#and there are people dedicating whole accounts to it

[bonefall]

Is there beef with the Holstein cows and you or what was that joke lol

It's kind of wild It's just never come up on this blog before, but I HATE holsteins. Bottom 10 cow breeds for me. I hate how they're so common they account for the majority of milk produced. I hate that they're the "default" cow to the point where some don't even know cattle HAVE other colors. I hate their tiny horns (IF THEY EVEN HAVE THAT. LOSER ASS HORNLESS COW) and their painfully massive udders.

Legit I'm trying so hard to not launch into a No Mouth Must Scream style AM speech-- shoot my hand slipped.

(AM speech about why i dont like holsteins below the cut)

For starters, I have to give a brief lesson on what these terms mean; the "Holstein" is the American strain of the "Frisian" breed. Frisians are an ancient breed from Frisia, in the north of what we now consider the Netherlands. Crosses between the breeds are "Holstein-Frisians."

(There’s even more to this but im keeping it as simple as possible. Also one of my friends is Frisian and she is probably going to kill me for describing it like that.)

Historically, livestock was adapted to the environment they lived in. Frisians were bred by the Frisii people for hundreds of years in extremely grass-rich, lush, flat environments. The "polders" of the northern parts of the Netherlands. They're huge and eat a LOT of food.

Traditional Frisians were developed to produce as much meat and milk from a single individual as possible, without compromising the health of the cattle with constant inbreeding to get quick gains. We are talking about a breed that is over 2000 years old. They had the perfect environment to make The Ultimate Food Cow and by god they did it. I can respect that.

So, take that, drag it across an ocean to a place that does NOT have polders, and add the rapid enshittification of capitalism to it. BAM you've got a fucking holstein.

There is ONE goal for "improving" the holstein. Make More Milk. As long as the black and white milkbag leaks enough, nothing else matters. Health? Fertility? Feed ratio? Ability to not die of infection? WHO CARES. MILK LINE GO UP.

Over 90% of holsteins are inbred to start with, because Milk Line Go Up. To the tune of having an average COI of 8%-- where extreme negative effects (think Hapsburgs) start to crop up around 10%

Holstein bulls are aggressive bastards (many dairy bulls are), so no one wants to keep intact males in their herds, meaning most cows are artificially inseminated

Not being limited by the natural lifespan of a living bull means that the same stud can keep having direct offspring for decades after his death

Toystory the bull had 500,000 calves before he died, and hit over 1 million offspring in 2015. That's ONE animal and to put this in perspective, there are 9 million holsteins in the US.

DON'T WORRY IT GETS WORSE

Not only can 99% of holsteins be traced back to just two bulls-- 99% of male holsteins share one of two exact Y chromosomes with those two bulls.

The gene pool is so small that it's equivalent to about 60 individuals. Warrior Cat allegiances are larger than that. That's barely bigger than modern ThunderClan.

"Massive lack of genetic diversity" does not begin to capture the existential dread of this situation. Mark my words, WATCH, when the Bird Flu finally mutates a strain that rips through a mammalian population, it's gonna be in the USA and it's going to be through our dairy cattle.

This is not prophecy or me laying a curse on the land, this is the natural consequence of basing the stability of US milk production on the equivalent of 9 million clones of two classrooms worth of individuals, and then packing them in close quarters

And we don't have to wait for doomsday for the impacts to be apparent on the cattle themelves

Holstein fertility has also dropped by half since the 1960s when the intensive inbreeding really kicked into high gear

Because their whole body is dedicating all of their resources to milk production, they have a notoriously "bony" frame.

Show judges, however, like this because they think that's a very "feminine" look for a 1600 pound ruminant. Very normal thing to think.

Like. I don't know if i can communicate this to people who don't look at cows a lot (it's not quite as obviously dramatic as a pug skull) but here is a comparison of an "ideal" show holstein and an "unselected" holstein from a herd that's been established as a sort of "control group" for what they looked like back in the 1960s;

The way that the artery on the "modern" cow's belly runs to the udder like a big pink worm freaks me out the most ngl

The udder also bulges out from between the back legs

The show cow is so thin

And then compare these both to a Holstein-Frisian cross who leans more on the Frisian side;

Proper weight, developed legs. Its biggest "problem" is actually just the udder shape-- deep udders, which "hang" low like that, aren't optimal for milk-focused breeds because the higher away from the ground the less chance there is of infection. In that department, the "unselected" holstein clearly outclasses the holstein-frisian.

But it probably won't be surprising to hear that the "show holstein," with its massive, swollen udder, is SUPER prone to infections such as mastitis.

But it is also just more prone to getting sick generally

And, to keep up with these insane demands, holsteins need a TON of food. You aren't going to just turn these things out into a pasture and be done with it. Even its ancestor the Frisian needed premium Dutch polder grass to be such a good cow-- crank that up to 11 with these Monuments to Humanity's Hubrice

The Texas Longhorn developed in semi-feral conditions and can eat a bush to become the best thing in a 10 mile radius. The Scottish Highland was iron-forged in upland moors with a steady diet of turf and rain.

Meanwhile if a Holstein has less than 5 homemade meals a day without poland spring bottled water it will die to death.

And the WORST part? You have to use these if you want to make money in dairy farming. It's WAAY too expensive to just run a suboptimal farm. Their milk isn't great, but they sure do make a lot of it.

...so Holsteins and Holstein-Frisians (and other "super efficient" breeds) have absolutely decimated heritage cattle. The American Milking Devon is a deep reddish brown with gorgeous horns and low maintenance; rare. Randall Linebacks are painted with lines of white speckles down the back and can be used for any purpose; critically endangered. The Niata was a pug-faced cow who could fight jaguars; extinct.

