#america's fucked excuse for an education system will have a lot to answer for on judgement day

[artigas]

i love my job. i am very lucky to be doing my job. it is a privilege to be pursuing your dream career. but last night i spent four hours grading essays where my students argued that edgar allan poe's attraction to the fictional character annabel lee is proof that he was a child predator. i cannot explain to you the psychic damage and profound concern i suffer when i am forced to grade.

[ptergwen]

smoke and mirrors

⇢ richkid!tom x richkid!reader ⇠

w/c: 4.1k

warnings: swearing, drinking, light angst, and implied smut

summary: because of your mother’s insistence on a pristine family image and tom’s messy one, you deny your true feelings for him

a/n: ok ok ok the pics of tom in monaco really made me think and i had to get everything out of my system so here we are! thank you and enjoy x

-

your living room is engulfed by a hushed chatter that comes from far too many guests. half the people, you hardly know. it’s overcrowded, superficial, and the last place you want to be. it’s one of your mother’s get-togethers, as she likes to call them. these things are always far from the casual affairs they sound like.

weeks go into planning, caterers and decorators making themselves at home in yours. the family’s image is everything to your mom, so being a good hostess is her top priority. ironically, she’s more concerned with throwing her gatherings than raising you. so much for family, huh?

the only reason you agreed to make an appearance tonight is that tom might do the same. he’s a really good friend, someone you’ve been able to count on through all the mess that is your lives. you met in high school, when he moved from london to the states. his dad was offered a job promotion he couldn’t pass up. plus, tom and his brothers would be receiving a stellar private education here in america.

it was a win for everyone, especially you. the freckle faced boy who got lost on his way to english class became your closest confidant. tom’s company is such a sweet escape. he’s not interested in opera or the stock market like most people you meet are. he sneaks you out to go on walks at dawn and does shots with you until you can’t stand straight.

as you two continue to grow together, revelations about yourselves have come to light. what you want beyond your inheritances, who you want beyond friendship. you figured out the second part on a faithful night recently. tom showed up to your place with a bottle of tequila. after you drank it down through lots of lime chasers and giggles, he kissed you. you didn’t kiss back.

your heart said to go for it, but your mind pulled you back in. you were so shocked and overcome with new feelings, you froze up. that, and you’d infuriate your mother. although she cares about tom a great deal, she loathes his public figure. he’s always getting papped in places and with people he shouldn’t be. the two of you together would just destroy her.

you still want to please your mom at the end of the day, no matter how deep under your skin she gets.

tom immediately apologized and tried play it off as him being drunk. you grew up with him, became part of each other’s families, which means you know him well enough to know he was lying. he meant every second his lips were on yours.

what you need to do now is something you’ve meant to for a while. the only problem is that you’re stuck at your mother’s party, and tom hasn’t shown up yet.

“y/n, darling,” your mom calls for your attention. she’s dragged you into a conversation with some bloggers, but you haven’t spoken a word. “why don’t you tell us about your trip to spain last summer?” she plasters on her award winning grin and squeezes your shoulder. it’s time to play along.

“oh, it was beautiful,” you halfheartedly reply, more to the bloggers than her. they nod in clear interest. one jots down notes. “we went for a few weeks and visited a bunch of different cities. i’d love to go back sometime.” the typical press formatted answer earns your mom’s approval. you’re off the hook. your eyes start to wander around the room, hoping to set on tom.

“we?” the woman taking notes asks. must everyone pry? “my friend and i,” you shortly reply. you’re standing up on your tiptoes to see over the crowd. you’d think six inch heels would do the trick. “i’m actually looking for him right now, so if you’ll excuse me,” you offer a polite smile and silently pray they won’t ask who. unfortunately, your wishes don’t come true.

the other blogger, a short and stubborn man, speaks up. “just a friend you say? come on, tell us. who’s the lucky fella?” he inquires. your mother raises a firm eyebrow, signaling for you not to.

tom has a reputation for his reckless behavior. it’s your mom’s worst nightmare when the media associates your names under most circumstances. you’re representing her, so she does whatever she can to control how you’re seen. you’re constantly in the papers, being a young socialite and all. it sucks.

“he’d like to stay out of the tabloids, sorry,” you cover for tom, on your mom’s behalf. “i should really go. it was nice meeting you.” the bloggers don’t bother to hide their disappointment as you shake their hands. your mother rubs your back in approval. “thank you for doing that. we’ll talk later,” she speaks lowly. “bye, mom!” you practically make a run for it. 

weaving through the sea of people, you end up by the main entrance. it’s hard not to get lost even though it’s your house. the place is packed with girls just a couple years older than you, wearing pearls around their necks. men’s strong colognes flow through the air. you’re in a form fitting red slip dress and louboutins yourself.

smoke and mirrors is what they call it. you show the pretty parts to distract from your ugly ones.

harrison suddenly comes waltzing in with a lady on either of his arms. you’d expect nothing less. he’s tom’s best friend besides you, considering the failed kiss attempt didn’t change that. their parents worked at the london branch of the same company. they each came to the states and met you. you happily introduced them to your world, helping to make it theirs as well.

“haz!” you meet him at the front door. he’s smirking while he leads the women inside. “fancy seeing you here, isn’t it?” he jokes. “very funny. i died laughing,” you deadpan, curiously eyeing harrison’s plus two. they merely giggle. “listen, have you seen tom anywhere? if he’s coming.” you’re fighting back a frown. “why wouldn’t he be?” harrison questions in a more serious tone this time.

“long story. you have guests to entertain, so i won’t get into it now,” you decide and manage a small smile instead. he perks up. “right. i’ll let you know if i see him?” nodding, you give him a wave goodbye. “enjoy yourself.” “you too, love. cheers!” the girls lean into him, harrison wiggling his eyebrows at you. he’s ridiculous.

hours pass by without word of tom. it isn’t like him to miss an event, especially if you’re in attendance. you despise these exhausting nights, and he’s supposed to be your rock during them. he should have his arm draped around your shoulders, whispering silly remarks to you while you hide out somewhere. you miss him more than you thought possible.

you’re just about to give up when you spot nikki ushering her husband inside. behind them follows tom, clad in a grey checkered suit with his locks perfectly tousled. he’s here. you waited the whole night, and he finally came.

tom kisses his mom on the cheek before strutting over to the drink table, not without a few reporters hassling him. they’re probably looking for another holland scandal to break. he declines their requests for comments on this and opinions on that, instead pulling up a chair next to harrison. the two exchange hugs and fix themselves glasses of champagne, you watching their encounter.

harrison fills tom in on the drama he’s missed tonight while they sip their drinks. tom keeps forcing smiles that don’t reach his eyes. he’s fiddling with his fingers, leg bouncing up and down steadily. those are the telltale signs he needs saving. however awkward it may be, you’re going to have to break your silence. it was bound to happen eventually.

“mate, i’m telling you. she fit her entire first right up her-“ “boys,” you cut into harrison’s story, greeting him and tom. his face tints deep pink upon your arrival. “don’t let me stop you. finish your charming anecdote,” you encourage him and subtly glance over at tom. he’s biting back a grin as he sets his elbows on the table.

“not with a lady present. let’s just… pretend you didn’t hear that,” harrison chuckles nervously and hops to his feet. “i’m gonna leave you two to chat.” humming, you move to take his chair. tom sucks in a breath. “what happened to the girls you brought?” you wonder. “they left. said they got bored,” harrison admits, tom stifling laughter. he elbows his friend for that.

“oh, fuck off. i’ll see you later,” he mopes, flicking your arm for good measure. tom salutes him and grabs his nearly empty champagne. “so long, bruv.”

it’s just you and tom now, seated side by side, silently so. he has no intentions of speaking first. he’s too embarrassed, and you don’t blame him. this is on you. you clear your throat before starting the conversation.

“can i top you off?” you tap the bottom of his glass with a tiny smile. tom shakes his head. “i’m alright, thanks.” he finishes the last sip and sets it down, turning to face you. your smile has vanished. “wasn’t sure you were gonna make it. i’m glad you did,” you change the subject. as if he’s considering the sincerity behind your words, tom furrows his eyebrows.

“mum wanted us to. she dragged me and dad straight off the golf course,” he explains and clasps his hands in his lap. his fingers interlock with each other. you fight off the urge to replace them with yours. “we would’ve been here sooner, but the paps are camped outside.” the hint of a smile forms on his lips, at last. “guess it’s not often you get the town’s finest under one roof.”

“you think i’m one of the town’s finest?” you tease, resting your chin in your palm. something flashes behind tom’s eyes. he looks right into yours, scooting closer. “absolutely. you’re the most eligible bachelorette in this whole building.” you allow a toothy grin to spread across your face. “tommy, stop it. you’re too nice to me.”

the nickname is music to his ears. tom looks you up and down, licking his lips simultaneously. “no, seriously. you look gorgeous,” he muses, you pushing at his chest. he exhales a breathy laugh, and you giggle yourself. “red’s definitely your color.” “reverse card. you wear it way better than i do,” you insist. your fingers tug at the collar of his suit. “too bad you didn’t match me.”

you’re relieved you two can talk like you usually do, light flirting and good vibes. it might not be so hard to put the kiss behind you. well, you can’t go on pretending it didn’t happen. you have to at least discuss the fiasco. tom should know why you didn’t reciprocate, then you can take it from there. whether he still has feelings for you, assuming he ever did, will depend on how that turns out.

“not to ruin the fun, but we still have to talk,” you murmur, tom’s body stiffening across from yours. he’s not sure he’s ready to discuss that. “can it wait? we’re at a party,” tom reminds you, running a hand through his styled locks. “yeah, my mother’s. don’t tell me you’re having a good time,” you playfully chastise him. he simply shrugs. “hardly. you’re the best part.”

you ignore the butterflies roaming about your body.

“you won’t mind a quick convo, then. it is with me,” you attempt to persuade him and place a hand on his knee. tom coughs a bit too loudly, the contact surprising him. “you know what? i think i’ll take you up on that drink first,” he decides with a mustered up smile. “coming right up.” you pat his leg before taking his glass. he chews on his lower lip while you poor the bubbling liquid. that was certainly… odd.

you slide tom his champagne back with an exaggerated wink. tom scoffs at this. “mm, thanks. care to join me?” he brings the alcohol to his lips, eyes never leaving yours. your mother specifically said no drinking tonight, since the press would be here. screw your mother, though. “please. could you hand me a glass?” you eagerly grab the champagne bottle. tom searches for an empty cup next to him.

you two are unspoken drinking buddies at this point.

