#my dad is a big antivaxxer

[verthanthi]

My wife and I went to my grandmother’s funeral a few weeks ago and we were both suffering from a viral URI that was weeks long at that point.

Not only did I not want to get people sick in general, but I knew there would be a lot of elderly folks paying their respects to my grandmother and it just made even MORE sense to mask up. So of course we did. We care about people, I guess.

Not to mention, the number of hugs as people offer their condolences…

But half of my family is US conservative and half of the conservatives are anti-vaxxers. Every one of them gave me shit about COVID being over or gave me that sassy “really?” look.

So each one I loudly said, “We’ve got an upper respiratory infection that’s lasted three weeks and I didn’t want to share it, but if you want I can cough on you. And [Wife] is sicker than I am. Want me to have her cough on you? I’m sure she wouldn’t mind.” (She probably wouldn’t.)

Suddenly they were “oh! No, no! That’s okay! Ha ha! You silly kids! Weeks, you say? Oh my.”

Yeah, you ignorant fucks. Weeks.

I’m trying to protect you and everyone else in this room from something I’m suffering from. ACTIVELY!

Because I don’t want YOU to have to suffer.

Imagine that.

(Some of my family thanked me for being considerate. Even if they didn’t, I would still have masked up, but it felt nice to know someone got it.)

it sucks that masks weren't already common in most of the world bc now ppl associate them so heavily with covid 19 and assume if ur wearing one then you must be super paranoid about that specific disease. like yeah i don't want to catch covid but i don't want most things that float around on public transport. also i like having a warm face. also it makes me look cool. maybe i just want the kakashi appeal. what's so wrong abt that.

[blujayonthewing]

[holding friends and family upside down by their ankles and shaking until wedding RSVPs fall out]

[endivinity]

theres only so many times i can go for a high-powered walk to get rid of absolute incandescent anger!!! i’ve only been in this house for two and a half months and it’s just, destroyed me utterly.

my dad is 65, white, british. he is also terminally online. he spends most of his time looking at memes, hanging out in /b/ offshoots for all his news, and watching opinion piece videos (which, surprise surprise, if he doesn’t agree with the opinion, he’ll mock it or close it before finding something that aligns with his views more).

i dont even know what his views ARE because he’s got so little critical thinking beyond ‘if i don’t agree with it, it’s wrong' and all he spouts are things he read somewhere and my god he’s repetitive. he says the same jokes and repeats the same memes frequently. spouted the ‘avocado toast millennials’ argument thats YEARS out of date. has such a shallow inane understanding on complex societal Stuff.

today he was saying how the will smith chris rock thing was staged, bc a slap is far too minor, tupac wouldve shot him, smith would never have slapped alec baldwin if he’d said it, rock braced before the impact, etc etc

all this garbage, for every topic. he delights in dark humor memes and anti-government rhetoric.

he’s an antivaxxer. he supported the freedom convoy. he blames biden specifically, for what putin is doing. he hates democrats (we are in new zealand, democrats shouldn’t even be on his radar. this is how i know he spends all his time on /b/ boards which are predominately White Americans). instead of the covid tracer sign-in he fills out the forms with his name as ‘jacinda hitler’ or ‘adolf ardern’. he thinks everyone should be infected with omicron to give them full covid immunity (conveniently glossing over health risks and long covid. he isn’t vaccinated bc of the .5% chance it might cause issues with his fucked up kidney). he is for some reason pro-police, despite the anti-government stance. he thinks that jkrowling is entitled to her opinion (conveniently glossing over her financial and cultural icon status granting her a massive platform, and how he refuses to acknowledge different opinions bc theyre Wrong and Stupid). he thinks trans people are wrong unless theyre fully transitioned and surgeried (conveniently ignoring all the things in the way of transitioning. nz’s mastectomy surgeon retired in 2012. our waitlist is 40+ YEARS long), and shouldn’t compete in sports, and how a rapist claimed to be a woman and was put in a women’s prison, and look what happened!! trans people dangerous!! he likes to watch car crash videos and people trying to pull insurance scams. he loves the concept of the darwin awards. he believes that capital punishment should be a thing. he likes posts Owning The Mentally Ill Snowflakes On The Internet. his favorite saying is ‘sacred cows make the best hamburgers’ as justification for punching down on minorities, an absolute bastardization of what the phrase was originally meant to be. i am a mentally ill trans person living in his house. i have a permanent chronic sleep disorder, possible undiagnosed adhd/autism. my brother who lived here before moving out to study, definitely has undiagnosed autism. DAD HIMSELF had to quit his job. his job he had for almost 30 years, because of chronic anxiety and depression. the meds he has to treat it are not insubstantial - they started him in on the big guns right away. he IS the mentally ill snowflake on the internet. he doesn’t know how to interact with anything any more unless it’s mocking and belittling.

he is a horrible person. and i am so angry

[ms-demeanor]

Hello ms demeanor, how would you argue with someone who thinks that when vaccines are out theyre gonna have 5g chips that will track you or whatever in them. I think my father, who's generally a reasonable person, is slipping into that rabbit hole...

I wouldn’t argue, I’d probably say something like “Dad, you’re saying things that don’t sound much like you recently and I’m worried. What’s going on?” and listen to him and do everything you possibly can to get him off youtube, facebook, twitter, and turn off fox news.

A lot of people are falling deeper into these rabbit holes because they have time to engage with conspiracy theories more than they ever have in the past and they’re getting something out of believing these things - a sense of agency, a sense of community. They’re probably also getting love-bombed in their antivax anti 5 g groups so you don’t want to be super adversarial otherwise you’re Just Like The Libs My New Friends Were Talking About.

