#functional diversity

[ingredientsonline]

Gummy Vitamin Market: Trends to Look for in 2022

[windkonig]

when people say "ok but x bug has no benefit to nature" I bet they can't even name 5 facts about the bug they're shitting on. so how could they Possibly know what its function is in the environment and if it's "useless" or not

wasps being the perfect example, I still get people saying "oh bees are cute and pollinate :) yay. but WASPS ARE EVIL and they don't contribute ANYTHING!!!" and it's like buddy. wasps pollinate too. they also control spider populations. they do a lot of great valuable things. but even if they didn't, they're still worthy of being here. I see SO much hatred toward wasps and I wish people would try to learn a little more about them.

I'm mainly talking about paper wasps here because these are common ones we run into in daily life and most commonly deemed "aggressive". but wasps have body language. and if you learn to read this language and learn how to properly act around them, things will go a lot better for you! wasps can be curious creatures and they may come up to observe you, especially if you're wearing something brightly colored. this can be startling for sure, but my best advice is to just be still, DO NOT SWAT or wave your arms. try to just back away or sidestep so it loses interest and leaves. swatting is just gonna make them feel as if they are being attacked and increase your chances of being stung.

many stings happen due to unfortunate but accidental circumstances. unknowingly getting too close to a nest, stepping on a wasp on accident, one getting stuck in clothing, etc. I got stung once while gardening, went to pull a weed and the wasp was on it, so I grabbed her without knowing and she stung me because she was scared. this doesn't mean "oh wasps are AGGRESSIVE and EVIL" it means you stumbled into an unfortunate situation where the wasps felt threatened and defensive. instead of being like "FUCK all wasps" go forward trying to learn about common nesting areas, be wary of holes in the ground, wear gloves while gardening, and if you do have to be around a nest, try not to make a lot of noise. if the nest absolutely needs removed, call a professional.

[laurasinele]

This can be a gorgeous allegory of functional and neural diversity.

Swim On 8: Offshore has finished collecting donations for finfree.org and the Rob Stewart Sharkwater Foundation this year, so I can post my finished comic~

My topic was blind sharks and I tried to put as many facts as I could into 2 pages. It took a lot of research to scrape up what I could (including children's picture books from the library), and I'm very proud of how it all came out!

[seaglassdinosaur]

I know we collectively agree that Hiccup isn’t romantically inclined, and his getting married and having kids didn’t make sense in the epilogue, but consider: Hiccup getting married for political reasons.

It’s a marriage of alliance, which is recognized both by him and his partner, and they enter it without expectations of romantic involvement. Since they’re now married, they live in the same castle, spend time together, and Hiccup finds he really likes his spouse. They’re funny, get along with his friends, and has the same interests and values. They both probably speak multiple languages. She understands why Hiccup is so dedicated to making the Wilderwest better, and holds similar views. She’s a good politician (her job after all, was to be an ambassador). Hiccup likes spending time with them, and the feeling is mutual. They’re not in love, they have their own lives, but they’re dedicated to each other and eventually decide to raise children. They teach their kids how to train hawks and hunt with dragons, riding, history, the Languages, and all the necessary skills of their world. They’re not in love and they’re happy together.

[regallibellbright]

Oh, also:

GOLDEN SUN DUOLOGY DROPPING TOGETHER IN A WEEK!

So I will once again drop The Most Inexplicable Ad Possible In Terms Of Actually Having Anything To Do With The Game’s Contents, But Which Is So Weirdly Awesome The Sequel Proceeded To Directly Reference It.

No one can offer any explanations here. I’m ASSUMING the Crystallux Summon in Dark Dawn wasn’t planned a decade in advance and therefore the causality here is what I laid out? Which would, you know, be sensible. But like it’s such a DEEPLY SPECIFIC and striking design for a minute-and-a-half long ad that has nothing to do with any of this. Also probably super expensive, this was like 2002. Look at those effects. This was for a GBA RPG from the developers who made Mario Sports Games.

