To the people in the OTW Tumblr Inbox asking about how the OTW is responding to the American Election.

This is a separate post (and not a response to a specific message) because we all need to see it.

Folks have been asking Support (through the form) as well as the other social media mods, and we have now been given the following to tell you.

<3 Mod Remi

How are disabled and interracial illegal???

Interracial marriage was outlawed for the longest time, and disabled people lose government benefits when they get married so they cannot have reassurance that they will continue to LIVE if they get married.

Story time: my mom is white, dad is black. They’ve been together twenty four years, married for twenty three. When my parents were dating they did it on the low TO KEEP MY DAD SAFE.

My mom’s parents said “We don’t care who you love.” At that point she’d only ever brought home white guys. She brought my dad home-her mother called her a nigger lover and damned the relationship as much as possible. Her father grew around his prejudices after I was born but never apologized, just wasn’t a blatant fuck.

The day she introduced my father to her family was the last time she spoke to her mother for over twenty years. When I was getting sick and she called and asked her mother and grandmother if anyone in the family had anything strange happen similar what I was going through they told her “it’s because you married a black man. You made your bed, you lie in it.”

Cops pulled them over all the time and asked my mom IF SHE WAS OKAY AND IF SHE NEEDED HELP BECAUSE MY FATHER-A BLACK MAN-WAS DRIVING A 100 POUND WHITE WOMAN AROUND. HE WAS HARRASSED AND THREATED WITH ARREST.

My father ended up getting into a fight in self defence because some entitled hick decided he didn’t like seeing a black man and white woman in the bar together. Thankfully other patrons helped my father but he still couldn’t go to the er for his injuries. My mom patched him up and they were terrified the cops would take him away.

THEIR BEST FRIEND GOT LICENSED TO MARRY THEM SO THEY COULD ACTUALLY TIE THE KNOT BECAUSE NO ONE ELSE WOULD AND CITED JIM CROW ERA LAW AS TO WHY.

When shopping with just me my father wouldn’t hold my hand if there was a group around. Why? I’m far lighter than him and people had stopped and asked him “whose child is that?” Or “little girl where’s your parents?” and were stunned when I grinned and pointed at my dad and proudly proclaimed “my daddy’s right here.” You know where else mixed kids couldn’t hold their parents hands? Apartheid South Africa. We live in fucking FLORIDA.

So yeah. Some history for you.

This post was made in October 2018. The above poster’s parents met in 1994. We were a generation removed from the Civil Rights movement and this was happening.

Also re:disabled people - if you are disabled and receive government assistance, and you get married, you lose that assistance.

Project 2025 ain't gonna roll out all at once. So what we're gonna wanna do is make passing each individual part of it as difficult as possible, so there's less to undo once we finally get this country back on the rails.

Resist every step and do not get distracted by stupid bullshit. Distracting people with stupid bullshit is one of Trump's favorite political techniques. We saw it all over the place in the first term.

Trump will say something like "You know the Hispanics actually punch kittens, it's what they do."

And the news will be like "TRUMP SAID HISPANIC PEOPLE PUNCH KITTENS" for three weeks.

And while they're doing that the Republicans in Congress have quietly deleted healthcare.

Do not get distracted by stupid bullshit. Trump is a dancing monkey whose greatest asset is the ability to yank the spotlight off of everyone else. Keep your eyes on Congress.

if I had a nickel for every time I voted for the potential first female president over trump and trump won I’d had two nickels and it’s really fucking fucked up that it happened twice

Before January 2025:

If you are a USAmerican in a relationship that might be affected by legislation that dissolves same-sex marriages, who may no longer be recognized as next-of-kin, especially if you have children, get your rights in writing!

Your marriage certificate may not be enough to prove you have rights to make medical decisions for non-biological children or for a same-sex spouse or partner.

Go to a lawyer, get it spelled out as clearly as possible that you have a voice in emergency medical and legal situations.

For those of us who aren’t lawyers or well-versed in law generally, can someone clarify what kind of document, by name, people should be drafting with their lawyers? Is it a type of letter, or is there a name for this classification of document? I’m aware that it probably varies by US state, but a lot of people are likely feeling extremely lost right now and don’t know where to start on this. I definitely don’t. I live in a state that isn’t likely to nullify existing marriages or prevent new ones from taking place, but who knows what they’re going to try at the national level and enforce from the top down.

Power of Attorney should cover most partners and spouses to ensure that they will be making each other's health care decisions in cases of serious illness. LGBTQ+ spouses and domestic partners must execute proper Health Care Power of Attorney documents listing each other as the highest priority agents for making each other's health care decisions in case of incapacity.

Here's a resource from GLAD.

A Pragmatic and surprisingly comforting perspective about the Trump 2nd Presidency from the ACLU

***Apologies if this is how you found out the 2024 election results***

Blacked out part is my name.

I’m not going to let this make me give up. It’s disheartening, and today I will wallow, probably tomorrow too

AND

I will continue to do my part in my community to spread the activism and promote change for the world I want to live in. I want to change the world AND help with the dishes.

And I won’t let an orange pit stain be what stops me from trying to be better.

A link to donate to the ACLU if able and inclined. I know I am

If you need to remember that we fought back in the courts, what we fought for, there's a documentary about the ACLU in the first Trump presidency:

Hey America, did you know Plan B has a shelf life of 4 years! P.S remember to individuals who weigh more than 155 lbs it will be less effective

Check your ballots and tell your people to check theirs. There is a process to fix errors (usually signatures not matching; common with younger voters who tend to sign their ballots nicer than their driver’s license or whatever form they signed to register)

just wanted to say that i'm seeing headlines everywhere say "floridians rejected an amendment to secure abortion rights" and that is NOT TRUE.

we voted ~57% to enshrine abortion rights in the florida constitution. amendments for our state require a supermajority, aka 60% to pass. this is bullshit and we were set up to fail.

the entire time, our governor Ron Desantis' officials were pressuring and threatening media outlets for publishing anything supporting this amendment.

don't believe the bullshit headlines. floridians wanted abortion rights.

Check your voter registration status - YOU CAN REGISTER AND VOTE IN PERSON DAY OF

Know your rights as a voter

Voter safety and resources for domestic violence survivors - you can cast a secret ballot at the polls

How to stay safe during civil unrest (PDF)

24/7 LGBTQ+ friendly suicide hotline that you can call, text, or chat

Everyone who's not in the US is EXTREMELY welcome to vote, too, because we know this election affects far more than just us and it's very understandable to be stressed about it.

god i hope the cpsc takes the shot. i think this would dramatically change their entire business model. amazon makes so much money by selling defective or mislabeled or just plain dangerous products and then faces little liability because this stuff is actually being sold by random third-party sellers that don't get vetted at all and can be hard to prosecute because they're in china or wherever. this is a big part of what makes amazon so powerful and it would be good for everyone if they were forced to bear more responsibility for the damages caused by the crap available on their website

Here's the link if someone can paste the article into the reblogs

Note that it is not an accident that this is happening now. One of the things Biden has made a point of doing is appointing aggressive and anti-corporate people to Federal agencies, such as the Consumer Product Safety Commission. There have been a string of rulings and rule changes from such agencies that have been good for the average American and/or good for labor unions, but bad for the big corporations.

UPDATE: Amazon is officially a distributor who is legally responsible to recall dangerous defective products! The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) issued the decision and order on 7/30/24 by a commission chair nominated by Biden in 2021. Democrats are the party of consumer safety and improving lives.

Democrats are the party of consumer safety and improving lives.

Find your polling place, get your ID, register day-of if you have to, and VOTE FOR MORE RULINGS LIKE THIS!

JD Vance is your archetypal Republican spineless goon.

He shits on women, then when called out to his face, he pretends to have no idea and lies.

Trump does this on every topic. I don't know Stormy Daniels. I don't know E. Jean Carroll. I didn't know the comic at MSG.

Such a weak-minded defense. Such cowardice.