If you do want to engage the way to do so best appears to be through sincerely asking questions.

“Huh, that sounds odd, that doesn’t sound like it’s right, why would people try to do [whatever unbelievable thing].”

“Wow, that sounds like a big project. Wouldn’t an awful lot of people have to keep that secret? I’m not sure you could keep a secret like that if large organizations were involved. I feel like some janitor somewhere would let the cat out of the bag.”

“Wow, dad, some of these people you’re talking about are. Kind of really scary. Why did [x famous antivaxxer your dad is quoting] say [x horrifyingly antisemitic or eugenicist thing]? It’s kind of scary hearing you quoting someone who thinks that way, I just want to understand” (famous antivaxxer/politician/woo peddler/whatever almost always has said something that generally reasonable people will find horrifying but will make up excuses to themselves for - they have a harder time making up an excuse to their scared child.)

Good luck.

Try not to blow it up into a fight or an ultimatum or anything; it’s harder to leave an extremist ideology if everyone in your life has told you how horrible your ideology is and how much they hate it - if you can be the listening ear without letting yourself get hurt too much try to be a safe, nonjudgemental person they can come back to if they start to get worried about the path they’re following.

[madanimalscientist]

My mom signed me up to get the vaccine as soon as it was available and instead, literally days before I was supposed to get the shot, I got chicken pox because someone let their kid come to a party with it and so a bunch of kids at the party got chicken pox. I remember Mom finding out who and calling them and reading them the fucking riot act (one of a handful of times I ever heard her chew someone out like that growing up) and Dad had to go live with a buddy of his until I was no longer contagious because he'd never had it either and Mom didn't want him getting sick. I still have the pockmark as a visible reminder of having had it, but just the one and it's not very big.

Fun fact: getting celiac can shuffle your immunity to things and if you have been recently diagnosed with celiac, go get your titers checked just in case! I knew this from relatives, so I went and got my titers checked after I got diagnosed. Cue the most panicked phone call I have ever gotten from student health:

Nurse: Hey [redacted], are you sure you had chicken pox as a kid?

Me: Yes, I remember it and we have photo evidence

Nurse: Yeahhhhh so your titers came back and you have immunity to MMR which is good news but zero immunity to chicken pox. How soon can you get here for the shot? (context: there was measles floating around and chicken pox, because I was in the Bay Area for grad school and f****ing antivaxxers meant there were breakthrough cases bc of it).

Me: Ironically I'm about to go to my immunology class but I can come by after? Like in 2 hours?

Nurse: We'll be waiting, just walk right up to the clinic, we'll get you sorted

So then I head into my immunology class and have THE BEST THING to tell my professor before class starts. His face visibly blanched, it was great.

So I did get chicken pox, but then ~20 years later had to get the shot anyways. Hopefully this means I won't get shingles bc in my family we have a history of getting shingles young and it's really terrible, fingers crossed.

But also newly dx-ed celiacs, get your titers checked!

(I am still immune to chicken pox now, but for some reason the hep b shot doesn't stick and I need to get a booster every 2 years but at least it's not like a relative of mine who needs the MMR shot every 2 years because the R bit of the shot doesn't stick)

I have a theory about gen z and millennials, so please help me out with this poll.

Please make sure to vote as to whether you got vaccinated as a child or not, if you did not get chicken pox. Take care, spread this around, and vaccinate your fucking kids. Poll is not exclusive to any country. Vote no matter where you're from.

[keroseneinhalers]

my favorite part of warrior cats is the grotesque story of squirrelflight, ashfur, and the extended cast of cats that sound like they came out of an ajj song

this gal named squirrelflight flirts with a guy named ashfur a few times. typical 80s romance song. its quick, its fleeting. squirrelflight gets together with brambleclaw. its all real lovely. brambleclaw gets promoted to leader after squirrelflights dad goes into retirement and makes his deputy the chief. brambleclaw is now bramblestar

(before the promotion and after the marriage, brambleclaw leads the entire 4 clans to a new territory. not relevant. he also stabs his brother in the neck with a tent stake)

and then squirrelflights sister leafpool, who is a medicine cat and sworn into celibacy, has sex with a guy from windclan named crowfeather. this is something all the cats are sworn not to do. double illegal.

crowfeather is a bit of a whore because he was previously in love with another girl who went on a magical journey with him when he was a child. (brambleclaw was there for that too. brambleclaw is eternal and everywhere) the girl crowfeather was in love with got impaled by a falling stalagmite while protecting a tribe of savage feral cats with names very similar to english translations of a few native american names i know. interesting. racist? there was a mountain lion involved

yeah so they have sex and leafpool gets pregnant. but since she did two crimes in one she gives the kids to squirrelflight and pretends they belong to her and brambelstar. theres an uncomfortable birthing scene because the kids decided to emerge from her cat uterus in the middle of a snowstorm. this is very telling of their characters after birth

theres three kids. jayfeather lionblaze and hollyleaf. jayfeather is very angry. lionblaze is angry but in a brave way. hollyleaf loves rules. they are a legendary trio

theres a thing about superpowers, and a prophecy or something. jay is sickly and blind and can see peoples thoughts. lionblaze never loses any fights, ever, and he maims ashfur a little while theyre trianing. hollyleaf doesnt have any powers, but she is absolutely obsessed with the warrior code and gets caught up with a guy named sol who says the world is gonna end. none of this is relevant except the "bootlicker hollyleaf" thing

