purple

[header ID: praying mantis climbing on spiny indigo plant. green background. end ID] [icon ID: praying mantis climbing on light purple flowers. end ID.] 🪐 19 human years 🌌 Autistic, Queer, Disabled. Creator of things, amateur clown, lover of bugs and word games. Blog under construction: I am continually adding image descriptions

[drowsydragontastemaker]

Welcome, traveler! Here is the organization system for my blog.

I add image descriptions to all my original posts and am attempting to add IDs to reblogged posts. Posts with image IDs are marked by the hashtag “image description added”.

I post frequently about bugs, art, queer things, and various world events slash discourse.

Bug posts are tagged with “bugposting”.

Queer posts are tagged with “pride stuff”.

Original art is tagged with “my art”.

Anything involving politics, news, or discourse is tagged with “world events”.

My original posts are tagged with “purple’s posts”.

Posts comprised mainly or solely of text are tagged with “text post”.

Posts featuring art, photos, images are tagged with “image post”.

I do have a few guidelines. Please be respectful when interacting with my content. I am a big fan of bugs, and I won’t tolerate any comments bashing or villainizing bugs. I also will delete rude or bigoted comments of any kind. That being said, everyone is welcome to peruse this blog.

Do feel free to filter as you please. Have a look around, stay as long as you like. I hope that my blog makes you smile.

[homunculus-argument]

Reading fantasy again, I've started thinking about how odd it is how in books like that, the non-human races invariably scoff at human frailty and vulnerability, even those that they'll call friends. Like that's mean?? Why would you be a dick to your friend who you know is not capable of as much as you are, and it's not their fault they were born like that. That's mean.

Like consider the opposite: Characters of non-human races treating their human companions like frail little old dogs. Worrying about small wounds being fatal - humans die of small injuries all the time - or being surprised that humans can actually eat salt, even if they can't stomach other spicy rocks. Being amazed that a human friend they haven't seen in 10 years still looks so young, they've hardly aged at all! And when the human tries to explain that they weren't going to just unexpectedly shrivel into a raisin in 10 years, the longer-lifespan friend dismisses this like no, he's seen it happen, you don't see a human for 10 or 20 years and they've shriveled in a blink.

Elves arguing with each other like "you can't take her out there, she will die!" and when the human gets there to ask what they're talking about, they explain to her that the journey will take them through a passage where it's going to be sunny out there. Humans burn in the sun. And she will have to clarify that no, actually, she'll be fine. They fight her about it, until she manages to convince them that it's not like vampires - humans only burn a little bit in the sun, not all the way through. She'll be fine if she just wears a hat.

Meanwhile dwarves are reluctant to allow humans in their mines and cities, not just out of being secretive, but because they know that you cannot bring humans underground, they will go insane if they go too long without seeing the sun. Nobody is entirely sure how long that is, but the general consensus is three days. One time a human tries to explain their dwarf companion that this is not true, there are humans that endure much longer darkness than that. As a matter of fact, in the furthest habited corners of the lands of the Northmen, the winter sun barely rises at all. Humans can survive three weeks of darkness, and not just once, but every single year.

"Then how do they sane?" Asks the dwarf, and just as he does, the conversation gets interrupted by the northland human, who had been eavesdropping, and turns to look at them with an unnerving glint in her colourless grey eyes, grinning while saying

"That's the neat part, we don't."

[reallyreallyreallytrying]

her voice was as silky as silken tofu. but her words were as firm as extra firm tofu

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

Humans are like "let me hold the thing. Let me pick it up. It's cute and I want to hold it, I want to wrap my weird elongated front feet around it, I want to encircle it with my freakishly long, oddly flexible front toes. I HAVE to hold things I HAVE to or I'll die."

[elisabethdeep-blog]

I know normal people can just pass their bill over and around an object and know most things worth knowing about it, but humans don't have electroreceptors At All. They only have mechanoreceptors. Which are most concentrated in the aforementioned 'hands'... and in their mouths.

They do also have eyes, and their vision is actually pretty acute. But their optic and mechanic sensory inputs aren't integrated together like electro-mechanic sense is. So they have these two fairly sophisticated sensory complexes that Barely talk to each other.

No wonder they try to bring the two inputs together in their environment then; picking things up and turning them around allows them to apply both their mechanical and optical senses to the object. They're just trying to make up for a deficiency of neural organisation.

And like. I mentioned the other concentration of mechanoreceptors is in their mouth... So just be glad they mostly grow out of constantly wrapping their viscera-looking tongue around everything.

