i wish men understood that when women are talking about feminism and rape culture and shit, it’s not just a political conversation. it’s not about being a “social justice warrior” or whatever. it’s about our actual lives being shaped by misogyny since childhood, and the daily reality of living in fear of violence. this isn’t a fucking game or philosophical debate. this is our fucking lives. 

this post is picking up like 100 notes per minute its outta control 

Stan Queen Guinevere

Yes Queen ♕

YESS I SAW HER TWITTER AND IT WAS IS SO GOOD. This warmed my heart because to be honest it was discouraging to see the debates going around this and my position has always been clear that in this case everyone who has an audience could be using their plataform (especially given their past history of pseudo activism and charities) to echoed our black fan fellows voices.

They are free to do as they deemed fit, but I’m free to gauge my own reaction and judgment about it and mine is that silence is compliance at this tipping point, so I’m really really encouraged and lift by this.

This was 2016:

This is now

Angel Coulby has been tweeting and retweeting a lot, from Covid19 news, BLM to peaceful protest and she is really a queen pf the people.

I love her Twitter, it's always something informative and intelligent 💜

oppression isn’t generational and trying to frame politics as “the old people are wrong and the young people are right” erases the fact that there are old people who have been fighting the good fight for decades and the fact that there are young people who are literally nazis

Plus while there might be less old people fighting the good fight it’s usually because they were killed or were part of the minorities that have poor living conditions that kill you early

As came up recently, in fact: Seniors Are More Conservative Because the Poor Don’t Survive to Become Seniors

Fuck, yeah.

Watch: George Carlin spoke the truth about pro-lifers in 1996 — and it’s still being proven today.

Anti-woman. Period.

I mean, to be fair, it’s kinda both right now.

This is 40 years of the billionaire-bought-and-paid for GOP implementing policies that take money out of the pockets of working people and putting it in the pockets of their masters.

The GOP is a fraud. They can’t be trusted. Vote them out, all of them. Everywhere…

My greatest worry is that everything’s going to be blamed on Trump and the rest of the GOP will get a free pass

If we’re going to be honest, both parties are beholden to the rich, just in different ways. The rich want a system where everyone else has no way to overthrow them. The way to do that is to create an illusion of choice. The Republicans don’t give a fuck about the poor, and the Democrats don’t give a fuck about the poor. One party is just more brazen than the other. We’re fucked either way as long as we trust the establishment of either party. They are two wings of the same vulture that’s feeding on our dying middle class.

I feel like this would be a slippery slope towards making it illegal for people to choose to not vote.

that’s already how it is in australia

That’s just so fucked up. :( Do certain medical conditions exempt you?

?????? why is it be fucked up to have compulsory voting? that’s the way it is in most democratic countries? it’s a part of being a citizen, like paying taxes and obeying speed limits? the fine for not voting is only like $50 and because of the compulsory voting law, our country bends over backwards to make it accessible: it’s always on a weekend, lasts most of the day, and is set up at schools and community centers so there’s one within easy reach of almost everybody. you can also mail your ballot or vote early if you’ll be out of the country on the day. like, IT’S EASY TO VOTE, and the penalty isn’t even that ridiculous. i don’t understand why the usa doesn’t have this, except obviously it would make it harder to literally stop minorities from voting.

I think we Americans tend to forget that a lot of other countries don’t actively work to make it harder to vote.

Adding to this here, in Australia you don’t have to vote. Or, more precisely, there’s no way they can tell if you ruined your ballot. You have to turn up, get your name marked off, but you can put a line through the ballot if you don’t think any of the candidates are worth voting for. Or do this: 

Or this: 

Or this: 

You have get your name crossed off (if you don’t want to wear the fine), but you don’t have to make your vote counted if you’re opposed to it. 

And it is so, so easy to vote. Stuck at work or on holidays? That’s fine. Do a postal vote.  Stuck in hospital? That’s fine. They’ll go to you. Stuck in an old people’s home and can’t get around? Again, they’ll go to you. It’s amazing to me that it’s so hard for so many Americans to actually vote. If you make it compulsory, than at least the government is obligated to provide you with the means to vote. 

And look, I get it. Sometimes I don’t want to vote either. But I suck it up, I walk three minutes down the street, and I hope that this year they’re selling lamingtons again. Oh, and I buy a democracy sausage, which, even if all the candidates suck, makes the effort of turning up pretty worthwhile. 

