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Would just like to say that this storm in SoCal is the perfect example of incompetence.
Not from the community though.
It has now been 11 (eleven) days without snow plows. San Bernardino County is offering shelter and food at the local high school and other places but the people (including me and my family !) can't even get there because the roads aren't plowed.
The National Guard is supposedly up here but we haven't seen or heard any sign of them.
We've had one grocery store a town over have the entire roof collapse from the weight of the snow.
As a total, my area has gotten over 9 (NINE) feet of snow in just under two weeks.
Gas leaks have begun everywhere because the pipes are shifting from the snow. Two houses that I know of have burned (basically exploded) from gas leaking and the fire department can't get there in time, because the roads haven't been plowed.
The community has turned to help each other though, offering to shovel snow off of decks and roofs to prevent collapse, offering extra food, water, firewood, medicine, pet food. We can't get down the mountain because the roads haven't been plowed and those who are able to find a way down can't get back up.
People need medicine, food, water, heat. We had a diabetic just around the corner who ran a high fever and thankfully made it to the local hospital in time. An emergency CAT plow had to come, but it still took a long time for it to get through the snow. 911 is useless at the moment, they are two to three (2-3) days behind emergency requests. If you're in trouble, you're on your own.
In the meantime, the news is showing lovely helicopter footage of the pretty snow covered mountains (I'm tired of hearing helicopters overhead every 15 min) and San Bernardino County is patting themselves on the back during press conferences saying how good of a job people are doing to help with relief. They have done NOTHING. And the sheriff (who doesn't have jurisdiction over this issue) is trying to deny the hospital helicopter from taking off and landing up in the mountains because there "is too much air travel so it would be dangerous to have this helicopter in the air" but all of the news helicopters doing nothing are perfectly fine. That helicopter has saved lots of lives so far and is the only way down the mountain for those in desperate medical need.
There have been unprecedented avalanches in nearby mountain communities. Forest falls, just below Big Bear, has no water. An avalanche took their water tower out.
The mountain communities need plows. Yes, food and water and shelter are nice in theory, but get us PLOWS. If people can get down the mountain and around town to help others, that would be the best way to get through this.
My family has enough food and heat, thankfully. But we only planned for 2 weeks when we heard of the storm. It's been 11 (ELEVEN) days. The only news we've heard of a plow coming is within 1-2 weeks at minimum. We might run out of dog food, cat food, firewood. And what about other people who didn't stock up or didn't have the money to stock up? What about short time rental users who excepted to be up here for a few days and are stranded without supplies?
Get the mountain communities plows.
#sorry for the long rant#but its so frustrating seeing the news do nothing#and people down the mountain going 'oh look how pretty the snow is'#snow is deadly#socal#southern california#crestline#big bear#lake arrowhead#forest falls#san bernardino#san bernardino mountains#might be doxxing myself but this is important for people to know#irl
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Don't get involved with Wookieepedia
We all know Wookieepedia — it’s the Star Wars wiki, and an invaluable resource for fic writers everywhere. I’m not telling you not to look at Wookieepedia, but I do need to warn you not to get involved with the community. If you do want to edit it, then never join the discord or get involved with the forums (Senate Hall). It’s a cesspit of bigotry, and you cannot change it.
I tried. Along with a very well-known and vocal user named Immi Thrax, we tried to push back against misogyny and queerphobia. We thought we succeeded. You might have seen supposed “progress” on Wook: the addition of pronouns in the infobox, the addition of an anti-discrimination policy and an apology from the male wook admins for historical abuse towards marginalised editors. We did this. We, along with a small group of queer women and nonbinary editors, badgered the admins to write that apology for months, spoon-feeding them the things they needed to address and telling them that the early piss-weak drafts were unacceptable. We demanded infobox pronouns. We demanded an anti-discrimination policy and worked with them to add a glossary.
And then they ran us off the website.
We had a side server specifically for women and nonbinary people, with a few channels that also contained men we trusted. A woman (who was voted in as an admin after Immi) took screenshots from this private server and then posted them publicly. The screenshots were taken completely out of context and misrepresented their contents. The woman who took the screenshots deleted messages in them to make us look worse. They slandered us and put us in danger, because Immi has been targeted by dangerous corners of the internet before (which they were well aware of), and we were terrified we would be doxxed. All of the men approved of this, forced Immi to resign, and spread blatant lies about us. Wook users attacked us, and it was deemed perfectly acceptable to do so.
When I wrote the initial forum post about sexism and misogyny on the website, Master Fredcerique, one of the admins, told me that he was in fear of losing his job during 2021 because of discord screenshot leaks, and that "Safety for everyone was of utmost importance" to him, hence requesting I not provide usernames for my examples of bigotry. It is clear that Immi, myself and others in those screenshots do not count in this 'everyone'. I wonder why he wanted to protect the perpetrators of misogyny but was happy to endanger women!
As a result of this horrific breach of trust and privacy, every single queer woman and almost every nonbinary wook editor has left the site. We were too radical, and they had to destroy us. Sure, a woman did this, but I don’t think it’s an accident that a cishet woman who self-describes as a Republican in Florida forced the two loud leftist lesbians off the site. And the men approved of everything she’s done and contributed to it. One (1) man (notably not an admin) stood up for us, and he was banned for doing it.
So don’t join wook. If you do edit, don't trust anyone. Have every single conversation about wook in public, where people can never take your words out of context. Do not participate in DMs, group chats or any wook-related servers, including the official one. Marginalised editors' very existence is a disruption to the status quo of Wookieepedia, and there is every possibility you will be seen as a threat, even if you are not initially treated as one.
#star wars#wookieepedia#wookiepedia#the likelihood i'm going to be permabanned on wook for this post is very high tbh#i just really don't want any other marginalised people to go through what i did bc it absolutely destroyed me#update i did get permabanned for this
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Lunar's mental health. An update.
TW: bad mental health, EDs, depression, s/h, personal stuff, suicidal thoughts, anxiety, vent, self hate, heavy topics.
Sorry I haven't been posting!!
An update on me.
...Hi, you might know me as Lunar, or, TheLunarSystemWrites! I'm just an artist on here, trying to do things I like.... right?
Well, unfortunately, real life doesn't really... care. It doesn't care if I have friends to talk to, art to make, things I like to do.
I've been exhausted, physically and mentally. I've been busy working a lot in our home. (Painting, building, packing, inside work, cooking, etc) and it's always stressful... we're starting to get a little tight on money.
I've spent majority of my time in my bed. I don't wanna face my family members, so I've hidden away. It's hard to get up every day, and try to find the will to take care of myself.
I also recently relapsed with Bulimia, a disorder that, essentially means I throw up whatever I eat. I've been purging since September 16th, 2022. But I had awhile where I only purged once a day or none, but I'm back at it with full force. So my body doesn't have any energy left. I've also now lost my periods do to it.
I don't sleep well. It's much easier to stay up all night than waste my only free time sleeping. So I have no energy from sleeping well unless I sleep a whole day away, which makes me groggy.
Self harm is also something bothering me too, I'm too tired to do it and yet I keep doing it. Wasting precious spoons on it, I literally can't be clean for a whole year this year, that dream is dead. But, I am a few days clean as I type!
Suicidal and intrusive thoughts have been.... pesky. But I can't just leave my friends, plus I have prizes to make.
