“Navajo Nation — in the “Four Corners” area, with land that borders part of Northeastern Arizona, Southeastern Utah, and Northwestern New Mexico — has been hit hard by COVID-19. So far there are 354 confirmed cases with 15 confirmed deaths. As with much of the nation, the testing picture is incomplete. Navajo Schools stayed open two days longer than non-reservation schools, but the Navajo Nation has taken up strong distancing precautions since then. The Diné have now issued stay-at-home orders and instituted a strict curfew. They’ve also declared a state of emergency.

The seriousness of this response isn’t without precedent. The Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918-1920 was devastating for the Navajo Nation. According to historical records, 12 percent of the population perished, or 3,377 people. So far, COVID-19 has mortality rates anywhere from less than one percent to ten percent or more, depending on a long list of factors. But preparedness seems to be a major determiner and Navajo Nation is woefully ill-equipped to fight off a virus like this. It’s certainly worth noting that 2009’s Swine Flu was four times more deadly in Indian Country than the rest of the U.S.

Diné attorney and leader Ethel Branch has set up the Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund on GoFundMe (she also set up a Relief Fund for the Havasupai). This is the fastest and most direct way you can help people right now.

So far the Relief Fund has 2,000 families seeking assistance. The money is going to packages that are being dispatched throughout Navajo Nation. The Guardian reports that each package is filled with “flour, beans, rice, canned soups, dried meat, fever and cough medicine, as well as fresh vegetables, fruit, and meat when available.” These are crucial lifelines for many Diné.

So far, the Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund is at about 50 percent of its goal. You can donate directly right here.”

Read the full piece here

this movie is so fucking creepy jesus fuck

It’s by Tim Burton, what did you honestly expect?

Actually, it’s Henry Selick, who was the director of The Nightmare Before Christmas. The book was written by Neil Gaiman, though, and is far…far….worse.

Sorry, I’m about to geek the hell out.

The movie is captivating, but the book is twenty kinds of terrifying, even now, ten years after I first read it. As disturbing as the movie may have been to some, the things Selick added really serve to cushion just how horrific the story really is.

First of all, the character of Wybie does not exist in the book. Coraline is facing all of this nearly alone, with her only help coming from the sly comments of the cat, a warning from the circus mice, and the stone given to her by her neighbor, presented with no comment but that it “makes the unseen seen.”

Second, the Other Parents are never quite as warm (and, dare I say, normal) as they are in the gifs above. They’re described as having paper-white skin and the Other Mother’s hair is said to move on its own, and her long, red, claw-like nails don’t ease any uncertainty that she is absolutely, positively up to no good. The first time Coraline meets them, they (and the rest of the Others) seem to be playing roles (for whatever reason, Coraline does not seem to pick up on this), like they all know what to say and what to do and are simply waiting for Coraline to make her move in their terrifying play world. This is shown to be partly true when the Other Parents tell her they know she’ll be back soon after she refuses the buttons - this time, to stay.

Third, the Other Mother commits atrocities that really should not have been in a book for anyone not fully grown up. She physically deforms the world around Coraline to slow her progress in their game beyond any mild traps the movie portrays, and, instead of turning the Other Father into the wandering pumpkin-thing seen in the film, she simply ceases to use him and throws his body away in the cellar, leaving him to rot with whatever bit of sentience he has left. She begins to lose her touch, as Coraline gains the upper hand. Her world doesn’t just become a nightmare - it falls apart completely. No creepy but oddly cool bug furniture here, just the house that now appears to be a child’s drawing. Whatever the Other Mother is (a beldame, but something tells me she’s much more ancient and powerful than that), she does not give half a hump about what she has to do to ensnare Coraline. Destroy the supporting characters of her twisted creation? Done. Allow herself to be dismembered to ruin Coraline’s life in the normal world? Not even gonna bat an eyelash.

On a final, personal note, imagine eight year-old me, ignored by my parents, absorbed in the story and identifying with Coraline from the start. Imagine me finishing this bloodcurdling book and immediately thinking of my basement, where there is still a locked door that my grandmother swears up and down is nothing more than a storage room, but has not once in my (or my mother’s) lifetime unlocked.

Can you see why this book still scares me?

