An article interviewing 4 Iranian women on their experiences with the war being waged as well as Khamenei's government:
Voices of Iranian women: 'We celebrated, but we cried. We danced, and we mourned'
Source: The Irish Times - Media Bias Fact Check gave it a score of High Factual Reporting and Left-Center bias
Even as we celebrate Women's History Month, it's important to remember that women's history is NOT a thing of the past. Women are making history currently, will make history for as long as humanity exists, and are an intrinsic part of contemporary issues. The fight against the crimes being committed against the Iranian people cannot succeed without taking into account the fight of Iranian women.
Any more resources on the subject, or about Iran at all, would be much appreciated!
The Tehran Times dedicated today’s cover to the schoolgirls who were killed in the US-Israeli airstrike on Shajareh Tayyebeh Girls’ Elementary School in Minab (along with other Iranian children killed by aggressors).
More information: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c1l7rvqq51eo
The source is the BBC which is considered reliable and unbiased by the Ad Fontes Media. However, something I've noticed among sources on the Minab bombings is a lack of decisiveness in the titling.
This seems innocuous but can create bias against severity and rely on framing the content of the article as alleged despite strong evidence, so keep that in mind when researching on the issue.
For the record, she actually abandoned the movement BEFORE they all got whooping cough, but abandoned it too late. There’d been a breakout of measles in her area that caused her to reassess, and she and her doctor had already drafted and started a catch-up vaccination schedule, but her kids caught whooping cough just before it could be started. Then she wrote a blog post for The Scientific Parent explaining how she and her husband had come to wrong decisions in the first place, how they changed their mind, the consequences they suffered as a result, and asking other parents to please vaccinate their kids. And now she’s an activist for destroying the misinformation of anti-vaxxers, and reaching out to anti-vaxxers because she’s understands their fears but knows their kids deserve better.
She was trying to the best for her kids and just didn’t know how to interpret the validity of information or its sources, an actual skill that can be actually difficult and that is under-taught and a necessary first step to being able to trust vaccination research, so chose no action over taking an action she wasn’t sure of. She kept looking into it with family and friends and even eventually came to the right conclusion before her kids became sick, but it was still too late.
Honestly it was pretty brave of her to publicly admit she was wrong. She could have just quietly vaccinated her kids and not become a national news story, but instead she spoke out, even saying “I’m writing this from quarantine, the irony of which isn’t lost on me.” and also “I am not looking forward to any gloating or shame as this ‘defection’ from the antivaxx camp goes public, but, this isn’t a popularity contest. Right now my family is living the consequences of misinformation and fear. I understand that families in our community may be mad at us for putting their kids at risk.”
She understood the consequences and still put herself and her story out there.
You know what, it does take a big person to admit they were wrong so publicly and work to undo the harm. I believe I made fun of her in the past, but timemachineyeah changed my mind.
“I never thought leopards would eat MY face, until I realized they totally would, and they will eat your face, too!” warns defector from the leopards-eating-faces party
#really important actually#like. it’s so important that we allow people to STOP voting for leopards eating faces#because if you attack anyone leaving the leopards eating faces party when they realize it’s bad#the only support system they’ll have is the people who want them to come back to it#you have to make it possible for people escape instead of considering them forever tainted and impure and inherently evil
The #1 trait of anti-vaxxers is not “they’re stupid” or “they fell for propaganda” but “they don’t know who’s safe to trust.”
The movement is pushed by women, especially suburban moms, because they know damn well you cannot trust doctors. You cannot trust the medical industry, the billion-dollar corporate zone of “you should lose some weight and maybe the pain will stop.” Cannot trust the ones who keep changing diet advice - is it no sugar? No carbs? No fats? Is it dangerous to let kids eat things in wild colors? Food pyramid: good or bad? They cannot trust the BMI chart that says they should lose 75 lbs to be “healthy.” (Whether or not they “should” lose 75 lbs, they know damn well that “healthy” does not describe any part of the journey to getting there.) Cannot trust the ones who keep giving them incomplete and sometimes incorrect information about contraception. The ones who said “that’s false labor; you have two weeks more” 12 hours before they gave birth. And so on.