[vamptits]

I can't keep having the same conversations about love languages, mbti, iq, bmi, "brain fully formed at 25" and shit over and over again...

[vamptits]

these things exist on a spectrum from untrue to straightforwardly racist btw. so if we could retire them forever that'd be nice.

[hareofhrair]

“Love Languages” are just common couples therapy techniques mangled and repackaged by an unqualified homophobe. Relationships generally need all 5 love languages to be fulfilled, which is to say, everybody needs to communicate with, spend time with, and do things for their partners, and that’s got nothing to do with any special way you communicate affection.

MBTI has been proven completely ineffective at predicting anyone’s success at a particular job, and half the people who take it twice will get different results. Reputable psychologists do not recognize it, and the company that owns the rights to it uses it to scam people. People don’t adhere to strict binaries in basically anything. Very few people are going to be exclusively introverted or extroverted. It’s just astrology repackaged as pseudoscience. Shockingly enough, you can’t boil the complexity of the human experience down to a dozen Types of Guy.

The concept of IQ is flawed from the start— “intelligence” is an abstract concept that encompasses many different skills, from social intelligence to emotional intelligence to the very narrow kind of problem solving intelligence IQ tests generally measure for. It cannot predict how fast you learn, how much you know, or how logical and well read you are. It mostly measures how good you are at solving puzzles. Coincidentally, it’s also a pretty good predictor of income and education level, take a guess why. Most people’s IQ will change throughout their lives, because it’s inconsistent bullshit we’ve only held onto this long because we’re still kinda hoping we can breed the ubermensch. IQ tests and the way they attempt to categorize people are explicitly eugenicist and racist.

BMI was developed by a man known as the grandfather of eugenics, who first of all was a mathematician, not a doctor, and second never intended the formula to be used to categorize individuals. It’s intended to give a rough estimate of obesity in populations, and it’s not even good at that. It hangs around because of fatphobia and insurance companies who want it as an excuse to charge fat people more.

The study which determined people’s prefrontal cortex was still developing at 25… stopped measuring at 25. Evidence suggests your brain probably never stops developing. Stop infantilizing grown adults. This is a branch off from the larger mess of misinformation surrounding fMRIs.

If you haven’t put together what all these things have in common yet, here’s the moral of the story: STOP TRYING TO CATEGORIZE PEOPLE. STOP TRYING TO PUT PEOPLE IN A GODDAMN BIOLOGICAL HIERARCHY. EUGENICS IS BAD, AND WILL ALWAYS BE BAD, NO MATTER WHO’S DOING IT.

[randomslasher]

No matter what a post on tumblr tries to tell you, your moral and ethical stances will never be determined by what you reblog and what you scroll past. Don’t let manipulation tactics force you into doing anything you don’t want to do.

[randomslasher]

I find it very interesting to note the times in which this post has a sudden resurgence. It often follows very stressful, upsetting events, where a lot of “REBLOG THIS OR YOU SUCK” posts start appearing on this site. 

So I’ll say it again: it is okay if you come to tumblr to escape upsetting news. It is okay if you’re just here for fun and fandom. It is okay if you do not want to use your tumblr as a place to read about or spread the current events that are circulating. It is okay if you need a place to decompress and just relax. There are other ways to be involved in/support causes and you are allowed to set boundaries on social media platforms without it being indicative of your belief systems. 

Your beliefs, values, ethics, and moral stances are not determined by whether or not you reblog something. 

[theacridstackrid]

@bettinalevyisdetermined we need a quick rb of this

[bettinalevyisdetermined]

Wow, I actually used this post in one of my earlier videos (all the way back in 2022)! So glad this came back around! Thank you for tagging me in this. ^_^

(I didn’t always make a point of including the post link in my video descriptions back then. Now I can fix that on this video, at least!)

[drowsydragontastemaker]

Video of the posts is linked at the bottom.

[headspace-hotel]

so many articles about Fast Fashion, not enough articles about what the hell is happening to the quality of clothes

Like okay. People own more pieces of clothing nowadays and they wear them a lesser number of times before throwing them out. BUT.

Why do we pretend like this is pure vanity or careless wastefulness, rather than forced by the qualities of the clothes themselves?

The other day, I was going through boxes of old clothes in the basement in search of fabric to practice sewing on. The difference in quality of the fabrics themselves is shocking! The worn-out old jeans from twenty years ago are MUCH thicker and tougher than anything more recent. My old baby clothes are made as sturdy as my work clothes from today.

