#It's not... NOT what it's about??

[llatimeria]

Just finished The Santaroga Barrier by Frank Herbert (my dad likes to play audiobooks in the car on trips) and I didn't like it much (and there's quite a bit of Yikes in it, because frank herbert and the 1960s in general,) but the aspect I found most interesting was the concept of like. A world's subconscious desire to kill The Other.

In the book an investigator visits a small cultish town in order to investigate it for a market study after a few other researchers mysteriously died. he gets into a frightening number of "accidents" while he's there (like the former investigators) and starts believing that there was a conspiracy among the townsfolk and all of them were intentionally trying to murder him.

tl;dr, it turns out it actually was a subconscious yet intense phobia/hatred they had of The Outside they had as part of their personal traumas, childhood indoctrination into their local cult, and the LSD-like drug they were constantly on. They didn't mean the investigator any harm, if anything they were extremely welcoming, kind, well-meaning people, but this background radiation of fear and rage kept making them accidentally do things to kill him - mixing up insecticide and spices in his food, gas fumes being pumped in his hotel room after a botched maintenance job, a torn carpet tripping him off the railing of the balcony, and Many Other subtle attempts on his life that he just happened to avoid by sheer chance.

But all the townsfolk don't really think anything of it - the town doctor, especially skeptical, "diagnoses" him as "accident-prone" until the investigator begs and pleads with him for days after several brutal accidents in a row, and only then does the doctor start believing him but even then only comes up with the theory that all of this supposed malice towards the investigator is "subconscious" - later shown to likely be correct when the investigator himself, after overdosing on their special drug, "accidentally" shoves his colleague off a roof, killing him, but the investigator physically cannot see it as anything but an accident anymore. it simply doesn't reach his mind that he killed a former friend of his. it was just an accident. he just fell, all on his own.

the idea of A Town That Wants To Kill You, But It's Nothing Personal resonated with me from the perspective of being a disabled person, especially one in a generally welcoming, accepting environment. when you're disabled, not a lot of people will come to you bearing their ableism between their teeth. They'll be nice, insensitive maybe, but nice, and are often outwardly willing to accomodate you. But they also stick out their leg as you're walking along to trip you. They'll apologize, and you'll maybe even believe it, even though to you, from your perspective, it was obviously an attempt to harm you. You excuse it once, maybe twice, but after a point, you realize that this world, this community you have entered, is actively hostile towards you and everyone like you. so you start screaming it to the rooftops. you tell authorities that the world wants to hurt you, but they begin affixing labels to you like "paranoid" or "anxious". they know no one actually has it out for you, personally, after all. that would be ridiculous.

but you still keep getting tripped down the stairs. the rat poison and the sugar at your favorite coffee shop still keep getting mixed up, but only when it's your order. in the hospital, recovering from your previous "accidents", a nurse will still accidentally pump you full of saline instead of medicine.

after a point, doesn't the fact that all of these are "accidents", and that no one WANTS to kill you, just... stop mattering a little bit? Yeah, no one wants to hurt you, but they just keep doing it. They keep making stupid little mistakes. They know everyone like you who has visited their community has died or been seriously injured under suspicious circumstances, but the idea that they, themselves, could be a little bit at fault just doesn't even register to them. they don't even consider that they might have to change their ways in order to protect people like you. After all, you can't prepare for every "freak accident". Even when the solution could be as simple as "stop putting rat poison next to the sugar", every time it happens to you, or a person like you, it's just an "accident", that no one "meant" any harm, and "nothing could be done".

it doesn't cross their mind that a string of unfortunate accidents ceases to be accidents, but serious negligence. it can't cross their mind, because they're not the victims here. they only even begin to acknowledge something might be wrong when the victims are screaming in their face, day after day. even then, they come to the conclusion that even if you're right, and the community does want to kill you because you are Other, they won't immediately see anything wrong with that. To Them, the answer is clear as day: just become one of Them, and you'll be safe. They take care of their own.

[foolfortune]

[never-quite-buried]

Nope now it’s at the point that i’m shocked that people off tt don’t know what’s going down. I have no reach but i’ll sum it up anyway.

SCOTUS is hearing on the constitutionality of the ban as tiktok and creators are arguing that it is a violation of our first amendment rights to free speech, freedom of the press and freedom to assemble.

