#self ownership

[reina-de-babilonia]

Sometimes, your mother will shame you or condemn you for choosing a life of ease and respect to your feminine energy and breaking the generational trauma of suffering and sacrifice that a lot of women have ingrained In themselves.

[thesirencult]

EDUCATION IS IMPORTANT

If a degree is a "piece of paper" and rich people don't need that, why do they send their kids to the most expensive schools and universities?

They could network at the country club, why at university?

Because education IS important. That's what they don't want you to know.

Education is freedom.

[wageronancap]

When someone does something wrong and defends themselves by saying "I was just following orders", they may as well be admitting "My moral character is decided by someone else."

How can someone who "just follows orders" claim to be a good person? If they attribute any evil they commit to their superior and thereby deny being evil themselves, then it is only consistent that any good they do must also be attributed to their superior: they cannot be stated to be good people.

Order-followers, in admitting and expressing pride in their abdication of their moral responsibility, objectify themselves to be instruments of their leaders, without mind or will. They forsake their humanity and become no better than tools to be used by other men.

And since good people do not exploit others to be their tools, these order-followers will inevitably find themselves under the rule of evil people, who have no moral qualms about exploiting their followers or their victims to achieve their ends.

But order-followers are not objects, or instruments, or tools. They are people, with minds and souls. With agency and will and choice, and therefore responsibility.

What order-followers are doing when they make that excuse is making a choice: their security in their job is worth more than standing up for what is right. Offloading the responsibility to be a good person to their superior is a attempt to avoid facing the guilt of their evil, and a sad one at that.

Order-givers just talk. Talk means very little: it is just sound. Order-followers are the ones who enforce the talk of the order-givers: they are the ones who put the talk of the order-giver into action, into reality; they are the ones who are making innocents suffer. For if the order-follower didn't exist, who would enforce the will of the order-giver upon the innocent?

Order-followers are more guilty of evil than the order-givers.

[dailyanarchistposts]

B.4.2 Is capitalism based on self-ownership?

Murray Rothbard, a leading “libertarian” capitalist, claims that capitalism is based on the “basic axiom” of “the right to self-ownership.” This “axiom” is defined as “the absolute right of each man [sic] … to control [his or her] body free of coercive interference. Since each individual must think, learn, value, and choose his or her ends and means in order to survive and flourish, the right to self-ownership gives man [sic] the right to perform these vital activities without being hampered by coercive molestation.” [For a New Liberty, pp. 26–27]

At first sight, this appears to sound reasonable. That we “own” ourselves and, consequently, we decide what we do with ourselves has an intuitive appeal. Surely this is liberty? Thus, in this perspective, liberty “is a condition in which a person’s ownership rights in his own body and his legitimate material property are not invaded, are not aggressed against.” It also lends itself to contrasts with slavery, where one individual owns another and “the slave has little or no right to self-ownership; his person and his produce are systematically expropriated by his master by the use of violence.” [Rothbard, Op. Cit., p. 41] This means that “self-ownership” can be portrayed as the opposite of slavery: we have the dominion over ourselves that a slaveholder has over their slave. This means that slavery is wrong because the slave owner has stolen the rightful property of the slave, namely their body (and its related abilities). This concept is sometimes expressed as people having a “natural” or “inalienable” right to own their own body and the product of their own labour.

Anarchists, while understanding the appeal of the idea, are not convinced. That “self-ownership,” like slavery, places issues of freedom and individuality within the context of private property — as such it shares the most important claim of slavery, namely that people can be objects of the rules of private property. It suggests an alienated perspective and, moreover, a fatal flaw in the dogma. This can be seen from how the axiom is used in practice. In as much as the term “self-ownership” is used simply as an synonym for “individual autonomy” anarchists do not have an issue with it. However, the “basic axiom” is not used in this way by the theorists of capitalism. Liberty in the sense of individual autonomy is not what “self-ownership” aims to justify. Rather, it aims to justify the denial of liberty, not its exercise. It aims to portray social relationships, primarily wage labour, in which one person commands another as examples of liberty rather than what they are, examples of domination and oppression. In other words, “self-ownership” becomes the means by which the autonomy of individuals is limited, if not destroyed, in the name of freedom and liberty.