And THAT'S what makes me hate them most of all. I LOVE cows, but whenever I see a reference to one, it's a holstein. It's always boring black and white splotches with big pink udders. They're practically synonymous with "cow" when their homogeniety is actually hiding much cooler breeds from you.

Did you know cows can be tiger-striped?

And that England has its own type of longhorn?

Or that cow horns can twist upwards like an antelope?

And that they can have REALLY LONG ears?

And that they can be blue?

And that's not even getting into some of the cows that have gotten a small crumb of attention lately, such as Highlands, Ankole-Watusi, and Texas Longhorns. There's so many cool cows out there! And they're all really different from holsteins! MOST of them are also a lot healthier and produce tastier milk and meat!

TL;DR yeah i don't like holsteins and I like sniping at them. For reasons both legit and petty.

[tiredmoonslut]

The Elriel/Gwynriel ship war is hilarious to me not only because it's the most 2016 Tumblr Clexa/Bellarke bullshit I've ever seen but also because I don't remember Gwyn and Azriel ever having so much as a scene together---not because it didn't happen, but because it was so unremarkable to me in ACOSF that I instantly forgot it

[sickfreaksirkay]

tumblr users have this unique way of making everything they say condescending like if one more person comments on my post about the thesaurus saying lover is a synonym for knight like “ummm yeah actually op knights are actually very well known for being lovers”. yeah i fucking know that. my whole blog is about knights. do you think i don’t know that

[0w0tsuki]

Anyways never tell me that sissies are safe for trans women again.

[cybers-shithole]

IVE MADE IT. IVE OFFICALLY BEEN FAKECLAIMED 🎉🎉🎉🎉

[unagrancantidaddepanes]

”thats cringe” why is it cringe. You are cringe. Why do you hate love

[knightofmordred]

merlin official are so pathetic, hyping people up with a 'surprise' rewatch of episode one just to promote their US streaming sites 😵‍💫 get outta hereeee 💀💀

[inkskinned]

it's easier to apply for jobs than ever! so what if you lost your insurance, anyone can get a job these days, even without meds. everyone is hiring! there's a "good employee" shortage!

well you just need to revamp your resume, here's a paid app subscription that can read it for you. rewrite the cover letter they won't read. google jobs in my area and then scrawl through Monster/Indeed/worbly. did you want to save the search? this was posted 98 days ago. over 1 billion applicants! this position is trending.

jobs i actively like doing and get paid for. your search returned no results. easy-apply with HireSpin! easy apply with SparkFire! easy apply with PenisFlash! with a few short clicks, get your information stolen.

watch out! the first 98 links on google are actually scams! they're false postings. oopsie. that business isn't even hiring. that other one is closed permanently. find one that looks halfway legit, google the company and the word "careers". go to their page. scroll past brightly-lit diversity stock photo JOIN US white sans serif. we are a unique, fresh, client-focused stock value capitalism. we are committed to excellence and selling your soul on ebay. we are DRIVEN with POWER to INNOVATE our greed. yippee! our company has big values of divisive decision making, sucking our dicks, and hating work-life balances. our values are to piss in your mouth. sign here and tell us if you have gender issues so we can get ahead of the sexual harassment claim. are you hispanic although let's be real we threw out the resume when we saw your last name.

sign up to LinkHub to access updates from this company. make a HirePlus account to apply. download the PoundLink app. your account has been created, click the link we sent you in 15 minutes. upload that resume. we didn't read the resume, manually fill in the lines now. what is your expected pay grade. oh actually we want hungry people, not people driven by a salary. cut a zero off that number, buddy, this is about opportunity, and we need to be thrifty. highest level of education. autofill is glitching. here is an AI generated set of questions. what is your favorite part of our sexy, sexy company. how do you resolve conflict. will you get our company logo tattooed on your person. warning: while our CEO is guilty of wage theft, we will absolutely refuse to hire a nonviolent felon.

thank you for your interest at WEEBLIX. we actually already filled this position internally. we actually never had that posting. we actually needed you to have 9 years of experience and since you have 10 years we think it might be too many? we'll be texting you. we'll email you. we'll keep your resume. definitely absolutely we won't just completely ignore you. look at your phone, there's already a spam text from Bethany@stealyouridentity. they're hiring!

wait, did you get an interview? well that's special, aren't you lucky. out of 910 jobs you applied to, one answered, finally. and funny story! actually the position isn't exactly as advertised, we are looking for someone curious and dedicated. it's sort of more managerial. no, the pay doesn't change - you won't have any leadership title. now take this 90 minute assessment. in order to be a dog groomer, we need you to explain cell biology. in order to be a copyeditor, write a tiny dissertation about the dwindling supply of helium on the planet. answer our riddles three. great job! we just need to push this up to Tracy in HR who will send it to Rodney who is actually in charge. and then of course it's jay's decision and then greg will need to see you naked and if you survive you'll be given a drug test and a full anal examination.

and of course you'll be hungry this whole time, aren't you, months and months of the same shit. months of no insurance, no meds, no funding, barely able to afford the internet and the phone and the rent - all things you need in order to even apply for our thing. but do it again! do it again and again and again, until you flip inside out and turn into a being of pure dread!

you're not hired yet because you're lazy. there's over one million AI-generated hallucinated jobs in your area. don't worry. with zipruiter, hiring and firing is easier than ever. sign up. stay on-call.

in the meantime, little peon - why don't you just fucking suffer.

