#falling life expectancy

[eaglesnick]

Second-rate Britain 6

The UK’s official retirement age is one of the highest in the world. Despite having  the fifth largest economy on the planet, Britons are expected to work long into old age before they can draw on their state pension. I gave three reasons yesterday why the government had postponed its plans to raise the pension age from 66 to 68.

“One is fear of social unrest as seen in France. Second, there is an election in less than two years time and raising the pension age is a vote-loser. Third, and perhaps most worrying of all, is that life- expectancy in the UK is falling."

Yesterday I was foolishly optimistic that this delay would be for several years but today it was announced:

“The Government plans to have a further review within two years of the next Parliament to reconsider plans for the state pension age to rise to 68.”  (Express and Star: 30/03/23)

So, we might yet see a retirement age of 68 before the end of the decade.

But this is not the main point of today’s observations. A very good reason for NOT raising the pension age is that in the UK life expectancy is now falling, not rising.

“For the first time in 100 years, Britons are dying earlier. The UK now has the worst health trends in western Europe – and doctors and experts believe that the impact of austerity is a major factor.”  Guardian 23/06/19.

Tory government’s have repeatedly deprived public services of adequate funding, which in turn has led to a decline in the quality of these services – from worsening housing conditions to NHS staff shortages. The deliberate running down of the NHS has led to massive waiting lists and many patients have died before they can be treated. The last decade has quite literally seen Tory government policies killing people. And before anyone blames Covid for increased waiting lists (which it did), the date of the quote above is June 2019, six months BEFORE Covid struck.

Needless to say, the fall in life expectancy disproportionately affects the poor, which is maybe why Tory governments seem not to care. It is no coincidence that it was the rich who received tax breaks on their pensions in the last budget while the rest of us will soon be expected to work until we are 68. While the rich can squirrel away a bigger pension pot much earlier than before, we will have to labour until we are nearly into our seventies.

Government’s figures show that 

“…females born into the poorest areas are the worst affected. Between 2018 and 2020, healthy life expectancy at birth in the most deprived areas was 19.3 years less than in the least deprived areas between 2018 and 2020. For males, it was 18.6 years fewer.” (Nursing in Practice: 27/03/22)

Life expectancy In the UK only began to fall after 2010, the year the first Tory government came to power after the financial crash of 2008. There then followed a decade of austerity measures and cuts to public services. During this time:

“… while life expectancy rose in most places during the first decade of the millennium, from 2010 it began to decline in some places… life expectancy fell in some urban parts of Leeds, Newcastle, Manchester, Liverpool and Blackpool where life expectancy was below 70 for men and 75 for women… there was a 20-year gap in life expectancy between a woman living in Camden (95.4 years) versus a woman living in one area of Leeds (74.7 years). And for men, there was a 27-year gap in life expectancy between areas in Kensington and Chelsea (95.3 years) and parts of Blackpool (68.3 years)”  (BBC News: 13/10/21)

The next time the unelected multi-millionaire Sunak tells us he is putting our “needs before politics”, we might want to insist he puts our lives above the economic interests of his already rich friends.

[i-bet-you-wish-i]

Inspired by @secretdazedragon lovely "vampires are cats' posts and this iconic gif

[uncanny-tranny]

Amatonormativity has destroyed so many people's understanding and acceptance of themselves, and it's heartbreaking.

Yes, it is normal to be in your 20s, 30s, or older and not have lost your virginity, had a first kiss, or a partner. It is normal to say that you aren't ready for those things, too! It is normal if your life doesn't follow the "college graduate -> engagement -> buying a home -> 2.5 kids and a dog" trajectory that so many people have idealized.

So many people associate maturity with losing your virginity, or having a first kiss, or a serious relationship, and I think that's a dangerous association. Maturity isn't gained through those things, and you don't have to have those experiences to be considered "mature" or "grown." It is not a bad thing to go at your pace. Nobody else can live your life but you. If you end up having those experiences, that's great! But it should be done because you want to experience them, not because you feel "broken" and "immature" without them.

[lover-of-mine]

"Buck is attached to this symbolism of couches being related to relationships, and that's not something that's actually going away anytime soon."

