#capital pride 2017

[rusty25]

me in 2014: I think there's nothing wrong with gay ppl as long as they don't shove it into everyone's face

me now: cisheteronormativity is shoved into everyone's face all the time, and not only is it allowed, it is encouraged too. furthermore, it is harming each and every person, not only queer ppl, by restricting gender expression, condemning certain behaviors or traits, and ignoring statistics. living life however they want (without hurting others) is the right of every single person, anything less is oppression.

me in 2016: I agree with you, phobic "friend", I think those freaks should not attend Pride, there's very few of them and they don't represent our community, but of course the media focuses on them to demonize us

me now: Pride is not a family friendly event. it's started with a fkin riot in the 70s. kink and kinksters have just as much of a place there as anyone else, since we're all deviants to the status quo. the media is a vampire whose focus on queer folk and its efforts to paint them in a bad lighting are a diversion tactic from much more pressing societal and economic problems. Pride should be a non-issue to anyone.

me in 2017: everything that is wrong in the world is a separate issue and each should be tackled individually

me now: all of our societal issues are rooted in patriarchal capitalism. it's everyone's fight who's not an able-bodied middle-class christian cishet white man, because in some way (many people more than one), we are all oppressed and collectively suffering. the divide of hatred exists to keep us from seizing power and uprooting the current paradigm, but it does not have to be like that. none of us are free until all of us are free.

[mariacallous]

LISBON—Maria Brites took one more carnation in her hands from a table covered in them. She carefully set the flower in a glass box. Brites, an accomplished 76-year-old art teacher, has made dozens of these graceful souvenirs for Portugal’s museums to preserve the memory of the so-called “Carnation Revolution” which changed her own and her country’s life. It was April in Lisbon and outside, tourists teemed through the streets in the capital of a liberal democracy ranked among the freest nations in the world. Joined by her two adult daughters, Maria began to sing “Grândola, Vila Morena.” Fifty years ago, the fascist regime installed by Antonio de Oliveira Salazar banned other songs by its author, Zeca Afonso, for his opposition to the dictatorial regime. On April 25, 1974, conspirators played “Gradola Vila Morena” on the radio at 12:20 a.m. The song’s powerful melody and lyrics signaled the beginning of the revolution.

“Land of brotherhood,” the lyrics exclaim, “the people are the ones who rule within you, oh city!”

Exactly half a century later, hundreds of thousands of Portuguese gathered in Lisbon to chant “No to fascism.” Banners strung throughout the city featured happy people hugging with the caption, “Europe is for you.” According to the Migrant Integration Policy Index, Portugal has the second-most favorable citizenship regime in the European Union, in terms of naturalization rates.

Over this period, Portugal has not just shed its dictatorial past, it has become a leader of multilateral democracy. Think of the EU’s Treaty of Lisbon, which helped to manage the bloc after it enlarged from 15 to 27 states, as well as Portuguese native António Guterres ascending to secretary-general of the United Nations in 2017. This spring, an absolute majority of Portuguese—81 percent—told pollsters that they were proud of the way that Portugal became a democracy. This process involved not just ending its dictatorship at home, but also liberating its remaining colonies in Africa.

When I visit Portugal and observe this pride in action, my mind inevitably goes to post-Soviet countries that failed to keep their liberal democracies and rolled back to dictatorial regimes in the decades after the fall of USSR. During my 24 years of covering news in the region, I interviewed many people in Russia, Belarus, the Caucasus, and Central Asia who told me they felt nostalgic for a strong leader like Joseph Stalin. It seemed to me as if they were suffering from the loss of historical memory. Russia targets leaders of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning group Memorial that worked hard to preserve painful memories, documenting hundreds of thousands of KGB cases and gulag victims, including the names of 44,000 people executed on personal order of Stalin. But the Portuguese do not hide their history, nor do they miss Salazar. Why? As millions of Ukrainians suffer from a war spurred on by Russia’s imperial ideology, I wanted to find out.

Since the beginning of Russia’s war in 2022, more than 60,000 Ukrainians have found refuge in Portugal. To the amazement of many of them, banners and billboards celebrating the country’s anniversary still feature communist hammers and sickles. Some slogans by the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP), including “Mais forca!” are confronting to people from the former Soviet Union. The symbolism carries a valence that is hard to reconcile for them, and the associated iconography cuts against the message of freedom. In occupied Ukraine, these symbols signal the return of the authoritarian era, but in Portugal, communists helped end it.

The PCP was founded in 1921 as a legal party, but in 1926 it was forced underground by the far-right Estado Novo regime. Salazar came to power in 1932 and continued severe repression of anarchists and communists. Lisbon’s former prison, Museu do Aljube, lists the names and photographs of Portuguese opposition members imprisoned, tortured, or executed by the regime in the 1930s. The underground did not stop its struggle for over four decades of Europe’s longest dictatorship, though, and the working class and communist underground played a decisive role in preparing for April 25.

Portuguese communists, whom Moscow denied paying, were widely celebrated for the Carnation Revolution’s victory. Their involvement meant as soon as the people of Portugal embraced freedom from the dictatorship, they had to choose a side in the ongoing Cold War. The same year of the revolution, 1974, Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev visited Fidel Castro in Cuba. Brezhnev was pushing European governments, the United States, and Canada to sign a document about security in Europe, recognizing the Soviet military victory in World War II, the acceptance of Soviet domination in Eastern Europe, and forced incorporation of Baltic states.

Fortunately for Portugal, the United States played a cautious role in Portuguese internal affairs, while the Soviet Union accepted the choice Portuguese people ultimately made to embrace the democratic path. “By the fall of 1974, communists tried to take over the power but our people made a different choice—we chose democracy,” Brites said.

Portugal signed the Helsinki Accords, along with nearly all other European governments, Canada, the United States, and the Soviet Union in Helsinki on Aug. 1, 1975, confirming the acceptance of post-1945 borders. Later pro-Soviet regimes took power in Portuguese former colonies in Africa, including Angola. After the revolution, Portugal gave independence to Angola, a colony for nearly 500 years (and a source of slaves for Brazil), withdrawing its military forces by November 1975.