[jewishvitya]

A pro-Palestine Jew on tiktok asked those of us who were raised pro-Israel, what got us to change our minds on Palestine. I made a video to answer (with my voice, not my face), and a few people watched it and found some value in it. I'm putting this here too. I communicate through text better than voice.

So I feel repetitive for saying this at this point, but I grew up in the West Bank settlements. I wrote this post to give an example of the extent to which Palestinians are dehumanized there.

Where I live now, I meet Palestinians in day to day life. Israeli Arab citizens living their lives. In the West Bank, it was nothing like that. Over there, I only saw them through the electric fence, and the hostility between us and Palestinians was tangible.

When you're a child being brought into the situation, you don't experience the context, you don't experience the history, you don't know why they're hostile to you. You just feel "these people hate me, they don't want me to exist." And that bubble was my reality. So when I was taught in school that everything we did was in self defense, that our military is special and uniquely ethical because it's the only defensive military in the world - that made sense to me. It slotted neatly into the reality I knew.

One of the first things to burst the bubble for me was when I spoke to an old Israeli man and he was talking about his trauma from battle. I don't remember what he said, but it hit me wrong. It conflicted with the history as I understood it. So I was a bit desperate to make it make sense again, and I said, "But everything we did was in self defense, right?"

He kinda looked at me, couldn't understand at all why I was upset, and he went, "We destroyed whole villages. Of course we did. It was war, that's what you do."

And that casual "of course" stuck with me. I had to look into it more.

I couldn't look at more accurate history, and not at accounts by Palestinians, I was too primed against these sources to trust them. The community I grew up in had an anti-intellectual element to it where scholars weren't trusted about things like this.

So what really solidified this for me, was seeing Palestinian culture.

Because part of the story that Israel tells us to justify everything, is that Palestinians are not a distinct group of people, they're just Arabs. They belong to the nations around us. They insist on being here because they want to deny us a homeland. The Palestinian identity exists to hurt us. This, because the idea of displacing them and taking over their lands doesn't sound like stealing, if this was never theirs and they're only pretending because they want to deprive us.

But then foods, dances, clothing, embroidery, the Palestinian dialect. These things are history. They don't pop into existence just because you hate Jews and they're trying to move here. How gorgeous is the Palestinian thobe? How stunning is tatreez in general? And when I saw specific patterns belonging to different regions of Palestine?

All of these painted for me a rich shared life of a group of people, and countered the narrative that the Palestininian identity was fabricated to hurt us. It taught me that, whatever we call them, whatever they call themselves, they have a history in this land, they have a right to it, they have a connection to it that we can't override with our own.

I started having conversations with leftist friends. Confronting the fact that the borders of the occupied territories are arbitrary and every Israeli city was taken from them. In one of those conversations, I was encouraged to rethink how I imagine peace.

This also goes back to schooling. Because they drilled into us, we're the ones who want peace, they're the ones who keep fighting, they're just so dedicated to death and killing and they won't leave us alone.

In high school, we had a stadium event with a speaker who was telling us about a person who defected from Hamas, converted to Christianity and became a Shin Bet agent. Pretty sure you can read this in the book "Son of Hamas." A lot of my friends read the book, I didn't read it, I only know what I was told in that lecture. I guess they couldn't risk us missing out on the indoctrination if we chose not to read it.

One of the things they told us was how he thought, we've been fighting with them for so long, Israelis must have a culture around the glorification of violence. And he looked for that in music. He looked for songs about war. And for a while he just couldn't find any, but when he did, he translated it more fully, and he found out the song was about an end to wars. And this, according to the story as I was told it, was one of the things that convinced him. If you know know the current trending Israeli "war anthem," you know this flimsy reasoning doesn't work.

Back then, my friend encouraged me to think more critically about how we as Israelis envision peace, as the absence of resistance. And how self-centered it is. They can be suffering under our occupation, but as long as it doesn't reach us, that's called peace. So of course we want it and they don't.

Unless we're willing to work to change the situation entirely, our calls for peace are just "please stop fighting back against the harm we cause you."

In this video, Shlomo Yitzchak shares how he changed his mind. His story is much more interesting than mine, and he's much more eloquent telling it. He mentions how he was taught to fear Palestinians. An automatic thought, "If I go with you, you'll kill me." I was taught this too. I was taught that, if I'm in a taxi, I should be looking at the driver's name. And if that name is Arab, I should watch the road and the route he's taking, to be prepared in case he wants to take me somewhere to kill me. Just a random person trying to work. For years it stayed a habit, I'd automatically look at the driver's name. Even after knowing that I want to align myself with liberation, justice, and equality. It was a process of unlearning.

On October, not long after the current escalation of violence, I had to take a taxi again. A Jewish driver stopped and told me he'll take me, "so an Arab doesn't get you." Israeli Jews are so comfortable saying things like this to each other. My neighbors discussed a Palestinian employee, with one saying "We should tell him not to come anymore, that we want to hire a Jew." The second answered, "No, he'll say it's discrimination," like it would be so ridiculous of him. And the first just shrugged, "So we don't have to tell him why." They didn't go through with it, but they were so casual about this conversation.

In the Torah, we're told to treat those who are foreign to us well, because we know what it's like to be the foreigner. Fighting back against oppression is the natural human thing to do. We know it because we lived it. And as soon as I looked at things from this angle, it wasn't really a choice of what to support.

[wormkink]

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[phantomrose96]

When people join self-improvement or even hobbyist communities, there are some absolutely critical skills of fundamental skepticism they need when going in. I think most people who get into these communities aren't aware of these.

And just, as a fundamental few:

Does this person stand to gain financially from the thing they're trying to sell you on?