[hansoeii]

I'm very much not normal about loki and mobius right now

[mylastmoleculeofserotonin]

I’m convinced that people who hate Mabel have a) never watched the show and/or b) don’t have siblings. Because until they encountered Bill Cipher for the first time, there was nothing to suggest Dipper’s obsession with the journals was more important or valid than Mabel just wanted to have a normal summer with a whirlwind romance. And even after incident with the portal Dipper and Ford actively keep everything secret from Mabel and Stan so she has no idea of the stakes or what Bill is capable of. Add to that that her dreams of the future were all suddenly crumbling around her all at once, and it is perfectly reasonable if not expected that she would fall for an immortal chaos demon’s tricks.

Also, most of the stuff involving the journal that goes wrong is Dipper’s fault but he still pretends like he and Mabel are in it together. And those of you who are siblings know that Mabel takes it extremely well. Like if I had accidentally sold my body as a puppet to a demon and the only way I could ask my sibling for help was through a sock puppet, I would expect them to help, but only after they spent a good half hour laughing and making fun of me with the additional consequence would be that any time I ask them for a small favor in the future, they would remind me that they were the one to save me from my stupid mistake, so no, they won’t pass me the salt.

(Also, can we just take a moment to see the giant double standards when it comes to the romances that Dipper and Mabel’s have. When Mabel pursues a romantic people treat it as irrelevant and getting in the way of the plot even when it doesn’t. But when Dipper tries to win Wendy’s affection, people expect Mabel to drop everything, sacrifice her pet, mess with time travel to help set up a scenario which Dipper can win a carnival game as a flex.)

[fujii-draws]

I think there’s something extremely entertaining abt two kids who aren’t child prodigies, but infact;

-Constantly cheating death over and over again, even when they should’ve absolutely perished ages ago.

-Continue their streak through gaining the Grim Reaper as their father, who keeps cheating them out of death even more as atonement for trying to kill/harm them once himself.

<<< Simultaneously the luckiest and unluckiest god damn teens/young adults

[valfeathers]

(stumbles into a room covered in blood and sweat) i painted

[cinnamonsikwate]

"why couldn't shuro have just been honest about what he felt with laios and falin it's not that hard" are you. are you White

[phoenixcatch7]

In love with the idea of captain marvel being Billy's imaginary friend. Like, it'd be so easy. Early depictions had them as almost fully separate people sometimes, like one soul with two minds, rather than just two filters like we mostly see now.

But imagine a Billy down on his luck, hurt and hiding from police and criminals alike, daydreaming the hours away as children do, taking inspiration from all the superheroes rising to fame, making little stories to play out his dreams of saving the world with a generic action doll he found while dumpster diving once. Most of the paint's rubbed off.

Red's his favourite colour, his comfiest jumper is a bright ruby even after all the grime and washes. Gold, too, it's shiny and warmer than silver! A hero cape is a must, big and eye catching! And he can fly, of course, like superman, and in his daydreams, when he's sore and frustrated after a long day's grind, his superhero is smart enough and knows all the right words to get the bullies to stop without resorting to fighting.

His superhero fantasy is one he spends a lot of time on, the first one he goes for when struggling to sleep at night, and he can picture it so clearly. Captain marvel is big and bright and kind, strong enough to lift the boxes for the old lady up the road who's moving all by himself, fast enough to catch Jamie who fell out of the tree on Saturday and broke his leg and couldn't come to class for weeks. He appears at the entrance to alleys when Billy is cornered, he steps up behind to cover for him when he gets caught shoplifting, he sits at the bus stop with him when it's pouring rain and the right bus doesn't seem to be coming.

And then the wizard comes, or rather whisks him away, and like a magician from a fairytale breathes life into his imaginary friend until Billy feels thrice his size and a million times more invincible.

From then on, captain marvel is a real hero, just like Billy is a real boy, and as one they save the whole city, and then the whole world, and get cats down from trees and help Mrs Victoria move the last of her boxes and she gives them a pinch in the cheek and cookies for the road and sometimes it hurts but it's so much better than he imagined.

[bugtoast]

So i was looking around tumblr, and i found @squidflavoredsoup 's posts and like??? y'all i didn't know i wasn't alone in having this weird triangular guy in my house!!

seriously though, what is he even doing here???? how'd he even get inside???? where did he come from, cotton-eye joe???

[puniflash]

The Fall Guy

This movie has completely taken control over my existence, so here are the little things I love most about it, in no particular order.