“here you are, darling,” tom drawls, holding out the glass for you. every time he calls you that, you completely melt. “thanks, tommy,” you purr in response. you’re finally pouring your own drink when someone taps you on the shoulder, and hard. you look behind you to find your mother standing with her hands on her hips, less than thrilled. speak of the devil.

“hello, mother. can i help you?” you make sure to ask rudely. she responds with a smile that’s obviously fake. if tom weren’t here, you’d be getting scolded. “yes, my darling. those bloggers from earlier were hoping you’d finish your interview.” your mom shakes your shoulder in a motherly way. you squint up at her. “didn’t they leave hours ago-“ “they’re back,” she sharply informs you.

she’s lying, and you have a hunch as to why.

frowning, you hold tom’s hand in both of yours. “sorry, this won’t take long. why don’t you go find tuwaine?” you suggest instead. “he’s around here somewhere.” tom gives you an understanding nod and laces your fingers together, even if it’s only for a moment. “must be chatting up some producers or whatnot. i’ll see if i can help.” he’s such an incredible friend to everyone. he deserves the same from you.

“thomas, so lovely to see you,” your mom interrupts. tom stands up, kissing both her cheeks out of courtesy. “you, too. what a wonderful party. thank you for having us.” despite what the rest of the world believes, his manners are impeccable. “of course. give nikki my best, will you?” your mom puts her hands on his shoulders. he grins at her. “definitely. take care, mrs. y/l/n.” “always a pleasure,” she states, nudging you to come along with her.

you shoot tom one last apologetic look as your mother pulls you along and towards the crowd.

tom is no idiot. he’s well aware how she really feels about him.

when a swarm of guests is surrounding you, your mom lets go. you scowl, crossing your arms over your chest. “why would you do that? i haven’t seen tom in days.” she sighs without a care. “isn’t it time you branch out? expand your social circle?” her manicured fingers ruffle your hair. you push away her touch. “i’m social enough. we were in the middle of something really important.”

you begin to walk away, but your mother takes your arm. “whatever you’re about to do, it’s a mistake. he’ll make a fool of you,” she practically spits. yanking your arm from her grasp, you laugh bitterly. “of me, or of the family name? look around, mom.” you gesture to the spot beside her where your dad should be. “as far as i’m concerned, i have no family except tom. i’m gonna go check on him.”

you’re gone before your mom can stop you. she simply stands there, utterly mortified by what you said.

you run around the house to find tom, stumbling in your heels and not giving a fuck. you’d truly meant the part about him being your family. all the holland’s, honestly. they’re the most genuine and caring souls, and you don’t want to lose the one you’re closest to because of your mother’s delusions. 

tom is in a circle with harrison and tuwaine, the three of them chuckling amongst themselves. you’d hate to bug him, but this can’t wait anymore.

“uh, tom?” you mumble his name, appearing behind him. he steps away with another quiet laugh. “hey, y/n/n. that was quick, hm?” your face gives away your distress. his whole demeanor shifting, tom reaches for your hands. “what is it, love? is something the matter?” “just… come with me,” you croak out.

you manage to smile at harrison and tuwaine, dropping one of tom’s hands so you can lead him upstairs. they each return the smile and share curious looks.

following behind you, tom keeps your hand tight in his own. he’d thought you were going to grill him about the kiss that barely happened. it seems like this is a much more pressing matter. his outburst of emotions can be discussed another time. now, it’s time to deal with yours.

you drag tom into the first room on the second floor, which is your dad’s study. he’s away on business this weekend, so he luckily couldn’t make the party. tom sits down in the office chair. you sit up on the desk, in front of him. your lip quivers the second his worried features come into view.

“y/n/n, what’s going on? why are we in here?” tom wonders, his tone soft. your heart clenches. “i- i wanted us to have some privacy when i told you this,” you sniffle out and blink back the tears forming. you’re sort of shaken from the conversation with your mother, and mostly because you have no idea how tom will react to your confession.

his hands come to stay on your thighs, right below your dress. they feel warm against your bare skin.

“tell me what? i’m listening, yeah?” tom gazes up at you with so much love. “lay it all out for me.” god, he’s fucking amazing. if only you knew where to start. “do you, um…” you trail off, letting your tears subside and words settle. “do you remember when your family made your big debut in town?”

a grin replaces tom’s frown, painting his beautiful face. “how could i forget? you made it quite memorable.” he traces circles on your thigh and elicits a giggle from you. “i spilled a whole thing of soda on your white fucking button down,” you recount with a lighthearted sigh. “right before your dad was supposed to introduce you to everyone, too.”

tom presses his tongue into his cheek to hold back another grin. “took ages to get it out. dad went mad when i didn’t show.” he cocks his head to the side, you leaning back on your hands. “you held me hostage in the laundry room so you could do that bloody stain stick.” your mouth drops open in mock offense. “i had to clean up my mess! i wasn’t gonna let the world meet you covered in pepsi.”

that was one of your earliest memories together. the holland’s threw a party and invited everyone who was willing to attend. they had been hoping to properly introduce themselves to the town, and this was their way of doing so. although yours and tom’s friendship was fairly new, you spent all night together because you had experience with such events.

tom’s dad was making a speech to thank the guests for coming. you and him listened from the snack table, until his name was called. he rushed to go up there while you were pouring yourself a drink. he’d bumped into you, and the bottle ended up all over him. you snuck tom right off to his laundry room.

you’d felt terrible as he stood there shirtless and blushing, you aggressively swiping his button down with a stain stick.

“why do you bring that up?” tom questions and continues circling your skin. you purse your lips. “i dunno. it was the last party i actually enjoyed,” you admit, putting your hand over his that rests on your thigh. “like to reminisce when i’m suffering through one of my mother’s.” his eyes shift to where your hands are laced. “i see,” he affirms. “so, is that… all you wanted to talk about?” “not even close,” you laugh out.

a burst of courage coursing through your body, you say it. “when you kissed me the other night-“ “i won’t do it again,” tom cuts in, trying to avoid the rejection he thinks you’ll give him. “it was a mistake, and i’m so sorry. our friendship is more important than my feelings.” you seem excited to hear that, though it’s not for the reason tom expects. “you do have feelings for me?”

he’d forgotten about his i was drunk excuse.

“um, yeah. i do,” he admits, cheeks rosy and lip caught in his teeth. “but, i’ll learn to put them aside, if that’s what’s best.” “no, no. it isn’t,” you dismiss him and put your free hand on his chest. “i love you, tom. that’s what i was really trying to tell you.” your words bring an instant grin to his face. he chuckles in disbelief, standing from the chair.

“fuck, thank god. that’s all i’ve ever wanted to hear.” he’s between your legs now, his hands moving up to your hips. you’re beaming at him as your arms snake around his neck. a burning question comes to tom’s mind. “hang on. why didn’t you kiss me back, then?” he almost whispers, thumb brushing over your hipbone. “this is gonna sound weird, but… my mom,” you reluctantly let out.

“you’re gonna have to elaborate,” tom prompts you and raises an eyebrow. you can’t hold back your eye roll. “she’s never been a fan of the person you are in the media.” his lips form a line. “i gathered.” your fingers tangle in his curls at the nape of his neck reassuringly. “i was subconsciously scared i would be letting her down in some way, if we were together.”

tom allows your hands to work their way up to his scalp. he exhales contentedly as you play with his ever so soft hair. “i understand, she’s intimidating. what’s changed that brilliant mind of yours about coming clean?” your nose scrunches up when he pokes one of your temples. “oh, yeah. i yelled at her earlier ‘cuz she stole me away from you.” his face lights up. “sexy.” “shut up,” you groan. “someone had to tell her off.”

“good thing it got to be you,” tom agrees with a squeeze at your hip. “‘m proud of you, y/n/n. it’s not easy, standing up to mummy dearest.” you tug on his hair. “like you’d know. nikki is a saint.” “that’s what she’ll have you believe,” he says under his breath, you gasping. his lips turn up in a smirk. “on that note… i love you, too.”

“would’ve been embarrassing if you didn’t say it back,” you acknowledge with a cheesy smile. tom dips his head down to rest his forehead against yours. “yeah, yeah. save the attitude for your mum.” your legs easily wrap around his waist, tom’s breath hot as it hits your face. “let’s give that kiss another go,” you mewl. he doesn’t hesitate to reply. “with pleasure.”

tom’s lips land on yours, you kissing back right away. he smiles into it as your lips gently move together. “about fucking time,” he grumbles, your hands situating in his chocolate curls once again. he’s savoring every second you touch him, kiss him, love him. the taste of your mouth is one he’s craved for longer than you could imagine.

it doesn’t take long for things to heat up, you messing with tom’s hair and tom rubbing your hips. you lay back on the desk as his tongue enters your mouth. holding you by your waist, tom hovers over you. his tongue tangles with yours in a deep kiss. between that and his fingers beginning to massage your thigh, you’re done for. you’re ready to take this a step further by the time he’s kissing down your neck.

“tommy?” you grab onto his shoulders, your head back. his lips detach from your skin with a grin. “yeah, love? ‘s everything okay?” he coos, pressing a final kiss to your collarbone. “more than.” you tilt his chin up to peck his lips. “you wouldn’t happen to have a condom, would you? just thinking ahead.” he laughs breathlessly, reaching into his suit pocket.

“conveniently enough, i do. not sure your dad would like me fucking you on his desk, though.” tom sets his hand on your leg that’s still hooked around his waist. “my room’s always available. carry me?” you make grabby hands and bat your lashes. he hoists you up by your waist, not lifting you just yet. “that would break the news of us, no? your mum’s gonna go apeshit.” he keeps his arms around you, chuckling.

“let her. besides, i know a couple of bloggers that would love to announce our status update.” you peck tom’s lips, grinning as you do. you’re suddenly in the air and being picked up by tom. the surprise of it makes you squeal, clutching onto his broad shoulders instinctively. he gives you the look of adoration that’s reserved for you only.

“we’ll go pop a few bottles with everyone, then we’re celebrating on our own.”

