#I LIED WE'RE A SYSTEM

[puppppppppy]

isnt it great when u take your adhd meds and instead of using that brainpower for stuff like ASSIGNMENTS. AND PROJECTS. your brain decides the next 6 hours will be brainstorming ponysona names and making oc playlists

[kinnoth]

ok but what is truer to the gay experience than the prettiest little twink at your local gay hotspot picking the straight-passing-est refrigerator of a man to be his hookup

[chipistrate]

As much as I hate to say it, I don’t think Princess Quest is canon. There’s Vanny graffiti that was recently made, and I can’t see that happening if Vanessa was freed.

Honestly I feel like that was more of a red herring/easter egg rather than definitive proof that PQ isn't canon. Like how there's also graffiti that says 'Wizard' with rabbit ears on the 'd' (iirc), most likely being an easter egg to Dr. Rabbit/GGY.

There's way too much proof towards PQ being canon for some random reused graffiti on the wall to disprove it- like if it was a new texture or something I could maybe kinda see it? But it's literally just reused from the base game.

[grotto-esque]

I think... people should cultivate a skeptical, questioning mentality towards news reporting, and perhaps especially if that reporting confirms your worldview.

[doubleca5t]

"weird" really is the perfect descriptor for modern conservatives because I would argue the defining feature of the current american far right is that they exist purely in their own bespoke media ecosystem that is both highly conspiratorial and mostly untethered from the truth. this is a group of people whose belief system has been debunked and disproven so many times by legitimate sources that they've resorted to just telling each other increasingly absurd lies in order to justify those beliefs. the upshot of this being that the minute you remove any of those lies from said bespoke media environment, there's really no appropriate response other than some varient of "bro, what the fuck are you talking about?"

how am I supposed to respond to someone who says that Democrats are running a satanic cult where they ritually sacrifice children to harvest their adrenachome - a theory that is not only insane, but is also a throwaway gag from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. what do you expect me to say to someone who says that trans women are dominating in women's sports, and when asked to give examples responds with a list of non-white cis women? How am I supposed to take someone seriously who thinks that wildfires are caused by space lasers controlled by the Rothschilds or that schools are installing litter boxes for children who identify as cats or that most large corporations are "Marxist" because they have mandatory diversity trainings?

like sure I can take them seriously as a political threat but how am I supposed to have any respect for them as *people*. because as people they are just deeply fucking weird. we should be able to dismiss them out of hand because it's not like they'd care about whether or not we're making a reasoned argument

[propertyofwicked]

FAKING AN INTEREST

f1 grid x platonic!reader (implied landoxreader) smau

based on this request! (this may need a pt 2 honestly)

warnings: none, just men having the audacity

masterlist the playlist

⭑･ﾟﾟ･*:༅｡.｡༅:*ﾟ:*:✼✿　　✿✼:*ﾟ:༅｡.｡༅:*･ﾟﾟ･⭑

-----------

yourusername made a new post!

liked by logansargeant, oscarpiastri, and 21,223 others

yourusername what the fuck is a DRS?

view all 9,211 comments

danielricciardo what he say fuck me for?

⤷ yourusername hi! im free may 28 if you want to hangout may 28 lmk im not doing anything may 28 please msg me if ur available may 28 so we could maybe hangout or do something may 28 !!

⤷ danielricciardo ill clear my schedule - what day did u say u were free?

⤷ username1 mad about being labelled as a fake f1 fan only to turn around and flirt with the drivers? is she fr?

⤷ yourusername get a job, touch grass?

username2 how does she know them im so confused

⤷ username3 she went to school with oscar i think?

logansargeant will you stop posting the worst pictures of me?

⤷ yourusername say please?

⤷ logansargeant please y/n im begging

⤷ yourusername start using the metric system and i'll consider it.

lilymhe come back to williams i miss u

⤷ yourusername can i bring lilyzneimer? 🥺

⤷ lilymhe omg yes!! lily-ception

⤷ oscarpiastri @/yourusername dont take my girlfriend to enemy territory tf?

⤷ logansargeant enemy? ☹️

yourusername made a new post!

liked by lilyzneimer, oscarpiastri, and 34,502 others

yourusername congrats on driving fast bestie

tagged: oscarpiastri, lilyzneimer, jensonbutton

view all 7,210 comments

username4 jenson button? what are you doing here?

⤷ yourusername forming a danica patrick hate club

⤷ yourusername we're discussing gentle parenting tactics for logan <3

⤷ logansargeant is this why jenson keeps telling me that sharing is caring??

⤷ jensonbutton in my defence i told her it wouldn't work 🤷

⤷ yourusername we'll see about that - alex_albon do you feel cared for?

⤷ alex_albon im staying out of this.

oscarpiastri thank you y/n!

⤷ yourusername so proud of u bestie

⤷ oscarpiastri i already paid for dinner you can stop pretending to be nice now

⤷ yourusername brb faking an interest in our friendship rn

⤷ username10 she's never letting that comment go fr

username7 their friendship confuses me but im so here for it

username8 oscar paid? who's shocked

⤷ username9 not me!

⤷ username10 not me!

