#got angry and needed to vent

[a-bit-too-much-of-a-zelda-fan]

Ableism in the Pricing of Higher Education

I have one more semester of college left, god permitting. Because of the ways my disabilities (ADHD, Autism, and Bipolar Disorder) impede my learning and my productivity, I have had to work so hard to get even mediocre results in college. And I've had to take on so much more debt. Despite it all, I'm going to make it through, and I'm damn PROUD of it. But let's talk about it, because this system is fucking broken and I'm fucking angry about it.

This gets pretty long after the cut, so TL;DR:

Universal public college tuition and student loan debt forgiveness are not just economic issues. They are disability issues, and we need to fight for them like it.

The pricing scheme at my university functions probably not unlike most higher education institutions. Any student who takes three or fewer courses a semester pays à la carte. A set amount for each class. Any student who takes four or more courses a semester pays the same flat rate. The more courses you take, the farther your money goes.

This is broken and it's insane that this is the standard. Of the eight semesters I've completed, I only tried taking the "standard" five courses twice. Both times, I had to withdraw from at least one of them because the workload was too heavy. My brain just isn't wired in a way that can handle that much work and mental bandwidth. My attention span only goes so far, and it gets even worse if my meds aren't just right.

So every other semester, I've taken four courses. The minimum to be considered a full-time student and to pay the flat rate. Each semester, I've raked in a maximum of 12 credits. I say maximum because there have even been four-course semesters that I've had to withdraw from one just to pass the other three. Meanwhile, the assumption is that neurotypical people take five courses a semester.

My university, like pretty much every one in the US, requires 120 credits to graduate with a Bachelor's degree. At 3 credits per course (generally), that's 40 courses. A neurotypical person taking 5 each semester can graduate in 8 semesters, or 4 years. At that same pace, that sets someone like me at graduating in 5 years. Now I'm an laden with an extra year's worth of debt compared to them.

That all assumes I pass all my classes every time, which sometimes, I just fucking can't because my brain is crosswired for what they want it to do. I'm hopefully going to manage to graduate in 9 semesters. How? Well I went into college with 15 credits from dual enrollment in high school (that we paid for out of pocket). That gave me the wiggle room to only take 4 courses each semester. But with my performance, there are still gaps.

I've needed to take two summer courses, which each cost me about $1,300. I'm currently earning 3 credits doing study abroad, which I do admit is an expensive way of going about getting credits, but the program alone (without airfare and living expenses) was about $5,000. Without these "extra" credits, I wouldn't nearly be able to graduate when I will be.

All the while, some neurotypical people are out here taking five or even six classes and paying the exact same rate that I am. They're graduating earlier and not going into as much debt, what, because they happen to have the brains that this pricing scheme favors?

This isn't even considering jobs. Other students are able to balance having a job and taking a full course load. Graduating faster, paying less, and actively earning money to offset the cost more. I'm not going to pretend it's easy for all of them. No way. That's a stressful way to live, but the point is that they can live that way. I can't. I just can't.

I'm going to name my privilege because it's a big one here. My family is decently wealthy. As long as I can remember, we've been able to live comfortably. Financial aid agreed, apparently, because even after the loans I'm allowed, we still pay about $9,000 out of pocket every semester. Put that up against someone in my same financial situation but with a brain that works the way the college thinks it should. That's another $18,000 my family is on the hook for compared to them, all for the same degree. It's bullshit.

But if someone with a brain like mine isn't as fortunate financially as I am, where the fuck are they gonna get that extra money? My family paid for my summer courses and study abroad out of pocket. Where is that less privileged student getting that fucking money? A job? Yeah right, they can barely stay off academic probation from poor grades, like me. What part of this is fair? It's not fair to me, and it's certainly not fair to anyone less wealthy than me.

The short term solution is so obvious it hurts. Create a separate pricing plan that costs the same, but just takes longer. Have me pay less per semester than someone taking 5 courses, and in exchange, prohibit me from taking more than 4. They are using more resources than me, so in the capitalist mindset, they ought to pay more than me.

Fuck the capitalist mindset, though. Fuck everything about college costing money. What the hell? I go to a public, state-funded university and I'm still tens of thousands of dollars in debt? And my parents have just that much less money in their retirement accounts? Financially at least, I have it fucking easy. My family can tank the costs. We can take out a home equity loan because we can afford our own house in this economy. Not everyone can.

Fuck it. This is inhumane. Education is a society's greatest asset. When people are allowed to achieve their ambitions and succeed in life, the economy performs better. Standards of living go up. Democracies become healthier. Most importantly, the people are happier. Because what's more important than being happy and healthy?

So when education is locked behind a fucking paywall, who wins? Not the students, and not society. Taking financial privilege out of it, the worst losers are people like me. People whose minds just can't work in a way that lets us take 5 courses and a part time job at the same time. We are fucking losing. We are losing money and we are losing time in our lives. All this debt sets back our savings, our investments, our stability to start our own families.

Universal public college tuition and student loan debt forgiveness are not just economic issues. They are disability issues. People like me are paying a price that neurotypical people don't have to, and it doesn't have to be that way. There are ways that we can make it better for us, and there are ways that we can make it better for everyone. So let's fucking do them, alright?

That means voting for the people that will put those policies in place. That means protesting when they don't. That means walking out of class and protesting ableist school administrations. That means being an active citizen in our democracy. If we need to fight to get the things that we need to thrive, then we are gonna have to give one hell of a fight.

[ducktracy]

there are a lot of evil people in the world and a lot of darkness in the world and so it’s very important for me to stress that now more than ever is the time to spread kindness and compassion. combat the evil by not only not partaking in it, but actively refuting it. destroy the notion that being compassionate or generous or kind to someone is uncool or embarrassing or even scary. be the change you want to see. start a chain reaction. positivity only breeds more positivity. do an act of kindness for someone so that that person who is too afraid to do it themselves can see you, realize that they’re not alone, and perhaps sheepishly follow your example. and then the next person who is too afraid but sees that person can do the same. when bad news comes out about bad people or horrible atrocities in the world it’s such an easy impulse to despair, and obviously it’s important to feel what you need to feel. grieve. be angry. be sorrowful. be empathetic. but dust off your pants and get up and be a part of a chain reaction that, no matter how small the scale, and spread compassion and love and care. all the reasons why you might not—“it’s hard! it’s scary! people will make fun of me! it’s useless because there’s too much evil!” are all grade A arguments as to why you should. you have no idea how many people you could inspire to do the same. even if it doesn’t get you anyway far, you can at least say you have the nobility of trying. please choose love and please choose life. you are worth loving and you are worth inspiring others to love

[mikakuna]

anyone ever notice that mainly the only way that bruce and jason mend their relationship, both in canon and fics, is by jason realizing bruce actually feels bad for everything he did or is shouldering too much and it guilt trips jason into trying to fix his relationship with bruce? this isn't all cases but it definitely is the case with most popular fics. bruce apologizes sometimes yeah but it's usually just someone telling jason or him realizing just how heartbroken and depressed bruce is. jason then internalizes out of guilt that he needs to lay off bruce and realize that maybe bruce is trying his best

in fact most relationships jason has with the bats in fanon is like this. jason calls tim replacement until oh nooo the poor baby is so sleepy and running on coffee and awww he's just a little boy i need to stop being a menace, meanwhile tim or alfred never apologized for every nasty thing they said or imagined about jason when he was robin. enemy to caretaker makes me barf. do not make my boy who has been a caretaker to adults since birth take care of this rich boy who's been taken care of extraordinarily since day one. tim having this supposed childhood trauma fans talk about doesn't take away from the fact that he was taken care of as a child

[kerizaret]

In case you haven't noticed May has sucked for me so far, anyway *projects onto blorbo*

[spiltcandycoatedpunkblood]

I thought the whole point of the watcher debacle was that we "constructively point out the flaws of their business decision whilst also being understanding that they want to do more with their success because we don't know them as any more than content creators and say how much this will impact their viewership during cost of living crises" not "threaten and bully them and their livelihoods and make them out to be literal villains that need to have their company burn down to make them learn a lesson and throw vile racist abuse at the CEO of the company because them being insensitive and making a mistake even once before wanting to do better makes them irredeemable unforgiveable bastards that don't deserve good things", right?

[whump-is-love-whump-is-life]

Thinking about that time before the betrayal. Those moments of happiness, of safety, of trust

When you think back to those moments and they’re forever tainted. When you’re just going about your day and memories hit you and they hit you hard. So many emotions in the present moment. How could someone so horrible seem so good? Were there moments you missed? Signs they aren’t who you thought? How could you not know?

How could they do this to you? To others? How dare they pretend they’re anything but a monster— and they are, always have been. You know it now and you feel so stupid for having not before.

How can you ever trust again?

[wavebiders]

LRT that is such a thing with queer fandom spaces tho. It's like that post that's all "yeah your story is so gay but how are you treating your female characters" you know?

like yeah it's great that this is the queer fandom website but a good chunk of the time that just means placing a lot of focus on the white guys and that's still not great lmao

[floral-hex]

woke up at 4am feeling the weight of my life crushing me, so I’ve been sitting out in my car for the last couple of hours because I just need. to. be. somewhere else.

[trans-axolotl]

have not left bed today + found out another friend got locked up + want to beat up every single adult that saw what was happening to me and looked away or actively made it worse

[truckstoptigers]

i hold so much more anger than anyone around me realizes

[greaserink]

Tmi but having your workplace send you home for crying too much is such a humiliating feeling somebody take me out back

[beanswithbones]

.

[spacejammie-eimmajecaps]

Being chronically ill is such a miserable way to live, like so much of my time is spent suffering and enduring pain and being absolutely exhausted and just waiting, waiting, waiting for relief that may or may not come

[poisonouspastels]

[unseemingowl]

I am very fortunate to live in a country that is in general safe for women, much safer than many other places. I have rarely experienced getting accosted in the street at all.

And even so, as I’m thinking over the super unpleasant encounter I had with a man trying to chat me up friday, my first instinct is just to roll with it and just not examine it, because really, sexual harassment is still so expected when you’re a woman.

[mars-ipan]

steroids have decided the two emotions for tonight are Gamer Rage and Deep Yearning Sadness