#racism isnt an easy fix but so fucking what

[decolonize-the-left]

So something I've observed about civil rights or really any progressive movement in general is that- well for one there are different groups of people within that movement.

For example, there are the passive supporters: people who will act when convenient- signing a petition, attending a nearby rally, voting, in more recent times also sharing posts & memes, etc. They may be part of a wider community of people who share oppression, but don't really care for or prioritize the most marginalized voices in their community. In my observations, these are the people who have the least to gain from progress, people who are uncomfortable but not so much their lives are at risk on a daily basis without progress. They are motivated but not desperate.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, there are the active supporters. People who act regardless of its convenience, even willing to put themselves directly in front of a gun if it means more rights and protections. In my observations, these are the people who have the most to gain from progress, people who's lives are at risk without progress. Theyre also typically the ignored voices of their community, as their needs are not easy to address and as such make Passive members of the community uncomfortable. Every single time a movement of progress has been initiated- it's started with this group of people and often as an act of desperation after using other methods and still being ignored.

And of course there is a spectrum of people between these two groups.

Now my original point:

What I've noticed is that after Active supporters initiate a movement, after they spark the conversation (through some act of violence or public resistance to the state) and gain media attention for the fact.... They're shoved aside by the same Passives who ignored them previously.

Passive supporters co-opt the movement they previously did not care very much for. They call the active supporters extremists and terrorists in an attempt to win the favor & support of their oppressors... to get their own needs met. Usually this is because they see their own needs as needs of everyone, if life for them improves then so do the lives of Actives. The reverse is not true, providing Actives with their needs won't have a huge impact on Passives as they are already fairly comfortable (in comparison) since they do not face the same level of oppression for whatever reason.

So Passives prioritize themselves.

They shame the active supporters, praise peaceful protesting, and often they go so far as telling Actives to stop asking for their more immediate needs to be met so they can focus on the needs of Passives instead. The words "unrealistic" and "extreme" get thrown around a lot when Passives do this to Actives.

And that's fucked

And that's why when I'm looking at ANY political, humanitarian, or other movement I ALWAYS look at the most marginalized members and stand with them. Half the time I don't even bother listening to anyone else. If it matters, the most oppressed are gonna talk about it.

The ones who's intersections of identity have given them the experience and knowledge to not only to understand their oppression, but have given insight to the ideologies responsible for their oppression and can recognize that ideology systematically AND when the same ideology is being used to harm and target others. The ones who don't want to simply put a band aid or numbing spray on their oppression, but to rip it out of everyone's lives from the very roots, because they KNOW how much it hurts

The folks who intimately understand oppression are the ONLY ones who could could intimately understand eliminating it.

And I think ANYONE who doesn't do the same thing after becoming aware of this pattern... Is a piece of shit. It's why I can't stand liberals or those "I'd support them if they were peaceful" or the "well what did they expect from (victimless act of violence)" people or "well they did x" people who try to get Actives cancelled & silenced for not being perfect after doing NOTHING to help but liking and following them anyway.

They're not helping us. They're helping themselves. They're literally standing in the way of progress that could save MILLIONS of lives. And for what, so their lives can be marginally easier? So they can get a treat after begging for scraps from their oppressors??? I don't get it.

All this to say:

STOP TRYING TO SIDE WITH YOUR OPPRESSORS. QUIT THROWING MEMBERS OF YOUR COMMUNITY UNDER THE BUS. FUCKING LISTEN TO THEM. THE WHOLE PLANET WOULD BE BETTER IF YOU DID.

[frogs-inatrenchcoat]

Wassup this is a throwaway account that I will rant on once before deactivating.

So because of my dirty ex step parent(s) constantly bullying my mum we now have to go to court and stuff, and I have heard that 1.) If the judge here 'Isnt in a good mood' Then the thing ends up biased, and 2.) If you aren't wearing clothing he likes or deems aproprite, you have to sceduele a different date with different clothes. And I'm fuming because the justice system should not work that way! Why should the mood of the judge influence the end of the trial? Why should the clothing of one person decide the ending of the legal battle? Some families don't have the money to own nice clothes and you're just gonna throw them out of court and tell them to sceduele again?! The court might as well not exist given the things I've heard out him.

And before everyone's all like "ShuTuP uR liKe 13 AnD thAtS jusT hOw it woRKs" I know! I'm saying that it is so simple and easy to fix! It's not that I don't understand that this is a commonplace in the justice system, I'm saying that fixing it is so very simple and no one will because crooked judges like that make money for others who really don't need it.

I really hate living here in America and not being old enough or having the funds to move to another country. (Yes I know it's harder than that too, so don't even) Like, the fact that the leaders of the country and most of the past leaders valued labor over lives and capitialisum continued is stupid! I know it doesn't take one president to change that either, but the overwhelming amount of redneck rasict idiots in this country prove how stupid we really are. The fact that so much of the 'adults' in this country are the way they are, prove that maybe some of them have not, in fact, matured.

Like my dad. He's for Trump, rasict and transphobic. This is the man I am supposed to look up to. A man who thinks that some rich cheeto-y douche should be in charge of a country, a man who defends cops and says "All live maters isnt a racist statement." A man who says "You should just be who you are", Is the man who is in charge of me and a supposed ro-model for me and my sister. No.

This is a society where an educated 13 year old like me can think of a better way to run a country whereas a middle-aged rich man cannot, shows a lot. The fact that the rich coperate big cats do not care about innocent people dying, facism, racism, etc, but a group of 13 year olds does is really stupid.

Back before Bernie Sanders sadly resigned, I was speaking about politics as I usually do because my friend group is a well-educated group. I was speaking about how I think Bernie Sanders is a wonderful canidate and would help us make good progress towards fixing this shattered country. Two of my closest friends said they didnt agree with the gun control thing. They said it was fun to shoot guns. Then about a week later a kid threatened to shoot up the school and both of them stayed home.

What is it with people wanting money anyway? Like our superintendent had us come in on Monday when the school had no power in the middle of winter. A Michigan winter. So it was like 19f ish (about -7 in celsius for all of you great people who are smarter than us), pretty warm actully. We had to go home early but we stayed to eat so he would collect money. Later I learned that the power was out on Sunday and he knew about this but still had us come in.

You Boomers and Karens can say whatever makes you look better but in reality, you guys have screwed the planet over, we have to take care of it and instead of educating up properly, you're shoving us in an unheated school to learn about the difference between a simile and a metaphor. You are teaching us Triginomitry rather than important life skills and wonder why the previous generations with the same education isn't able to care for themselves. And then once everyone retaliates and tells you to shut up you respond by calling Boomer and Karen a slur. That's is, by far, the dumbest shit i have ever heard and you need to shut the fuck up.

ANyway, rant over, I am not fuming anymore.

[synodicatalyst]

one of the bad things about the homestuck epilogue to me is that now i have to put up with people talking about how homestuck is inherently awful bc of its 'problematic elements' like yes it has bad shit and hussie is evil but the stuff they talk about isnt like a central part of the comic and a lot of it is pretty easy to miss if you dont play the friendsim or skipped parts of openbound or were an archive reader

 like idk what 2 say about that bc the criticisms are legitimate (yes meenah’s relationship w/ vriska is bad and wrong and yes there are elements that are pedophilic even fi they werent intended that way) but when ppl say anyone who likes it is racist and a pedophile and ableist etc… like. ugh. idk. sorry to vent in your inbox todays just been super shitty

oh yeah, i definitely understand this - yesterday i was linked to a callout post that called homestuck “irredeemable” due to its “lesbophobia/homophobia, misogyny, ableism, racism, anti-Semitism” (etc.) and it’s pretty frustrating! not that calling out these things is bad - but it’s like, as your resident Gay NB Dude of Colour who has LITERALLY written essays and talked on a podcast about the racism in homestuck, and how we should treat it / whether it’s still “okay” to like it even despite the Bad Things, it’s almost… horribly dismissive and condescending seeing people circulate callout posts and tell homestuck fans about how problematic homestuck is as if we aren’t the people who are the most aware of it?