SCOTUS: tiktok bad, big security concern because china bad!

Tiktok lawyers: if china is such a concern why are you singling us out? Why not SHEIN or temu which collect far more information and are less transparent with their users?

SCOTUS (out loud): well you see we don’t like how users are communicating with each other, it’s making them more anti-american and china could disseminate pro china propaganda (get it? They literally said they do not like how we Speak or how we Assemble. Independent journalists reach their audience on tt meaning they have Press they want to suppress)

Tiktok users: this is fucking bullshit i don’t want to lose this community what should we do? We don’t want to go to meta or x because they both lobbied congress to ban tiktok (free market capitalism amirite? Paying off your local congressmen to suppress the competition is totally what the free market is about) but nothing else is like TikTok

A few users: what about xiaohongshu? It’s the Chinese version of tiktok (not quite, douyin is the chinese tiktok but it’s primarily for younger users so xiaohongshu was chosen)

16 hours later:

Tiktok as a community has chosen to collectively migrate TO a chinese owned app that is purely in Chinese out of utter spite and contempt for meta/x and the gov that is backing them.

My fyp is a mix of “i would rather mail memes to my friends than ever return to instagram reels” and “i will xerox my data to xi jinping myself i do not care i share my ss# with 5 other people anyway” and “im just getting ready for my day with my chinese made coffee maker and my Chinese made blowdryer and my chinese made clothing and listening to a podcast on my chinese made phone and get in my car running on chinese manufactured microchips but logging into a chinese social media? Too much for our gov!” etc.

So the government was scared that tiktok was creating a sense of class consciousness and tried to kill it but by doing so they sent us all to xiaohongshu. And now? Oh it’s adorable seeing this gov-manufactured divide be crossed in such a way.

This is adorable and so not what they were expecting. Im sure they were expecting a reluctant return to reels and shorts to fill the void but tiktokers said fuck that, we will forge connections across the world. Who you tell me is my enemy i will make my friend. That’s pretty damn cool.

[koobiie]

shoutout to everyone who wants to infodump but cant string together coherent thoughts to form sentences and instead just look at you like this

[miiilowo]

phenomenon

[savrenim]

......suddenly struck by the idea for a piece of worldbuilding of "fae don't like iron bc it is the most stable element*"

*as in elements higher you can extract energy via fission and lower you can extract energy via fusion but iron itself there is no excess binding energy to extract at all

[riacte]

not romantic not platonic but a secret third thing [what would happen between earth and the moon if the earth stopped spinning as illustrated by xkcd randall munroe]

[couldnt-think-of-a-funny-name]

I think we're too harsh on medieval painters because this is legitimately what some poodle mixes look like

[sillyguy-supreme]

white americans when you tell them that the idea of climate change as an impending disaster is a reductive first world perspective because it’s a tangible reality for many in the global south already:

[marlynnofmany]

If that doesn't have potential for some fairytale nonsense, I don't know what does.

[sleepygaymerdisease]

[12neonlit-stage]

you're allowed to discuss and work together, reblog for a higher sample size or something

You have 1 week, good luck!

[butchfalin]

the funniest meltdown ive ever had was in college when i got so overstimulated that i could Not speak, including over text. one of my friends was trying to talk me through it but i was solely using emojis because they were easier than trying to come up with words so he started using primarily emojis as well just to make things feel balanced. this was not the Most effective strategy... until. he tried to ask me "you okay?" but the way he chose to do that was by sending "👉🏼👌🏼❓" and i was so shocked by suddenly being asked if i was dtf that i was like WHAT???? WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME?????????? and thus was verbal again

[bakerstreet-and-beyond]

There seems to be a general malaise on most of Tumblr about TikTok getting banned in the United States.

I understand the problems, "brain rot", whatever but- A government banning a social media app that opened the world for many people is legitimately scary and upsetting. Say what you want but, there are MANY global and local issues that would not have gotten the same traction, recognition, and outreach without TikTok.

And then add to this that Meta/Facebook was one the largest lobbyists working to get TikTok banned... Like- I think folks should be more concerned about the implications of what this means, especially since the ban goes into effect the day before inauguration.

[bethfuller]

limited perception.

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