⤷ yourusername me tbf he usually forgets his wallet

⤷ oscarpiastri i leave it on purpose, actually

⤷ yourusername gold digger 🫵

username8 she literally only goes to the races so that she can post about it on ig and pretend she knows what's going on

logansargeant you never congratulate me :(

⤷ yourusername tf u want me to congratulate u for? brushing your teeth?

⤷ logansargeant no one else will :(

username6 where did u find that picture of oscar?

⤷ yourusername wdym find? i took it loool

yourusername made a new post!

liked by logansargeant, lilymhe and 7,893 others

yourusername glorified uber drivers

tagged: logansargeant, alex_albon

view all 1,235 comments

logansargeant best biscuits ever

⤷ username5 biscuits?? that wasn't very wtf is a kilometer of you

⤷ yourusername one of us! 🇬🇧 one of us! 🇬🇧 one of us! 🇬🇧

⤷ landonorris one of us! 🇬🇧 one of us! 🇬🇧 one of us! 🇬🇧

⤷ alex_albon one of us! 🇬🇧 one of us! 🇬🇧 one of us! 🇬🇧

⤷ logansargeant oh! so this is hell!

landonorris cute! don't do it again!

⤷ yourusername i snapped the head off yours hoping it was a voodoo doll.

⤷ username3 do they hate each other or..?

⤷ yourusername yes.

⤷ landonorris cancelling our lunch plans

⤷ yourusername i was kidding pls dont im so hungry

⤷ username4 lunch plans? y'all seeing this???

username6 the picture of logan im dead

⤷ yourusername he was modelling for his cookie design

lilymhe i want the alex one

⤷ yourusername boxed it up just for u <3

⤷ yourusername alex said he'd give it to u later

⤷ alex_albon i lied. i ate it. no regrets.

yourusername made a new post!

liked by landonorris, oscarpiastri and 24,789 others

yourusername lando norris fakes an interest in the menu

tagged: landonorris, oscarpiastri

view all 1,432 comments

username5 y/n out here living our dream </3

⤷ username6 god i have seen what you've done for others 🙏

⤷ yourusername lando eats chicken nuggets with a fork you can have him

⤷ landonorris this is defamation, my lawyers will be in contact.

landonorris in my defence, that place was FANCY and i wanted to pretend i wasn’t about to order chicken nuggets and chips

⤷ yourusername fancy?? oscar literally ordered a cheeseburger??

⤷ oscarpiastri dont expose me like that y/n

⤷ logansargeant one of us! 🇺🇸🦅 one of us! 🇺🇸🦅

⤷ yourusername it's not funny when u do it <3

logansargeant you never want to go to lunch with me :(

⤷ username7 logan try not to get jealous challenge - hard

⤷ yourusername i literally had brunch with you like yesterday?

⤷ logansargeant ok and?

username11 she is never gonna let that comment go is she. we get it, you know f1.

⤷ yourusername why should i?

⤷ username11 it wasnt that deep

⤷ yourusername why should i give david coulthard the platform to perpetuate negative commentary on women in motorsport?

⤷ yourusername why do we keep allowing men to talk down to women with genuine interests instead of providing them with opportunities to excel in the field?

⤷ username2 say it louder for the people in the back queen

username1 lando looks so fineeeee

⤷ yourusername too bad he sucks at chess

⤷ landonorris you cheated!

lilymhe u look so sexy let me take u out 🫢

⤷ yourusername only if ur paying 🫢

⤷ lilymhe we’ll put it on alex’s card

⤷ yourusername sounds good

⤷ alex_albon do i have a say in this?

⤷ lilymhe no.

⤷ yourusername no.

⤷ landonorris no.

⤷ oscarpiastri no.

yourusername made a new post!

liked by lilymhe, logansargeant and 31,245 others

yourusername y/n l/n fakes an interest in getting her degree 🍾🥂

tagged: ybfusername, youruniversity

view all 2,103 comments

landonorris that caption isn't even a lie 🤐

⤷ yourusername sorry cant hear you over the sound of me being a graduate

⤷ landonorris did you not literally spend the last year asking if you’d “finish this degree or if it would finish you” ??

⤷ yourusername i literally have a piece of paper that says i finished it

⤷ landonorris talk to me when you get a trophy

⤷ yourusername ok mr won one race now thinks hes the shit

⤷ username4 gagged.

landonorris but fr, congratulations y/n! proud of you always!

⤷ username4 always huh? im smelling soft launch

⤷ username9 go back to bed grandma

oscarpiastri congrats on reading and writing stuff bestie!

⤷ yourusername thanks king! <3

username6 intelligent queen we loveee

username6 suck on that david coulthard.

⤷ yourusername he better be sleeping with one eye open

⤷ username11 got a degree and now thinks she's better than a literal racing legend

⤷ yourusername dude do u like need a hug or something? if i didn't know any better id think you were in love with me

username2 shes so unserious i love her

lilyzneimer congratulations gorgeous!

⤷ yourusername congratulations to you too lil <3

⤷ username3 hot girls get degrees 🤷 i don't make the rules

⤷ lilyzneimer still cant believe the girl that used to sleep in biology graduated university

⤷ yourusername me neither tbf

⤷ oscarpiastri same.

⤷ yourusername no one asked u vroom vroom

username13 what was your dissertation on?

⤷ yourusername net-zero carbon development in race mechanisms and engineering !

⤷ username13 oh you SMART smart

⤷ landonorris debatable

logansargeant well done! does this mean no more highlighters abandoned on the floor of williams hospitality?

⤷ alex_albon please say yes 🙏

⤷ yourusername but watching you trip over them was so funny 😟

ybfusername those 3am library trips finally paid off! 🙏

⤷ yourusername jet lagged delirium and caffeine i will miss u

⤷ ybfusername im so proud of us

lilymhe graduate, baker, sexiest woman alive - is there anything you cant do?

⤷ yourusername have a genuine interest in motorsport 🤷

⤷ lilymhe wait till they find out you fake an interest in golf too 💀

⤷ yourusername im only there to see u bbygirl

yourusername made a new post!

liked by landonorris, oscarpiastri and 24,789 others

yourusername here to watch my friends drive fast cars.

tagged: lilymhe, landonorris

view all 703 comments

landonorris well, some of us drive fast cars

⤷ alex_albon what are you trying to say?

⤷ landonorris speak up a bit i cant hear you from the podium

username8 lando? yn?

⤷ username8 i feel like im interupting something

⤷ username4 can we let them just be friends and not ruin this pls

lilymhe oh we are so back

⤷ yourusername and we’re never leaving! <3

⤷ alex_albon oh god

⤷ logansargeant please no

⤷ yourusername fine, ill leave 😟

mclaren hope to see you in our garage soon y/n!

⤷ yourusername i have always looked good in papaya

⤷ username8 admin how much did lando pay u to say that?

⤷ mclaren 🤫

oscarpiastri williams take her back she keeps slapping my hat across the room

logansargeant you literally told me you're only here to get max’s autograph and sell it on ebay?

⤷ yourusername ok and?

⤷ maxverstappen1 poster or hat?

⤷ yourusername both please 🫶

⤷ maxverstappen1 bring a pen

⤷ username7 what have i just read?

⤷ maxverstappen1 im supporting y/n's financial endeavours?

[ridleymocki]

(seeing so many bad faith interpretations of the argument, y'all are really going to make me do this, okay HERE WE GO)

.................................

What Ed says: "I think last night was a mistake. I'm not ready for... Whatever this is."

What Ed means: "I didn't want last night to happen so soon or under those circumstances. Things are changing rapidly, which makes me feel out of control and scared."

What Stede hears: "I regret sleeping with you. I don't want the sort of relationship that you're after."

.................................

What Stede says: "It was a fine fish. It was... whatever. I was just trying to make you feel good!"

What Stede means: "I only cared about the fish because you cared about it, and I care about you. I liked the fish because it made you happy. Ordinarily, I'm ambivalent about fish."

What Ed hears: "I lied to you. I didn't care about your achievement I was just placating you to get what I wanted."

.................................

What Ed says: "Here's the news: I'm leaving. I got a job on a little fishing boat and I'm leaving. I'm a fisherman now."

What Ed means: "I think I need to be away from you to figure out who I am, because I haven't been able to do that while we're together, and your lifestyle now is the life I'm trying to leave behind."

What Stede hears: "I've made a decision to leave you and have a life without you. I don't value what we have enough to work with you to find a solution, I'd prefer to end it."

.................................

What Stede says: "Oh, Ed. Seriously? You're not a fisherman."

What Stede means: "I think you're using this plan to escape and avoid your problems. It sounds like you're pretending to be someone else. It seems to me like an impulsive decision and I am concerned."

What Ed hears: "I don't support this ambition. I think you're incapable. I don't think you can be different from what you have always been."

.................................

This is the kind of analysis done in therapeutic environments. When I put what they mean, it's not just a rephrasing but a boiling down to the core issue. I could go on to the rest of the dialogue but do you see the continuing ship-in-the-night miscommunication?? It's tripartite:

failing to express one's current emotional reality with the most accurate and clear language, often because that reality is not fully understood to oneself,

misinterpreting the other's language, due to preexisting sensitivities and defensiveness about one's own understanding of the situation,

increasing frustration and sense of personal attack that results from those misinterpretations, which perpetuates and worsens the poor communication.

Importantly, this kind of pattern means you miss the best and most important kernels of communication in an exchange because you're reacting to the more inflammatory parts.

Stede: "This can be whatever we want it to be." (I am willing to make changes to our arrangement so that you're happy). Ed: "I don't even know who I am! Alright? I know I don't want to be a pirate. And you, you're blowing up, you're the toast of the town." (I think we want different things. You're just starting a journey that I've already finished).

With those two bits alone they could've sorted this out. The first is the answer to the second. But they didn't -- couldn't -- latch onto it because all their other baggage was getting in the way.

And I'm being proven correct that this is what is happening, because I have seen next to nothing on here about the above two lines, only reactionary takes of fans also focusing on the inflammatory parts because of their predispositions. You're doing an encore performance of what they're doing.

Point being, there are no bad guys in this scene, just repeated system failure!