[star-anise]

An ask I got recently:

hi so i’m a transmed and i’m not sure if you’ll answer this because of that but i saw your post about transmedicalism and was wondering if you could expand on that? you seem like a genuinely kind and judgement-free person, thank you darling x

My response:

Heh, you call me “judgement-free” and ask for my opinion on a topic I’ve formed a lot of judgments about… I get it though, I’m not into attacking people for what they believe so much as providing FACTS. As a cis queer, my insight into transmedicalism isn’t really about the innate experience of trans-ness so much as using my education and professional experience to talk about social science research, diagnostic systems, and public health policy.

This ended up really long, so the tl;dr is, I think transmedicalism as I understand it:

Misunderstands why and how the DSM’s Gender Dysphoria diagnosis was written,

Treats the medical establishment with a level of trust and credibility it doesn’t deserve, at a time when LGBT+ people, especially trans people, need to be informed and vigilant critics of it, and

Approaches the problem of limited resources in an ass-backwards way that I think will end up hurting the trans community in the long run.

TW: Transphobia; homophobia; suicide; institutionalization; torture; electroshock therapy; child abuse; incidental mentions of pedophilia.

So first off I’m guessing you mean this post, about not trusting the medical establishment to tell you who you are? That’s what I’m trying to elaborate on here.

I have to admit, when you say “I’m a transmedicalist” that tells me very little about you, because on Tumblr the term seems to encompass a dizzying array of perspectives. Some transmedicalists believe in what seems to me the oldschool version of “The only TRUE trans people suffer agonizing dysphoria that can only be fixed with surgery and hormones, everyone else is an evil pretender stealing resources and can FUCK RIGHT OFF” and others are like, um… “I have total love and respect for nonbinary and nondysphoric trans people! I qualify for a DSM diagnosis of dysphoria but that doesn’t make me inherently better or more trans than anyone else.”

Which is very confusing to me because according to everything I’ve learned, the latter opinion is not transmedicalism. It’s just… a view of transness that acknowledges current diagnostic labels and scientific research. It’s what most people who support trans rights and do not identify as transmedicalists believe. But I kind of get the impression that Tumblr transmedicalism has expanded well past its original mandate, to the point that if a lot of “transmedicalists” saw the movement’s original positions they’d go “Whoa that’s way too strict and doesn’t help our community, I want nothing to do with it.”.

Okay so. Elaborating on the stuff I can comment on.

1. DSM what?

The American Psychiatric Association publishes a big thick book called The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, called the DSM for short. This is the “Bible of psychiatry”, North America’s definitive listing of mental disorders and conditions. It receives significant revision and updates roughly every 10-15 years; it was last updated in 2013, meaning it will likely get updated sometime between 2023 and 2028.

The DSM lists hundreds of “codes”, each of which indicates a specific kind of mental disorder. For example, 296.23 is “Major depressive disorder, Single episode, Severe,” and  300.02 is “Generalized anxiety disorder.” These codes have information on how common the condition is, how it’s diagnosed, and what kind of treatment is appropriate for it.

Diagnostic codes are the key to health professionals getting paid. If there isn’t a code for it, we can’t get paid for it, and therefore we have very few resources to treat it with. The people who actually pay for healthcare–usually insurance companies or government agencies–decide how much they will pay for each code item to be treated. They’ll pay for, say, three sessions of group therapy for mild depression (296.21), or they’ll pay for more expensive private therapy if it’s moderate (296.22); they’ll pay for the cheap kind of drug if you have severe depression (296.23), but to get the more expensive drug, you need to have depression with psychotic features (296.24).

Healthcare companies, especially in the USA where the system is very very broken and the DSM is written, are cheap bastards. If they can find an excuse not to fund some treatment, they’ll use it. “We think this person who lost their job and can’t get off the couch should pay this $1000 bill for therapy,” they’ll say. “After all, they were diagnosed as code 296.21, and then saw a private therapist for five sessions, when we only allow three sessions of group therapy, and you’re saying they haven’t had enough treatment yet?”

A lot of the advocacy work mental health professionals do is trying to get the big funding bodies to pay us adequately for the work we do. (This is a much easier process in countries with single-payer healthcare, where this negotiation only needs to be done with a single entity. In the USA, it needs to be done with every single health insurance company in existence, as well as the government, sometimes differently in every single state, and then again on a case-by-case basis as well.) Healthcare providers have to argue that three sessions of group therapy isn’t enough, that Medicaid needs to pay therapists more per hour than it costs those therapists to rent a room to practice in, or else therapists would lose money by seeing Medicaid clients. DSM codes exist a tiny bit to let us communicate with each other about the people we treat, and a huge amount to let us get paid. The fact that their existence lets people make sense of their own experiences and find a community with people who share common experiences and interests with them is a very minor side benefit the DSM’s authors really don’t keep in mind when they update and revise different diagnoses.

So when it comes to convincing insurance companies to pay for treatment, humanitarian reasons like “they’ll be very unhappy without it” tend not to work. The best argument we have for them paying for psychological treatment is that it’s economical: that if they don’t pay for it now, they’ll have to pay even more later. If they refuse to pay, let’s say, $2000 to treat mild depression when someone loses their job, and either refuse treatment or stick the person with the bill, then that person’s life might spiral out of control–they might, let’s say, run low on money, get evicted from their apartment, develop severe depression, attempt suicide, and end up in hospital needing to be medically resuscitated and then put in an inpatient psych ward for a month. The insurance company then faces the prospect of having to pay, let’s say, $100,000 for all that treatment. At which point somebody clever goes, “Huh, so it would have been cheaper to just… pay the original $2000 instead so they could bounce back, get a new job, and not need any of this treatment later.”

Trans healthcare can be kind of expensive, since it often involves counselling, years of hormone therapy, medical garments, and multiple surgeries. Health insurance companies hate paying for anything, and have traditionally wanted not to cover any of this. “This is ridiculous!” they said. “These are elective cosmetic treatments, it’s not like they’re dying of cancer, these people can pay the same rate for breast enhancements or testosterone injections as anyone else.”

So when the APA Task Force on Gender Identity Disorder (a task force comprised, as far as I can tell, entirely of cis people) sat down to plan for the 2013 update of the DSM, one of their biggest goals was: Treatment recommendations. Create a diagnosis which they could effectively use to advocate that insurance companies fund gender transition. Like when you go back and read the documents from their meetings in 2008 and 2011, their big thing is “create a diagnosis that can be used to form treatment recommendations.” So that’s what they did; in 2013 they made the GD diagnosis, and in 2014 the Affordable Care Act required insurers to provide treatment for it.

A lot of trans people weren’t happy with the DSM task force’s decisions, such as the choice to keep “Transvestic Fetishism,” which is basically the autogynephilia theory, and just rename it “Transvestic Disorder”. The creation of the Gender Dysphoria diagnosis, basically, was designed to force the preventive care argument. They didn’t think they could win on trans healthcare being a necessity because healthcare is a human right, so they went with: Trans people have a very high suicide rate, and one way to bring it down is to help them transition. One of the major predictors of suicidality is dysphoria. The more dysphoric someone is, the more likely they are to attempt suicide (source).  Therefore, health insurers should fund treatment for gender dysphoria because it was cheaper than paying for emergency room admissions and inpatient psychiatric hospitalizations.

I have spoken to trans scientists about what research exists, and my understanding is: The dysphoria/no dysphoria split is not actually validated in the science. That is, when you research trans people, there is not some huge gaping difference between the experiences, or brains, of people With Dysphoria, and people Without Dysphoria. Mostly, scientists haven’t even thought it was an important distinction to study. The diagnosis wasn’t reflecting a strong theme in the research about trans experiences; that research showed that trans people with all levels of dysphoria were helped with medical transition. The biggest difference is just that dysphoria is a stronger risk factor for suicide. Experiencing transphobia is another strong risk factor, but that’s harder to measure in a doctor’s office, so dysphoria it was.

(I’ve seen some transmedicalists claim that dysphoria’s major feature is incongruence, not distress. And I’ll just say, uh… in psychology, “dysphoria” is the opposite of of “euphoria”, literally means “excessive pain”, and is used in many disorders to describe a deep-seated sense of distress and wrongness. As a mental health professional, I just can’t imagine most of my colleagues agreeing that something can be called “dysphoria” if the person doesn’t feel real distress about it. If you want a diagnosis that doesn’t demand dysphoria, you’d need Gender Incongruence in the upcoming version of the ICD-11, which is the primary diagnostic system used in Europe, published by the World Health Organization.)

2. Doctors are not magic

Medicine is a science, and science is a system of knowledge based on having an idea, testing it against reality, and revising that knowledge in light of what you learned. We’re learning and growing all the time.

I don’t know if this sounds painfully obvious or totally groundbreaking, but: Basically all medical research is done by people who don’t have the condition they’re writing about. Psychology has a strong historical bias against believing the personal testimonies of people with conditions that have been deemed mental disorders, so researchers who have experienced the disorder they’re writing about have often had to hide that fact, like Kay Redfield Jamison hiding that she had bipolar disorder until she became a world-renowned expert on it, or Marsha Linehan hiding that she had borderline personality disorder until she pioneered the treatment that could effectively cure it. Often, having a condition was seen as proof you couldn’t actually have a truthful and objective experience of it.

So what I’m trying to say is: The “gender dysphoria” diagnosis was written and debated, so far as I can tell, by entirely cis committee members. The vast majority of psychological and psychiatric research about LGBT+ people is written by cisgender heterosexual scientists. Most clinical and scientific writing has been outsider scientists looking at people they have enormous power over and making decisions about their basic existence with very little accountability.

And to show you how far we’ve come, I want to show you part of the DSM as it was from 1952 to 1973. It shows you just why so many older LGBT+ people find it deeply ironic that now the DSM is being held up as definitive of trans experience:

302 Sexual Deviation This category is for individuals whose sexual interests are directed primarily toward objects other than people of the opposite sex, toward sexual acts not usually associated with coitus, or towards coitus performed under bizarre circumstances as in necrophilia, pedophilia, sexual sadism, and fetishism. Even though many find their practices distasteful, they remain unable to substitute normal sexual behavior for them. This diagnosis is not appropriate for individuals who perform deviant sexual acts because normal sexual objects are not available to them.

302.0 Homosexuality 302.1 Fetishism 302.2 Pedophilia 302.2 Transvestitism […]

Yes, really. That is how psychiatry viewed us. At a time when research from other fields, like psychology and sociology, were showing that this view was completely unsupported by evidence, psychiatry thought LGBT+ people were fundamentally disordered, criminal, and incapable of prosocial behaviour.

My favourite retelling of the decades of activism it took LGBT+ people and allies to get the DSM to change is from a friend who did her master’s thesis on the topic, because she leaves in the clown suits and gay bars, which really shows how scientific and dignified the process was. The long story short is:  It took over 20 years of lobbying by LGBT+ people who were sick and tired of being locked up in mental institutions and subjected to treatments like electroshock training, as well as by LGBT+ social scientists, clinicians, and psychiatrists, to get homosexuality declassified as a mental illness. And that was homosexuality; the push to change how trans people were listed in the DSM is very recent, as seen in the latest version listing “Transvestic Disorder”, a description very few trans people ever use for themselves.

Here are a few more examples of how people with a condition have had to take an active part in the science about them:

When HIV/AIDS appeared in the USA, the government didn’t care why drug addicts and gay people were dying mysteriously. Hospitals refused to treat people with this mysterious new disease. AIDS patients had to fight to get any funding put into what AIDS is, how it spreads, or how it could be treated; they also had to campaign to change the massive public prejudice against them, so they could be treated, housed, and allowed to live. Here’s an article on the activist tactics they used. If you want an intro to the fight (or at least, white peoples’ experience of it), you could look into the movies How to Survive a Plague, And the Band Played On, and The Normal Heart.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) is a little-understood disease that causes debilitating exhaustion. It’s found twice as often in women as men. Doctors understand very little about what it is or why it happens, and patients with CFS are often written off a lazy hypochondriacs who just don’t want to try hard. There are basically no known treatments. In 2011, a British study said that an effective treatment for CFS was “graded exercise”, a program where people did slowly increasing levels of physical activity. This flew in the face of what people with CFS knew to be true: That their disease caused them to get much worse after they exercised. That for them, being forced to do ever-increasing exercise was basically tantamount to torture, so it was very concerning that health authorities and insurance companies began requiring that they undergo graded exercise treatment (and parents with children with CFS had to put their children through this treatment, or lose custody for “medical neglect”). So they investigated the study, found that it was seriously flawed, got many health authorities to reverse their position on graded exercise, and have made strides into pointing researchers to looking into biological causes of their illness.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a rare but debilitating disease that isn’t researched much, because it affects such a small portion of the population. The ALS community realized that if they wanted better treatment, they would need to raise the money for research themselves. In 2014 they organized a viral “ice bucket challenge” to get people to donate to their cause, and raised $115 million, enough to make significant advances in understanding ALS and getting closer to a cure.

A common treatment for Autism is Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA), which is designed to encourage “desired” behaviours and discourage “undesired” ones. The problem is, the treatment targets behaviour an Autistic person’s parents and teachers consider desirable or undesirable, without consideration that some “undesired” behaviours (like stimming) are fundamental and necessary to the wellbeing of Autistic people. Furthermore, the treatment involves punishing Autistic children for failure to behave as expected–in traditional ABA, by witholding rewards or praise until they stop, or in more extreme cases, by subjecting them to literal electric shocks to punish them. (In that last case, they’ve been ordered to stop using the shock devices by August 31, 2020. That only took YEARS.) Autistic people have had to campaign loud and long to say that different treatment strategies should be researched and used, especially on Autistic children.

So I mean… I get that the medical model can provide an element of validation and social acceptance. It can feel really good to have people in white coats back you up and say you’re the real deal. But if you get in touch with most LGBT+ and transgender groups, they’d say that there’s still a lot of work to be done when it comes to researching trans issues and getting scientific and governmental authorities to recognize your rights to social acceptance and medical treatment.

Within a few years, the definition you’re resting on will turn to sand beneath your feet. The Great DSM Machine will begin whirring into life pretty soon and considering what revisions it has to make. You’ll have an opportunity to make your voice heard and to push for real change. So… do you want to be part of that process of pushing trans rights forward, or do you just want to feel loss because they’re changing your strict definition of who’s valid and who’s not?

3. Scarcity is not a law of physics

One of the major arguments I see transmedicalists push is that there’s only a limited number of surgeries or hormone prescriptions available, so it’s not okay for a non-dysphoric person to “steal” the resources that another trans person might need more. This makes sense in a limited kind of way; it’s a good way to operate if, say, you’re sharing a pizza for lunch and deciding whether to give the last slice to someone who’s hungry and hasn’t eaten, or someone who’s already full.

When you start to back up and look at really big and complex systems–basically anything as big, or bigger, than a school board or a hospital or a municipal government–it’s not a helpful lens anymore. Because the most important thing about social institutions is that they can change. We can make them change. And the most important factor in how much the world changes is how many people demand that it change.

I’ve talked about this before when it comes to homeless shelters, and how the absolute worst thing they can have are empty beds. I used to work in women’s shelters, which came about when second-wave feminists started seriously looking at the problem of domestic violence in the 1960s and 70s, It was an issue male-dominated governments and healthcare systems hadn’t taken seriously before, but feminists started heck and did research and staged demonstrations and basically demanded that organizations that worked for the “public benefit” reduce the number of women being killed by their husbands. Their research showed that the leading cause of death in those cases were when women tried to leave and their partners tried to kill them, so the most obvious solution was to give them someplace safe to go where their partners couldn’t find them. Therefore the solution became: Women’s shelters. When feminists committed to founding and running these shelters, local governments could be talked into giving them money to keep them running.

(Men’s rights activists, the misogynist kind, like to whine about “why aren’t there men’s shelters?” and the very simple answer is: Because you didn’t fight for them, you teatowels. Whether a movement gets resources and funding is hugely a reflection of how many people have said, “This needs resources and funding! Look, I’m writing a cheque! Everyone, throw money at this!” In other news, The BC Society for Male Survivors of Sexual Abuse does great work. People should throw money at them.)

When the system in power knows there are resources it wants and doesn’t have, it finds a way to make them appear. For example, in Canada, the government knows that it doesn’t have enough trained professionals living in its far North, where the population is scarce and not very many people want to live. Doctors and teachers would prefer to live in the southern cities. But because it’s committed to Northern schools and hospitals, they create incentives. For example, the government offers to pay off the student loans of teachers or health professionals who agree to work for a few years in Northern communities.

Part of why trans healthcare resources are so scarce is that for a long time, trans people were considered too small a part of the population to care about. Like, “Trans people exist, but we won’t have to deal with them.” Older estimates said 0.4% of the population was trans, which meant a city of 100,000 people would have 400 trans people. A single family doctor can have 2000 or 3000 clients, so the city could have maybe 1 or 2 doctors who really “got” trans issues, and all the trans people would tell each other to only go see those doctors because all the rest were assholes. And the cracks in the system didn’t really seem serious. A couple hundred dissatisfied people not getting the healthcare they needed? Meh! Hospital administrators had more to worry about!

But the trans population is growing. A recent poll of Generation Z said 2.6% of middle schoolers in Minnesota were some kind of trans. which is 2,600 per 100,000. That’s enough to make hospitals think that maybe the next endocrinologist or OB/GYN they hire should have some training in treating trans people. That’s enough to make a health authority think that maybe the state should open up a new gender confirmation surgery clinic, since demand is rising so much.

Or well, I mean. Hospitals have a lot on their minds. This might not occur to them as their top priority. They’d probably think of it a lot sooner if a bunch of those trans people sent them letters or took out a billboard or showed up by the dozens at a public meeting to say, “Hello, there are a fuckload of us. Budget accordingly. We want to see your projected numbers for the next five years.”

When you’re doing that kind of work, suddenly it hurts your cause to limit your number of concerned parties. Sure, limited focus groups or steering committees can have limited membership, but when you put their ideas into action, to protest something or lobby for political change, you need numbers. If you want to show that you’re a big and important group that systems should definitely pay attention to, you don’t just need every trans or GNC or NB person who’s got free time to devote to your campaign, you also need every cis ally who can pad out numbers or lick envelopes or hand out water bottles or slip you insider information about the agenda at the next board meeting. You need bodies, time, and money, and you get them best by being inclusive about who’s in your party. Heck, if it would benefit your cause to team up with the local breast cancer group because trans women and cis women who have had mastectomies both have an interest in asking a hospital to have a doctor on staff who knows how to put a set of tits together, then there are strong reasons to do it.

Basically: All the time any marginalized group spends fighting over scraps is generally time we could spend demanding that the people handing out the food give us another plate. If you don’t think you’re getting enough, the best answer isn’t to knock it out of somebody’s hands, but to get together to say, “HEY! WE’RE NOT GETTING ENOUGH!”

That kind of work is complicated and difficult! It’s definitely much harder than yelling at someone on Tumblr for not being trans enough. But if you do any level of getting involved with activist groups that fight for real systemic change, whether that’s following your local Pride Centre on Twitter or throwing $5 at a trans advocacy group or writing your elected representative about the need for more trans health resources, you’re pushing forward lasting change that will help everyone.

[arcticdementor]

I was talking to Sarah yesterday and I had a revelation I think is worth sharing.

Let’s begin at the beginning. About a month ago, Instapundit posted this.

Now, I’ve been thinking of the rise and fall of civilizations lately. I can’t think why it’s been on my mind. It’s a tale as old as time—a civilization emerges, establishes a new worthwhile order, the good things brought forth by said order soften up the people maintaining it, the softening turns to decadence, and the decadence gives way to the barbarians, who clean the slate. Where would you say things are lately?

…

In short—the federal government of the United States of America has become impotent at almost all good things.

Expanded out—There is no start to its talents. It cannot maintain its borders. Since the “election” it doesn’t even try. No surprise there. It cannot maintain friendly relationships with allies—as our recent screwing of Britain on our way out of Afghanistan shows. The “leader” of the “free world” could not be bothered to pick up the phone for our closest ally. Speaking of Afghanistan, it can’t win a war. It can’t even lose gracefully. In fact it fucked up leaving so badly some people are entertaining that it intended to fuck it up, because how the fuck does somebody above the age of six not notice that pulling the military out first and the civilians out second is not even a remotely workable strategy? Resulting in leaving millions of dollars of equipment—and—excuse me, what? Millions of dollars of dollars in the desert? Fantastic.

It makes self sabotaging and idiotic choices to stymie its own domestic oil industry, while accepting a pipeline not from Canada, but one that’s a joint Russian-German venture instead. Which means the problem, contrary to any environmentalist whining, isn’t the pipeline—it’s the pipeline with a friendly country. Big surprise— its only true interest in the environment lies in international agreements that hamstring us while doing nothing to China, the world’s largest polluter. It either can’t be trusted on energy production  and the environment, or is trying to get it wrong.

It can’t manage its economy. What could have been a “V” shaped recovery has been turned into an “L” shaped one. What could be contributing? Paying people to do nothing? Rampant inflation? Meanwhile all the dumbasses running the country can think of is spending several billion more dollars that don’t exist. The country has infrastructure problems for a fact, but they’ll only acknowledge that to the extent of cynically plastering the word on an “infrastructure” bill which is in fact just a far Left wishlist that largely ignores actual infrastructure, in the hopes people will be dumb enough to support it because it has the right label.

And on.

And on.

And on.

What aptitudes does it have besides taking money, trampling civil liberties, and ignoring constitutional laws at gunpoint? News flash, dummies: We don’t need peaceful protestors incarcerated without a trial. We don’t need the weight of the federal government turned to the problem of violating states rights because Texas passed a law Biden doesn’t like. We need military egresses that look like they weren’t planned by Bozo the clown and an economic plan better than something China would design for us as an attempt to permanently sink the country. Is there anyone at all in DC who can provide that? If not, is there anything useful they can do? I’ll wait.

…

This is what decadence looks like. When the government stops even attempting competence because nothing and nobody that currently exists can replace or displace them so who cares about results? When comfort and plenty have become so common, been taken for granted for so long, that the question of utility or even basic sanity isn’t even distantly considered. When it’s assumed that self-harming policies that will obviously damage the country won’t really matter because nobody has ever known a world without America and fundamentally has no idea how the present day came to be. When the country’s most educated start chasing bizarre and unimaginably stupid ideas on economics that boil down to “inflation won’t happen if you double the monetary supply by printing money, if only you just believe hard enough”. In fact, when education stops being a means to greater insight, more useful abilities, and a better life, and becomes a cult devoted to the kind of idiocy that can survive only with strenuous censorship, the tenets of the cult being treated by the indoctrinated as a collection of sacred mysteries and deeply-thought paradoxes— while to those not similarly trained it is self-obviously a collection of contradictory and self-serving lies.

Verily, decadence is here. We can infer that what comes next is the barbarians. And we have options. Mexican illegals? A heady mixture of poverty-stricken Marxists who have never known a system that wasn’t corrupt, functionally lawless, and devoted to the tenets of voting oneself rich; and outright criminals with lives like “a demon’s resumé”? Perhaps radical Muslims? By sheer numbers worldwide they’re the most likely option. The Taliban just got a huge infusion of cash and a big boost in morale. In a few short days we’ll know whether they’ve arranged a thank you gift for Zho Bi-Xen and his kleptocrat marching band to commemorate his intended pull-out date. But even if, and God I hope, they have not, we can expect an uptick in terrorism and quite shortly. Or perhaps China? The Middle Kingdom would laugh at being called barbarians, but I call genocidal communists like I see them. Mao was morally three steps below a pig and Xi has enough power to aspire to greater depths. As is I wouldn’t dream of feeding a pig Mu Shu Xi due to the great risk of poisoning the pig.

But there is a barbarian group not considered. Us.

Hang on. Before you balk, listen. Look again at what these idiots are selling as the fruits of civilization. Defenses of pedophilia and urinals as art. And more, too—sterilization and disfigurement of teenagers in the form of sex changes. Black supremacy as a panacea to made up threats of white supremacy. Books nobody reads, movies nobody watches, paintings that exist only to launder money—even the ones not made by Hunter Biden.

What good person would not be proud to be considered a barbarian by these miserable, over-decorated Faberge people? I’d be mortified if they agreed with me! So they think I’m a sexist or a racist or whatever. Fine. They do not use these words to mean the same things I mean, so it’s a pointless argument, and they are now officially beneath my explaining myself to them. When the people who are calling me names are so morally opaque that the Taliban can make devastating critiques of them just by referencing the foundational works of their own gender studies programs, I’m done caring about the names. Fine. I’m what you think is a racist. I’m what you think is a sexist. But you think a lot of very stupid things, and as the curtain continues to draw back on the carnival of madness that’s been behind the scenes the entire time it’s occurring to me that what you think and reality overlap so seldom that the only time not to ignore you is when I can ridicule you. If that is your civilization, someone hand me a pointy horned helmet.

…

Yes, this is a moment of peril, but also opportunity. See in your country what every hostile group listed above sees in it—the makings of great civilization, along other, less stupid lines. All of it guarded by weak, fat, stupid people with no will and no self-belief. Take that mindset and go forth.

Get involved in your local systems. There is an old prayer for God to make ones enemies ridiculous. Congratulations to whomever was still praying it. Your prayers have been answered. Will you tell me that you cannot defeat these people? People who lose casual debates to terrorists not on principle but on basic facts?

…

You can’t reason with them so don’t bother. Recent events have made it clear you may as well try to talk sense into a three-day-old mackerel. Just confront them with their own stupidity so that people who see the inevitable video understand what this is about, and don’t feel that you are too good to shout them out of the room. You’re the barbarian, remember? Not like the nice civilized people with their gender-queer Tik-Tokers pushing vaccine propaganda. That means you’re excused from conversations with morons. Don’t bother trying to find common ground. Look at where they’re standing! Do you want to try to find the midpoint between that and reality? Silly. Pointless. Send them back to their walled online gardens to whine to their equally stupid friends about the barbarians.

Can we take it back from the ground up? I don’t know. But hey, it’s got to be worth a shot. Join the fun! Find some friends and locate a low-hanging political event to raid. When was the last time you went to a town hall for your town? Isn’t just a part of you curious to know whether your local county commissioner starts by declaring her pronouns? Wouldn’t it be wonderful to see someone like that made very uncomfortable? You can make that happen. You can probably do it within the next month. Bring a few friends! Or a few dozen. Some of the people reading this probably were afraid to do that kind of thing for fear of losing their job. The Biden economy might have freed up some of your time. What have you got to lose now? More importantly, the way things are going, are you going to lose it anyway if things continue as they are? Think on it.

[janiedean]

But the other countries care about what America is doing because their politics and whatever else is going on it's going to affect the world and because America is the country that keep interfering in other countries politics more than other countries. The other governments are pretty shady but America is the one that stand out more then the other governments because of how much influence it has outside of the country

I mean like why is everyone even considering America to be the worst country anyways?

........ anon idk what’s your point here but:

the fact that we give a fuck about what happens in the US because it affects us doesn’t mean we don’t hear about what happens in the US all the times even if it doesn’t affect us (I mean anon no offense given but we hear about BLM on the news here and BLM’s existence means absolutely zero to anyone in my country since it’s a purely american movement that makes sense in the US)

the fact that the US influence other countries doesn’t mean that people inside the US shouldn’t care at least out of basic decency

other than that, exactly because your shady government influences other countries and 99,9% of the time it’s done in illegal ways, US americans should fucking have a clue about how the rest of the world works, but I see that a lot of the time they don’t even know how things in their own country work or used to work (I mean, again, some ppl on tumblr have no idea the vietnam war had the draft and thought they went as volunteers, like????) so I mean, that’s a problem

other than that, at least here, somehow everyone not from the US is supposed to know how the US work but not the contrary and if we dare say that culturally for us a thing is different suddenly we are fucking problematic - whatever

now, I don’t wanna be an asshole, but about your second answer, JUST TO SAY ONE, the US:

have the death penalty

have the gun culture

don’t have universal free tax-payed healthcare for everyone

these three should suggest already why someone outside the US would not consider it a great place to live, but we can also add:

I just learned lately that there’s an adult illiteracy rate of 13% which doing the math on all the people inside the US it means... around 43 million illiterate adults and excuse me but to me that’s completely out of this world unacceptable

college costs so much people either go in debt or enlist to attend

people actually enlist also for medical coverage and get out of poverty and if that is the only way you have out of it sorry but your system is fucked

if I had a disabled child here my life would be complicated but over there? man it’d be way worse from what I hear

the educational public system seems to be fairly crappy and I’d rather keep mine

and to top it all off I could say it’s ridiculous that at 18 you can join the army but can’t fucking drink alcohol until 21, but I wish that was the least problematic thing. but like guys I don’t hate the US not US culture nor US citizens but from our very external pov here, your country has issues and it should deal with them, maybe starting with the 43 million adults who can’t read or write which is nowhere near worthy of any place that wants to boast that it’s the best country in the world. *shrug*

[badmousestuff-blog]

Is TAXATION THEFT

(SHOTS OF ME OPENING A LETTER)

Mmm Money. Oh hello there, Badmouse, I was just enjoying the sweet sweet smell of the British Payslip, nah its pretty bland, this one here’s from a job I had about 2 years ago, ah memories, memories, memories…. (Sees Tax) I’ve been stolen from.

£50 taken from me! Money that I don’t even get to decide how it gets spent, 1 vote every 5 years out of 2 preselected jerks every 5 years I wouldn’t call a great turnaround. We don’t tolerate thieves coming into our houses and stealing our prized possessions, why do we allow the Federal government to do the same?

(British Mouse appears) We don’t have a Federal Government in Britain, you poser twat.

Rational Mouse: Maybe I can be of assistance.

Its not really ‘THEFT’ though is it? Its a lot less of this “Gimmie your money, of you’ll die!” And a lot more of this “Gimme your money, and I’ll give you, Mrs Piggy Winkle.

IrM: Still Theft Buddy! If one man steals from you, is that Theft? What about 5? What if they buy the man a hamburger and give him a vote? Is that not still the…

MYOPIA ———————————————

RM: This is Myopic and Archaic guff dude

(Irrational Mouse Gasps)

This isn’t how the form of governance we now inhabit came to be anyway, its like that Who will Pick the Cotton without slaves analogy when you compare it to Roads.

Its conflating a systemic transport basis, to a generalised commodity thats sold many times over. They’re not the same thing, theres a very obvious reason why business prefers state run roads the same way industrialised economies prefer state run schools. You’re sort of neglecting why these things came to emerge in the first place. Is it it any coincidence that most of the toll roads started being gutted when Feudalism came to a close?

IrM: Who even are you?

RM: Oh, I’m RATIONAL MOUSE

IrM: So that means I’m…

(RM does the Jack Nicolson eyebrows)

IRRATIONAL MOUSE… Well thats not fair is it?