ashfur is stewing. ashfur has been stewing for years now. long enough that they literally brought all 4 clans across the continent to a new territory kind of stewing. hes lonely. he misses the girl he was madly in love with, and shes married to the coolest guy in town. hes in agony. (over in windclan, crowfeather has a new girlfriend. manwhoring as long as he lives)

theres a big fire. thunderclans entire territory sets on fire. everyone is escaping, except for squirrelflight and her three kids. jayfeather, lionblaze, and hollyleaf, who is contemplating becoming an antivaxxer or something

imagine this: a clearing on the edge of a pit. the pit is where the cats live. everything is on fire around this clearing. there is one log running across the clearing, and squirreflight and her fake kids are going along it to escape. theyre the last out

ashfur appears he stands at the other end of the log. hes pissed. hes crying. he hates squirrelflight. he hates her so much. his rage is all consuming, like the fire that burns around them. he says he wants her in as much pain as possible, and he knows how: taking the only thing she loves in this world. her 3 kids

we all know something ashfur doesnt. the kids arent hers. squirrelflight, though non an omnipresence, is gifted with this knowledge herself.. she sees ashfurs twisted evil mind and tells him, flat out that they arent hers. she doesnt love them. he can kill them, they mean nothing to her. they are, after all, just her sister leafpool's. why would she care for them?

ashfur is stunned. he gives up. he leaves. squirrelflight and her three kids leave. its a bit awkward. imagine the thanksgiving dinner table after a particularly bad argument. thats all this is really

anyways. hollyleaf is broken from this. shes the daughter of a medicine cat and a manwhore from a clan that only eats rabbits. she cant take it. much like ashfur, she snaps

there are these big clan meetings, once every month. everyone goes, except the old people and the dying people and the kids who just want juiceboxes and lunchables. thunderclan is heading out to the Meeting Island. they find a body in the river. surprise! its ashfur

they go on to the gathering despite finding the body of one of their finest, most mentally haunted warriors polluting the stream with the blood seeping out of his slit throat. the three kids are there. squirrelflight is there. leafpool is there. bramblestar is there

this story has very weird heathers energy to me. its there, but it isnt coherant. like a bad remix of 100 gecs, sort of. this part is no exception

hollyleaf runs up to the big tree the clan leaders stand on and monologue. shes not allowed to do this. perhaps the sense that she lost her identity with her illigitimate birth turned into something real, that the warrior code didnt matter anymore. perhaps she was just tired of being kind; she wanted to go apeshit

she confesses. to two things. number one - the muderder of ashfur. how tragic. number two - leafpool. leafpools affar with crowfeather. squirrelflights lies to her for her entire life. theres chaos. thunderclan is like stan twitter after a minecraft youtuber said something racist 8 years ago. the 3 other clans are trying desperately to get in on this drama. the hot tea of the hour if you will

hollyleaf says her share. she runs away. lionblaze and jayfeather chase after her all the way back to the thunderclan territory. she yells at them. she runs into a tunnel and gets crushed by rocks. thats the end. shes dead.

jk jk that was a lie shes alive and shes living in a huge cave system with a ghost cat. remember the native american coded mountain tribe? yeah, they had ancestors. the ancestors lived at the territory the 4 clans moved to after squirelflight flirted with ashfur and before she got together with bramblestar. they used to drown little kids in the tunnels. jayfeather is the entire reason why the ancestors moved to the mountains and became the racist mountain tribe. i wont explain the timeline of this, and i dont think i could if i tried

up above hollyleafs slowburn romance with a transparent cat, theres a new girl with superpowers. prophecy fulfilled yadda yadda. her sister is annoyed that she isnt #quirky and so she joins a fighting cult run by the cats in hell. i cannot stress this enough its literally every cat from the 50 some books before this who went to hell. they have an army of children. theyre training them. the sister kills one of her classmates and becomes equals with the hell cats. my second favorite plotline in the series

the hell cats come to the land of the living. the sister betrays them. theres a big battle, and its supposed to be the end of the series but you know theyre gonna continue it for at least 20 more books. (they did). hollyleaf appears, and i dont think its ever explained how or why. but shes back, and she joins the battle. everyones too busy with the literal hell cats to care much about some kid with a body count of 1 appearing randomly

hollyleaf fights a bit. she gets mauled to death. thats the end. its just over. she dies and she doesnt come back. rip to a queen

i think my biggest question besides why would someone create this ad continue to do so for fifty plus books, is how the fuck brambleclaw stabbed his brother with a tent stake when he literally doesn’t even have hands. what.

[billdecker]

darren came from home hospital this afternoon. obviously i’m over the moon but the stress i’m feeling is just something else. 

he’s well within himself, but very sore. his shaved stomach looks like when a cartoon character gets in a tangle with a lawnmower and it shaves a big strip out of their hair/fur. just this bald swollen stomach compared to his hair chest which made me laugh. it wasn’t a standard hernia but what the surgeon called ‘a knuckle of fat’ that had popped through. made me think of the adipose in doctor who. 

i am so tired beyond belief. i’ve managed to get some sleep this evening but before that i’d managed about 4 hours out of the past 48. 

my in-laws have suddenly become antivaxxers (my mother-in-law has an itchy scalp despite her gp saying itch skin is a side effect of her blood thinners, and d’s mum, sis, and step-dad are all convinced it’s the vaccine looooooool) and are trying to blame the hernia on that. D’s dad is literally dying at the moment and D had planned to go to see him but that’s now cancelled yet again. over the past couple of years D’s dad has had several big strokes and is in hospital every couple of days with pneumonia. d’s not been able to see him since before covid because every time he tries to organise a visit something happens (lockdowns, his dad having another stroke). we’re in stoke and his dad is all the way down in somerset. before D got admitted we were literally planning a sudden visit for him to just drop everything and go so they can have a goodbye. now he’s can’t do that.    

i’m struggling. i just realised i forgot to do the dishes and clean cecil’s litter tray so i had a cry. they will be top of my list for the morning before my dad nips around to take darren to the GP to get his dressing changed. D’s been signed off for 6 weeks. I know it won’t always be as bad as this but i’m already panicking about how i’m going to cope. 

i’m glad i told my parents about my potential autism/adhd before this (literally two days before) because they’ve been so much more understanding about what i can and can not put my energy towards. i know if i ask them to help me hoover the flat they will no question, i just don’t wanna have to ask them. i’m not good with hoovers. the sound is a lot and they get tangled and that makes me stressed. 

your comments here were so lovely yesterday and genuinely got me through the rest of the day. i didn’t really expect it. i’m not very open her about my life and my daily struggles as i used to be. forgive me for not replying to them all. my head is a mess. 

i just feel really lonely. just makes me realise that despite my family what few friends i have. my best mate is ill at the moment and hasn’t read my messages (she’s got several exhaustive disorders and is basically having a breakdown). i’ve had one other friend check in on me. it’s not that i really want more or that i crave attention, i just feel lonely. i have no friends locally, just my family. my best friend lives in bristol, and my other friend is in america. 

one positive thing is that despite the stress i have not binge ate. i have kept my disordered eating in check. it’s taken a lot to do so but i’ve done it. 

i haven’t used this place as any kind of diary or to let out my thoughts for donkeys years, so thanks for giving me that space and being so kind. i really feel like i’m rambling so i’m gonna go now and sorry for this essay. i’m going to try to get some more sleep. 

[paperbulletsoftheforebrain]

I’ve been on a space humor podcast kick lately. I listened to the “Cigarette Candy” episode of Wolf 359 and then followed it up with the “Antivaxx” episode of EOS 10 and wow do those hit differently this time. I hadn’t relistened to them since the pandemic began. Between Eiffel describing his symptoms (fever, sore throat, coughing, sore back, headache, etc.) and the whole crew of the ship refusing to get basic immunizations to, you know, keep everyone on EOS 10 safe, it’s just a big oof.

Also my father quit smoking between my last listen of Wolf 359 and oh would he love some of those cigarette candies. He does take nicotine lozenges, but he cuts them into quarters so he’s not taking too much at a time. Again, it just hits different. I feel a little more empathy for Eiffel because I remember how cranky Dad was at first.

I don’t think I have anything profound to say about these discoveries, mostly just a general, “huh, pandemics sure change things.”

Or maybe to quote Eiffel “I feel like there’s a lesson to be had here, but it’s kind of lost in all the hallucinations right now. I’ll get back to it.”

[sockth]

MUTUALS. I DO NOT ASK YOU FOR MUCH, SO PLEASE. PLEASE VOTE FOR CLYDE OH MY GOD HE IS SO SILLY.

if my pleading is not enough to convince you, welcome to my list of reasons

HE GETS REALLY INTO EVERY ROLE HE LIKES.

First of all, his lord of darkness lord. 100% thinks he is working with Taco Bell green sauce instead of goo that turns people into nazi zombies <3. Awesome. What a silly guy. He sets out a whole plan to get revenge on being kicked out of time and space. He's SO dedicated. He makes a stupid fort in his backyard. He recruits so many people. He steals the stick, and makes a VIDEO to reveal his evil plan.

Your honor, if he just wanted to ruin the game, he could have just stolen the stick and kept the war going. No, by getting revenge, he is writing himself BACK into the story, so he can hang out with friends some more. Also fully tries to not have consequences for his actions by saying he isn't playing anymore. Thank you, Clyde. Very cool.

NEXT there's his MOSQUITO ROLE. Oh my god he takes this so seriously. These are both real lines from the game.

Super Craig: "You know you don't really need to drink that shit, right?" Mosquito: "Well, you really need to punch your enemies, Super Craig?" Super Craig: "Uh, yeah." Mosquito: "All right, then. Don't be a hypocrite."

Super Craig: "Next thing you know you'll be laying eggs." Mosquito: "I would if I could!"

What is wrong with him <33. I need him to explode he's so funny. He also tries to get out of paying his check at Raisins even though he 100% needs to by calling the girls his kryptonite. He is so lame. Please vote for him.

2. KINDEST LITTLE BEAST

you have to hear me out here. Ignore the post covid special for a second, or be a Clyde apologist and just believe future Clyde is why past Clyde became an antivaxxer (which btw, is a GREAT scene. Clyde not questioning why there is an older man in his house telling him vaccines will make him grow titties on his head is peak.) Well, either way. I don't really care what your excuse is. YOU CANNOT FORGET ABOUT THE LICE EPISODE. Not only is the entire thing a moral dilemma, but he's also implied to be the ONLY KID who struggled with it. Was he a coward? Yes. I support him for that, though.

Also, the episode has one of my favorite moments in the show which is just. the opening of this. Great recovery, buddy!

On top of that, he wants to make lemon bars to help the Gulf crisis :) the sweetest little guy. Even in the episode which has made Clyde like absolutely slandered by the fandom (The List), he tries to comfort Kyle. Albeit uh. Really badly <3.

Also, he takes the fall for the guy who pooped in the urinal. Once again, awesome job, Clyde, even if you didn't really think it out.