Vote Blue.

It's totally not comparable to the handmaid's tale you guys, it's just a VP candidate (who's the understudy to a 78 year old who exhibits clinical signs of dementia) saying he wants to restrict the movements of pregnant women within the country and imprison them if they try to leave their state...

“undecided voters” as a concept is so hilarious like I can’t imagine making it to this point in the election cycle and being like “I still just don’t know….”

“Donald Trump is threatening democracy and repeatedly calling for violence but Kamala Harris is a woman and kind of annoying so I don’t know. I just don’t know. Jill Stein maybe? But she’s an even more annoying woman. This is so hard.”

Kamala is facilitating a genocide. She's not an "annoying woman." She is ACTIVELY supporting and legitimizing a genocide. AT BEST, she might make concessions for the well-being of Americans at home.

If you are okay with improving your material well-being in exchange for the genocide of Palestinians, you are functionally no different than the average German in WW2 who was "Well, I don't like the Furher's zeal but I must admit I have benefited handsomely from new lands available for purchase in Poland!"

I’m going to hold your hand when I say this, allowing Trump to take office will mean the extinction of the Palestinian people. He does not care. He is not anti-genocide. He is anti-refugee. He is anti-Muslim and he is extremely dangerous. I do not agree with Kamala. I do not like her. I will always choose the lesser of two evils over passively letting the greater evil win. We shouldn’t have to choose between two evils but America is an imperialist force no matter who is at the helm, if you are American, you can keep patting yourself on the back for not voting for Kamala but I need you to know that doesn’t help the Palestinian people in the slightest.

@dithorba this is exactly what got Trump elected the first time. Hillary wasn't perfect, so people refused to vote for her. And we ended up with the most corrupt president in U.S. history.

What I really need all of you to understand that this isn't a vote for who you support; this is a vote against who you oppose.

I'm not voting for Kamala because I support her, I'm voting for her to keep Trump out of office. "If you don't vote for Kamala, then you support Trump" is NOT hyperbole. The only way to defeat a Trump vote is with a Kamala vote. If you don't vote, then you're letting a Trump vote have power. Not voting is HELPING TRUMP WIN.

This is not about who is good and who is bad.

This is, and always has been, about damage control.

If you think both candidates are bad, then bad things are going to happen regardless. Go out there and vote for how bad you want things to get because if you don't, I guarantee you we'll get the worst case scenario.

My dream for the election is that it’s definitive. I want a 2012-style Election Day where everyone built it up beforehand to possibly be close but then the results start rolling in and it was like “Oh, nevermind. It’s obviously Obama. Everyone go to bed.”

I just want voters to put a stake right through the heart of Trumpism so that it crumbles to ash before our eyes. That’s the dream.

like to charge, reblog to cast

they're burning ballots in the US now btw. in case you wanted to know where things are at.

Edit: to clarify, locations mentioned are Vancouver, Washington and Portland, Oregon. This news story does not involve Canada.

“no one for president” you sound like such a fucking cringe edgelord and unless u plan on staging a massive revolution in a country of 300 million spanning 3.8 million square miles and overthrowing the government before November I would suggest voting for the candidate who DOESNT cater to white supremacy subcultures, getting involved in local community services & initiatives, donating to causes, or campaigning/protesting instead of this performative mock activism

In 2016, over 75,000 mail-in ballots were left uncounted and discarded because they were received after  mail-in voting deadlines, which all vary by state, according to CBS news. 

Some states like California allow you to check with the Registrar of Voters on-line to verify both if a ballot has issued and if it was received to help prevent voting errors.

Remember, the most common forms of voter fraud are 1) gerrymandering, 2) voter suppression and 3) foreign participation through both lobbying and online misinformation. 

OCTOBER 13. IT’S BEING DELIBERATELY SLOWED. OCTOBER 13.

This is the most important election of our times. GOP will use anything they can to suppress Democratic votes. Make sure your vote is counted.

if you can. take your ballot directly to a ballot box. every city hall will have one. check your city’s website to find other absentee ballot locations