[unveilandresist]

Got a glimpse of where we're at as a country medically via the r/nursing subreddit. People are really not okay and it's deeply scary. 'Letting it rip' when it comes to covid is killing thousands and disabling millions. With the latter, here's what it looks like:

Nurses saying they are seeing ear infections in kids all the time secondary to other illnesses (or routinely in adults which they have never seen before), nurses saying their hospitals are overrun by flus, rsv, norovirus, mycoplasma pneumonia. many people saying they went to the doctor sick as a dog and came out with 3 different illness diagnoses at the same time or that they and their kids get sick over and over and over. it is not normal for this to happen. we were lied to about covid, y'all.

have you and the people around you been physically as well this last year or two as they were in 2019?

If you didn't know, as a lot of people don't - covid makes you immunocompromised. It damages the immune system, blood vessels and organ systems. It's a vascular infection, not a cold. the more infections you get, the worse it is. In the lab it's considered a level 3 pathogen (categories are for risk level/safety protocols), in the same category as tuberculosis. People are being treated with IVIG, because it's for immunocompromised people.

Also there is improper preparation and tracking for a h5n1 (type of bird flu) that has a very real chance of evolving to become a pandemic this and/or next flu season. they are finding it in wastewater all over the country, someone in Louisiana is in critical condition with it. Flu vaccine provides partial protection to it so I'd highly recommend getting that this and next winter.

Following epidemiologists is really important and helpful. The government wants you to go to work and think things are normal so they don't have to send you another check - they are not invested in our collective wellness (in fact, they take tons of lobbying money from insurance companies invested in keeping you sick). With some of these folks saying it is taking them weeks to recover from the flu, I wonder if some of it isn't bird flu, though it could be just being significantly immunocompromised.

fwiw masks work. I haven't gotten as much as a cold in years. well fitting kn95s and n95s protect you. even if you can't wear one at work, wear one to the doctor, at the grocery store and pharmacy. it would really help disabled people in general too.

[tanadrin]

could you elaborate, why do you believe that people online continue to talk about the flint water crisis as if it were still active? Is it just ignorance of the solution or are there ongoing health issues?

i mean i think people do that bc "everything is fucked and nothing ever gets better" is a genre of post that tickles the limbic system, and in the attention economy of the internet, anything that tickles the limbic system tends to do well, bc it produces engagement. outrage, and outrage-adjacent things, and cliches like "why is no one talking about [major news article everyone is talking about]" and "don't get excited about apparently-good-thing X, here's why it's actually just as bad as [completely different thing it is in no way just as bad as]" and all that other stuff.

and because negativity and outrage--even negativity with no underlying substance--makes a bigger splash than positive stuff with real underlying substance, continuing to repeat "flint doesn't have clean water" (a crisis that did genuinely drag on for a very long time!) has more salience than the news that flint's water problem was fixed (something that took a long time when it finally was properly tackled and didn't generate a single large headline).

there's kind of a similar dynamic in climate news actually, where genuine improvements in areas like energy storage and clean energy rollout and new nuclear permitting don't make a dent in people's narrative that everything is fucked and we're making no progress because IPCC forecasts about what would happen if we hit 4 degrees of warming are genuinely very bad and scary (and, thankfully, no longer on the table!), whereas the boring policy details of stuff in the Inflation Reduction Act, or China's continuing expansion of EV manufacturing are, well... boring. although climate news is different in other ways--like, the planet will continue to warm until carbon emissions are net negative, so even as we make progress on that issue the crisis continues. it's not all good news. but there is good news there, which just gets much less traction online bc of the dynamics of how news works on the internet.

needless to say, though, i think if you want to have an accurate understanding of the world you need to internally mentally check your own tendency to succumb to engagement bait like this. worst case scenario you fall into a doom loop, which i think is pretty unhealthy just in general. but if you notice somebody post something compelling, and you click on their username, and it turns out that all they post is about how the world is fucked, and nothing good ever happens, and we're all gonna die, i think you should be suspicious of them and their motives. not because doomposting is inherently manipulative or deceptive--a lot of people genuinely are doomers! but that doesn't mean they're not responding to the limbic incentives of social media, either. after all, if you too express nothing but pessimism and outrage, then the people addicted to pessimism and outrage will applaud you for being Very Serious and give you lots of engagement and attention, and you will react accordingly.

and also, you know. some people do just lie on the internet for attention. that is absolutely a thing that happens. i am not inclined to bend over backwards to try to reconstruct a generous framing of those lies where maybe people somehow are under the mistaken impression that there is some ongoing sub-problem affecting flint that they have mistaken for being isomorphic to the original crisis. some of them are just liars!

[nothorses]

You've made a lot of really great posts about transmasc experiences and struggles, and they really resonate with me! So I guess I want to in complete earnest ask: why the push for 'transandrophobia' when anti-transmasculinity as a term has been around for longer and faces little friction by comparison? I don't really *dislike* transandrophobia, but its meaning gets muddied everywhere from different directions, while ATM is pretty direct and succinct I feel. It's very clear that it's about TRANSmasculine oppression. I'm not against having a dedicated term at all, but the content of our struggles gets lost in the weeds of attaching kind of understandably divisive terms like misandry and androphobia in an attempt to mirror a phenomenon very specifically about misogyny; it seems more trouble than it's worth considering ATM is right there

I'll be honest, this ask is confusing to me for a few reasons.