But, I'm unmotivated. I can't seem to write or draw anything. All my art is looking... regressed, to me. Everything is repetitive.
I've hated myself now more than ever in my life, I'm in a pretty bad place and I hate how self aware I am.
SPEAKING of regression! I have like, regression block. My brain isn't working with me, isn't regressing unless Involuntary. So my main coping mechanism is.... out of order.
I've been angry at the world, really pissy and moody. Tired, hungry, sad, then happy but not much. Numbness is a huge factor, I'm feeling depressed.
Not to mention, there's drama everywhere I look. This creator gets bullied, that one turns out to be disgusting. People get doxxed over opinions... it's constantly anxiety that I'll be wrongly accused, ridiculed, or abandoned. It's terrifying that people will go at each other's throats. It's exhausting to deal with it and be dragged into drama with problematic people.
Every day has been the same for me for the past 3 years. I'm tired, bored, understimulation controls me.
My friends are my lifeline right now.
I feel uncomfortable in my own body all the time, unsatisfied with my art, everything is essentially falling apart in my life.
Depression, anxiety... not a good mix to wake up disoriented and anxious, then gave zero spoons throughout the day. I'm not in a good home situation right now.
So... I kinda just... haven't been posting, role-playing, answering DMs, answering asks, etc...
I'm burnt out.
I feel like I'm a walking corpse.
Useless even.
I don't feel like myself anymore, I barely have the energy to talk to friends, every little bad things sets me back. I just can't bring myself to really engage much anymore.
So... sorry. I'm sorry, if I wasted your time. Or if this isn't like what you wanted to hear. I'm just not okay anymore, April was the last good month I had this year. APRIL.
I just wanted to update you all, there's a lot of other stuff I didn't share because it's nit important. I swear I'll get to the prizes eventually, I just ain't up to it right now. Might not be for awhile, apologies in advance!!
Hope you guys can understand, I might or might not be back to doing art, who knows. But I'll definitely get things done before that if I ever stopped. It just doesn't bring me joy, I used to hope I'd make an AU people cares about, and I've barely achieved that ^^"
Hope you're all well!! Stay safe, take care!! Remember to hydrate and to try eating if you can, you're spectacular!!!
Daily clicks!! ^^
Previous pinned post.
#tw selfhate#tw depressing thoughts#tw depressing stuff#tw depression#tw depressive#tw depressing shit#tw sui talk#tw ed implied#tw ed discussion#tw ed not ed sheeren#tw eating issues#tw mental health#tw mental illness#Tw vent#tw sh related#tw sh in tags#tw anxiety#vent post#tw personal#update post#Intro post#blog info#pinned post#pinned intro#Important
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i liked your dnp stuff but the fact that you still feel comfortable posting dnf is actually insane. regardless of the details of the situation why would you even want to think about those men they're such creeps.
I'm happy to hear you liked my Dan and Phil stuff!
Unfortunately I think we're just going to disagree on the rest of your message. The fact that you think they're creeps indicates to me that you're being very truthful and you don't care to look into the details of anything, which we differ on. The details of the situation are actually very important to me, and not at all something I want to disregard.
Here's a fun detail: did you know the campaign against Dream, the root of all of this public opinion about him, started on Kiwi Farms? I'm not going to link it because it's a vile site, but if you've never heard of it you can google for verification. It's an alt right hotbed where the users orchestrate mass harassment and doxxing of anyone they don't like. This is not an insubstantial fan defense of Dream - like I said, you can literally google it. You can look at the thread on him, the over five hundred pages of it. You can see them planning how they'll take him down and spread the lies/rumors.
Can you guess why they might not like an openly queer, neurodivergent content creator in the gaming space? Their actual goal was to try and see if they could get him to kill himself. They set out to start enough rumors that would go mainstream and spread enough about him (doxxing him, his family, etc) and it worked, to an extent. He didn't kill himself, but they absolutely succeeded in making people who aren't familiar with him genuinely believe he is an awful person though none of the facts really stand up because his story is just like most other people's. He grew up in a conservative home and had some dodgy posts about politics from when he was fifteen. (Did you know Phil Lester did the same thing?) That's been warped into "Dream is a Trumper Republican." when he's absolutely not. He's not perfect, but he's literally just a human being who has had a growth trajectory that people want to ignore because it doesn't fit the "creepy" box they think he belongs in.
He was in an abusive relationship as a teenager (where he was abused) and he had some messy situationships with other people his age. Most people with a high school/teenage social experience also go through that. But Dream's actions at 17/18/19 are held on a pedestal compared to real life (not online) adult relationships instead of other messy teenagers. None of the allegations about him are true. They came from fans who couldn't provide any proof, and burner accounts. They were all dropped and recanted. But people don't want to hear him clear things up. They don't want to see that people admitted they were lying. It doesn't fit the narrative of creepy.
Anyway - like I said, I'm glad you liked my dnp stuff, and I wish you the best! But I'm just not someone who is going to distill people down into one specific category or drop anyone based on public opinion without looking at the facts myself and coming to my own conclusion.
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Me adding my two cents is probably not gonna do much, but here I go, I guess:
I want to preface this with saying that Wilbur's content and Lovejoy have been incredibly important to me and I've put a lot of time, effort and money into supporting Lovejoy especially. So finding out about this, before finding out about the details, I had originally reacted with incredulous derision of twitter stans. And then erring on the side of caution about how things developed.
At this point there's almost no question that it's Wilbur, for the simple reason that Shubble would have cleared up his name if it wasn't. There's no way she would throw someone innocent under the bus, if she knew somebody else was guilty. Additionally, not a single person in Wilbur's surroundings has disputed any claims and have only narrowed it down further towards Wilbur. At this point it is incredibly unlikely she is talking about anybody else.
I do want to take a moment to comdemn those (mostly on twitter) who used this opportunity to dig into both Shubble and Wilbur's private lives, trying to construct a narrative of her abuse and in some cases going so far as doxxing Wilbur. It is entirely possible to support Shelby and condemn her abuser, without invading their privacy and endangering people's lives. Shelby's goal was to warn people and to make them more aware of the signs of abuse. As well as make it as clear as possible, who she's talking about without saying who it is directly, for a meriad of possible reasons. It was not an invitation to write abuse fanfiction about her private life.
That being said, the way I will feel about this in the long run will depend heavily on how Wilbur deals with this situation. I will definitely distance myself either way (slowly but surely), but his reaction to this will influence how I will act moving forward.
Should he stay silent or respond with insincerity/derision/defensiveness/etc., then that's it for me. Fuck him.
But should he come forward, own up to it, apologize and prove that he is working on himself, then I might be able to find it in myself to give him a second chance over time. I just don't believe that doing bad things makes you irredeemable forever and ever and ever.
We know for a fact that Wilbur has been struggling with mental health problems for most of his teen and adult life and from his solo music we are also aware that he is incredibly aware of the fact that he is the problem in his relationships. Expressing dark thoughts in music, does not automatically mean somebody is abusive. In fact, creating dark art is an excellent way to deal with harmful thoughts and impulses. I have literally never taken his lyrics to mean that.
However, his lyrics in YCGMA and MSR have always been incredibly autobiographical and do show that he is acutely aware that he's the unhealthy element in his unhealthy relationships.
We also know directly from him, that he has distanced himself from most of his social circle and sought out therapy as recently as 2 weeks ago in an effort to improve his mental health.
