#all is as it always was

[godofallrats]

The world is a Great Wheel that grows tall and withers in equal measure. All things ride its turnings; ruling for a time flowering and splendid, fruits of life's magnificence. Then we grow old and stagnate, returning to the hungry earth to nurture the next cycle. In this way we live our lives in eternal change, becoming more then less then more again. Life can be found in all things here, it permeates the very foundations of existence. Tis not for us to judge when wild animals tear at one another, or great oaks take root in corpse dross, or fungi enslave whole colonies of social insects.

Naturally this makes a bridge between the ephemeral and flesh, as much between wilderness and civilization. Death hungers for life, just as life aches to pass its time on the Wheel. Hungry Ghosts crave the sensations of the living, while living beings strain to pierce the Veil that is only a turning away. Those Wise of The Wheel seek sacred Mysteries like the Empress Hanging herself; shades clothed in flesh and speaking through beasts’ cries. They are but two sides of the same coin. A stag runs through the woods leaving a trail of blood. His flesh will sing in the stomach of the hunter and kudzu will grow along his bones. This is Its Truth, flowers blooming splendid before being plucked and pressed between the pages of the Old Ways.

Time moves forward, yes. But here, in the fullness of the Wheel, time has no true substance, for growth and decay birth one another in the same instant, there are no beginnings or ends, nor past or future. Only a cycle always moving in ceaseless cycles unto eternity.

Things happen. They always have and always will; this is how the Wheel sees Fate, markings on the spokes that signify important events but will naturally happen in the same way, just more worn. Eventually these testaments to experience will erode to the point of no longer being recognizable from their origin, but that is simply the nature of things.

Space is the movements of the Wheel itself; connections growing and dying in lockstep. Sympathy & synchronicities are simply where ourself and others have gone, and will continue to go. When Fate and Space run together in harmony they keep things going at a holistic rate; relationships cultivated then returned to the earth as right to do.

The Wheel and its Turners have gods of their own. They are primordial things, representing that which is of substance here, great hunting wolves, and leviathans of the abyssal deeps. But also, the lesser things equally of importance, the first corpse to be interred to a graveyard and the wheat seed that will eventually feed thousands; exalted as they are, for they are life clothed in death, and death clothed in life. All things have power, yet it is those who create momentum in the Wheel who are truly impactful.

I have found Timber's Wise have difficulty discerning where the line is drawn between the elemental forces & extancy; as they do with most things, we simply don't care much to ponder it though. Are the massive storms or roaring wildfire that ravage hearth and land really that different from the Wild Hunts of old? What matters to the Wheel's Truth is not in these details but rather in how it changes nothing. Of course tsunamis rip apart fishers' homes and disturb aquatic ecosystems, but new spirits join the local cycles and sediment rearranges the topsoil in peculiar ways. And those who survive another day will adapt to it all or perish.

Yet the Wheel is not as wild as it appears. The symbols and rites invoked here may be frightening to a people who have forgotten the true sacrament of sacrifice, but they are its fundament, and even the most detached city-dweller offers their own obeisance. Grinding the grain, seeding the soil, slaughtering the lamb, and brewing the beer distinguished complex creatures from the more base; they still do. Burying the dead and hoping they will be reborn to whatever next comes, we build our testaments of memoriam for those who no longer walk among us as if it matters. And in ways, it does. Both royalty and fodder, all things are the Wheel, and the Wheel is in all things.

[stimmingandstruggling]

more good news from tiktok: they’ve started blocking celebrities.

they’re calling it block party 2024. just blocking and ignoring countless celebrities who havent said shit about palestine. influencers, actors, anyone who went to the met gala, whatever, they’re getting blocked. and people keep talking about how cathartic it is, how good it feels, how they never realized they could DO that. there was some kind of subconscious law against blocking famous people, but it’s broken, and people are LOVING it. and it’s WORKING. a social media/digital advertising coordinator was talking about how ad companies are PANICKING, because they can’t accurately target anymore. so many big influencers, including fucking LIZZO started talking about palestine the MOMENT their follower counts started going down. and the best part? no one is forgiving them. lizzo posted a tiktok asking people to donate to palestinian families, and all the comments just said you’re a multimillionaire. put your money where your mouth is. blocked.

i feel like i’m witnessing the downfall of celebrity culture, right here right now. people are waking up.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

The math just adds up!

