several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

@fabulousatlas

Do you mean people who have no “real” problems, or people who have real problems that you don’t personally understand. Hm.

People try not to be ableist challenge failed smh

Yall are making slurs and being racist to a group of people that doesn't even exist yet (robots). Unbelievable how frothing at the mouth you are to have an acceptable target, no wonder there's no much prejudice in this world if you people are like this!

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

Illustrated the story haha

Featuring Adam and his dinner

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

The canal was not a cornucopia. At least, not to most. Hardly any creature could manage to survive here, let alone thrive; if they didn't fall first to the toxic runoff, they'd fall to starvation. Only the carp, the catfish, and the rats had prevailed. Them, and the slew of artificial beasts escaping their test tube cages.

But over the years, Adam has learned to take what he's given. Being relegated to the role of a beast meant living like one; no matter what he may feel. Now he is speeding through the waters, in swift pursuit of a carp with two tails; it didn't manage to get far before his jaws clamped around its head with a 'crack’, muffled by water.

He would have once been able to rationalise himself from eating it raw. He's said himself, he does not need to destroy he lamb and the kid to glut his appetite; but desperation and hunger did not listen to moral principles. And so he puts the carp's belly to his mouth, pale dull skin giving way to his teeth. The taste of iron fills his mouth; mushy organs, lean bitter meat. He swallows it quickly. He strips the fish clean of its flesh, bit by bit, chunk by chunk. Letting the bare skeleton still slick with blood and entrails drift back into the water; he looks back; two other carp snapped at each other over those few pitiful scraps of meat.

It wasn't likely that they'd get any.

He continues on. Letting the murky water wash off the blood from his hands, his lip, his chin. Then he realises that it wasn't enough. So he drops onto the canal bottom. Covered in a slimed carpet of algae, he could always manage to find something— usually a catfish, or snails— crawling around in the bottom. But before he continues his search, his air runs out; he was forced to surface.

It was nighttime by now, the darkening, red-tinged remnants of the setting sun rapidly fading beneath the skyline. No, he wouldn't have any luck finding fish in the nighttime waters; he banks right, rotted talons pressing into the mud as he hauls himself ashore. He could hear little paws skittering across dirt, little furry silhouettes darting in and out of view. Too fast.

Footfalls barely audible against the dirt, he continues on. A hulking form, kelpy stringy hair dragging along with it. His nose twitches; he sees a dog-sized silhouette, bare ribs, hollowed-out belly and softening collapsing skin with flies already beginning to feast; and he sickens. He hurries past the corpse and tries not to think any more of it. Until, he comes face-to-face with glowing, green eyes.

A furtive, shrill hiss cuts through the air. A haggard, reptilian silhouette emerges; dog-faced, spiny, with a whip-thin tail. Around two thirds as large as him. And yet he starts backing away, one foot already placed in the water.

“Wait-“

The creature lunges forward, a whirl of claws and spines and yellowed teeth. He rolls to the side— watching the beast faceplant in the dirt— but clawed paws skid against earth as its paw whips towards him with renewed ferocity. His own hands rise up to shield himself, those claws opening gashes on his skin— for a moment he is in a standstill, grappling with the beast before he notices that whip-thin, stinger tail hurtle towards his face.

He kicks the beast with such force it was sent skidding back towards the water. He vaguely registers the cracking of ribs, a pained whine; he dares to look towards the water. The creature flails weakly in the shallows, its bony, haggard body gently rocked back and forth in the tide. The canal, giving its own twisted lullaby. He caught a glimpse of emerald scales in the moonlight, dashed across water; this finally compels him to approach.

The creature reaches a paw towards him as he steps forward, swiping weakly. Its mouth hung open, its breath rattling with blood.

‘I’m sorry,’ he mouths, as he reaches down and snaps its neck.

He turns away, about to walk off. That was when the adrenaline fades entirely and he finally realises how exhausted, and hungry he was. What little sustenance that fish had offered him vanished; and slowly, hesitantly, he finds himself glancing back at the broken carcass behind him.

‘No. Don’t do it. Don’t—‘

With hurried movements he drags the creature’s body ashore; he pins its limbs aside, his teeth tearing into scaled skin. It crunched, tore, gave way beneath; the sharp tang of iron filled his mouth. Lean muscle, soft guts. He fell upon it all like the starved dog he was; and in that moment shame takes the back seat. The carcass had seemed a feast to him then; within another hour it was stripped down to sinew and bone.