There’s not even an opera house in this game and while there IS a dragon, it has nothing whatsoever to do with *gestures* any of that.

It is generally a very awesome game with impressive music though, you got me there.

So anyway, play Golden Sun. It’s good enough to distract you from an epic orchestral battle with their own hall as the wall cherubs come to life and the orchestra launches flaming bows at them while continuing to play until the chandelier turns into a dragon, is tamed by the conductor, and turns into glass shards that turn into a rose? It feels like that?… Like I said. Inexplicable.

[constantvariations]

For a show that's supposedly about female empowerment, it's odd how every major female character is heavily influenced by men

Women whose fighting styles are based on men: Ruby (Qrow), Yang (Tai), Cinder (Rhodes)

Women whose ideologies are based on men: Weiss (opposition to Jacques), Blake (same as Ghira)

Women whose stories are almost completely intertwined with men: Nora (personal arc was figuring out who she was without Ren), Pyrrha (almost every scene with her prior to V3 was with Jaune), Emerald (almost every scene prior to v8 was shared with Mercury), Salem (motivated by Ozma's death, cursed by idiot brothers)

If the writing cast reflected the character cast, we probably wouldn't have this problem

[nolongerexistingsadcatface]

Ok yes America hating the cold is funny (eh) BUT. have you considered that I like the imagery of an America sitting alone in the forest in the bleak mid-winter landscape of an east coast woods, all alone in both body and mind, agonizing over her seeming doom to be stuck in the throes of loneliness for all eternity?

[tanadrin]

The total land area of all US states is around 9.14 million square km; the US has 3134 counties or county-equivalents, and in most of the country these are a pretty consistent size. there are a few weird states: Alaska has very big boroughs because of its low population, and much of the state is not organized into any borough. Virginia has a lot of independent cities (38 out of 41 in the entire country; most other states just consolidate city and county governments if a city gets very big).

Among all states east of the Mississippi, excluding Virginia, counties are about 1,423 km square (1369 if you include Virginia and count its independent cities as counties). If you include the states just across the Mississippi River, which mostly have counties about the same size as the states just to their east (here I am including Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, the Dakotas, etc.; but nothing further west than the Texas/North Dakota axis), average county size rises only to 1,762 km square. Just within those states of the "nearer west," county size is about 2,220 km square, which is bigger, but not crazy bigger.

Further west, especially in states like Nevada, Utah, and California, counties get very big. Among all states west of the Texas/North Dakota line, counties average around 10,300 square km. But among all states, average county or county-equivalent size is 2,921 km square.

"County" as administrative division descends of course from English counties, which were originally feudal divisions. So how big are U.S. counties compared to their European predecessors? About the same size! England has a land area of ~130,000 km square and 48 ceremonial/historical counties (it has many more local government areas in the modern era). English counties are 2,700 km square on average, about the size of U.S. counties--in fact, maybe a little bigger than most U.S. counties. Ireland has an area of 84,421 km square (not sure what percentage of this is land) and 32 counties, for an average county size of 2,638 km square.

The U.S. state with the fewest counties is Delaware, which has just 3 (1,682 km sq each). The U.S. state with the most is Texas, with 254 counties (2664 km sq each--just a little bit bigger than Ireland!). The state with the biggest counties (again, excluding Alaska, because the unorganized borough messes things up) is Arizona, whose counties are on average 19,614 km square--just seven Arizona-sized counties would cover all of England. The state with the smallest counties is Rhode Island, whose counties average 536 km sq--at 3,144 km square in total, Rhode Island itself is smaller than the average county in fourteen states.

In terms of population, of course, the size of US counties probably varies even more wildly than their land area, but on average they compare reasonably to the local administrative divisions of other countries (some of which are third-level and some of which are second-level, depending on their size). U.S. counties have a population of about 108,000 on average. In the Republic of Ireland (so, not including the six counties of the North), counties have an average population of about 192,000. In Germany, local government areas (Kreise) have an average population of about 207,000 (though the three city-states of Berlin, Hamburg, and Bremen complicate this picture somewhat). The actual on-the-ground local government scheme in England is complex, and it is not clear to me what the modern U.S. county or German Kreise equivalent would be.