When I started talking about transandrophobia around the summer of 2020, the conversations I was encountering were very much, like, a handful of people across Twitter and Tumblr (literally, a handfull!). I picked up "transandrophobia" because it was one of two words I saw in use, and the other- "transmisandry"- felt much less clear and much more contentious. It seemed super obvious to me that people would draw a line from "men's rights activists" trying to push this idea that "misandry", as a systemic oppression of men by women, to "transmisandry", and assume some ill intent where there was none. It's confusing!

"Transandrophobia" was the better of two options being floated at the time, at least in any conversation I saw. "Anti-transmasculinity" was not really a term I'd been made aware of, if anyone at all was talking about it at the time.

I have seen people pick up "anti-transmasculinity" more recently (maybe in the last year?), and this is definitely the first I've seen someone shorten it to "ATM". The people I've seen use that term have been mostly people who seem really new to the conversation, and the vibe I've gotten has been very, like, "we're the Good Transmascs, our word isn't dirty and gross like those other Bad Transmascs everyone hates. you'll listen to us now that our word is Good and Pure, right?"

Which is like... kind of frustrating, and kind of sad, honestly. I think these people honestly believe that if they just choose the right word, all the people who've been dragging me and every other transmasc talking about these issues through the mud for the last 4 years or so will really just stop & listen. If they can just say it right, these people- who have been relentlessly harassing and spreading lies about every single transmasc who came before them for years now- will care what they have to say, and will be willing to engage with them in earnest, compassionate dialogue.

If you just find the right word, all of these people will care about your hurt, your pain, and the suffering of your community.

It kind of breaks my heart. It's an incredibly hopeful, kind, loving way to view the world. It's compassion and patience and forgiveness that these folks are not being given, but that they so badly want to offer to others.

And at the same time, it sucks to be the Bad Transmasc. It sucks to have fought so hard for so long, and for the people I've been fighting for all this time to turn around and say, "you're gross, and dirty, and evil, and everything you've done is a mistake." It sucks to see the people I've been fighting for agree with the people I've been fighting against, and shove me under the bus in an effort to appeal to the people running me over with it. Knowing that the bus is going to aim for them once it's done with me just makes it sadder, yknow?

@saint-speaks wasn't the first person to ever speak the word "transandrophobia", but he is the one who coined and popularized it in its current form. And then he was dragged through the mud so hard and so brutally that some people think I coined it, just because when I defended him (too little and too late, imo) I withstood the mud-dragging better than he did (and gee, I wonder white.)

And now people take for granted that everything everyone said about hymn to justify that frankly fucking evil harassment campaign was true, actually, and we should abandon the word he coined and find one with purer origins.

If you honestly think "anti-transmasculinity" is just a more practical word, that's fine. I don't care what word we use. But they're going to cover it in mud, too. They're going to cover every one of you in mud.

Will you keep fighting for "ATM" once they make it the new dirty, gross, bad, evil word? Will you keep fighting when they drag you and everyone else through the mud for using it? Or will you agree with them, make up a new word, and never look back?

Please don't let us drown in the mud. We've been fighting for you, and we want to fight with you. Please.

[reasonsforhope]

Some things that make me hopeful: That HIV/AIDS could be on the path to eradication via medical advancements, and that a lot of cancers are becoming "chronic treatable illness" rather than terminal illnesses. That vaccine development is as good as it is, and could be better. In short I find it inspiring that as harmful as our current healthcare system can be at some points, despite that, we're successfully fighting stuff that was often in history seen as inevitable or fate. Medical advances are slow but steady.

That for as bad as AI is in many ways, there are very promising developments with small, specialized machine learning models to serve as "second eyes" to assist humans in hyper-detailed tasks with bad outcomes if the human misses - e.g. detecting cancer in pathology samples, spotting tornado development in severe storms on radar. Accessibility is also getting a boost - text readers for Blind/visually impaired people and sound alerts/notifications for Deaf/hearing impaired people are improving, as is translation software for people who are not good natural language learners. That between solar, wind, nuclear, and even possibly the development of batteries that are less environmentally impacting/dangerous than Li-Ion, we may well start turning the tide on fossil fuels' damage to the planet. Walkable cities aren't a joke but an actual field of development and study, and there's actual work on public transit and moving away from dependence on cars in many places. On a social level, that, while, yes, it seems like the US and some other countries are going backwards for the time being - that it's very unlikely those advances will be forever lost worldwide. More people than ever are for LGBTQIA+ freedoms and rights, more people than ever are against at least the most overt and harmful displays of bigotry and racism and sexism even if they aren't perfect, etc. And this might be a bit controversial, but the decline of compulsory religious practice in much of the world. That you can choose your faith and how you display it, or choose to have no faith or anywhere in between would have seemed entirely impossible to people even 100 years ago in a lot of places and now, that's a given human right pretty much everywhere but the most restrictive theocracies and hyper-traditionalist families.

Hopeful things!! Thanks for sharing!!