Is the business model of this whole community one of artificial competitiveness? Is there a pressure around never lapsing, or never straying from the model being sold to you?

Are the claims made in this community becoming bolder and bolder deviations from standard information?

These are absolutely rife in fitness, nutrition, and financial-advice communities and they often receive very little scrutiny except among those who already "got out." Because from the outside, seeing someone get into fitness is a good thing, good for them, glad to see it, look at that dedication, happy for them. Same on the other categories, and probably numerous others I haven't seen.

---------

Does this person stand to gain financially from the thing they're trying to sell you on?

If the answer is yes, that does NOT mean "immediately abort", it means keep that in mind when you're interacting with their content.

This nutrition influencer has given you some great recipes for free, and now they're promoting a "really fantastic" brand that they have an affiliate link with? Their motivation isn't to be your friend and helpfully clue you in on a great product. It's to make money off you.

You really like this fitness influencer's work outs, but she gets MORE interaction and MORE viewers the skinnier she gets? She CLAIMS she's been losing weight naturally with healthy eating and exercise, and she's still full of energy, and You Can Too. This is not your friend. This is not someone who knows you. This is someone under large financial and social pressure to do everything she can to put out her best appearance and her happiest appearance, and your attention and belief in the appearance is where the money and clout come from. You really need to remember this in the same way you remember to look both ways before crossing the street. You can cross a street and you can follow a fitness account, but protect yourself when doing it.

---------

Is the business model of this whole community one of artificial competitiveness? Is there a pressure around never lapsing, or never straying from the model being sold to you?

Communities stay strong if they retain people. There are a lot of fine and positive ways to retain people, but it's often easier to retain people by instilling them with a sense that they must be here. They should feel bad if they lapse or if their attention drifts. What they were before was inadequate. Everyone outside this community is inadequate. Do you want to go back to inadequate?

Is that financial subreddit that taught you valuable lessons about 401k's, index funds, and budgeting also quietly pressuring you to always do more? Are the top posts from extremist examples of people living in destitution so they can show the most extreme screenshot, and curate the envy of everyone else who ought to be ashamed of not doing as well as them?

Is that fitness community that got you into jogging also putting you in the mind that the truest and best people exercise 7 days a week? Never miss a metric? Never compromise on their dedication?

Is that person who "cut out all sugar and feels amazing" informing you that you should never have another cupcake in your life? And if you DO it's because you're BAD and DON'T WORRY, you'll get RIGHT back on the horse after. Shame will motivate you to come right back, and stay with the community, and never leave.

As long as you stay, the community grows. As long as you stay, the ad sponsors and the endorsed products and the influencers can benefit more and more. And sometimes, there's perhaps not even a malicious force behind it. It can happen from evolutionary pressures. The communities that survive are the ones that retain people. A community that trips accidentally into a model of pressuring people to stay is one which retains people and thrives.

-----------

Are the claims made in this community becoming bolder and bolder deviations from standard information?

You joined because you wanted to learn to cook for yourself. And this community has been helpful! You know how to make some delicious things. You've tried vegetables you've never tried before. And maybe you needed some convincing that brussel sprouts can be yummy, but what do you know, turns out you like them roasted.

But what else is being said? What things are being said with more and more frequency? Is it that "humans don't actually need any sugar, and it's a poison being sold to us?" Is it that "seed oils are toxic for you"? Is it that "pasteurization is bad"? Is the raw fruitarian convincing you that cavemen lived exclusively off fruit and you can too?

They'll have sources sometimes. Check them. Are they cherry-picked? Are they from an insular echo-chamber? Why isn't the mainstream literature aware of this? And if the answer has anything to do with "because mainstream wants to TRICK YOU and you're actually BAD for ASKING" then don't engage. Disregard. Take the recipes if you must but apply your skeptical filter to all the parts that are snake oil.

Sometimes it's that another community is only a stone's throw away. That person with a great financial portfolio has only good things to say about crypto, and what they're saying is making sense (average person [not smart] [poor] [bad money skills] laughs at crypto, but you're smarter. you're on the in-track). That amazing bodybuilder is pulling the hottest dates, and he says it's about male-confidence, and he says there are good support guides on becoming a respectable masculine man, and all you need to do is reclaim your masculinity in a society that wants to steal it from you.

In any place like this, come up for air. Come up for air FREQUENTLY. Talk to regular people and engage in academic literature outside this circle. Conspiracy thinking wins if you draw all your information from the entity trying to sell you on the conspiracy.

------------

And I hope this is clear but my message is not "never join a community." My message is know danger when you see it. Recognize when you're being used or pressured. Don't fall for conspiracy thinking. Protect yourself. You can use a gas stove to cook meals but don't touch the flame and don't burn your house down. You can cross the street but recognize the signs of a car coming down the street.

And I'm making this point because so many people just don't know. ...Because getting into fitness is "good" and "self-improvement"! So is nutrition. So if financial responsibility. People walk into it and the extremism can make them feel accomplished, and admired, and like they're a part of something, and maybe even like a proper self-punishment for their own inadequacies. And people on the outside won't save you because "Wow! He spends 3 hours at the gym every day! I wish I was that dedicated." is a common attitude, and will push you deeper into what has its claws in you.

Everything I'm saying is not because I'm so much smarter and so much holier-than-thou for knowing this when others don't--I'm saying this because I was in it. I fell for it. Not all the examples above, of course. But I recognize the machine in them. It is highly appealing to run farther and fast longer and overload your class schedule when you don't feel good enough and want to prove something, and so many communities will sell you on the idea this IS an accomplishment. Then once you do, you have to do it forever. Or else you'll go back to not being good enough. And since fitness is "good", and weight-loss and good grades, no one can save you but you.