RM: Look just read the script bud, y’know how it ends

IrM: Fucking writers, you don’t do anything…

RM: Excuse me

IrM: The state has been showcased to be an incredibly inefficient, bureaucratic nightmare, that can never innovate like the market can, it wastes too much of its money, I mean have you seen the state’s attempts to be cool, they couldn’t even make a Millennium Dome profitable.

EFFICIENCY ———————————————

RM: Well you’re right on profits but apart from that its pretty much all Chicago School taft

(IrM gasps)

So many of us have a distrust for the public sector these days, its really no wonder seeing as for the past 40 years men in suits have done an active push of erasing the private sector defects by blaming the state. Quite interestingly, and surprisingly for a lot of leftists, the state sector is actually very efficient, especially when it comes to R&D.

IrM: Blow me

RM: No, I’m serious, wide spread free at the point of use services benefit amazingly from economics of scale. https://newint.org/features/2015/12/01/private-public-sector http://www.psiru.org/sites/default/files/2014-07-EWGHT-efficiency.pdf

Let me put it this way, what seems more efficient to you. Have 10 businesses all competing to not to make the best product, but to win them over to you, you can’t just ask them. In order to do that you’ve gotta come up with some snazzy designs, aesthetically pleasing logos, a funky marketing gimmick, before long you’re spending so much dough in marketing you’re not even interested in helping people, just getting yourself seen. Or You could just have one org that does all of that stuff, it doesn’t need to compete. Sounds to me like a lot of hands that could be spend doing R&D.

IrM: Thats investment not waste, besides R&D is the definition of the private sector … Yea?

RM: No. The private sector utilises R&D a lot, but effectively every piece of GPT was created in the public sector. Yes Samsung made this phone, but who made the battery that goes in it? Why is the state sector significant? TIME. Companies flock new models of these out every year to keep the money train rolling, and most importantly keep faith with their shareholders. Makes them flimsy, crappy, liable to break. But GPT takes decades not years to bring it up to commercial satisfaction. Do you really think that  shareholders are gonna give you investment with the tagline of “Coming this summer. 2047”

Fact remains, we’ve had plenty of time to analyse the effects of the free-market and what we find is theres hardly any greater efficiency.

IrM: You’re really getting off topic here, okay fine businesses want roads, the market isn’t as efficient as I thought, it doesn’t mean that taxes are moral.

WHY BASE AN IDEOLOGY AROUND IT? —————————————————————

Fair enough, the government sure as hell does take my money through a warm gun doesn’t it?

But for the vast majority of us… its really small, like in my pay check I only lost 1/20th of my monthly income, and sure its annoying not being able to spend that on the latest gamer game or a lush soap but I am getting free healthcare, an education, a polli… I’m getting firemen, ROADS, libraries, Society. If thats worth £50 a month then fuck me daddy I’m ready.

(BRITISH MOUSE gasps)

Point here is, you’ve got no semblance basing your entire ideology around something so insignificant, especially when the majority of us will not be owners we’ll be workers and buyers. Now I’m no normie, I know that a lot of this just goes on corporate warfare, IMF loans, and bailouts. But I recognise that thats part of the system we live in and sadly we have to hang on to what we’ve got whilst the very government I am under is selling it all off to the highest bidder. Don’t want things getting worse do I?

IrM: Yeahh its not a significant thing to base your ideology around, but you’re not getting the point, Taxation is still THEFT!

RM: Ok.

IrM: (Puzzled) eh… No, Taxation is Theft.

RM: Well at this point does anyone care about the views of an An-cap. Come back to reality dude.

(Blinding light)

IrM: The right of a man to own his own own property is a right ordained by common natural law prerequisite to our beings here on earth, through the self-ownership of a person’s own oneself, by natural exclusivity to the creation of ethics and rule of law, as prescribed in first principles, to disagree is literal rape and medieval iceland an…

RM: Alright I get it, you want a wibbly wobbly philosophical answer. Look I could the Positive/Negative rights shit if you want, Kant and Moral hierarchies if we want, I really don’t think folks give a damn about that right now, besides theres probably better people who could do that job than me (Olly)

I think when the dust has settled it all comes down to taxes being negligible compared to what you defend.

IrM: Huh?

RM: Exploited Labour

IrM: Huh, there is no exploitation, if I want someone to pick my potatoes…

EXPLOITATION IN 45 SECONDS

A man has £10 worth of Capital, he uses this to buy raw materials. He pays a wood turner to turn this wood into a chair worth £50. For this he pays the labourer £10. The turner therefore has to make 5 chairs in this arrangement in order to buy 1 of them for himself. You don’t gotta be a genius to see theres a disconnect going on here…

Remember my old pay check? I made about £1000 a month, Now as you…

IrM: Why do you keep leaving? I’m in here?

RM: I got £1000 a month, in an average day we made £1500 worth of goods, generally there were 3 people there each day. Divided by all of us thats £500 each. Now I’m gonna be super generous and say that only half of that is profit, that brings us up to a daily average of £250, but I only saw £60. Whats going on here?

IrM: You decided to take that job…

RM: No I didn’t it beats eating ass omelettes for a living.

I’m not denying its very liberal estimate it is, but £190 is a lot of money that I literally get no say in how its spent, I’m sure a lot of it would of have to have gone back into my employment or taken out as more taxes, but its not the specific amount I’m interested in, the point is I get no say my labour power, I don’t even get a vote, best I can do is fuck my boss. If we drag this out to a month, thats £3000, I’m getting screwed. And this, this small little number, is what we consider… THEFTTTTTTTTTTTT. Those Chicago boys were good.

IrM: You can… You can start your own business…

RM: Majority will always be workers not owners.

IrM: Not if everyone decided to save up their money and open one

RM: Nobody’s going to buy your cigars if they’ve quit smoking to sell you cigars.

PAUSE

And don’t think I’d stop there, I’d consider RENT theft too, think of all the money we spend so just existing in buildings, somehow I don’t think it costs half our pay checks to have personal washing machine fixers.

IrM: But its their property

RM: O RLY?

IrM: Yes, if they weren’t allowed to do that then they wouldn’t bother, nobody would be able to find anywhere to rent

RM: And maybe if jesus had been hanged we’d all be kneeling over a fucking gibbet.

IrM: Wa.httt??

RM: Theres a reason I think why we call them American Libertarians. See if you pick up a copy of Adam Smiths stuff you’ll notice that he’s not the pastiche we think of him as. Check this out… “The landlords like any other men, love to reap where they never sowed, and demand a rent even from its nature produce” Now I’m not saying BOOM Smith’s a lefty, the point is he didn’t view Capitalism as great just because, he was looking at it based in his experience of the system as it existed in Britain.

But America has a very different history to us Anglos, the entire nation was founded upon a certain hatred of taxes, and tea.

BM: Actually it never really was about the taxes, they just wanted to own the slaves whole sale, didn’t want old money controlling the colonies so they could …

And when you take the views of this man, and throw it into the melting pot of Exceptionalism and Capital, you get all sorts of zany concepts, like the Self-Made man, The U-turned addict, the Noble Christian, and above all the cult of the founders. They’re dead, they’re not going to sleep with you, I’m sorry.

So what of it? Is Taxation theft? Sure, but its not worth basing your life around it. We all think the Capitalist process is just the general flow of life but its very recent, Medieval Ireland and Iceland don’t compare guys, and at the heart of that system is Exploitation, something that we all as a class deal with on a daily basis, and gain nothing from. One might argue, Taxes on business are a trade off for what they get from us.

I know when you first get into politics its juicy to claim theft over a little bite out of your salary, but we only see it that way because its… literally right in front of us, there isn’t a spare column that counts your total labour value. We shouldn’t get so pissed off over the pennies scraped off instead of the huge overhead.

IrM: Well, guess you got me there.

RM: The circle is complete

BM: I must say it really is a very American thing this whole Taxation, not good business isn’t it rather? RM: Well at least we don’t live in a socialist country… like FRANCE!

Yeah thats like 2, 3, 4 personas in 1 video, I could start an extended universe.

BOOM RAWRRRRRRRR

Oh what now?

I’M THE LATE FOR TRENDS GUY, FEMINISM IS CANCER!

nope nope.

WAIT, STOP, SOMEONE GIVE ME AN OPINION!

[surprisemomblog]

#blacklivesmatter

After hearing about George Floyd (and not even being able to bring myself to watch the video), I was waiting for a while to find something I felt comfortable posting as an educator. It seemed justifiable to me to wait. Over the last several days, I realized that makes me part of the problem.

I ended up posting something to Facebook on Friday about my own white privilege. This is a concept I’ve discussed with my students on a number of occasions. As an English teacher, I am fortunate to read novels that address racism with my students. We are able to connect those novels to real-life events and discuss these concepts at length. Nevertheless, I am shocked every year at how many students say white privilege isn’t real (though I am not surprised those words never come from the mouths of people of color). Of course, I can’t say this to my students, but ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?

I feel like there is a misconception that admitting to white privilege means you’re guilty. That you’re doing something wrong. That you somehow chose it. What people don’t realize is that the point is that you don’t choose it, just as no one else chooses the color of the skin with which they are born. You aren’t guilty for having white privilege, but you are guilty if you don’t use that privilege to—at the very least—speak up for those born without the same privilege.

I am unbelievably fortunate that I never have to worry about my son having his hood up and hands in his pocket and risk being shot, just because he has his headphones up too loud and can’t hear the person who thinks he’s a threat. Every single time I have sped past a cop and not gotten pulled over, it is my own white privilege that saved me from a ticket—or worse.

There’s another misconception that saying #blacklivesmatter means you’re saying other races don’t. I read a post by someone with the name Shola MRichards, and he said it perfectly: “Saying ‘All Lives Matter’ is insensitive, tone-deaf, and dumb. All lives can’t matter until Black lives matter.” It’s interesting because often the people who protest the concept of “Black Lives Matter” are the same people who say we are all a bunch of sissies and that the idea of being politically correct has been taken too far. Yet, who’s the sissy when you can’t even acknowledge that the lives of a single race matter? You are. You are a coward.