[starlightshadowsworld]

Notice how we have yet to hear of any Hamas deaths.

We've yet to see a body that has been identified as one of them.

Because you and I both know that would be all over the news... And yet, nothing.

19 days (as of today, 26.10.2023)

Over 6000 bombs dropped since 7th October.

7000 Palestinians killed by Israel.

And not one has been identified as a member of Hamas.

You expect to me believe a country with one of the funded military in the world.

Who has one of the most sophisticated surveillance systems in the world.

Simply can't find them?

We have yet to see one of them killed.

What we are seeing are the bodies of civilians, of men, women and children.

We are seeing doctors plead for fuel because premature babies in incubators desperately need it to stay alive.

Of elderly who refuse to leave their homes because they remember the last time they did and haven't been able to return.

We're seeing parents identifying their children and children identifying their parents.

If this was simply all about getting rid of Hamas, why are they not trapped under the rubble?

Why is it that the areas targeted are refugee camps, hospitals, schools, mosques, churches.

All places that are reported to be sheltering civilians.

We hear numbers of deaths, of how they've killed X many people (and a lot of lies about that.)

How this bomb needs to drop because that's who the IDF are fighting, it isn't about civilians.

But it's the civilians who are being killed.

Because it isn't about getting rid of Hamas.

It's about erasing the Palestinians off the earth.

They are targeting areas sheltering civilians.

They are targeting areas outside of Gaza like the West Bank.

Places where Hamas does not operate.

Because it isn't about them, it never was.

They poked a bear with a stick for 75 years and the second it bit back, it was the perfect excuse to kill it.

And market themselves as the victim to the rest of the world.

This is not a war.

It's an ethnic cleansing.

It's a genocide.

[usagiarchive]

love. — jing yuan x reader.

나의 작은 마음도, 그 안에 작은 파도처럼, 부서지고 밀려와선, 네게 녹아내리고, 그제서야 보이는 나의 영원.

sypnosis. [ 1.1k words. fluff + sfw. ] — the usual weekend trip with your lover turns into an unexpected, but welcome surprise.

usagi's note: àirén - my love (or quite literally the person i love) xīngān - darling, heart, or my humanity

“Are you ready to go?”

You nod as he reaches out to take your hand carry for you, giving him your hand as he lets you step into the starskiff first.

It had been tradition, since the two of you started dating, that every weekend, you would have a date night, every two weeks, a whole day together, doing whatever, as long as you spent it with each other, and every three months, you would go on a weekend trip.

This was established to work around both your busy schedules, with you working as a full time healer in the Alchemy Commission and with him always at the Seat of Divine Foresight.

This weekend, he was the one to choose this time and he decided to take a drive to an island beach four system hours away from the Luofu.

As soon as you took off, your lover made sure you were comfy and okay.

“You should take a nap,” he tells you, “I'll get us there, besides, I know you took Li Meng’s graveyard shift last night,”

The tone of his voice betrays little, but you know he's scolding you for putting others before yourself again.

“I know, I know, her daughter had a fever and no one could take care of Xiao Ying,” you say, snuggling into the soft, fluffy blanket he draped over you the moment you were buckled in.

“Sleep, Àirén,” he leans in to give you a kiss on your forehead, “I'll wake you when we're there,”

He does not wake you up.

Or maybe he did and you didn't get up, because the moment you open your eyes again, you're already settled into the bed of the villa he rented.

You hear him tinkering away with something in a different room, so you get up and look for him.

You find him in the walk in closet fiddling with both your clothes and putting them up in hangers.

Quietly, you sneak up on him and hug him from behind.

You feel him chuckle, “How's your sleep, my love?” he asks as he puts his hand on top of yours and draws circles on it.

“Had a really good nap,” you rasp, “Why didn't you wake me up?”

He detaches and turns around, booping your nose then cradling your face, “I did, you wouldn't wake up, so I carried you in,”

You pull him into a hug again and snuggle his chest, “Mm, okay,”

The two of you stay there for a moment, with him hugging you back, one hand on the small of your back while the other the back of your head.

“How about we go and have dinner, Àirén?” he asks, and when you nod, he pulls back, takes your hand, and leaves a kiss.

“I'll be wearing cream,” you tell him and he smiles, “I know, I packed a matching one,”

You smile back and he gives you a kiss on your forehead, “I'll leave you to get ready then.”

Jing Yuan never skimps out on dinner. Ever.

Especially so when he's with you, which rings true when you then find out that the restaurant he brings you to was one he rented out the entire outdoor deck for the two of you.

Again, as always, he reassures you that it's simply for privacy considering his position as the Luofu Arbiter General, but you know better than that.

You roll your eyes at him with a smile as he gives your intertwined hands a kiss.

The view was wonderful, the outdoor deck overlooked the beach with the orange-pink hued sunset, the breeze was cool, and it was really quiet, save for the crashing of the waves.

“It's beautiful,” you say in awe.

Jing Yuan squeezes your hand, admiring how pretty the sunset reflects on you, “Yes, it truly is beautiful,” he whispers.

The dinner goes as planned, the two of you had wine, ate really good food, then headed back to the villa.

