basically emotional manipulation and guilt tripping as social justice praxis is pointless and not sustainable imo. it doesn’t promote real growth or solidarity if the entire basis of your activism is stemming from guilt or fear
i’m especially upset by the pressure to reblog things immediately without fact-checking, expressing doubt is considered betrayal of the cause, so a lot of bad info gets boosted in a hurry
Every time I mention shopping online at whatever website
Some Fool; “Oh but you’ve gotta be really careful with that!”
Me, a 48th level blackbelt of buying things online; “Yes I am aware. I always check the seller rating and history and see how long they’ve been in business. Which is why I have never had a bad experience with them.”
That Same Fool, twelve seconds later; “Oh look at this cute thing I just bought on Wish!”
Me; oh my god
Me, taking the internet by the shoulders; listen. Do not ever shop at Wish. Go read the absolute thousands of testimonies from people who got their card info stolen off Wish or had vendors overcharge them and refuse to refund.
READ THE DAMN SELLER INFO. CHECK THE SELLER RATING. SEE IF THEY HAVE BEEN IN BUSINESS FOR A REASONABLE TIME.
Go find those same damn things on Aliexpress (but not electronics do NOT buy electronics there. But that cute necklace or whatever? Sure) or on ebay for roughly the same price. Pay via Paypal.
Question: would you be able to compile a list of smart things to do while buying things on the internet? Because a that sounds like a grand way to avoid buying from Amazon.
1. Amazon is, at best, a decent storefront. Everything on Amazon, or nearly, you can find elsewhere, often from the maker’s store for less money. Shipping time might be more but I don’t give a shit. Amazon is great at finding things! So go look at things on Amazon, and then check the name of the seller selling them. Google that name. Find item on Not Amazon. Buy item. Flip Amazon the double bird.
2. Paypal. Paypal protects you. There is a reason it became such a big thing. If you have problems, Paypal will fix them. Paypal has an army of lawyers on staff to go after shitty sellers, which you do not. Paypal will also refund your money, which if you give money directly to a shitty seller good fuckin luck getting it back. Paypal whenever possible.
3. Read the damn seller ratings. If a store has 0 reviews? Nope out. If the seller rating is below 95% I won’t touch ‘em.
4. Literally anything you can find for sale on the internet is probably on Ebay, where you can use paypal.
5. Specialist shops. If you are looking for, say, linen thread and wool broadcloth, don’t go to amazon. Search for ‘historical costume supply’ and go right to the websites of the people who specialize in that shit.
6. If it looks too good to be true it is. If you found some sort of electronics for a ridiculous price those electronics are built out of spare factory floor sweepings assembled in the dark by kleptomaniac crows and will break as soon as you look at them.
7. Every facebook sponsered ad with a link to a shop is a fake store designed to steal your money. Yes, every goddamn one of them.
a hard pill to swallow: if an audience can pick up on where the story is going, it’s a good story.
A kinda related note i hope you don’t mind me adding on: one of the most life-changing bits of story advice i ever received was actually in a class on “Revenge and Vengeance in the Ancient World,” if you can believe it. The professor was talking about how everyone in ancient Greece knew all the Greek myths back to front and told them over and over again - and someone asked why they would keep retelling the same stories if they already knew they ended.
She explained that basically it wasn’t the endingthat was the most suspenseful or exciting part, but how you got there. This is why The Iliad spoils its own ending in the opening lines. This is why we have so many different retellings of Shakespeare, of Arthurian legends, of fairy tales.
There are no truly original stories or truly unpredictable endings. So, IMO, it’s better to focus on how you as a writer/filmmaker/artist/whatever can bring something new to the body of the story rather than trying to shock and mislead your audience.
We have this misplaced focus now on “preserving the surprise” that comes out in really obvious ways like the Game of Thrones finale and Marvel’s slow decline as they refuse to tell their actors or composers anything that they could actually use to add depth to the story… but I find it really interesting the subtle ways this focus has affected our media without us even realizing as well.
I’m currently catching up on an Animorphs podcast by @dorkbajirchronicles, and a ton of places online recommend to new readers to read two of the books out of publishing order in order to preserve this one big reveal, so that’s what they did… and it fell SO FLAT. The casters ended up concluding that maybe it’s just because the series is geared toward kids and they’re adults, but I think the real explanation is that the reveal ISN’T what people think it’s meant to be.
When the readers find out with the characters (out of publishing order), yes it’s a huge reveal… but it feels cheap, because it’s not meant to happen in this way. We are meant to find out ten books prior and spend the next chunk of time positively WRITHING with this giant chunk of knowledge that the characters don’t have!! It is so much more weighty that way!! The pull for us isn’t the surprise of finding out at the same time as them - it’s the intrigue of ‘I know this thing that they don’t know and WHEN are they going to find out??? HOW are they going to find out??? ARE they going to find out??? How will they react???’
And I think that set of questions - the I SEE IT COMING BUT WHEN AND HOW - are what we’ve slowly lost in recent years. The best stories are re-consumable even when we know what’s going to happen. If the only hook is that people don’t know where you are going, and there’s no foreshadowing so they can’t even try to predict it… you’re doing a bad job.
also attempting to make your ending always a surprise tends to result in either your ending just coming off as really dumb, or it not actually being that much of a surprise, which makes all the hype about the twist feel pointless.
tl;dr: dramatic irony is Important and Powerful and, bizarrely, “spoiler culture” has led some modern storytellers to forget this.
As an aspiring author dealing with this issue right now–thank you. I very much needed to see things put this way!!
I’d rather read/watch a story with a predictable ending that has natural/well done progression to get there, than a story with a “surprise” ending that comes out of the left field.
lowkey I feel like a lot of people my age younger think selfcare is like “treat yourself to new outfit” or “put on a facemask” or “have an extra scoop of ice cream” but i cannot stress enough this enough sometimes selfcare is “brushing your teeth” and “cleaning your room” and “eating some fruit” or “going for a walk”
It’s not just about the frivolous ‘treat-yourself’ stuff. most of the time it’s about actually taking care of your body’s basic needs
It just depends if the issues you have are “I have straight up not been attending to my basic needs and I should do that” or “I’ve been overworking myself and had a lot of shit and I’m gonna indulge a little to unwind.” Both can be self care, you just need to make sure you’re not using a face mask as relief from poor eating habits.
Wait what’s a buildings fire evacuation plan if you aren’t supposed to use the elevator to get down
You go down the stairwell/fire escape. Is that weird?
But what if you have a walker or a wheelchair??
in america at least, in this situation, there isnt one. either your loved ones or the firemen can get you out using the emergency fire escapes or stairs, or you die
That’s fucking horrific, thank you
“fun” little story:
last summer my friend who is an amazingly talented artist and i were in this super tall building, and she’s in a wheelchair and i’m pushing her around the room. it’s an art exhibit and some of her art was chosen to be showcased there and so it’s all fine and dandy until suddenly an alarm starts going off
a FIRE ALARM
everyone starts running for the stairs and my friend just looks at me with this forlorn look on her face
“i can’t go down the stairs”
but i’m a stubborn bitch “i’ll carry you”
“what about my chair? it’s too expensive for me to be able to get another one if i can’t get this one back”
“i’ll carry that too”
and i did. we went to the stairs (by then most people from our floor were gone) and i lifted her up in a fireman’s carry over my shoulder and then lifted her chair up and used the ridiculous amount of adrenaline that was coursing through my veins to make it down approximately 20 half-flights of stairs until we met some people exiting lower floors, one of which who kindly took the chair. I changed positions so i was holding my friend bridal-style which was, somehow, easier and the person who took her wheelchair (with her permission to handle it of course) accompanied me to the ground floor and then out the doors
basically there is no real protocol for people who can’t use the stairs in an emergency. it’s up to the people with them, if anyone, to help them or the person to somehow make it down the stairs alone, unassisted
thank fuck that it was just a faulty alarm system, because if i was unable to carry her down those stairs and the building was on fucking fire???? then i don’t know what would have happened to her, but i don’t think it would have been very good.
it’s fucking ridiculous and ableist to the absolute max.
I use a cane. When I did a day-long fire safety training at my northeast American university (UMass Amherst), I asked that exact same question: “what am I supposed to do if the fire alarm goes off and I’m in my lab on the twelfth floor?”
the fire marshal hemmed and hawed for a while and then said to take the elevator- you’re supposed to leave it free for the fire department to use and they want able-bodied people out fast not waiting for elevators. if the fire alarm has just gone off the building probably hasn’t suffered enough structural damage to make using the elevator dangerous, and modern elevator wells are heavily reinforced. many large and high-trafficked buildings on my campus have fire rated elevators that link in with the fire alarm system so they won’t let you off on a floor with a possible fire.
if the elevator isn’t working, wait in the stairwell and call the fire department to let them know where you are. modern stairwells are also heavily reinforced- it might not be pleasant but modern building code usually requires fire-resistant stairwell doors in office and big residential buildings, also to help firefighters get in and out safely. older buildings’ stairwells may or may not be retrofitted with fire-resistant doors but a stairwell is generally the safest place to wait if you can’t get out.
what happened to your friend was horrible, and i’m very glad you were there to help her out, but you can absolutely use the elevator to evacuate if it’s not shut down. those don’t-use-the-elevator rules are for abled people.
I’ve never heard of the elevator exemption or the stairwell-area-of-refuge thing before, despite being in fire drills. It’s good to know that there is some planning for people who aren’t able to do stairs, architectural and otherwise - but it doesn’t do any good if no one knows about it. :(
It has literally always been a lie. These lies have killed millionsof Americans over the years. It has cost the US Trillions of dollars in lost efficiency and higher healthcare costs over the years. It has helped drag down the life expectancy of the US, meaning, ultimately, that Americans have lost hundreds of millions of years from their lives.
It was always a lie.
People in the notes are saying that he needs to do a lot more than tweet, and that it shouldn’t have taken Covid for him to have a change of heart. But he has been doing a lot more than tweet for the last twelve years.
Not that it even comes close to making up for when he worked at Cigna, but he’s written books, appeared before the House of Representatives, founded a non-profit investigative journalism company, and is currently president of a group advocating for universal healthcare
Friendly reminder that hating Pokemon Unite isn’t just about “"no Sinnoh remakes or no let’s Go Johto”“.
Fucking Tencent is the one making it.
Tencent is known for spyware, punishes those who support the Hong Kong protests, are KNOWN to rip off larger companies or buy out larger companies if they’re seen as competition, are extremely rampant with censorship of any kind, and were receiving personal information from Apple such as I.P Addresses, and the CEO is extremely honored by the communist party that supports Muslim concentration camps.
This company is absolutely fucking garbage and it’s pretty obvious from the comment section of the video that everyone who knows about Tencent is chiming in with them dipping the moment they announced it was made by them.
And if that’s not enough to stop you from wanting to play tencent has driven many players who actually did enjoy their games away due to the rampant cheating that occurs and isn’t dealt with in their other online games. They’re known to try and milk their gamers for money with pay to win deals and from the sounds of it ”“free to start”“ means you’ll have to pay eventually no matter what and then continue to keep paying in order to succeed or advance in later levels due to the pay to win structure.
For those who are excited about this there are LITERALLY so many other games on this oversaturated market that spent time on their back grounds, and textures, and design that dont make them look like a dollar store rip off game. Please look into literally anything else.
Pokemon Unite is NOT the way to go
I’m sure that people in the videos comments did a MUCH better job of explaining the dangers of tencent instead of me and theyre most likely a lot more well aware of the first hand experience with them. But please just take my word for it when I say that the ”“unfair hate around this game because it’s not a Sinnoh Remake”“ is bullshit.
There’s hate for a reason
I’ll admit I was skeptical of these points bc there are no links or resources to back em up, so I did a little research.
So Tencent is a ridiculously large conglomerate holding company whose investments in video games ALONE pile up fast:
(Outside of video games, Tencent also invests in “search engine[s], e-commerce, retail, real estate, software, virtual reality, ride-sharing, banking, financial services, fintech, consumer technology, computer technology, automobile, film production, movie ticketing, music production, space technology, natural resources, smartphones, big data, agriculture, medical services, cloud computing, social media, IT, advertising, streaming media, artificial intelligence, robotics, UAVs, food delivery, courier services, e-book, internet services, education, and renewable energy.” Needless to say, the company has a LOT of influence and power.)
Regarding OP’s mention of the Hong Kong protests – Tencent made a partnership with the NBA to secure rights to stream its U.S. games in China, but in October 2019, when Houston Rockets general manager Morey expressed support for the protesters in Hong Kong, “Tencent began sending out refunds to customers after cancelling the broadcast of NBA games” due to NBA executive manager Adam Silver’s support of Morey’s “freedom of political expression.” (x)
Regarding OP’s mention of censorship – oh boy there’s a lot of info that proves their rampant censorship. Most notably, Tencent owns the social media app WeChat (which has “a billion active daily users”) and uses it to facilitate Chinese government surveillance and censorship. Millions of WeChat conversations were found to be relayed to police; people have been interrogated and arrested due to their private conversations. (There have been ”penalties against numerous WeChat users for mocking President Xi Jinping, criticizing judicial officials, commenting on massive floods, sharing information about human rights abuses, or expressing views related to their persecuted religion or ethnicity.”) Also, WeChat SIGNIFICANTLY distorts the news available to its users by using AI to find and delete select topics (including in 2018, the “deletions from some 4,000 public accounts…[of] major news stories like the U.S.-China trade dispute, the arrest in Canada of Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou, the #MeToo movement and public health scandals”). (x)
Regarding OP’s mention of ripping off other companies – Tencent’s founder and chairman, Pony Ma, has famously said, “[To] copy is not evil.” There are plenty of allegations and remarks out there about his inclination toward copying.