The answer was not to give up on the hobbies I was doing. I cook for myself most nights. I run and bike as regular parts of my routine. I like new recipes and I like half-marathons. But these are just positive additions to my life and they do not define my worth. If I miss a work-out it's whatever. If I order take-out it's whatever. I fundamentally do not care about the influencer with the washboard abs, and if I try a work-out from her, I have no loyalty to it. If the new recipe I try mentions "clean eating" I'll roll my eyes and just figure out if the recipe seems good. If the recipe is botching itself to avoid certain scare-words I will simply find something else.

There is absolutely a reasonable place for challenging yourself and trying things outside your comfort zone. The internet is full of resources to do so much more than you currently know how to do. And if that community is an oven, recognize it's an oven. Wear oven mitts. If it's actively on fire, leave. You're the only one protecting you. Stay safe.

[fearandhatred]

just making sure that while y'all reblog this in good fun and good faith you don't forget what i intended it to mean !!!!!!

can't wait for when the good omens fandom finally runs out of theories and we all just start fistfighting each other

[greenglowinspooks]

To be honest. DCxDP where the reason Danny meets the bats is Ace the Bat-hound

Like, just think about it for a second. Danny is in Gotham for college, or maybe he just moved out to find a city where having mad scientist parents isn’t actually that unusual.

He can see ghosts.

The ghosts know this.

Now he’s getting harassed left and right by spirits trying to get closure. Fine, whatever, most of them are a one-and-done type deal, and the amount of ghosts trying to get his help steadily decreases.

Except for this one very stubborn dog.

It just keeps showing up and leading him to crime scenes! He doesn���t know how many “anonymous tips” he can call in to the cops before they trace his phone! And this dog, this incredibly good boy, will not stop trying to help the city. He’s never met anyone with such a strong sense of justice, let alone a dog. Can dogs even have a moral compass?

And so Danny just accepts the fact that Ace isn’t going anywhere and becomes his reluctant sidekick/dedicated medium. He leans into the whole thing, dressing up in a mix of traditional magic-user attire and accessories that pay homage to the ghost dog.

He becomes somewhat well known. The psychopomp detective following around the shadowy figure of a German Shepard? That’s unusual! That’s weird! I mean, it’s not the weirdest thing in Gotham, sure, but he’s a new vigilante and he’s got a ghost dog that people can only see when it’s around him. Someone’s gonna notice.

Damian, as Robin, is the first to reach out to him.

Ace doesn’t know Damian but he does know a Robin, and while this isn’t his Robin, he’s still friendlier than usual. Danny’s panicking because oh god the bats are here and also is this kid gonna steal my ghost dog, Damian is absolutely delighted by Ace, and Ace is just happy to see a Robin again.

Damian decides that the psychopomp isn’t a danger to anyone, and there’s no reason to put this encounter into his reports, really, and perhaps Danny can help with some of his cases in the future.

Danny is sweating bullets because Damian basically tells him that he’ll keep him secret as long as he gets to play with Ace. Ace is happy that he’s finally getting some bat affiliated crime-fighting assistance.

And so, Danny is now both Ace AND Damian’s reluctant assistant. At least whenever he’s in trouble, he can always call a middle schooler to help him.

(Is Robin even in school? He’s out patrolling damn near every night, and he stays out late as hell. Does he have a bedtime? He should.)

Eventually it gets to the point where Damian is going over to Danny’s house. When he first sees it, he has a damn bitch you live like this moment, to which Danny responds that not everyone has the money to afford a nice place. Damian counters that he could at least take the time to clean up, and Danny replies that he’s working, going to school, and being a vigilante assistant to a ghost dog, something’s got to give.

Danny nearly has a heart attack when he checks his bank account the next day and sees that someone transferred him 10,000 dollars.

And so they get into a routine. Danny and Damian fight crime with Ace at night, and occasionally Damian stops by during the day to play with Ace and have Danny help with his homework.

(Damian is smart enough to do it on his own, but some of the instructions are written incredibly confusingly, and he would never admit to needing help to his family. Danny is just glad that the kid is in school and cares about his education, blissfully unaware that he’s basically emotionally adopted him.)

Damian is used to being in Danny’s company.

Eventually, when going over a case with the family, Damian absentmindedly remarks that he’ll have to ask Danny about some of the clues that they might be missing. Nightwing asks who he means and Damian makes a face like he just swallowed a lemon.

Cue shitstorm.

Who is “Danny?” Why is Damian willing to ask for help from anyone, much less someone outside of the family? Does he know who Damian is? Has Damian been compromised? What the hell is going on?

Damian now has to explain that Danny is the psychopomp with the ghost dog who he might have met hunted down while on patrol and conveniently not mentioned, but he’s not a bad person, really, and he lets him play with Ace, and he’s been quite helpful on certain cases due to his ability to talk to ghosts.

Bruce insists that the family meet Danny. Damian, hoping that he won’t just skip town the second he hears the news, relents.

Danny is surprisingly eager to meet the bats, considering his earlier fears.

Damian, blissfully unaware of what’s coming, sets a time and place to meet.

Once everyone is there, he gives Bruce the earful of a lifetime.

Robin is in middle school! Danny knows that there’s no way to stop the boy from going on patrol, but you could at least shift his schedule so he gets enough sleep on school nights! Does the Bat even know where he is half the time?! (No) And why isn’t he comfortable asking his family for help with both cases and homework? Did they ever even notice how much time he was spending at Danny’s house? If Danny was a bad person, he could have seriously hurt the poor boy! Shame on you!