So they have their kids, and they want so much for their kids to be safe, and the doctors and nurses say: Get them vaccinated.
So they ask: What about if there’s complications? An allergic reaction? Side effects?
And the doctors and nurses say: Get them vaccinated.
This is… not reassuring.
And they ask, My sister-in-law’s cousin had a really bad reaction to the MMR shot and I want to know how I can tell it’s safe for my kids.
And the doctors and nurses say: Get them vaccinated.
Throw in the right-wing/libertarian faction yelling YOU CAN’T TELL ME WHAT TO DO and the insurance companies saying “hey um you need a specific type of coverage for that; we probably cover those vaccinations but you’ll need this special paperwork to be sure” - and then you have the actual anti-vax propagandists yelling some combination of cherry-picked statistics and outright lies, and you get a whole lot of moms willing to say BUGGRE ALL THIS FOR A LARKE.
There is no amount of facts that can fix this. They’re swamped with facts from 300 directions. What they need to fix this is empathy and the kind of connections that lead to trust.
They need to trust that, even as the medical industry dismisses a whole lot of womens’ concerns, in this particular area, they’re right.
Add in the consequences of having a significant portion of your social support network tied up in a particular worldview, leaving it, much less openly condemning it, is really hard and means losing your community support. In a world where the system can’t be trusted to pick up that slack, Moms can’t afford to risk the change - until the cost of staying clearly outweighs the coat of pushing back, not just in general, but for their kids.
Kindness doesn’t just matter because it’s more ethical - it'salso a more effective strategy.
Kindness doesn’t just matter because it’s more ethical - it'salso a more effective strategy.
Get this into your fucking heads. Kindness and compassion and one might even say “love,” are strategies, not just vague fluffy inoffensive emotions. Cruelty will never save us.
doves and pigeons being basically identical scientifically speaking is so important to me.
the dove, the symbol of the Holy Spirit, of God's immeasurable love and mercy come to intercede for us. is the same bird as the common "flying rat" of the cities, the slums, the poor, dilapidated areas that most folk would never willingly go.
even there. there is God. and He comes scruffy and dirty
What if the children go to schools unafraid of tear gas and bullets?
What if the birds come back, and the bees are healed, and every species moves from endangered, to threatened, to thriving?
What if the rainforest ADVANCES?
What if every parking lot had solar panels? What if every structure had solar panels? What if we built climbing gyms and terraced gardens in the skeletons of old coal power plants?
What if you baked your neighbor bread, and they shared their home-grown blackberries?
What if every person who needed a home, had one? What if every person who needed healing was healed?
What if every body was treasured for what it was, not what it should be?
What if every trans child's parents attended their graduation, their wedding, their new-name-day?
What if every warehouse became a closed-circle repair station? Goods flowing out, and back, and out again? What if landfills started to SHRINK?
What if the water and air were clean? What if there was enough public transit that the cars dwindled, leaving the streets safe for kids on bikes, evening deer, midnight cats and foxes?
In honor of Women's History Month, I felt like sharing some information on a few (in my personal experience) less talked about figures in women's history. I've tried to include a mix of more contemporary women as well as historical.
Phillis Wheatley: The first African-American woman to be a published poet, and the writer of one of my favorite poems On Imagination (1773)
Rigoberta Menchú: A Guatemalan advocate for women and indigenous peoples' rights who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1992
The Mirabal Sisters: Three sisters - Minerva, Patria, and Maria-Teresa - dubbed "Las Mariposas" for the work in opposing the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo
Lucy Stone: An abolitionist and suffragist who campaigned for political and social reform. Also the first woman in Massachusetts to be awarded a university degree.
Susan Nalugwa Kiguli: A Ugandan poet and professor of literature. One of my favorite poets of all time. I highly recommend The African Saga.
Nettie Stevens: The discoverer of sex chromosomes and their role in sex differentiation
This is obviously not nearly all the women who have contributed to the future of humanity. If anyone else has any figures they'd like to share, I would be really grateful!
absolutely flabbergasting to see people who have so enthusiastically succumbed to despair. like okay denethor, but some of us are gonna actually face the armies of mordor in battle nonetheless.
The thing about Denethor is that he not only succumbed to despair, he wanted to ensure that Faramir succumbed with him. Similarly, a lot of people now are not only succumbing to despair, they're actively proselytizing despair, trying to convince others to join them in their hopelessness. Despair is apparently lonely and they want company in their self-immolation.
btw denethor succumbed to despair bc he was doomscrolling on the palantir. Sauron tweaked his algorithm so he only saw bad news, and he fell into the trap of thinking the world couldn't be saved.
Happy International Women's Day, y'all! Have a haphazardly put together collage of some of my favorite characters in fiction media, from childhood to now.
List (from top left to bottom right):
Sarah Jacobs (Newsies 1992) played by Ele Keats
On top - Alice from Alice in Wonderland (1951)
Antoinette Cosway (Wide Sargasso Sea 1993) played by Karina Lombard
Fantine (Les Miserables) played by Lea Salonga
Esther Jacobs (Newsies 1992) played by Deborra-Lee Furness
Katie Bell (Harry Potter) art by upthehillart
Drew Tanaka (Heroes of Olympus)
On top: Sally (Nightmare before Christmas)
Lawino (Song of Lawino) - I couldn't find any visual for this character, so I chose to represent her with a photograph of an Acoli woman taken by lafrohemien on Instagram
On top: Aviva Corcovado (Wild Kratts)
Sybil Crawley (Downton Abbey) played by Jessica Brown Findlay
Winter Hayle-Blackburn (Lunar Chronicles)
Emmie, Jo, and Georgina (Trials of Apollo)
Cinderella (Cinderella 1950)
Anne Shirley (Anne of Green Gables 1985) played by Megan Follows
Since some people seemed interested in me talking about the effects immigration could have on our favorite little newsboys, I thought I’d make a post about it. I really did focus on community a lot in this because of how important it was and still is to the culture of New York, so these might be kinda samey and I apologize for that. I didn’t do all of the newsies, just some of the ones that really screamed “affected by immigration in some way,” but if you want to hear about any of the characters I missed, feel free to ask, and I’ll see if I can come up with something! Minor warning, this is kinda angsty, but I made sure to add fluff!
Based on his names and lines in the novelization, Jack is Irish. No matter when his relatives immigrated, they likely suffered in some way from the potato famine. Ireland is still affected by the famine today, so I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that Jack would struggle with its effects, such as generational trauma. Besides that, there’s textual evidence for Jack struggling with food insecurity the way many poor, disenfranchised kids do.
Because of this, I think Jack would see food as a love language of sorts. You can kinda see this in the scene where he’s eating with the Jacobs family: Jack just really basks in the domesticity of taking part in a family meal and it clearly meant a lot to him. I think that when people make food for him, whether it be a full meal or a cake for his birthday, he’d be really touched. And when he’s older and he has a home and a kitchen of his own, I think he’d try to do the same thing for his loved ones. Results may vary, but the love behind his actions never does.
The history of Jewish immigration to America is very long, but the bulk of that immigration happened between 1880 and 1920, when Poland was divided under Russian, Prussian, and Austro-Hungarian rule. Many of these immigrants were leaving Eastern Europe to escape pogroms targeting Jewish people under Russian rule after the assassination of Tsar Alexander II. Because of these pogroms, about 3 million Eastern European Jewish immigrants came to America between 1880 and 1924.
This influx of immigration led to a very strong Jewish community in the Lower East Side that the Jacobs family would be part of. Manhattan was (and still is) the epicenter of Jewish culture in America and I don’t see it explored enough. David clearly isn’t thrilled at the idea of going back to school, so his closest friends besides the newsies would most likely be from their synagogue and I’m sure it’s similar for Sarah now that she’s working from home. I imagine it would be very a very tight community, especially for Esther and Sarah.
Spanish and Latino immigration to New York was fairly uncommon in the 19th century and still only hit its peak in the mid-20th century. Bumlets (played by a Latino actor) would most likely be pretty lonely in a way the other boys aren't. And as much as he loves the family he’s made for himself with, it’s a very different community than the one he was born into (I personally headcanon Puerto Rican).
Which means that when he does manage to find a similar community in Manhattan, I think he’d really latch onto it. And since he’s such a genuinely sweet boy (at least imo), I think they’d really love him right back! I absolutely adore the friendship/found family the movie gave the boys, but I think it would be really good for him to have a community built around cultural experiences in addition to his newsie community.
I’ve always seen Itey as a fairly recent immigrant, meaning I placed him as immigrating in early 1899. An interesting phenomenon I learned about through my research is that many Italian immigrants during this time period were single men and that an average of 40% of these men would later return to Italy. The immigrants who stayed, like Itey, would still be very close to their families in Italy and send money back to them.
Family is extremely important in Italian culture and I think being so young and so far away from his family would be very difficult for Itey. I’ve always seen him as 16, so he’s at a strange point in life where he’s old enough to live in America on his own, but still young enough that he needs guidance and support from someone older and more settled. Obviously, Kloppman provides that support for the boys as best he can, but I also think Itey found a community of his own among his fellow Italian immigrants. I’ve mentioned this in a different post, but I'll go ahead and say it again: This guy is a hit with little old Italian nonnas.
(Side note: @nsnshahana asked me if I could have one of his many adoptive nonnas and while it doesn’t exactly line up with the independent young man I see him as, he still very loved and supported by them, so don’t worry! He’s very well-cared for.)
My friend @chaosfairy introduced me to the idea of Dutchy being a Dutch immigrant who grew up on the border between the Netherlands (typically called Holland then) and Germany, meaning he speaks both Dutch and German. And thanks to @jackcowboyhero, I also think he has a real knack for picking up languages (English, of course, but also French, Italian, and a little Spanish!). So you have a young man who knows six different languages, which is very impressive! The thing is, I also think he’s dyslexic.
Even today, people refuse to understand dyslexia and I think it would be very hard on Dutchy, especially when he was learning English as a child. Reading and writing in Dutch was hard enough, but when you add in an entirely new language, I think he’d feel like he was dumber than he actually is for a long time. What I think would help him with these feelings is, first and foremost, supportive friends. You would never be able to convince me that the other boys wouldn’t find his affinity for the spoken language fascinating and I think they would definitely help him improve his fluency.
Last but not least, I think Swifty would have a very complicated experience with immigration. He is a half-white, half-Chinese boy living during the height of the Chinese Exclusion Act and during an era where it’s illegal for him to exist in pretty much every state besides New York. To keep him and any siblings he might have as safe as possible, I think his parents would’ve raised him as more American than Chinese. So he has this disconnect from his heritage that really starts to bother him as he gets older.
One issue he’d face is the fact that the majority of Chinatown residents during that time spoke Cantonese and I’ve always seen him as being semi-conversational in Mandarin. It would be one of those things that further isolates him from his heritage and I think it would be very frustrating for him. However, he’s also a very stubborn person, so I can definitely see him teaching himself Cantonese just so he can make those connections with other people.
I think one of the goals of society should be that someone who requires expensive medicine and a lot of care can live an amazing life, the longest life they possibly can, with dignity, even if they have no friends or family or anyone who cares enough about them to help. the goals of a society should be to make life better than if we are alone, society should want life to be as good as possible for as many people as possible, and those goals should account for people not having social support networks.
social life aside, the most hated or ignored person in town should be able to live as good and fair and just of a life as the most loved person in town. survival needs to stop being a popularity contest.
i've reached the stage where i've decided I must be cursed. I'm like a Disney princess if my magical obstacle was shipping rarepairs instead of a sleeping curse or a sorceress with too much righteous indignation
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