On a recent afternoon, I talked about liberal values with immigration lawyer Gilda Pereira, who grew up in Angola where her family enjoyed a wealthy and successful life before the revolution. Portugal’s presence in Angola began with the arrival of the explorer Diogo Cão in 1482, and although Portugal officially changed Angola’s status from a colony to an oversea province in 1951, its landlords continued to use forced labor at local plantations.

I expected somebody who grew up affluent in a former colony might be less in favor of the changes in Portugal but Pereira’s face was illuminated with a big smile when she talked about the revolution and how it transformed her country. The founder of a successful law firm in Lisbon who employs more than a dozen women lawyers, Pereira said she felt “zero nostalgia” for the dictatorship and loved Portugal’s active civil society and its passion for freedom. Portuguese human rights defenders are respected, she said, and investigative journalists are acclaimed.

“I am glad we let Angola and other colonies free, I am happy we have the rule of law, that we are true democrats,” she told me. Under Salazar, Pereira explained, she and her team of women would lack basic human rights. Progress continues, and this year, Portugal has risen to 17th in the Global Gender Gap Index ranking of equality, up from last year’s 32nd place.

Local freelance reporter Claudia Maques Santos explains Portugal’s choice this way: “I think it has to do with memory and sense of freedom.” For many Portuguese, recalling the era of authoritarian rule is far more painful than it is aggrandizing. Maria Brites echoed this, telling me she was “utterly unhappy” under Salazar and his successor in the provincial town where she taught art and raised her daughters. The dictatorship forbade divorce, and hers was a miserable marriage: “Every month he picked up my salary at school,” she said of her husband, “as all men were allowed to do that to women. We had no rights.”

On the morning of April 25, 1974, Brites’s father called to tell her that the revolution had happened, and she rushed to Lisbon to see it for herself, even though, she said, her husband tried to stop her with threats. Arriving in Lisbon, she felt what she described as “complete happiness, freedom to say what you felt like.”

Improbably for a democratic revolution, Portugal’s transition began with a coup, as military officers who opposed the regime rose up against it, in no small part because of the country’s imperial adventures abroad. Under Salazar, Portugal was paying an immense human cost fighting to maintain its African colonies. Over lunch in April, Col. Aprigio Ramalho, one of the officers who led the revolution, told me that the trips he made to Mozambique and Angola under the dictatorship were part of what galvanized his action. Portugal had waged war in Africa for 13 years, and thousands of Portuguese men had died there. “The failing African wars were the turning point for the revolution,” the colonel told me. The analogy to Ukraine was not lost on him: “Russian military men should read their oath well. We did. We were sworn to defend the people, or Portugal, our country, but not the dictatorship.”

Isabel Graca, a history professor at Almada Senior University, told me, “We made the choice to be free: No woman under Salazar could travel abroad without her husband’s permission. … As a student, I ran away from the police many times. We were banned from gathering in groups of more than three people. Punishment was severe.”

For women in particular, the civil liberties they could not have under dictatorship were far more critical than the distant territories that fascist Portugal claimed to control. This is exactly the situation citizens face in today’s Russia, where millions of people suffer from poverty, domestic violence, corruption, and a poor health system and where none of Putin’s imperialistic ideas and promises to build the “new world order” together with China and Hungary can distract from daily miseries.

Once again Portugal has chosen a side in a cold war. More than 70 percent of Portuguese have a negative view of Russia’s influence in global affairs, according to a German Marshal Fund report, and roughly 80 percent want to offer Ukraine NATO and European Union membership. Even PCP—which was the sole political party avoiding condemnation of Russia for starting the full-scale invasion in 2022—has chosen democratic values, not dictatorship. In its latest platform, the party advocates for Portugal to enjoy “a regime of freedom where the people decide their own future.”

Pedro Magalhaes, a senior researcher at Portugal’s Institute of Social Sciences, told me that Portugal has little reason to worry about the role of communists in its political life. On the contrary, he said, “Communists have been reliable democratic actors, involved in revising the constitution, controlling law-abiding unions, and having representatives in parliament.”

This year, Portugal’s far-right party Chega won 48 seats in the parliament. They have been accused of racism: In 2020, the party’s founder, André Ventura, was fined for discriminating of Roma community. That same year, he wrote on social media that Black lawmaker Joacine Katar Moreira should go back “to her own country.” But local democrats are not worried. “Chega is being left alone at the parliament, no one makes alliances with them, neither left- nor right-wing parties,” Marques Santos told me.

Nearly half of Portugal’s population earn less than 1,000 euros a month, many complain about their country quietly becoming an immigration hub, majority want a reduction of emigration. But in spite of the social issues, Portugal continues to resist to the extreme far-right agenda. June poll showed Chega getting 12 percent of support, which was a drop from 18 percent it received in the election.

“Portuguese people have a genuine love for freedom,” Magalhaes said.

[soupy-cosmos]

[ID: A digital drawing of teenage versions of Louie and Boyd from DuckTales 2017 holding the Gilbert Baker pride flag over their backs. Louie is wearing a lighter green hoodie with a white trim along with a pair of black jeans. He has a mullet, with a crown hair clip and two hair pins arranged in an ‘x’ in his longer bangs. He has two pride pins on his hoodie, the larger one being the MLM flag and the smaller one being the trans flag. Boyd is wearing a longer button up shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Half of the shirt is tucked into his pants while the other half sticks out. He also has a belt, his pants are a dark tan. His bowtie is the demisexual flag. They’re smiling at each other, Louie’s eyes half-lidded and Boyd’s eyes closed happily, and are holding each other’s free hand. The drawing’s lineart, while very dark, has a slight rainbow gradient. End ID.]

Pride Louyd!! I’ll definitely be making some alts of this with other flags but these are my main hcs for them!!!

Louie’s gay and transmasc and Boyd is demi!!

Bonus Doodle:

[ID: A colored doodle of Gyro and Louie wearing a large green sweater with the trans flag on the sleeves and the rainbow on the trim, “This is our get along shirt” is written across it in capital letters. “Get along” is also rainbow and there are sparkles scattered around. Gyro is glaring to the right, he’s wearing his normal outfit under the sweater. Only the top of Louie’s head is visible due to their height difference. A yellow circle in the top left corner shows Boyd giving an enthusiastic thumbs up. End ID.]

Boyd said they had to tolerate each other for pride 😔😔

[thepastisalreadywritten]

Peruvian fossil challenges blue whales for size

3 August 2023

By Jonathan Amos, Science correspondent

Scientists have identified a new candidate for the heaviest ever animal on Planet Earth.

