constantly attack left-leaning parties don’t seem interested in stepping up to be the local politicians who actually offer people hope.

While it might be frustrating to vote for the lesser of two evils, sometimes it really is about voting against fascism. And seeing adults sit out on that decision because it "feels bad" is fucking wild.

[ellieellieoxenfree]

made this post before and i WILL make it again but there is something so infuriating in browsing old kiseki tags and 99% of the chen yi discourse is reductive 'gee he's such an idiot why doesn't he understand his feelings.' like yes, i am not free from the sin of calling him an idiot (with love), but it's just...the kid was born into a gang, lost his parents early, was raised by an emotionally detached, abusive predator who enjoyed manipulating children and teenagers into doing his dirty work (sorry, CDY stans, but i'm right -- i too love the old man yaoi but the guy is a certified piece of shit), was given the almost insurmountable goal of being the primary caretaker, probably even before he hit puberty, of an incredibly damaged, abandoned little boy with documented issues from his mother's drug use while in utero, and was thrust into a leadership role in the criminal underworld at the age of fucking seventeen.

it's no fucking wonder he doesn't have his shit together -- who's there to teach him any kind of healthy relationship modeling? -- but it's often not noticed that as he got older, he would have been trained to set himself slightly apart from the other men (and teenage boys, argh) in yiyun meng, because he was a leader and he had to command respect and authority. ai di is capable of making friendships, albeit surface-level ones, or at least feigning himself as a good-time party boy to hide the massive roiling trauma underneath, but chen yi would have had responsibility and the massive job of heir hanging over him since childhood and would have constantly been chasing that dragon in the hopes of impressing CDY. which was never going to happen because as an abusive predator, CDY knew he would always have more power over chen yi if he consistently withheld his affection and approval. fear breeds loyalty. chen yi says CDY raised them both, but ai di was always a sort of uncontrollable, extraneous son whose loyalties started and ended with chen yi, whereas chen yi is fucking pliable to CDY's emotional manipulations because he has literally no other frame of reference to say 'hey, that's fucked.' he's the first, the primary, the heir, the one to pin all the hopes on. CDY semi 'parents' him, but ai di doesn't fall for the bullshit in the same way. he's loyal to those who have shown him kindness -- chen yi, zong yi. (ze rui is his own tangent.) chen yi was raised to think of CDY's 'kindness' to him as an immense debt he would spend a lifetime repaying.

and then i could go on for hours about how the fuck a character who has been raised to put himself in last place his entire life, after his boss and his sworn brother and his men, is supposed to know how to learn to take things for himself. how is he supposed to know how to want, when he's never been told that's even an option?

just annoys me so goddamn much we got characters who are so complex and whose traumas are so firmly rooted in the same fixed point that makes untwining them a joy and the fandom looked at them and went 'hee hee funny little idiot man doesn't get emotions.'

[damnfandomproblems]

763632033850327040

TW.

I know I'm going off on a tangent here, but I want to say that people using the term "mouth breather" is always really disheartening. It's a huge gut-punch in a situation many people have been dealing with for decades.

Here's my deal: I've had sleep-disordered breathing since I was a kid. It started with bad nasal resistance issues, which meant I I couldn't breathe through my nose and had to use my mouth. Parents didn't do jack shit about it because they didn't know it was a big problem. And it totally messed up the formation of my skull. Now my jaw is slightly recessed, I have vertical maxillary excess, I can't fully close my lips, and my airway looks like a coffee straw (I've seen an MRI of this and it's totally pinched when I'm on my back, and even when I'm upright), so I can't even breathe through my mouth properly without a ton of noise and resistance. Every day, I wake up with a sore throat, dry mouth, and feeling like death. That "mouth breathing" has given me sleep apnea and UARS. CPAP doesn't help so I'm looking at a bilevel now and failing that, ASV. My jaw joint sounds like gravel and constantly clicks out of place.

And doctors don't do shit. I've seen three different ENTs for my nasal issues, and all three of them just scoped my nose and said "idk, looks fine". None of them actually looked at the skeletal structure of my face despite being fucking ENTs who are supposed to, you know, know everything about the nose. None of them actually thought, huh, I'm using the pediadric scope for your nose, that might indicate there is a bigger fucking problem than just your turbinates, which you've already had a reduction for. Nope. Nothing.

The one jaw surgeon I went to told me, "idk, I can give you a sliding genio, but that's it, I don't want to mess up your ~pretty face~ (yerk) by doing an advancement". When I literally need an advancement of some kind because my jaw and tongue is encroaching on my fucking throat.