This does not excuse his actions whatsoever. Mentally ill people are still responsible for the harm that they cause and Shelby is unbelievably brave to tell their story. I hope they finds peace, I hope she has all the support she could ever need and I hope she has achieved her goal of making people more aware of how people end up in situations like this. She is an inspiration for standing up for herself like this.
But I also think that, should Wilbur come forward, admit to his wrongdoings and prove over time that he is working on becoming a better person, friend and partner, that he does not have to be shunned forever and ever and ever. He has a long life in front of him and I hope both for him and all his future friends and partners that he manages to find a healthy, happy way of living. This can happen, even while he never bothers Shelby, or the other people he hurt, again.
This is a best case scenario. I do think he is allowed to take some time to formulate a response. A hasty response to situations like this have never helped anyone ever, neither the victim, nor the accused. Taking his time to come to terms with the situation, which surely came as a shock, and to really think about how he wants to deal with this situation is much better than him writing a twitlonger as soon as he finds out.
Either way, I will distance myself from him and Lovejoy, slowly but surely. I won't get rid of the merch clothing I own because it was quite expensive and throwing it away is a waste of perfectly good clothing, but I won't find the joy I once felt wearing them. (I am salty about me being gone from home for a few months and having ordered Lovejoy merch, which had been waiting for me for weeks and then finding out about this literally the day I travelled back. It definitely felt weird as hell to unpack that stupid NORMAL longsleeve with his fucking face on it, while being hurt and confused and angry.)
Listening to Lovejoy's music, likewise, will never feel as euphoric as it once did, even if I go back to it. Which really sucks cuz they genuinly hit my sweet spot in music taste. YCGMA and SISV specifically, have been so, so important to me and removing them from my listening rotation i going to Hurt.
Interestingly, I don't feel quite as terrible as last time I had to suddenly cut a content creator out of my life. So I guess practice makes perfect lmao.
I don't know if me writing and posting this had any point. I guess I just wanted to get it off my chest and maybe it resonates with somebody.
Anyway, take care of yourselves. Take it easy and try to focus on other things, if this hit you hard (ideally offline). Try to meet with friends, maybe play some boardgames (or video games), go for a walk,read a book, have a coffee with a loved one. There's joy in the world, despite it all.
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hello! feel free to answer this privately if you want, or not answer at all, but i wanted to ask how you balance your anonymity on tumblr while working in politics/communications. like, do you ever get scared of your employers finding your blog? anyways i hope you have a wonderful day 🙏
yeah--it is a big concern. and yeah--i do worry about it a lot. i try to manage it by keeping any personal social media accounts i have under my real name very separate from my tumblr stuff. i don't really post on the accounts under my real name a lot, and don't post anything about politics there basically. conversely on here i try to remain as nonspecific as i can so i dont dox myself.
and it's like, yeah-- I could easily just like not talk about politics on tumblr and mitigate all risk whatsoever. because the big thing about actually working in politics that i don't know that the average person understands is that unless you're a freelance commentator, you're...not really supposed to talk about politics online unless its in support of your "team."
however, i think my thought process is that i do have some specific and detailed knowledge about the american political system and process that might help those i know find a little more clarity on what's going on-- because it is frustrating and confusing and terrifying and despite what some people might say, the answer to all the problems is not burning the city down. if i can help just a few people understand how to try to use this deeply flawed system to start to make things better and not just give up as the world seemingly gets worse every day, i think that's important. i've heard having any positive take nowadays or wanting to craft solutions instead of revolutions be called hopeless naivety. I just call it hope. We aren't going to be the first generation in history to solve all the world's problems. The goal is to try enough new things and not fail in the same way others have before so that people going forward can better know what doesn't work and start getting things right.
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Bottom of the barrel isekai reviews:
Todays title: Welcome to demon school iruma
hi, im back, tell a friend.
Anyways we will be looking over something populer, and only a few images this time. I want this to be a nice slide back into the mix while I get ready to boil myself alive by reading shitty isekais.
"b-b-b-b-but dox!" you say, your form emaciated and ghoulish from months of little to no attention "how is it an isekai?"
Normally an isekai requires some form of passage into another world through death, but again, we are going to consider any and all portal fantasies to be on-par with isekais. as death and jumping through a funky portal are really kinda the same thing if you think about it.
so! plot synopsis, we open on the titular character iruma! they are being sold to a demon, don't worry this action will be the literal best thing that has ever happened to them. Also, added treat, slavery is not a running theme in this manga! HURRAY! WE HAVE FOUND OVERCOME THE BARE FUCKING MINIMUM! HUZZAH FOR MEDIOCRITY! MY DESIRE TO RUN MY HEAD THROUGH A ARC OF GONGS UNTIL THE SOUND WAVES LIQUIDATE MY BRAIN MATTER HAS LESSENED!
anyways we get to know some important plot points between the buyer and the product! (our mc)
iruma is a 14 year old yes man. They say yes to everything, even yes to the idea of breaking child labor laws! as their parents are frivolous unimportant freaks that spend way too much money then bolt, leaving him to work off the debt. Anyways, that's how this happened. they wanted dosh, and our buyer, we will call him grandpa!
Why is he so interested in buying a child? simple! He is rich and wants to have a grandson, unfortunately, he does not have a dick due to war injuries... ok thats a lie, he just wants a grand kid.
Anyways this is a very interesting title in the fact that it is still in a way, a power fantasy, but the power in that fantasy is separated towards other things.
It is a story in which you have the power to be helped. The adults in this manga are actual competent adults, they are there for the protection of the children, they are there to guide, nurture, train and help them grow. Despite differences or annoyances some may have, those are secondary to the ferocity they show when it comes to ensuring the protection of their students.
Iruma does have a lot of “i am the chosen one” but it is not something that automatically aids him in most situations, in fact it is the triad of facts of “I am a human”, “I want to help”, “I am determined” that allow him to rise both in power and social standing. The might makes right idealism of the underworld forced to reckon with people that stop to drag someone across the finish line.
As for the plot, it goes along a few separate arcs; there is a very clear progression of time as Iruma gets older. Mostly split into two parts. Irumas social life, in which we get to see him become better and better friends with the students and faculty at this school. Showing both the give and take as they both show how far they are willing to go for each other.
The second half is the mystery and political intrigue of the demonic society at large. The idea of a demon king has gone missing, disciples of which are eager to try and resurrect him as they see no one who is more suitable for the role, opposing forces trying to groom the top students at various schools into the role of king in a contest of disciples.
I think you should give it a read, its cute, the designs are fun and the power system while simple is still enough to give the action that is there a lot of meat. It's also satisfying thing to read if you just got done with a shounen and you are wondering “where the fuck are the adults? Why are these children doing everything?”
Draw backs. Not a lot but some of the students are essentially drawn as adults and there are parts where you will feel slightly skived out by.
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(Sorry, brain dump ahead)
I need to tell y’all something, but I feel like only my older followers will understand what I’m talking about
When I was writing my informative paper on proshipping and anti shipping, including all the arguments for and against each side, I realized something very important.