Nightwing is mortified that Damian didn’t trust him enough to tell him about any of this. Red Hood is laughing his ass off, because yeah Danny is making good points but he’s also chewing out the literal Batman. Tim is recording the whole thing. Steph is delighted by the absolute gall of this Danger Twink™️, and already planning to add him to several groupchats. Damian is more embarrassed than he’s ever been in his entire life.

You, he points to Nightwing, did your academic life feel supported when you were a Robin? Nightwing is too stunned to speak. Red Hood, eternal shit-stirrer, says that oh, we all prioritized patrol over our education, that’s just how it is. Red Robin actually dropped out of high school to avoid distractions, did you know that?

Danny honest-to-god shrieks at this.

He finishes his angry rant and leaves, everyone too stunned to stop him.

And as it turns out, Tim wasn’t the only person recording the whole thing.

The entire internet is blowing up with Psychopomp The Danger Twink™️’s rant. People are taking sides. Things are getting messy. Red Hood literally admitting on-camera to previously being a Robin is somehow not the main focus here.

Eventually someone connects some dots from the video, as well as stories circling the internet about the psychopomp. A ghost dog named Ace, who is the literal only reason that the psychopomp is fighting crime at all, which seems incredibly fond of Nightwing and Robin.

A crime-fighting dog who wants constant attention from both the current and original Robin.

Oh my god, Ace the Bat-hound died and became a crime-fighting ghost.

And, somehow, that’s still not the strangest thing going on in Gotham.

[varpusvaras]

An AU in which Jason, upon returning to Gotham, gets really swept up into the whole crime lord thing, and never gets the time to go through with his revenge plan.

It starts small. He comes back and gets to work, and after a while, he has managed to carve out some of the crime from crime alley. This gets him noticed among some of the people there. One night, a group of thugs approach him, but instead of wanting to fight him, they want to work for him.

Jason, still fresh, with not much revenue coming for him yet, tells them that he isn't hiring because he cannot exactly pay them much. The thugs say that it doesn't matter, because they like what he is doing, and would like to be in on it anyway, and, well. If Jason has help managing other things, he can dedicate more time on his bigger plan, right?

Wrong. Things start to move much quicker now, and that means that more people come in and want to work for him. At this point Jason has money coming in, and he starts paying them, too, which makes more people come in, which in turn makes more money to come in as well. Jason can pay them more, and suddenly he notices a difference in many of the goons he has on his roster now. They seem happier. They joke more, many of them have better clothes on them, and they don't look so gaunt anymore, either.

Jason asks about it, once, and the goon tells him that they have had the money to buy actual groceries and new pair of boots, which makes living a lot more comfortable. They even got to buy their kid a new winter jacket! Now, if they save up a little bit, they will be able to get their kid new school books as well!

And Jason, Crime Alley boy Jason, who loved school and reading, feels his heart strings being violently yanked. Don't worry about the books, he says. I will take care of it.

At the end of the month, he has managed to organise a book delivery system for all the Crime Alley kids, where they get school books and picture books and science books about dinosaurs and angient Egypt and all that. He tells his goons that for every kid that stays in school for the semester, he will give them a bonus.

It works wonders. The amount of kids dropping out from school gets cut by 60 percent just during the first semester. The book system grows, and suddenly Jason finds himself pushing some money to get the old local library running again, to make things a bit easier. He even hires some people to run the system for him. Suddenly, he is like actually employing people. He needs an accountant. He hires one for himself, and then another one to run other funds.

Things just keep escalating after that. Local parent group starts to have meetings in the new library, and they put up a babysitting club and start a clothes exhange program as well, where you can bring all the clothes that are too small for you, and people get to take what they need home. A soup kitchen starts as well, first because the kids need snacks, and then it grows so much that Jason needs to find a place for it to run effectively and safely. Many local restaurants get into it as well, and their business starts to rise as well, because people who are fed and have warm clothes have more time and energy to seek for jobs. Many of them are still employed within just Crime Alley, though, because jobs elsewhere require an adress, and some people don't have those.

Jason thinks about himself, after his parents died, on the streets, trying to survive, and thinks never again. He tells his accountant to start budgeting for housing.

He needs to hire more people for it. He needs to run his crime empire, after all, he doesn't have the time for this.

He has so many people working for him now. There are a few thugs that were previously employed by other Gotham Rogues coming in as well, because they have heard good things about the Red Hood. The other Rogues are in and out of the prison or Arkham all the time and the pay isn't reliable and there is a high chance that you will get beaten up by one of the bats as well, and they don't really get offered medical services by their bosses, you know?

There's another thing. Jason now has to organize people to get first aid-training. And also get some sort of vaccination program going. And also get everybody dental.

It's all getting too much for him, really. He doesn't even have a high school diploma.

He mentions this to one of his goons one night, because they said that he looked stressed. Don't worry boss! The goon tells him. We will take care of things, if you want to go back to school! It would be a good example, too, for the older kids, who are still dropping out more than the little kids, you know?

So Jason goes back to school. God he loves school. He barely even thinks about his revenge plan anymore, because he is busy running his programs and studying and making plans with his goons.

He gets his diploma and then starts a community college so people can get degrees.

He then runs into an entirely new problem. The people look up to him, especially the kids. And now the kids also want to help him.

Jason, the second Robin, the bird with clipped wings, tells them no. Absolutely not. You are kids, go back to school, your bedtime is at nine.