Of course, you didn't forget to update Yanqing on what was happening (the boy worries, okay?) and sent him what he calls a “proof-of-life” picture. Yuan was sure to send him plenty.

Other than that, the night was really peaceful, the two of you snuggled together on the bed, reading books, nothing out of your usual routine.

And as always, Yuan falls asleep first and you have to stifle your cuteness aggression with how he looks. You snap a few photos to Yanqing before telling him to go to bed.

He replies with pictures of paperwork, followed by ‘as soon as i finish this i will >n<’.

You smile and put both your books away before tucking yourself into bed with him, too.

Jing Yuan wakes without you beside him, and for a moment he panics. He's always the first to rise on weekend vacations, or on the off chance that he does not, you wake him to have breakfast together.

His worries were quelled when he sees you outside in your sleepwear, reading a book.

He walks into the closet and pulls out a shawl before getting out to join you.

“It's cold,” he says as he drapes the fabric around you, “I don't want you to get sick,”

You give him a soft smile and sink onto his side as he sits next to you. He wraps a hand around your shoulder and pulls you close. The two of you sit like that, just watching the ocean wake up as the sun rises.

Suddenly, Jing Yuan says your name and you look up at him.

He pulls away from the hug and gives you a kiss on the forehead.

“I want to spend the rest of my life with you,” he starts, and immediately your lips part in shock.

“You helped me in the times I was in my lowest, you helped me raise Yanqing, and you've become such an integral part of my life it would be a mistake not to do this,”

He pulls out a simple gold band from his pocket.

“I've spent most of my life with you, and now I want to keep living it with you,”

There were no questions needed to be asked, he knew, and you knew, too.

With a smile and a sigh, you bury your face in his neck and nod, “Yes, I would like to spend the rest of my life with you, too, Xīngān,”

Your now fiancé pulls you back and slips the ring on your finger then cradles your face.

“May I please kiss you?”

You lean forward as your answer.

BONUS:

usagi's note: im so happy i survived omg guys, i only have one presentation left then my finals THEN IM FREE. like our holiday break spans until the 3rd week of january. aaaa r u guys proud of me ?? also i love 'love.' by w2e, i like calm songs and ive always liked calm wedding proposals, i am TOTALLY projecting okay bye!!

@usagiarchive 2024. do not repost, translate, or use for AI.

[alex99a]

The Universe is Amazing !!!

If you go outside on a clear evening and look to the northern sky, this is what you will see.

Polaris, the "North Star" is actually a triple star system composed of the bright supergiant Polaris Aa which is in orbit with the dimmer Polaris Ab and Polaris B. Situated less than 1° away from the north celestial pole, Polaris is currently our "pole star" over the North pole and is useful for navigation.

At this time of year (we're getting on toward fall as I post this) if you look to the approximately 7 o'clock position you will see two stars in a line aimed nearly directly at Polaris. These are the stars Merak and Dubhe which form the front of the "bowl" of the asterism (what we used to call constellation) The Big Dipper. The Dipper rotates slowly around Polaris over the course of the year with those two stars always pointing at it. So, you can tell the time of year (absent other clues of course) by where The Big Dipper lies in relation to Polaris.

The Universe Is Amazing !!!

(editor Alex here. For all the people accusing me of being a Nazi because of the unfortunate resemblance of the above illustration, I suppose if you have evil in your heart you ascribe evil to others. Why not keep it to yourself.)

[thebreakfastgenie]

I really fear the takeaway from Trump's successes are, democracy rewards mindless obedience more than independent thinking. Republicans ruthlessly stamp out dissent and got a rock solid voter base. Democrats tried to encourage critical thinking and questioning convention and only enabled ratfucking splinter groups and grifters.

I mean, yeah, democracy rewards a party that can make its voter base turn out unfailingly every single time. If you encourage your voter base to think critically, sooner or later they're going to question you. And you want that, in theory, for moral accountability and all that. The problem is that people lose perspective and forget that dissent is all well and good but there are situations where you need to put on a united front, like elections.

One underrated aspect of Republicans' ability to maintain a solid voter base is that hate is part of their platform. Rabid bigots are willing to ignore a lot of other stuff to vote for the people who not only hate the same people they do but actively validate their hatred. That's why Trump ran those horrible transphobic ads in Pennsylvania. I think it's also why the Republicans have just continued going full steam ahead on being openly racist and found success that way. Democrats can't do that, because fundamentally their platform is not based on hate, so they can't appeal to that same psychology. Democrats have tried it with the populist hating rich people thing and that hasn't worked out and you can talk about hating the bigots but it's still not as effective.

Democracy basically rewards the lowest common denominator. It's just harder to get people to hear and respond to complex and often boring truths than it is to concise and sensational lies. This has always been a problem but social media has amplified it. And let's face it, "we are always striving to be better" is a more responsible but less appealing mentality than "we have god on our side." I'm not necessarily saying this was great, but for a while there was a certain veneer of class expected from both parties, which leveled the playing field somewhat. Republicans have become the party of the mean and dumb. They're not just appealing to the mean and dumb, that's who a lot of actual Republican elected officials are.

