#Sneers.

[hinamie]

self-indulgent sukuna sheet

[canisalbus]

[theabigailthorn]

people sometimes ask if I'd ever consider becoming a university professor and I'm like yeah sure I'd love to do a shit-tonne of unpaid busywork in the sexual harassment factory just so some cis guy can plagiarise my work while my debt-crushed students get arrested for daring to question why their fees are being invested in weapons companies

[tanadrin]

The Marx Understander: We should be voting blue harder

correct. sitting in your room jerking it to fantasies of a revolution that has no leaders, no organizational infrastructure, and no strategy is not more historically progressive than participating in electoral politics. revolutions don't spontaneously self-organize. the revolutionary left in the United States is fragmentary and riven with internecine feuds, and uses abstentionism as an excuse for its irrelevance. anytime somebody suggests that milieu might not be a tenable vehicle for large-scale political change, somebody leans back in their chair, sneers, and offers some cutting remark with zero substance that functions solely to indicate that cool kids don't vote, cool kids don't team up with liberals, cool kids don't care about large-scale effectiveness, they only care about the incestuous world of far-left politics.

they have no substantive defense of their behavior, of course. if they did, they would be able to offer a defense besides repeating Democratic campaign slogans in increasingly mocking tones to indicate their disapproval. the "far left" in american politics these days really is just an unpleasant, cliquish social club on the internet. and once you notice how their model for politics is Mean Girls, how they have no style of communication that isn't dripping with irony so they don't actually have to make a positive claim that they might have to defend, how they have zero ambitions beyond their extremely insular world, it becomes impossible to ignore.

[mylordshesacactus]

Okay, I didn't want to clog up the notes of someone else's post with something tonally different because that's rude, but. I Need to elaborate some more about no-kill vs open-intake shelters because I feel like some people still don't get it.

I'm gonna use an example here: My cat, Nepenthe, came from a small municipal open-intake shelter (I don't use the term "kill shelter" because I think it's obscene and cedes ground to ARA fuckwits for no reason) in an area with a NOTORIOUSLY awful stray cat problem.

She was on the euthanasia list. She was next in line on the euthanasia list.

They would never have been cruel or manipulative enough to say it that baldly, of course, but...I can read. Status was "at rsk", with two days' grace before ticking over into "extreme risk", the red zone. The ones who have had the most time, the most chance, if the shelter ever runs out of cage space.

I have gone the fuck off on people who hear that and immediately assume I will tolerate them bashing or insulting that shelter.

Because here's the thing about Penny. She is my baby, my darling, light of my life, and if I hadn't come along, euthanizing her would have been not only necessary but an ethical obligation.

She was neurotic, traumatized, and unpredictably aggressive--not "I'm bad at feline body language and ignoring her subtle back-off signals" unpredictable, I mean "we showed footage to a professional feline behaviorist and their immediate reaction was 'oh that is NOT normal'" unpredictable. "Actual legitimate psychological problems" unpredictable. The previous three times she had met with potential adopters, she attacked them unprovoked and had to be recaptured by a vet tech wearing a bite sleeve designed for aggressive dogs. She was the textbook definition of unadoptable.

She could not be fostered. There was absolutely no way she could live in a home with small children, or older children, or an elderly person with thin skin, or anyone who would get upset if they were clawed in the face without warning every few days.

Now, here's some math for you, keyboard warrior writing up a condescending screed about how there's Never Any Excuse for euthanizing a healthy animal:

The average length of stay in that shelter, for a healthy cat, was roughly two weeks. Which means, on average, assuming fast turnover, a single cage space in that shelter can save the lives of 24 cats every year.

Penny, when I met her, had been there for 43 days. A month and a half. Three times the average length of stay.

I love her. She has improved my life immeasurably and there is nothing I wouldn't do for her. Her life is not more valuable than the lives of the other 23 cats who might have been saved by the slot she was taking up. Euthanasia, if space had run out, would have been the only ethical option.

(Yes, obviously I DID show up and I DID choose her. But frankly? I was a grad student with a psychology degree, studying to be a therapist, living alone, no plans to have kids, a private room where she wouldn't have to interact with other people or animals, de-facto engaged to a professional animal behaviorist; I was ACTIVELY LOOKING for an edge-case project cat, and could calmly and intelligently articulate my understanding of the seriousness of her behavior and my plan for helping her. You can't count on that happening. I was a fucking unicorn.)

No-kill shelters have the INCREDIBLE luxury of deciding who to save. They have the luxury of having all the time in the world to wait. And in the meantime, what exactly do you think is happening to the other animals? The ones they DON'T pick? The ones there's no room for? Do you think they magically don't need to be surrendered anymore? Does Santa Claus find them a home, perhaps?

You can't reduce the life of an animal to math. Good, ethical no-kill shelters can be wonderful resources--either taking highly-adoptable animals from open-intake shelters to free up space as efficiently as possible, or else taking in behaviorally or medically complicated dogs who need more time to find their perfect match than open-intake shelters can give.

But if you're going to shit on open-intake shelters, you don't get to be a fucking coward about it. So here. Prove how much smarter you are.