Like, an example of a criticism I saw was that “a character’s lesbianism is treated like a fetish” - in obvious referral to an andrew hussie formspring comment from 2011 (? or 2010 maybe i cant remember) and it’s like……. oh my god… are we just going to ignore the fact that homestuck has a genuinely groundbreaking number of lgbt characters (all of them), develops natural arcs for its characters outside of their identities, provided many people with positive lesbian representation literally absent from like everywhere else, did it ORGANICALLY and NATURALLY somehow despite the fact that andrew hussie is a (probably) straight white cis man - owing to the fact that the development and increase in LGBT representation was specifically in appreciation of the fanbase it gathered? are we ignoring the fact that andrew has fucked up multiple times but current homestuck projects like friendsim, and even the epilogue, are actively including and centering the voices and work of real life wlw, women of colour, trans people, etc. as a SPECIFIC point of the fact that like, andrew KNOWS he’s made these mistakes??? this isn’t me being an andrew hussie apologist because i dont even fucking..trust him or anything. but the lack of context surrounding Why Homestuck Is Bad, Actually is horribly stupid

i literally do not know how to break it to people that actively shaming and calling out a piece of independent media that has been significant to the lives of many lgbt poc and is currently working actively to rectify its mistakes is not like… Specifically Cool and Woke. on a basic level, i can understand the concerns of these people but they show a lack of nuance and understanding of growth and genuine value for the people they’re supposedly Standing Up For. i can’t stop them from doing as such but i sure do find it annoying. especially since posts like these lead to people calling out and harassment of people who are fully aware of the mistakes the work possesses. ESPECIALLY BECAUSE HALF THE SHIT IS PLACED OUT OF CONTEXT OR IS COMPLETELY OUTDATED (LIKE THE KANAYA THING. LIKE, THEY LITERALLY GOT ACTUAL LESBIANS TO WORK ON ELWURD’S ROUTE TO SHOW THAT LESBIAN CULTURE IS A THING ON ALTERNIA)

homestuck is actively antifascist, makes a point of ridiculing homophobia and misogyny especially that of the gross reddit brand (via caliborn), and lots of people - lgbt teens especially - found a home in its narrative, because it both represents them and portrays a growing up narrative that is scarily fitting for the current day. it sure does have its issues but where the fuck else am i going to get my vriska fix. SHOUNEN ANIME?? i think not

sorry for just like, unleashing my Frustrations in response to your ask anon, but i hope this sort of resonated with your own grievances. I’m sad to hear that your day has been bad, so i hope you wake up tomorrow feeling refreshed… here is jade harley

[globrights]

yeah they should listen but just saying its not necessarily (& I'm sure not in the case of RCG) coming from a place of hate at all. its not even like is it worth upsetting ppl to do this joke,its that they don't even get the logic that it would upset ppl in that context. they think theyre making the gang look like fools for being racist and thinking wearing blackface is ok, that's it. the idea that wearing it as an actor in that context to make the point is also hurtful isnt immediately obvious

yeah but. just because they aren’t coming from a place of hate doesn’t mean that the offense committed and their resultant actions weren’t harmful? bc when rcg+ don’t own up to their mistakes or try to justify it or realize we have a point but still won’t say anything or try and quietly sweep it under the rug etc etc their choices have consequences? and you have “diehard” fans who’ll fucking start harassing and demeaning poc and allies who stand up for them? rcg+ run a tv show that reaches millions and sadly their choices as individuals and as a collective can have very real world consequences. they’re not some quirky little corner of the internet they have to have some fucking responsibility?? and its not like they’ve never realized they were wrong about stuff and apologized. they bent over backwards over their use of the r word. they climbed mountains to make things up to the lgbt community over mac’s retracted coming out plot. yet they’ve continued to say the n word as recently as s12 and we already know what happened in s14. its startling to realize that white people can be hurt by the r word and white people can experience homophobia but they don’t experience racism (at least not in america. or lbr anywhere fucking else). so its like. its starting to get suspicious that this is the one thing they are so pressed about. and like. lets say u wanna continue to argue that the r word stuff was sth they talked about regretting years after it happened n they fixed mac’s apology within the storyline and didn’t pop off w apologies even after the backlash had happened. i just gotta say this isn’t sth they can fix w a quirky ep about the gang deciding they won’t be racist anymore, this is something they gotta own up to and apologize for. the best time to do that was after they found out how much it hurt people. the second best time is right now, as soon as possible, please. 

like not to bring up big mouth re the bi/pan controversy esp since that was about lgbt issues and not race but they had the fucking guts to see that they fucked up and apologize and promise to make things right. like its real fucking easy to do that. and big mouth is arguably something just as safe as sunny (big mouth is popular n has been renewed for quite a few new seasons, sunny is sth fxx wants to keep doing), so, u can’t really invoke rcg+ being worried about their show’s survival or whatever the fuck. and if they are its still kinda fucking shitty to sacrifice poc! so. yeah. like if u have such a raging hard on for rcg+ and would like to continue to get off on that without guilt u can just go ahead instead of trying to defend them here, idk if ive said this before but genuinely rcg+ needs no fucking protection, neither does sunny, they’re fucking rich and they’re fucking fine

[tumblunni]

Ehh i think i finally summed up why all of this steven universe diamonds stuff has been so underwhelming.

YES you can redeem a villain

but you have to

actually

TRY

Yes you can write a story about the world’s most fuckin horrible person being really actually sad at heart

Yes you can write a story about an abusive parent actually being able to change

Yes you can write a story about some wild genocidal alien civilization of asshole space rocks actually only doing it because something something societal pressure DESPITE BEING THE ONES IN CHARGE WHO SET THE DAMN RULES I GUESS

But fucking hell its not gonna be EASY and you shouldn’t treat it that way.

All of this shit was SO fucking quick?? And everything else WASNT!

You spent SO long hyping up these guys you spent SO long convincing us that they WERE evil and that they had entirey different motives for what they were doing and EVEN WITHIN THIS FUCKING EPISODE you spent more time showing us White Diamond being absolutely ridiculously existentially horrifyingly awful and refusing every offer everyone gave her to help and refusing every chance and fucking fucking goddamn violating people’s entire minds and just.. fuck.

After all that you cant just fuckin have steven walk up to blue and yellow and say “hey everything you did was bad” and them go “GEE WE NEVER KNEW!” for some reason this time they’re convinced in a single sentence despite it being the same sentence steven said before in every damn episode and pink said to them years before and every person they abused and enslaved and mutilated and KILLED said while they were DYING

And you can’t fucking have white diamond never redeem herself and never change and never admit she’s wrong and steven SOLVE IT WITH FUCKING FIGHTING WHILE SAYING HE DOESNT WANT TO, WHILE THE ENTIRE SHOW TRIES TO CLAIM THE REASON THEY ARE DOING IT THIS WAY IS BECAUSE OF PACIFISM

because seriously he?? just defeated her?? and this made her?? change???

redeeming a villain shouldn’t be easy. redeeming a villain has to have the villain TRY. white diamond has done nothing to prove she really has a heart, prove that she really did all this for sympathetic reasons, prove that she’s able to change, AND ESPECIALLY NOTHING TO MAKE IT UP TO ANY OF THE PEOPLE SHE’S HURT

she just got defeated and basically admitted she’s wrong cos she has no other choice. and i guess her blushing because steven issued a SICK BURN to her is meant to be enough proof that her entire motivation so far has been because of self confidence issues forcing her to put up a false front aka her entire personality we saw so far. If you wanna tell me she’s entirely different to what we saw so far then please could you please give it more screentime than twelve goddamn seconds.

This is like how yellow and blue just suddenly were accepted as part of the family and steven agreed to go with them to homeworld literally just because they realized he “is really pink diamond”. Like they never fucking repented or actually learned to empathise with humans or ever explained why they dont empathise with humans no nope the only answer we got is that they were sad about their sister/daughter/friend dying even though they were already doing all the same evil stuff before that and its what caused her to leave in the first place. no we’re gonna just completely trust them instantly and not even continue making an effort to convince them? we’re gonna trust them so much we’re gonna trust that white diamond will also change just cos we beat her up? COS SERIOUSLY STEVEN FUCKIN DEFEATED BLUE AND YELLOW IN A FIGHT AND THATS THE END OF THEIR ARC, HOW IS THIS PROVING THE POWER OF PACIFISM!! beating everyone up and then saying the same singular sentence again and somehow now it works!! or saying “my mum was pink diamond” and it doesnt convince them but hey if we say it again with magical proof its true then i guess it works now. wow that sure does argue the power of words i guess

everything EVERYTHING they did was just a fuckin misunderstanding cos they dont UNDERSTAND they were doing bad and thus they dont have to face any form of consequences beyond being mildly embarassed i suppose.

if you wanna make that the ending then you need to work to disprove all the hours you spent implying that.. yknow.. they were doing things because they were evil

and even if theyre sympathetic they still did evil things and they still need to work to prove that theyve changed

and ESPECIALLY if you’re making a show very heavy on subjects like LGBT discrimination it shouldnt be FUCKIN WOW UNEXPECTED that the audience would see this plot as a metaphor for stuff like homophobia and abusive parents and.. yknow.. societal oppression in a law system that forces you to live in the closet in constant fear of being discovered and killed. and all the other apparantly accidental undertones of racism and extermination of indigenous people in stolen land which YOU REALLY SHOULD HAVE EXPECTED PEOPLE TO SEE WHEN THE PLOT IS LITERALLY EXTERMINATING PEOPLE TO STEAL THEIR LAND

all of that means you need to do MORE work to prove that that isnt actually what the plot is supposed to be, and more work to redeem villains who are very heavily goddamn triggering to a large part of the vunerable audience YOU SPECIFICALLY MARKETED YOURSELF TOWARDS

this was just so fucking overwhelming and somehow rushed despite being an hour long episode, and i hate it because the show spent so much effort on so much other stuff yet decided to half ass it at the really important part that NEEDED to have thought and time put into it if it was gonna nail the landing

especially after ALL THAT FUCKIN TIME AND EFFORT INTO THINGS THAT ONLY AMPED UP THE VILLAINY AND TENSION OF THESE GUYS AND MADE IT SO MUCH WORSE

like fucking hell how can you be so tone deaf??? this has been in the planning for so damn long and theyve been working on it forever and THIS is what they chose to rush over? this is the priorities they thought were important? even just within this episode if youre struggling to fit it all in then like seriously cut out some of the stuff like the montage of unseen fusion forms that did basiclaly nothing but a few jokes, and the equally as rushed bad lars and sadie romance resolution. Which is another thing that needed a lot of work to fix when the introduction we got to these two was a really unhealthy relationship and a dude who refuses to change despite being given twelve chances but suddenly changes COMPLETELY on the thirteenth one and i guess cos he died that proves he’s all good now. Except he acts all weird and creepy in the very next episode and endangers his new friends by acting all possessive over sadie again and getting angry that she has other friends????

i hate it because ive had to deal with the fandom telling all the people who were rightfully uncomfortable with how these subjects were handled that oh we’re just overreacting and oh wait and see cos they totally have a big plan for the ending or something that’ll make it all make sense. And comparing people being triggered by child abuse and racism to “huhu those dumb su criticals who hate the art style” or whatever...

god, man, its just a deflection of what the issue really is

“oh youre saying NO VILLAINS can EVER be redeemed and NOBODY can EVER talk about dark stuff in shows without being SECRETLY BAD AND SUPPORTING IT IN REAL LIFE?”

no im not saying that im just saying the subjects are fucking depressing to people who’ve suffered from the real life stuff and the villain redemption should be GOOD and should THINK ABOUT THOSE PEOPLE IN THE AUDIENCE if it wants to make up for it

like fucking hell look at how much zuko from avatar went through before his redemption. look at how long he struggled with his morality and how long it took him to realise he was wrong. look at how much detail they showed us on all the people who negatively influenced him into making the bad choices he did. look at how much he went through to make up for what he did and apologise to everyone he hurt. look at how everyone he hurt didnt believe him at first and it took a while for everything to work out. look at how sometimes he messed up and took steps backward before getting to where he needed to be. and look at how he actually changed as a person and continued learning and growing and trying to be a good person even far into the future after the story ended.

hell, fuckin look at PERIDOT! peridot had a full goddamn zuko arc! peridot had more screentime than all of the diamonds combined, and it was way better utilized! she had a full process from being introduced as a scary villain BECAUSE OF MISUNDERSTANDING WHO SHE REALLY WAS, then being revealed as having a fully rounded personality, flaws and redeemable traits while still being a villain. and moments of her proving that she did indeed only become a villain because she didnt understand what she was doing was wrong, and a personality that matched with that reveal rather than having NO INDICATION she was like that until it suddenly happened only after she was defeated. and her redemption came slowly through friendship with steven and it had moments of the other characters not instantly trusting her and also of her making mistakes and struggling with believing steven’s philosophy when it went against everything she knew about life. and speaking of which it was established that she had a very different life which had negative influences pushing these ideas upon her, and tough stuff that made her scared and pressured. Not just being in a high position of ruling over a planet in the lap of luxury and ONLY AFTER BEING DEFEATED do we learn that they feel pressured by the societal expectation to be perfect and they actually would have agreed all along with dismantling the system but they were just too afraid to be honest. Or whatever the fuck that rushed ending was trying to go for! And man even after peridot joins the team she’s NOT redeemed yet, she’s initially only halfway doubting herself and only teaming up with steven because they’re both afraid of the cluster. And she messes up and says horrible shit to her new friends and feels the consequences of her actions and chooses to change. And her ultimate choice to switch sides is REALLY hard, she gets so close to going back to the diamonds and its a great personal sacrifice on her part when she chooses to give it all up and make an enemy of the person she was so scared of!

and GAHHH that good redemption is one in a million episodes that really set up the diamonds Being Bad and should have been a goddamn tally in the “effort required in the fuckin ending” chart!

could we not have even just had one ten minute episode of blue and yellow going around earth and experiencing human life and realizing there’s things worth protecting? or a few damn scenes foreshadowing white being actually insecure and lying to protect herself, rather than GENUINELY ABUSIVE BECAUSE SHE’S BAD?

and seriously even if you hurt people because you hate yourself YOU STILL HURT THEM

a sympathetic backstory should be a reason why they COULD be redeemed, not proof that they already are redeemed just because the backstory was stated in words and nothing else has fuckin changed.

imagine if zuko just lost one fight to aang and said “yes but my dad abused me” and aang was like “oh no now lets team up with zuko to beat up his dad” and none of the bad things zuko did were ever mentioned again and also he keeps his season 1 personality throughout the entire series

imagine if peridot fuckin.. just changed sides cos she’s funny and we like her. people wantedher to change sides as soon as she acted funny and likeable but they still made the effort to actually prove she had changed! the diamonds didnt act remotely harmless or remotely good until they just suddenly are in the very last episode.

hoo

fucking

ray

also why are we constantly just ignoring all these dark things about homeworld? like the episode with holly blue agate and the famethyst slave caste and all the creepy ways the entire place operated. i totally thought thatd.. yknow.. EVER BE REFERENCED AGAIN?? its never even mentioned that anyone even WANTS to go back and save them?? and the human zoo were outright stated to be like.. unsaveable. “oh theyve never known real human life and theyre happy in their slavery so itd be cruel to take them away from it” One off episode, forgotten about. And the creepy as fuck scenes of gems being BUILT INTO THE WALLS AND DOORS AS SECURITY SYSTEMS and the confirmation that more lapis situations are constantly going on yet somehow that singing hairbrush person doesnt get all the sympathy that she did. And steven going daww at the pebbles instead of being horrified that theyre born to work as servants and forced to live in the walls because the noblewomen dont want to look at them? and he asks them to make him a new outfit?? and theres no plot anything involving them except them puttering around in the background outfitting?? like was none of this meant to be seen as PROOF THAT THE DIAMONDS WERE EVIL and PEOPLE WHO NEEDED TO BE SAVED????

goddddd

please say they were rushed or something please say this is all the faultof being given less time than they expected please say there were other plans for other episodes we didnt see that would have given at least slightly more substance to any of this

also why wasnt this even advertised as the last episode if its the last fuckin episode

hhhh well at least obsidian was a great character design and so were the other fusions and new outfits even if they only appeared for twelve seconds. and white’s whole scary evil mind invasion stuff was really good even if it actually hurt the episode by being good, kinda

man im not even mad or anything i just feel mehh and bored and like im actually glad its over. i never wanted to feel that way about a show that used to be so good. i kinda wish the earliest episodes werent so good if the answers to all those well set up mysteries were gonna have so much less effort than the setup itself

...man i should make a whole post about all the mistaken ways i THOUGHT the show was gonna go that actually would have been way more interesting than the real answer.

i’m just super glad that my last theory was wrong cos wow that would have been the only thing worse than this ending! when white pearl first appeared before we’d actually seen white diamond, and it had all this thing that white diamond hadnt been seen in ages.. well i was worried it was setting up some sort of reverse twist where actually white pearl is bodysnatching white diamond instead of vice versa. So the whole evil empire would actually be run by a member of the slave class that its oppressing, and the diamonds/representative of the upper class would actually be poor victims all along. dear god i am so glad i got that wrong! tho im weirded out by how evil white/pink pearl looked in that first hint that she was originally pink pearl??

anyway basicallly im just so fuckin tired

[self-containedadventures]

White conservatives fear they are going to lose their rights by stopping police brutality in the black community or granting amnesty to undocumented immigrants and putting them onto the path to citizenship or being more accepting of other cultures or letting gays get married or preventing the murder of trans people or cutting out casual anti-Asian racism from their everyday speech or dealing with any of these huge but easy to fix problems because deep down they know that they've been shitty and they know they're a part of the problem. Fox News correspondents will bend over backwards to pretend that the school to prison pipeline either doesn't exist or that it was built by black hands. They fear letting innocent people out of jail or giving them citizenship or equal rights or just letting a minority live without fear for five minutes because they think that once they're outnumbered every other group would do the same thing us white people have done to the rest of the world. They honestly think they're doing what anyone would do in their situation. White people know that the power is on our side and most of us will do anything to keep it because deep down we know how awful it would be to be treated like a minority. It's an inherently capitalist notion that you can treat someone horribly because you assume they would do the same to you in reverse circumstances. So don't let anyone white tell you they aren't aware of race, that any minority group isn't really oppressed, or that the system isnt rigged in our favor. We know it is and it's a ploy to let us keep the upper hand in what is perceived as a never-ending struggle for dominance and superiority. Fucked, man.

[lavender-uke]

Just another rant/story... literally happened just now

*trigger warning: violence in neighborhoods*

so to help me out economically, my sister in law and my brother got me a job through this government program theyve been working for.. and basically i will be giving away phones to people with government need based help. so just a few minutes ago, my brother, my baby neice, my sister in law and I were in their dining room... and we were going through the app i would have to use in order to qualify people for their free phone. My sister in law was showing me how all the mechanics of the app worked... and that’s when we heard four consecutive gunshots come from the liquor store nearby our house... usually people make jokes about how you cant tell a  firework from a gunshot, but this was unmistakably a series of gunshots... and it was certainly not a joke

we all froze... my sister in law and i turned to look at my brother, and my brother looked at us... our eyes were wide open in shock.. and i remember seeing my brother’s face and thinking about how similar his faced looked to DK’s when seventeen won their 1st award on show champion... any other time i would have laughed at the comparison, but at that moment i was just riddled with shock... a few moments passed by.. and it felt like an eternity before we heard a series of more gunshots and this time... they were seemingly shooting at each other.. 

