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went to the cleveland art museum & they have a maghreb exhibit that was entirely jewish + amazigh art :-) i was really pleasantly surprised

these mitpachat and the b'niqa are 19th century algerian jewish crafted + were my favorites

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Friendly reminder that you're not required to publicly take sides in any geopolitical conflict you don't understand.

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Sharing space is nothing new. Sharing bathrooms is nothing new. The reactionary outrage is so manufactured.

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“Make this more scenic” technically six feet underground is a scene

This may be the worst use of LLMs anyone has attempted, ever. Up there with recognizing mushrooms.

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Asdgfjsvjhlskgjs

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alright, let me settle some discourse right now (and probably make some individuals get mad at me):

disability is contextual.

is low support needs autism a disability? it depends. if we're talking about workplace discrimination or difficulty finding accessible events, then yes, certainly. if we're talking about wheelchair ramps, then otherwise abled autistic people are abled.

is hypermobility a disability? it also depends! in the context of medical discrimination, of course! but if we're talking about braille signs, then seeing people with hypermobility are able bodied!

is needing glasses a disability? big shocker, it also depends!!!!! if we're talking about exploitation by health insurers and the cost of accessibility, then it is a mild disability. but if we're talking about insulin access, then non-diabetics who need glasses are able bodied!!!

i hope this post can put all this discourse to bed forever because it is annoying when people act like disability is an eternal unchanging essential category when it's actually a fluid social construct and a word that describes the sociomedical position of a group of people that depends on the conversation being had. let's stop posting shit like "is wearing glasses a disability???" or "is dyslexia a form of neurodivergence???" or "are people with adhd really disabled???" because it fucking depends!!!!!!!

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Am I getting a good grade in tumblr mutual?

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So I’m co-directing the choir for High Holy Days this coming year (!!!) and we’re doing some “prehearsals” until my other co-director is back from maternity leave next month.

This week’s topic (after a lovely Havdalah observance which I don’t usually get to do with anyone but my spouse) was on Hebrew pronunciation conventions and nusach (musical of course), as well as some VERY basics of trope. I got very misty-eyed talking about the function of trope and how since Torah was for so long strictly an oral tradition it was just as important to preserve *how* things were said as it was to preserve *what* was said.

I love thinking about the fact that some (not all but some) of the melodies to our blessings are the same that our ancestors used centuries ago, and that the way we chant Torah now is the way our great great grandchildren will chant it too

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I was scrolling way back on my own blog to look for an old specific post, and I could see the progression of my unending joy and fervor for Judaism morph into fear and anger and defensiveness as things have gotten worse and harder, and, crucially, as I have become a more solidified and educated member of the community. This makes me deeply sad, so I’m going to fight it actively.

All that to say: Torah study last night was delightful. It was a small group this week, just four of us, but not only did we laugh much and do a lot of Hebrew decoding exploration (which is my 🎶faaaaaavoriiiiite🎵), but we ended up talking at great length about the relationship between HaShem and Moses.

We did this in the context of HaShem getting super into wrath and retribution, as they are wont to do, and Moses’s reaction is to basically say “okay, but like, if you kill your own people, everyone else is gonna think you’re a loser who couldn’t defend this people you promised to protect.” And it WORKS!!

So we were talking about how interesting it is that not only is Moses of course the only prophet in the Torah to whom G-d appears in person, but how much more of an equal footing they appear to be on, more of a partnership than anything else. Look at Avraham when he bargained for Sodom and Gomorrah: “yes HaShem you are great and powerful but I also believe you are merciful please let me search for one righteous person there.” Yaakov literally wrestled an angel. Joseph received dreams and had very earthly concerns about them.

Meanwhile, we have Moses - this man who, despite being raised as a prince of Egypt, is by all accounts a pretty terrible social leader whose little brother has to do most of the logistical stuff. And yet, he perhaps has the deepest relationship with HaShem. He has the kind of relationship where G-d can appear right in the Tent for the sole purpose of looking Moses in the eye to proclaim “I am deeply hurt and angry!!” and Moses has the standing to say “I understand that, but you have a bad plan about it.” Isn’t that wild??

I’m glad this week was Sh’lach L’cha, there was so much in there to talk about and explore and it did so much to remind me of the simple fact that I LOVE Judaism!!! I’m gonna do my best to continue to embrace that more often even in the face of everything. I hope everyone is having a restful Shabbos 💙

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I took my little brother (autistic, mostly non verbal) out and he was using his voice keyboard to tell me something, and this little boy (maybe 4 or 5?) heard him and asked me "Is he a robot??" I tried to explain to him that no, he isn't a robot, he just communicates differently, but my darling brother was in the background max volume "I am robot I am robot I am robot I am robot"

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mold pisses me off so much

oh you have to eat your produce the moment it leaves the store or the fuckin Hungering Dust will get it. and. poison your food

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if UBI were a thing in the united states i would work maybe 4-5 months out of the year then fuck off to the appalachian trail for 6 months and i’d still have a month or so left to do literally nothing

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if you don't do anything else today,

Please have a moment of silence for the people who were killed instead of freed when news of emancipation finally reached the furthest corners of the american south.

have another moment for the ledgers, catalogs, and records that were burned and the homes that were destroyed to hide the presence of very much alive and still enslaved people on dozens of plantations and homesteads across the south for decades after emancipation.

and have a third moment for those who were hunted and killed while fleeing the south to find safety across the border, overseas, in the north and to the west.

black people. light a candle, write a note to those who have passed telling them what you have achieved in spite of the racist and intolerant conditions of this world, feel the warmth of the flame under your hand, say a prayer of rememberance if you are religious, place the note under the candle, and then blow it out.

if you have children, sit them down and tell them anything you know about the life of oldest black person you've ever met. it doesn't have to be your own family. tell them what you know about what life was like for us in the days, years, decades after emancipation. if you don't know much, look it up and learn about it together.

This is Juneteenth.

white people CAN interact with this post. share it, spread it.

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some highlights from my students’ romeo and juliet modern interpretation projects:

- someone made a username for friar laurence with 420 at the end - the same kid who put 69 in romeo’s username like i wouldn’t know what either of those things mean - the girl who added ‘clean’ at the end of all the songs on her juliet playlist like lmao girl i know spotify doesn’t have the clean version - the kid who said romeo and juliet killed each other - the weird dichotomy of kids who put love story on their playlist vs the kids who choose bad blood - the kid who wrote ‘get a room’ as tybalt’s comment on romeo’s couple pic - the kid who said ‘romeo is probably one of those douches who follows a ton of people so they follow him back and then he unfollows all of them’ - the one who legitimately used the word ‘alrighty’ do kids say this in their text messages???? i thought i was the one talking like an elderly person but okay - the one who made romeo’s username ‘montagoose’ - the only kid who acknowledged that posting about your secret relationship on instagram was a bad idea - the girl who wrote that romeo would unironically say ‘#blessed’. she’s right. - the one single solitary girl who wrote mercutio as gay as shakespeare did (she’s also the only one who used mercutio at all which is a tragedy but whatever) - the one who wrote romeo’s insta bio as ‘thus with a kiss i die… LOL RIP ME 😂💀’ - the one who made benvolio’s username benvoliYO