3. LOOK AT HIS LINES IN THE FRACTURED BUT WHOLE AGAIN PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE

"On Friday nights I get to stay up an extra hour."

"I'm going to build a pillow fort this weekend."

"My dad lets me play with the big rolling ladder in his store's stock room."

"Can I have a ride in the Tupper-Mech sometime?"

"After my crime-fighting career is over, I'm going to open a car dealership."

There is something so wrong with him in this too considering how much he talks about laying eggs and flirting with girls, but this is a Clyde propoganda so just. Pretend I didn't say that. Unless that helps you vote for him bc it's funny and he's a loser. Then don't.

Oh yeah, for people who are just reading this (thank u mutuals for putting up with this) his mom is dead (which is 100% his fault) and it's awesome. For some reason he made his dead mom part of his superhero lore and was like fuck it yeah i'll roleplay that. Incredible.

Reviving

If only this worked on my mom."

Revived

"I saw my mom, she told me to kick your asses."

4. HIS INTENSE BURSTS OF EMOTIONS.

oh my god. Most of the time he is like :I, but in episodes he'll sometimes just SWITCH IT UP. Some might call this poor writing, but I call it very silly. I am counting the list under this.

Also for some reason these all include Cartman. I don't actually have an explanation for that.

This isn't an emotional one, but while I'm putting clips here I just want to say this is like. my favorite scene ever, and they cut it which is devastating. I hope you know I quote this way more than I probably should.

Also love how his friends immediately jump to his defense. Craig and Jimmy IMMEDIATELY throw hands. That's awesome. The friends of all time.

Anyway, thanks for coming to my ted talk that I wrote instead of writing my English essay on Modernism. Please vote for him he is SO silly and sweet and kind of disgusting. He has some of my favorite moments in the series.

Reblog for a bigger sample size.

[kittyprincessofcats]

Time for a sad and a little messy personal post because I feel like I have to write this down somewhere.

Don’t reblog this or I will block you.

Triggers warning for death (of old age), homophobia, transphobia, mentions of antivaxxers and other jerks

A few days ago, my grandpa passed away. It’s been a hard and sad few days since then, especially for my grandma and my dad. I’ve been trying to do my best to comfort them, even though I disagree with them on a few important things right now.

It’s weird because it still hasn’t fully sunken in for me yet. Even though the funeral was today, I still can’t quite… grasp that he’s really gone.

His death wasn’t unexpected or early. He was 90 years old and he’d been suffering from Alzheimer’s and Dementia over the last year. He barely remembered anything, barely recognized anyone, had to live in a care home because we couldn’t take care of him at home – so really, on a logical level I know that it’s better this way. He didn’t have a good life in that last year. It really is better that he died quickly and peacefully now, at the very high age of 90, than if he’d have suffered for another few years. And yet, despite knowing that it’s better this way, I am still sad.

I also feel strange overall because – well, I have very mixed memories of my grandpa. On the one hand, I’ve lived in the same house as him for over 20 years. He was a constant part of my childhood. I remember how he used to play with me when I was young and how he built the swing and the little house in our garden that I loved to play in. I still remember every line of the old poem he taught me when I was young.

And on the other hand, I know he had his bad sides. I know he was very racist and antisemitic. I know he was homophobic to a point where it scared me. I never came out to him, but I remember talking to him about marriage equality in Ireland many years ago, and how he told me that “all gay people should be rounded up and killed”. That was a sentence that never left me. And yes, I wasn’t out to him, so I know he didn’t relate to that sentence to me in particular – but still, what a thing to hear your grandpa say. I also remember coming out to my grandma and her imploring me to “never ever tell grandpa” – which I then never did, and now never will do.

It’s just been a strange feeling, throughout the funeral as well. It was strange to see that whole side of my family again after two years (with the crushing knowledge that I’m not out to any of them either and I don’t necessarily think they’d handle it well). It also made me angry that the antivaxxers in my family are the same people who just hugged others at the funeral without asking, or who would interrupt others’ crying with their “Can I take my mask off yet?�� questions.

I also felt for my youngest sister (who’s a trans girl and not out to our extended family either). To see everyone comment on how tall she’s gotten (something she hates) and to see our dad constantly (intentionally) misgender her wasn’t easy. Also, every time my dad mentioned the importance of family and how “family is always there for you” over the last few days, I wondered if he realizes the irony of doing that while refusing to use the right pronouns for his daughter.

Honestly, the most pleasant person to talk to at the funeral was the pastor. Which might be a bit ironic because I’m not a religious person (I officially left church a few years ago), but this particular pastor is someone I know well because I’m good friends with his daughter (he even mentioned that in his speech, which was kind of cute). But yeah, talking to him just felt like catching up with an old friend, while talking to the family members I haven’t seen in so long felt a lot more tense. (It’s also ironic that the pastor was the only person there who I know definitely isn’t homophobic, and who I know 100% would have gendered my sister correctly if he’d known. Again – ironic, considering that he’s the pastor there.)

Okay, I feel like this post really turned out messy. But I wanted to write all these thoughts down. It’s a strange kind of grief that I feel. How do you reconcile losing someone who was a big part of your life with the knowledge that that person violently hated people like you?

[savior-of-humanity]

cw for mentions of; therapy/therapists, family tension/drama below the cut

I have been feeling very down lately for......... a variety of reasons (which mainly involves stuff between me, my brother, and my mom and dad, mostly arguments and fights and some verbal abuse towards me and my little sister from my dad that’s been going on since last Christmas) and I've been wondering if I should see a therapist again

I had one before which I don't really remember what for, I think it was for school-related stuff and anxiety I think? But I don't know if I actually NEED one. But at the same time I don't want to mention it to my parents bc I feel like basically saying "haha I want to look into getting a therapist because of you :)" would.................not go down well with either of them lmao

and on top of that I am definitely not mentally (and probably physically) capable of getting a job anytime soon so my parents would be footing the bill for said therapy appointments if they were to ever actually happen aaaaaa

like. I just. I feel like my family’s slowly falling apart. My brother refuses to come around anymore because of what happened last Christmas (which tl;dr was basically a HUGE HUGE HUGE fucking argument/mental breakdown I had and I ended up staying at his place for a few days, and when I came back I had another mental breakdown and my parents took away the internet for a few days to keep me from talking to my brother), and my parents basically don’t think fondly of him anymore for whatever reason (I think my mom has this idea that he’s “trying” to “implant” toxic ideas into my head that she “only buys my love with gifts” or some other shit. although to be fair she’s a fucking antivaxxer lol) its just...................... yeah. its been rough

it doesn’t help that i feel sad and i haven’t been replying to threads as much as i want to, and i know it’s not a job and technically i don’t need to respond to threads but at the same time like. i want to reply to all the shit i owe!! but i cant because half the time i don’t have like the mental energy to write with them except for a few specific threads!!!!!! or i get distracted by other shit!!!!!!!! like i have stuff thats months old and i want to reply to!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

tl;dr i feel like big poo poo cringe rn

[drunklander]

Drunj!Der Yells About Outlander

Thoughts on Ep. 502

Watched this episode after winning Wynonna Earp trivia (fuck yeah, The Shit Tickets!) at a bar, put on by a queer af podcast, followed by going to see a queer af movie, and was all ready to get my Beauchamp fix... And it was like oh here’s a taste and a hint that we’re gonna end up in a story line similar to what we’ve already done multiple times, but now on to the menfolk.

For real though, this episode was like an OL greatest hits clip show. It had all the stuff we’ve seen before. A time traveler who wants to go home? Check. Rape PTSD? Check. A man being a dad to a kid who isn’t/might not be his? Check. That same man being the absolute worst? Check. Claire being reckless with future medicine? Check. Townsfolk questioning Claire’s medical knowledge in favor of the local Man of Importance? Check. Jamie trying to be on both sides at once? Check. A villain who seemed to have died the previous season and should have fucking stayed dead? Check.

We’ve literally seen all of this stuff before.

For a show that spent the first part of season two claiming to be a political drama and then last season claiming that they “weren’t political” I see we’re back to just leaning hard into politics that have direct parallels today.

No fucks left to give about the system Murtz is kind of my favorite Murtz. Like this dude spent his whole life living by a code and an oath and was fucked over by the system so many fucking times that he’s ready to just burn it all down. Curious to see how they walk the domestic terrorist vs. freedom fighter line with him for the rest of the season.

Got all excited about the bread title card because yay medicinal mold, but of course, the lead character was relegated to the B story.

Old timey medicine baffles me. Like the fact that bleeding someone was like a catchall remedy boggles the mind.

I feel rull bad for Mrs. Whoeverthefuck though. She tried.

Also, shit like this makes me be like, yo Claire, you sure you wanna stay here? Jamie’s really not all that and a bag of chips. But you do you, boo.

Speaking of Jamie, his hair looks really good. A thousand fruit baskets to the new wig person.

Lulz at Knox thinking the Gathering was about being loyal to king and country. Dummy.

Srsly though, Murtz Valmurtz is really getting under their skin. Is he like the *only* Regulator leader?

The convo between Knox and Jamie is literally as relevant today as it is in the 1770s. But yeah, the show IsN’t PoLiTiCaL.

The fact that fuckers think those at the bottom should be happy with their lot because “lol it could be worse” need to be punched in the face and taken out of power. Stat.

Also any time someone in power talks about civility as a reason not to rise up against injustice, I want to punch them. Because they deserve it.

I want to punch a lot of things.

This whole episode is very Les Mis, tbh.

Literalol at Claire covering dead guy’s face and not his body cavity before Bree comes in.

Aw Bree, why you gotta be a buzzkill? We were cheated of badass Doctor!Claire in S3. Let us have this.

Also, yeah, Claire, Bree’s fucking right. Which you’d think you’d know by now what with alL THE FUCKING TIMES YOU’VE BEEN CALLED A WITCH. AND NOW YOU’RE UPPING YOUR GAME TO LIKE NECROMANCY?!

Also the more she says no one will find out the more annoying it is because *clearly* someone *is* gonna find out and we’re gonna be back on the “she’s a witch!” “I’m not a witch!” “you literally have a dead guy in your closet!” merry-go-round again.

Today in most on-the-nose shots ever: How convenient that Marsali just happens to be doing some butchering right there, right then.

Petition for the show to go full Shondaland and just turn into a backwoods medical drama with Claire and Marsali, and all the others (cough the men cough) can fuck on off.

Tarring and feathering is like the old timey version of #AlwaysPunchAFascist but dialed to 11.

Oh the baggage behind Jamie saying redcoat man will someday wear his scars with honor that none of these fuckers know about...

Ok so clearly the English know that Claire’s a doctor so whenever shit hits the witchy dead dude fan, can we please have a quick resolution and not that dumb af “Claire goes to jail and of course her cellmate is a lesbian because Diana sucks at writing queer characters” nonsense?

Man Jamie is *not* subtle with this convo at the jail. Like Knox is right there and he’s just like hey buddies, I have people and we’re Scottish and y’know how we feel about protecting people vs. obeying the English.