He cannot control the older teens, though. They just tell him to fuck off and accept the help. Now train us, so we can start running the more specialized missions too. You can't be the only person jumping on rooftops. If you don't train us, we will do it anyway, dipshit. We ain't scared of you.

And suddenly Jason has his own vigilante team with him. His workers are unionizing. Some of them are actually running for the city council to get things addressed that need to be done the legal way. Crime rates have dropped by 70 percent around Crime Alley.

They can't really call it Crime Alley anymore, can they? It's Park Row again.

The bats are extremely confused by the new team. The Hoods, they call themselves. All of them with a red bat painted on their chests and fighting in an eerily similar manner to them.

Jason is not there on Thursdays. He is busy getting his English degree.

[povlnfour]

ੈ✩‧₊˚ CRASH LANDING (LN4)

pairing: lando norris x f!reader

summary: lando accidentally hits a stranger with his car — the internet can’t stop referring to it as a meet cute. (un)fortunately for lando, mclaren agree.

genre: comedy, fluffy

authors note: a continuation of the ending to beached! you don’t need to have read that to understand this, however it will give some insight to the mclaren matchmaker jokes <3 also in light of that, this is set a few races in the future! *oscarsgf user refers to the character in beached!

*faceclaim: keeahwah on ig (but please imagine her as you see fit!)

landonorris posted a tweet ੈ✩‧₊˚

tmz posted a tweet ੈ✩‧₊˚

landonorris posted tweets ੈ✩‧₊˚

lando’s texts with y/n ੈ✩‧₊˚

landonorris just posted ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by carlossainz55 and 203,488 others

landonorris practicing safe driving

view all comments

user you are so unserious sir

user SOOOO IS THAT THE GIRL HE HIT BC

user no clue but she’s CUTE

oscarpiastri @/fia look here

landonorris i will literally remind your girlfriend of your murder attempts when you first met

user it’s giving meet cute

user i’d read a fic on it

yourusername you literally drove off BEFORE I WAS EVEN IN THE CAR

landonorris IT WAS AN ACCIDENT I WAS DISTRACTED

user ASSUMING THIS IS HER???

user @/user CLICKING ON HER ACCOUNT IT DEFINITELY IS

yourusername just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by bestfriend, landonorris and 3,907 others

yourusername monaco recap🇲🇨 successfully didn’t get hit by too many cars!

view all comments

user AS IF LANDO HIT THE HOTTEST PERSON IVE EVER SEEN

user nah this is actually a full meet cute i’m sorry this is the shit you see in romcoms

bestfriend still can’t believe you didn’t take compensation but accepted a lunch date instead

yourusername can you blame me

user @/yourusername oh girl no one can you are so real for that

friend1 wait till everyone finds out you’re only there for another 4 days

user WHAT. i can’t have them separated already😶

user parasocial relationship with lando ended y/n is my new idol now

twitter reacts ੈ✩‧₊˚

yourusername just posted stories ੈ✩‧₊˚

[captions:

photo 1: lando paid for me to get my nails done !!!

photo 2: :D

photo 3: ur all romanticizing my life rn but this is my view in a fancy ass restaurant]

texts with your best friend ੈ✩‧₊˚

yourusername just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by landonorris and 11,276 others

yourusername final days in heaven. i’ll miss so much about this place

👤 tagged bestfriend, landonorris

view all comments

user wait she doesn’t live in monaco?? she’s leaving??? just after i’ve gotten attached to her and lando???

bestfriend please come back to visit asap i cannot go too long without my y/n cuddles

landonorris seconded

user um lando sir,,, seconded the whole thing? cuddles included?

user this cannot be the end of the meet cute i refuse to

landonorris just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by oscarpiastri and 286,425 others

landonorris safe to say i’ve had a pretty good break between races

view all comments

user a whole post dedicated to her with THAT caption? oh yep they’re whipped

user please tell me y’all are going to stay in contact?

user my heart is shattering already

mclaren 🧡

user MCLAREN PLEASE YOU’VE DONE IT ONCE BEFORE

texts with lando ੈ✩‧₊˚

mclaren interview ੈ✩‧₊˚

[transcript:

o: safe to say you’ve had a pretty interesting break before this race

l: hey let me remind you what happened for you over winter break!

o: okay but i didn’t literally hit my girlfriend with my car!

l: oh so you finally asked her out officially?

o: stop deflecting!

l: okay okay! yeah safe to say i had a nice time. always need a bit of a change in life!

o: so how are things going now?

l: (awkwardly) well you know how it’s… yeah

o: ah i get it. quite literally been there done that got the t shirt. but hey you did say all that when i got my big moment about mclaren—

l: no no no don’t give them any ideas! they’re listening!]

mclaren just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by 203,467 people

mclaren the boys are back! don’t forget to check out the new interview on our channel where lando and oscar talk all things hopes for the second half of the season, workouts and… girls?

view all comments

user mclaren. mclaren look at me. you know what you have to do

mclaren 👀

user when oscar asked him about y/n… i wanted to cry he looked so sad are things over between them?

oscarsgf @/oscarpiastri you’re such a gossip

oscarpiastri you love me for it

oscarsgf @/oscarpiastri you know what i’m thinking?

oscarpiastri @/oscarsgf plotting?

oscarsgf @/oscarpiastri plotting!

user what on earth is going on…

yourusername just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by oscarsgf and 29,481 others

yourusername lately :)

view all comments

user you are so ! gorgeous !

user i can see why lando is obsessed

user speaking of… where is our favorite brit in the likes☹️

oscarsgf pretty girl!!!

yourusername oh?!? thank u cutie!!!

user ^ oh their plotting is in progress???

mclaren you’d look good in orange👀🧡

landonorris posted a tweet ੈ✩‧₊˚

an email from mclaren ੈ✩‧₊˚

yourusername just posted stories ੈ✩‧₊˚

mclaren just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by 287,456 people

mclaren it’s race day🫡

view all comments

user WHO IS THE GIRL

user IS THAT WHO I THINK IT IS

user PLEASE TELL ME THATS Y/N

user LOOK AT HER STORIES ITS DEFINITELY HER

user SOMEONE WHO IS THERE KEEP US UPDATED PLEASE

user just posted a thread ੈ✩‧₊˚

yourusername just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by landonorris, oscarpiastri and 106,544 others

yourusername i don’t know guys, do you think he’s cute?

view all comments

user OH MY GOD FINALLY

landonorris i will hit you with my car again

yourusername is that a challenge mr. norris?

landonorris @/yourusername oh you better run fast

yourusername @/landonorris well duh cause you don’t know how to do the speed limit

user i love them. i love them so much.

oscarsgf omg can we force the boys to do mclaren double dates

landonorris leave this comment section now

yourusername @/landonorris too late we’re already texting

landonorris just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by yourusername, mclaren and 300,091 others

landonorris we are successful victims of mclarens matchmaking services

view all comments

user THEYVE DONE IT AGAINNN

user new fav couple fr

oscarpiastri oh how quickly you all forget me

user @/oscarpiastri WE COULD NEVER

user clearly i need to work for mclaren to get a cute gf

oscarpiastri @/oscarsgf is the second photo giving you flashbacks as well

oscarsgf they’re stealing our thing

yourusername thank you for posting the nice park date photo of me

landonorris well in all the others you’re mid cartwheel

mclaren glad to be of service🧡 anyone else? @/patriciooward how are you doing?

landonorris i’m gonna stop you right there

———————

a/n: WELL. hello friends. i said i wasn’t gonna post a one shot for a while, then this happened. i just hope its up to standard! i’m a little rusty in my writing considering everything!

in regards to new works, gonna be working on getting my wips out soon, and maybe popping some new smaus out at the same time as they’re easy and quick-ish for me to work on considering everything going on! do forgive me if i do some random family orientated stuff — pregnancy hormones are giving me baby fever for everything (is it still baby fever if you’re having a baby?)

let me know your thoughts in the comments/reblogs/asks — i’ve missed talking to you all sm! i have anon emojis available if people wanna chat too🤍

for the first time in a very long time,,, love, giselle xx

taglist (found here): @idkiwantchocolatee @vellicora @alessioayla @bborra @crimeshowjunkie @minkyungseokie @paolexsstuff @celestialpato @champagnelovers101 @loxbbg @hobiismyhopeu @tsukishitm-a @moonypixel @champagneproblems17 @ironmaiden1313 @lqvesoph @sunflower-golden-vol6 @six-call @skatingiswalkingincursive @peqch-pie @m0cha-bunny @woozarts @he6rtshaker @iluvvmeeee @goldenalbon @izzy-marvel @lucyysthings @lichterfee @tallrock35 @treehouse-house @iloveyou3000morgan @scopeiguess @amaranthineghost @gwginnyweasley @hetfieldd @sweetbabygirlsworld @wittywhispers @dark-night-sky-99 @namgification @casperlikej @marshmummy @geniusalpaca

tags for this post: @the-untamed-soul @itsprashimusic @purplephantomwolf @jasminesacademia

[theabigailthorn]

We know you were on accutane. Stop lying

not that it would matter if I had, and not that it's any of your business, but I have in fact never taken accutane.

This is a useful teaching moment though, because what you're doing is a well-studied phenomenon in digital media called 'policing fake femininity.' It's a thing people do to women in the public eye, a specific kind of criticism centred around accusations of being inauthentic, fake, or having cheated in some way. Often it's men doing the policing but women do it to each other a lot too, there are whole websites dedicated to it in fact. Often those criticisms centre around our appearances, as yours did here.

It's sometimes a response to perceived inequality, of which there is plenty! Women in the public eye - myself included - do benefit from a lot of privilege. I've always been quite open about that. People who engage in that kind of public bullying often tell themselves that because of the privilege (or perceived privilege) of their targets the fake femininity policing is socially justified, or the fault of the target. But it doesn't really do anything to correct the structural problems that give rise to that inequality.

In their paper "Policing Fake Femininity," scholars Brooke Duffy, Kate Miltner, and Amanda Wahlstedt say,

“The solution to the structural concerns associated with capitalist patriarchy is not, we contend, to label individual influencers “stupid famewhores” and disparage their mental health in ways that invoke the spectre of hysteria (e.g., “batsh*t crazy,” “delusional,” and “lunatic”). As Chemaly [Rage Becomes Her, 2018] argues, it is necessary that girls and women express their anger, but such a directive “is not an endorsement of unbridled rage, or permission to deliver a swift roundhouse kick to the face of anyone who upsets you, or to regularly fill the spaces you live and work in with hostility and discomfort.” While venting anger at these influencers and their purportedly questionable choices may provide some form of much-needed catharsis, such gender-coded vitriol amplifies the rampant misogyny and toxicity that women already face in online environments.”

If you'd like to know more, I recommend:

Steve Cross & Jo Littler, “Celebrity and schadenfreude: The cultural economy of fame in freefall,” in Cultural Studies

Brooke Duffy, Kate Miltner, & Amanda Wahlstedt, “Policing “fake” femininity: Authenticity, accountability, and influencer anti-fandom,” in New Media & Society