Do I think the violent protests happening are the answer? No. And I also think there is an abundance of evidence to support that a lot of the violence is not even being perpetrated by the protestors. Instead, it’s Anarchists and “fuck the man” people who don’t even know the names of those who have been murdered and are just using this as an excuse to pretend they’re in one of The Purge films. And those who aren’t? Well, even Target’s CEO (who, mind you, is a HUGE Trump supporter) came out in support of the protestors, even though it means he will oversee the rebuilding of several stores. You see it everywhere, but it is true: lives (Hell, even one life) are/is more important than materials.

As a woman who has received my fair share of mistreatment for being born that way, the treatment I have received pails in comparison to those who feel afraid to walk alone because of the color of their skin. The pain I have felt being undermined as a woman will never come close to the pain anyone who has lost someone they love because of racial discrimination feels. Many of you have also experienced prejudice for something beyond your control. While I hope your experience galvanizes you to do something here, this isn’t about you. And it isn’t about me. It isn’t about cops, either. It’s about pervasive systemic racial prejudice and injustice.

I don’t have the answer. I don’t know how to even begin to find a solution. In fact, I need a lot more education. But, if you believe in a better America where racism is something we are constantly working to challenge and combat, I am your ally.

FACEBOOK POST

I have privilege as a white person because I can do all of these things without thinking twice:

I can go birding (#ChristianCooper).

I can go jogging (#AmaudArbery).

I can relax in the comfort of my own home (#BothamJean and #AtatianaJefferson).

I can ask for help after being in a car crash (#JonathanFerrell and #RenishaMcBride).

I can have a cellphone (#StephonClark).

I can leave a party to get to safety (#JordanEdwards).

I can play loud music (#JordanDavis).

I can sell CDs (#AltonSterling).

I can sleep (#AiyanaJones)

I can walk from the corner store (#MikeBrown).

I can play cops and robbers (#TamirRice).

I can go to church (#Charleston9).

I can walk home with Skittles (#TrayvonMartin).

I can hold a hair brush while leaving my own bachelor party (#SeanBell).

I can party on New Year’s (#OscarGrant).

I can get a normal traffic ticket (#SandraBland).

I can lawfully carry a weapon (#PhilandoCastile).

I can break down on a public road with car problems (#CoreyJones).

I can shop at Walmart (#JohnCrawford) .

I can have a disabled vehicle (#TerrenceCrutcher).

I can read a book in my own car (#KeithScott).

I can be a 10yr old walking with our grandfather (#CliffordGlover).

I can decorate for a party (#ClaudeReese).

I can ask a cop a question (#RandyEvans).

I can cash a check in peace (#YvonneSmallwood).

I can take out my wallet (#AmadouDiallo).

I can run (#WalterScott).

I can breathe (#EricGarner).

I can live (#FreddieGray).

I can be arrested without the fear of being murdered (#GeorgeFloyd).

#BlackLivesMatter

*I copied and pasted this...please do the same.

[jlstreck]

American Punchline Ch 63

A TJ Hammond/Steve Rogers Crossover

You can find the previous chapters here (or on AO3).

Chapter 63

“What are you two up to?” Sam wandered into TJ and Steve’s office. “That may be the biggest white board I’ve ever seen. Where did you even find that?”

TJ and Steve both laughed as their friend walked around the massive board.

��Tony had it custom made for us. I think it killed him a bit not to install some super high tech version of one, but we both wanted an old-school whiteboard.”

“Old school to you. Still pretty new to me.” Steve poked TJ in the side as he moved to write on a different section. “Of course, he did set JARVIS to capture everything we write on here and archive it so we don’t lose things. Plus I think we’re supposed to be able to edit stuff.”

“Indeed you are, Captain.” JARVIS piped up. “All whiteboard activity will be fully cataloged and searchable.”

“I take it this is all tied to the event you guys are planning?”

“Sure is,” TJ grinned. “Thanks to Pepper and the team, we’ll be ready to go in far less time than ever expected.”

“Now that we have enough of the details locked in, Tony was going to have information printed up so you can invite anyone you think would benefit. I still can’t believe he managed to get the convention center on three weeks notice.” Steve shook his head.

“I’m not. It seems like there’s very little a determined Tony can’t do.” TJ shoved the cap onto his marker. “Since you’re here, any interest in helping out with this little shindig?”

“Lots of interest. What can I do?” Sam was quick to jump in to assist.

“We could use some more volunteer therapists, counselors, really anyone trained to help deal with our big three issues - PTSD, drug or alcohol abuse, and sexual preference. Stark is pulling in a bunch through his connections, but we want to make sure we have plenty of people for participants to talk to when they come.”

“You can certainly count me in and I definitely know people that will likely want to help. I assume you’re going to have some way of making sure people get with the right professional.” Sam slid into the over-sized chair near the whiteboard.

“Yes. Pepper has a team of people helping us on that front. With JARVIS’s help they’re building out a system that will track level of training and expertise for each of the mental health volunteers. Then as people come through registration they’ll have an opportunity to indicate which topics they want to speak with someone about so we can match them accordingly. Because we don’t know how long each one will take, the system will match each person to a team of specialists and they’ll have something that indicates there current place in line.” TJ explained, full of enthusiasm with how organized it sounded and how many people he hoped they could help.

“So basically they can wander around to the other areas until they’re one of the next ones in the virtual line?” Sam nodded thoughtfully. “I like it. It sounded like there was going to be a lot on offer. What else did you guys land on?”

“Obviously the mental health thing is a major piece of the event. On top of that we’ll have resources for education, employment, housing, various assistance programs, and service animals. Not to mention workshops on handling social media, networking areas for those that want to meet people in similar situations, plenty of quiet spaces for those that prefer to avoid the crowds, and lots of food.” Steve listed off all the offerings. “Honestly, if it weren’t for having Tony, Pepper, and the majority of the Stark Foundation behind us there is no way we’d pull something like this off so fast.”

“It makes me tired just listening to you.” Sam conceded. “Who should I point people to if they’re interested in helping?”

“You can provide the contact information to me and I’ll be sure the coordinators receive it.” JARVIS offered before Steve or TJ could fumble through providing contact information.

“Perfect. I’m gonna go make some calls.” Sam hopped out of the chair, sparing a quick glance back to where the other two had refocused on their whiteboard as he headed for the door.

“Do you really think we’re gonna pull this off?” TJ asked Steve, eyes fixed on the list he was currently making.

“Yeah, I do. With the team we’ve got supporting it there is no way it doesn’t come together.” Steve reached out, squeezing TJ’s shoulders. “JARVIS can you capture all this and send it to the Pepper and Emily?”

“Of course.” Steve and TJ stepped back so JARVIS could get a full view. While he wasn’t fully installed in the office, Tony had hooked up enough to integrate him with the board.

“What do you think …” TJ’s question was cut off by his cell phone ringing. “Shit. It’s my mother.”

“I suppose it would have been too much to ask for her to remain oblivious to my coming out?” Steve gave TJ a sympathetic look as the brunet bit the bullet and answered his phone, putting it on speaker so Steve could hear the conversation.

“It’s about time you answered.” Elaine snapped.

“I’ve been a bit busy.” TJ watched as Steve sat down on the couch near the window, following when the blond patted the space beside him. “And it’s not exactly like we left things in a way that made you think I was going to be calling to check in on a regular basis.”

“Your brother and grandmother both told me you needed space, but Thomas this is ridiculous. How in the world did you manage to convince Captain America that he was bisexual after only a few weeks. Do you realize the irreparable harm you’re doing to his reputation.”

“Excuse me, ma’am,” Steve cut in before TJ could even think of a response. “TJ had nothing to do with my bisexuality. As I stated during the show, this is one of those things the history books just didn’t have right. And as far as any damage to my reputation goes - quite frankly I don’t particularly give a damn. I’m done living my life to please those that want to use me as nothing more than a show pony.”

“But have you thought this through?” Elaine sounded desperate.

“I guarantee I’ve given more thought to what this means for my life than you have. I don’t expect everyone to support my decision, but it is my decision. I’ve come out and now I’m going to make the best of the platform I’ve been shoved onto to try and make life a bit better for those like me. If you have an issue with that, I suggest you take it up with me and stop harassing TJ about it. Your son has been nothing short of an amazing friend and supporter since I’ve met him. I believe it is no small miracle that he retained such amazing compassion and humanity given the circumstances of his life, and I’m damned glad to consider him such a close friend. Now if you’ll excuse us, we have more important things to deal with.”

Steve disconnected the call before Elaine could argue.

“Did you mean that?” TJ’s voice was quite as he remained frozen against Steve’s side.

“Every fucking word.” Steve tossed the phone onto the empty cushion beside them, wrapping his arm around TJ’s shoulders as they fell silent.

A/N: I know a great many of us would like to hang the jerk up by his toes and tear him to pieces, but fortunately Natasha and the others have more sense. I’m reasonably certain the congressman will be having nightmares about his mysterious visitor for weeks to come though.

*~*~ American Punchline ~*~*

A/N: Am I the only one that kinda went "aaaawwwwww" there at the end?

Realistically speaking, I'm hoping to wrap this up in the next several chapters and move on to the sequel. You guys won't mind if I pretty much completely rewrite CATWS will you?