The triple meaning of the title.

Colt not just being the fall guy in the sense of the stunt community, but also (almost) taking the fall for Henry's murder, and falling in love with Jody so deeply he'd basically die for her.

This is so cool, and I love the english language for it.

(Also, the little fall guy in the A? Perfection.)

The long shots.

My love for one-ers is just as big as Jody's, I guess.

The opening sequence is just so perfect.

Introducing the main characters, establishing Colt's and Jody's relationship and setting high stakes from the beginning with that stunt gone wrong.

This long shot shows you exactly what kind of movie you're gonna watch, and it's probably one of my favourite opening sequences in a movie ever.

This one is so perfect, too.

Jody trying to come up with answers for everyone, and keeping everything under control amuses me and stresses me out in equal messure.

And talking from the little personal experience I have, this sequence (and the whole movie for that matter) captures the work on set so accurately. It's truly amazing.

Long shots like this take so much time and effort to coordinate, and I just love, and appreciate it so much when movies do that. It's so impressive, and so fun to watch.

The prayer hands emoji.

Tom sending Colt nothing more than a prayer hands emoji because he just doesn't care about his well-being at all.

(I mean, he is in fact responsible for Colt's accident, so it's savage but not surprising.)

And then Colt giving that prick at his valet job the exact gesture because the guy acts like an asshole, and Colt couldn't care less about his crispy fiver.

Gold.

The script credits.

This is genius, and I love everything about it!

When you pause the movie and read everthing, you can see there are actual excerpts from the movie script, just a little modified, to fit the credits.

When I saw this for the first time it totally caught me by surprise, and now it is everything I never knew I needed.

This entire conversation.

Jody asking: "Did you fall?" is so ironic, I wanna scream.

Girl, of course he fell. FOR YOU!

And Colt is so high on whatever kind of drug they spiked his drink with, it's so endlessly funny to me.

Plus the way he just can't stop himself from telling Jody how beautiful she is over and over again, while completely ignoring her concern about his wounds.

Not to mention the extended version of this with that sponge bath discussion.

(Haven't seen the extendet cut yet but saw the scene on YouTube a milion times. I die everytime for multiple reasons.)

I could watch a whole movie of them just having a conversation like this.

Bonus:

Everytime I watch this I end up questioning my sanity, cause I feel like he spontaneously gets me pregnant with whatever it is he does here.

Every. Single. Time.

The way his eyes move from her eyes to her lips?

How Jody didn't just lose her mind, and all ability to breathe right then and there is beyond me.

Split Screen.

Another conversation that is just perfect in it's entirety.

The split screen opening exactly on the middle line of that shelf in the backround is satisfying me in a way that should put me in a mental facility.

Colt and Jody being so in sync and mirroring each other during this whole conversation, even after being apart for like 18 months is so special to me.

Colt knowing her favourite movies?

Their love for each other really is a different kind of epic.

The music matching the movie.

This is pure perfection, and I will never shut up about it.

The bottle equals the promise.

The container is turning around in an uncontrollable spin.

Also:

The Song "Dead Guy On Ice" from the original soundtrack is playing right when Colt says this to Gail on the phone.

Also, also:

"I was made for loving you" being woven into so many songs of the original soundtrack, and returning over and over throughout the whole movie in different ways.

It gives me James Bond vibes, and that just makes my heart smile.

I could go on and on about how much joy this sparks in me, everytime I watch the movie. It never fails to make me smile.

Jean Claude.

Nothing to add here, he's such a bon garçon.

Also, the fact that Colt and Jody just keep him after the happenings of the film, is probably my favourite thing ever.

(And I never knew I needed to hear Ryan Gosling speak french, but apparently it's something my body and soul desired very much.)

The post-it notes.

I am OBSESSED with this. Literally the most relatable thing about Tom Ryder. I love using post-it notes for all kinds of stuff when my brain gets overwhelmed, so this is just too real.

"FIRE MASSUSE"

"PRETEND YOU WENT TO JULLIARD"

"next role: paramedic vampire"

"is it MOMOA or MAMOA"

These are cracking me up so hard, I can't.

The cockroach story.

This seriously isn't talked about enough.

Right when I thought I couldn't fall any deeper for Colt's and Jody's relationship, they hit me with this.