IMMEDIATELY, we all ran and crouched. I heard my sister in law scream “GRAB THE BABY” and instinctively I yelled “LOCK YOUR SHIT” before running out of their dining room, quickly going through their bedroom, and into my parent’s kitchen... turning on all the lights, I ran towards the front door.. a little frightened by how close I was to the street at that point...but I locked the door and turned on the light to the front porch... I then ran into all the bedrooms and closed all the windows, despite the windows already being barred from the outside, and turning on all the lights.. 

we then ran back to the furthest part of the house, and we stayed together until we heard cop cars... it took way too long for them to show up.. considering they were about a single block away from our house and the liquor store up the street... I remember hearing my sister in law yelling “You see?! This is why I don’t like you going over there!” and my brother didn’t say anything .. because he was guilty of visiting that place, specifically its weed dispensery that since being placed there.. has seemingly made our neighborhood more dangerous... my sister in law was confused as to why i kept all the lights on, and my brother and i explained that it was better so as to make it seem like people were in the house.. because usually when things like that happen, the people being chased by cops are inclined to search for houses to hide in, but theyre more likely to choose a house that seems empty (though sometimes, they dont give a fuck and barge into your property anyway, thats why you close and lock everything too)

how bad does an area have to be to have a police station, and a weed dispensery within a block of each other?? and then for people to go shooting the place up without caring if the cops are right next door? and then for the cops to show up late? 

honestly, all i could feel was guilt, because my first thought was “I leave for college tomorrow and then I wont have to deal with this anymore because the town i live in is really nice”... and then i thought about all my underclassmen, the students i mentor, that still have to deal with this on a daily basis... and then i thought about all the classmates that felt pressure and hopelessness from happenings like this... and then i felt angry 

and i still feel fucking angry..

but i used to feel angry because i knew it was the social systems fault, and it encouraged me to do better in school and help my classmates.. but now i felt angry because i was seemingly expected to inspire and save the whole fucking town with my success in college or whatever, and i felt angry that my classmates who are pretty much all now fully dropped out of college felt the same way... i felt angry that this was the place i was expected to be in forever.. i felt angry that i had to fucking prove myself to everyone that im a fucking human with abilities and talents using “the power of education” because thats the easiest way to escape poverty ... even though i know many many MANY of my classmates would have really preferred the privilege to practice their artistic or athletic abilities like the white people do in the suburbs.. .the same fucking suburbs that white people complain that nothing happens.. when we’re over here begging for even an ounce of that kind of life... i felt angry because on top of racism, danger, segregation, and poverty, we have to deal with mental illnesses that never get fucking addressed because we’re 1. thinking about too much other shit and 2. dont have the fucking income to afford a therapist

i feel so fucking angry it sickens me, i feel angry thinking about all the fucking people that will tell me “okay, then what are you gonna do about it? You have to stand! Fight for your people! Fight for your rights! Fight for your education” 

like it is infuriating in the first place thinking about how the VICTIMS have to do something about it but mostly............it is NOT my job or even WITHIN MY HUMAN CAPABILITY... WITHIN MY EMOTIONAL ABILITY... AND MY MENTAL ABILITY... TO SAVE A WHOLE TOWN... TO SAVE ALL OF MY PEOPLE... LIKE IM SOME KIND OF MOSES... because thats how it feels to have expectations for the first time in your life... and thats how it is for most kids in areas like mine... because you know what? yes you’re right. standing up and fighting against racism and segregation together will help us all... but not everyone is emotionally capable of the pressure.. and that doesnt make them weak that makes them human.. because trust me when you live your whole life through this shit.. its not as fucking easy to take encouragement from all this.. its not.. this isnt some shit to be like “welp golly this is why we have to fight!” and shoot inspirational shit out of our ass... this isnt the kind of shit we want to be inspired by... this is our reality.... give some people space to deal with it how theyre comfortable.. because yeah they feel angry at the system.. but damn let them feel what they want to feel first.. even if it takes them years and years to be like “okay.. im ready to face this fight” even if it takes them their whole life.. 

because we’re fucking human... and all the emotional baggage is not easy to deal with.. and we didnt grow up with the “lets sit around and talk about our feelings” mentality.. NOR the “there’s a problem here, let’s fix it mentality” .....quite the damn contrary........

so yeah... rant over