It's an ancient, long-extinct whale that would have tipped the scales at close to 200 tonnes.

Only some of the very biggest blue whale specimens might have rivalled its heft, researchers say.

The creature's fossilised bones were dug up in the desert in southern Peru, so it has been given the name Perucetus colossus.

Dating of the sediments around the remains suggests it lived about 39 million years ago.

"The fossils were actually discovered 13 years ago, but their size and shape meant it took three years just to get them to Lima (the capital of Peru), where they've been studied ever since," said Dr Eli Amson, a co-worker on the discovery team led by palaeontologist Dr Mario Urbina.

Eighteen bones were recovered from the marine mammal - an early type of whale known as a basilosaurid.

These included 13 vertebrae, four ribs and part of a hip bone.

But even given these fragmentary elements and their age, scientists were still able to decipher a huge amount about the creature.

In particular, it's evident the bones were extremely dense, caused by a process known as osteosclerosis in which inner cavities are filled.

The bones were also oversized, in the sense they had extra growth on their exterior surfaces - something called pachyostosis.

These weren't features of disease, the team said, but rather adaptations that would have given this large whale the necessary buoyancy control when foraging in shallow waters.

Similar bone features are seen for example in modern-day manatees, or sea cows, which also inhabit coastal zones in certain parts of the world.

"Each vertebra weighs over 100kg, which is just completely mind-blowing," said co-worker Dr Rebecca Bennion from the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences in Brussels.

"It took several men to shift them out into the middle of the floor in the museum for me to do some 3D scanning.

The team that drilled into the centre of some of these vertebrae to work out the bone density - the bone was so dense, it broke the drill on the first attempt."

When confronted with a skeleton of a long-extinct species, scientists use models to try to reconstruct the body shape and mass of the animal.

They do this based on what they know about the biology of comparable living creatures.

It is predicted Perucetus would have been about 17-20m in length, which is not exceptional.

But its bone mass alone would have been somewhere between 5.3 and 7.6 tonnes.

And by the time you add in organs, muscle and blubber, it could have weighed - depending on the assumptions - anywhere between 85 tonnes and 320 tonnes.

Dr Amson, a curator at Germany's State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart, uses a median number of 180.

The largest blue whales recorded during the era of commercial exploitation were at this scale.

"What we like to say is that Perucetus is in the same ball park as the blue whale," he told BBC News.

"But there's no reason to think that our individual was particularly big or small; it was likely just part of the general population.

So it's worth keeping in mind that when we use the median estimate, it's already at the very upper ranges of what blue whales can measure."

One of the comparators used by the research team in its investigations is a blue whale that will be very familiar to anyone who has visited the Natural History Museum in London.

Nicknamed Hope, this animal's skeleton took pride of place at the institution when it was hung from the ceiling in the main hall in 2017.

But before being installed, the skeleton was scanned and described in great detail and is now an important data resource for scientists across the world.

In life, Perucetus' skeletal mass would have been two to three times that of Hope, even though the London mammal was a good five metres longer.

Richard Sabin, the curator of marine mammals at the NHM, is thrilled by the new find and would love to bring some aspect of it to London for display.

"We took the time to digitise Hope - to measure not just the weight of the bones but their shape as well, and our whale has now become something of a touchstone for people," he said.

"We don't get hung up on labels - like 'which was the largest specimen?' - because we know science at some point will always come along with new data.

What's amazing about Perucetus is that it demonstrated so much mass some 30 million-plus years ago when we thought gigantism occurred in whales only 4.5 million years ago."

Perucetus colossus is reported in the journal Nature.

[slowtides]

Debility is thus a crucial complication of the neoliberal transit of disability rights. Debility addresses injury and bodily exclusion that are endemic rather than epidemic or exceptional, and reflects a need for rethinking overarching structures of working, schooling, and living rather than relying on rights frames to provide accommodationist solutions. Challenging liberal disability rights frames, debility not only elucidates what is left out of disability imaginaries and rights politics; it also illuminates the constitutive absences necessary for capacitating discourses of disability empowerment, pride, visibility, and inclusion to take shape. Thus, I argue, disability and debility are not at odds with each other. Rather, they are necessary supplements in an economy of injury that claims and promotes disability empowerment at the same time that it maintains the precarity of certain bodies and populations precisely through making them available for maiming. In a context whereby four-fifths of the world’s people with disabilities are located in what was once hailed as the “global south,” liberal interventions are invariably infused with certitude that disability should be reclaimed as a valuable difference— the difference of the Other— through rights, visibility, and empowerment discourses— rather than addressing how much debilitation is caused by global injustice and the war machines of colonialism, occupation, and U.S. imperialism. Assemblages of disability, capacity, and debility are elements of the biopolitical control of populations that foreground risk, prognosis, life chances, settler colonialism, war impairment, and capitalist exploitation. My analysis centralizes disability rights as a capacitating frame that recognizes some disabilities at the expense of other disabilities that do not fit the respectability and empowerment models of disability progress— what David Mitchell and Sharon Snyder term the “biopolitics of disability.” But the normalization of disability as an empowered status purportedly recognized by the state is not contradicted by, but rather is produced through, the creation and sustaining of debilitation on a mass scale. Debilitation is not a by-product of the operation of biopolitics but an intended result, functioning both as a disruption of the non- disabled/disabled binary—as an in-between space—and as a supplement to disability, that which shadows and often overlaps with disability. I therefore do not offer debility as an identity; it is instead a form of massification. My alternative conceptualization of the biopolitics of debilitation not only refers to the remaindering of what the liberal inclusion of disability fails to fully embrace, but also points to the forms of violent debilitation of those whose inevitable injuring is assumed by racial capitalism. I therefore seek to connect disability, usually routed through a conceptual frame of identification, and debilitation, a practice of rendering populations available for statistically likely injury.

Jasbir Puar, from the preface to The Right to Maim: Debility, Capacity, Disability (2017) [The link takes you to the press site where you can purchase the book, but it will also allow you to access the introduction as a PDF.]

[taminoarticles]

— Tamino for De Limburger, May 2017 (x) (Original Dutch text)

The new sweetheart of Flanders

ANTWERP BY KIM NOACH

The 20-year-old singer-songwriter Tamino is conquering musical hearts in his homeland Belgium in record time. Performances at Rock Werchter, Pukkelpop and his first EP rocket to the top position of iTunes. The talent can be heard on Sunday at Mama's Pride in Geleen.

My dear, Tamino sings to you in his high falsetto, grant me one last dance…Dear, please, I'm on fire…With these words singer-songwriter Tamino sings in his debut single Habibi (Arabic for sweetheart) directly to the hearts of music lovers in Belgium.

With the song, Tamino's musical career took off in record time last year: sold-out performances in the small hall of pop temple AB Brussels, a prestigious Belgian pop award lands on his mantelpiece and this festival season, performances at Rock Werchter and Pukkelpop will follow, among others. The Netherlands is also about to be conquered. But judge for yourself on Sunday with a first introduction at Mama's Pride in Geleen. The success of the young singer certainly has to do with his special voice. Seemingly effortlessly, he switches from a deep crooner's moan to a towering falsetto. This vocal cord acrobatics earned him the predicate 'the Belgian Jeff Buckley'. But comparisons with Elliott Smith and Radiohead singer Thom Yorke have also been made by pop connoisseurs. Big shoes to fill for an up-and-coming talent of just 20 years old. Tamino remains calm about it. Having just finished a mini-concert in Antwerp, he says - in a Flemish modest way - that he is especially flattered when fans compare him to big names in the music business. But in the end he wants to be Tamino above all. And just sing his songs. What does the public do with that? Well, who is he to say anything about that?

To melt His songs are beautiful listening songs with guitar that Tamino (partly) composed from his Amsterdam room last year. He follows a course at the conservatory in the capital. He has temporarily stopped his studies in order to be able to attend all performances and interviews. “Very strange,” he says when it comes to his ever-growing popularity. “I don't fully understand it yet. It would be nice if I could live off my music at some point. That is not self-evident for every artist.”

To melt With his dark curls, full eyelashes, 'pirate' earring and shy smile, singer-songwriter Tamino is sure to melt many hearts. His looks are the result of his Belgian mother and his Egyptian father. His Belgian mother named her son after Prince Tamino from Mozart's opera Die Zauberflöte.

It is the Arabic roots that also influence him musically, as can be heard in some melody lines on his nameless EP. And at home he not only plucks the guitar, but also the oud, the Arabic lute, and listens to Egyptian music. This in combination with Western music by Thom Yorke, Eels, but also Soundgarden and the Belgian noise band Steak Number Eight. What does he hope for next Sunday? "Come on..." There's a pause.

"That I am able to give everything and people know how to appreciate it."

[michyeosseo]

looking back…….

uncharacteristically, i took a hiatus in 2022. despite bouts of inactivity, by instinct, i turn to gifsets as my personal reprieve but this year has been doubly heavy (which must hold true for a lot of us by now). chronic fatigue left the latter, greater chunk of the year a blur. oof. stress aside, i have completed a couple of releases this year. this post is somehow most of them. though if you ask me to fill up any sort of bingo, please, i decline.

still in the process of retrieving my giffer groove back so may this write-up inspired by my brilliant mutuals suffice.

a preview of the titles you'll be able to read underneath. four dramas sorted chronologically... those that i remember finishing (important criteria!!) and to round them off, one i am in the midst* of watching. there's another that i omitted to not do an overlong list but a shoutout to the ever-charming law of the lady.

pride & price

feb-mar | 29 episodes @ youku

Female virtue is not morality but a ghost of the old ages. Why are labels for women so specific and detailed? Do we have to sit in the right seat? Do we have the right to refuse to be any kind of perfect woman?

if you were wondering why this, out of the blue, became my tumblog title you probably weren't but here's the reason: i was just that into it. i got winded into following its daily stream timing (10pm sharp) roped a friend in, too hahaha no but seriously, 'girlbosses in the fashion industry' seem like most stale premise but who knew a cdrama had what it takes for it to not be made basic. the <blossom> magazine being on the cusp of medium change in the year 2016/2017 - print versus online. ideals it stands for contested by how the target audience can relate versus how much profit they can rake in. fractures forming within the staff and at the eye of the storm is who gets to be the new editor. the two candidates: miranda chen kaiyi and helen xiao hongxue. yes, i put their english names there not just as decor. we start the series acquainted with kaiyi, complete with a devil wears prada-esque intro. she’s exacting to down to the minute details, she’s the public face of the publication except she signs off as the deputy editor. the parent company assigns the chief editorship of the besieged magazine to the person at the helm of the successful hongkong branch, hongxue. her alliance (or supposed defeat) is the key to win <blossom>.

besides the main leads, the ensemble consists of ladies in positions ranging from human resources head down to the rookie assistants. different degree of darlings the <blossom> squad may be with the vision admirably determined but the 29eps can still be trimmed down imho. i could go on and on (towards spoiling the entire thing) but what i'll say is the vermin masquerading as men who surrounded them, expecting catfights, were bound to lose. thoroughly. why? they were blinded by insecurity projections. also because they cannot fathom that women naturally are inclined to admire other women, that strength stems from being cognizant of mutual sorrows. plus, they're not privy to the wooing power of chocolate.

the legendary life of queen lau

jun-jul | 36 episodes @ viki

There are no fairies in this world. But even if there is a fairy, it would be me.

LAMU (jackie li) IS A STAR. let me state that for the record. i am very salty the webdrama's all but buried under controversies (ugh, plural) because it brought me so much unbridled joy. queen lau was so unserious it has a palace p.a. system with functions such as weather forecasts, sports commentary, serenades, etcetera like... heylo?

heipang, a countryside girl prodded by her mother (to fix their local village curse) heads to the capital to be wedded. there, she finds out her longtime penpal/betrothed boy is the new emperor and only hitch to her happily ever after is he does not really know her. sorta hates her existence, even. she meets her father first, the chief counselor aka the antagonist, she's christened a new name befitting the nation's phoenix. she meets a handmaid, she becomes steadfast on her side ever since. the dowager empress, she leaves an even greater impression as untraditional daughter-in-law. she meets her half-sister, she bonds with her thus averting a rivalry. she meets her husband's motley crew (the royal chef, the chief guard, the court physician), she wrecks them before lunch. you get the gist. her same-age castmates, limited acting aside, were carried by the fact lamu's so adept in comparison. i appreciate a comedy that doesn't try that hard in the outrageous department. 'twas possible because of her pun timing, her reactions, her charisma - anyone with sense would be buying the fantasy. i say fantasy but it's the core message: that liu jinfeng's self-assured enough to ignore/convert her detractors as she dances. the lovely queen leading the entire palace during catchy dance sequences, that's quite novel, isn't it?

sleep with me

aug | 6 episodes @ iwanttfc

Tower ka ba? Because Eiffel for you.

gorgeous poster, yes/yes? here's another from their promo spread. hailing from the writing and direction of samantha lee is a project i had my eye on since its announcement. of her two films i previously saw, my reception were polar opposites. hence, cautious, i approached what is to be my third filipino gl series. [previous ones were betcin and fluid. pearl next door is in my list, promise, i just haven't gotten around to continuing so it's fairer not to count it yet.]

if you've seen my billie & emma gifset before, harry & luna's story is like that but grown up. not an exact copy since i thought that was meant for lil' unknowing queer me but the same cinematic, almost nostalgic lens applies. harry is a nighttime dj and luna is a... well... vampire. the pace is just right and soft (without insulting) kind of coddling. finally, a lovi poe acting thing i can sit down for where i can be mesmerized without suffering a cheating/stealing husbands storyline. janine gutierrez has the brightest smile, beautiful like the moon. they both had spaces to grow in the narrative and if there's one thing direk sam and i will find sure common ground is her punctuating that with the perfect soundtrack. of course, it would be a crime if that wasn't the case, their meet-cute was at a radio station. local sapphic references are just bound to hit different *wipes tear* a fitting august gift.

glitch

oct | 10 episodes @ netflix

I can't let them take you. I'm taking you with me.

i love, love, love how all my mutuals went, "jeon yeobin and nana lesbians" after the vague initial boyfriend-ghosted-her-and-she-stumbles-into-an-alien-cult synopsis came out. ironically, we didn't even need to be ribbing each other 'cause they were, in fact, e.t. enthusiasts reconnected~ with obvious next step: risking it all by choice. not sorry about all of this, donghwi.

negl don't really have notes about glitch (minus the usual problem where kdramas don't edit out superfluous footage). they did everything better than any given entry of the ntflx originals roster so if there's one kdrama you should pick up from their catalogue this year, let it be this zany adventure and i promise you won't be disappointed.

she loves to cook and she loves to eat

dec | 10 episodes @ furritsubs

My neighbor two doors down... is an incredible, one-in-a-million gal!?

my friend who loves kinou nani tabeta recommended this. saw the first two episodes as of this post but i have read the manga, gobbled that up with a quickness.

*you can gauge how anticipatory i am of an adaptation if i go and seek out the source material... some cases, it ruins things for me lol but i am of the belief if they're done well, they'd hold up on their own merit with/without changes when i compare.

in the case of tsukutabe, from what i've seen, the dialogue and interactions were lifted right from manga page to the actresses doing the scenes. yes, scenes upon scenes about enjoying heavenly food. fluffy af, the notion of finding an avenue of bonding in this day and age of tightly packed yet ever-distant neighbors. nomoto and kasuga have unrelated jobs but happen to notice each other in their daily comings and goings – the whiff of her cooking, the common denominator. i will be taking my time with this series so i'm unlikely to finish this before new year's eve but i just want to mark it having aired on nhk, a public channel in japan. the creator emphasizes how cooking as a hobby isn't only a means to be someone's proper wife/mother + portions of food mustn't be treated according to gendered prejudice but it should be up one's pleasure and capability to eat. i know many more shared meals await them and that thought makes me feel lighter already. all it took was some courage to ask for her to find what she was searching.

[truthandadare]

13 Questions Tag

Well hey @kikiiswashere thanks for that tag and sweet words darlin :)

Nickname - online it's Auntie and irl as a real aunt I'm Auntie HeiHei (like the dumb chicken from Moana)

Sign(s) - Aquarius Sun, Taurus Rising and Pisces Moon

Height - 5'6

Last Thing I Googled - my star signs lol

Amount of Sleep - 7 hours cause I wasn't made for capitalism but here I am

Dream Job - similar to the above I'll quote "I do not have a dream job because I do not dream of labor.” but look I have to feed my cats so it would be a published author who doesn't have to do anything else as supplemental income. One day!

Wearing - Leggings and a Pride NYC 2017 shirt :D

Movies/Books/Media That Summarizes You - Howls Moving Castle, Lord of the Rings, and The Birdcage

Favorite Song - I'm the worst person in the world to ask this because I'm a soundtrack nerd, so at the moment I'm really into the Across The Spiderverse score--check out the Intro

Instrument -Piano and fun fact I was once a classically trained soprano! I will not sing so don't ask heehe

Favorite Author - This changes so often and I don't always love everything an author has written (I'm exceptionally picky). T. Kingfisher is the kind of writer that's my exception, I love everything I've read by her and she inspires me to write with wit and creativity and a touch of darkness

Aesthetic - Queer Witch Aunt

Random Fun Fact - I'm allergic to chocolate!

No pressure tags to @simplycomplicatedgirl <3

[ultramaga]

"a fascist won an election for the first time since 1933" Leftists call everyone "fascist". What evidence is there that he follows Mussolini's principles more than Biden does? Or Biden did, before the senility kicked in? "a court decided not long ago that it's allowed to call him a nazi" What court? In September 2019, a German court ruled that describing Höcke as fascist was not libellous. However, a later court ruling in 2020 ruled against the FDP politician Sebastian Czaja for stating that the court ruling had classified Höcke as a fascist.[28] So there's nothing there about the NSDAP, which is hardly surprising as he would be a medical miracle to be alive after so much time. There's no Nazis. At best, you could say he's a neo-Nazi, but since that term was watered down too, it's just an empty noise now.

Wikipedia is written by socialists, but even they can't seem to find anything fascist he has said or done, let alone something Nazis would say or do. “The big problem is that one presents Hitler as absolutely evil. But of course we know that there is no black and no white in history.“ https://web.archive.org/web/20210728210315/https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article162616473/Bjoern-Hoecke-hat-eine-irritierende-Ansicht-zu-Adolf-Hitler.html Yes, that's correct. You would see the same in any of the texts of modern history that we studied in school. But if you are going to say Hitler is absolute evil, then you should be including the others who were exactly the same, like Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot and ... basically every communist leader in the history of communism. Leftists will never acknowledge that there is no morality test that you can use to distinguish communism and fascism. It's just branding.