Meanwhile, I've been suffering for 20 years thinking I had treatment resistant depression and insomnia when in reality, it was my shitty breathing and every day, currently stuck with a CPAP, I look at my data and breathing waveforms and I observe they look like they've been shot with buckshot. All my breaths are flat or ragged. I see myself constantly gasping because I can't get enough air. My DME (CPAP) provider won't even look at that data, because all they want to look at is a shitty single number that isn't even accurate, because CPAP machines are garbage with actually detecting breathing issues so they constantly spit out lower-than-reality numbers, especially for people with UARS.

Now I'm looking into double jaw surgery and EASE, and the initial consultations for each are months away. I can't do anything in the meanwhile. And the real fuck-shit part of this? I live in a country with "free healthcare", but the doctors can't even solve this. And the system moves way too fucking slowly. Twenty years of languishing, only to be told over and over "you must be a hypochondriac, it's just depression, we don't need to look at the data"? Fuck that. So I'm going to go into debt paying nearly 200k for double jaw surgery and for nasal expansion. I've considered killing myself over this plenty of times. I can't imagine how many people have killed themselves over this. All because they can't breathe through their nose.

From the bottom of my heart, fuck anyone who uses the word "mouth breather" like it's a fucking joke or an insult. Fuck them.

Sorry, I saw an opportunity to vent and took it.

Posting as a response to a previous ask.

[dysfunctional-doodle]

I hope this works -

Hello Everyone Who Has Found Their Way Here!

Or accidentally clicked on my blog I guess

Welcome to my blog, you can find links to comics and stuff below.

ASKS: Always Open!

COMMISSIONS: Open! (7/8) (longer wait times over assignment season, estimated ~ 2 weeks)

(More details below)

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STICKER SHOP:

I sell goofy stickers now! I will be creating a small graphic to condense this but check out my shop for turtle tots and more!

⭐️ -> SHOP LINK <- ⭐️

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COMMISSIONS:

OPEN! All can be done on my Kofi, but I will create a detailed post later. All prices ARE NOT FIXED, so if you would like to ask me about lowering them feel free and I will see what I can offer :)

-> KOFI COMISSIONS LINK <-

Otherwise, feel free to message me on tumblr. I only take PayPal, I’m afraid. Prices are:

ROUGH SKETCHES: £4 +

INCLUDED: 3 - 5 Sketches of any character/request, face and half body.

ADD-ONS: Colour (£1)

FULL DRAWING: £12 +

INCLUDED: Up to 4 characters on a page. These can be any ‘shot’, ranging from face to full body. A basic background (such as a solid colour or shapes) can also be requested.

ADD-ONS: Lighting (£2), Background (£5), Additional Characters (£2 per character).

CHARACTER SHEETS: £10+

INCLUDED: Refined drawings (up to torso) of a character of your choice. Each sheet will have 4 - 5 drawings on, and can include colour and lighting with add ons. The base does not include advanced colour, but usually a chosen block colour (see examples for reference).

ADD-ONS: Lighting (£2), Full Colour (£2), Additional Pose/Expression (up to 3 maximum, £3 each)

SHORT COMIC: £15 +

INCLUDED: Up to 4 - 5 pages of a comic of whatever scenario (SFW) given with any characters. The base does not include coloured illustrations, but does include dialogue and shading.

**If the comic is only a couple of pages there can be a price reduction **

ADD-ONS: Full Colour (£10), Additional Pages (£2 per page), Full Backgrounds (£15)

Feel free to DM me with questions :)

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TIPS:

If anyone can afford it I would appreciate donations so I can attempt to not be a student in debt and try and get professional equipment (not a 7+ year old iPad and a dream) for my art!

-> KOFI: https://ko-fi.com/dysfunctionaldoodle <-

Thank you for any help, this money means a lot even if it’s a penny - but please don’t donate if you can’t afford it, thank you :)

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SOCIALS:

Besides tumblr I don’t have much, but -

AO3: DysfunctionalRequest

Twitter: @defunct_request

Kofi: DysfunctionalDoodle

Deviantart: Dysfunctionaldoodle

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REPOSTING/COMIC DUBS

Lately there has been issues with people reposting my art. So, I shall reiterate in big letters:

NO REPOSTING WITHOUT CREDITS!!!

(So I don’t mind reblogs and reposts, but please please please don’t grab an image of mine and post it on your blog without credits - this is much more of an issue on devianart but I’m putting it here too).

Regarding comic dubs:

I have also seen people on YouTube dubbing my comics, which is great! However, please either:

Drop me a DM/message telling me you are doing this. I like to see this stuff for my own fun mostly, and also for reasons in point 2:

Please give credit to me. I’m sorry, but “credit to the artist” is not enough, my social links are literally right here on this blog. I’ve seen a YouTuber in particular do this - it’s great you like my comics but proper credit should be given, if that’s okay.

That’s all :)