#tldr im tired

[cheese-water]

GOD ARHHHGHHGGH this is an emotional rant because I’m exhausted and need to get this off my chest.

Wear a goddamn mask. I don’t care if you already threw them all out. I don’t care if it’s uncomfortable. I don’t care if it fogs your glasses. The ONLY REASON YOU SHOULDNT HAVE TO WEAR A MASK is if you have bad respiratory issues and literally cannot breathe while wearing them. You know who you are. Thank you for putting in more effort than whiny, ignorant, able-bodied asshats who feel that their comfort takes priority over others' lives.

God, I DONT EVEN KNOW WHAT TO SAY ANYMORE. EMPATHY. JUST A SLIVER OF EMPATHY FOR OTHERS. SO MUCH GOOD IN THE WORLD CAN COME FROM IT. AND YET YOU HAVE THE GALL TO CALL ME CRAZY FROM PROTECTING YOU FROM MY GERMS? GET A FUCKING HOBBY DUDE. CAUSE WHAT YOUR TRYING TO DO NOW WILL LITERALLY KILL YOU.

I got COVID for the first time in the fall of last year. When everything was "fine and dandy." And it’s not that I was a hermit or anything. I frequently had to go to school and work and whatever. And while I always wore KN90, that didn’t fucking matter. Masks protect others around you from your germs, not vice versa—just look at any COVID mask poster.

I got COVID because people stopped caring. It felt like a fucking joke to walk into a crowded room, let alone out in public, full of people who just don’t care about what may happen to you. Something they can prevent by just doing the bare minimum. Oh! My mistake! I can’t BELIEVE I asked YOU to think of others for once. How dare I even suggest you get your head out of your ass and see that the world doesn’t revolve around you, or maybe you’re the problem? The MERE THOUGHT OF INCONVENIENTLY CHANGING YOUR DAILY LIFE FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE DIEING IS JUST TOO GOD DAMN POLITICAL FOR YOU TO DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT.

So many people have the blood of millions stained on their hands. Horrific endings to millions of great lives, full of potential. Distraught families are unable or unsure how to put themselves back together without them; like shooting a gun at a perfect piece of pottery, the supports are swiftly taken, and what remains is fine dust. All of this comes from either ignorance or laziness. We all do. Hell, I do. But at least I try to scrub my hands. You don’t see me guiltlessly parading around for all to see, wearing my negligence’s victims like a shining fucking badge of honor. Others do this. Yet I’m the crazy one. I’m the paranoid one. I'M THE POLITICAL ONE

WEARING A MASK ISNT A POLITICAL STATEMENT. SURE IT CERTAINLY BECAME ONE AFTER THE PAST BACKWARD ASS YEARS WE HAD BUT IT SHOULDNT BE. I DON’T WEAR A MASK BECAUSE I WANT TO BE ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF HISTORY OR BECAUSE ACTUALLY I WANT TO BE ON THE LEFT

There’s a reason why I’m so angry. I wish it was out of pure selflessness for my fellow humans. I wish it was purely out of my love and desire for us all to be healthy, even those who choose to ignore the facts and hurt others because of it. I really do wish I had the energy to be like that. But I’m selfish. And I’m not going to pretend all my actions and all my emotions aren’t deeply rooted in this selfishness. And if my telling you guilt trips you into actually doing some good in the world, then so fucking be it.

I don't want my mom to die. She’s immunocompromised from a chronic illness too long to spell, but in short, if she gets COVID, I don’t know what I’ll do. I really don’t. And I know so many are in this situation and can’t do anything about it, are in worse situations or conditions, or are going through the grieving process now. When I got COVID in August, I was heartbroken. For the past two and a half years, I have put in the effort to keep myself safe. I wore a mask, sat alone at lunch, used every ignored hand sanitizer bottle I saw, and stayed at home as much as possible, all for nothing. All because some strangers can’t do the bare minimum.

I wasn’t only heartbroken, though. I was scared. I was terrified for not only everyone in my household, but especially my mom. Every single day I was sick, I worried that even though I was quarantining, her contact behind my door would literally be the death of her. If she just said "I love you" for a second too long, she’d be dead by morning. All because people stopped caring. I couldn’t tell you how much I cried that week, even if I tried. I didn’t want to kill my mom, even if it were by someone else’s hands.

We’re all okay now, and nothing happened BECAUSE WE WERE ABLE TO AFFORD VACCINATIONS. NOT BECAUSE OF OMICRONS' "LACK OF HOSPITALIZATIONS AND MORTALITY RATE," BULLSHIT. Because of these lies, there was a very high likelihood of me not writing this post and instead trying to cope and grapple with the sixth month anniversary of when I gave up on the world.

There are people behind those numbers. Get that through your fucking skull. Every time you go outside, just think, "Do I want to make someone’s worst nightmare a living reality?" If you don’t, then you’re going to have to put in the effort.