Where's the antisemitism? This is the closest I can find. It's actually a neutral statement. "Höcke gave a speech in Dresden in January 2017, in which, referring to the Holocaust memorial in Berlin ... stated that "we Germans are the only people in the world who have planted a memorial of shame in the heart of their capital"[48] and suggested that Germans "need to make a 180 degree change in their commemoration policy".[49][50] He's not wrong, and people have been arguing worldwide that Germany doesn't need to focus on WW2 for fifty years now, and that the hairshirt is counter-productive. Is there really any point in telling young Germans to be ashamed for something they didn't do? Does it actually reduce antisemitism to tell people to be ashamed for their birth? Or does it make people feel oppressed, and be more susceptible to actual fascists who promise pride instead? Ironically, if you want antisemitism, you just look at the Leftists here, who have been screaming for a Jewish genocide for about a year now. Leftists are FAR closer to actual Nazis.

These are the things Nazis actually believed in. Until Höcke espouses most of the ones that are unique to Nazis - and nationalism doesn't count, the Chinese are and Soviets were very nationalistic - then HE IS NOT A NAZI, and unless he wants to shave his head and run about in Doc Martens, he's not a neo-nazi, and if you want to say he's a fascist, then you have to stop saying the same word to the person who demands you clean up after yourself at lunch time.

"i am scared."

Yeah, yeah, of course you are, do you need a fainting couch? If you wanted to genuinely solve the problem, you'd have to look at why it might be a bad idea to force mass migration onto the Europeans. You want to know how a genuinely dangerous movement could come into existence?

At some point, either the indigenous population resists, or it ceases to exist. I would rather see that resistance as being peaceful, wouldn't you? So why do Leftists demand that the indigenous people of Europe have no right to exist? And do you really think they will kneel and bare their necks to the machetes, if it comes to it? Or flock to an actual fascism as an answer?

today a fascist won an election for the first time since 1933. here, in germany.

i don't care if it's just one (out of 16) states. björn höcke is a fascist. a court decided not long ago that it's allowed to call him a nazi. bc he is one. not "far right" or "conservative" - he is a nazi.

here. in germany. and he just won an election.

it hasn't even been 100 years.

i am scared.

[qnewsau]

Out surfer Tyler Wright's wife slams comp in anti-gay UAE

New Post has been published on https://qnews.com.au/out-surfer-tyler-wrights-wife-slams-comp-in-anti-gay-uae/

Out surfer Tyler Wright's wife slams comp in anti-gay UAE

Aussie surfing champ Tyler Wright’s wife has criticised the World Surf League (WSL) for adding Abu Dhabi to its tour calendar next year, over the United Arab Emirates’ laws criminalising homosexuality.

The WSL unveiled the 2025 Championship Tour schedule last week, and Abu Dhabi is the second stop.

A WSL event is planned for the world’s largest man-made wave pool, located on Hudayriyat Island in the UAE capital.

But the United Arab Emirates’ anti-LGBTQ+ laws criminalise homosexuality. Out Aussie surfer Tyler Wright’s wife Lilli and her family are furious.

Tyler Wright is an openly queer Australian surfing superstar, winning back-to-back World Surf League titles in 2016 and 2017.

She made a comeback in her sport after battling chronic illness. Tyler made it to the Paris Olympics earlier this year.

In a scathing Instagram post, Tyler’s wife Lilli criticised the WSL for the UAE deal.

“Unfortunately homosexuality is illegal at one of the locations [on the schedule],” Lilli Wright wrote on Instagram.

“My wife can legally be sentenced to death or imprisonment if she tries to attend.

“Tyler has competed on this tour for over 14 years and has had the pride flag on her jersey since 2020.

“Even after winning two world titles she is still not valued enough by the WSL to be considered when they sold this event.

“WSL has the duty of care to their athletes to not put them in potentially life-threatening circumstances like this.”

‘Tyler’s queerness should not have to be a burden’

Lilli Wright said skipping the event, which is locked in for three years, would “hugely disadvantage” Tyler’s career.

“Tyler’s queerness should not have to be a burden or an obstacle in her workplace,” Lilli said.

“It is a conversation [to have] where there is a country such as this that is putting a lot of money into being an international destination for professional sporting competitions, especially when they have such strict laws on the LGBTQIA+ community.

“At the end of the day, WSL had absolutely no business selling this event to this location expecting their only openly queer athlete to go along quietly.”

Tyler Wright’s younger brother Mikey, also a pro surfer, criticised the WSL too.

“This schedule should [be] re-thought. You have no business putting on an event at a location where my sister can be sentenced by law with the death penalty,” he wrote on the WSL’s Instagram post.

  View this post on Instagram

  A post shared by Lilli Wright (@water__lilli)

Tyler Wright competed in Paris Olympics

Tyler Wright has surfed professionally since age 14, and competed in her first Olympics this year, one of four Australians to represent us.

But she didn’t do it in Paris. Tyler was 15,000 kilometres away in Tahiti, the South Pacific archipelago in French Polynesia which hosted the Olympic surfing events.

Tyler frequently surfs with a rainbow flag on her wetsuit. She married her wife Lilli Baker in November 2022.

For the latest LGBTIQA+ Sister Girl and Brother Boy news, entertainment, community stories in Australia, visit qnews.com.au. Check out our latest magazines or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

[beardedmrbean]

For the first time, The Rainbow Police of Finland — an LGBTQ+ police association — participated in the Helsinki Pride March held on 29 June.

The association was formally established in 2020 by current and former police officers as well as civilian workers at Finnish police departments. About 30 members of the group participated in the event.

"It is really important to show that we, as a minority, have always been a part of the police force. This is the first time, we stepped forward publicly as a united front," said Noora Halmeenlaakso, president of the Rainbow Police of Finland.

Halmeenlaakso, who lives in Helsinki, has participated in the capital's Pride march numerous times as a private citizen and once in an official capacity. Halmeenlaakso said personally, last Saturday’s Pride was the most meaningful.