Fun fact I learned from seeing neil gaiman speak: when he first wanted the book published, his editor said it was too scary. He suggested she read it to her young daughter, and then decide. So she did, and her daughter wasn’t afraid, and it was published. Years later, Gaiman was sitting next to that daughter at an event and told her this story, and she said “oh I was terrified I just didn’t want to tell my mom”.

Coraline WAS too scary to be published, but exists anyway because a girl lied to her mother.

@neil-gaiman, is this true about the publisher’s daughter?

It was my literary agent, Merrilee Heifetz who read it and said “you can’t seriously expect this to be published as a children’s book.” So I suggested she read it to her daughters. And she called me back a week later and said “They love it and they weren’t scared at all. I’ll take it to Harper Children’s.”

A decade later, at the Opening Night of the Coraline musical, I was sitting next to Morgan, Merilee’s youngest daughter, and told her how her not being scared had made the book happen. And she said “I was terrified. But I needed to find out what happened next. So nobody knew.”

So, yes.

Children need access to terrifying and horrifying stories in which kids their age are the heroes. It’s healthy for kids to experience fear and horror and revulsion and disgust in fiction, because then they can learn on their own terms and in their own time how to handle those emotions. People who are kept away from scary stories when they’re young aren’t actually any better equipped to experience them for the first time when they’re adults: they’re actually going to be way more brittle. Scary stories are very functionally vaccines against real horrors.

Coraline is an excellent children’s story, not because it’s not gruesome and dark and twisted and revolting and existentially horrifying and full of all sorts of haunting little atrocities, but because it is all those things, and magnificently so. 

sorry for the donation post spam. things are worse than ever for me rn.

PayPal.me/dentseymour

please please please help me out! I’m willing to do anything!!! I can’t pay for food!! I’m going to get kicked out of my fucking house!!

I’m literally in debt now. Bout to be put in homeless hostels. Please help me

hello ladies: update: i am officially homeless. i will be staying with my bf for a few days then hopefully transitioning to a safe house next week. i am very scared and unsure of my future right now but i’m finally away from my abusers. wish me luck :)

02/29/2020: woke up to ten missed calls from the county sheriffs office! they tried to file a missing persons report against me, but since i’m over 18 they couldn’t. had to speak to an officer and verify that i left of my own free will. then they came to my job trying to find me, thank god i hadn’t clocked in yet and the hospital is so tight on security. my counselor is trying to find me a shelter for next week, we called 211 and they took us on a fucking goose chase—i swear we called 10+ shelters and no luck. starting to freak out. but at least i have somewhere to safe to stay until wednesday. i feel strangely calm sometimes, and for once i don’t have a constant sense of doom and danger in the back of my mind, waiting for the next little thing i do to set them off and hurt me.

thank you for your kind wishes everyone. obviously my biggest concern is housing, but second to that is transportation (i don’t have a car anymore, or a license). the bay area has a really cohesive transit system that’s very affordable, but not free. my best bet is a monthly clipper card that allows me to take BART, AC Transit and the Cal Train. since i don’t know where i’ll be staying in two days, this would be very, very helpful.

if anyone would like to donate to help me pay for the clipper card, i’d really appreciate it.

housing is a whole other story. the bay area is one of the most expensive places in the country, and the rent reflects that. for a single SHARED room in someone else’s home, the cheapest monthly rent i’ve come across is $850. this is a lot of money, as that’s more than what i make in a whole month at my job. i’m not expecting anyone to cover my rent...but i’m begging for assistance. me and my counselor have been searching for housing, but the shelters we’ve reached out to only serve victims of domestic violence, and since i was hurt by my parents and not my spouse, they’re hesitant to let me take a space. i’m applying for a second and third job to prepare for the worst case scenario.

(i also have zelle, which is directly linked to my bank account. i can no longer use cashapp since it is linked to my mothers bank account).

thank you.

Friends, this is bad.

Real, live antisemitic caricatures of Jews were on full display in a ‘fun’ parade in Belgium.  This is bad, real bad.

To my fellow, beautiful Jewish siblings: we will get through this as we have for the past 5000 years. Together.

I’ve posted the full article here for your convenience.

———————————————————————————

February 23, 2020 By Cnaan Liphshiz

AALST, Belgium (JTA) — Caricatures of Jews, including ones depicting them as ants, were prominently displayed at this city’s annual parade.