This is exposed in the right-libertarian slogan “human rights are property rights.” Assuming this is true, it means that you can alienate your rights, rent them or sell them like any other kind of property. Moreover, if you have no property, you have no human rights as you have no place to exercise them. As Ayn Rand, another ideologue for “free market” capitalism stated, “there can be no such thing as the right to unrestricted freedom of speech (or of action) on someone else’s property.” [Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, p. 258] If you are in someone else’s property (say at work) you have no basic rights at all, beyond the right not to be harmed (a right bosses habitually violate anyway by ignoring health and safety issues).

Self-ownership justifies this. You have rented out the property in your person (labour services) and, consequently, another person can tell you what to do, when to do and how to do it. Thus property comes into conflict with liberty. If you argue that “human rights are property rights” you automatically ensure that human rights are continually violated in practice simply because there is a conflict between property and liberty. This is not surprising, as the “property rights” theory of liberty was created to justify the denial of other people’s liberty and the appropriation of their labour.

Clearly, then, we reach a problem with “self-ownership” (or property in the person) once we take into account private property and its distribution. In a nutshell, capitalists don’t pay their employees to perform the other “vital activities” listed by Rothbard (learning, valuing, choosing ends and means) — unless, of course, the firm requires that workers undertake such activities in the interests of company profits. Otherwise, workers can rest assured that any efforts to engage in such “vital activities” on company time will be “hampered” by “coercive molestation.” Therefore wage labour (the basis of capitalism) in practice denies the rights associated with “self-ownership,” thus alienating the individual from his or her basic rights. Or as Michael Bakunin expressed it, “the worker sells his person and his liberty for a given time” under capitalism. [The Political Philosophy of Bakunin, p. 187]

In a society of relative equals, “property” would not be a source of power as use would co-incidence with occupancy (i.e. private property would be replaced by possession). For example, you would still be able to fling a drunk out of your home. But in a system based on wage labour (i.e. capitalism), property is a different thing altogether, becoming a source of institutionalised power and coercive authority through hierarchy. As Noam Chomsky writes, capitalism is based on “a particular form of authoritarian control. Namely, the kind that comes through private ownership and control, which is an extremely rigid system of domination.” When “property” is purely what you, as an individual, use (i.e. possession) it is not a source of power. In capitalism, however, “property” rights no longer coincide with use rights, and so they become a denial of freedom and a source of authority and power over the individual.

As we’ve seen in the discussion of hierarchy (sections A.2.8 and B.1), all forms of authoritarian control depend on “coercive molestation” — i.e. the use or threat of sanctions. This is definitely the case in company hierarchies under capitalism. Bob Black describes the authoritarian nature of capitalism as follows:

”[T]he place where [adults] pass the most time and submit to the closest control is at work. Thus … it’s apparent that the source of the greatest direct duress experienced by the ordinary adult is not the state but rather the business that employs him. Your foreman or supervisor gives you more or-else orders in a week than the police do in a decade.” [“The Libertarian as Conservative”, The Abolition of Work and other essays, p. 145]

In developing nations, this control can easily been seen to be an utter affront to human dignity and liberty. There a workplace is often “surrounded by barbed wire. Behind its locked doors … workers are supervised by guards who beat and humiliate them on the slightest pretext … Each worker repeats the same action — sewing on a belt loop, stitching a sleeve — maybe two thousand times a day. They work under painfully bright lights, for twelve- to fourteen-hour shifts, in overheated factories, with too few bathroom breaks, and restricted access to water (to reduce the need for more bathroom breaks), which is often foul and unfit for human consumption in any event.” The purpose is “to maximise the amount of profit that could be wrung out” of the workers, with the “time allocated to each task” being calculated in “units of ten thousands of a second.” [Joel Bakan, The Corporation, pp. 66–7] While in the developed world the forms of control are, in general, nowhere as extreme (in thanks due to hard won labour organising and struggle) the basic principle is the same. Only a sophist would argue that the workers “owned” themselves and abilities for the period in question — yet this is what the advocates of “self-ownership” do argue.