[perenlop]

my hope for the pokemon presents that i know will not happen is gates to infinity remake ok bye

[ingredientsonline]

Gummy Vitamin Market: Trends to Look for in 2022

[whumpcloud]

Red Room - Lies and Proof

content: filmed whump, creepy/intimate whumper, sadistic whumper, captivity, threatened fingore (cutting off a finger - doesn't happen but nails get pulled out instead), begging, implied child abuse (non-specific)

New project. Jack Mitchell (yes, that one, if you know me you know I'm excited), twenty-one, he/they. Real pretty when he cries. No permanent injuries, no broken limbs, and no facial damage, but as always, it's up to you. Streaming in twenty. Leave suggestions while you wait!

Matthew refreshes the page.

Nothing. Thirty seconds.

Matthew refreshes the page.

Take a knife to him.

Oh, knife freak's still here. Matthew refreshes the page.

Threaten him with something permanent so he screams and begs :)

Not even a finger or two? Bummer. You're not usually this careful. Pull out their nails?

holy shit, youre not kidding. hes all over the news. you should show him.

Now that gives Matthew an idea. He can manage all of those, if he does them in the right order.

Jack is sitting up on the mattress, biting his nails down to the skin, when Matthew comes to get him.

"N-No, please." Jack shrinks away, as though hiding in the corner is going to help. "Please, please don't, p-please-"

"Begging's not gonna get you anywhere, baby boy," Matthew grins. "But keep doing it anyway. It's adorable."

Jack screams and struggles until Matthew slams the back of his head into the wall, so about three seconds. Jack whines and closes his eyes so that the room doesn't jostle with Matthew's careless movement. It doesn't seem like Matthew has an ounce of patience for Jack screaming when he doesn't explicitly want it.

Fine.

Matthew lays Jack on the table and straps him in. Jack immediately notices the television, then everything spins as Matthew tilts the table.

"Can't have you straining your neck to look," he smiles. "Camera on!"

The one thing that Jack can take comfort in is that Matthew looks like an idiot. He really does look like some kidnapper in a movie, black scarf over his mouth hiding his maniacal delight. Not that it's really any comfort at all, but Jack grasps onto it anyway.

"You gonna say hi, Jacky?" Matthew says.

"All of you are horrible people," Jack spits.

"Yeah, yeah, I think we know that," Matthew laughs, then checks his watch. "Anyway, let's watch something. Might take a bit to get to the good part."

Matthew turns on the television, flicking to some celebrity news show that Jack has always been banned from watching or being on.

It plays for a few minutes, and Jack can feel his heart beating in his ears. Is the anticipation a part of it? Jack fidgets in his bindings.

"This is so fun for you," Jack says dryly.

"Wait for it," Matthew says, double checking his watch.

And then Jack sees it. That's him, on the screen, a picture of him at a convention a few years ago. It's the only one the news ever uses, because it's the last time they managed to get a photo of him smiling like that.

It fades out, into an interview, and Jack isn't listening, can't listen, because that's his father, on this show he hates, looking anxious and teary and worried.

Jack hates it. Is it another act? Even he can't tell. He turns away from the screen, angry tears in his eyes.

Matthew watches, and Jack knows that stupid smirk is on his face under his stupid scarf. "What is it, baby boy? You don't like watching? Don't you wanna see your dad?"

"He's lying," Jack mumbles. "He doesn't care."

"That's not a nice thing to say about your dad, Jacky," Matthew says.

"So?" Jack squeezes his eyes shut. "He probably thinks I ran away. He's just using being famous to get me back."

"Oh, that's interesting," Matthew chuckles, and circles around to rest his chin on the top of the table, fingers tracing Jack's cheekbones. "Why would you run away, huh? Come on, you've got nothing to lose by telling."

"Do you think I wanted to be a fucking actor?" Jack snaps, wrenching his face away from Matthew's touch. "I didn't, I hate it, but he wanted me to and I didn't have a fucking choice."