In the past couple years, I have had entire seams rip out of clothes on the first wash. That's not normal!

Polyester blend shirts that feel cozy and soft when they are new, become scratchy and rough after 20 washes or so. I am trying to avoid polyester, but it gets harder and harder; the other day i couldn't find a single pack of crew socks that was 100% cotton. SOCKS!

Also, pilling is out of control. The newest pants I bought developed pills within a single day of walking around campus with a backpack.

These companies are trying to frog-boil us but touching clothes from twenty years ago, the useless crap of today would stick out like a sore thumb...

[drowsydragontastemaker]

Don’t get me started on graphic tees…. The images fade away so fast!

[headspace-hotel]

being a pepper plant has to be so weird.

Imagine evolving capsaicin specifically to stop mammals from eating your fruits, and then a mammal comes along that not only will eat your fruits, but likes them specifically because of the capsaicin, so much that it starts using its weird paws to distribute and care for your seeds, which turns into a strong selective force that literally starts evolving you into producing MORE capsaicin and makes you a WAY more successful and wider ranged species than you ever were before

simply because this mammal LOVES Pain Chemical. that evolved specifically to produce pain in mammals. It's not that the capsaicin isn't WORKING. It's just that these freaks like it.

[headspace-hotel]

This is the same mammal with social instincts so goddamn strong that they literally try to form social bonds with their predators, and end up evolving the predators into a new species that fits into their social communities as a form of mutualistic symbiosis, and exists in several different forms with unique morphology and behaviors based on the function they perform.

Instead of, I don't know, EVOLVING TO BE FASTER, this animal finds a faster animal and sits on it. Which shouldn't even work because the faster animal is a prey animal and this animal is a predator, but SOMEHOW they FORM A SOCIAL BOND WITH THE PREY. So they can sit on it while it runs fast. And somehow the prey animal?? is cool with this?? and benefits from this relationship???

Literally how can you hate humans. Humans are possibly the most hilarious thing evolution has ever done.

[headspace-hotel]

other things humans have done

eat poison plants, decide they like getting poisoned, and evolve the plants to poison them more

evolve to not have hair, but they find mammals with thick fluffy hair and put the hair on themselves, and evolve the mammals to produce extra hair so they can both have a warm coat of hair

split up their parasitic lice species into two separate species because they start taking other animals' hair and putting it on themselves so much

learn how to set things on fire on purpose. maintain body temperature by just standing beside some wood that's on fire instead of literally any normal option

figure out that their prey tastes better and is easier to digest when they hold it over a fire after killing it. get smarter because they digest food so good after it's been held over a fire.

find a poisonous plant and try washing it in boiling water until they don't die when they eat it anymore

go across the ocean by making a floating nest despite not being able to breathe underwater, drink ocean water, or even swim naturally

drink milk from other mammals even though they can't digest it and it makes them sick. Evolve those mammals to produce more milk than their babies can drink so they can drink the milk. Some members of the species evolve to be able to digest milk because they were so hellbent on drinking it.

find flowers, bugs and minerals that are nice colors and crush them up to try to turn other things that color

eat mushrooms that make their nervous systems malfunction because they like malfunctioning their nervous systems

[headspace-hotel]

humans worldwide looking up into the celestial vault of stars a million light years away, separated from Earth by the deadly cold and emptiness of space: I bet there are guys up there to form social bonds with

[bettinalevyisdetermined]

[drowsydragontastemaker]

Attached to the bottom of this post is a YouTube video that goes through this whole chain of replies.

Also, humans are so silly. Gotta love em.

[whump-it-like-its-hot]

So earlier in art class today, someone drew a characters hands in their pockets and mentioned that hands are really like the ultimate end boss of art, and most of us wholeheartedly agreed. So then, our teacher went ahead and free handed like a handful of hands on the board, earning a woah from a couple of students. So the one from earlier mentioned how it barely took the teacher ten seconds to do what I can’t do in three hours. And you know what he responded?

“It didn’t take me ten seconds, it took me forty years.”

And you know, that stuck with me somehow. Because yeah. Drawing a hand didn’t take him fourth years. But learning and practicing to draw a hand in ten seconds did. And I think there’s something to learn there but it’s so warm and my brain is fried so I can’t formulate the actual morale of the lesson.

[kazoosandfannypacks]

Saying "I'm not going to draw this thing because I don't know how to draw this thing" is really shooting yourself in the foot, because you've now cut yourself off from an opportunity to grow.

