Wendigo

They/them, artist, very queer

[innovadesexual]

[biocrafthero]

[womprat-deactivated20170904]

happy pride month from the tribbles 

[trekheritageposts]

star trek heritage post (June 7th, 2017)

[srune]

only thing that comes to mind today.

[deadgenerations]

the fad of putting these little blurbs in TTRPGs was probably the most embarrassing bit of useless wanking the little industry scene has ever done, besides the time Warmahordes put a "this aint your daddys tabletop game!" in their rulebook.

does this serve any purpose other than to make the publisher feel like they're Doing Something, and to help consumers feel like their purchases are meaningful political engagement?

At the absolute minimum you could make a game which actually is a meaningful cultural expression of your ideals, or which is politically anti fascist in any way.

[sunspotpony]

So this is actually I can reassure you, the exact opposite of self indulgent wanking with no impact. It’s aggressively impactful in a very specific way—by making the nazis in the room very loud about the fact that they’re nazis.

I’m going to tell you about how a discord banner that was put up for pride month in the Lancer ttrpg official discord was so successful at getting bigots to out themselves, that it’s been the permanent official discord banner for 4 years now.

This is the updated version. It’s animated now.

But pride month 4 or 5 years ago, somebody made the server banner a Goblin mech dabbing in front of a trans flag.

And for your average person who joined the server, they just kinda went, lol cool.

For the trans people who joined the server, it made them feel extra safe.

And for the bigots who joined the server? They’d fucking bitch about it IMMEDIATELY. And promptly get banned.

And that month saw so many bannings of dipshits that they decided to keep that banner, because every single time a bigot joins the server, there is a high chance that they will out themselves IMMEDIATELY and be promptly banned.

While including text like this in a book is different than a community space, the reality is, fascists do not like being embarrassed or confronted about their beliefs; they have fragile egos.

So imagine you are going through the book with a group of friends, and you get to this block about “fascism bad,” and somebody is like, “I don’t know how I feel about this. It seems a bit stupid,” it immediately gets to raise a red flag for everybody that maybe this person isn’t, as cool to have at the table as they thought.

Similarly, you know how many bigots went and burned their beers/hats/shoes because some corporation supported trans people/gay people/Collin Kapernick?

This is performative, yes. But it’s not performative to puff up themselves as heroes. It’s performative, aimed right at the fragile skinned assholes who will boycott Oreos and Budweiser for “supporting the gays.”

It’s one of the FASTEST ways to reduce the number of virulent bigots in a community for ZERO COST.

Like, maybe the experience of the lancer discord is atypical, and fascists are learning to have thicker skins and lie about their beliefs better.

It’s still PROFOUNDLY CHEAP AND EASY to include this blurb.

So, it’s free, zero effort nazi repellent.

Frankly with that in mind, I’d regard anybody who ISNT doing this, as maybe a tiny bit cowardly.

It doesn’t fix the world— anyone who thinks the table top scene will magically save the day is a fool—but it does increase the odds that the hobby will be a safer place for more reasonable people, and not become a bastion of fascism like the wh40k fandom has.

[noctumsolis]

Like, maybe the experience of the lancer discord is atypical, and fascists are learning to have thicker skins and lie about their beliefs better.

It may be atypical but it's certainly not unique. Another example is the Heraldry discord I'm on, with an icon that is animated to switch its original colours and two other versions, displaying gay pride and transgender pride colours.

Bigots join, bigots mouth off, bigots get banned.

Sometimes we get a different flavour of bigot, ones who tolerate us queers but are racist as hell. They tend to out themselves, too, because it's a heraldry server. That fact alone makes them assume that we're all "European culture is best" and other racist bullshit. They get banned.

See also the Godot discord, with an icon that scrolls through pride colours in a beautiful way.

[trismeowgistus]

It even works for games famously infested with fascists like 40k. Games Workshop coming out with a (really rather tepid) statement of support of BLM had Nazis losing their minds in the comments fucking immediately

[walking-fandom]

I remember the meltdowns when the new Worls of Darkness books came out that this blurb is in. It's pretty easy to piss fascists off by just saying you don't want them there.

[crazy-pages]

The Pathfinder Facebook group did something like this on purpose as a honeypot and immediately banned all the bigots coming out of the woodwork, and immediately eliminated more than HALF of all incidents requiring moderators. Not just about bigotry, everything.

And that is TACTICALLY USEFUL.

Because game companies spend so much money moderating chat spaces (both forums and in-game chats) and they lose so much business when dominant third party online spaces associated with their game turn toxic. Hell moderation is the big money sink for social media. Managing that cost is one of the most difficult aspects of the business.

Now imagine telling a game or social media executive that you can eliminate half of their harassment in a single honeypot operation. Imagine telling them that you have a technique which surgically targets a majority of their most toxic members and immediately gets rid of them. Because that's what this is.

You slap up a big pride or power banner and an announcement that this company stands with [insert group here], or stands against fascism, and you take names on everybody who has angry or quibbling shit to say about that. And then you ban them all. And just like that the moderation load you're dealing with gets so much lighter. Keep it up with a similar announcement whenever a topical opportunity presents itself and you clean out any new trash which walks in too.

And it just so happens that the way to do this is to clear out the bigots and make a safe space for oppressed groups.

There are so many of these companies which are worried that by taking a stand like this they will hurt their user base. There are so many forums online with volunteer moderators who reflexively don't want to wait into politics because they think that will increase their workload. Give them good solid practical examples of this reducing their workload instead, and you will get some of them onboard.

Because this has a real measurable impact with the right follow through, and the impact is a general reduction in all harassment of everyone. And that is worth capital M Money and capital T Time to some people.

[scarecrowbutch]

[smallpwbbles]

[qwacktrap]

sorry i had to

[animalcrossingmemes]

[kaijuno]

I realize this is an animal crossing meme but as an astrophysicist I was really excited for a second that someone was finally seeing the light on how fricking difficult and a huge waste of time it would be to try to terraform Mars

[transbaphomet]

[purple-iris]

If and when a Vulcan tells you they love you, it isn't going to sound like a romance poem or a grand declaration. Hell, it'll most likely sound like they are reciting a logarithmic equation. Like its just another fact of the universe, like its just logical. Because it is. When they tell you that, its become an objective truth, an immutable reality, that would be best conveyed through touch telepathy or the web of bonds of their civilization, but that humans are not privy to yet.

[thetimetostrikeislater]

*Vulcan makes a horrific self sacrificing move.

Human: “why would you do that???“

Vulcan bleeding out: “what do you mean why???”

[knivesandteeth]

Tuvok on loving his children in 'Innocence': My attachment to my children cannot be described as an emotion. They are part of my identity, and I am incomplete without them.

[lizbot]

AU where Monomon and PK just shove a buncha Oomas into the radiance dreamplace.

[monomon--the--teacher]

@illuminating-dawn

[gaynfl-moved]

[0cyberdog0]

Cheeto

[ruinedchildhood]

[phantomrose17]

[silly-jellyghoty]

[lenacraft]

March

[abstractandedgyname]

[mycotic-blog-deactivated2026060]

MYCOTRIVIA I: prototaxites ⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

around roughly 420 to 375 million years ago, earth's landscape was dominated by up to 8 metre high fungus-like organisms.

these structures (called prototaxites) appeared during the devonian & silurian periods. they were the tallest land organisms before trees, & fossils display their resemblance to pillars.

they could reach over a metre in diameter at their trunk.

scientists debate their taxonomy: "while largely believed to be fungi, recent studies suggest they might represent a unique, now-extinct form of life, due to differences in chemical structure, such as the absence of chitin." however, many still believe that their spore-producing mechanism indicate a link to modern fungi.

READ MORE HERE | IMAGE SOURCES HERE + HERE + HERE

[curiousfungus]

1. There is much we don't know about it, but Prototaxites is extremely cool.

2. From the time the first Prototaxites fossile was found, there has been a hot debate about what kind of organism it was. At first, it was thought to be something like a yew tree (hence the Latin name), then a kind of algae. Today, most believe it was a fungus or a lichen (which involve fungi in a symbiosis with algae or cyanobacteria). As the original post mentions, very recently some scientists suggested that it was an entirely different kind of eukaryotic organism.

3. The fungus that makes up the galaxy-spanning mycelial network in Star Trek Discovery is named Prototaxites stellaviatori after the prehistoric Prototaxites.

[catchymemes]

[buddie-romance]

thank you ao3 for being an archive and not an algorithm. thank you for letting me like things without consequences, thank you for being free with no ads, thank you for having lawyers to defend our freedom of speech. thank you tag wranglers. thank you to all authors and thank you ao3

[capricoopla]

something

[purlturtle]

The moment I saw these double doors in our apartment, I knew I wanted to put colorful foil on them:

Today my wife did it, and I couldn't be more stunned and happy:

Isn't it amazing? This is a dream come true, and it makes me so happy! 🩵🧡💚💛💙❤️🩷

[purlturtle]

The doors continue to delight:

(pics taken as the sun shines through the doors, making all the colors shine and projecting some of them across the hallway floor) (edited this reblog to add a second pic)

[purlturtle]

This post is almost at 11,111 notes and I hope someone screenshots it when it happens!

[rathenarts]

@purlturtle here you are I got it for you!

[purlturtle]

what if I told you that I am RIVETED to my notifications at the moment, for fear that I will miss it

[purlturtle]

[purlturtle]

The galaxy map of this post's reblogs is a thing of beauty:

This isn't a post from a big blog that a ton of people reblogged from that one big blog. This isn't even a post that got big because one big blog reblogged it. Yes, there were a few big-name boosts, but almost all of these reblogs are just, this post ambling through Tumblr making people happy.

And that makes *me* happy. Thank you, fellow Tumblrinas!

[purlturtle]

Y'all.

My wife found this incredible rug to go into the living room, that matches the doors so so so well!

Isn't it fabulous?

(ID: wide angle shot of a living room with a rug in the center that is 5x8 panels of different colored squares)

[catboybiologist]

I'm sorry I'm going fucking insane over trans people in sports issues the anti trans crowd has lost the fucking plot and then has the audacity to act like its the trannies who are ridiculous

I used to be of the "well the sports issue isn't really important to me its w/e I just don't want it to be a gateway into other transphobia" but oh my fucking god we are so far gone. The fencing shit is sending me over the edge. What the fuck.

[catboybiologist]

I can't even articulate my words so I'm just going to tell a story in screenshots

I am so fucking tired of being gaslit about this

[catboybiologist]

I'm also still so fucking pissed that we have to include "ooo the trans fencer only finished in X place" because its a reminder that trans women will never be allowed to excel at anything in the public eye without being cut down. Fuck OFF

[asexualzoro]

i hope you don’t mind me adding to this post op but i’ve got a sorta personal connection to this story. for ppl who do not know this about me, ive been fencing for like five years and am trans. i also used to fence in the same circles as this woman

this woman—stephanie turner is her name, because i think people should know it so this shit can ruin her life—regularly fences cis men and wins because fencing is fucking co-ed

i know that is in the screenshots already, but what i can add which isn’t in the screenshot is that i personally know and have fenced some of the people listed in that “competition history” screenshot, including some of the cis men which she beat. i know from fencing them myself that these guys are good, smart, capable fencers

that said, even if i didn’t know them, i could tell you a lot of these guys are solid. do you see that column labeled “rating”? being rated means they’ve placed very well or won medals at prestigious or decently sized tournaments—E is the lowest rating (but still difficult to get) and ratings go up to A (and U means unrated). if you look, you can see she beat a few rated fencers in that screenshot, some of them male!

another thing i know about stephanie turner is that she fences at a club my friend’s brother works at. she regularly beats said brother, who is 6’4 and 200lbs. i’ve never met this brother, but if he’s anything like my friend, he’s a damn good fencer with years of experience. stephanie turner is GOOD. per my friend, she probably would have won the bout she took a knee on. she really did not need to pull shit transphobic shit and i guarantee she knows it.

all this shit about fencing cis men really does not matter, to be clear. being a woman beating men doesn’t make stephanie a good fencer—it doesn’t even make her a notable fencer. every afab fencer who is good enough to beat other fencers beats amab fencers. the first fencer i beat as an afab person was a cis man who started the sport at the same time as me just bc we were at the same general level. because again, fencing is co-ed. i just am explaining all this to show how damn stupid dying on this hill is (and the fact she for sure knows how damn pointless and hateful it is)

because fencing is NOT a strength sport! being stronger or taller than your opponent, like how a cis man would stereotypically be vs a cis woman, isn’t necessarily an advantage—strength can absolutely fuck you up if you don’t know how to manage it, and if you know how to use it, being shorter than your opponents can actually be an advantage

if anything, fencing a stamina sport, which something you can very much train no matter your gender if you put in the work. more than anything to do with strength or speed, though, fencing is a strategy sport. there is really no reason to gender segregate it. a lot of tournaments do, but plenty tournaments DON’T, and most clubs you go to for practice and drills and learning fencing will be co-ed and have you constantly fencing against “opposite sex” fencers

(half related—one of the best foils on my fencing team is a trans woman who sometimes fences in the men’s brackets in tournaments and regularly beats cis men)

if stephanie turner is a good fencer—which she definitely is—she knows all of this. that fencing is more about stamina, that strength and height mean nothing, that the only thing that really matters is your strategy.

stephanie turner was literally just doing this to be an asshole. the fact she’s getting money for it is fucking disgusting. i hope she faces some damn consequences for this shit, because it’s such stupid, hateful bullshit, especially for a sport where that “biological advantage” shit really and truly does not matter

i do want to end this addition on a nice note tho, so i want to add: a few days after this story broke—this weekend, actually—i attended a two day tournament as a spectator. while it wasn’t everywhere, i definitely saw a lot of refs and staff wearing trans pride/support pins, as well as a few people in attendance wearing trans supportive shirts and accessories. all of the people ive spoken to in the fencing world about this—which is quite a lot—have thought it both appalling and monumentally stupid, and im hoping that will lead to consequences for stephanie turner and anyone else who tries to follow in her bullshit idiot footsteps

[catboybiologist]

I don't have anything to add, but this is more insight than I could ever have so I'm RBing for visiblity

[fennalfennec]

Any time something like this comes up, I also think about chess being segregated by gender. There's no reason for it, and I think that extends to most sports (including fencing, which thankfully is largely unsegregated).

Why do we need - or even want - two separate leagues for men's sports and women's sports? The gender pay gap, the recognition gap, the trans sports "issue" are all solved by having only one league for these sports (except, of course, for bigotry like we see above).

Men have the advantage - on average - in some sports, sure, that's the argument. But time and time again, stories show that the best female athletes can and often do defeat the best male athletes (in fact, that's why competitive skeet shooting was gender segregated in 1992).

It all seems pointless to me, especially on an activity that is supported to be fun.