@steverogersnotebook @marvel-at-stucky @colorfulcandypainter @buckythetinman @dwindlingdichotomy@captainbuckybarness@readergirl1013 @purplechewbacca @eyeluvmusic21  @penny-yolo @sarahsassafras13 @lilbitmo0re@justfollowtheroad @sebstan-theman @dickpuncher365  @captaincutebutt@unabashedlyfoggybanana@gingerrootknits  @hopefulfangirlblr @katherinekittentaylor @brb-theres-cookies@sciencebeam

[60footwhitearrow]

Speaking as a Chinese person born and raised in the USA I find this post and the notes hilarious and also slightly annoying bc

1) all the US folk in the comments whining "not all americans!" is hysterical to me bc it's the same idea as with "not all men", yeah it's not literally 100% of Americans or 100% of men but it's enough of them and also it's about the system/culture more so than the number of individuals. You're like, completely missing the point. But at the same time

2) there a few good points there like yeah the cultural stuff and the education system play a big role in this and also for a lot of us US folk who are accustomed to being around other US folk 24/7 we just haven't had the opportunity to actually know anything otherwise and when asked where we're from we just respond with our states out of habit bc literally everyone around us expects that (especially if we go to a college in the US where every convo with a new person starts with "where are you from" and chances are it's somewhere in the US where if you respond "the US" or even preface with "the US" it's just. Redundant and dumb) and

3) obvs this doesn't serve to excuse anything that may be construed as (or actually is) US-centric or arrogant and obvs this doesn't mean we shouldn't be more aware and mindful (I feel like @animateglee gave a perfectly reasonable way to handle it) but people who assume it must be just bc of innate superiority complex and deliberate arrogance are just. Ridiculous. I get that it's annoying and insulting but something insulting* coming from a place of ignorance doesn't warrant quite the same reaction as something insulting coming from a place of active malice (as an lgbtq+ woman of color don't fucking fight me on this)

*but not actively or immmediately harmful, like I feel like this definitely has roots in deeper systemic and cultural issues but assuming a non-US person knows where a big US city is just isn't the same as someone calling a POC or an lgbtq+ person by a slur

4) I'm assuming this post is talking about US folk in other countries, including other countries in the Americas. Talking to non-US folk while in the US I feel like it's perfectly reasonable to say which state/general region I'm from, I'd have the same expectations as a tourist myself. When I go to China and ask another Chinese person where they're from I expect that (assuming they're actually from China and not another tourist like I am) they answer with something like Weihai or Xizang, and those are the kinds of answers I get. Aka more specific than just "I'm from here, China." I expect this even though I'm the tourist in that situation, because I'm asking someone while in their home country where they're from. But talking as a US tourist in another country is a different story; if that Chinese person would then ask me where I'm from, I shouldn't think of initially answering with anything other than "the US" without sounding arrogant. I feel like that distinction/clarification is an important one that's lacking here

5) if you're one of those percentages or life-stories people, unless you're asked specifically for that information please. Don't. In many cases asking where you're from is a formality or just small-talk to be friendly, if they're actually interested in something that specific they'll ask for it. Plus if you don't know the language or culture or are otherwise connected to whatever you're claiming to be in some way other than "my great-great grandfather was a quarter Finnish and that's a fun fact", does it really matter in this context?

meeting a new group of people

me: hi! so where are you guys from :D

normal people: I am from Russia/Brazil/Italy/Australia/etc :)

Americans, assuming studying the specific geography of their country was ever relevant to me: Oh I was born in iower but went to school in Oregano (My parents come from East Carolina though):~)

[abrokenchaingang-blog]

From this Angle

As a young African American man in the 21st century, we all know the struggles we face collectively. And if your don't, let me be the one to paint a small picture of reality. From discrimination and racial profiling, to the lack of our education and economical growth within our communities on so many different levels; we remain behind, stuck at the fuckn bottom. Drowning in a system that's caused us to become the most divided we've ever been. Leaving us powerless as a whole, unable to make any real progress.    With that being said alone, It's easy to feel some type of way. And most likely you do. To say that I feel you bruh is an understatement. With this frustration building up through generations, some of us have responded in ways that play right into the hands of a system we passionately despise. Self inflicted wounds that permanently scare the young black man with prison time and rejection from mainstream society, conditioned into a lifestyle that leads to a dead. Making it extremely difficult to get ahead. Shit, in most cases, a lot of us just feel trapped. Either it's in a fuck ass job that we could care less about or in our situations in general. Whether in the streets or corporate America, the weight of the world on our shoulders makes it a constant struggle for us all tryna figure shit out. Using all kinds of vices to distract us from this pain, keeping some stuck, and taking others under. We've gotten to a point where we've lost respect for ourselves and our own people. And so has society. Looked upon as the incapable, hopeless, and in some cases, mindless seeds of society....

Shit ain't looking too good for the home team champ.

OUR MISSION So where does it end? How do we lighten up this burden and change the false reality that shit just "is what it is"? I believe the solution starts with you and me bruh. The answers start here... "Broken Chain Gang". Here we represent Accountability, Growth, Ambition, and Persistence that Empowers the Young Black male to succeed on levels only imagined. A family-like community where we go on this journey together exploring topics and insightful ways we could change our circumstances through personal development and building businesses/careers to improve our overall lifestyle. As a member, you are also free to openly share your ideas, adversities and experiences as a young black man, ways you look to improve, what you've learned and get feed back from myself and other members as well. With this movement, I'm convinced we can: - Make Major strides collectively.

- Take control of our destiny by creating our own opportunities.

- Break free of the contentment and stereotypes of the black male in America. AND

- Become better men who are financially and mentally empowered to lead better lives.   Now, are the odds stacked against us? Of course. But the real question is, what the fuck we gonna do about it? So whether your striving to find new ways to empower yourself as a black man, gain financial freedom through business and investments, or just looking to be apart of a tribe that will push you to become the best version of yourself... Its time to grab your nuts young nigga. Regardless of your position. No more excuses. Lets make it happen.

[janiedean]

That's why I said worst country and im thinking EVERY Americans are very retarded. Remind me, who the fuck is in the white house again? A fucking celebrity star that MOST AMERICANS doubted years ago who wouldn't be a fucking president and would make a bad president which appears to be the case now and people voted for him??????????? Seriously, fuck Americans and perhaps maybe they should die if they do not pay more attention to the bad shit going on

Because I don’t think it’s even an excuse no more that I don’t want to hear about the badshit in the world because that shit is more depressing which is true but that does not justify them sitting there ass about it and doing nothing while they are playing games or posting something about cats!!!!!!!! Maybe everyone should throw the depressing shit in their faces as fuck them, they don’t care? Then everyone around the world don’t care about you And America fucking sucks more than China and other countries that they considered bad. Without looking at the positives and why you could argue that they are “better” than the US has even if these countries do not have something like the First Amendment. I apologize with this rant I’m going on but do you see where I’m coming from what this?

…. no, I don’t.

all right, I debated not answering this, but since I have a feeling some of y’all aren’t really catching the drift of my political opinions, I’m gonna go at it:

first: please do avoid calling people retarded - it’s not nice, it’s not funny, you can use any other damned word that doesn’t have the connotations that specific one has, and honestly, if I’m discussing a country where thanks to classism and a shitty educational system they have forty-three million people who can’t read and write because their teachers couldn’t be arsed to make sure they actually learned, you going and saying they’re *retarded* is really fucking shitty, end of question, so if we really need to have this conversation chill the fuck out and drop that tone because I’m not here to insult people like that especially if talking about people who might have not gotten an education because their teachers/peers thought they were ****retarded**** with a bunch of ***s;

second: okay, and berlusconi was elected in italy thrice and berlusconi OWNED the televisions that started the reality genre in italy along with gossip newspapers and shit so he was basically trump except less whacked (AND IF I’M SAYING THAT…), so what, now I’ll call **retarded** everyone else who’s voted berlusconi? or the current italian government made of utter incompetents or racists? trump is shit but I’m the least person who can go and laugh about it COMING FROM THE COUNTRY WHERE PEOPLE VOTED HIS EQUIVALENT THRICE and now voted pretty much the same;

third: actually trump didn’t get the popular vote and the percentage in which he made enough to win was…. poor white people who didn’t finish high school/barely finished high school. who most likely live in areas where no one has given a fuck about sky-high unemployment since at least the beginning of the eighties. ‘scuse me I’m not gonna judge people who fell for it when they didn’t get an education and he was an outsider promising them to change things (which ofc he won’t do but they can’t know), but never mind;

fourth: trump got 62,984,828 votes. hillary got 65,853,514. now, the US have an esteemed population of 328,355,612. if we take out trump’s voters, we have 265,370,784 people. now, according to you, TWO MILLION SIXTY FIVE PEOPLE SHOULD DIE BECAUSE OF HOW THE OTHERS HAVE VOTED? like, are you listening to yourself? because that’s fucking ridiculous, period;

fifth: I highly doubt most americans are on the internet posting pictures of cats;

sixth: americans on tumblr/on the internet are in 90% of the cases privileged people who have no clue of how the non-privileged people’s lives work or they wouldn’t be assuming that all trump voters voted for him because they have boner for neonazism, but judging the entire population by their online presence isn’t exactly fair;

seventh: man, I think, idk, NORTH KOREA is fairly worse than the US are (also pls just call them US, AMERICA IS THE ENTIRE CONTINENT idc for how it’s referred to in english IT’S UNITED STATES gdi), same as idk, eritrea, south sudan, every damned dictatorship refugees flee from, most likely syria these days, and a lot of other places, including china, because I mean AT LEAST IN THE US YOU DON’T HAVE RESTRICTED INTERNET ACCESS and shit like that like man if according to you the first amendment is not enough to make someplace way better automatically than dictatorships/autocracies, well, congrats but really fucking not. without free speech you don’t have a democratic country, period, and no one wants dictatorships. ffs;

eight: I’m all for us-criticizing (and criticizing tumblr’s us centrism) but in no way shape or form I am ever going to go like ‘all americans suck they should die’ because a) that’s not how it works, b) judging an entire population is always wrong period, c) a lot of those americans who voted trump and so on are actually victims of the system which sucks, d) I actually don’t hate americans as like, actual people, I hate us centrism and how the us meddle with about everyone else and destabilize entire areas and then OPS WE HAVE TERRORISTS ARE WE SURPRISED, but I don’t hate them and I don’t hate the US as a whole because again, as I’ve said a countless number of times, there’s been excellent stuff that came from the US and excellent people who came from there and writing off 325 million people because of politics especially when it comes to trump who has been elected in this specific political climate is just downright asinine;

finally: I didn’t write off americans as a lost cause when they voted bush jr the second time (the first was a fraud and we all know it), at this point I think I can afford to not do it for trump.

to finish it all off: I don’t know if it was clear, but just in case, the fact that I’m US critical doesn’t mean I hate the US as a whole and the fact that I’m a leftist doesn’t mean that I have to automatically think everyone who votes where I don’t or wouldn’t is an idiot and believe me my current government is making me test that every day but I managed to not do it yet, so can you, and the fact that I think the american left is centrist/that tumblr left is a joke, and the fact that I don’t think all trump voters MUST be evil doesn’t mean I actually like trump or that I’m not a leftist.

and I’m not having any political related discussion in those terms. ALL MUSLIMS SHOULD DIE was the point that I had to hear from neofascists/the equivalent of your alt-right people when I was in middle school post sept. 11th and I didn’t think it was a great argument, and all americans should die is the exact same matter.

tldr: if you want to discuss this like a civil person who can actually do things rationally fine, if not please find someone else to rant at because I don’t appreciate this kind of language/tone. thanks.