I had a friend in college who was an absolutely amazing artist. I loved seeing his work! One time I said something to the effect of "I could never do that."

He told me something that, as an artist, I resonate with. He said art isn't about natural talent; it's a learned skill. When you tell an artist their level of skill is impossible for you to reach, you're assuming their level of skill is a natural gifting they have, and it discredits the hundreds to thousands of hours of hard work they've put into getting where they are today, and you're cutting yourself off from trying to reach that point yourself.

[what-hos-there]

I don't remember where I heard this but I wish I could, because it stuck with me:

Talent is THE RATE at which you learn things, not whether or not you can learn certain skills at all.

And that suddenly clicked for me. I have been very talented with a lot of things in my life and once I realized that I had basically been getting XP multipliers on my normal life experiences, it suddenly felt so much less awful to realize that I did not have the same advantage with other skills I struggle with, and that's okay. I might even have some debuffs on those, and that's okay. It's still all gaining as long as I keep working on it!!

[drowsydragontastemaker]

Welp. This is my sign to better my (human) anatomy.

[drowsydragontastemaker]

Image description: three images of traditional pen fanart from Humans-B-Gone. The character is Rose the Chilean Rose Tarauntula.

The first image is of the whole page. There is a stylized drawing of Rose in pinks, blues, and purples, sitting in a field of blue and yellow flowers. Also pictured are two sketches of Rose, one a full body purple line art, the other a sketchy pink and yellow portrait of Rose with her eye closed and pedipalps raised. The sketchy portrait has a thought bubble above Rose filled with blue flowers.

At the bottom of the page is a high detail black and white scientific illustration of a Chilean Rose Tarantula facing forward. “Rose” in all caps is in the top right corner in burgundy, decorated with with green thorny vines. At the bottom left corner is the phrase “Humans B Gone” in all caps and the artist’s signature in blue and decorated with green leaves. The signature is two versions of the Chinese character “fen” drawn to look like they are holding hands.

The second image is a close up of the pink, blue, and purple stylized drawing. The third image is a close up of the scientific illustration. End ID.

I finally finished drawing Rose! I have a couple episodes to catch up on for Humans-B-Gone and I’m so excited! I saw that there’s gonna be a cone head mantis, so I definitely have to draw them soon. I will get around to drawing Sophodra at some point, promise. Extremely grateful to @revretch for creating such fun and beautiful arthropod characters!!

[beezlebutch]

"Pride month is over"

WRONG! Your pride month is over! Me and all the other disabled queers are having pride month two: disability edition

[jehandant]

Reblogging this again bc people in the notes are asking a lot of "Am I included? Am I disabled if I have x?" and I just wanted to add the flag here to show people who the pride month is for.

This is the new flag, the old one was more vivid and in a z shape, but it's been made more neutral to be inclusive of people with seizures or sensory issues.

Each stripe represents a different aspect of disability:

Red: Physical disabilities

Yellow: Cognitive & intellectual disabilities

White: (And this is the key one I think) Invisible AND undiagnosed disabilities

Blue: Mental illnesses

Green: Sensory disabilities

If you're autistic or have ADHD? this is your pride month. If you have a mental illness, it's your pride month. If you're hard of hearing, this is your pride month. If you have an autoimmune disorder, this is your pride month. If you are not diagnosed with anything but you know something is up with you: THIS IS STILL YOUR PRIDE MONTH.

[great-and-small]

Apparently the local university’s undergraduate entomology course sends students to catch insect specimens at the same place I like to go birdwatching, which explains why I saw three enormous frat looking dudes with tiny bug nets and overheard one emphatically say “bro BRO I told you we already have enough lepidopterans”

[bug-gender]

(this has been sitting in my drafts since april but whatever. when have I ever done anything in a timely manner?)

ough episode 8 of hbg got me good

everyone is right about the charming beetle grandpa and gregorsa being ominous but I can't believe I haven't seen anyone talk about rose this episode!!! like this spider is queer!