Regarding OP’s mention of Apple – at least in iOS 13, Apple’s “Safari browser uses Tencent’s Safe Browsing system to help fight malicious webpages–but Tencent may log IP addresses in the process.” Apple’s also had many issues with surveillance and censorship in China. (x)
Regarding OP’s mention of Tencent’s money-grabbing – their popular technique of gaining revenue from games is to publish “free-to-play” games, such as Pokemon Unite, and then include in-game transactions so people will pay *after* having gotten into the swing of the game.
TL;DR: Tencent is a despicable company whose hand in a Pokemon game should be a red flag. Don’t support this company.
Y-you are an absolute godsend
I didn’t expect this post to blow up like it did, but that’s probably a poor excuse for no links
Thank you so much for taking the time to find sources
This website has a clickable map where you can see suspected and confirmed sundown towns by state, as well as information about whether these attitudes are historical or current.
I’d just like to add, see how they behave when they’re angry/frustrated/exhausted, and if you see something that concerns you, wait until they’re calm, and then talk to them about it.
My husband used to yell when he got frustrated, but after I explained to him that I found it upsetting, he stopped yelling and started consciously working on asking for help before he got to that level of frustration.
When I’m upset over something, or just in a bad mood, I tend to withdraw. My husband explained to me that it makes him feel like I’m mad at him, so now when I need some space, I’ll tell him what I’m upset about, or that I’m in a bad mood for no particular reason, and I need to be alone for a little while.
See your friends and partners at their worst, but don’t assume that their worst is immutable. If someone loves and cares about you, they’ll try to accommodate you to the best of their ability.
^^^^ This is the best advice I’ve ever seen on this site, and it is so important. Communication is everything, and is 80% of the reason my husband and I have such a healthy, strong, and supportive relationship.
April’s Character of the Month is Maedhros! To this point, Maedhros’s only biography on the site was created for the Seven in ‘07 event almost fifteen years ago. @heartofoshunhas taken on the formidable task of writing the biography of the SWG’s most popular character. The biography will be a two-part article, with the first part covering Maedhros’s early life and the various influences that shaped the leader he would become in Beleriand. You can read the first part of Oshun’s biography of Maedhros here: https://www.silmarillionwritersguild.org/node/5455
(Note that Tumblr messes up our links so that they frequently return a Page Not Found error, so you may need to copy and paste the link above.)
My friend and longtime collaborator @heartofoshun wrote this! She’s written over one hundred character biographies for the SWG, and I feel like all of them have been warm-ups for this one about one of her (and my) absolute favorite characters. It’s a two-parter, so please check out Part 1 and let her know if you appreciate her work!
[image caption: black and white mist overlaying a pair of sai. text on image: MattElektra Shiptober Week 1. Tuesday, October 1 Spar. Wednesday, October 2 Crimson. Thursday, October 3 Spectral. Friday, October 4 Yearn. Saturday, October 5 Beware.]
Happy Shiptober, everyone! It’s time to kick things off with the week one prompts! So excited to spend October with you amazingly talented folks, and see all your awesome creations! ♥
MattElektra Shiptober guidelines:
1. Create MattElektra content of any type based off the daily prompt (Graphics, fics, vids, meta, you name it! Show and comics-inspired works welcome!)
2. Post it at tumblr and/or the platform of your choosing
3. Tag it with #mattelektrashiptober in the first five tags
4. Do it again the next day (or as often as you can!)
[image caption: black and white image of Matt and Elektra standing closely together, foreheads nearly touching. text on image reads #MattElektra Shiptober, white pumpkins are inserted before and after the text.]
Hello MattElektra fam! Who’s up for turning the month of October into MattElektra Shiptober?
The nights will be growing longer and darker in Hell’s Kitchen, while the days will be filled with crisp breezes and golden sunlight…. Let’s spend those 31 days together, celebrating the beautiful, multifaceted month of October along with our beautiful, complex, sexy, multifaceted ship!
Want in? Here are some simple guidelines:
Create MattElektra content of any type based off the daily prompt (Graphics, fics, vids, meta, you name it! Show and comics-inspired works welcome!)