So if by the term “self-ownership” it is meant “individual autonomy” then, no, capitalism is not based on it. Ironically, the theory of “self-ownership” is used to undercut and destroy genuine self-ownership during working hours (and, potentially, elsewhere). The logic is simple. As I own myself I am, therefore, able to sell myself as well, although few advocates of “self-ownership” are as blunt as this (as we discuss in section F.2.2 right-libertarian Robert Nozick accepts that voluntary slavery flows from this principle). Instead they stress that we “own” our labour and we contract them to others to use. Yet, unlike other forms of property, labour cannot be alienated. Therefore when you sell your labour you sell yourself, your liberty, for the time in question. By alienating your labour power, you alienate the substance of your being, your personality, for the time in question.

As such, “self-ownership” ironically becomes the means of justifying authoritarian social relationships which deny the autonomy it claims to defend. Indeed, these relationships have similarities with slavery, the very thing which its advocates like to contrast “self-ownership” to. While modern defenders of capitalism deny this, classical economist James Mill let the cat out of the bag by directly comparing the two. It is worthwhile to quote him at length:

“The great capitalist, the owner of a manufactory, if he operated with slaves instead of free labourers, like the West India planter, would be regarded as owner both of the capital, and of the labour. He would be owner, in short, of both instruments of production: and the whole of the produce, without participation, would be his own. “What is the difference, in the case of the man, who operates by means of labourers receiving wages? The labourer, who receives wages, sells his labour for a day, a week, a month, or a year, as the case may be. The manufacturer, who pays these wages, buys the labour, for the day, the year, or whatever period it may be. He is equally therefore the owner of the labour, with the manufacturer who operates with slaves. The only difference is, in the mode of purchasing. The owner of the slave purchases, at once, the whole of the labour, which the man can ever perform: he, who pays wages, purchases only so much of a man’s labour as he can perform in a day, or any other stipulated time. Being equally, however, the owner of the labour, so purchased, as the owner of the slave is of that of the slave, the produce, which is the result of this labour, combined with his capital, is all equally his own. In the state of society, in which we at present exist, it is in these circumstances that almost all production is effected: the capitalist is the owner of both instruments of production: and the whole of the produce is his.” [“Elements of Political Economy” quoted by David Ellerman, Property and Contract in Economics, pp. 53–4

Thus the only “difference” between slavery and capitalist labour is the “mode of purchasing.” The labour itself and its product in both cases is owned by the “great capitalist.” Clearly this is a case of, to use Rothbard’s words, during working hours the worker “has little or no right to self-ownership; his person and his produce are systematically expropriated by his master.” Little wonder anarchists have tended to call wage labour by the more accurate term “wage slavery.” For the duration of the working day the boss owns the labour power of the worker. As this cannot be alienated from its “owner” this means that the boss effectively owns the worker — and keeps the product of their labour for the privilege of so doing!

There are key differences of course. At the time, slavery was not a voluntary decision and the slaves could not change their master (although in some cultures, such as Ancient Rome, people over the could sell themselves in slavery while ”voluntary slavery is sanctioned in the Bible.” [Ellerman, Op. Cit., p. 115 and p. 114]). Yet the fact that under wage slavery people are not forced to take a specific job and can change masters does not change the relations of authority created between the two parties. As we note in the next section, the objection that people can leave their jobs just amounts to saying “love it or leave it!” and does not address the issue at hand. The vast majority of the population cannot avoid wage labour and remain wage workers for most of their adult lives. It is virtually impossible to distinguish being able to sell your liberty/labour piecemeal over a lifetime from alienating your whole lifetime’s labour at one go. Changing who you alienate your labour/liberty to does not change the act and experience of alienation.

Thus the paradox of self-ownership. It presupposes autonomy only in order to deny it. In order to enter a contract, the worker exercises autonomy in deciding whether it is advantageous to rent or sell his or her property (their labour power) for use by another (and given that the alternative is, at best, poverty unsurprisingly people do consider it “advantageous” to “consent” to the contract). Yet what is rented or sold is not a piece of property but rather a self-governing individual. Once the contract is made and the property rights are transferred, they no longer have autonomy and are treated like any other factor of production or commodity.

In the “self-ownership” thesis this is acceptable due to its assumption that people and their labour power are property. Yet the worker cannot send along their labour by itself to an employer. By its very nature, the worker has to be present in the workplace if this “property” is to be put to use by the person who has bought it. The consequence of contracting out your labour (your property in the person) is that your autonomy (liberty) is restricted, if not destroyed, depending on the circumstances of the particular contract signed. This is because employers hire people, not a piece of property.

So far from being based on the “right to self-ownership,” then, capitalism effectively denies it, alienating the individual from such basic rights as free speech, independent thought, and self-management of one’s own activity, which individuals have to give up when they are employed. But since these rights, according to Rothbard, are the products of humans as humans, wage labour alienates them from themselves, exactly as it does the individual’s labour power and creativity. For you do not sell your skills, as these skills are part of you. Instead, what you have to sell is your time, your labour power, and so yourself. Thus under wage labour, rights of “self-ownership” are always placed below property rights, the only “right” being left to you is that of finding another job (although even this right is denied in some countries if the employee owes the company money).

It should be stressed that this is not a strange paradox of the “self-ownership” axiom. Far from it. The doctrine was most famously expounded by John Locke, who argued that “every Man has a Property in his own Person. This no Body has any Right to but himself.” However, a person can sell, “for a certain time, the Service he undertakes to do, in exchange for Wages he is to receive.” The buyer of the labour then owns both it and its product. “Thus the Grass my Horse has bit; the Turfs my Servant has cut; and the Ore I have digg’d in any place where I have a right to them in common with others, becomes my Property, without the assignation or consent of any body. The labour that was mine … hath fixed my Property in them.” [Second Treatise on Government, Section 27, Section 85 and Section 28]

Thus a person (the servant) becomes the equivalent of an animal (the horse) once they have sold their labour to the boss. Wage labour denies the basic humanity and autonomy of the worker. Rather than being equals, private property produces relations of domination and alienation. Proudhon compared this to an association in which, “while the partnership lasts, the profits and losses are divided between them; since each produces, not for himself, but for the society; when the time of distribution arrives it is not the producer who is considered, but the associated. That is why the slave, to whom the planter gives straw and rice; and the civilised labour, to whom the capitalist pays a salary which is always too small, — not being associated with their employers, although producing with them, — are disregarded when the product is divided. Thus the horse who draws our coaches … produce with us, but are not associated with us; we take their product but do not share it with them. The animals and labourers whom we employ hold the same relation to us.” [What is Property?, p. 226]

So while the capitalist Locke sees nothing wrong in comparing a person to an animal, the anarchist Proudhon objects to the fundamental injustice of a system which turns a person into a resource for another to use. And we do mean resource, as the self-ownership thesis is also the means by which the poor become little more than spare parts for the wealthy. After all, the poor own their bodies and, consequently, can sell all or part of it to a willing party. This means that someone in dire economic necessity can sell parts of their body to the rich. Ultimately, ”[t]o tell a poor man that he has property because he has arms and legs — that the hunger from which he suffers, and his power to sleep in the open air are his property, — is to play upon words, and to add insult to injury.” [Proudhon, Op. Cit., p. 80]

Obviously the ability to labour is not the property of a person — it is their possession. Use and ownership are fused and cannot be separated out. As such, anarchists argue that the history of capitalism shows that there is a considerable difference whether one said (like the defenders of capitalism) that slavery is wrong because every person has a natural right to the property of their own body, or because every person has a natural right freely to determine their own destiny (like the anarchists). The first kind of right is alienable and in the context of a capitalist regime ensures that the many labour for those who own the means of life. The second kind of right is inalienable as long as a person remained a person and, therefore, liberty or self-determination is not a claim to ownership which might be both acquired and surrendered, but an inextricable aspect of the activity of being human.

The anarchist position on the inalienable nature of human liberty also forms the basis for the excluded to demand access to the means necessary to labour. “From the distinction between possession and property,” argued Proudhon, “arise two sorts of rights: the jus in re, the right in a thing, the right by which I may reclaim the property which I have acquired, in whatever hands I find it; and jus ad rem, the right to a thing, which gives me a claim to become a proprietor … In the first, possession and property are united; the second includes only naked property. With me who, as a labourer, have a right to the possession of the products of Nature and my own industry — and who, as a proletaire, enjoy none of them — it is by virtue of the jus de rem that I demand admittance to the jus in re.” [Op. Cit., p. 65] Thus to make the self-ownership of labour and its products a reality for those who do the actual work in society rather than a farce, property must be abolished — both in terms of the means of life and also in defining liberty and what it means to be free.

So, contrary to Rothbard’s claim, capitalism in practice uses the rhetoric of self-ownership to alienate the right to genuine self-ownership because of the authoritarian structure of the workplace, which derives from private property. If we desire real self-ownership, we cannot renounce it for most of our adult lives by becoming wage slaves. Only workers’ self-management of production, not capitalism, can make self-ownership a reality:

“They speak of ‘inherent rights’, ‘inalienable rights’, ‘natural rights,’ etc … Unless the material conditions for equality exist, it is worse than mockery to pronounce men equal. And unless there is equality (and by equality I mean equal chances for every one to make the most of himself [or herself]) unless, I say, these equal changes exist, freedom, either of though, speech, or action, is equally a mockery … As long as the working-people … tramp the streets, whose stones they lay, whose filth they clean, whose sewers they dig, yet upon which they must not stand too long lest the policeman bid them ‘move on’; as long as they go from factory to factory, begging for the opportunity to be a slave, receiving the insults of bosses and foreman, getting the old ‘no,’ the old shake of the head, in these factories they built, whose machines they wrought; so long as they consent to be herd like cattle, in the cities, driven year after year, more and more, off the mortgaged land, the land they cleared, fertilised, cultivated, rendered of value . .. so long as they continue to do these things vaguely relying upon some power outside themselves, be it god, or priest, or politician, or employer, or charitable society, to remedy matters, so long deliverance will be delayed. When they conceive the possibility of a complete international federation of labour, whose constituent groups shall take possession of land, mines, factories, all the instruments of production … , in short, conduct their own industry without regulative interference from law-makers or employers, then we may hope for the only help which counts for aught — Self-Help; the only condition which can guarantee free speech [along with their other rights] (and no paper guarantee needed).” [Voltairine de Cleyre, The Voltairine de Cleyre Reader, pp. 4–6]

To conclude, the idea that capitalism is based on self-ownership is radically at odds with reality if, by self-ownership, it is meant self-determination or individual autonomy. However, this is not surprising given that the rationale behind the self-ownership thesis is precisely to justify capitalist hierarchy and its resulting restrictions on liberty. Rather than being a defence of liberty, self-ownership is designed to facilitate its erosion. In order to make the promise of autonomy implied by the concept of “self-ownership” a reality, private property will need to be abolished.

For more discussion of the limitations, contradictions and fallacies of defining liberty in terms of self-ownership and property rights, see section F.2.

[hyenaboycunt]

"I'm my own Dom. I can do this."

-scrawls degrading, shaming, objectifying things onto my body in sharpie-

-throws on boxers and an A-shirt-

"Okay, that's enough dopamine to get the day rolling. I totally have enough spoons to make applesauce."

^^ It thinks it's lying to itself, but it knows that doing a Task™️ for "Daddy™️ (me)" will probably work.

[russburlingame]

I SURE SHOWED THEM!

In 2008, I was working at a small comics-news site, and I was the guy who was charged with writing TO SEE, OR NOT TO SEE. That was the column where we reviewed comic book movies and TV shows (and also things like DOCTOR WHO and THE BIG BANG THEORY), and at one point, my boss asked me to write about the then-new IRON MAN movie.

I am sharing this with all of you, fully aware of how totally absurd it is, but I will say that I have never wavered in my disdain for CIVIL WAR, either in comics form or as a CAPTAIN AMERICA movie.

From 2008-me:

I will not see Iron Man.

As a longtime comics reader and comics journalist, I have never been a huge fan of the character of Tony Stark.  His most compelling arc, to me, is the classic Demon in a Bottle, recently reissued through Marvel's hardcover program, wherein Stark battles with alcoholism rather than a supervillain.

Or, if it's the current incarnation of Stark, a superhero.

That, of course, is what's at the heart of my compulsion to avoid the Iron Man film: Marvel Comics's Civil War and the role that Tony Stark/Iron Man played in it.

