#puritan values

[cocklessboy]

The other day I told a friend of mine that I never forget to take my ADHD meds because I fucking love my ADHD meds. I'm in my late 30s, I didn't finally get a diagnosis and meds until less than two years ago, and they have changed my entire life.

And he raised his eyebrow at me. We'd been discussing addictive medications a few minutes before, like the Tramadol I finally got from the pain specialist to take once a week or so to give me a break from my chronic pain, so I reassured him that methylpenidate (Ritalin/Concerta) is not addictive (at least not in people with ADHD).

His response? To raise his eyebrow even harder and say "Well it sure SOUNDS like it's addictive!"

And I had to explain to this man - who works in a healthcare related job by the way - that just because medication makes you feel good and helps you, just because you look forward to taking it, that doesn't make it addictive or dangerous. And he wasn't convinced.

The simple fact that I was excited to take a daily pill that has literally changed my life, after decades of fighting to get that medication, made him think I shouldn't be taking it so often. That it must inherently be dangerous.

I'm not even in America, but I'm pretty sure this attitude began there and then spread over here to Europe. This Puritan idea of "if something feels good, you must beware of it. Pleasure is dangerous, it is sinful, it is addiction, it is evil."

I know too many people who subconsciously believe that pleasure = addictive = dangerous = bad. Joy is a slippery slope to hell.

So here is your reminder for today that you don't need to be afraid of feeling good. If something improves your life, use it. Even if it is addictive - learn what that addiction means, whether the addiction is inherently dangerous or not, and whether the benefits outweigh the drawbacks and risks.

My ADHD meds are, in fact, not addictive. But I will take them every day because they make my life orders of magnitude easier. I will enjoy them every time I take them.

My tramadol is addictive. I will still take it. I will keep it on a schedule to avoid becoming addicted, primarily because addiction in this case would mean reduced effectiveness. But I am not afraid of my painkillers. They are life changing.

Take your meds, everyone. Don't let anyone scare you away from doing something that improves your life.

[spriheal]

How are Mental Health and Addiction related

Mental health and addiction are closely linked. Understanding this connection can help people get the support they need. Let's explore how these two issues are connected.

What is Mental Health? Mental health is about how we think, feel, and act. It includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. Good mental health helps us handle stress, relate to others, and make decisions.

What is Addiction? Addiction is when someone can't stop using a substance or doing an activity, even if it causes harm. Common addictions include alcohol, drugs, gambling, and even video games. Addiction can take over a person's life and be very hard to overcome.

Connection Between Mental Health and Addiction

1.Self-Medication:

Some people use drugs or alcohol to cope with mental health issues like depression, anxiety, or stress. This is called self-medication. They might feel better at first, but over time, addiction can make mental health problems worse.

2. Changes in the Brain:

Both mental health issues and addiction can change the brain. These changes can make it hard for people to feel pleasure, control impulses, and handle stress. This can create a cycle where mental health problems and addiction feed into each other.

3. Genetics:

Genetics can play a role in both mental health issues and addiction. If someone has family members with mental health problems or addiction, they might be more likely to experience these issues themselves.

4. Trauma:

Experiencing trauma, such as abuse or a serious accident, can lead to both mental health issues and addiction. People might turn to substances to escape the pain of their trauma.

5. Stress:

High levels of stress can trigger both mental health problems and addiction. Stressful situations, like losing a job or a loved one, can lead people to use substances to cope.

Mental health and addiction are deeply connected. Understanding this connection is the first step towards getting the right help and support. By addressing both issues together, people can work towards a healthier, happier life.

[invisiblefoxfire]

"if something makes you feel good in addition to treating your medical condition, that's bad and you shouldn't do it" we really have built a fucking society here haven't we

People are so weird about anything that makes you high to the point of wanting the chronically ill to suffer more. “Just take OTC painkillers 🙄”

Many of us do. Do you know how damaging that is to the body? To take every damn day, round the clock? Ever think that’s why many spoonies have to have a strategy, constantly rotating drugs?

It’s literally not the end of the world if a spoonie needs to consume cannabis in order to more effectively manage pain and other symptoms (weed SAVES my ass from persistent daily nausea. I wouldn’t be able to eat otherwise).

It’s especially weird when people are anti-any-pain-med-that-has-a-high when they’re guzzling caffeine drinks. They really can’t pretend it’s out of concern and “worrying about the dangers of addiction.” Quit coffee, then, Susan! And get back to me in a week, tell me how you feel.

[spurgie-cousin]

the prudishness of conservative Christianity is so exhausting. the insinuation that you can understand humanity on a fundamental level without acknowledging the parts of it that are messy or ugly to you is like, maddeningly stupid.

not to mention literally nothing is MAKING you look at things you don't want to look at, or consider things that make you think too hard, or be around people who are comfortable in their "imperfection". with how good evangelicals are at ignoring the real issues that are negatively affecting the world, you'd think they'd just do the same for the TV shows and movies and music they don't want to consume, but then that would mean they'd miss an opportunity to shame any believers that do get something out of those mediums and we wouldn't want that.