He would have once felt ashamed.

But now there is only the viscera he wipes from his chin.

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

????

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

I feel like the root of a lot of white people denying they’re racist comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of what racism is.

Most whites(even ones that would consider themselves progressive) misunderstand racism at its core when they believe it’s an attitude. That it’s the mindset of openly racist MAGA and Confederate flag assholes. But those are just the extremists. And as vile and insidious as those extremists are, the vast majority of racists are also the comfortable white middle that uphold the system and are complicit to it— because that’s right. Racism is not an attitude, it’s a system.

It’s white artists and media creators using people of colour as an exotic, alluring force. It’s voyeurism without understanding— just look at the Latina hottie in movies, the Asian babygirl, the swarm of video game character and costume designs that use vague, generic ‘tribal’ and ‘exotic’ elements. Looking at you, Genshin.

It’s the elevation of white voices, achievements and media to create a society that is saturated with whiteness. The fact that most people scorn DEI and misunderstand what it actually is— giving people of colour in the workplace ‘special treatment’ when said ‘special’ treatment was daring to have people of colour in the workplace function as equals and not tokens to wave around for diversity points.

In art and media, it’s filling spaces with white characters and Eurocentric beauty. As a kid, the only movie or show that I ever saw in North America who featured someone that looked like me was Mulan. Maybe two other shows or movies come to mind, but that’s it. And this is a problem in my native country(China) too. The rampant Eurocentrism in Chinese modern media and character design, where everybody has pale peachy skin, double lids and the same soft, dainty features.

Racism is not just the extremists. It’s the comfortable middle, the people who scorn DEI, the artists who make their Black and Brown characters the aggressive, physical ones. The artists that give Chinese characters kimonos, and the whites that deny any implications of racism because they are progressive, queer, neurodivergent or any combination of the above. Guess what, everybody is human. Nobody is immune to bias, racial or otherwise. I’m not exempt from this too; nobody is. But if you do not make an effort to acknowledge those biases, to put them aside and listen to nonwhite voices(for the love of god don’t say “as a white person—“ under some nonwhite person’s post about racism), if you are not trying to be aware of racism around you, and if you are not trying to put a stop to it in whatever way you can—whether online or in your community— you are a part of the system, and you are racist.

And don’t immediately try to deny that or react in hostility. Being racist does not mean somebody is immediately a part of the vilest extremists(although they might as well be), it just means that you are a part of the system of whiteness.

For more information into racism as a system, I recommend researching about critical race theory.

Good place to start but by no means comprehensive:

https://huemagine.medium.com/the-8-white-identities-a-brutally-honest-look-at-power-complicity-and-the-illusion-of-allyship-7149dec5c0d5

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

🫵 STOP! you are doomscrolling. tell me your favorite animal instead

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

I'd there anything that you'd like a prosthetic limb to be able to do? Like something that's not on the market but you could slip on to accomplish a task and then easily remove before it gets cumbersome?

I'm sorry i sat on this ask for so long, it's been very difficult to write an answer to this question that i feel is both honest and useful, but here's my best attempt at answering with what i consider to be an okayish amount of context...

I'm assuming you're asking because this post of mine blew up and got a lot of attention, and it looks like you're a maker that's keen on designing things to help disabled people and that's great! there are a lot of areas where products just don't exist but are of great help or need to people, and filling that gap is really really great! lots of people have lots of different needs, and many disabilities and situations can be helped with technological solutions, much of which need more development, both professionally and more grass roots.

but when it comes to my situation, ie upper limb amputee, i cannot stress enough: the problem is not prosthetic technology, the problem is other people, and ableism.

what i want people to focus on is that i can do almost everything i need to for myself without a prosthesis, using just my elbow, my nub (the soft squishy end of my residual limb), and a taking my time. a bit more awkward, a bit slower, more trips to the fridge and back, but i can do it. the things that i can't do myself, I'm lucky enough to have people to help me and happy to do so.

but what people actually focus on is prostheses, people love prostheses... so let's talk prostheses!

I have a myoelectric prosthetic "hand" - a big robot gripper that i can control with intentional nerve signals picked up via electrodes inside the socket that sits over my forearm; telling it to open and close on command, and controlling how fast it does so. the initial reason i wanted one was for soldering, because electronics is an on and off hobby i wanted to continue. I'm sure you know that through-hole soldering is at least a three handed job even for the regularly limbed, so i thought i needed it for that at least, and figured it would be handy (hah) to just wear all day for any task i might want two hands for.

well, in the four years of training and rehab and practice since... I'm fairly confident i don't actually need it for soldering, let alone anything else. my elbow grip and dexterity is good enough i can easily hold and aim a spool of solder without my prosthesis. i sometimes put it on to take out the trash, but that's just a time saver, it takes less trips and is faster than slinging bags over my nub arm. it has a little led flashlight in it that's useful at night outside sometimes? and as alluded to in the original post, it's got a small tip that can press little buttons that my nub can't, and that's the role i most often reach for it to fill.

but myo prostheses are a hassle to put on, often taking several attempts to get positioning right, it's hot and sweatty, there can be pressure sores, and it's real heavy in a way your shoulder never really gets used to. these are not really technological issues that need more research or smarts to solve, they're pretty fundamental limits of trying to attach any kind of medical devices to the human body. if i really had any big necessary use case for absolutely needing two hands, I'd go back to physical therapy and re-train to use a body powered prosthesis; the ones that secure with nice soft leather straps and use your opposing shoulder to control hook grip with tension wires. technology that hasn't changed in several centuries because we kinda already perfected it... it's low tech, reliable, has built in proportional control and feedback, and never features in science fiction because it's just not cool enough.

so why do i still bother? why keep my prosthesis, maintain it, have the socket padded so it keeps fitting, continue the slightly painful muscle control exercises instead of letting them atrophy and the damn robot hand sit on the shelf forever?

the problem is other people, and ableism.

when I leave the house in my natural body, nub on display for all to see (under an arm warmer because perpetually cold stump is a problem seemingly every amputee has to deal with)...

people stare. they notice me from a distance, no matter what i wear, how i carry my body. but it's not just staring. it's glaring, it's disgust, it's fear, it's dehumanisation. i have people recoil in horror, cross the street to avoid me, pull their children close to their bodies as if they might start dropping limbs if they get too close. people have stopped me in the street, from behind, demanding to know "what happened", I've had to get off trams at random stops to escape little old ladies insisting i disclose my highly traumatic medical history and that I'm being rude and uncooperative for not "educating" them on "such a fascinating curiosity"... or best yet, the one all my wheelchair using friends know inside out: forceful unwelcome "help" from strangers without even a hello, yet alone an ask. i once had a man leap to his feet and begin thrusting his hands towards my crotch because i wedged a water bottle between my thighs to unscrew the cap and he decided i was clearly incapable of doing it myself... and this isn't even getting into the ways that medical professionals treat me differently.

i go outside in my natural body, and I'm treated as a freak.

you know what happens when i go out wearing my prosthesis? children smile, adults mind their own goddamned business, leave me alone, and at absolute worst I've had a total of two people in four years talk to me about it, politely introducing themselves before saying "that's neat, how does it work?"...

because fiction and futurism have given people so many deeply ingrained fundamental ideas about prostheses and amputation that I am treated more like a human being while wearing a bulky robot claw with electrodes pressed into my skin, than when i dare to exist as i now naturally am.

this is also borne out by the hundreds of notes on my original post declaring we need to invest more, research more, design more, so that prosthetic technology is better and "works" and is cooler... and literally nobody asking why a piece of technology was designed in such a way that i needed to use my nose, needed to hold two buttons down simultaneously half a meter apart that are barely fingertip sized, when either of them being a toggle would work - a firmware fix that would take 30 seconds to implement if anyone actually thought about the real technological needs of limb different people, instead of scifi fantasies about improving prosthetic technology until its "indistinguishable from the human body", as if that goal should be self evidently desirable.

the actual technological solution to this situation, by the way, is a bracelet with a chopstick glued to it.

so.

*deep breath*

I'm sorry this was long and angry, I hope you can sense that my anger isn't directed at you, the question asker, but broadly at everyone and the way society perceives amputees/limb different people... and I hope anyone who reblogged my original post also shares this, because damn did tumblr miss the point of it!

to finish off, I'll give you the snippy snarky bitch response i originally had in consideration, before I decided to spend several hours on paragraphs of furiously slow one-thumbed attempt at shifting my audience's perception of prostheses... because legit it's great that you want to know how things can be improved for disabled people through technology! it's just that in this one particular case...

if you want to design some technology that would be most helpful to me but is totally absent from the current market, I'd like a portable pocket sized device that projects a psionic field to make ableds mind their own fucking business and just treat me like a human being when i go outside :3

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

The 2025 Gender Census is now open!