Civil War was Marvel's definitive story of the last ten years; nearly all of its central characters played a role, and it revolutionized the way that superheroes are viewed by the public and written by the creators of the Marvel Universe.  The basic premise of the story was that a group of young, irresponsible superheroes took off after villains way over their heads.  When the situation got bad, the reality-TV superheroes were more worried about looking good for their audience than pulling back and saving lives, so ultimately a powerful villain set off an explosion that devastated a large area surrounding the bad-guy hideout.  Caught in the blast radius was a school, and the parents of the children killed managed to guilt Tony Stark into supporting a law mandating registration of all powered beings.  In spite of years of resisting a "Mutant Registration Act" on the grounds that it was discriminatory toward people born with powers, many of Marvel's heroes did an about-face on the issue in the face of the terrorist attack.  Tony Stark led the charge of the characters who were willing to trade their freedom for security.

That weakness of character was not the reason that I gave up on Iron Man.  Obviously, the story could have been a metaphor for the 9/11 aftermath, when people made bad decisions because their fear and confusion led them down a callow path.  What made Stark a villain in my eyes, was his willingness to take the disagreement to the next level.  Superheroes punching each other over just about any issue is old hat--but Stark authorized his people to use lethal force, leading to the deaths of heroes who opposed the Registration Act.  And when, later in the story, he began to seem to lose his handle on the situation, he responded by recruiting villains to his cause, granting them immunity and a license to hunt good guys who didn't agree with his pet legislation. He became, effectively, the villain of the story.

And in that way—using immoral methods that other heroes would not stoop to—he was ultimatley declared the "winner" of the superhero Civil War. In the final moments of the decisive battle, Stark's reliance on technology was laid bare when his armor was shorted out by a clever Captain America—the leader of the insurgents—who could have ended it by killing Stark but didn't do it. Because Captain America is, after all, a hero.

Or rather, he was a hero. In the aftermath of the battle where Captain America spared Iron Man's life, the spy organization that Tony Stark's military ties had put him in charge of arrested Captain America. Betrayed by his longtime friend and ally, the hero of Civil War was assassinated on the courtroom steps en route to his trial.

A fairly reasonably person might ask, "What does the Iron Man comic, which sells around 100,000 copies a month, really have to do with the blockbuster film by the same name, which will undoubtedly be seen by more people this afternoon than the comic is all year long?" It's a fair question, and one that I've been faced with (sans the statistical specifics) by dozens of people who I've told I refuse to see the film.

The answer is Joe Quesada.

Under Quesada's stewardship, Marvel has become more media savvy than ever. Their Internet capabiltiy (and even simple things like providing electronic copies to critics), the fact that they own their own film studio now and Quesada's willingness to run, scripts in hand, to any mainstream media outlet who will carry the story anytime a major plot point is set to be revealed, have come together to show Quesada's understanding of synergy and the notion that comic book characters are not merely two-dimensional personalities inhabiting a 2-dimensional world but rather franchises. The Spider-Man and X-Men franchises, for example, are hugely successful and the merchandising money they bring in far outweighs the money made by the comics. As we saw with the Back in Black story that was shoehorned into the Spider-Man titles around the time that Spider-Man 3 was in theaters, the movies, TV shows and other media dictate to a great extent the direction and even sometimes the specific plot details of the comics.

Put simply: If you give money to Iron Man: the movie, and the Iron Man franchise thrives, then Quesada and his cohorts at Marvel Editorial will be left with the impression that Iron Man—comics and all—is headed in the right direction.

And I just can't give my ten bucks to that.

[vizthedatum]

My girlfriend just told me she wants to self-collar herself, which is the most romantic thing I've ever heard.

[kinfriday]

"People are under no obligation to make sense to you."

No one owes anyone an explanation on what brings them joy. The othering and demonization of difference are culture left overs from a time when anything outside the normal could be a threat.

It is vestigial and thankfully fading giving way to experimentation and self authorship like we have never seen before. We will all be better for it, for with innovation comes evolution, discovery and growth.

We own ourselves, and if we embrace this we create a masterpiece. Why make generic hotel art of your life? This is our time to be everything we are. May we make the most of it.

“Cringe culture is dead” isn’t just about letting 15 year olds cosplay MHA (but is also an issue). It’s about letting 50 year olds dance at clubs even if they’re “bad at it”, it’s about letting 10 year old’s wear random bits of clothes to make an outfit that’s “weird”, it’s about letting adult men experiment with artsy makeup looks even when they’re “messy”, it’s about letting teens scream music even if they “sound bad”.