I AM SPARTACUS FITZGIBBONS!

Aaand, naturally, the fuckwit preaching civility is the one to kill a man in cold blood. Rise up, motherfuckers. Rise up.

THANK FUCK ROGER IS A TERRIBLE SHOT BECAUSE IF THAT SQUIRREL DIED I WOULD LEGIT QUIT THE SHOW. RUN AWAY AND BE FREEEEEE YOU PRECIOUS LIL WILDERNESS FLOOFER!

Roger is, and I cannot stress this enough, the fucking worst.

He’s like look how shitty I am at being a soldier but then bitches about having to try to learn. And then he bitches about how dumb it is to shoot at squirrels as if being able to hit a squirrel wouldn’t make hitting a much larger thing, like a man who is shooting back at you, that much easier. And also, how the fuck does he think they get meat to eat? Shooting it, you twatwaffle.

And he’s like so fucking butthurt about being left behind. Like no shit, asshat. You’re bad at being in the past and have made no real effort and you whine a lot and are generally the worst. Of *course* you were left behind. Stop being emo about it and maybe actually try.

“He doesn’t respect me, Bree.” Yeah, no shit. Because you’ve done LITERALLY NOTHING to earn his respect. WHY ARE YOU SO TERRIBLE IT’S LIKE THEY’RE INTENTIONALLY TRYING TO MAKE HIM SUCK.

He also is like butthurt that his wife is a better shot than him when she gets the turkey he misses. How the fuck are we supposed to ship this. Ugh.

#BreeDeservesBetter

Oh Bree, sweetie, Jem won’t get hit by a car, but there are like eleventy million ways to die in the past. Just stick with the “you want to stay with your family” stuff.

Roger clearly doesn’t want to stay and is gonna pull a Fred and make Bree feel bad about wanting to all season, isn’t he. Fahkin’ doucherocket.

“I want to go but I’ll stay for you and look how magnanimous I am as I whine about it and make no effort to acclimate to the time.” Take your martyr card and shove it, Rog.

Shorter Jamie Fraser: “If you stand for nothing, Knox, what’ll you fall for?”

I’m already over Roger singing all the time tbh. Mostly because it reminds me that soon he won’t be able to do that anymore and we’re gonna be subjected to like half a season of him being more insufferable than he already is.

Wait, was Joan already born last episode? Or was there another time jump? Is Marsali preggers with baby #3? I lost track.

I love this scene between Claire and Marsali with my whole heart. Marsali especially.

CAN WE PLEASE JUST HAVE A WHOLE SHOW OF THESE TWO BEING ALL BADASS AND DOCTORY TOGETHER!?

Although, quick question, how fucking long is Claire planning to keep that un-embalmed body lying around in an un-refrigerated surgery/root cellar? Just curious...

Because you know someone’s gonna find it eventually and that’s gonna be a whole to do and I really need to stop being preemptively annoyed at plot lines that haven’t actually happened yet.

And with all this talk of plowshares and swords, I really am going to be singing Les Mis for days...

How long have these biddies been living on the Ridge? The fucking Leoch folks spent like a minute with Claire before they were like yep, she knows what’s up. These folks have apparently been here for months and are like loool, pass. They live in the fucking woods. You’d think they’d be more open to Claire’s brand of medicine.

Omg are they like the accidental antivaxxers of the Ridge?

#VaccinateYourFuckingKids

I mean, Bree, I think there’s some difference between Claire pretending to be a dude doc and telling folks to wash their hands and Otter Tooth.

Season 2 Claire and Otter Tooth on the other hand...

Ok so Jamie needs more men so that means next week is AHS: Beardsley Farm and then maybe (hopefully) instead of being like lol jk you can all go home, it actually goes right into the battle thing. Still not sure if they’re gonna do Roger getting hanged as the mid-season big thingy and then do the Bonnet nonsense in the back half or keep trying to do both of those at once.

Hey, Roger, pro-tip, next time you see Morag MacKenzie, maybe don’t fuCKING MAKE OUT WITH HER YOU FUCKING DUMBASS.

Claire’s totally right about how they should go back. Honestly, they should. But instead of talking with her like Claire is now with Roger, he’s just being all moody about how he’s bad at the past and wants to go back. You’re shooting yourself in the foot, broski.

Oh hey Husband the Quaker. And is that a fellow Quaker named Hunter with him? Are we gonna get Denny and Rachel this season?! Please and thank you that’d be great, I love them.

Murtz talking to his squad is full on Enjolras being like don’t worry fam, Marius will stand and fight with us. His place is there, he’ll fight with you.

The two very different but very similar ways Murtz and Jamie approach being Laird of their squads is fun to explore.

Bree lecturing Claire about changing the future by saving a few backwater hicks like Claire didn’t spend years trying to fucking change all of Scottish history is a bit rich. Like writers, we get it, you’re trying to be like oh snap, wait for the consequences of this bread!science! But like come the fuck on. We sat through all of season two.

“You’re a good dad, you know that?” Oh man, I’m getting that déjà vu about a shitty man getting kudos for being a good dad to a kid as if that negates all of his shittiness.

Oh hey, Bonnet’s back. Clearly we couldn’t have just let him die last season. Gotta drag shit on for longer than it has to. This is the [Outlander] Way.

If they were gonna keep him around as a villain, they shouldn’t have (in addition to all the other reasons) included him raping Bree. Jamie, Murtagh and Bonnet all making choices within and outside of the law to various degrees in order to make their living in the Colonies would be a really interesting contrast. But nope, gotta just go all in. BeCaUsE tHe BoOk.