I have family that I live with. I have friends with their own families. I have pets. I have a job now with coworkers who I care about. And while none of these things give a shit about fiction and internet morals (hell, I’ve had conversations with just about everyone I know about this stuff, and we all agree for the most part), I would give a shit if I was doxxed and put the people in my life in danger. I realized that if I post that document, and the right people saw it, I would put them in danger. I’m not willing to be a martyr for fandom drama. I’ve seen what antis are capable of doing, I’ve seen how they’ve indirectly killed people and how they’ve directly ruined lives. I don’t want that. I care about, not only my own well being, but also the people who I care most about. That’s not to say that anti harassment and anti censorship aren’t important to me, by any means. But my real life takes precedence over my internet life.
If there’s one thing I learned from that paper I wrote (but didn’t post), it’s that the internet is cruel and unjust. It’s that I could never feel comfortable with myself if I labeled myself as an anti. I made it clear that I’m proship, and that paper I wrote is the reason I’ve come to this conclusion. I did my own reaserch, form an unbiased standpoint, while choosing to side more with antis, and I came out of it as proship. My tastes in fiction have not changed. But my understanding of the topic did change. That paper has nearly a year’s worth of research put into it, and it would piss people off. It would, more importantly, piss off antis. I’ve seen what happens when antis get pissed, and I’ve been on the receiving end of the mild version of it. Many times. I’m not willing to go through the version where they don’t hold back. My paper included many documented examples of it, and since the time of writhing it, there have been so many more. I’m not going to be another one of those people who have their lives ruined over stupid fandom discourse.
It’s more than just internet drama to me though, regardless. I know that this is more than just fandom. At its core, it’s all forms of fiction and what is and is not acceptable. It’s about bullying and harassment, and how it keeps getting worse as time goes on. Not just internet harassment either. It’s happening in the American school system every day, people I knew when I was in high school were forced to drop out, get their ged, or do online schooling because of the real world harassment they were receiving. The way that my generation, and the generation bellow me, views other people is appalling. Bullying is just “funny”, and I can’t stand it. The internet is at the core of this issue, of course. It’s taught impressionable minds that other people are like npcs. Cancel culture has taught us that if you step out of line, even for non-issues, then you are the scum of the earth and deserve what’s coming to you. And if you see someone who steps out of line, you need to be ruthless. It’s better to attack other people, so long as the negative attention isn’t on you. Even the older generations are affected. This isn’t something we should be ignoring, but we are. Antis in fandom spaces might seem like it’s not a big deal, but it’s a rabbit hole that runs deeper than people realize.
My paper made me realize this, it made me realize that society sucks, the government sucks, the internet sucks, and I’m pro-freedom to do whatever you want so long as it doesn’t hurt real people. At the end of the day, I’m not going to be a martyr. I refuse that role. You shouldn’t want to be a martyr either. Be kind to people, that’s what’s important. Create spaces where people know they are safe to do whatever the hell they want so long as it doesn’t hurt real people. Stand up for real people who are being hurt by others. Stop harassment, stop hate. I’m tired of seeing people hurt each other over fictional characters who don’t exist. Don’t put yourself or others in danger. Block people who spread hate, and don’t give them a platform to be hateful.
I’m rambling, but for me, there’s no real good outcome unless people suddenly realize that being hateful because of fiction is dumb. I’ve become tired of trying to explain to antis why it’s dumb, there’s no way to talk to many of them. I also can’t risk the safety of others for an issue that only I’m focusing on. There’s other problems in the world, and in my personal life. I just want to be kind, at the end of it all. And I want others to feel the same. But then again, just being kind to others would solve a lot of the worlds problems if everyone followed that rule.
I need to shut up now though, sorry for the dump lol
#rambles#proship#profic#anti anti#profiction#comship#anti censorship#anti harassment#fandom discourse
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A Call to Action
Hi all.
I wish I had better news to give. I thought long and hard about whether or not I should share this because I will be functionally doxxing myself when I do. But I've had several days to sleep on it and think about what to do. I've come to the conclusion that this is more important than me. This will be a long post but I urge you to read all of it. I'm afraid I have to be thorough here given the situation.
I think everyone who has been following me for more than a week knows how much I love religious studies as a field. It is my single greatest passion in life.
Unfortunately my school, UNC Greensboro, is trying to eliminate our department under claims of it being "not financially justifiable," among others (including anthropology and all Korean language classes.) These claims are highly spurious. Debunking this in full will take some time but I'll try to cover as much ground as I can in the relatively short space I am given and provide some sources. If anyone needs further elaboration, I'll report to the best of my abilities.
This is all to lead into the fact that I would like to provide some opportunities for people to help us out over here, which I will cover at the end. The shortest possible version is: please signal boost this. I do urge you to read it in full, though.
With the first introduction out of the way...
A Second But Very Brief Introduction to Religious Studies and a Justification of Its Presence in Academia (Given the Natural Bent of this Site is Sometimes Towards Antitheism)
Feel free to skip this if you have any familiarity with religious studies as a discipline, I'm putting it here because I find that it's often confounded with theology and every time I talk about it someone asks me if I'm going to be a priest (no.)
To be clear, religious studies is not theology. It does not purport the existence of any higher spiritual powers or presences. It is strictly the study of religion and spirituality as a force in human culture. This falls under both negative and positive effects, and covers everything from historical impact to individual psychology to macrosociological effects of religion to the simple understanding and study of mythology and folklore.
While internalized cultural norms are of course an issue that must be overcome by any scholar, for a religious studies scholar the Catholic Worker, the Sikh ragi, and the long-dead Sumerian ašipu should all have their beliefs and inner lives treated with the exact same sort of gravity and understanding, no matter how far their own beliefs might be from our own. It is, in my subjective opinion, the most humanizing of all the humanities because we are forced to operate on a deeply personal, vulnerable level.
I wish I didn't have to explain why these sorts of skills are important, especially given the current climate of intolerance that has been growing across the world and the growth of anti-intellectualism. I recognize that I might have to but I don't want to linger on that given everything else I have to cover in this post. Go ahead and ask as I do love talking about my field but I might take some time to answer.
A Brief Summary of Events Beforehand
My school has hired a firm known as rpk Group (lack of capitalization true to actual title) to restructure school funding financially with a focus on eliminating programs deemed to not earn enough for the school. Here is a brief explanation from the source itself. I apologize if the school website's CSS is still broken and it's difficult to read due to the social media icons being about thirty times the size they should be. Apparently they couldn't find the funding to pay a web designer instead of an expensive financing firm.
Those of you who have kept up with news in American academia may recognize this as the same group that forced cuts at West Virginia University. Please keep that in mind as we go forward.
Here are the high points:
Religious studies attained a passing grade under the rubric set out by the school. There have been active attempts to hide the scoring system from anyone but faculty. The spreadsheet in which the data was published has been password protected (source, which also contains several other refutations to the chancellor's talking points.)
For those who wish to keep score, anthropology did as well and our anthropology program is known for being quite good. This is without going into the other benefits the anthropology program provides the school with, which include such things as a community garden.
There were lower scoring programs that were kept. In other words, the decision-making process has been entirely inscrutable.
This is supported by the fact that the administration has been giving out incorrect numbers regarding program attendance to both news outlets and students, with some programs proposed to be cut having their student enrollment off by several factors.
Religious studies had over five times as many students as was originally reported. The Chinese language minor was reported to have zero students when there were thirty-six. To operate with this level of error from alleged professionals beggars belief and undermines any faith I would've had in this process.
The administration has claimed that they used the correct numbers in their rubrics. As they will not publish further data to myself nor the public, I have no evidence this is actually true.
They were going to cut Korean language as a minor. We don't have a Korean language minor. We do have a track of Korean language and I am given to understand as of this semester, culture courses. Which are operated solely by one professor and are consistently full or close to capacity due to popularity. There is no evidence they are losing the school money and I have several testimonials that the Korean culture-related programs have drawn students to UNCG as it is a unique niche the school gives not just over other UNC schools but over other colleges and universities.
Faculty and students were given information about what programs would be cut at precisely the same time, through an email sent schoolwide. Many students and faculty were in class at the time this was sent and had to proceed as if they weren't about to have their programs eliminated.
The administration alleges that current students will be able to finish their degrees. I have little faith this is the case for reasons that will take a while to get into but, to summarize as briefly as possible, completion of a degree here requires certain high-level classes that may be difficult to obtain with faculty cuts.
The chancellor alleges that Jewish Studies and Islamic Studies will not be affected by the elimination of religious studies, despite the fact that they are hosted under the department and Islamic Studies uses the same funding. As such, I believe that the highly technical and academic category used to refer to this sort of thing is "a blatant lie."
The administration has tried to quietly edit out any errors in original reporting. I am pleased to report that, as many of us intensely online people know, the Wayback Machine exists. Here is the original statistically incorrect press release that was given, which they have tried to bury.
While they have held forums, these have largely been ceremonial gestures rather than serious attempts at communication. At the one I went to, all non-administration speakers were given only two minutes to speak while the chancellor and dean were given as much time as possible to respond. Their responses to concerns were often dismissive and rarely addressed the necessary issues. I believe any person present will back me up on this, though I am not currently in possession of a voice recording.
I must operate within the evidence I am given. The best-faith interpretation of their actions is that the metrics they were using to determine what cuts should be made are incorrect and must be re-done before going through with any sort of program cuts, and that the administration's collaboration process with the group they employed is poor to nonexistent given the scattershot information provided. There is very, very clearly a communications breakdown somewhere along the line that raises this entire procedure into question.
I think it goes without saying it's all downhill from there. The level of arbitrariness with regards to cuts, lack of professionalism, and total lack of transparency would lead a reasonable person to believe there are heavy political motivations involved here and not simple brute facts. You are welcome to draw your own conclusions anywhere along this spectrum, of course. I encourage you to be skeptical.
Lastly, if I can't convince you that it's worth stopping this process to save religious studies, think about the anthropology department. Think about the languages that are getting cut. Think about physics or mathematics. A large-scale public university without a physics program is quite frankly unreal and the fact it's primarily humanities being targeted runs parallel with some sinister trends within American education. This process should, at the very least, be halted for time being.
What You (the Reader) Can Do
Firstly, be aware that we have until February 1st before decisions are finalized. I apologize for the short time limit. Myself and other members of the community were taken completely by surprise as well, and once again as I mentioned above it has caused some level of cynicism around the motivations of the administration.
With that out of the way...make noise about this. The school administration is making all efforts to keep this quiet. I can say the good news is that according to other people on the ground, they are beginning to lose control of their narrative that they are making difficult financial decisions to keep the school financially solvent.
Believe it or not, the farther removed you are, the better. If this hits a national scale then the school may be finally forced to acknowledge they are rapidly causing the otherwise prestigious UNC system, typically considered to be one of the best public university systems in the US, to be a national laughingstock and that they will lose money as their reputation declines in a way that they would not have if they'd simply carried out this process in a more reasonable way.
You can sign our petitions here and here. Easy enough, takes about three minutes, self-explanatory.
Finally, reach out to an academic or any passionate learner in a specialized field today. A lot of us feel understandably threatened and demoralized. Again, this is not just about me or even about my school. This is about trends within the American education system. Explaining the hows and whys in full detail is not within the scope of this post, but I think a reasonable person can conclude after looking at the current evidence that there is a dismantling of American schools in favor of a corporatized existence. For those of us who love knowledge and learning, this is incredibly sinister. Knowledge should not have a price tag put on it.
A Final Word
I and several other people have Chancellor Gilliam on record saying that he has dedicated his life to working at the collegiate level and towards students. While he and the administration have tried to ensure that their statements outside of highly controlled environments are not easily accessible, I should be able to provide a clip if needed given that this statement was livestreamed and North Carolina is a one-party-consent state in regards to recordings.
They have consistently characterized this process as having to make hard decisions to keep the university afloat. The chancellor is currently the highest-paid employee within UNCG itself and the fourth highest-paid member of administration within the UNC system as a whole (source.) Please be aware this does not include other benefits, which in 2022 put his salary above $500,000 (source.) As others have, I must ask why these "difficult decisions" within the school have not included a salary cut for himself if he is so dedicated to improving the lives of students.
Thank you for your time and consideration. If you've gotten this far, you've already listened more than anyone outside of the academic departments have and that means a lot to me in and of itself.
#religious studies#mythology#college#studyblr#college life#university#north carolina#theology#religion#unc#tagging in as much stuff as i can think of lol#anything is worth a shot at this point#academia
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For about 10 or 12 days I had a Discord Server called Eclectic Grove. I was excited about this server because it was something I wanted to create for awhile now. It was going to be about the different types of pagan traditions and practices. It mainly focused on European Witchcraft because thats what I knew and wanted to discuss.
I made the mistake of advertising it on Tumblr. I didn't realize how "Woke" Tumblr was and it completely destroyed my server. The number of fights that would break out towards me because I used the wrong "Term" or refused to add a non-pagan tradition would soon turn into fights within the server. A lot of this was directed at me since I held the power.
I made the mistake of making a woke girl a mod. She was more about smearing pagan tradition to make others happy who weren't actually pagan than protecting the traditions people faught for. Paganism when I was a child did not even have its own section in book stores. It was shoved into the back dark corner and basically forgotten. If someone was browsing through that section than those people generally were not treated well at check out.
This eventually ceased to be a problem because people faught for their right to practice their faith. Wicca eventually because a recognized religion on college campuses and other faiths such as Druidry, Celtic Paganism, etc. These practices are still growing and people getting together and sharing knowledge about these practices is what helps keep it alive.
I strived to do this on my own discord server. But you know whats more important? Gender and Skincolor. My server had NOTHING to do with someones Gender or Skincolor. The woke leftist of Tumblr tried to make it about this. Eventually the fights moved to DM'ing me to fight with me on my views for my server.
If you join a server and you don't like the way things are being ran, LEAVE THE FUCKING SERVER! This, I thought was common sense, it isn't. So in order to protect myself from getting anymore death threats or perhaps being Doxxed as this was also threatened to me. I got rid of the server entirely. Why can't people just click "Leave Server" is beyond me. It isn't that hard. Maybe Woke people just can't figure out how a button works. Who knows.
Like I said in my last post on Tumblr, if you are trying to learn a practice, and you were using Eclectic Grove as a way to educate yourself. You can msg me and we can talk. I might just add you to the private server I have made.
To everyone who didn't cause trouble I am sorry this happened. Feel free to msg me. We can talk about things and see if you can join my private server.
To those who were more concerned about pleasing everyone, smearing pagan practices, skin color, and gender. FUCK YOU.
#witchcraft#paganism#witch#pagan#asatru#book of shadows#discord#druidism#familiars#grimoire#baby witch#witch tips#beginner witch#witches of tumblr#witchblr#witch community#pagan witch#eclectic grove
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Heyyyy im dying for an update on castles!! Any hope of getting one soon?😭💗
hi anon! thanks for your message! the tl;dr answer to this is: no.
or, i don't know. maybe? sigh. it's just been a lot lately.
it's a funny one, you know? most of you will not remember this, but there used to be a time when i would share (maybe overshare - is that a word? i've always wondered why that is a word when it's your platform and your rules and people can just choose to ignore you) on tumblr. not just about fics and writing and peaky blinders, but also about me. the stuff i felt. the stuff that was going on in my life. lots of things.
i grew up in an era of blogging and livejournal (seeing dreamwidth make a comeback lately is oh-so-bizarre, btw) where people opened up online - sometimes too much. this was before doxxing, before cancel culture, before it became dangerous to do so. people would complain about their jobs, their mates - the internet was an outlet. and, i don't know if it was better or worse, i'm not here to make value judgements and i've always thought people who say "things were better in my day" sound like absolute twats, but it was undoubtedly different. i've had this conversation with someone on discord lately, about the dreamwidth comeback actually, when this person said: 'people get real personal on there, though' and i was like: 'yeah, i suppose it's just the culture of the place.' a place where, unlike tumblr and everything that came after it, most of the content produced was through words, rather than images. when the internet was still made for writers and you weren't afraid of "clogging" someone's dash with posts that were too long to be digested in less than ten seconds.
the thing is: i like writing. it makes it easier to organise thoughts. and, up to 2020 (2021, even) i used to post monthly updates on my writing, but also about my life, for you. remember how i told you when i passed my bar exam? how i quit my job, found another job, and then another one. i told you about the boy and hinted at my break-up. i told you about how one of my best friends sank into a very toxic relationship, from which i couldn't save her. i told you when my dad died. it wasn't even that long ago. and, i explained to you that for these reasons, and maybe others, i didn't have a chapter out as early as i would have liked. and, you understood. you were kept up with what was going on. it was the pandemic and a different time.
but then, gradually (oh-so-quickly and oh-so-slowly), "you" became "many." i like that word - "many" - it's what my hairdresser said the first time she cut my hair: "they are very fine, but there are very, very, many of them." i suppose that between the first chapter of castles and the latest, my follower count grew into the hundreds and i got - well, scared. scared to share: what i thought, why i wasn't posting, how much or how little i was writing, how i was feeling. because there were too many of you. because i started to hold myself up to higher standards, too.
the truth is that no one wants to listen to anyone on the internet complain. it's not fun. and, specifically, no one wants to listen to fanfiction writers complain. why would they? why would they moan about how busy they are? about how creatively drained they might be? about how maintaining a healthy balance between real life, a job, and writing, is hard, if you do it seriously. because it's a hobby. because it's not "real" writing. because it doesn't matter.
well, anon, i'll tell you something. the voice in my head, it goes like this: why are you tired? it's just fanfiction. stop taking yourself and your little stupid story so seriously. stop thinking this is Important because you're writing about something you feel is important. no one cares. and: you only wrote 80,000 words last year, people write full-blown nanos in a month, calm down. it's not that bad, you don't have children. it's not that bad, you don't have dying parents. it's not that bad, you have money. you're a white cis privileged girl who can afford to spend her free time on writing because you don't have to work multiple paying jobs to foot the bills. so many people do. people who are much busier than you write a lot more than you do. shut up, what are you crying about? why are you responding to this poor anon with anything other than "soon, i hope." they weren't even mean about it.
and, i like the word "many" because it encompasses the realness of it, the repetition of it. many, many, many. it's less theoretical than "a lot". you can't say: a lot, a lot, a lot. it's morning as i write this, irish drizzle blown in by the wind against my window, thin droplets like static and i wonder: could i isolate thirty thousand? count up to thirty thousand little drops of rain against glass and imagine what that would look like as people. that's a small stadium, isn't it? and, it's also almost how many people have clicked on castles, in the past three years. it's also how many people, in my head, are telling me to just suck it up and write the next chapter. it's been a month already, hasn't it?
to tell you the truth, i still overshare with some people. there's a very small discord i'm on which is more like a group chat with my best internet friends. it's a lot of fun. and, i'm not going to tag them here for fear that you might come at them with pitchforks, but after i was explaining this to them, how exhausted and drained and lost i've been feeling lately, i had some, last week, tell me i should just give up castles. just stop, recharge, take care of myself. it's just a fic, it doesn't matter. let it go, you know?
so, yeah. you read that right, anon dearest. people who i really love, and trust, told me i should put your beloved on an indefinite hiatus and move on with my life. how's that for an update? and, they didn't say it in a "this is a bad fic and it's not worth continuing" kind of way, but in a "it's not worth working yourself into the ground" kind of way. in a "fanfiction is a hobby" kind of way.
i typically count years from september to august (i'm still in school, in my head, sue me) and this past one has been long and hard. for reasons that i won't explain because of the "very many" issue i mentioned above. for reasons that i also won't explain because as i also mentioned above, i can't help but always compare myself to people who have it worse. but, the fact of the matter is that whilst i'm not really asking for sympathy, i do want to say this, as i hope it will help provide a bit of context to how i'm feeling right now, in terms of writing.
anon dearest, i'm exhausted. i'm bored. i'm turning thirty in 24 days. i'm sick and tired of putting everything in my life on hold "until i finish castles". i would estimate that right now (and for the past three years) castles has eaten up about 75% of my free time. i think the first couple years, i didn't really mind. because it was the pandemic. because there wasn't much else i wanted to do. but now, when i see my friends, i try to schedule it on weekday evenings because i want to keep my weekends for writing. when i travel at the weekends, take holidays, do anything that will take me more than a couple hours, it's a compromise made against writing time. a compromise i often feel guilty about because it delays the next update and because ultimately, it delays the moment when i do finish castles. when i am able to move on to something else. move on with my life and also maybe another story of my own.
these past few months, i wrote almost every day from late march until last week because i knew i'd be going home to france in august and wouldn't be able to write there, so i needed to get ahead. everything in my life is planned around writing and updating and i'm a little bit burnt out, anon. it's typical summer me, nothing to really worry about, i felt the same last year (those who were already here will remember) but it doesn't make it suck less. and, that's why people are telling me to give up. because i keep getting stuck in this cycle of overworking myself, getting burnt out, taking a month off and diving back in again. it's fanfiction and it's a hobby and it's meant to be fun and it's just not fun anymore. it feels endless and draining and like a vampire eating my "good" years. time my mates are spending getting married and having children. and, even if i don't think that's what i want for myself, precisely, i still don't feel like the life i'm currently living is one i want to be living in five years' time.
i don't want to be exhausted. i don't want to be working all the time. this groundhog day of getting up, opening up my (work, or personal) laptop, deliveroo-ing my meals, working until 9:30 pm, and repeat. i have seven chapters left to go to the end, which will take 12 to 18 months, and i don't think i can go on like this for another year. i don't want to. something's gotta give: my IRL life, my job, or this "hobby", and it is logical (oh-so-logical) that it should be the latter.
and, yet. when my pocket friends suggested this, i came at them with pitchforks. i said: no. no, no, no, no. i can't give up. i don't want to give up. i love this story. it's unnerving and draining and exhausting, but haven't touched it for a week and i already miss it - it's crazy. and, it's true: it's not fun, but writing, to me, has never been "fun". it's: fulfilling, exhilarating, meaningful, it gives me the chills and a sense of peace but it's not "fun". i don't know who the fuck writes for "fun". you can enjoy things that aren't "fun", you know? i definitely do.
and, if i had to pick one thing to give up on that list, honestly, it would be my job - 100%. i'd finish castles in six months, if i could give that up. but, i can't, lovely anon. because fanfic doesn't pay. because writing doesn't pay. and whilst i do have a savings account that i intend to use someday to take time off to write, i don't think i could justify using it for anything other than original fiction. because at least, there would be a tiny bit of hope that the book might get picked up and i could make my money back. i can't, like, quit my job to write fanfiction, can i? even if i did set up a patreon, i doubt you all would want to fund me, lol.
so, i don't know. i don't know what to do, anon. i don't want to give up castles. realistically, i probably won't. realistically, i'm probably going to keep ploughing through and overworking myself and feeling like i'm throwing my youth and my free time away into this project that everyone will most likely forget the moment it is finished. right now, to answer your question, i have about 6,000 words on the new chapter. right now, i'm also taking august off writing. to recharge, to sleep, and only write if i feel like it. later? i don't know. i think i'm in a place where i've just got 30,000 words out in three months and i'm too brain-dead to think clearly. i am acutely aware that this issue doesn't have a solution (or at least one that i like) but i might be more willing to compromise my life again after a bit of rest and holidays.
anyway, sorry for being a debbie downer, anon. and sorry i don't have an update for you. i'm dying for one, too.
#asked and answered#castles#i might delete this later cause it's so depressing and it's not *me* but it's also how i feel right now#i just don't know what to do lads
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(same anon about appologies fucking you over in us law)
i also think a lot of people forget that as a mexican man in the US, there's a highger layer of danger for him at being doxxed than some people might know about.
the US system is made to harm people like him. people were threatening to SWAT him, this has happened to streamers before. and the US is a place where people go out with assault weapons with the specific intent to hurt immigrants and anyone who is not "the norm"
so genuinely, seeing the ex-admins like tweets saying he's only victimizing himself, claiming he's being to emotional, and post messages like "womp womp" at Q's stream.... i cant help but to feel horrified
i understand the anger. i understand feeling upset at him.
i dont understand dehumanizing him to the point of mocking his emotions or his feeling scared for his physical safety when he ltierally got sent pictures of his house with threatening messages
Putting your previous ask here so I can do a 2-in-1 answer.
I had actually seen the post you linked but thanks anyway for brining it up to my attention, especially because I should have been more specific answering that one anon when i said that saying sorry can’t lead to legal consequences !
Yes, saying sorry can incriminate you if you word it in such a way that it turns into you admitting a wrongdoing, this is actually the . Wacky exemple but if you steal 5$ from someone and then tell them « I’m so sorry I shouldn’t have stolen these 5$ from you », you’re admitting of having done so. But if you say something like « I’m sorry that happened I wish I could help you get these 5$ back » you’re good.
OP’s post and the article they quoted expressed that pretty well so I’ll link it here too :
———
About your second ask : First, anyone who goes out of their way to spread Q’s personal information and/or uses it to threaten and harass him are proper freaks and I will never stand for that.
This is especially gross because, as you rightfully said, it’s particularly dangerous in the US because of police brutality during swatting and well, guns. Even more so if you’re an immigrant like it’s the case for Q.
I don’t think some of the admins reacted the way they did in relation to Q expressing fear for his safety, there are still a lot of things that were said and, I would argue more specifically, unsaid in his stream that can be criticised. I wanna do a post about his stream later when I’ll have thought about it more in depth (it’s a nonsensical draft sitting in notes app rn i still need to pump myself with more caffeine to get the braincells properly working)
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Nagging potential voters while offering them nothing has been a losing political strategy every time it's been tried. If you actually care about wresting political power from fascists - yes I am questioning your commitment - you'll get involved in on-the-ground organizing instead of acting like an asshole online. Because I cannot stress this enough: what you're doing here on tumblr? That hurt us in 2004. And 2016. And a bunch of the off-years too. Knock it off. And before you complain about my tone: I'm using the same one you did in your post. If reading this made you upset, maybe sit for a while and think about the implications of that.
lol, I honestly can't tell you how much this makes me laugh so thanks for the early morning comedy
I don't actually have any idea which of my MANY posts you found and decided to have an issue with.
Any ways, I have a Tumblr, which is mostly non-serious because in real life, my real life my real work is very serious and political and this generally is a decompression space away from that were I can express other interests, US Senators generally don't want to hear my take on comic books (well Pat Leahy....)
I'm not gonna lay out chapter and verse what I've done or do because I'm not doxing myself for an anon troll, but last election I knocked over 2,000 doors for Democratic candidates, I've been pretty open that I was HFA in 2016 and OFA before that
so generally in most of my posts I'm asking, basically begging people, to get as involved as I am, well maybe not AS involved, you don't all need jobs In politics someone has to drive the buses after all. But its very easy as a volunteer to make a huge huge impact on your local Democratic Party and on elections around you and it's amazingly healing to get out and talk to voters, a day of walking around knocking doors and talking to voters will cure you of wanting to dive bomb a strangers in box with nonsense like this.
any ways since I was you know, there, in 2004 and I'm gonna go out on a limb here and assume (since you assumed quite a lot about me) We lost that election because the Bush team totally shamelessly claimed our famous war hero candidate had in fact faked his Purple Hearts and hadn't earned his Sliver and Bronze Stars. Also they pretty shamelessly implied that a vote for Democrats was a vote for terrorism and stressed to evangelical voters that they'd ban gay marriage forever and always if Bush won re-election, which I think was very key to pulling Bush over the finish line in Ohio (and the election as a whole)
Not that that matters the "Nagging" narrative is silly, and mainly used by people who want to not feel bad for not voting being engaged. That its somehow Democrats fault for asking them to vote and pointing out the negative things that will happen if Republicans win. Thats how all campaigns since the dawn of time have worked however. All Campaigns are a mix of two things "here are the good things I would like to do" and "here are the bad things my opponent will do if they win" there's no way to campaign without the latter duh.
any ways like I said Tumblr is my silly happy place, but I'm still me, so sometimes I shoot off about the real life topics that matter to me. And here on Tumblr sometimes I can be blunter and ruder than I might on social media linked to my real life, thats not gonna change or anything I'm just saying.
finally I hope everyone gets involved, its fun its easy it makes a big difference, google your city or county and "Democrats" to find a local meeting, Everyone should check out The Sister District project, Swing Left, and Run For Something as I've said else where there are important elections happening all the time, Democrats have a chance to win the Governorship in Mississippi a dear friend of mine is down there right now working that and I couldn't be more proud of his unwavering efforts to blue the south (he helped get Andy Beshear elected in 2018) so random troll anon I hope you're doing more than uh... whatever this is, I'm gonna keep doing my thing.
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Hey I saw your tags about your degree and how you ended up as an archivist and I was wondering if you would be willing to elaborate more on how that happened and stuff! I work in a library right now (though I do not have a MLS, I waffle back and forth on going for one) and archives are something I'm very interested in but they seem somewhat impenetrable as a field.