“Cringe culture is dead” means letting people learn new hobbies at any age, experiment with their identity at any time, expressing themselves in ways outside the norm just as much as it means let 20 year olds play roblox. 

Cringe culture is just social norms being forced on people rebelling against societies value consensus, it’s keeping people in brackets that are easier to market to. 

Let cringe culture be dead in every aspect of life outside online spaces.

[lonepower]

yes i Am paying real money to make you all look at our new dog. we've had her for 3 hours and if anything happened to her I'd kill everyone in this room and then myself. her name is Tater Tot

[reina-de-babilonia]

What's a life mistake if thanks God I’m glad and relieved I never begged for a man's attention or love towards me

[thesirencult]

SEDUCE LIKE A GODDESS

"Her seductive power, however, did not lie in her looks [...]. In reality, Cleopatra was physically unexceptional and had no political power, yet both Caesar and Antony, brave and clever men, saw none of this. What they saw was a woman who constantly transformed herself before their eyes, a one-woman spectacle.

Her dress and makeup changed from day to day, but always gave her a heightened, goddesslike appearance. Her words could be banal enough, but were spoken so sweetly that listeners would find themselves remembering not what she said but how she said it."

- Robert Greene, The Art Of Seduction

Contrary to popular belief, seduction can be applied to any situation. Seduction does not only come in handy when you want to attract a lover.

You also seduce your dream clients, powerful players you can network with and potential friends.

Marketing is a form of seduction.

You seduce co-workers, bosses and parents. Successful military leaders, politicians, CEOs, hedge fund managers... Those are all equipped with the power of seduction.

Seduction is a form of energetic projection. In order for you to seduce, you have to be abundant and authentic.

It's the art of alchemising your sensual and creative energy. That's why seductive energy is most prominent in its rawest form. Sexual energy.

In order for you to seduce you need to indulge in yourself. You can not fake it. You have to accept your strengths and weaknesses. You have to give in to your own sensuality and raw energy.

Let your inner sacred goddess shine.

That's how you become magnetic.

[kinfriday]

People own themselves and their bodies. It shouldn't be controversial to say that, but for the longest time Doctor's have been gatekeepers to full self realization.

There are people who have sought out more extreme body modification but were denied a medical professionals help in doing it, so they undergo these procedures in tattoo parlors and piercing shops without anesthesia and it's all fundamentally necessary. I am a free and sapient being, capable of making my own choices and nothing should stand in the way of me customizing this meatsuit. Normal is just a setting on the washing machine, and one I don't use.

Yes I'm trans-species, yes I'm a therian, and transgender, and there is nothing wrong with that.

controversial opinion but top surgery and other trans healthcare shouldnt be trans exclusive. so what if an autistic woman wants top surgery because boobs are a sensory nightmare?? good on her. she isnt "mutilating" herself any more than anyone else who gets cosmetic surgery for anything.

it doesnt have to be exclusively "trans healthcare." maybe a cis guy just wants boobs or a cis girl wants a dick. who cares. your bodys yours. customize that bitch. the more normalized it is to just do whatever with your body for any reason the easier itll be for the people who need to do it to actually go through with it because they wont be socially pressured as hard or harassed afterwards.

[sk3tch404]

Welcome home.

So guys, I used graphic pencils for the first time on one of my art assignments and now....

Just know that ur girl got it 💪🔥

Also dont mind his fuck ass shoes okay

[thirdity]

Love of self is still determined by negativity insofar as it devalues and wards off the Other in favor of the Own.

Byung-chul Han, The Burnout Society

[bacchuschucklefuck]

Ooh what's barbarian Figs subclass

m flipfloppin between giant and totem (def reskinned) for her rn! giant would be Really funny for junior year and there's some thematic stuff for the transformation element I think would be interesting, but just purely on a character basis I think fig would love totem esp. as a barbie girl in freshman year. if I land on totem I kinda imagine it like a wuxia animal style thing tbh, mostly just because the idea of someone coming into a fight expecting typical movie shaolin choreography and getting Teenager That Mauls You To Death is entertaining to me

[todokidokifordeku]

So you telling me we're gonna get this next week

And then this, same episode

And we are still gonna get this at some point in the future?

While knowing SandRay is potentially end game???

Sand. Honey. Favourite child of mine. Do you really want to settle down for this?😔