[junglejim4322]

Pdf of The Question of Palestine by Edward Said

[liquidstar]

If my mom sees a significant amount of blood she gets lightheaded, and has fainted on some occasions. Once it happened when we were kids, I wasn't there to witness it but I heard the story from my dad. Basically my brothers, around 7 or 8 at the time, were playing outside while my mom was making their lunch, and she accidentally cut her finger. It wasn't anything serious, but it drew a fair bit of blood and she passed out. My dad saw this and rushed over, but he didn't really know what to do so he just sort of started slapping her to wake her up (not recommended, but he had no idea and panicked)

At that exact moment my brothers both came in from playing, and all they saw was our mom unconscious on the floor and our dad slapping her. So, like, without even saying a word to each other they both just INSTANTLY start whaling on him, like, full blown attack mode to defend our mom. Which obviously didn't help the situation, but she did wake up and everything was fine.

Now our dad says that he's actually really glad they attacked him over what they thought was going on, because it means he raised good boys. And I still think that's true, they're very good boys.

[arctic-hands]

Every time there's a food recall that spreads from one company to the next, even from generic brands that are unique to the store selling them, it makes me realize the illusion of choice under capitalism hyped up by conservatives is a bunch of bullshit.

Oh and uh, don't drink apple juice for a while. Arsenic. And it's more than just Aldi and Walmart

[runawaymarbles]

The thing I keep coming back to, with all the *gestures expansively* is that real life doesn't have peaceful epilogues.

Every single win has to be defended. Forever. I'm sorry. It sucks. The Nazis lost until they stopped losing. The US had abortion rights, and then 50 years later it didn't. Empires fall, and then they invade other countries again. Oppressive regimes are overthrown and replaced with other oppressive regimes. You will never finish the work etc etc etc. Which is why it's so fucking important to be able to acknowledge and celebrate progress, when it happens. The people who came before you didn't put in all that work for nothing, and you aren't, either. You can't save it all for the Ultimate Victory because there is never going to be an Ultimate Victory. There's no such thing as a time when everything is good, and ours shall not be the commune of Heaven.

[kiwi]

everybodys gotta get back into the practice of using pseudonyms online... i remember the time of screen names where u never ever told anyone ur real name and that was just understood as basic internet safety. plus having a screen name is fun because sometimes it sticks so well that it becomes part of ur identity that u can use in whatever facet of ur life you choose. it rocks to pick your own name

[fleshadept]

looking at (vetted) gofundmes for people trying to escape palestine and i don't know how many of you actually click on the gofundme links you reblog but i would like to point out, for what it's worth, just how amazing it is that so many have raised so much money. it may overall feel like a drop in the ocean but the fact that several gofundmes have raised tens of thousands of dollars is amazing. it is so expensive to leave gaza right now, and people still need money after they escape. but regardless of what propaganda the US, UK, canada, and other western nations are trying to pump out, people across the world are doing what they can to help these people survive. many of them are still very far from their goals (like this one and this one and this one) and some of them are very close to high goals (like this one), and some of them have reached almost double their original goal.

and that's not even addressing direct aid or organizations that take continuous donations for distribution of food, menstrual products, etc. the PCRF has raised $16,000,000 of their target goal of $20,000,000 to fund current aid and long-term relief efforts in gaza. ANERA's febuary 13th update discusses the material ways they helped palestinians today:

(ANERA donate link)

my point is, it often feels like the world is turning a blind eye to palestine. but i would like to point out that there is an important difference between "the world" and "western political leaders and media narratives". a breathtaking amount of real people, the people who make up the world, are trying to help. in the face of israel attempting to commit genocide, the world is saying No. These people deserve to live. and literally sending millions of dollars internationally, through the internet connection that israel has desperately been trying to destroy.

it may not feel like it matters in the grand scheme of things. but to the people who get fresh clothes, or a hot meal, or blankets, or the kids who get new toys, or to the people who are able to bring their families to safety, it matters to them. go make someone's day better. i've linked so many options with ways to do that.

[valmillion]

really funny that every website is in an arms race to make itself as bad as possible and immediately someone makes a firefox extension to fix it

[pigswithwings]

above all else a trans woman is a person. above all else a trans women is a woman who goes to the same grocery store as you and buys fruits in the same grocery cart as you and goes home and eats her dinner the same as you. above all else a trans woman is a woman who dresses like you do and talks the same way you do. above all else a trans woman is a woman who wants to be cared about the same way you want to be cared about and a trans woman is a woman who makes friends the same way you make friends. above all else you should care about trans women because they are people. treat her as such.

