#or who aren't very educated

[blackcandlesinwinter]

The LGBTQ community would be so much healthier if we would all just... stop caring so much about words. If you truly do not like the words someone uses, please just politely ignore it and move on the way that you would if the person behind you in the check-out line audibly farted. Differences in preferred language are an unavoidable part of human communication - this will never change. Someone using a term you don't like isn't hurting you, it isn't about you, it isn't an attack on you. You don't have to like hearing it, but if you're over the age of 8, you're expected to be mature enough not to call out or chastise random strangers for farting in your vicinity, so you should be able to shut up and move on if I call myself FTM. It's just a fart, everyone does it sometimes, it won't kill you, Jesus Christ. Please have a little perspective.

don't use "ftm" it's outdated and offensive. it implies that the trans person was their agab, which we never were. i was always a boy, never a girl who became a boy.

i'm 35 years old. i've been IDing as trans or something similar to trans for nearly 20 years. i was probably calling myself FTM while you were playing tag during recess, anon.

i WAS a girl. i IDed as a girl early in my life. i recognized myself as a girl, called myself a girl, lived as a girl, and was a girl. who then IDed as a man. hence, F t M.

spend more time worrying about yourself instead of strangers on the internet, anon.

sorry not sorry if this comes off as needlessly hostile, but i've been getting a lot of shit from a lot of teenage trans kids about the language i use to describe my own goddamn experience, and i'm growing real fuckin weary of it.

i have elder trans friends who call themselves transsexuals and transvestites and trannies. are you going to seriously go to a 60-year-old trans person who survived the reagan years and tell her she's not allowed to use certain language to describe herself because it might offend the delicate sensibilities of some teenager on the internet?

do yourself a favor and log off, find some real-life trans people who are over the age of 20 or 25, and spend time talking to them instead of getting all holier-than-thou at random strangers on tumblr.

[welcometogrouchland]

my Stephanie Brown hot take is that she should get mad bitches now that she's single in comics. Yes yes shipping BUT the one time she had sex she was punished by the narrative via teen pregnancy. I think she should be allowed to have as much sex as she wants with zero consequences. Could be a lot of sex, could be a little. Point is she should get to do it without getting narratively baby trapped this time. she should get them pregnant, actually.

[canisalbus]

I am a vet student, and I had a patient today who looked like Machete! Made me think of your boys. Also, I get a kick out of the small animal veterinary surgery textbook, because there's a Vasco-like dog on the cover.

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[isfjmel-phleg]

I dislike the love triangle in this book for a variety of reasons (why does there have to be one at all, simply because our heroine happens to be close to two boys? what purpose does it serve besides contriving Love Drama? it's not even like she must choose the one who best embodies who she must become or anything that serves a thematic purpose--she knows from the start which one she loves, and the other one is just an annoying obstacle to the endgame romance), one of which is that it completely destroys the boys' friendship with each other. Here, they're romantic rivals and openly, childishly hostile to each other, with little indication that they were ever really friends even in childhood. The friendship that exists among all three children in the original book--it's never just "Mary and these two mismatched boys who are tolerating each other because of their separate friendships with her," but the boys are friends with each other too--is one of its most delightful aspects, and to lose that alters the characters themselves. I'm not saying that there isn't room for difficulties in the friendship as they all enter adulthood. But replacing a dynamic of mutually caring bonds among relative equals with two guys who dislike each other competing for the prize of the heroine does not effectively serve Burnett's themes even in the context of adult versions of these characters.

[nonconstories]

Someone pissed me off a couple of days ago

So! Below are several links to programs and foundations that promote adult literacy! Hundreds of millions of adults world wide were failed by their education system and now must fend for themselves while trying to read contracts and hospital bills and infographics from the CDC. But they don't have to be alone, and it is never too late to learn!

ProLiteracy: A network of educators, researchers, and advocates which provides research reports, learning materials, and other support to adult education programs. They assist with connecting volunteers to local programs and provide guidance and support to community leaders trying to use their programs' findings to advocate for social and political change.

Adult Literacy League: An adult education program in Central Florida, which aims to provide students with one on one attention to foster growth and confidence. It also offers English Second Language courses and job skills training, and each new student receives a comprehensive assessment to determine the best plan for them.

Saint Vincent and Sarah Fisher Center's Foundational Skills Program: A 100% free adult education program aimed at adults reading below a fifth grade level. It operates year round and is either in person or remote, and they now have a GED testing center that is open to students and the public alike.

Washtenaw Literacy: A free network of trained tutors for adults in Washtenaw County, Michigan.

Adult Learning Program (Las Vegas/Clark County): Free education classes to those lacking a high school diploma, those seeking to learn ESL, and adults who read below an eighth grade level. Also assists in students' search for gainful employment. Nevada got so fucked by COVID and the education/literacy numbers in the South West are grim. Please help these guys.

Hawaii Literacy: In addition to helping adult residents of Hawaii Island learn to read and write AND bridging the education gap in Hawaii's underserved children, they offer computer literacy classes, ESL classes, and a bookmobile. 1 in 6 Hawaiian adults struggle to read and write.

[envolvenuances]

and I think child modelling should be illegal I'm not even joking

[biff-adventurer]

i realize a lot of people in the xiv community might not know this, but the ao dai is not a qipao. it's a bit insensitive to wear the ao dai without pants (like, as in, at least jeans or leggings) b/c

1) we must be respectful/not conflate different ethnic styled clothes with one another, as it perpetuates orientalist ideas and attitudes, and

2) vietnamese players will see you and probably ask themselves where your pants are (confirmed from a close friend of mine who was tirelessly harassed on the first day the ao dai was released for validation to wear the ao dai out of cultural context)

if you're looking for chinese style clothes in xiv, such as qipao, you'll want to look at the "far eastern garb for women/men" or the "far eastern socialite's attire", for examples. if you're looking for japanese style or korean style clothes, they're available, too.

the thing is, mixing and matching east asian wardrobes contributes to this orientalist image of the far east. scholar edward said talks a lot about this in his 1978 book "orientalism", where it is summed up as:

"the exaggeration of difference, the presumption of Western superiority, and the application of clichéd analytical models for perceiving the 'Oriental world'".

there are lots of high fantasy tropes that feed into racist stereotypes and caricatures. just because ffxiv comes from the far east doesn't make it immune to perpetuating certain ideas or images uncritically - but that is an entirely separate discussion, if equally important.

to avoid creating characters and stories that feed into the negativity in this world, research and specificity are your friends. this doesn't limit one's creativity, but rather humanizes your characters and the world we live in.

ultimately, it's your adventure and your choice. whether you take the lore literally or as a suggestion is up to you. either way, i wish you well on your journeys throughout the radiant world of etheirys.

[mark-erre]

Starting to call my square and sphere.... "square" and "sphere"

#genius

[bibuckleykinard]

how many times do we need to learn as people that irony and hyperbole can be harmful because 'jokes' aren't easily distinguished from genuine thoughts and feelings until we stop rewarding people for speaking or posting about violence

like even if you're joking/don't actually believe that/think whoever you are insulting is bad/immoral/fictional therefore deserves it - ad hominem attacks always do more harm to the people who share those characteristic then the individual you intend to cause harm to or discredit

[glorious-spoon]

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[cathymee]

promised myself that i'm gonna fix up my notes from last sy so i can share it with upcoming humss students but i also keep going 'but what's the point'

[icewindandboringhorror]

oh my god.. a job for me.. historical pierrot beach performer lol

[madlori]

I see posts going "Okay, I'll vote for Kamala, I GUESS IF I HAVE TO" and "omg if that's the best we can do I suppose I'll support it" and I'm like...

What do you people fucking WANT?

Let's run down how she's rated politically by some organizations that we vibe with, kay?

ACLU = 93% on civil liberties

AFL-CIO = 100% on trade unions

Human Rights Campaign = 100% on queer rights

League of Conservation Voters = 91% on environmentalism

NARAL = 100% on reproductive rights

NRA Fund = 7% on gun rights (we LIKE a low score on this one)

NEA = 100% on education

Planned Parenthoos = 100% on reproductive rights

In addition, GovTrack (which is a nonpartisan tracker) places her in the MOST politically left-leaning categories of Senators. So we've got a very liberal, woman of color who's spent her career trying to mitigate draconian tough-on-crime laws to benefit the accused and keep black people out of prison and decrease recidivism and that's somehow...just barely tolerable.

So I ask again...what is that you're dissatisfied with? Is it Palestine? as recently as March she was calling for a ceasefire and demanding aid to Gaza. Keep in mind she's pretty constrained as to what's possible to do in this situation.

Is it just that she was a prosecutor? That is an important job that needs to be done and we WANT people doing it who aren't rah-rah tough-on-crime Gestapo types, which she is not. We need prosecutors who are addressing the root causes of crime and looking for ways to help people escape the cycle, which she has done to the point that she was often called SOFT on crime.

So what is your objection here? Is it that her politics aren't 100% aligned with a bunch of Tumblr socialists? I got news for you...we Tumblr socialists DO NOT REPRESENT THE ELECTORATE. If such a candidate existed, they would not win.

Democrats struggle sometimes because our tent is large. Republicans just want you if you're a straight white man and preferably rich. There's room for a lot more types in the lefty side, but sadly that means a lot of room also for dissention among the ranks. This is how they get us. Let's not let them, huh? Just a suggestion.

[teenagefeeling]

on the topic of female-dominated fields, i have actually noticed what i think is a trend of younger men going into library science. and i looked it up on wikipedia and they cited an ala study from 2014 that already showed that. now, it's not a huge change, there's still like 4 times as many female librarians as there are male ones. but i have personally noticed more young men in both the public libraries i visit and in my mslis classes and i think statistics may reflect that as well. what that means for librarianship, i have no idea. i think it's generally a good thing to see a more diverse range of young people entering the field. it'll just be interesting to see if public perception of librarianship changes over time in relation to it.

[girlivealwaysbean]

dni.

[elainemorisi]

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2024-college-return-on-investment/

I'm sorry, I'm a complete asshole about this with absolutely no skin in the game (for at least ten more years), but it also drives me nuts. So please just. look at the graph