[ Link to survey ]

The 12th annual international gender census, collecting information about the language we use to refer to ourselves and each other, is now open until 30th August 2025.

It’s short and easy, for most participants it takes 5 minutes or less.

After the survey is closed I’ll process the results and publish a spreadsheet of the data and a report summarising the main findings. Then anyone can use them for academic or business purposes, self-advocacy, tracking the popularity of language over time, and just feeling like we’re part of a huge and diverse community.

If you think you might have friends and followers who’d be interested, please do reblog this blog post, and share the survey URL by email or at AFK social groups or on other social networks. Every share is extremely helpful!

Survey URL: https://survey.gendercensus.com

The survey is open to anyone anywhere who speaks English and feels that the gender binary doesn’t fully describe their experience of themselves and their gender(s) or lack thereof.

If you can't wait for survey numbers, you can click here for a public spreadsheet of non-secret info with graphs as it comes in, updated manually a few times per day.

Thank you so much!

[ Link to survey ]

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

[source: Prestin Thōtin-awāsis]

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

scars in fiction: I got this trying to save my lover from an assassin- but tragically, I was too late. now I carry the mark of my failure with me always, and I can never forget~

scars in real life: so I was trying to open macaroni sauce with a paring knife

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

People actually need to get a fucking grip. Like do they not realise that cyborgs are not entirely fictional and that there’s real people who need machines to survive lmao. Like what. Do people not realise that they’re just being bigoted all over again but the group doesn’t exist— or they don’t know of it. You can joke without it being at the expense of other people. Is this such a difficult concept.

Even then. As someone who is staunchly pro-transhumanism, and believes in a future where many people will be cyborgs, this is just weird. The mechanical human is not inferior, ‘subhuman’ or dangerous. People scream about the dangers of a robot uprising and then proceed to treat robots like actual shit. And if this is already happening in fiction, then what the hell is stopping these people from being bigots towards actual, sentient robots in the future, when they exist.

Yall are making slurs and being racist to a group of people that doesn't even exist yet (robots). Unbelievable how frothing at the mouth you are to have an acceptable target, no wonder there's no much prejudice in this world if you people are like this!

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

honor the request

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

(314 is on tumblr now, lmao. Main blog is @several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat . This blog is for RP and character related asks only.)

Am I supposed to write something here?

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

Lightning-struck.

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

🍀💚 today (august 3rd) is CLOVES syndrome awareness and research day ! 💚🍀

.. and like last year, i'm doing some charity commissions for it! :3 open from now until the end of august !

these commissions will be in support of the CLOVES foundation, who help fund research for treatments and further study on CLOVES syndrome! they also use their donations to pay for things like mobility aids and specially sized shoes and clothes for people with CLOVES who may need them :-)

donate at least $5 to the foundation, and i will draw + send you a custom lil abstract creature if u send me proof of your donation ! :3

my website - claim a commission or support me directly! i'm a young artist with CLOVES syndrome myself so i greatly appreciate any support <3

examples of some of my creatures under the cut! and more in #my art tag on my blog

click on each image to view it in full ! :3

these r what i call leviathans: creatures with long, spiky, winding bodies and often lots of teeth or eyes

some octopi and squids :3 :

and last but not least some whales and fish !

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

DAILY AFFIRMATIONS

1. I AM A GOOD LITTLE LAB EXPERIMENT

2. MY SUFFERING IS FOR THE GREATER GOOD

3. THE SCIENTIST THAT EXPERIMENTS ON ME LOVES ME UNCONDITIONALLY

4. I LOVE GOING INTO THE TUBE/JAR/INSERT RELEVANT APPARATUS OF CONTAINMENT

Reblog to share with your friends who are also Scientific specimens🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗🤗

[several-geese-in-a-trenchcoat]

"this is a universal queer experience"

>ask if it's universal or white

>they don't understand

>I pull out a diagram explaining what is universal and what is white

>they laugh and say "It's a good experience sir"

>I'm a native american trans woman

>Experience is white