Post it at tumblr and/or the platform of your choosing
Tag it with #mattelektrashiptober in the first five tags
Do it again the next day (or as often as you can!)
And most importantly - have fun!
[image caption: black and white smoky background with daily prompts printed in the foreground. for a text-based list of prompts, click the Keep Reading link below.]
MattElektra Shiptober is inspired by the fantastic artists’ challenge Inktober. If you have any questions about this event, give me (@significantowl) a shout. I hope you’ll find some creative inspiration here, and join the fun! And please reblog and help spread the word!
[image caption: black and white image of Matt and Elektra standing closely together, foreheads nearly touching. text on image reads #MattElektra Shiptober, white pumpkins are inserted before and after the text.]
Hello MattElektra fam! Who’s up for turning the month of October into MattElektra Shiptober?
The nights will be growing longer and darker in Hell’s Kitchen, while the days will be filled with crisp breezes and golden sunlight…. Let’s spend those 31 days together, celebrating the beautiful, multifaceted month of October along with our beautiful, complex, sexy, multifaceted ship!
Want in? Here are some simple guidelines:
Create MattElektra content of any type based off the daily prompt (Graphics, fics, vids, meta, you name it! Show and comics-inspired works welcome!)
Post it at tumblr and/or the platform of your choosing
Tag it with #mattelektrashiptober in the first five tags
Do it again the next day (or as often as you can!)
And most importantly - have fun!
[image caption: black and white smoky background with daily prompts printed in the foreground. for a text-based list of prompts, click the Keep Reading link below.]
MattElektra Shiptober is inspired by the fantastic artists’ challenge Inktober. If you have any questions about this event, give me (@significantowl) a shout. I hope you’ll find some creative inspiration here, and join the fun! And please reblog and help spread the word!
If you live in the Chicago, IL area, please be careful when letting your pets outside or walking them. Someone is placing hotdogs laced with rat poison around Chicago suburbs. (via abc7chicago)
I really hate having to ask, but I’m desperate. My first post lost traction so I’m starting anew. I have a job but it pays minimum wage and my stepdad has been stealing 50% of each of my paycheck since I was 16, for “rent.” He is physically and verbally abusive and makes my mental illnesses a million times worse. I cannot transition at all while in this house. If I put on makeup or fem clothes he screams how I’m a p*ssy or a f*ggot and threatens to kick me out on the streets. He slaps me around when he gets drunk, which is happening more and more often. I know it’s the holidays, but if someone could help me fund a safe living situation, it would be the best present I ever received. If you cannot donate, please share this post so it can reach people who can.
Help Me Help My Mom: She’s An Aspiring Nature Photographer With No Laptop
A bit of background:
My momma has been through a million years worth of hard times, and she’s never let that keep her down. She spent parts of her childhood homeless, she ended up raising her little sister because their mom was an alcoholic, and a myriad of other difficult things that would, justifiably, make her bitter towards the world. But she’s not. She sees beauty in everything. She worked so hard to be a good mother to myself and to my cousin (because his mom, her sister, was continuing the cycle of abuse that my mother was able to break free of). She’s a wonderful, strong, and relentless person who I love and admire more than anybody else in the world. She was put through the wringer and came out a diamond.
About two years ago, my mom began photographing the birds we see in our backyard (like the beautiful Harris Hawk above; she took that picture about a week ago). She’s only using a point-and-shoot camera because we can’t afford anything better, but she’s able to take amazing photographs even with that limitation. She has a natural talent for photography and she constantly works to improve her skills. However, her laptop is old and non-functional, so she does all her edits on her phone. Wildlife photography has become her passion and her safe place from the difficulties the world throws at her, and I hate to see our monetary restrictions holding her back. I work two part-time jobs and she works full-time as a dog groomer. We still don’t have enough money to replace her laptop to something more capable of storing all of her photographs (she seriously has hundreds of gigs of photos, it’s insane) and capable of handling editing software.
Please, please, please, help me raise the funds to get my momma the computer she deserves so she can take her dream to the next level. She would kill me if she knew I was asking for this, because she wouldn’t think she deserves it. She definitely, definitely does deserve it.
Hey all! Local geeky folks have partnered with several well-known TTRPG publishers and indie creators to bring you two very interesting bundles, and I encourage you to take a look.
Boss Baby Bezos is at it again! Amazon opened a union busting website for people to report workers unions, so lets do the world a favor and waste Jeff’s time, money, and life energy (I hope) by spamming his website with bogus reports.