Just like the rest of us fucking do

You know how sometimes you catch someone in a lie, and so they tell an even bigger lie to try and cover up the first lie they told?

Well, that’s happening right now.

Last winter, a handful of celebrity doctors went on mainstream news networks to assure us that Omicron was “mild.” They carpet-bombed us with articles and tweets, doing their best to brainwash everyone.

They were wrong.

In the end, real science junked that idea. An article in the Journal of the American Medical Association showed that Omicron killed more people than previous variants, even when adjusting for other factors. Another study by doctors at Massachusetts General and Harvard Medical found that Omicron was just as deadly. In fact, “the risks of hospitalization and mortality were nearly identical.” As it turns out, the entire idea of “mild” Omicron was based on an old, flawed idea known as the law of declining virulence, developed by a doctor who was studying tick-borne disease in cows. It was debunked decades ago.

Most epidemiologists know that viruses don’t magically evolve to become milder. Virus evolution is random and chaotic.

In some cases, viruses evolve to become more deadly.

A handful of actual scientists tried to explain all this last winter, including disease experts at Johns Hopkins. A handful of other established experts spoke out against this myth. As a microbiologist at Penn State told Politifact, “You can’t just say it’s going to become nicer.” They were largely ignored, because everyone already sort of believed the misinformation. If they knew it was based on a study about cows, they probably would’ve thought twice.

This year, the makers of “it’s mild” are back.

They’re selling “immunity debt.”

We should be skeptical.

Schools and daycares are sending letters home to parents talking about this “immunity debt.” They’re saying that healthy children are getting sicker, even dying, because they weren’t exposed to enough germs over the last two years. Newspapers and TV stations across the country are running with it, proposing it as a “possible reason” for this year’s explosion in pediatric hospitalizations. Meanwhile, major medical organizations have sent a letter to President Biden urging him to declare an emergency over an “alarming surge of pediatric hospitalizations” due to a range of respiratory viruses, including Covid.

A lot of people are drinking the “immunity debt” kool-aid.

After all, Americans have believed for generations that getting sick is “good for you.” We think our immune system behaves like a muscle. We worry that if we’re not giving it a workout, we’ll get weak.

It’s a myth, just like the law of declining virulence.

Here’s why.

[katmaibearfan]

a personal update

i've been having some Mystery Health Issues for the last month or so, and one of the main symptoms i have been getting is extreme fatigue. in addition, there's some other life stuff happening which, with the fatigue i have been having, has been pushing me very close to (and sometimes over) my limits.

i have a doctor's appointment tomorrow to hopefully start getting some answers about what's going on, but that will almost certainly take me out for the whole day, between travel and bloodwork and such. in addition, my father-in-law and his girlfriend are visiting this weekend, which will take up a lot of my time and energy as well.

this is mostly just my exhausted-and-rambley way of saying that i wish i was posting more than i can right now. while i was hoping to use the month of august to get those ID and Lore posts out (since many of the bears go on walkabouts this time of year, action slows down on the cams), i think its very likely that these life events and health issues will be taking the majority of my time for the foreseeable future.

to be clear, i will still be posting here when i can! its just that i will probably not be able to as frequently as i would like for a while. hopefully these health problems are easily diagnosable and easily treated, and i can get back to spamming y'all's dashboards with brown bears sooner rather than later.

[ratcontrolledracecar]

not to have spn brainrot on main but why does this feel like a reference steve yockey and jeremy carver i need answers

[atlas-library]

Once again, @mana-jjk inspires me with her analysis of Toge. She reminded me of his harmless pranks, like the one where he steals Maki's skirt— And she doesn't seem to care that much, right.

So I've been having a silly headcanon, dancing around in my mind.

I usually headcanon Toge as trans, not in a binary way though— He mostly uses he/him and they/them pronouns in my mind, but is very much close to the genderfluid label. A bit of pangender and agender at the same time, if we had to use some other labels. He's all and nothing, his gender fits his moods and outfits, he's Toge, that's it.

But what if? What if it didn't cross his mind before the school (it didn't, it was still there but he'd think "That means I'm a guy" when he's never been one, at least not entirely)? What if the first time he gets to break gender norms is by stealing Maki's skirt?

He keeps staring at it, wondering, and when Panda teases him about it (thinking Toge is having other thoughts, or probably knowing he doesn't yet still teasing), Toge shakes his head. Fish flakes.

So Panda tilts his head to the side, deep in thought, and then— "Wanna prank Maki?" And it's the perfect excuse.

Toge nods. Salmon.

The first time he steals Maki's skirt and puts it on, it feels... weird. They're not the same height or size, Maki's hips are slightly wider than his— But then, Toge convinces himself it's just for the prank. Panda loves pranks, he loves Panda and pranks are funny.

Maki doesn't find it funny, though, just annoying; she rolls her eyes at them, calls them stupid and childish (in a typical "Boys are stupid" fashion she's learnt in elementary school), and flicks Toge's forehead as she walks past him. She doesn't even ask for her skirt back... which seems obvious, since she probably has a spare.

So Toge doesn't take it off right away.

He walks around the hallways dressed like this, feels the wind on his calves, and twirls to watch the pretty movements the skirt does. He does this the rest of the afternoon, until the sun goes down and Maki taps his shoulder with a pout. Oh. She wants it back.

So Toge follows her to her room, waits until she invites him in, and doesn't look around in case she doesn't want him to— But her closet has a glassdoor on the inside. He sees his reflection and, when Maki isn't looking, slowly lifts up his shirt until the waistband of the skirt is visible.

It's slightly too big. It doesn't fall prettily on his hips. Still, he likes it.

Behind him, from the corner of her eye, Maki watches Toge as he shyly admires his reflection. She'd seen that look before— On Mai, every time they'd get new clothes she felt really fit her.

Maki doesn't get Inumaki a lot, but she gets him in that specific moment. He does look pretty in a skirt.

[zenythycal]

Finally forcing myself to confront and do something that’s difficult for me

[sleepdeprivedlilbean]

here i randomly found this Ink drawing I made like, a year ago?? close to a year ago at least lol

man i think it’s time to bring back the posca markers cause holy shit what was i on this is gas-

anyway i don’t hate this and i never posted it so here u go guys u can have him, my treat

cropped and other filters under the cut per usual lol

I have like one other drawing i’d be willing to post that’s mostly done, its just not fully rendered

but i like it anyway, it’s just old lol

[tmos-time]

i have to be honest, people insisting that ai art is not real art did a HUGE disservice leading people to bark up the wrong tree about this shit. i don't hate ai art because its "not real art" i hate it because its a testament to the way capitalism continues to squash humans into little isolated boxes so that they can focus on "real" work more. even regardless of that, its like were slobbering and spitting trying to argue if a deviantart user making model bases is proper art or just a tool, completely glossing over the fact that this supposed user has been doing this by tracing other peoples artworks

[zymstarz]

people who actively chose to not vote i hope you know you are in fact equally as responsible if this turns out the way we're all worried about. bystanders are always equally as complicit.

[majimassqueaktoy]

Really not understanding the people being mean to Yong Yea and saying he'll never be Kuroda like. Yeah that's literally why Kuroda is also still voicing Kiryu?? They haven't gotten rid of Kuroda, they've just found a new English va for Kiryu since the games are having English dubs now??? They haven't even officially recorded anything leave the guy alone.

[mymp3]

trailer talk

[flyttadigs]

reposting bc it didnt show up in the tags and i insist on spreading the carrriagepilled propaganda thru an amv that i spent a month on. dl linkz in the comments

[hoshizoralone]

You like vocaloid stuff, so have you ever played Project Sekai? Curious what you'd think of it/its characters.

during its first launch i played it pretty religiously for like 2 months. i really liked the musical theatre guys theyre funny (in general i love boy + girl combos in things that usually are girl centric (this is why idolmaster crossbranch content rules), musical theatre guys edge out the other group for being funny)

i have no substantial thoughts on anyone else EXCEPT i cannot stand anyone in 25ji or whatever theyre called. except mizuki theyre chill but everyone else in it annoys me so bad like damn … every time i see someone say a story update they have its always some insane shit like if this was actually going down on vocatwit half the group would have the craziest callouts. mizuki get out of there

crypton vocaloidwise my interest goes kaito = meiko > luka > rin > [MASSIVE POWERGAP] len = miku

[ballercollective]

Im going to kill like 10 different people if i hear another peep about payjay because oj ans paper interact in the trailoR IM GONNA LOSE ITTTT IM GONNA GO FERAL STOPPPPPPPP

[gemharvest]

To watch yourself go from "wow, I really like talking to these people. I'm going to be really sad when we fall out of contact" to "holy shit, these people are actually here to stay, aren't they?" is such a weird experience and yet.. Anyways I forgot how nice it was to make friends.

[bingobongobonko]

mfw i come up with the name of the series out my ass but im gonna pretend it was called oracle eve the entire time.

[sunnykeysmash]

"But there's nothing sweet about them as Ronald "Mac" MacDonald (Rob McElhenney), Charlie Kelly (Charlie Day), Dennis Reynolds (Glenn Howerton), Dee Reynolds (Kaitlin Olson), and Frank Reynolds (Danny DeVito) yearn for the past as they attempt to survive in 2023." (s16 press release)

"We're always running outside, out into the world, looking for riches and treasures when we've got everything we need right here" (tends bar)