[endusviolence]

Rowling isn't denying holocaust. She just pointed out that burning of transgender health books is a lie as that form of cosmetic surgery didn't exist. But of course you knew that already, didn't you?

I was thinking I'd probably see one of you! You're wrong :) Let's review the history a bit, shall we?

In this case, what we're talking about is the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, or in English, The Institute of Sexology. This Institute was founded and headed by a gay Jewish sexologist named Magnus Hirschfeld. It was founded in July of 1919 as the first sexology research clinic in the world, and was run as a private, non-profit clinic. Hirschfeld and the researchers who worked there would give out consultations, medical advice, and even treatments for free to their poorer clientele, as well as give thousands of lectures and build a unique library full of books on gender, sexuality, and eroticism. Of course, being a gay man, Hirschfeld focused a lot on the gay community and proving that homosexuality was natural and could not be "cured".

Hirschfeld was unique in his time because he believed that nobody's gender was either one or the other. Rather, he contended that everyone is a mixture of both male and female, with every individual having their own unique mix of traits.

This leads into the Institute's work with transgender patients. Hirschfeld was actually the one to coin the term "transsexual" in 1923, though this word didn't become popular phrasing until 30 years later when Harry Benjamin began expanding his research (I'll just be shortening it to trans for this brief overview.) For the Institute, their revolutionary work with gay men eventually began to attract other members of the LGBTA+, including of course trans people.

Contrary to what Anon says, sex reassignment surgery was first tested in 1912. It'd already being used on humans throughout Europe during the 1920's by the time a doctor at the Institute named Ludwig Levy-Lenz began performing it on patients in 1931. Hirschfeld was at first opposed, but he came around quickly because it lowered the rate of suicide among their trans patients. Not only was reassignment performed at the Institute, but both facial feminization and facial masculization surgery were also done.

The Institute employed some of these patients, gave them therapy to help with other issues, even gave some of the mentioned surgeries for free to this who could not afford it! They spoke out on their behalf to the public, even getting Berlin police to help them create "transvestite passes" to allow people to dress however they wanted without the threat of being arrested. They worked together to fight the law, including trying to strike down Paragraph 175, which made it illegal to be homosexual. The picture below is from their holiday party, Magnus Hirschfeld being the gentleman on the right with the fabulous mustache. Many of the other people in this photo are transgender.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of a group of people. Some are smiling at the camera, others have serious expressions. Either way, they all seem to be happy. On the right side, an older gentleman in glasses- Magnus Hirschfeld- is sitting. He has short hair and a bushy mustache. He is resting one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him. His other hand is being held by a person to his left. Another person to his right is holding his shoulder.]

There was always push back against the Institute, especially from conservatives who saw all of this as a bad thing. But conservatism can't stop progress without destroying it. They weren't willing to go that far for a good while. It all ended in March of 1933, when a new Chancellor was elected. The Nazis did not like homosexuals for several reasons. Chief among them, we break the boundaries of "normal" society. Shortly after the election, on May 6th, the book burnings began. The Jewish, gay, and obviously liberal Magnus Hirschfeld and his library of boundary-breaking literature was one of the very first targets. Thankfully, Hirschfeld was spared by virtue of being in Paris at the time (he would die in 1935, before the Nazis were able to invade France). His library wasn't so lucky.

This famous picture of the book burnings was taken after the Institute of Sexology had been raided. That's their books. Literature on so much about sexuality, eroticism, and gender, yes including their new work on trans people. This is the trans community's Alexandria. We're incredibly lucky that enough of it survived for Harry Benjamin and everyone who came after him was able to build on the Institute's work.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of the May Nazi book burning of the Institute of Sexology's library. A soldier, back facing the camera, is throwing a stack of books into the fire. In the background of the right side, a crowd is watching.]

As the Holocaust went on, the homosexuals of Germany became a targeted group. This did include transgender people, no matter what you say. To deny this reality is Holocaust denial. JK Rowling and everyone else who tries to pretend like this isn't reality is participating in that evil. You're agreeing with the Nazis.

But of course, you knew that already, didn't you?

Edit: Added image IDs. I apologize to those using screen readers for forgetting them. Please reblog this version instead.

[chloesimaginationthings]

The FNAF Vanessas meet their younger selves..

[junglejim4322]

The thing that is interesting is if you have any semblance of personality you will definitely encounter people who viscerally hate you and obsess over you for years and you will not even remember their name

[tallymali]

genuinely what is the reason for the internet becoming so prudish?? who can i fight about this

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"

just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible