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Hypocrisies of social justice movements:

- Advocate free thinking and intellectual curiosity, but frequently engage in intellectual dishonesty and censorship when it disagrees w/ their prerogative

- "Freedom of speech for me but not for thee"

- Denounce dehumanization, but commit it frequently when people are "canceled"

- Claim to value the ability of discomfort to help people learn/change, but frequently defame ("cancel") individuals whose arguments make them uncomfortable, regardless of how realistic those arguments might be

- Use character assassination and censorship to have their way, no matter that this directly contradicts their principles of social justice

- Accept little to no criticism, despite criticizing endlessly

- Advocate 'embracing diversity,' but will dismiss/denounce/defame/demonize those who acknowledge differences and who insist that such differences should not be overlooked, and should instead be honored

- Appoint themselves the arbitrary arbiters of right and wrong: judge, jury, and executioner on every issue

They do all of this in the name of social justice

I appreciate what these movements are trying to achieve. But the lack of situational/self-awareness in them is astounding. They are isolating themselves in an echo chamber. They are losing people.

Fazil Goes App

I don't know much about this player, he's not really in my wheelhouse, as it were. But I admire trying new channels in this post-music, ubiquitous-music world. So Mr Say has an app (built by InstantEncore) and I'm simply taking note.

SABRINA CARPENTER via Instagram (July 16, 2023)

a free ride? is this what it is? like when people buy faux service dog vests so their untrained pooch can go everywhere "legaly"?

On Tuesday December 30th, my family boarded a flight from Punta Cana, Dominican Republic bound for Newark, NJ. The flight # was 1515 and we were scheduled to take off at 1:55pm. I was traveling with 16 members of both my immediate and extended family including my own children, ages 11, 8, 6 and...

just like it’s important that we let people embrace and be flamboyant with their gender, we must allow people to have gender be a nonimportant part of their identity. a cis woman can love being feminine and claim her womanhood loud and proud, just like another cis woman can just be ‘whatever’ about it. a trans woman can be hyperfeminine and proud, while another can just say ‘yeah i’m a woman’ without it being a gigantic deal to her. a non-binary person doesn’t have to be constantly torn up about their gender identity to be non-binary. all experiences of gender are unique and valid in their own way.

the wicked thing about minwoo arguing that youngwoo wouldn't have gotten her job without her connections is that he's not wrong - not when it comes to her abilities since she's proven several times how good she is as a lawyer (including during the current case they're handling together) and that's without even mentioning how good her results were in school but when it comes to people giving her a chance. she was not given one despite her stellar results by anyone because she is autistic and she was unemployed for several months before her father and the ceo talked about her. so technically minwoo is right, with the way things were she wouldn't have gotten this job (and that's not to say she wouldn't have been able to get another one somewhere down the line at all) but he made the conscious decision to see it as something unfair to him instead of something unfair to her that no law firm would take her in because she is autistic when they should've been welcoming her with open arms (because she was first always! she got almost perfect scores at the bar exams! because she is good at it and likes it and deserves to be treated with respect) and I think the fact that he doesn't see it as a blatant proof of society's prejudices and instead is set on fighting youngwoo as if she were part of the "strong ones" in this society and not one of the people the strong ones would like to oppress or put to the side speaks so much more about him than anything he's done before

fyi things like insulin, hearing aids, wheelchairs, glasses costing money at all is a form of structural ableism

language has bias in it; and often we don't recognize it unless we're very close to it.

i am funny. i feel confident about that. my brother will make the same exact jokes i make - and he is called funny. i'm more often called "sassy", despite the fact i rarely actually talk back. i don't even use sarcasm as much as he does - if you actually look at the jokes i'm making, i am not sassy. but i am femme-presenting.

i googled it once. it is supposed to mean lively, bold, feisty. all of these are less demeaning than the ever-feminine sass. it feels kind of stupid to be annoyed by that simple word.

i'm a nag, also, if i'm being honest. i nag. in my body, nagging is whenever i remind someone repeatedly to do something for me that they are not-doing-currently. in the past, with boyfriends, i've felt myself become hyper-annoying. "please," i'd say. "this is the third time i've asked this week. please just do the dishes. i don't have time in the morning." this is nagging.

i can't actually feel comfortable with the idea i might be smart. i often say i'm clever or fast or quick-witted. i will shrug and say i'm well-read and i got lucky in education. smart people are doctors. smart people don't choose an art as their career. smart people don't look or act like i do. and they don't let their life be ruined by their adhd, not like i have, i know that for certain.

it came to my attention about 10 years ago that there's a racist paradigm in writing of lightness/whiteness as "pure" and darkness/blackness as "associated with crime". i had just gotten out of high school and hadn't really been exposed to critical reading yet. i took a long look at my own work and started to be very, very careful about what descriptions i applied to "good" and to "evil." it was important to me to continue this research - to make sure that i actually listened to what i was saying; and how i was saying it. i won't always be aware of the connotations/origins of a word - there are thousands - but i always take the critique whenever one i missed is shown to me. i understood - okay, this is the work that i should do and take care in. and the work is ongoing. there is no "final line" to undoing one's societal learning.

but. despite all this. despite all the academic application and the research and the logical actual knowledge: i allow the language inside of me.

i know i'm not pretty. i know i am also not thin, i'm average (which is to say, to most people - i'm not pretty). i am not graceful, delicate, or "wife material". i am shrill and grating (feminine connotation), i am loud (feminine connotation), i am immodest. i am a feminist (which is to say, to most people - i am going to cause a problem on purpose).

i know each of these might not worry other people - they can be loud on purpose. they have a roguish charm - there's no such thing for them as being immodest.

a few days ago a person i had just met gave me a strange look, laughing at something i said. "you know," he cocked his head, "for a woman, you're really... brazen."

there are people out there who would have taken that as a compliment.

having now seen the sea beast and some reactions to it: i think it is actually very important and meaningful that the story didn’t have maisie become like a sea monster biologist! i think it’s really important that they decided to simply stop interacting with the creatures at all and leave the deeper waters to them. i think people forget or aren’t aware of the ways science and scientific pursuit has propped up or been used as a justification for imperialism and expansionism and colonialism. it’s not a neutral profession or goal. of course for us, the audience, it would have been really fun and cool and interesting to learn more about the creatures and maybe even see humans bonding with them, but that’s really not in line with the message of the movie and it’s honestly refreshing that they went that route.

it is somehow reminding me of that time in a Billboard interview where Tiffany Young was asked to give an advice to Bangtan members and she said, "Your band mate is the only person who will understand the process, [.....]" and it stems from the fact that the deep & understanding kinds of connections and friendships most members of the bands have, came through a form of trauma bonding and shared experiences. of course it wasn't the sole reason but it did play a role.

mina le said "trauma-bonded" to describe the kind of relationship most boyband (can apply to girlbands too) members have with each other and honestly it makes so much sense, how come that adjective never came up to me before seeing how sickeningly tiring and traumatic the manufacturing culture of these boybands and girlbands is in almost every music industry.

Darlings, dir Jasmeet K. Reen (2022)

" Once there was a flood in the forest. A frog was resting on the river bank. A scorpion stuck in the floods requested the Frog, "Please help me cross the river!" Thee frog asked, "What if you sting me?" The Scorpion replied, "Silly, if I sting you then we will both drown. Why would I kill myself? The Frog believed the Scorpion and let him hop on his back. They began to cross the river but as soon as they reached the middle of the river, the Scorpion stung the frog. The Frog asked, "Why did you do that?" The Scorpion said, "I am a Scorpion, stinging is what I do. It is in my nature." Some men are scorpions, dear. They never change, Badru. "

-Darlings, dir Jasmeet K. Reen (2022)

amid the celebrations about the queen probably dying soon, we need to remember how this will negatively affect the country. there will be millions spent on a funeral and charles’s coronation while we are in the middle of a severe economic crisis and working class families are having to choose between heating and food. it will take attention away from all the important politics and parliament may be suspended. all news and television will be about her death and her reign — it’s been said that comedy programmes will be cancelled for potentially up to a fortnight out of ‘respect’.

yes, celebrate this news. but her death does not erase the fact that the monarchy exists, and it will be a spit in the face for working people when the money we all so desperately need is spent on her and the rest of her family

not to oversimplify an extremely complex discipline but if i had to pick one tip to give people on how to have more productive interactions with children, especially in an instructive sense, its that teaching a kid well is a lot more like improv than it is like error correction and you should always work on minimizing the amount of ‘no, wrong’ and maximizing the amount of ‘yes, and?’ for example: we have a species of fish at the aquarium that looks a lot like a tiny pufferfish. children are constantly either asking us if that’s what they are, or confidently telling us that’s what they are. if you rush to correct them, you risk completely severing their interest in the situation, because 1. kids don’t like to engage with adults who make them feel bad and 2. they were excited because pufferfish are interesting, and you have not given them any reason to be invested in non-pufferfish. Instead, if you say something like “It looks a LOT like a tiny pufferfish, you’re right. But these guys are even funnier. Wanna know what they’re called?” you have primed them perfectly for the delightful truth of the Pacific Spiny Lumpsucker

The hard truth about autism acceptance that a lot of people don't want to hear is that autism acceptance also inherently requires acceptance of people who are just weird.

And yes, I mean Those TM people. Middle schoolers who growl and bark and naruto run in the halls. Thirtysomethings who live with their parents. Furries. Fourteen-year-olds who identify as stargender and use neopronouns. Picky eaters. Adults in fandoms. People who talk weird. People who dress weird.

Because autistic people shouldn't have to disclose a medical diagnosis to you to avoid being mocked and ostracized for stuff that, at absolute worst, is annoying. Ruthlessly deriding people for this stuff then tacking on a "oh, but it's okay if they're autistic" does absolutely nothing to help autistic people! Especially when undiagnosed autistic people exist.

Like it or not, if you want to be an ally to autistic people, you're going to have to take the L and leave eccentric, weird people alone. Even if you don't know them to be autistic. You shouldn't be looking for Acceptable Reasons to be mean to people in the first place. Being respectful should be the default.

Quick PSA,

You can fight for a woman's right to wear a hijab and also fight for another woman's right to NOT wear one if she doesn't want to - and you'd still be fighting for the same thing, a woman's right to choose.

You're still fighting for her freedom.

but they don't care about the burnout. everyone is burnt out, they tell me. who isn't burnt out!

the good news is they don't say depression is a choice as much anymore, but the symptoms for burn out and depression are so hand-in-hand that they are mirror images of each other. but depression is serious. you're not depressed, you're just whiny. they barely change the script - don't be lazy! burn out is for people with real problems. burn out can be resolved with some fun candles and a day off work. burn out only happens in adults - no kid can be burnt out, after all; they've barely even had a life to live!

do you have a roof over your head and a steady job? you're not burnt out. so what if every night you wake up with a panic attack frothing inside your chest. you're lucky your problems are small. get back into plants or into yoga. shut up about it.

rich people get burnt out and go to fancy places. they get burnt out in their fancy offices with their real-people problems. they get burnt out and hire an assistant to help them never burn out again. you don't have the money to burn out. you don't have the two weeks to recover in a local spa. the job you come back to will still be stressful and hard.

you find yourself often wondering - does nobody remember about the pandemic? it seems almost like a joke or a punchline. being burnt-out was okay "during" the pandemic. now that people are back to ignoring covid, burnout is just-an-excuse again.

you google how to know if it's seasonal affective disorder or burnout. you google how to know if it's anxiety or it's burnout from working. you google how to know if my depression is back or i'm burning out badly.

coming back from burnout just leaves you covered in ashes, not new growth. you struggle to get back basics, and then - you're just supposed to get back up and keep going. every day the amount of tasks you are able to do seems to dwindle even further - where does the time go? why is everything moving so-fast-and-yet-so-slow?

my therapist and i were talking about how many people had latent mental illnesses that were triggered by the pandemic. how depression can be environmental and situational. i am annoyingly logic-driven about my own recovery - i like to be sure i'm working on the "right" thing. i tell her i feel like i'm lying. that it just might be burnout, and i need to stop complaining. she asks me what words come to mind when i think of burning.

oh, i guess i see.

we casually ignore the violence of being left empty.

Today I was going on an impromptu visit to my friend's house who has been very sick lately and while I was on my way, sitting behind my father on the scooty, I saw a stray dog passing by. He had his whole tongue out and I thought maybe there was some health issue that caused it. I only saw him in the passing but I felt sad for not being able to help him out and then it led me to thinking about the animals that are way worse than him, living on streets with pain and trauma and then there people whose lives are full of pain and trauma too and I just couldn't do anything to change the fact and it then led me into thinking how much better am I than the person who is oblivious to these sufferings? I am doing nothing just like the oblivious people. How much value does just knowing and being aware while doing nothing holds? And then it led me into thinking of having this conversation with one of my friends and I know they'd tell me "Something better than nothing." and I'd think "For how long tho?" but I know they'd reply saying "You won't always stay on the side watching silently. One day you'll get a chance to do something and you'd do it because you know and that'll make a change, no matter how small. An oblivious unaware person won't be able to do that because they don't know." And I felt okay then. Maybe only for a bit but something better than nothing right? It must hold some meaning right?

hey remember when Aled Last said "there's this idea that if you're not straight, you have to tell [people] immediately, like you owe it to them. but you don't. you don't have to do anything until you're ready" and Charlie Spring said "you didn't just force yourself because I'm out already?" and Tara Jones said "don't feel like you have to come out to anyone before you're ready" and Nick Nelson said "I'm not saying I want to have a public announcement, but I want to tell the people who matter" and when Geoff explained that Charlie getting outed was a trauma?

remember all that??