ALSO, you can see even on the fucked up ballots that you NUMBER CANDIDATES IN ORDER OF PREFERENCE. There’s no need to calculate whether I would be throwing away my vote on the candidate that I most agree with if they’re not from a major party. I can say, I want that independent person to get in, but if not them, give me Big Party A, and if not them, that minor party person is still better that Big Party B, and I’m not giving any preference to the Lunatic Fringe Party.

Our system certainly has some issues still, but I can show up to somewhere nearby, line up for a few minutes (if at all), vote exactly in line with my values (on paper, leaving a paper trail that can be recounted), and then buy a sausage and some home made cupcakes on my way out.

A country’s voting system matters a hell of a lot and every citizen deserves one that makes it easy to vote and results in a government that is representational and accountable.

And by the way, one time I had a bad asthma flare-up on Election Day and didn’t make it to my polling station. I got my fine in the mail, I filled out the form explaining why I couldn’t vote, no more fine. I would rather have, you know, expressed my preference for who should run my country, but they were cool with the fact that I couldn’t do it that day.

“oh no, what if people actually have to participate in picking the government officials who will impact their lives” jesus christ

I wonder from where so many Americans get the idea that voting is supposed to be some expression of your deepest, most beloved values and virtues rather than a pragmatic, political move meant to shift your country as much closer to your ideal as possible. This strikes me as another example of extreme individualism. Voting isn’t about *you*. It’s about your city, state, and/or country. It doesn’t have to feel transcendently good deep down in your bones. It just has to *do* as much good as you can do, in this particular moment in time.

my politics summed up

I’m still so fucking mad at Cracked for firing this guy. I hope he finds a way to keep Some News going, because it was an amazing, awesome show.

WTF HOW COULD THEY FIRE HIM? HE WAS ONE OF MY FAVS!

Dude, Cracked - or the company that bought Cracked last year - fired almost everybody. Cody Johnston, Michael Swaim, John Cheese, Robert Evans, fucking Dan O’Brien - it was a massacre. They’re clearly transitioning away from salaried content producers and to more “user generated” content like the PictoFacts and articles from freelancers. I am so fucking disappointed. 

why you should not dismiss research unless you rly truly mean it

Internet, I am a queer researcher of queer health and I have something to say.

A few weeks back, a study went viral about the relationship between marriage equality policy and queer teen suicide rates, and a lot of people reacted thusly: “queer mental health is better when we’re not discriminated against! BREAKING: SKY IS BLUE, WATER IS WET”

This happens a lot. People see research about a thing ~Everyone Already Knows~ and they mock it. Now I want to make two things really clear:

1. Everyone does not already know.

2. This shit can lose these projects their funding.

Did you know that media coverage is a crucial factor in funding allocation? When we submit our application for grant renewal, we have to provide a list of news articles about our research so they can decide whether the public cares enough about us to let us keep doing our work. And most research doesn’t get all that much coverage, so individual reactions can really matter. If the primary reaction to our publications is eyerolling, we legitimately might not be able to continue.

I’ve seen some frustration from people who believe this research funding would be better put to use “actually helping” the affected populations instead of–I don’t know, pinning them under microscopes or whatever it is they think we do. But funding for policy initiatives is driven by research. I know you wish politicians would listen to individual voices telling them where the problems are, but that’s honestly not a smart way to direct limited resources. We need solid evidence. And a lot of the areas that need the most attention aren’t obvious–who knew bisexual people are at a much higher risk for physical and mental health disparities than gay and lesbian people? Who would have guessed that transgender folks are more likely than any other group (including straight people) to be military veterans, but overwhelmingly don’t claim their benefits? I’m sure some people noticed these patterns, but they definitely weren’t common knowledge within the queer communities I’ve grown up around, and those findings are leading to direct action as we speak.

I get that it can be frustrating to feel like your identity is being reduced to facts and figures for the benefit of red tape. But trust me, the researchers aren’t your enemy here. Most of us are queer too. All of us are just as frustrated by this crap as you are. We are doing our best, and I swear to you this work really is making a difference. Please don’t sabotage it.

I’m reblogging this because it only has 9 notes, and it should really, REALLY have a lot more.