You've run out of space. Every cage is full. The cat cannot be fostered. You've filled all your available foster slots with other cats, to buy her time. The "no-kill" shelters are full--they pulled the cats they thought they could save, and the scruffy, psychologically-unsound, adult black domestic shorthair with chronic herpes? Nobody wants her. In this world her unicorn's not coming.

She's had three times as long as every other cat here. You have given her every chance, wrote her a lovely bio, moved other cats to other shelters to keep space open so you didn't have to make this choice; but she mauled someone else today and there's a sweet, cuddly, highly-adoptable tabby with no problem behaviors being checked in right now. If you can't put that new cat somewhere it's going to be euthanized without even being given a chance, even though it is extremely adoptable and would likely find a new home within a week.

You don't have a magic wand. You can't wish a conveniently empty second shelter into existence. Every option has been exhausted.

Look me in the eye, and tell me which one dies.

[hiancii]

Laughable

[irenespring]

I will return to not stanning politicians tomorrow but watching Kamala Harris destroy Donald Trump is like a religious experience to me. She's leading him into traps to distract him into saying nonsense about crowd sizes, pointing out how he is an adjudicated rapist and convicted felon, and just nailing every question.

I am smiling So Much after a really shitty day.

Now I understand why some people start riots when they win at sports.

This is the woman who made Brett Kavanaugh cry and she is here to break Trump like he's a glass at a Jewish wedding.

[toastywindow]

Stede and Izzy scenes cause it's actually a wholesome experience watching these two do their shit without Ed for the moment

[prideprejudce]

I think alot more people would enjoy the show if they learned to see Rhaenyra and Alicent as Unreliable Narrators, and characters who are supposed to have glaring flaws and weaknesses.

Mandatory preface- There are Issues™️ with season 2 that are its own other ask- but the complaints ive seen about character assassination on both women kind of tells me ppl just wanted to see the two just GirlBossing around, not being tragic characters trapped in their own circumstances.

For Alicent specifically- she just isn't written to be Cersei 2.0, and while it was really interesting to see motherhood from cersei's point of view, its already been done!! I actually prefer seeing Alicent's mercurial clinging to and abandoning motherhood- its interesting!! She was made a mother at what- 15? An age where you truly arent mentally developed enough to raise 3 kids, AND be a child bride, AND be a queen, (AND be a lesbian).

Alicent is interesting to me because she's stunted at 15 years old, she's an adult woman who talks to and sometimes bullies her kids as if they are her peers, and is obsessed with her childhood crush(es). She hasn't built any new relationships* past the ones she was entangled with as a teenager, she's obsessed with both acting out to make SOMEONE see that shes suffering, (she's honestly pretty blatant for someone who prides themselves on being the Temperate Voice of Reason) but also to erase herself and reset to before she had to marry the king, before aemma died.

I think most of her 'bad out of character' decisions are just these two impulses winning out, her trying to force a reset, go back to a time where none of this had happened yet, when things were simpler and she had love and every day wasn't the worst day of her life™️.

She sleeps with cole, the man she thought was pretty at 15 (her last uncomplicated attraction just before it all went wrong and aemma died) -she doesnt seem to like it that much, but she does seem compelled to seek him out, esp when upset- shes obsessed with, and desperate to reconnect with Rhaenyra, her childhood best friend (and first love) and get back to where they were as kids, AND she still treats and asks her father for absolution as if he's still the only authority that matters to her just like she did at 15. Alot of her 'victim complex/bewildered they took it so far' behaviour in the plotting of rhaenyra's usurption reads to me like a teenager in over her head, she talked big game and now its real and shes panicking!! She's tragic BECAUSE she's still a teenager- so stunted shes unable to meaningfully grow up and learn to make healthier choices for herself, or move on and stop trying to grasp at the 'if i could just go back' urge.

As a mother, I think this creates an interesting dynamic as well, and I do like that in the casting even, she seems closer in age to her kids than rhaenyra does to hers. I think the contrast ppl are drawing with Alicent Protecting Her Kids in season1 compared to her giving them up in season two isn't bad writing to me, just massive differences in context. Sure she protected Aemond in driftmark, but we cant ignore that she probably felt humiliated by her husband choosing rhaenyra's side over hers in front of everyone, did it seem like a grown woman fighting for her son?? or a teenager furious with her ex winning one over her again? or both!! both sides twisted together is still interesting! When she protected Aegon from Rhaenys, is stepping in front of her son the king to protect him from the enemies dragon fire not the most romantic daydream of a deserving death a child bride could come up with?? Was it the impulse to protect the son she couldnt decide if she loved or hated, or was it to have the most heroic death possible to escape the reality that she sees coming. And if Rhaenyra hears about how Brave she was in the face of a dragons maw, and cries about it forever and feels sooo bad and regrets it til the day she dies, thats an added bonus. I think Alicent loves her kids, but is teenager selfish about HOW she loves and protects her kids, and is unable to be a mature, consistant, protective mother to them when she also sees them as having ruined her life. I think in season 2 when she 'gives them up' shes relieved, and once again following the compulsion of 'if i reset to when Rhaenyra was heir, i had no sons, and i wasn't married or queen, everything will be better'. I think theres complexity to it, i think she does love her sons and feels insane about it, but I think Alicent has been trying to Go Back in more and more Intense ways ever since she got married, and we might be giving her sanity more credit than it deserves when it comes to the need to wipe the board clean and go back to being 15.

hey anon are you trying to get married to me or what

[hexcrystals]

3000 - three thousand - anti-racist counter protestors forming a barrier around the beacon centre in newcastle, holding signs saying ‘geordies are of all colours’.

£12,000 raised by a local resident in hartlepool who wanted to show appreciation to the mosque after it was targeted.

sunderland residents joining a mass clean up after the riots, many wearing safc football shirts as they swept up broken glass and helped board up broken windows.

hundreds of people gathering in middlesbrough at 7 in the morning and bringing cleaning equipment to share so they could put the town back how it should be.

white people standing shoulder to shoulder with their neighbours of colour, vicars and rabbis and imams standing together to condemn the violence, folks offering to walk people of colour home or accompany them on public transport if they feel unsafe alone.

this is what working class northern england looks like. this is who we are. racists and fascists are not welcome here. they do not define us.

the riots are terrible. the people participating in them are scum. but do not write off my entire community as ‘stupid racist northeners in shitty post industrial towns’ when we are doing all we can and proving that that could not be further from the truth

[bruciemilf]

To this day when Jacob visits, bruce, due to force of habit, has the urge to sit on his knees by Jacob's feet

I feel like jacob used to make him "know his place" constantly by controlling many specific things

It’s very much possible!! The way I envision it, the terrible thing is that it’s all so unintentional.

The authority figures in Bruce’s life, aside from Alfred, got off on bending him till he broke. And he didn’t. And Jacob does it, but there’s no vindication in it.

He wants Bruce strong; Not docile, or submissive, or controlled. You don’t make it in Gotham without any teeth, and he helped Bruce grow his.

Joe Chill thought Bruce tragedy, but Jacob thought him fear, and one is significantly stronger than the other.

But still.

It’s the second nature of war, controlling things. Maybe a part of you doesn’t want to. The other part of you does it anyway, and that part survives. Jacob will always be half man, half war.

Bruce is in love with mankind; That, no one can dispute.

There’s just some things you don’t unlearn. Tying your shoelaces. Riding a bike. Walking, running, fighting. For Bruce, it’s always, always yearning. He wants a warmth from Jacob because that’s his mother’s blood. And Jacob can’t give it to him.

It’d make me even sadder if Damian imitated that, thinking it’s an affectionate custom, but it’s not, and Bruce is horrified.

“No— Dami, don’t do that,” he doesn’t want to see his baby kneel by him. Ever. “That’s not good.”

“Then why do you do it?”

Bruce still looks for an answer to that.

[archerdepartures116]

this is more of a silly one but hc that lqg really likes sweet flavors, like reaaaally likes sweets, but he pretends that he’s more of a sour enjoyer or whatever because sj made fun of him abt it once and now he has to suffer through eating only sour foods or something

Sometimes Bingqiu invites him over for dinner and LBH needs to make sure theres a surplus of sweets or else there be none left by the time dinner is done

[eggo-tistical]

thinking about post-yotsuba light going about his new life and never outrunning himself.

it starts out relatively innocent: adding extra sugar to his coffee in the mornings and when he realizes it he dumps the lot in the sink.

opening his mouth to say that he’s done in the shower, then closing it right back up.

having a brief conversation with the task force and getting frustrated when they don’t catch onto his point immediately.

seeing a pair of baggy jeans and a white longsleeve tee in the window of a store, walking a little faster on the street.

developing the habit of circling his hand around his other wrist like a phantom handcuff.

checking the weather report almost obsessively, staying inside if it rains.

throwing out the worn chess set in his bedroom when he can’t stand to look at it any longer.

then it gets worse; glancing at his own reflection in the mirror, dark circles underneath his eyes, before always turning off the lights whenever he’s in the bathroom.

visiting bookstores to buy armfuls of shitty ���who done it?’ mysteries, promising himself to get some reading in before sleeping, but they all end up beneath his bed as he pulls more and more all-nighters.

turning into somewhat of an adrenaline junkie, allowing his family (who are all so proud of him) or misa to rope him into day trips to amusement parks, if only to feel his heartbeat go faster and his palms start to sweat (all natural human reactions).

scrolling on his laptop and encountering this stupidly colorful ad for a dessert cafe that just opened, turning in his chair to ask a ghost if it wants to go.

curling up below the covers in the dark, twisting around absentmindedly to pose a riddle or protest another accusation, and only finding a cold dip in the mattress where L used to lie next to him.

but it’s fine. it’s fine because he’s kira, and this is his new world, and he won. he has won, alone in his room, his life, and living — he is alive, he’s sure of it. and that’s more than his equal can say.

[mod2amaryllis]

got a sneer to im

[utilitycaster]

truly the constant of this campaign has been "literally no one likes Ludinus Da'leth at all"

[chillhypocrite]

Working on my proportions and such. I have SUCH. A hard time drawing Colin Morgan, and I don’t know why. His weird Irish face confounds me.