"some young arachnid man?" "mm, well. I think I'd prefer-"

she was about to say that she'd prefer a woman. she's gay. a lesbian. a tarantulesbian, if you will.

but also when the beetle said "I don't have a head for these kinds of things. I'm just a man, you know" and she looked so uncomfortable. like that's the kind of discomfort you get when an old person says something sexist that they don't think applies to you but it does

you might be thinking "but rose is a woman, it doesn't apply to her" and you'd be right. but also wrong. because she's a trans woman! the bioessentialist view in macrovolute society that men are inferior applies to her because as far as it's concerned, she is a man

rose is already regarded pretty poorly in macrovolute society because she's an arachnid. arachnids aren't supposed to be engineers, especially not male arachnids. which rose is. because she's trans. a transantula... a transantulesbian? someone needs to revoke my portmanteau privileges

I'm pretty sure rev confirmed that rose is a trans lesbian already, but it's so cool to see that in the show! I'm just so excited about this akjsfdsjfah

[drowsydragontastemaker]

[ID: close up photo of an American cockroach. Black background. End ID.]

I have no more finished art as of right now, so here’s the cockroach reference picture I used for the gregorsa fan art. I haven’t done a lot of fan art, ever, but it was super fun.

I want to draw sophodra or rose next but the motivation has slipped away from me for the time being…

[drowsydragontastemaker]

[ID: traditional pen drawing of fan art featuring Gregorsa from Humans-B-Gone. The bottom half of the paper features more detailed drawings. From left to right, 1: the words “Humans-B-Gone”. 2: a color drawing of Gregorsa, an anthropomorphic American cockroach. He has an orange body and face with a stripe of cream-white down his middle. The round shell behind his head is bluish-white. His face is oval, with two large dark squared eyes. There are two white circles beneath his eyes that resemble spectacles. His mandibles hang from his chin and are bent together. Behind his body is a dark protective shell. Gregorsa’s top two arms are visible. His left arm is bent and raised. Next is a scientifically accurate sketch of an American cockroach in black and white. The cockroaches top are pressed together and bend outwards. Its antennae are up and its mandibles outstretched. The top half of the paper features quick sketches of Gregorsa in orange and black ink. Clockwise from top left is 1: a sketch of the top view of Gregorsa with a skull pattern on his thorax. 2: the words “Gregorsa (humanized)”. 3: a bust sketch of Gregorsa looking concerned. 4: a face sketch of Gregorsa looking dejected, with three wavy lines above his head. 5: a central sketch of Gregorsa from the legs up, his limbs folded behind his back, one arm held in front of his body. 6: a face sketch of Gregorsa with furrowed eyebrows, looking straight ahead. In the top left corner is the artist’s signature, the Chinese character for 奋 (fén) next to the Chinese character for 芬 (fēn). The characters are yellow and two circles have been added to make it look like the characters are holding hands. In the top right corner is a yellow box containing the date, 6/24/2024 in yellow ink. End ID.]

I recently discovered this really cool animated series on YouTube called “Humans-B-Gone” by @revretch! The premise—macro insects and bugs— is super unique and the world building is truly amazing. I love everything arthropod so I had to make fan art. I’m hoping to find the energy to draw the rest of the cast soon. I highly recommend you check it out. Here’s the link to the first episode: https://youtu.be/AwkxjZXpADg?feature=shared

[daydreamodyssey]

*helps a bug outside so people don't kill it*

*flash forward and I'm convicted of a crime I didn't commit*

*no lawyer touches the case for me*

*everyone hears a buzz and turns around*

*the bug is wearing a tiny suit with a tiny suitcase and becomes my defense attorney*

[revretch]

Every time I think praying mantises can’t be any more extra, they find a way to prove me wrong

[revretch]

Most insects can’t make any noises at all, but these fuckers can stridulate (like a cricket) AND hiss (like a hissing cockroach). Can you believe that shit?!!

Not only that, they have eyes with nearly a 360-degree field of vision, AND necks that can turn 180 degrees, AND torsos that can twist 180 degrees. Is that necessary? Is that REALLY necessary?!!

All this time, we’ve assumed they just blend into their environment, as well as they’ve perfect blending with the scenery. Instead, at least in the case of the orchid mantis, we’ve found out they’re just *so* beautiful that prey insects prefer them to the *actual flowers.* There are plenty of other mantises that evoke flowers, too. Add this to the fact that most insects can’t see green, and a mantis could simultaneously seem green to blend in to vertebrates, but yellow like a flower to attract insects. Who knows how many of them do this?

And, of course, there’s the bizarre fact that they look way more like us than the majority of other animals, including the majority of animals actually more closely related to us.

Oh, and they’re terrifying giants very few insects can stand against (exempting the hymenopterans–nobody, anywhere, is more terrifying than hymenopterans).

It just feels like someone kept adding stuff to their character sheet and the DM wouldn’t stop them. What is this, mantises. Who let you be like this