Just imagine Colt on all fours, trying to usher that coakroach out of the room, while Jody just sits on the bed, telling him to get it done because she wants to start their movie night.

The domesticity this story implies is killing me in the best way possible.

You're so uncoordinated.

Another thing we just don't talk about enough is this scene right at the beginning:

This is kinda blurry but he totally bumbs her head on that cabinet behind her, and all she does is laugh it off and tell him he's uncoordinated.

And I just love the thought of Colt being this super profesh stuntman, always double-checking everything to make sure it's safe to do the stunts and roll the cameras, but going back to being so adorably clumsy the second the adrenaline rush wears off.

I will never get over this.

That's my girl.

Colt reacting like this when Gail says "That's my girl." is everything to me.

It's so cute, and you know it's exactly what he thought as well, 'cause he is so freaking proud of Jody. It's just so perfect.

"You blew yourself up!"

Tom telling Colt he's supposed to be dead 'cause he blew himself up, then proceeding to blow himself up is amazing writing, and shows how much thought went into this whole thing.

This movie is so good at foreshadowing itself, and I can't get enough of it.

Bonus:

He gets three bars on his phone, and then there are three explosions errupting.

This is satisfying my brain on another level. I can't even put it into words.

Spicy margaritas

Yet another beautiful conversation, that comes full-circle in the end.

Just casually planning a trip to the beach in the middle of the film production chaos, I love that for them.

(The way Ryan says "spicy margarita" is a beautiful thing, that haunts my dreams in the best way possible.)

In conclusion

I love this movie with all my heart, and I could talk hours and hours about how amazing it is.

There's so much more I love about it, but it's just too much to fit it all in here, so these are just the small things that make it extra special for me.

Honerable mentions go to:

- Dan Tucker, master of movie quotes, and best friend Colt Seavers could ever ask for.

- Colt Seavers' coffee side quest.

- The movie lighting a Ryan Gosling sized fire under my ass, prompting me to forget about life, and get a new obsession.

[slydiddledeedee]

they are so funny. to me.

[sunsetstarving]

RAHH DAY'S BIRTHDAY DAY'S BIRTHDAY!! @daydream-draws have a mystery twins just for you :)

you're one of my favorite people to talk to and your spam posting different fandoms has gotten me through MANY a difficult evening--more than that, even, because i often discover new-old stories through you and your fantastic taste :)) it's truly been a privilege to be your friend over the years and grow together in art and life and personhood!! i hope you have an absolutely splendid birthday filled with love and comfort and all of the best things, and i love you so very much 💚

[a-witch-in-endor]

Chapters: 19/30 Fandom: Avatar: The Last Airbender Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: The Gaang & Zuko (Avatar), Zuko & the Fire Sages, Sokka/Zuko (Avatar), Yue & Zuko (Avatar), Azula & Zuko (Avatar) Characters: Zuko (Avatar), The Gaang (Avatar), Yue (Avatar), Azula (Avatar), Zuko's Hat Additional Tags: Funny Hat Zuko AU, Fire Sage Zuko AU, Ozai (Avatar) Being a Terrible Parent, Found Family, Fire Hazard Siblings, canon-typical child abuse, Zuko is the Temple's Baby Nerd, Worldbuilding, Zuko Joins The Gaang Early (Avatar), Zuko has never met a hill he wasn't ready to die on, Autism Summary:

High Sage Kenji blesses Fire Prince Zuko with the resilience of the reed, who bends in the wind and never breaks. When he is done, Fire Prince Ozai narrows his eyes, seemingly displeased by this blessing. But Kenji does not speak for himself; he is only a vessel. 

-

The newly-crowned Fire Lord Ozai offers his firstborn son to service in the temple.

This turns out to be a catastrophic mistake.

[bonerot19]

I'm thinking about Jason Todd dying in early spring. when the weather is just starting to turn around. before the flowers bloom.

I'm thinking about Jason Todd feeling alone again. when he'd thought he had a home, a place to belong. "did felipe fall...or was he pushed?"

I'm thinking about Jason Todd trying to save his mom. maybe he thought that the third time might be the charm. maybe he would be enough for Sheila.

I'm thinking about Jason Todd dying in early spring. april showers bring may flowers. but Bruce was too late and Sheila betrayed him and he still tried to save her and he didn't get to see the flowers bloom.