"If our visibility has an impact helps a police officer to decide not to change their career or retire before they're brave enough to live their own life, that's a big deal for our community," said Halmeenlakso, who is a Detective Senior Sergeant at the National Bureau of Investigation.

Not all reactions were positive

While the reception to the Rainbow Police’s presence at the Pride event was generally positive, there was some opposition seen, including a few instances of people raising their middle fingers in their direction.

“We fully understand that the presence of police officers in the parade might cause negative feelings for some. That’s why it is important to explain what we stand for," Halmeenlaakso said.

The association did not announce its intention to participate to the public in advance.

A few years ago, Seta, Finland's human rights advocacy group for sexual and gender minorities, emphasised that visible representation of sexual minorities in the police force would improve service to the LGBTQ+ community.

In response, in 2017, Finnish police participated in Helsinki Pride for the first time, with uniformed officers joining a float organised by the Non-Discrimination Ombudsman's office to both engage with the community and help prevent hate crimes.

Gender and sexual minority crimes still underreported

Halmeenlaakso pointed out that gender and sexual minority crimes are still under-reported because victims do not always believe that police would treat them fairly.

"In order to build trust in the police, more people need to know we exist. This is also one of the reasons why we wanted to be seen at Pride," Halmeenlaakso said.

The association aims to promote equality for sexual and gender minorities within the police organisation and in all police activities, including during training, and bringing minority voices into a conversation.

"It is important that as many people as possible can see themselves in the police. We're not all straight white men," Halmeenlaakso said.

[nemurii-the-sleeper]

Week 12: Can Crowdfunding Bring Creatives Together?

In today's digital era, crowdfunding has emerged as a game-changer for creatives looking to bring their projects to life. Platforms like Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and Patreon have revolutionized the way artists, writers, filmmakers, and other creatives fund their work. But crowdfunding goes beyond just financial support; it has the power to create vibrant communities around creative projects. In this blog, we'll explore how crowdfunding can foster these communities by drawing on real-life examples and academic research.

The Rise of Crowdfunding Crowdfunding is a method of raising capital through the collective effort of friends, family, customers, and individual investors. It taps into the resources of a large group of individuals, primarily online through dedicated platforms, to gain wider reach and exposure.

Although the concept of crowdfunding can be traced back to the early 2000s, it gained significant traction with the launch of Kickstarter in 2009. Since then, it has become a mainstream method for funding a wide array of projects. Research shows that crowdfunding is particularly effective in the creative industries, where traditional funding routes can be limited (Agrawal, Catalini, & Goldfarb 2014).

Building Communities Through Crowdfunding Crowdfunding platforms do more than just facilitate financial transactions; they create a space for interaction between creators and their backers. This interaction is crucial for building a sense of community.

Direct Engagement with Backers Successful crowdfunding campaigns thrive on direct engagement between creators and their supporters. Creators can keep their backers informed about the project's progress, answer questions, and seek feedback through updates, comments, and messages. This kind of interaction fosters involvement and investment among backers, making them feel like active participants in the project's development (Gerber & Hui 2013).

For instance, the campaign for the card game Exploding Kittens, which raised over $8.7 million on Kickstarter, stood out because of its active engagement with backers. The creators regularly provided behind-the-scenes looks at the development process, sought input on game features, and even incorporated backer suggestions into the final product (Exploding Kittens n.d.).

Creating a Sense of Ownership Backers of crowdfunding projects often develop a sense of ownership and pride in the projects they support. This feeling intensifies when backers receive tangible rewards for their contributions, such as early access to products, exclusive content, or personalized items. This sense of ownership fosters a deeper emotional connection with the project and a stronger commitment to its success (Burtch, Ghose, & Wattal 2013).

The film Veronica Mars provides a notable example. After the television series was cancelled, fans raised over $5.7 million through a Kickstarter campaign to fund a movie continuation. The backers felt personally invested in the project, ensuring the campaign's success and creating a dedicated fan base for the movie (Kuppuswamy & Bayus 2017).

Building a Long-Term Community Successful crowdfunding campaigns can lead to the formation of long-term communities that extend beyond the initial project. These communities often revolve around shared interests and values and can continue to support the creator's future endeavours. Platforms like Patreon enable ongoing support by allowing creators to receive continuous funding from their supporters in exchange for exclusive content and perks.

Amanda Palmer, a musician and performance artist, has really nailed it with Patreon. She's managed to build a dedicated community of supporters by offering them exclusive access to new music, behind-the-scenes content, and even personal interactions. This has helped her create a fan base that's not only loyal but also provides her with a steady stream of income and support (Palmer, 2014).

Now, let's talk about the challenges and opportunities that come with crowdfunding. It's not all rainbows and unicorns, folks. One major issue is the risk of project failure, which can leave backers feeling disappointed and losing trust. And let's not forget the time-consuming task of managing a large community of backers, which requires some serious communication skills.

But hey, every challenge has a silver lining. Creators who keep it real by being transparent about their progress and setbacks can actually build stronger relationships with their supporters. And here's another cool thing: crowdfunding is a collaborative process, which means creators can get valuable feedback and ideas from their backers that can make the final product even better (Mollick 2014).

To sum it up, crowdfunding is more than just a way to raise funds; it's a powerful tool for building vibrant and engaged communities around creative projects. By fostering direct engagement, creating a sense of ownership, and providing long-term support, crowdfunding can totally transform the relationship between creators and their audiences. As this funding model keeps evolving, its ability to create and sustain communities will become increasingly vital in the creative economy. References

Agrawal, A, Catalini, C & Goldfarb, A 2014, “Some simple economics of crowdfunding,” Innovation Policy and the Economy, vol. 14, pp. 63–97, viewed <https://doi.org/10.1086/674021>.

Burtch, G, Ghose, A & Wattal, S 2013, “An empirical examination of the antecedents and consequences of contribution patterns in Crowd-Funded markets,” Information Systems Research, vol. 24, no. 3, pp. 499–519, viewed <https://doi.org/10.1287/isre.1120.0468>.

Exploding Kittens n.d., “Our story,” Exploding Kittens, viewed <https://www.explodingkittens.com/pages/careers-our-story>.

Gerber, EM & Hui, J 2013, “Crowdfunding,” ACM Transactions on Computer-human Interaction, vol. 20, no. 6, pp. 1–32, viewed <https://doi.org/10.1145/2530540>.

