Finally got a clear shot of noonoo carrying her spring, it's her favourite toy

noonoo….

Biden continually works with really smart people in the background, quietly, until he's ready to do or announce something. He uses these tactics in negotiations with other countries as well. He's not bombastic nor does he make the media happy because he's boring, but he's effective.

Whether you like him or hate him, he's actually good at this job and he gets shit done and often times it's actually good shit.

re: that last post, ive said it before and ill say it again: no one deserves to die (deserving is fake and death is bad) but some people need to be stopped and choose to make death the only way to stop them

I disagree. Pedophiles 100% deserve death.

you are moralizing and weaponizing your disgust in order to construct and justify a category of person you're allowed to murder

what do you think you deserve for this?

Sorry, no person deserves to die, thankfully child molesters and pedophiles aren't human, so this doesnt apply to them.

denying the humanity of people who do horrible things accomplishes exactly three things:

3.a. if you've already established that only an inhuman monster could kill a child, then all you have to do to get people to burn down the jewish quarter is say that jews kidnap christian children to bathe in their blood

3.b. if you've already established that only an inhuman monster could commit rape, then all you have to do to get people to string up a black man you don't like is find a white woman who's willing to point at him while she cries and babbles

3.c. if you've already established that only an inhuman monster could molest a child, then all you have to do to get people to drag gay people behind their trucks is say that since gay people can't have babies, the only way they can make more gay people is by following a nefarious Agenda to "convert" children by molesting them

3.c.a. meanwhile if you try to address the rampant sexual assault of catholic altar boys, you're met with "don't be ridiculous, he's a priest!" (see #1) and with assertions that even if it does happen sometimes, those priests are just infiltrators who don't represent the church and there's no reason to make sure priests and altar boys are never alone together (see #2)

I realized how bad of a take this was after I added my last bit, i apologize for the idiocy i portrayed in my half thought out statements. And I appreciate the way you rebutted this with reasonable statements rather than going hog wild because I said something you didnt agree with.

hey no worries. we've all been there, and anyone who says they havent is either 11 or afraid of their social circle

unlearning our kneejerk reactions is a process, and it's not a linear one. its good to practice thinking before we post, but sometimes thinking after we post just has to be good enough

That gator:

Do you mean like me, or like that people in general should do that?

There should definitely be more kinky romance in the world.

This post helped me make sense of something that has been nagging at me for ages, but I haven't been able to put words to until now!

I consider myself to be a kink positive and sex positive person, but I've had this ongoing issue of finding myself very uncomfortable with what I've come to think of as "kink-adjacent" communities. These are communities that practice a lot of the same things as the kink communities I'm familiar with, but without the sex.

Somehow, even though I'm on the asexual spectrum myself, I have always felt more comfortable interacting with people in the explicitly labeled "kink" communities, while the non-sexual communities that are often labeled "no kink!" make me very uncomfortable.

What I've just realized is that OP is completely right! It's all kink because it's not about the sex. It's about the power exchange and the power dynamics.

Inside kink communities, that's usually all spelled out up front and there is no hiding it. We all know that this is about power dynamics etc. We all know that this is kink.

But in those communities where people are screaming "No kink! SFW only! No sex!" all the stuff about power dynamics and power exchange tends to be obfuscated and/or denied. Maybe this is because I'm neurodivergent and I struggle with ambiguity, but I really dislike this obfuscation!

My perception is that when things are clearly called kink, as they should be, it's easy to define my boundaries around them and let people know what I am and am not comfortable with. But when people won't recognize that something is kink, just because it doesn't include sex, then it feels so much harder to maintain those boundaries. I just want to know what I'm getting into before I show up somewhere (virtual spaces included). It's important for me to be in the right headspace when I'm encountering certain types of power dynamics.

OP, I really hope this doesn't derail your post or I'm not intruding on a larger conversation that I've missed. I'm genuinely so grateful that your insight helped me make sense of something that I've been struggling with.

No, that's a great point, and thank you for making it. A lot of people don't talk clearly about power exchange and boundaries outside of sex, and they should. Kink communities are often good at that in ways that others are not.

Also, acknowledging that non-sexual and non-romantic content can still be KINKY content is important in a fandom sense sometimes, in that if you have a fandom very full of those "SFW only! no sex!" types, you don't get things that I would 100% consider kink appropriately tagged and labelled in fanworks.

I'm adjacent/mildly in a fandom that is RIFE with stuff that is very much kinky content, of various stripes, some of which I don't enjoy at ALL, but none of it's tagged, because the fandom is also very averse to shipping or sexual content. Which gets kind of uncomfortable especially when characters who are minors are caught up in kinky/kink-adjacent dynamics with adults that I personally don't want to read about, but it's okay and doesn't need tagged for because it's a "SFW no sex no shipping" fandom for them. And while the rest of us in the fandom can kind of spot when that stuff's happening and avoid it, we're worried about them leaving this fandom for other fandoms that expect better tagging standards and acknowledgement of kinky content and having a really bad time.

If you can understand and internalize that kink =/= sex or romance, you can better identify when maybe you've written something that is playing with power dynamics in a way that probably needs tagged for, especially if it's a teenager and an adult involved in those dynamics in your fic. Which is so two steps to the side of the OP's point so hopefully this isn't obnoxiously derail-y, but it IS adjacent to both OP and @maemaybe's points so.

Here we are. (lmk if this is too tangential, OP)

This is all very important to talk about, and I appreciate that you did. If these dynamics aren't recognized, they can't be acknowledged and tagged for, either for those who enjoy them or those who want to avoid them.

Tumblr's love of the liege/faithful knight dynamic, for example? Not-necessarily-sexual kink, potentially.

I want to also caution people against forcing a label of kink on other people's writing or activity. Not that I'm saying what's happening above, but that it can be really fucked up to have someone telling you, "your relationship/ship/etc. is non-sexual kink." Telling someone "this makes me uncomfortable because it feels too close to that for me, so can you please tag for it?" is one thing, but saying, "This is that thing" is another.

Look.

I have made you a chart. A very simple chart.

People say "You have to draw the line somewhere, and Biden has crossed it-" and my response is "Trump has crossed way more lines than Biden".

These categories are based off of actual policy enacted by both of these men while they were in office.

If the ONLY LINE YOU CARE ABOUT is line 12, you have an incredible amount of privilege, AND YOU DO NOT CARE ABOUT PALESTINIANS. You obviously have nothing to fear from a Trump presidency, and you do not give a fuck if a ceasefire actually occurs. You are obviously fine if your queer, disabled, and marginalized loved ones are hurt. You clearly don't care about the status of American democracy, which Trump has openly stated he plans to destroy on day 1 he is in office.

if you want to vote for a third party, what you are going to do is vote for biden in november 2024 and then as soon as that’s done, start trying to get ranked choice voting in your state

we will ALWAYS be a two party system until voting reform happens, and voting reform won’t happen if project 2025 happens.

suck it up and vote biden, then put the next four years to good use

^^^

ok it felt more like this

TIL that there is journalism equivalent to the Bechdel Test. An article about a female scientist fails the “Finkbeiner Test” if it mentions one of seven topics regarding her womanhood

via reddit.com

The fact that she’s a woman

Her husband’s job

Her child-care arrangements

How she nurtures her underlings

How she was taken aback by the competitiveness in her field

How she’s such a role model for other women

How she’s the “first woman to…”

Okay, one quote, and then you absolutely have to read the whole thing. 

It blew my mind, because she’s right. The fact that there’s some many firsts left is the result of bias in the committees NOT IN THE WORK WOMEN DO

I wonder if it would work to flip it, like: This is the first the awards committee for underwater goldfish athleticism gave an award to a woman’?

Please be coherent about this and recognise that what this headline means is:

Poor and marginalised people are being kicked out of the houses they worked decades to secure, just at the time in their lives when they are the most vulnerable

And the ones kicking them out aren't of a specific age either. Soulless assholes come in every generation, and the ones born with too much money are the worst of the lot. Right now, a guy your age is authorising an eviction against someone the age of your grandma. Pop culture generations cannot explain that.

This.

I'm not gonna tell you how to vote, BUT...

Here are some truths about the upcoming United States election.

I really hope you make your peace with this now. Please, vote how you want, but with one candidate saying he will essentially outlaw transgender people, I can't imagine NOT voting for the only other candidate who can possibly win. Right now the polls are 50/50, which is absolutely insane to me.

In my experience, it's usually younger people who talk about either voting their conscience, or not voting at all to "send a message." I assure you, not voting doesn't send a message to the candidate who loses. Your message is only received by the millions of Americans who will suffer as a result.

I don't want to argue. I have no desire to fight with anyone over this anymore. And if you want to ask me "so I have to choose between two killers?" as a gotcha, then I'm sorry to say... The answer is yes. Those are the choices we've been given. And because the United States is no longer a true democratic republic, there's not a whole lot we can do to change that right now.

I decided to clean up an old comic of mine! A thirty something year old Tintin reflects on his childhood with Chang.

Abortion rights will be on the ballot in Arkansas, thanks to a 100% unfunded volunteer effort! Amazingly good news.

This is a really, really good example of not letting perfect be the enemy of the good.

Because yes it fucking is better to restore some reproductive rights and abortion access to people in Arkansas even if it's not perfect. Even if it's not as much as it should be (which is total), this will make such a fucking big difference to so many people, especially with "life and health of the mother".

You don't necessarily stop there. You keep educating; you keep doing outreach and explaining and pushing and teaching people in Arkansas that the fearmongering and misinformation they're fed by Certain Interest Groups is wrong, and maybe one day it will be perfect.

But literally every person who manages not to have an unwanted, unviable, dangerous, non-consensual pregnancy forced on them to term because of this is still worth that effort, imperfect as it is.

NO MATTER WHERE I HIDE MY DONUT FRYER NICK ALWAYS FINDS IT AND USES IT

I'M SO SICK OF HIM

HOW?!!?!?

NICK. NICK STOP MAKING DONUTS PLEASE NICK WE NEED TO BREAK INTO THE INSTITUTE AND GET MY SON NICK PLEA

Ok I want to say something controversial

But you are responsible for your own safe spaces. You can block tags, block words, block people.

“But i thought fandom was supposed to be a safe space” —yeah you have to curate it.

Unfortunately one persons’s safe space may be another persons’ trigger. That’s ok. Simply block them, block the tag, block the word etc. They can do the same for you.

Maybe I’m just out of touch, but I’ve been around since the days of “don’t like, don’t read” and that’s a good philosophy. If it squicks you, scroll past. If it causes you anxiety or upset, block! Plenty of people are responsive if you ask them to tag an upsetting trigger. And if they’re dicks about it, block em.

Since different people have different needs, one person’s safe space will be another’s Trauma Central.

I don’t know who said it first, but “I need to be able to express my anger without shame” and “I need to be away from yelling and loud noises” are both valid needs people can have for a safe space that really aren’t compatible with each other.

So are “I need to process my trauma” and “I need to not meet any trauma.”

Or “I want a safe space to tell/read the stories that speak to me” and “those stories are distressing to me.”

Insisting that your needs are the only needs anyone should have is not a safe space, it’s its own act of violence.

You don’t get to make others homeless to make the universe your personal safe space.

Read this bit again: