themostlyharmlessfandragon

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

On the subject about parents needing to control their child's reading and invade their privacy in order to "protect" them from "inappropriate material:

Until I was in....college? At least? The vast, vast majority of the books I read were either a) assigned by my school or b) (the vast majority of my reading) provided to me by my mother.

My mom is a librarian. She filled our rooms with books, picked especially for us. She pointed out books on the shelves in our home library (separate from our bedroom shelves) that she thought we would like. She bought us books for birthdays, Christmas, and just stacks of recommendations. She once paid me $10 to read one of the Cirque Du Freak books because she said I needed "to be exposed to bad literature."

She respected my privacy in room, didn't go through my belongings. She explicitly pointed out to us that she wouldn't know if we took a particular book of the shelf, as long as we returned it, if we didn't want her to know we were reading it. She purposely brought us books that she didn't care for herself, because she thought we might find them valuable or enjoyable.

And if we wanted to read something she thought might upset or disturb us, she would explain why. She wouldn't stop us from reading it - just ask us to check in with her, to talk through it.

And so when I read something that upset or disturbed me, I would go to her. She would listen and talk through it with me.

If she said she didn't think I would like something, or that a book might disturb me, or that she thought I should wait until I was older, I listened to her.

She didn't need restrictions or control to protect me. Because she proved I could trust her.

Controlling kids is never about "protecting" them. It's just about control.

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

When I first started taking diabetes meds I constantly felt like my blood sugar was low and I insisted on getting a blood sugar monitor to test this and it turned out the meds were just bringing my sugar levels down to what they ought to be and I was just so used to having high blood sugar I thought it was low and eventually I got used to it and I guess what I’m saying is that getting healthier sometimes feels scary and unnatural in the beginning stages but you get past that part eventually

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

We live in the dumbest, lamest cyberpunk dystopia possible.

So LA has been — and continues to — protest against ICE. These protests haven’t gotten any smaller or lost any momentum, but social media wasn’t reflecting it.

TikTok users, realizing that the platform/other social media are censoring/deleting/shadowbanning these protest videos, decided to find a workaround.

They’re calling it the LA Music Festival. Ice detention centers and other protest locations are “stages.” The hottest band is Rage Against the Machine. “Here’s what gear you should be bringing to stay safe at the LA Music Festival.”

And it fucking worked.

TikTok has become a proving ground for a lot of new music, meaning lots of labels and organizations have lucrative deals with TikTok to promote their new artists and music festivals. So they absolutely cannot censor the words “music festival” or train the algorithm to ignore it, or they risk endangering that very important revenue.

So now protest videos are flooding feeds again, but it’s the LA 24/7 Music Festival. Truly an incredible timeline we’ve landed in.

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

the semantic drift of the term "liminal" genuinely pisses me off and i know its petty. LIMINAL IS A TRANSITIONAL STAGE BETWEEN TWO STATES- OR. IF WE WANT TO WIDEN THE BOUNDARY HERE. IT COULD BE ON THE VERY EDGE OF BECOMING SOMETHING ELSE. just because something is abandoned doesn't mean its liminal. in fact, that shopping mall was MORE liminal when it was dying off and shutting down outlets every month than it is 5 years later when the space is fully abandoned.

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

One year on my birthday when I was struggling with money (earned £6.70 an hour, slept on a mattress on the floor), I had friends visit for a party.

We went to an aldi to get food, and everyone insisted on paying for their own food, buying full bottles of fizzy drink, their own snacks and so on. Some of the friends brought their own baked goods too. Later, one friend covered a Chinese takeaway order for me and everyone ordered lots of food to eat with no hesitation, only to mention that their eyes had been bigger than their stomachs when the food did arrive.

I didn't realise what was happening until the next day, when each person left my flat with the same "oops, bought too much food to take home with me— I'll just leave it with you!" farewell.

I think about it a lot. I don't know if it was planned or not, but they all made sure I didn't need to worry about food for a good few weeks. Back then, I had to freeze loafs of bread to ration them out, and I had an iron deficiency from not being able to afford good food. But alone in my flat, I realised that I suddenly had a kitchen full of reminders that my friends loved me.

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

I heard on the radio that sugars and carbs work better when they bond to fiber and protein, so I thought id make more conscious decisions around that when I choose my lunch options. Its early yet, but I do feel like I don't get the afternoon crash that I used to.

So like... yes its okay for me to have the coke with lunch, but not the coke by itself. I should also be having meat or a grain or both. Yes, the candy bar is okay, but one with nuts in it is more likely to be what I need for the day.

Like... yes, balanced meals. But sometimes convenient is what you got, so learning how foods bond together made that work better.

Anyways, thanks NPR, for telling me some food science that wasn't body shame-y!

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

i post in a few communities focused on helping people identify ai-generated images and something i'm noticing a lot is how many people are paying for a "business logo" and receiving an ai generated image.

y'all, even before generative ai, if a business logo is commissioned, you are owed at the very least a raw .psd file. standard practice is to provide a vector image, because a logo needs to look good at several sizes, but a raw editable .psd is the bare minimum. receiving a .jpg or .png is not accomplishing the directive of providing a logo, at best you are receiving a logo concept.

maybe tumblr isn't the right audience for this but i have to vent my frustrations here because this is a scam that could be avoided just by people understanding what it is they require. you don't even have to be good at telling if something is ai or not to avoid this problem, because ai cannot vectorize or provide layers! aaaaghh!

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

Personality hire

Working Cats

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

there's a jewish story about a rich man who goes to his rabbi to ask him about building an orphanage, and the rabbi is like "yeah duh go for it!!" and then later the rich guy comes back and is like "actually I've decided not to... I was just doing it for my own image and not coz I cared about orphans" and the rabbi was like "bitch the orphans don't care why you're building the orphanage!!!" and sometimes I wish I could say that to lefties who haven't unpacked their christian upbringing. sometimes motives don't matter!! who give a fuck why a politician wants to do a good thing? bitch the orphans don't!!

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

on craigslist you can find jobs offering the same benefits as the army of ancient rome

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

.❤️

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

when god closes a door you reach your little paws under it and go mrrwwaaaooow mmreeaaow

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

it's important to me that people know the original "he would not fucking say that" was in response to a tiktok where someone said eric cartman would thank you for asking for his pronouns. Like it just doesn't hit the same without context.

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

i want you to be happy kris

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

* Won't you play again, Kris?

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

evenings on baker street

[themostlyharmlessfandragon]

when your grammar accidentally transfers