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[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

can't believe we might see a new world record run so soon. we may be only a few months away from a frame-perfect PM

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

this right here is why radfem lesbians are absolutely baffling to me. like they know the majority of their community doesn’t share their shitty beliefs right? most lesbians are NOT transphobic, most lesbians do NOT agree with them. just something to consider

(it is important to note that the group they surveyed was small, but this is definitely not the first time i’ve seen a study come to this conclusion, and a larger report will be released in june!)

obligatory link: https://www.justlikeus.org/blog/2023/03/31/trans-day-of-visibility-ally-lesbian/

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

Sourced from @hotweirdg0rl

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

You know, it occurs to me that the known internet phenomenon of Reddit “am I the asshole?” posts having completely misleading headers is actually a really great example of a far less known but far more common practice of extreme journalistic spin in cases where there are large monetary incentives to diminish the story in question.

Like, if you see a Reddit post titled “Am I the asshole for buying my wife a new dress?”, the post is pretty much always something totally deranged like: “I (48) really dislike the way my wife (20) dresses, because I think it’s too revealing and makes her look slutty, which was fine when we started dating five years ago, but it makes me feel like she’s going to cheat on me now that we’re married. I’ve politely asked her to get new clothes multiple times, and every time she refused because she said she liked her clothes, and didn’t want to waste money buying new ones. Yesterday I couldn’t take it anymore so I threw out a bunch of her old dresses and bought her a new one that was more modest looking. She started crying because one of the dresses I threw out had been left to her by her mom who died when she was a teen, but I couldn’t have known that it had sentimental value. She said that I should have asked, but obviously if I asked she’d have just told me not to throw out any of her clothes, including the ones that weren’t sentimental. Also, the more modest dress I bought was pretty expensive, and she never thanked me for it. Am I the asshole here, or is she being unreasonable?”

Similarly, whenever you see a headline like “Woman Wins Millions From McDonald’s Because Her Hot Coffee Was Too Hot”, if you dig a bit, you’ll almost always quickly find out that what actually happened was: A 79-year-old ordered coffee which, unbeknownst to her, was being served extremely dangerously hot, because McDonald’s was trying to have coffee that stayed warm over a long commute without spending any extra money on cups with better insulation. The coffee spilled on the old woman’s lap, giving her severe third degree burns over a huge portion of her body, including her genitals. She got to a hospital and they managed to save her life with skin grafting, but she became disabled from the accident, and her genitals and thighs were permanently disfigured. She tried to settle with McDonald’s for her medical costs, and McDonald’s refused to cover any portion of her medical expenses at all, and so she sued. At trial, the jury discovered that this same exact thing had happened seven hundred times before, and McDonald’s had still decided not to change their policy because paying out individual suits was cheaper than moderately reducing their coffee profits. As a result, the jury awarded punitive damages designed to penalize McDonald’s two days worth of their coffee profits, in addition to the woman’s medical costs.

I think it’s largely the same phenomenon, but I know a lot of people who are familiar with the first case, but don’t know to look for the second. If you see some totally outrageous “how could a person ever sue over this stupid thing?” case, you should immediately be incredibly suspicious that that’s all that actually happened, because a lot of the time, it absolutely isn’t. The people who have the most incentive to make their opponent look not only wrong, but completely crazy for having any sort of grievance at all, are often the actually unreasonable ones. 

Anyway this is all to say that if I see ANY of y’all automatically siding with McDonald’s over the recent case where 4-year-old girl was severely burned by their chicken nuggets because “hurr durr dumb kid didn’t know that chicken nuggets were hot, people sue over anything lol”, I will grab that McBoot you’re licking and shove it all the way up your McFuckingAss.

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

just a reminder that BetterHelp is selling your fucking data and that they themselves have said at industry meetings that they're a data-driven company more than a people-driven company

It feels like for a while in there that people were dropping them as a sponsor but now that the controversy has slightly dimmed there are so many ads for them again; do not give them your information, do not give them your money

I know insurance is a pain in the ass and mental health treatments cost too much out of pocket for most people. So do they, that's why they're making this little bait and switch operation. Helping people is, at best, a side product of their data harvesting, and at worst just a trick to lure people in.

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

I think it needs to become common knowledge that "inability to read social cues" can show up as overcompensating.

You don't know how much misbehaviour is allowed, so you become the perfect child who never tests rules.

You don't know if someone is irritated with you, so you'll be extra generous and self-effacing.

You don't know how much is expected of you at work so you'll kill yourself in a minimum-wage job and not notice that nobody else is working like this.

"Hardworking and quiet" should be as much of an autism red flag as "ignores rules and doesn't know when to stop talking". Or why don't we just start using words to communicate so i can stop tracking everybody's eyebrow twitches, that would be great.

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

Get cops/SROs out of schools.

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

The nativity scene at Claremont United Methodist church

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

So, I’ve been pulled over a few times in my life. Not many, but a few. And I’ve also been in a couple of cars that got pulled over. And let me tell you, if you were actually doing something wrong, the officer doesn’t make any small talk, just straight into “I clocked you doing 70 in a 55.” The only time I’ve ever gotten the “do you know why I pulled you over?” was the time when I wasn’t doing anything wrong, and I got let go even though he insisted to the end that I was doing 87 in a 70 (white privilege at work).

“Do you know why I pulled you over?” is a trap. It means there’s a good chance the officer doesn’t actually have a good reason to ticket you, and is trying to get you to waive your 5th Amendment rights and incriminate yourself. If you make a guess, that’s a confession of guilt.

But there’s another trap, that I’ve heard of but haven’t yet experienced. It’s “do you know how fast you were going?” With that one, they’re hoping you’ll say no, because then they can name whatever speed they want – you just said you didn’t know how fast you were going, if you deny the speed they name then you’re lying to them.

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

if you want young queers to want to associate with elder queers then maybe the culture shouldn't be so ridiculous and over the top. I get second hand embarrassment from drag queens and leather daddies and kinksters in puphoods acting like they represent all gays

I would much rather be represented by drag queens, leather daddies and pups than by petulant cowards afraid of their own reflection. You are talking about people who never had the option of being seen as "normal people who just happen to be gay" and channeled their pain into self expression, community and art. And who are you? You define yourself not in terms of who you are and what you create but in terms of who you are not and what you lack. These people you hate only seem larger than life because your life is too small and insignificant to fit them.

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

thank you to anon for letting me know about these tweets! these tweets highlight exactly how supporters of the right wing govt in india have been trying to change the narrative regarding covid-19 and it's destruction here! while this discussion surrounding funeral pictures is incredibly nuanced and some may even stand by their belief that pictures like this shouldn't be shared... i invite you to take a look at these series of tweets by indian journalist, rana ayyub, on their importance.

(tweets by @/SamiraNadkarni)

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

Cannot believe I am seeing people getting their tits bent out of joint about a man taking his daughter into a women's room. That shit was like, completely normal when I was a kid. We really have taken a flying leap backwards as a society into the Cootie Zone

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

Neil behind the camera all day tomorrow

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

I made another thing.

With apologies to Neil Gaiman.

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

a meditation on boundaries

i. 

Back when I thought I was straight I would go on dates with boys. The boys would usually want to kiss me. I disliked kissing, but I thought that their preferences deserved to count as much as mine, and I reasoned that they probably liked kissing more than I disliked kissing. So kissing was a morally good thing to do. I also reasoned that if I told them I disliked the kissing then they’d feel guilty and enjoy it less. So I did not tell them. 

I am certain I was making some kind of critical error but it has taken me a long time to figure out what it might be.

ii.

I like cuddling. I know some straight girls who like cuddling with their straight female friends but don’t want to cuddle with people who might be attracted to them because it makes them uncomfortable. But they don’t want to explicitly tell me this preference because they’re worried it’s homophobic. Ever since I learned that this dynamic was present in at least one friendship of mine I have not cuddled with any straight girls because there’s a plausible scenario in which I’d be making them uncomfortable and they wouldn’t tell me. 

Keep reading

[musings-of-a-pragmatic-idealist]

We live in a dystopia....