The displays came a year after the Jewish Telegraphic Agency exposed anti-Semitic displays in last year’s parade in Aalst, located about 10 miles west of Brussels. Participants said the new displays were designed to reject the criticism of the town and carnival that followed JTA’s report.

Raphael Ahren        (photo)

Keep reading

Reblog this.

Show the world that you care about stopping systematic antisemitism.

Show the world that you care about the Jewish People.

Donations Needed

A friend of mine has been trying to escape her abusive husband for some time and is desperately in need of money for it, especially so she can keep taking care of herself and her kid. If you have any money to spare, it will help immensely and I will greatly appreciate it as well. If you have no money to spare, please reblog this post so others may see it and thank you so much for your help. 

Gofundme 

Ways to get Jehovah’s Witnesses to fuck off (as written by a former Jehovah’s Witness)

Additional reminders:

As a victim of the cult please please please signal boost this. Make sure it gets over 100,000 note, Normally I have dni standards but I want everyone to reblog this. No one deserves to be preyed upon by the JW org. Also to people who are tempted to call the police on the JW’s. There’s been quite a few videos  that have proven the governing body have friends in the court system. They’ve been sued many times,.and during the Montana case they managed to keep breaking court rules without being held in contempt of court. That to me suggests that they must have friends within the court who are letting them do this.  This cult know how to extort people into holding off on finally labeling the cult as a hate group globally. They couldn’t stop Russia from doing that but the governing body is still trying to stop other governments from doing the same. Not only is it a high control cult when it comes to silencing and demonizing its victims who’ve left. But its a high control cult that’s learned how to become mostly above the law. Also if anyone is curious to know more about what this cult teaches fee free to ask me too. I’ve been a JW cult victim since I was 22. I was 22 when I woke up to the reality that it was a cult. It was the only perspective I had on life for a long time until I turned 18 and began to try to mentally become more independent. I have a lot of info on how dangerous the cult is. I’ve told some of my other mutuals about how dangerous it is. But not all of my followers and mutuals know yet. So feel free to ask away. I don’t want any of you to be manipulated by this cult. (This cult also has real pedos in it so if you’re a minor  would not suggest you try to go out of your wa to confront adult JW’s. For the sake of your safety.)

It’s been an emotional week. I wanted to share this encounter I had with a very hateful man on the Pittsburgh bus because it reminds me that there are brave people in this world. Let’s all do everything we can to stand up for each other.

Catherine wants to make people more aware about how important it is to be aware of these issues.

She knew him for 20 years. He worked as a police officer. 90 days as a punishment is such a pathetic sentence. Total rubbish. this guy is evil and who knows how many victims of his assaults have stayed unknown. What a scums serve in the law enforcement… 

Please share.

Please share.

This!☝️☝️☝️☝️☝️

Protect children by any means necessary!

the older i get the weirder it is that not a single p.e. teacher in my entire school career was able to recognize the difference between “a child who doesn’t get enough exercise” and “a child with serious health problems impeding their ability to exercise in this particular way”

you know what else is weird? we had to do that fitness test every year but like… we never actually… learned how to do the things they tested us on…

like, now that i am an adult i have learned how to build up my strength so i can do pushups, but that seems like something they could have taught us? in school? in the class where they tested our ability to pushups? they never taught us how to work our way up to actually doing a chin-up, or whatever. even if i had just been “out-of-shape” (as a CHILD), nothing they did would have solved that problem. i did not learn how to exercise in a functional way until i was out of school and teaching myself, so i’m not sure what those p.e. classes were even intended to accomplish, really.

people are adding a lot of horror stories to this post that are really similar to mine (exercise-induced asthma, running the mile every friday, coughing nonstop for hours afterward and never actually getting any faster or building up any endurance, fainting at least once and not even getting sent to the nurse) but

to add something to the “really obvious shit any idiot could have told me” list

they taught us that the average walking speed should be 3mph, and i consistently tried on treadmills to walk at 3mph, and that always seemed really fucking fast to me and i never understood why

i’m 5′2″

i was in my twenties before i realized that i cannot go that fast because i have short fucking legs

why did grown-ass adults with eyes try to teach my short ass that i should be able to walk an easy mile in 20 minutes

It’s like they say.