Hellooo!!! :D OMG!!! It’s always nice to meet other people in the field!!! I understand the apprehension about wanting/not wanting to go back for an MLS/MLIS—it’s a lot of work and debt for very little, tbh. Work experience is arguably more important than the degree unless you have very specific career goals (like archives, for example).
It’s a little bit difficult to answer this one without utterly doxxing myself, but the short answer is that I kind of. Fell into it? I was initially hired because my “specialty”/background is data and cataloging (the information science part of the degree lol), and I was supposed to do something else in a different department altogether. However, there was a little bit of staff shuffling and my museum looked internally when they needed an archivist to do something very specific with the collection. Because I was relatively new to the role (so I hadn’t settled much), had previous work experience in special collections, and the project is time-sensitive (grant related; oh, grants…), they just scooted me over to archives for what was supposed to be few days a week until they hired someone else, but… well. Here we are. I’m sorry I don’t have a very straightforward answer!! It really was just a weird alignment of circumstances in an extremely underfunded institution.
Technically I swap between a few different roles, and as much as I do enjoy my job I don’t know if I will stay an archivist long-term. You’re right—it’s an extremely impenetrable field and often jobs will look for multiple academic qualifications beyond just an MLS/MLIS when looking for candidates, like secondary relevant MAs or PhDs. I don’t think I’m technically even qualified to do my own job, because my background is not maritime history. Like you saw, it’s literally horror literature lol. I just happen to be really, really good at information analysis, which fits my museum’s specific need. And because I’m not technically qualified on paper, my institution doesn’t “have” to pay me an archivist’s salary, so everyone kind of wins. I’m the budget-friendly option for them and I get to do interesting work—but don’t know if I could leverage this experience into a similar position elsewhere when it’s time for me to move on.
It’s difficult to weigh the worth of going back for the degree (and choosing a specialty) because of the high commitment/low reward aspect of the industry. Personally, I do think it’s worth it—with the caveat that in order to find a job there is an extremely high chance you will have to move for your job. Out of town, probably out of state, potentially out of the country depending on where the openings are. I pivoted away from looking into a lit PhD because this was basically a requirement for academia, and I don’t have the ability to do that. Archives are very similar, I’m just a fluke. Libraries in general are a little all-consuming, although you might already know that. An MLS/MLIS would open a lot of doors, but you would have to shape your life around your job because of the way your new position would (in theory) work. It’s a very personal decision.
Either way, libraries are lucky to have you!!!! You’re doing wonderful, essential work by default and it makes me happy to hear you’re passionate about the field enough to consider staying long-term. <3 It seems like there’s always a shortage of staff because of the low pay and grueling environment (depending on the place, I suppose, but that’s been my experience) and I’m glad you seem to have found your place in our industry d(*゚ー゚*)
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Did you choose your own Chinese name?
Mmm kinda. And as a certifiable tranny I chose my own English name too!
English names are just Whatever honestly, in comparison to Chinese names at least. It took me maybe five minutes to choose my English name. I chose Chris because I was obsessed w Chris Pine and there were soooo many Hollywood Chrises it seemed common and Cool. I thought Christopher was too Normal and also I have a cousin with that name so I chose Christian so I could zag on ‘em. Also being a Christian was super important to me at the time lol cringe imagine. I kept my “gender-neutral” birth name as my middle name and BAM! Christian Taylor
I’m not able to change my legal English name in any country so despite being legally male in two countries my girly ass birth middle name kind of gives it away
My Chinese name IS legal and NOT girly so I prefer it actually!
Chinese names are WAY more serious business than English names. Like if someone’s going to have a baby they might look at star charts and pray and see fortune tellers and everything. Each character needs to have meaning AND also it’s not supposed to be a name someone already has? Like you SHOULD NOT name someone after a celebrity. You know in English movies where someone has a baby and just decide what to name it right there after it’s born? NOT okay in Chinese culture lol
So it took me a few weeks to choose mine. First I listed all the more common characters with meanings that I valued. I also wanted them to have some callback to my English name. Then I asked my Chinese friends about the final combinations I made up, if they sounded masculine and if any of them had accidental double entendres or sounded made-up or low-class or whatever. So what I finally chose was a team effort and has a lot of meaning for me
I’ll just tell you it because it’s not really doxxing myself bc you can’t find me by googling it lol. Actually I just found out there’s some musician with the same name
So it’s 林毅安 (lin2 yi4 an1)
林 because my birth middle name was Lynne after my dad’s mom who died when he was young. I felt bad for taking that from him when I transed my name so I wanted it included in my Chinese one. Also lin means forest and I like nature. Plus it was the most common surname in the first city I lived in in China
毅 because it means perseverance and like strength kind of? Perseverance has always been a super important in my life
安 because it means peace which I also like and value. 毅安 put together, yi-an, is like the last three letters of my English name, Christian
Additionally in Chinese you have a name that people call you like day to day? Nobody like actually calls you your full name except like teachers? So my “nickname” if you will is 天 (tian1) because it’s simple and it means heaven AND I think it’s so fun that my name is Christian, my English nickname is Chris, and my Chinese nickname is Tian
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alright so. this may be doxing myself slightly but i don’t really care because i feel like this is bullshit and IMPORTANT. i am both a student and a staff member of a Virginia Community College School (VCCS). as a staff member we regularly have to go through mandatory training through the state, as we are a state school. last year, our governor released an update to the training, which is the following. (important parts highlighted in green)
this is a part of Executive Order Number Ten (2022) “FOCUSING VIRGINIA'S DIVERSITY, EQUITY, AND INCLUSION OFFICE AND DESIGNATING A COMMONWEALTH CHIEF DIVERSITY, OPPORTUNITY, & INCLUSION OFFICER”
obviously, this is not a good time. because
1. ignoring native american history and acting like VA history started when (white) settlers colonized the area.
2. the inclusion that we are created by a Creator, excluding those who have different beliefs.
(not to mention some other parts that i’ll get to in a bit, but they’re unrelated to the training as far as i know)
and not only was this wording in the order itself, it was carried over to the ACTUAL TRAINING.
(censored my actual college name bc i don’t want to dox myself THAT much)
thankfully my college has discontinued this training
however they’re conducting surveys with faculty and staff to find out if this is a real actual thing that people care about (we do!!!)
some other bullshit that was in the order includes this
“parents rights” uh huh. we know what that means (requiring teachers to out potentially lgbt children, putting them in dangerous situations and letting parents opt out of “controversial” subjects). and my favorite needs to be protected group under inclusion acts. a few cells in a womb. great.
this isn’t really a call to action really, more of a “pay attention to what’s happening in your local government and how it affects you” thing? i know we all focus on Big Import things but whatever asshole is in government can cause issues no matter how small their power might seem. organize locally if you can and pay attention. i know this might come off as insignificant in the grand theme of things, but separation of the church and state is MASSIVELY important, even in document form, and i don’t think i really need to elaborate on why pretending native american history didn’t happen isn’t a good thing.
anyways reblogs would be appreciated and if you want more information dm me. idk how much more i’ll give though bc i’m a massively paranoid person, and i don’t want to get in trouble at work.
#dandy.txt#long post#also note. idk if vccs has raised eyebrows at this or just my specific school#also sorry if the wording isn’t too good i’m kinda sick rn LMAO
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