Also I hate with the passion of a thousand fiery suns the Jemmy’s paternity stuff. Le sigh.

Remember in season one when the show was about Claire and she was in episodes for longer than 10 minutes?

I miss Claire.

[fwoosheye]

Also, to jump back to the reblog about how the algorithm only wants clicks but doesn't care if it's good or bad, this is a big part of how people get into rightwing bs and conspiracies and so on despite not having grown up in that kind of environment. I have for example seen articles about (iirc) how a journalist created a tiktok, interacted with a somewhat transphobic clip to see what they would be recommended, and much sooner than they'd expected the algorithm had lead them into homophobia and racism and nazism. My dad mentioned the other day how he heard on the news about some journalists who created a fake 12yr old on fb and within 10 clicks they were seeing nazism propaganda.

This is pretty much what is the scariest thing about algorithms for me (and partly AI since it often scrapes/is fed what the algorithm recommends to people): If you aren't aware of how algorithms function and how you yourself interact with it, then the risk of you slipping into the bigotry and misinformation pits is very high.

You are not immune to propaganda, and the propaganda is made to exploit the exploitive nature of algorithms.

Whether that propaganda is queerphobic or antisemitic or islamophobic or antivaxx or antifeminism or whatever else you can think of: they're made to collect clicks and views, and while not everyone who clicks them will believe it some people will, and they will spread it to others who thinks like them if the algorithm haven't already reached them. Ignorance isn't spread in a vacuum, and because the big platforms don't want to adjust the codes to better ignore misinformation – despite it apparently being very much possible from what heard – it is on us as users to be alert. And part of that is to know how to navigate databases

Because it’s a major cultural shift

Dude, aside from people just going “ugh, kids”, the whole point is that the assumption that sites have algorithms is a sign of how the entire internet has been ruined. It’s a major cultural shift and a terrible one.

AO3 is the opposite of obscure in fanfic fandom, and its entire existence is political and an act of resistance.

No shit people react to cluelessness about how it sorts content: how it sorts content is a conscious ethical statement.

And to answer this other person’s comment:

Wattpad, dude. No separate index by fandom, no see everything by date, just a massive fic section and tags that show the 1k most recent or 1k most popular.

Nearly every major fic site has worked something like AO3 until we get to the modern app hell that is Wattpad.

[goblinham]

my mom has corona (: maybe my dad will stop pretending the virus isnt a big deal now. he’s already told my brother to wear a mask before they got the results back which is a step up from “I bet antivaxxers are the same people telling everyone to wear masks.” (:

[fratboykate]

I had a similar conversation with my mom and she was incredibly dismissive. I guess boomers (or whatever is called the generation born in the thirties/forties) and millennials/zoomers have the same "if I die, I die" attitude

Like....can y’all just...chill? No one needs to die if y’all dumbasses just stay the fuck inside and away from risky situations for a few weeks. It’s not forever. Just...stay the fuck inside for a couple of weeks. That’s it. That’s all anyone is asking of you.

I was on the least healthy place for my blood pressure yesterday: Facebook. I have so many people I should 100% delete because they’re going to make me catch a murder charge one day but at the same time I leave them because I don’t like living in an echo chamber and like to see what the idiots in the wild are saying to actually gage the temperature of the country. My newsfeed is majority Bernie Cult members from my hella liberal college, Antivaxxers and essential oils people from college/back home/LA randos, like a handful of Trump supporters (also surprisingly from my hella liberal college), and then just everyone else I’ve picked up since 2007. When I tell you that only the minority of people make sense on any given day I’m not lying. I was snooping on a thread yesterday from a friend who posted about staying inside. The moment I see a thread has more than like 10 comments and it’s a mildly controversial opinion on either side of the spectrum I’m there cuz I know I’m about to witness big time stupidity unfold. This thread had like 50 comments so I knew I was in for a ride. Literally 75% of them were his white friends/family from god knows where in America being like “I’m not going to freak my kids out. If they want to have playdates with their friends they can have playdates.” or “The government is blowing it up. It’s just the flu.” and my favorite...my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE ONE was this woman full on dying on the hill of “People going out to bars do it because that’s the only place they can meet their friends. It’s for their mental health.” and other people were like “Talk to your friends on the phone??? Meet at a house if you HAVE to??? Why do you need to go to a packed bar??? That’s selfish to those at risk.” and she kept being like “IT’S THEIR COPING MECHANISM. IT’S WHERE THEIR FAMILY (AKA WHAT SHE KEPT CALLING PEOPLE’S FUCKING FRIENDS) MEET SO LET THEM GO TO BARS. YOU’RE PRIVILEGED IF YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND THAT.”. Honestly...this is how we die. Not by nukes but by people being too fucking dumb to just...listen for once.

My dad is a boomer and my mom is Gen-X. Gen-X are the only people I’ve seen take it seriously. The forgotten generation now has it’s time to shine...by staying indoors. They’re going to be the ones to save us.

[percedurza]

i love how anti vaxxers are like MY CHILD WILL GET AUTISM but like,,,,,, autism is something you’re born with????? just because you’re usually diagnosed later in life does not mean its an acquired thing. your brain doesnt just magically change and develop autism when youre 7, youre born with it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! as someone with autism, i know this!!!!!!!!!!!! maybe sometimes you should,,,,,,,, research 😳😳😳😳😳😳 scaryyyy ooooh research how awful,,,, my dream is to get facebook and locate the antivaxxers and just give them a big ol’ “shut the fuck up you sentient cum sock, your mom didnt get fucked, your dad shit in her”

and thats on having a brain 😳