The only way to avoid mindless obedience in a democracy is to get your citizens to use their minds. Often mindless disobedience is mistaken for critical thinking. We all hate the Electoral College (as we should) and that specific system was a compromise no one especially wanted but everyone could live with, but there's a reason some of the framers were hesitant about direct elections. You're counting on the public to be informed and think for themselves and exercise good judgment. That is a tremendous amount of faith to place in people and as we're seeing now, it doesn't always pay off. I can't convince myself there's an acceptable alternative to democracy so I have to continue to believe the public is capable of better. It can be very demoralizing, though.

[amememightywarrior]

Food in Dawntrail

Gonna go ahead and share my thoughts on it as posted on twitter, excuse the format!

I found the prevalence of food in DT's MSQ very interesting. In a lot of cultures, food and food-sharing are acts of love both familial and neighborly. It also symbolized a desire to reach out and understand one another, from xibruq pibil to tacos to ice cream to weird grapes.

Our first encounter with food in DT is when Wuk Lamat wants to give us some tacos, but then BJJ smashes them carelessly, a sign that he is rejecting sharing and love

During the lay of repast, which is ALL about food, we learn a lot about the symbolism of meals and food and culture. It's great. 

Zoraal Ja and Bakool Ja Ja are teamed up and shown to not understand or care about food and sharing despite the BLATANT emphasis on it in the trial.

More subtle stuff that isn't called out is the way food is raised - like the Crystarium, where wandering around can reveal the importance, if you wander around DT you can find an example of what's called the three sisters method of farming.

For those unfamiliar with this system, it's actually a very culturally important method of farming in the americas where 3 staple crops, maize, squash, and beans, are grown together in a harmonious fashion. and i mean TOGETHER.

The maize, which grows tall and strong, provides support for the beanstalks which curl around it and provide stabilization both physically and nutritionally. At their feet grows the ground-covering squash which shades the soil, keeping it moist and preventing weeds.

The next major time we learn of food and agriculture is in heritage found, where we see people preserving real food as an act of culture more than anything else, showing the resilience of culture and the spirit of sharing in even the most lightning riddled situations.

After that it gets interesting. The concept of food in S9 is abstracted into the absurd (the grapes??? help), but they still share the food. More than that, it's a SPECTATOR sport, seeing WoL and Wuk Lamat eat. If you've ever been to a dinner with a family of a different culture, you will know the experience of tasting a new cuisine for the first time, and people asking you what you think of it. They share their culture with you and hope you approve. It's the sharing of joy, and it's the same as when you eat in S9.

Then we're REALLY challenged. We enter living memory and find the inhabitants feasting on the mere idea of food. They share with us as well, giving us popcorn. Did you lie and say it was great? Did you speak the truth of your tastebuds and reject the popcorn?

The food in living memory is tasteless to us, the only real ones in the place. But the act of sharing, that was the real important part. And so perhaps if WoL lied, it was not to spare feelings, but to show that yes, they were sharing in joy and culture.

Thus introduced, we are hit with that ice cream. We know it tastes of nothing, but we give it to Krile and her parents to share. Krile knows it doesn't taste like anything, and she struggles. But G'raha zips in with his own, to make her laugh and help her understand the joy.

The way each character reacts to food within DT is symbolic and shows a bit of their own perspectives. Someone who's very out on the edges, Estinien, is also someone who has embraced food very heavily after being freed from Nidhogg. He runs around eating everything in sight now.

And of course we also have the cornservant, who wants to feed everyone. I haven't actually done that quest line yet but I can already tell you what's at the heart of it XD

A lot of this we all know, I'm just calling it out specifically because it was beautifully done in DT.

Oh, before I forget: Otis and Gulool Ja

Otis, despite being, er...mechanical, has been feeding Gulool Ja. It is a familial act, feeding and helping this child grow despite zero relation.

is it just another fetch quest? Another shared meal of many shared meals in the field? Or is it asking us to look at this meal in the context of all that came before it?

What does it mean to love and care for one another? Otis shows it by being there and feeding Gulool Ja.

It contrasts with two other parties: Cahciuna's group, and Zoraal Ja.

Zoraal Ja does nothing. He does not feed his child. Abandoned him outright. ZJ rejects family, love, and sharing.

Cahciuna's group is trying really hard to take care of him, and he does allow it because they keep finding and taking him home. But why does he run away to eat with Otis? Cahciuna's response to realizing he WANTS to leave is to allow it instead of insisting.

I find that rather mysterious but I think it shows Gulool Ja prefers organic sharing, not S9 where everything is simply handed to him. Hopefully we see more of him in the future so we can learn wtf is up with this little blue-scaled cutie.

Food takes a background role in a lot of stories but DT took it, explained it, and then challenged our understanding by taking away the most talked about component, stripping away flavor to ask us what the point of food-sharing really is and how it reflects ourselves & our culture.

We've seen a lot of these themes before - ARR used to have a whole thing about feeding the soldiers before the assault on the garlean strongholds, SHB had the infamous rhon ron food stand scene, etc

we just got it called out repeatedly and the concept gently deconstructed for us in DT. 

So. what does the act of food-sharing mean to you? What does it mean to your WoL? How did you see the Lay of Repast? What did you think of the popcorn?