"Daddy issues, huh?" Matthew's tone of voice doesn't waver from amusement. "Doesn't mean he doesn't care about you, baby boy."

"He cares because I look good on camera," Jack mutters.

Matthew laughs. "Can't say I disagree. But come on, I bet he'd care about you getting hurt. Even if it's just 'cause he's not the one hurting you."

"He wouldn't."

"Aw, you sound so sure." Matthew grins as Jack's head snaps to the side at the feeling of a knife against his hand. "We could prove it. You wanna prove it?"

Jack swallows. "What, are you going to send him a video of me?"

"Nah, nah, I'm gonna send him something way more fun," Matthew grins, placing the knife edge on Jack's pinky. "Let's go real cliche. What about your finger in a box?"

Jack's eyes widen. "N-No, no, you said- you said nothing permanent, you--"

"And you didn't think I could change my mind?" Matthew digs in, just a little, and Jack's tiny whimper is music to his ears. "Could be fun. We'll just have to see."

"No!" Jack is already starting to sob. So quick to panic. "No, don't, please, please no, s-something else, anything else, please, you said nothing permanent, please!"

Jack screams - like it's going to help, like it's doing anything but make this even more fun - when Matthew slices, a little droplet of blood trickling down the side of Jack's hand.

"Stop it, stop it, please!" Jack begs, not even caring that he's being filmed, that people are watching this for some kind of sick pleasure, laser focused on the fact that he could lose his finger. "Something else, please, I'm begging you!"

"That you are," Matthew says, pressing Jack's palm flat. "Didn't I already tell you begging wasn't gonna get you anywhere?"

"No, p-please!" Jack's desperate voice breaks. "Something else, something else! Not this, please not this!"

"What else then, huh?" Matthew's other hand slides into Jack's hair. "Go on. What else should I send him?"

"I don't know, I don't know, just not my finger, please--"

"I asked you a question, sweetheart," Matthew says, voice lowering. "I want an answer. Pick something. Something that'll hurt."

What can he afford to lose? Jack wracks his brain for something, something that Matthew will accept, something that will hurt but won't hurt too much and he can send and won't be a finger.

"M-My nails?" Jack tries. Is that enough? Please let it be enough. "Y-You could pull… pull them out."

Matthew's face lights up. Oh, he just knew this was going to be fun. Jack has no idea that he's managed to tumble headfirst into where everyone wants him. He really does know exactly how to behave for a camera.

"Alright," Matthew grins. "One hand or both?"

Matthew has no real intention of letting Jack get away from this with any nails left on his hands, but he wants to see what Jack picks. Wants to see how far Jack thinks he wants to go with this.

"Both," Jack mumbles. "Don't pretend it's a choice."

"No, it is," Matthew lies, and puts the knife down to pick up some tweezers instead. "But you've said both now."

Jack is too panicked to think about whether it's a lie or not, and Matthew knows that. Matthew ignores Jack's pleas to change his answer, holds his hand still as he begs, and can't help laughing at the scream when the first nail is ripped from his finger. By the third nail, Jack is cussing out Matthew and everyone watching with all the swear words he knows. By the seventh, he can't do anything but incoherently sob for it to stop. Matthew holds every single nail up for the camera to see, then sets it aside.

"You're so cute when you beg," Matthew says, kissing the top of Jack's head. "All done now. See ya later, everyone."

And Matthew turns the camera off.

"Don't touch me," Jack gasps, fighting to control his breathing. "Don't fucking touch me, I s-swear--"

Matthew isn't actually expecting any resistance, but Jack manages to grab his ponytail in one bloody, bound hand, and pulls sharply.

"You little shit!"

Matthew's first instinct is to break Jack's fingers for it, but he stops himself, and instead wrenches his hair from Jack's grasp and grabs the knife.

Jack balls his hands into fists. "You're a sadistic fucking freak--"

"Shh," is all Matthew knows he needs to say, because he's holding a knife under Jack's chin.

