Lady of the Stacks @ladyofzestacks - Tumblr Blog

Wholesome

i know i just reblogged this a few hours ago but i keep thinking about this man and his powerful emanations. i think this might actually be the physical manifestation of the soul of new york city. if he dies the city itself becomes pillars of dust

chromatickita

thelatestkate

capesandshapes

As a former librarian I'm actually required to remind you that many libraries that subscribe to Libby are opted into a program that lets you subscribe and access magazines for free with no wait

And that this is actually a really fun, low cost way to not only access news and larger cultural magazines, but also to get free patterns for many different crafts that you can screenshot if need be and that lower the financial barriers to entry for trying new things

From my experience working in both academic and public libraries, many libraries are use it or lose it funding-- I have to say this because a lot of patrons feel guilty for how much they use the library and how often they're using it funny enough, but the worst thing you can do for libraries is not try out new features and not use what's already given to you as much as possible.

The numbers that come as a result of your patronage are how most libraries justify their continued existence in times of financial hardship, which sucks but, go check out some magazines on Libby!

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disast3rtransp0rt

As someone who took etiquette lessons, politeness is an incredibly effective tool for disarming bigots. You can either force them to reconsider their words/actions by directly and calmly confronting their behavior (by using the rules of society in your favor), or you can dip entirely while they appear to be in the wrong.

Both options are great.

Because the thing is, when bigots pick fights, they are 100% counting on you to get louder than them. Or meaner. They want you to react emotionally and provide fodder for their 'You're Too Emotionally Immature To Understand' cannon.

What they aren't expecting you to do is say one of the following phrases in a polite, concerned tone:

Are you okay?

That's not the kind of language I was raised to use with others.

Do you need a moment to think on why that wasn't acceptable?

This is no way to engage in intelligent conversation. Please try that again in a kinder tone if you'd like this to continue. (I really like this one because it lets you turn their public-shame rhetoric around)

For those of you who'd are spiteful and/or dealing with Fundamentalists/Evangelicals/generally shitty Christians:

What's happening in your life to cause you this much anger? I can't imagine hurting so badly that I need to hurt other people.

Who taught you it was acceptable to treat other people this way? Certainly not the Jesus I remember.

Whatever happened to 'judge not lest ye be judged'?

If I talked like that in front of my parents or grandparents I would be ashamed.

I think there's something you need to pray on before we try and have this conversation.

And my all time favorite:

"It sounds to me like there are some seriously dark and angry forces at work in your heart."

(Nothing stops a Christian bigot in their tracks faster than implying the Devil is causing their bigotry. But you MUST be calm, polite, and gentle with your tone and wording. It is absolutely fair to twist the rules and play them at their own game, but you gotta play hard.)

TLDR: It's much faster to use etiquette, politeness, and rhetoric reversal when eviscerating idiots online and in person, because they aren't expecting you to weaponize their behaviors back in their direction. Don't get angry, get spitefully polite! :)

themythicalcodfish

I once witnessed a very soft-spoken young Southern man take a hateful older woman’s hands gently in his and say “Sister, I am so sorry that the Devil has carved a home for hatred in your heart. I’ll pray for you.”

It was glorious.

1863-project

This works with all sorts of inappropriate behavior. I work as the archivist in a public library, so I end up on the reference desk a lot, and sometimes patrons will say or do things that aren't exactly appropriate. When patrons try to hit on me, I put on a teacher voice and calmly ask, "Is that an appropriate question to ask someone at work?" and it shuts them down immediately.

This sort of thing always does the trick.

thememedaddy

chucktaylorupset

(via hornedchick)

Kurt Vonnegut wrote: “When I was 15, I spent a month working on an archeological dig. I was talking to one of the archeologists one day during our lunch break and he asked those kinds of “getting to know you” questions you ask young people: Do you play sports? What’s your favorite subject? And I told him, no I don’t play any sports. I do theater, I’m in choir, I play the violin and piano, I used to take art classes.

And he went WOW. That’s amazing! And I said, “Oh no, but I’m not any good at ANY of them.”

And he said something then that I will never forget and which absolutely blew my mind because no one had ever said anything like it to me before: “I don’t think being good at things is the point of doing them. I think you’ve got all these wonderful experiences with different skills, and that all teaches you things and makes you an interesting person, no matter how well you do them.”

And that honestly changed my life. Because I went from a failure, someone who hadn’t been talented enough at anything to excel, to someone who did things because I enjoyed them. I had been raised in such an achievement-oriented environment, so inundated with the myth of Talent, that I thought it was only worth doing things if you could “Win” at them.

thecollectibles

Girl and Cat by Robbie Aldis

sandmandaddy69

harzilla

Reblog to cast healing for your homies.

charaznablespeteevee

lordofmasks

The Collector | prints

rylandsgrace

Barbie + text posts

stinkybrowndogs

You can get this as a sticker here

theanishimori

Source: [X]

TL;DR – Twitter thread by a library worker about a woman who pulled hundreds of books out of a library dumpster and donated them to an underserved school. THOSE BOOKS WERE THROWN OUT FOR A REASON. Like outdated science, racism, and misogyny. #ContextMatters [The news article is about a different woman who pulled books from a landfill to hoard/sell – which triggered the Twitter writer’s flashback.] Image ID added – kudos to KATZENCHEN (Some words and phrases have been adjusted for screenreader accessibility):

1st Image: A quote retweet by Twitter user Ingrid C. hyphen A, the tweet it is quoting is an article by CBC Ottawa it reads “She saved 200’000 books from the landfill and hopes to find them all a home” an image of an old white woman in a blue coat is attached to the tweet. Ingrid’s tweet reads: We discarded over 100 books with outdated science info and racist/misogynist imagery and a woman fished them out of the garbage and donated them to an underserved school. She donated racist, crap science garbage books to children.

2nd Image: a continuation of the previous tweet in the form of a Twitter thread, the tweets reads: Lots of teachers have wish lists and most of them don’t include garbage. Better to purchase one thing they need rather than gift them 100’s of useless things they don’t, you’re actually creating more labor and the purpose of these gifts is to take something off their plates. Another kicker about the woman who dragged our discards out of the garbage: She took her story to a NYC tabloid, talking about how the books were “perfectly good.” The conditions of the books was perfectly acceptable, but the contents of them weren’t.

So my thoughtful curation of our collection, which took months of decisions and hands-on time with these books, was sold to Page Six (yes literally, Page Six) as 100’s of “perfectly good books” being thrown in the garbage. She didn’t come to talk to a librarian to see why we’d discarded the titles. She went to Page Six to get more clout for her crappy environmental sustainability Instagram. So in addition to giving NYC kids garbage books with dubious value, she threw my work and my library under the bus.

At the end of the article, a local public school was quoted as saying they would have gladly taken the books, but the school hadn’t seen them! We donate 100’s of books each year that we think schools and other educators can actually “use,” these schools deserve more than 70’s non-fiction books.

End Image ID.

astrodidact

intheheartofman

wonderwanda

I reblogged this yesterday, but I want to reblog it again. Diabetic ketoacidosis turns your blood acidic and will essentially burn you from the inside out.

The stories you hear of people dying from rationing, this is what happens to their body.

Affordable insulin isn’t just a right, it’s a necessity.

No one should have to die like that when it’s preventable with access to proper medication.