If you can’t do, teach.

If you can’t teach, be a gym teacher.

It never occurred to me until reading this notes the utter ridiculousness that PE teachers held all kids to the same benchmark standards for like number of pushups and sit ups, time of mile, etc. even though everyone is at a different level athletically and has different body types and heights

Can we all agree that PE was a traumatic experience for non-athletic kids? It dented my self confidence for a decade and it probably played an integral role in my developing an eating disorder that nearly killed me two years in a row –too busy comparing myself to the CHILDREN who had been taught to be athletic to consider myself worthy of anything else than starving myself to death.

My mum had a similar experience in 8th grade when her PE teacher asked her to demonstrate how to do hurdles, then asked another athletic girl to demonstrate after her –only to say “see class: do it the way Tammy did it. NOT how Cheryl (my mum) did it.”

It wasn’t until I got a fiercely feminist fitness teacher in grade 10 did I realize I was actually capable of LEARNING this shit. Fuck elementary PE.

I hated P.E. the entire time I was in school, and it didn’t occur to me until well into adulthood that if I’d have been taught properly or not pressured the way kids are pressured, I might have actually enjoyed sports. Cause like, I’d love to build muscles, or play volleyball, or tennis, or what fucking ever, but gym class ruined it for me.

Anyone looking to learn what PE class totally failed to teach, Anatrik’s videos on strength workouts are very good:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dF1DOWzf20&t=3s

He’s also worked with a friend to create this great strength routine:

https://www.reddit.com/r/bodyweightfitness/wiki/kb/recommended_routine

What I love about Anatrik’s stuff is that all of his exercises not only describe proper technique very clearly, but come with suggested progressions – if you’re not strong enough for an exercise, there are several levels of easier exercises designed specifically to build up your strength over time until you can do it.

P.E. is one of the most traumatizing things from my entire history of schooling.

I have a distinct memory of being berated for not knowing the rules of rugby in the first PE lesson where we played it. I had never seen a match before, how the fuck was I meant to know the rules without the teacher telling us?

Having abusive parents, you learn to only care about things in secret. Liking things openly becomes unsafe, because your parents notice, and it’s the first thing they’ll take away from you the second they need to blackmail you. After a while it only feels safe to not care about anything, to not want anything, and to not be attached to anything, because then it can’t be used against you, they can’t use it against you. You have to be apathetic if you don’t want to be openly vulnerable to abuse. Eventually you learn to hide everything from everyone. Even your friends don’t find out about it. Every pleasure feels like guilty pleasure, like you’ll pay for it later. Your entire life becomes a secret that feels too dangerous to tell anyone.

Yes, your mother will miss you. Yes, your bully will make a sappy facebook post about what a wonderful pearson you were, yes.

Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem, but you know that. You know that. And you wonder why anyone and everyone has been shoving that down your throat since you first learned what the word suicide meant. Those slogans might have lost their meaning but anything that keeps you alive is worth saying.

So don't kill yourself untill you finish your shampoo and conditioner at the same time. Don't kill yourself untill Doctor Who is finally canceled. Don't kill yourself untill you tell someone your best pasta recipe. Don't kill yourself because I will keep coming up with reasons that you need to hear all of them.

Don't kill yourself. I love you. You're important.

Its a bad day, not a bad life. There's more to this. The world will keep spinning on it's axis without you but think about the sunlight. Think about the love you'll miss and the celeberity twitter posts. Think about you.

Please don't do it. I've been there and I don't want you to go. I love you and wish only the best. 💜💜💙💜💙💜💛💜💙💜💜💛💜💙💜💛

Now I'm crying

Everything okay?

If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, you are not alone.  

If you are located in the U.S., contact the National Eating Disorder Association (NEDA) Helpline at 1-800-931-2237 for support, resources, and treatment options.

If you are located in the United Kingdom, The Beat UK is here to support people who have or are worried they have an eating disorder.  You can find all of the support services they provided by clicking here.

If you are located anywhere in the European Union, you can find support resources in your area at Mental Health Europe.

If you need some inspiration and comfort on your dashboard, follow Post It Forward on Tumblr.

Everything ok?

If you or someone you know is a victim of abuse, contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233.  Trained advocates are available 24/7 to take your call.