Climb Like A Monkey Out Of Hell Where I Belong

HND. BA Honours English. Masters in English Literature. I am fuckin' serious about my books, and I'm writing one. Also serious about my music. Mild cerebral palsy does not run my life, I run the cerebral palsy....

[guerrillatech]

[my0clonic-jerk]

[cardassiangoodreads]

Genuinely, one of the measures that's stopped book banning the most when districts implement it, is having the would-be banners fill out a form that demonstrates if they've read the book or not. Like where they have the summarize the plot and characters and do a mini book report and give a review. It stops them in their tracks. This is why in my high school, every time someone wanted to ban a book it ended up going nowhere. There was one where a conservative student wanted to ban the manga "Legal Drug" for having a marijuana leaf on the cover, then got the form that required them to actually read and either balked, or read it and realized it was not pro-drug at all. (The other one that reduces book bans even further is "requiring the would-be banner to be affiliated with this actual school in some way, either by being a student, faculty/staff or a parent of a child at the school" because the vast majority of bans are "activists" with no affiliation with the school who just travel around trying to do this in districts all over the U.S. IIRC a few years ago someone crunched the numbers and just 51 parents were responsible for all the book bans that year nationally. 51! In a country with 50 states, with over 300 million people total!)

[tjalexandernyc]

Laws like this indeed do a lot to stop fascist book censorship. They can also help legally protect librarians from getting fired or harassed for keeping books on the shelves! Some states like Rhode Island have already passed these laws. If you're in a blue state, look up whether you have laws like this on the books. MAYBE your state is trying to get one passed right now, like New York's Freedom to Read bill. call your state elected officials to voice support for it.

[phalaenopfish]

Please don’t take your pets for granted. Even if you’re frustrated that your dog has been barking all day or your bird has been screaming for attention, remember you are all they have in this world. Give your fish that extra water change. Give your dog or cat that tummy rub they’ve been begging for. Chop up some fresh fruit as a treat for your rodents or reptiles. Just spend some time with them. Be compassionate to your animals. They are living creatures that are alive simply because you wish them to be. They may only be a small part in your life, but to them, you are their everything.

[innerchildabortionclinic]

getting kicked off love island for just swimming in the pool and not talking to anyone

[wizardshark]

So fun fact from when I worked on multiple reality shows, names redacted for NDA purposes.

Gay people are INCREDIBLY ANNOYING for production when they are on reality shows cause they always do shit like this. Reality shows pick their cast specifically for people who will create drama, so it tracks that bringing in some gay people (in the era that I worked, 2013-2018, this was considered to be new and interesting) would diversify people enough to create some conflict. To a degree, this was true.

But what actually happened was that the gay person, or worse, people, would end up estranged from the other people because Straight People Who Are Fucking Nuts in a way that would be ideal for a reality show are very different from Gay People Who Are Fucking Nuts.

There's one particular instance I remember in which our Gay Person tm wasn't getting into drama and no one could figure out why. Any time anything happened it would just defuse almost instantly. Eventually we prodded during a solo interview and one of the guys said something along the lines of "Mayn gay marriage just got legalized n shit if I yell at this guy I'm being a homophobe". This meant that our gay was COASTING along in this reality show cause no one would vote him out!!

But you know what the PINNACLE of this was?

DATING SHOWS.

One... Very popular dating show I worked on (you know the one) has an unofficial, unwritten rule: you can only have 1 queer woman in the cast of ladies. This is because for a solid few years, if ever there were two bisexual women in the show, they would ALWAYS abandon the man and run off together instead. You can't have contestants saying shit like "this guy has no personality and sucks ass. I prefer this girl I met who actually listens to me". Like this was an actual epidemic in the casting. It happened over and over for YEARS and they couldn't find a way to stop it without literally separating the women from each other, which obviously wouldn't be good for the show. They also couldn't show this was happening because that. Uh. Would be pretty bad to reveal to audiences.

Eventually they just decided to subtly prod and see if women who were going on the show were gay and then avoid having two on the same season at the same time. To my knowledge they still do it this way.

Anyways the summary is that gay people are fucking crazy in a way that heterosexual tv just does not know how to handle

[pattern-recognition]

Hostile

[pattern-recognition]

Да, комиссар

[worldheritagepostorganization]

World Heritage Post

[northern-punk-lad]

Labour must stop just writing a cheque for benefit claimants, says McFadden

Exclusive: Work and pensions secretary signals possible reform to welfare as ministers await key reviews

I Said they where gonna do this the minute they said pip was inhumane I hate these fuckers

[ayeforscotland]

“Instead of benefits we’ll provide jobs support instead.”

*Proceeds to do nothing to support disabled people getting into work. Offers no legislation to protect disabled people from employers. Capitulates to property investors and discourage working from home.*

[whowantstobeaphd]

As a disabled person on benefits, not kindly, fuck off.

I wish I could work more. I am actively looking for work, I have a work advisor, I have a PhD. Most roles say they are not willing to be flexible on hours. Often you start without any ergonomic equipment and have to wait months (while your body is in increasingly more pain) either hoping your company or the government pay for equipment you are legally entitled to.

When you started that new job you have to re-explain your reasonable adjustments, also legally protected, and then not get them because your managers don't understand. Now your mental health, on top of your physical health, is declining. You try to hold on for months until the adjustments settle, but in that time you've either been unable to do the work due to the lack of support or you've had so many flare ups of symptoms you physically cannot be at work (have 6 weeks bed bound as a treat). You feel guilty taking time off a new job so you work while laying on the floor, or at random hours to make up the time, making everything worse. Meanwhile your employer does nothing.

You finally leave that job because the pain is just too much. You apply for Employment Support Allowance, £400 a month, and constantly fight with the DWP about your benefits while working a part time job thay finally fits your requirements but the hours are too few to cover your bills. You will lose your ESA if you work more than 16 hours a week or make more than £812/month (you wanted to live your life? Fuck you). The DWP decides, without every seeing you, that you're not disabled enough and ends your support.

You become more stressed, the symptoms of your condition become harder to manage, your mental health declines further. But every six weeks the job centre calls and ask you 'are you applying for work', you say 'yes' and that's the end of that.

You burn out so hard that the need to work can cause you to have a panic attack.

You have no one to turn too. You don't know what to do. Thanks for the phone call.

[hiddendip]

we get back to the eternal problem that the government wants you to take a job that doesn't fucking exist.

"well you could work part-time" - most part-time jobs are in hospitality, care or other trades that are impossible with mobility issues. i can't stand behind a bar for 8 hours, let along move a keg or handle a 3-deep bar.

"what about an office job?" - with what experience? the two-day "employability skills" course the jc+ sends you on is about as useful on a CV as including your fucking shoe size.

"what about an apprenticeship" - that pays less than disability benefits and isn't available to over-25s (and is a struggle for over-21s because it becomes part-funded) - not to mention the fact that most apprenticeships in 2026 are bullshit, you do not need an apprenticeship to become a fucking recruiter, that's called an entry-level position.

my friend is trying really fucking hard to find a job, and they got pointed towards this "job finder" quiz and you know what they got back? beekeeping. fucking beekeeping. they live in a flat in the middle of a city, how many fucking beekeeping jobs do you think they could find?

the government needs to get a fucking grip with this shit

[aniron48]

It's (007 fest) WIP Wednesday!

I haven't done a WIP Wednesday in *forever*, and so today I want to share an excerpt from a 5+1 fic I've been fiddling with for a while. It focuses on a moment from Skyfall that lives rent-free in my head: the bit where Moneypenny says that Q is afraid of flying, and Bond says, "Of course he is."

I have...a lot of thoughts...about this moment, more of which I may share later on. I've also seen lots of fics tackle this piece of canon well, from leaning into reasons Q may be afraid of air travel, to explaining why this was all a pretext in the first place. So for now, suffice it to say that I was ready to dive in with a fic of my own, featuring five times Q lied to Bond about why he didn't fly to Macau--and one time he told him the truth.

This is one of my favorite flavors of fic to write: two parts crack fic to one part deep emotion that comes at you once your guard is down. 😁 Teaser below the cut!

Q sighed, taking his hands out of the bathrobe pockets and crossing his arms across his chest. “Well, as you know, I’m an ethical vegetarian.” “Naturally.” Bond knew no such thing; in fact, he was fairly certain he’d seen Q eating a cheeseburger at his desk just the week before. But then, he supposed you could never tell these days, what with all the plant-based meat substitutes on the market. “Then it should come as no surprise to you that I’m also a member of the Royal Society for the Preservation of Canadian Geese. Or at least,” Q said, turning to look wistfully out the hotel window, “I was.” Bond cleared his throat. “I see.” “And as you know, when an airplane runs into a flock of geese, it’s extremely dangerous—” “Yes, I—” “For the geese.” Bond opened his mouth, and then closed it again. He’d seen a movie about this, recently. While on a plane, in fact. Tom Hanks had been in it. “I don’t think—” “At any rate,” Q said, raising his voice to speak over Bond, “I decided enough was enough. I staged a small one-person protest on a flight to Vancouver. Stood up as soon as the fasten seatbelt sign was off and took off my jumper so everyone could see my “think of the geese” t-shirt. Gave a quite moving little speech, if I do say so myself. But the air marshal on board didn’t like it. And so I was banned from all major airlines.” Bond blinked at him. Maybe this was all a dream. Worse still, maybe he’d never made it out of the henchman’s lair. Maybe this was all the result of the latest hallucinogenic drugs to debut on the henchman market, and for which Bond was the unwilling, and unconscious, test subject. “But you flew here.” “I said I was banned from all the major airlines,” Q said. “I’m not banned from RyanAir. They’ve got no standards.”

[coldlikedeath]

I’M NOT BANNED FROM RYANAIR, THEY’VE GOT NO STANDARDS

[my-flying-sister]

I love rebloging. It’s the adult equivalent of showing everyone the cool rock I just found.

[the-dandy-liar]

[the-great-kraken]

newsreader just had to genuinely ask this man "why would an intergalactic warrior want to stand for election in clacton" unserious fucking country

[jen-kollic]

I am fucking loving how shit-scared the UK right-wing is of a man with a bin on his head. Now that Count Binface might actually win the Clacton byelection they're desperately trying to smear him with such gems as:

"He's anti-Brexit!" Good.

"He's anti-Trump!" Good.

"He's anti-establishment!" At this point I think you're just trying to make me like him more.

"His manager once called Farage a horrible cunt!" Well Farage *is* a horrible cunt, what's your point?

"He's making a joke of British politics!" Well that's very appropriate given that current British politics *are* a fucking joke.

"He's a left-wing liberal elitist!" I don't know if you can be all of those things at once, but I do know that Count Binface isn't the one getting millions in donations from cryptocurrency billionaires sooooooo...

Vote change. Vote Binface.

[stewcopeland]

HAHAHAHAHA

[yesterdaysprint]

The Philadelphia Inquirer, Pennsylvania, July 29, 1904

[lilaccatholic]

Well that’s not so crazy I mean how much could–

OH

[persianpenname]

[cal3ris]

is this gonna get me fired you think

[lost-carcosa]

[the-coffee-nebula]

Chakotay: Do crabs think people walk sideways? Janeway: ...Chakotay, what the hell.

[mawofthemagnetar]

What do you mean “chat” is now referring to ChatGPT and not twitch chat? What? What? What the fuck? No?

When I address chat I am speaking to a presumed Greek chorus of real human people shitposting on their lunch break, not a machine that devours lakes to covert electricity into slop.

[thesweetiepienovels]

Actually, you are enough. Even if you don’t work. Or study. Or go out. Or have friends. Or have family. You’re enough because you exist and your existence is enough to be enough because you are not a product. You are not a sum of output. You are not a task to complete. But because you are something the universe wanted and put here even if you’ll never understand why. Somewhere in the cosmos your existence makes a difference, even if it’s not the way others existences do.