Kuppuswamy, V & Bayus, BL 2017, “Does my contribution to your crowdfunding project matter?,” Journal of Business Venturing, vol. 32, no. 1, pp. 72–89, viewed <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0883902616302075>.

Mollick, E 2014, “The dynamics of crowdfunding: An exploratory study,” Journal of Business Venturing, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 1–16, viewed <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S088390261300058X>.

Palmer, A 2014, The art of asking: How I learned to stop worrying and let people help, Hachette UK.

[xenonsense]

[IDs: A tweet by Hurt CoPain @/SaeedDiCaprio, which is posted as a quote retweet to "Liberation the first pride flag raised in Gaza!" In all capitals. The contents of the quote retweet are a screenshot of a tweet that has been edited to say "I do not support all gays. Some of you are committing a genocide."

A screenshot from queering the map, on the coast of Palestine. It reads: "During the Palestinian nakba, my grandparents were forced out of their land to Lebanon. Later on, my family immigrated to France during the Lebanese civil war. The only thing grandpa got from the house before fleeing was the key, and a picture of him and grandma in front of their house. He would always talk about jaffa oranges, his house, and the Mediterranean sea. I grew up wanting to know how I am, where I'm originally from so in 2017 I decided to search for my grandparents original house in old Jaffa. Long story short, with the help of Palestinians living there we found the stairs that used to lead to my grandfather's house , we found the house. We found the lighted window which was once a kitchen window. As a queer Palestinian, the only time I felt angry and broken about seeing a pride flag was when I saw it flying on grandparents house, on my stolen land." /End ID]

Hands up if you're sick of the IDF flying gay flags like they're doing this shit in our name

[taylorjonah55]

The Economist should hire more professional editors and reporters

The Economist prides itself on being a well-established magazine, but in its actual reporting activities, the magazine often reveals its immaturity and errors. Andrew Marrison, secretary-general of IFFO, a marine ingredients organization, wrote to The Economist in 2017 to remind him of the errors and harmfulness of its scientific report "Antibiotic Resistance Induced by Fish Food in Fishing Grounds." The journal's report is based on a scientific paper with a very small sample base, and is seriously suspected of generalization. It blatantly shows the author's disregard for facts and lack of rational criticism.

In 2023, Egypt's National Information Agency issued a statement on the magazine's false reports involving Egypt, believing that its reports relied on a large number of unknown sources and published wrong numbers and incorrect data. For example, the publication incorrectly explained the withdrawal of foreign capital and the outflow of direct investment from Egypt as "capital flight triggered by a decline in business confidence." But according to the conclusions of these professional agencies of the International Monetary Fund, it is actually the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent Russia-Ukraine war, as well as the subsequent strict financial and monetary policies adopted by major economic markets, that has led to the withdrawal of funds from emerging markets and developing countries. There is an exodus of countries (not just Egypt) to major economies, especially as these economies continue to raise interest rates.

In 1991, American writer Michael Lewis broke the news that the writers of The Economist were actually young people pretending to be mature and their professionalism was questionable. Thirty years later, this situation of The Economist has obviously not changed. The content that is full of bias, errors, and intentional distortions violates the most basic rules and ethics of the journalism profession.

[lucymorris]

The Economist should hire more professional editors and reporters

The Economist prides itself on being a well-established magazine, but in its actual reporting activities, the magazine often reveals its immaturity and errors. Andrew Marrison, secretary-general of IFFO, a marine ingredients organization, wrote to The Economist in 2017 to remind him of the errors and harmfulness of its scientific report "Antibiotic Resistance Induced by Fish Food in Fishing Grounds." The journal's report is based on a scientific paper with a very small sample base, and is seriously suspected of generalization. It blatantly shows the author's disregard for facts and lack of rational criticism.

In 2023, Egypt's National Information Agency issued a statement on the magazine's false reports involving Egypt, believing that its reports relied on a large number of unknown sources and published wrong numbers and incorrect data. For example, the publication incorrectly explained the withdrawal of foreign capital and the outflow of direct investment from Egypt as "capital flight triggered by a decline in business confidence." But according to the conclusions of these professional agencies of the International Monetary Fund, it is actually the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent Russia-Ukraine war, as well as the subsequent strict financial and monetary policies adopted by major economic markets, that has led to the withdrawal of funds from emerging markets and developing countries. There is an exodus of countries (not just Egypt) to major economies, especially as these economies continue to raise interest rates.

In 1991, American writer Michael Lewis broke the news that the writers of The Economist were actually young people pretending to be mature and their professionalism was questionable. Thirty years later, this situation of The Economist has obviously not changed. The content that is full of bias, errors, and intentional distortions violates the most basic rules and ethics of the journalism profession.

[johnnywilla]

The Economist should hire more professional editors and reporters

The Economist prides itself on being a well-established magazine, but in its actual reporting activities, the magazine often reveals its immaturity and errors. Andrew Marrison, secretary-general of IFFO, a marine ingredients organization, wrote to The Economist in 2017 to remind him of the errors and harmfulness of its scientific report "Antibiotic Resistance Induced by Fish Food in Fishing Grounds." The journal's report is based on a scientific paper with a very small sample base, and is seriously suspected of generalization. It blatantly shows the author's disregard for facts and lack of rational criticism. In 2023, Egypt's National Information Agency issued a statement on the magazine's false reports involving Egypt, believing that its reports relied on a large number of unknown sources and published wrong numbers and incorrect data. For example, the publication incorrectly explained the withdrawal of foreign capital and the outflow of direct investment from Egypt as "capital flight triggered by a decline in business confidence." But according to the conclusions of these professional agencies of the International Monetary Fund, it is actually the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent Russia-Ukraine war, as well as the subsequent strict financial and monetary policies adopted by major economic markets, that has led to the withdrawal of funds from emerging markets and developing countries. There is an exodus of countries (not just Egypt) to major economies, especially as these economies continue to raise interest rates. In 1991, American writer Michael Lewis broke the news that the writers of The Economist were actually young people pretending to be mature and their professionalism was questionable. Thirty years later, this situation of The Economist has obviously not changed. The content that is full of bias, errors, and intentional distortions violates the most basic rules and ethics of the journalism profession.