[tennessoui]

Poor Anabella, he just wants his mom to not have a stroke and she's not on board that train and now a hot but cold doctor is trying to fix his life and maybe get him to have a threesome with his offputtingly beautiful wife and him. I genuinely feel for and worry about him and really want to know what happens! Also Carli-Kin really met this guy and went 'I can and I WILL fix him' would be fascinated to get some of the story from his POV. You nourish us, Kit, this spooky season! 🦇🧛‍♂️

poor poor Anabella he has so much going on rn

I love the idea that anakin is like wait did hot doctor want me to fuck his wife with him?? Did hot doctor want a threesome ?? :0 :0

love that for him love how off target it is but also how these context clues could align to that understanding lol

Anakin shows up at the Kenobi household after he figures out they’re vampires and he’s like hello yes I may be dinner but I’m not a whore…..only one vampire here may stick it in me tonight…..

[hartshorn-and-isinglass]

So Yeah I Just Got Done Watching The Sudbury Devil

...and it kinda blew my mind. It's somehow the most-unreal and most-real historical film I've ever seen. This is basically a thesis piece on de-romanticizing the period movie, and I cannot imagine anyone else currently in the biz who would even want to try and do that, and that's what makes this such a special project.

Watching this, I was reminded of how people dress up as fairies and elves and go to Ren Faire with the justification that "well people back then believed in those things so this is what their world would have looked like to them!" and let's just say this movie is a bit of a dark funhouse-mirror version of that idea. If we run with the conceit of looking at the Puritans' world through their eyes, it's less glitter and elf ears and more penis magic and Rosemary's Baby. Satan lurking around every corner, horrors beyond comprehension... and on the other side you have the more quotidian horrors of an oppressive and rigid hierarchy, ostensibly the side aligned with God. I grew up in the Evangelical milieu, so that shit hits a little close to home. Maybe one day I'll tell the story of how church life in my teen years was so miserable I accidentally a witchcraft... but I digress.

Admittedly I may be biased because I've watched so much of Andy's stuff and I get where he's coming from, so I don't know what this is going to look like to people being introduced to Andy's work for the first time, even if they are history enthusiasts. Watching a lot of the Witchfinder General's antics helps with the Original Pronunciation dialogue, and Andy's videos on King Phillip's War are a primer on the themes he's working with in this movie. I remember King Philip's War in school being the merest of footnotes but Andy treats it as crucial to understanding this country in all its fucked-up complexity and he's kinda winning me over on that one.

I should note that this movie is definitely not going to be for everyone: this has a level of gore that's on the bleedin' edge of what I can stand and a lot of sexual content, apparently enough that some people had to walk out of the premiere. All of it is in the service of the story, though. So yes, I recommend giving this a whirl when it comes out on streaming/to a theater near you if you can stomach some very literally visceral stuff. It's so much more unhinged and weird than I could possibly convey in a review, I dunno. I'm so glad I got to see it (but EVEN SALTIER that I didn't get to go to the IRL premiere now after seeing what Dr. Justin Sledge brought to the screening).

[chrispineofficial]

idk if this is anything, maybe it speaks to being continuously threatened as an ethnicity for 6,000+ years, but in my lived experience jews just don’t have the level of depravity to our family “drama” that gentiles do lmao like we yell and fight and Go Through It but we don’t harbor skeletons. we get it all out there we get over it and then we drink wine 🤷🏻

[snekdood]

the worst types of tumblr archetypes to encounter on here:

if you're not like this? great! you don't need to tell me, and this clearly doesn't apply to you :)! just because you might share similarities, doesn't mean you're the same if you don't act this way. Be thankful you are not as extreme as these archetypes.

[theendofmybody]

so age verification laws have made it to my state, meaning that if websites containing ≥33% porn (including basic nudity) dont implement a strict age verification process they could be sued for the damages caused by exposing minors to sexual material, in other states this verification process involves using one's government issued id. and i am so beyond pissed that "protecting the children" only ever means protecting them from nudity or knowledge of sex when theres so much genuinely harmful bigotry and misinformation on the internet.

[pixxyofice]

'Please don't classify belos as a christian' you are aware people who are christian behave like him Currently right. Like you know the reason he's written like that is because of dana's own relationship with religion right. And that the religion you hold dear has been used for so many shitty things that people are surprised when a christian actually is kind and nice to people unlike them?

[dudelynxx]

he/she hunter toh (crowd cheers)

[nuvomica]

so many ships i get into for the fun, messy potential end up with the most boringass vanilla fanbase ever. mfw i have taste but also mental issues so i'm stuck here with all you dumb virgins

[applecherry108]

I’m so sick of this morally regressive puritanical bullshit.

Just watched some tiktoker (mid-20s probably) clutching their pearls because they just learned that a prominent actor is a shitty person. Like, racist, sexist, homophobic kind of shitty. But this person wants to then conflate those awful things with this actor saying fuck too much and flipping off cameras.

My brother in Christ, those things are not the same level of egregious and I desperately need you to understand that.

[firebirdsdaughter]

As the daughter of a history major…

… Where the hell are so many americans on tumblr going to school???

I just saw a post about how ‘it’s taught in america that the pilgrims were Good and fleeing religious intolerance but they were actually Bad’ which first off, you cannot make those distinctions bc freaking everyone was up to kill anyone who didn’t agree in those days, but also… People claiming to be american claiming that they were definitely taught exactly that??

Maybe… If you never took a history class past elementary school, I guess. Or maybe you were in Florida (oh, gods, get my mother started on people killing each other in Florida).

Bc, resident American here, albeit one in Massachusetts, and… No. We’re not taught that. You get a romanticised version in early grades maybe, but the higher you go, you get taught that the most Puritans had different religious beliefs than the standard in England, so they took the opportunity to ship off to the colonies. There’s no victimisation, it’s just straight facts. And that usually, that was the category of people shipped off to the colonies—criminals, religious differences, poor people… Like no one in their right mind wanted to go off into the ‘wilderness.’ They did it bc they hated being where they were, and England was all too happy to get rid of them. Hell, they were also completely unprepared and many of them died on the way over. Like that shot went super bad for so many reasons.

I’m not going to claim I remember every detail I was taught, and I had a bit of a deeper knowledge bc my mother is, again, a history major w/ an interest in American history bc it is whacky), and I do remember the ‘founding’ being a little simplified, but I also distinctly remember going into higher grades and having teachers outright explain ‘what you were told as kids was a very simplified version, let’s talk about it in more detail.’ We weren’t taught that there were ‘good’ or ‘bad’ guys, we were taught that these people had a difference in belief and that for that reason, they ended up shipped off to the colonies. We talked about the conflicts, the damage, the ugly bits.

I think people claiming to have been taught a sanitised version either didn’t take many history classes, didn’t pay attention, or don’t remember much of what they were taught (which no judgement here, I barely remember). Or maybe they’re just trying to sound Cool on the internet? I can’t know. But I remain baffled by certain myths about the us that alleged Americans come out of the woodwork to claim are true when… Your experiences are not universal???

Like I’m happy to criticise the education system, bc excuse me while I cry about not being able to hold a conversation in Spanish, but like. Unless you were in a very particular environment (I went to public school, btw)… No, you weren’t taught that shit. There’s parts missing, sure, but they did not, at least not beyond elementary, try to claim the ‘Pilgrims’ were blameless. I remember being taught that life was harsh and short, and people bitter and stubborn. I don’t doubt that the words ‘fleeing religious intolerance’ might’ve been used, bc technically, yes, they were. But I am also intolerant of trolls, and mosquitos. That’s a statement, it has no bearing on what kind of people either group was.

[tonguethulhu]

Terfs arent feminists, or radical, they're misogynists masquerading female empowerment in favor of alt-right oppression.

[todayisafridaynight]

so actually when you said about aokis further career it like got into my mind and i was like hmm yeah what would it be! cause he's a smart dude actually becase no dumbass could do what he did (even if he WAS a dumbass actually) so he def has skill experience and education and taken into account that he's on his way to Redemption (oooh you wouldn't believe how much thoughts i had about him being slowly accepted by ichigang party and most important getting back to being good friends with ichiban himself-) we just look the other way from bleach japan and 3k plan and what not (and i hope he's also not gettin back to THAT jeez) it WAS a phase

(first thing first imagine if he'd suddenly decided to fight BJ back with ichigang like imagine some of their pool employee face when The Aoki Himself tries to sabotage their work like a little bitch he is and you were 100% he died or something)

but actually i don't think he would stray too far from what he did as aoki - maybe not on the Great Scale Of Big Politics buuut maybe a politican of a local scale? maybe he STILL would be against gray zones™ but this time he would actually help? like trying to fit these poor people into society get em citizenships and jobs? (oh everyones gonna be so damn proud you know maybe hamako can open a real restaurant wow!)

like what's the thought behind it all: i may be foolish to think this man would still want to do the good thing (while being a bit of an edgy bitch as a treat cause cmon he deserves it) but i think he does want to do good. it's just like rn he hangs out with people he tried to erase earlier and not with bj assholes and it's impossible for him to not be influenced by that. and at this point i think he could do anything like yeah boy go learn how to mix cocktails or whatever but honestly? i think he would do what he can do good and that's all this political stuff - even if it's a small scale thing at least it keeps him entertained enough to not went down another spiral about his uselessness. he's useful and he's helping that's all!

thank you for coming to my tedtalk i hope i didn't make you regret allowin aoki essays in your inbox cause maybe its gonna be like that for some time . and oh oh damn it's AN ASK UH OH WHAT DO I DO UHH what do you think about that btw cause im interested in any thought and reply essays cause its going to give me zoomies when i wake up

tbh one of the infuriating things bout aoki's actions for me was the fact he was in a position to totally grant people in the grey zones a more 'honest living' if that's what he really wanted- like as governor of tokyo he undoubtedly had enough influence to give people citizenship and etc

if he were allowed to come back and if he were to continue a political career- first off Good Luck Coming Back Champ LMAO but also yeah it'd be neat to see him use whatever power he had left for the better while not doing a pure 180 since like. aint no one changing their worldview THAT fast but at least he's trying