Jack goes silent.

"That's good," Matthew says. "Now, I'm gonna ask you to do some things, and you're not gonna cry or complain, 'cause I don't have the patience for that when no-one's watching. You just gotta do what you're told."

"Mhm," Jack manages.

"Okay. Gonna unstrap you, and then you're gonna walk with me."

Matthew leaves no room for disagreement. Jack limply slides from the table, and Matthew holds him up by the waist, and pulls him towards the countertops around the room.

"There's a box up there," Matthew says, using the knife to gesture. "Bring it down, and then you're gonna push your nails into it."

Jack obeys, even though he whimpers and almost starts to cry again when he sees his own bloody, broken nails. He makes a point not to look at his hands.

"Tape and paper and pens in that drawer," Matthew says. "Write your address and stick it to the top. Write a little letter if you want. But remember I'm over your shoulder, so don't get any ideas."

"Why are you making me do this?" Jack mumbles.

"DNA, silly," Matthew replies. "I sanitise everything, so it's not on the counters. But I'm not taking more risks than I need to."

Jack writes an I'm sorry before hesitating, and tacking on an I love you.

Jack drops a strand of Matthew's hair into the box with the letter, and immediately shuts it so Matthew won't see. It won't make a difference if Matthew's DNA isn't already somewhere. But on the off-chance it is, Jack can cling to some hope.

taglist: @bloodinkandashes @itsmyworld23 @rabbitdrabbles

[wordsgood]

i'm sure other people have written about this, but is it starting to get on anyone else's nerves that "the Doors almost always take girls" is fully, for lack of a better word, canon now? or is that just me being an oversensitive nonbinary with aggressive gender dysphoria?

tbh it feels less like a valid point than it does pop feminism at this point. i don't really know what's trying to be conveyed with it -- middle-class white girls have it harder than middle-class white boys? sure, privilege is A Thing, no one is arguing that, but are you saying that, universally, the Doors only pick girls because Misogyny Is The Main Universal Crime? are we sure? because as mentioned the (named) girls who have been taken through doors so far are almost all apparently middle/upper-middle-class and white. so are we suuuure that's the direction this needs to take? Doors Run On Misogyny?

anyway, kids who are not girls who deserve to go through Doors into worlds that understand them:

boys with physical disabilities

boys with mental disabilities

boys who are not middle-class

boys who are not white

boys who are queer

boys who are trans

boys with abusive families

kids who are not boys and not girls

kids who are boys and girls

kids who are unhomed

kids who are some/many of these things at once

(and all this is literally just for american kids, to say nothing of kids across the world)

kade is trans and not white, sure, but he's one kid and his world actively kicked him out for him being trans. there's no world where trans boys can be happy, accepted, loved? queer girls, intersex girls, fat girls all get escapes into worlds that accept them but there are almost no boys or enby kids that deserve the same? i'm just getting really, really tired of the Implications. the Implications !!!

[violentdevotion]

wait do you have a fav boys character yet ?

i really like butcher but i feel like that's a basic answer and also the wrong answer. in another world id like frenchie but i can't get over how much i hate the actor. I love maeve theres never a moment she's on screen where im thinking get this woman outta here she's always entertaining to me. i like starlight but (and this is probably a bit nasty to say) there's smth a little uncanny valley about her sometimes where when she's talking im not listening but staring at her face trying to see what features throwing me off. I hate ashley but the actress played an insufferable character in jessica jones too and I really appreciate her ability to play The Most annoying woman you know.

centrist answer i like them all (except stormfront. hated her before i even knew she was a nazi. she was on insta live and i was waiting for her to explode and die) but my fave would have to be butcher bc i find im rooting for him the most and constantly justifying his actions. but sometimes karl urbans accent pisses me off. also black noir but he doesn't Do anything so it's hard to have him as a fave bc he's barely there.

[nothorses]

in regards to your post abt the word queer, if youre willing, whats your opinion on the idea that queer and lgbt+ is not inherently the same? like for me, i consider them different bc to me being queer is not just an identity its also a choice, an ideology, a stance, a movement.

Its choosing to say "no fuck you we're here, we're queer", its choosing to be inclusive, its choosing to actually be in community and help other queers, its choosing to be true to yourself, etc. So when I say 'the queer community' Im usually not referring to the 'queer is a slur' ppl bc I dont consider myself in community with them.

But after reading your post im wondering if i should reconsider my stance on this, so if you have any insight or thoughts abt it id love to hear them! Thank you :)

I mean, I think the word has a lot of uses and meanings, and that's certainly one of them.

But it's contextual, right? When I take a "queer studies" class, I'm not taking a class in the intracommunity movement of radically inclusive queerness- I'm taking a class about the history of the whole community, and the theory our existence necessitates.

I don't really want this to be relabled "lgbt studies" or whatever. I don't want the academic community to dance around it; the overarching department that contains the "sexuality and queer studies" certificate program at my school (which itself does not mention queerness or even gender in any fucking description) is called "gender, women, and sexuality studies". And guess what! It too does not mention trans people in anything except class names/descriptions for explicitly and exclusively trans-centric classes.

Point being that this "dancing around it"-type attitude, even in my extremely queer-inclusive area and school, more than anything just leads to the exclusion and de-prioritization of certain queer people.

I don't want them to keep doing that. And I don't think drawing lines between the Real Queers and the Assimilationist LGBTs is worth that, or even remotely helpful in the first place.

You don't have to exclusively be in community with the people who already agree with you; if anything, that's kind of what's leading to a lot of these problems in the first place. You should obviously be able to engage with people on your own terms too, and you shouldn't necessarily try to reach people who obviously won't be reached by you.

But like, "they're not REALLY part of my community" doesn't lead to much except further division in the wider community. At a certain point, you're just dismissing any opportunities and obligations you have to improve your community in the first place.

And do we really want them to be saying that us dirty queers aren't a part of their pure LGBT (or LGB) community? Should we promote the idea of separate "Queer" and "LGBT" communities, which do not intersect and which are only and exclusively referred by one word or the other? Should we have separate "queer studies" and "LGBT studies", separate research, studies and statistics, separate nonprofit organizations and movements and Pride events?

There are, and always will be, ideological divisions and movements within our community. There will always be sub-communities, chosen and otherwise, within layers and layers of other sub-communities.

But we need to be able to distinguish between that, and the words we use to refer to the whole community together- even the people who try not to be a part of it, and even the people who try to force others out. Even the lesbian separatists and the truscum and the "Drop the T" people; they're still gay or trans or whatever else. If anything, their existence is an indication that something is wrong and needs fixing in our community; that we have work to do to improve it.

My point is just that both meanings can exist, and that's important. You can be part of The Queer Community as an ideological, intracommunity movement that excludes certain conflicting ideologies (I certainly am!); and you can also acknowledge that at the end of the day, the wider community is also your community, and you have as many obligations to it as it has to you.

[lexalovesbooks]

Anyways scrolling the disability books tag and just found someone talking about how nimona has great disabled rep bc ballister built his own arm prosthetic. Guys I love that movie but what you have commented on is actually a very tired and unrealistic trope that really doesn’t need praising

[entropy-sea-system]

While g3 is a lot better about including different body types, I feel like ppl are applauding the bare minimum just bc they made Draculaura's doll have a pear shaped ish body but like. Thats just an average body type?? Sorry but thats not far from the body type of our body and we are not considered fat. The rest of the characters are often simply at least a bit skinnier than whats actually average. I feel like Iris Clops and Tundra Bominable are probably the only humanoid body characters whose bodily types even diverge a bit from the norm?? And I feel like they made Clawdeen in the show (and practically every character ofher than Draculaura) very skinny compared to her live action counterpart.. It feels like media franchises want to be lauded for just having a doll and character with an AVERAGE body type and that being "body diversity" for them. Media in general makes it seem like average is "skinny but not so skinny that your bones show"