Welcome!

Annika * 27 * he/him & she/her * dragon enthusiast

[rabid-transcendentalist]

@ whatever took her from us

[strawberryjayne]

antique.alchemist : instagram

[vampireapologist-archive-deacti]

When I was 18 I took a ballet class at college and every morning our beginner adult class started just as the Ballet Majors in the studio next door took a mid-class break.

Many mornings they would gather in the doorway of my classroom and watch us struggle through our bar warmups or jumble up a new technique while they smiled and whispered to each other.

And every morning I dreaded seeing them there because I knew they were making fun of me.

I had other classes with some of them, and I was always embarrassed when ballet came up, and it always did, them being ballet majors, because I loved to talk about it but knew they’d seen me dance, and I was sure they thought I didn’t belong in the conversation.

At the end of the semester, our instructor announced that she’d like to invite the dancers from the next door studio to sit in on our final performance as an audience, and everyone in my class hesitated. We’d worked so hard, we wanted to celebrate our progress during our final without being judged. Most of us left class that day suddenly more anxious about the final than we’d ever been.

The next morning, in one of my other classes I had with the ballet majors, one of them approached me, and as if she’d been reading our minds the entire semester, she said

“Hey. I just wanted to say that I know we watch you guys dance a lot, and I wanted to make sure you know we’re never laughing at you. When we watch you guys learn the basics…..it reminds us of when we first started when we were younger. It’s like…looking at ourselves when we first fell in love with dancing. That’s why we love watching you guys.”

It shocked me. I felt awash with relief and utterly stupid all at once.

Here I had spent an entire semester assuming the worst of people who had otherwise been nothing but nice to me in every other setting, and I had no one to blame for that but my own insecurities that I’d allowed to rule me for months.

I’d been so unfair to these girls, because I was self conscious. I was so worried about being judged that I’d judged all of them.

Here I was worried they were laughing at me, and all along they were looking at me with nothing but absolute delight, even envy for what I was getting to experience.

This encounter changed my entire attitude, permanently.

It made me realize that, yeah sometimes people are jerks for no reason, but more often than not, people really are just….Good.

Since that day, I’ve started giving everyone the benefit of the doubt until they prove me wrong, for their sake and for my own.

And I’ve learned that the world becomes a lot better and life becomes a lot easier when you accept that maybe not everyone is judging you. Maybe you’re the one who’s hardest on yourself.

Let yourself be. Let yourself exist and breathe and be happy.

The world is a much better place.

[acaemia]

I needed to read this, thank you.

[ajaviary]

Same here! I think it’s something we all need to remember! Thanks for sharing

[hellomynameiscytherea]

We all needed this.

[segamascott]

[virgomoon]

VIRGOMOON'S BLACK MUSIC COLLECTION: a series of playlists where i collect black artists from various genres to showcase the talent of my community; particularly that outside of typical genres you see us in.

black people created rock btw: my magnum opus. as the title suggests, here is rock music made by black people or bands that feature at least one black musician, particularly the lead singer and/or songwriter. classic rock, pop punk, hardcore, punk rock, goth, and more. this includes rap rock remixes and rock inspired rap tracks. songs range anywhere from the 60s to now.

a southern gothic tale: this playlist is just like the above, except featuring black artists who make primarily country music. there's bluegrass, folk, blues, and the like here. including covers and crossover songs. again, older music as well as newer tracks are featured here.

black alternative: black music that isn't just generic "pop", "rap", or "rnb". nothing wrong with those genres, of course, but obviously, we make all kinds of music and deserve to be recognized there too. here you'll find hyper-pop, bedroom pop, indie pop, dark pop; all those trendy sub - genres.

juicy fruit, certified bubble yum: bonus points if you know the song the title is from. anyway, here's bubblegum pop by black artists because for some reason black pop girls get labeled as "urban" and "rnb" when they're not? not necessarily? music from the 80s and on.

black girl punk!: punk and punk adjacent music from alternative black women in music. including fem presenting artists.

we've always been here: a new addition to the collection! this is every song from the various playlists collected into one major playlist. the only missing one is juicy fruit, as i wanted to showcase more unknown / underground artists and/or the songs from known artists that are a little more obscure because they're showcasing alternative genres than what we're used to from them. for example, don't hurt yourself from beyonce. a blues rock song from a known pop artist. still adding music to it as of april 2025.

[cassandrasimplex]

I knew having Redditors cross-train on Tumblr would produce weird fucking magic.

[cassandrasimplex]

It gets better. This Redditor went the full Goncharov.

[digitaldiscipline]

Glorbcharov: Dishonor Among AI Thieves

[starry-genome]

Y’all missed the best part:

[headspace-hotel]

Category 5 Glup Shitto event

[everybodysinvited]

The benefits of home STI test kits 🧪💉

In the UK, you can test for some STIs with at home test kits which is really helpful for a whole plethora of reasons, so let's take a look! You can order free test kits in the UK from either of these sites:

https://freetest.me

https://sh24.org.uk/orders/new

or buy test kits here:

https://fettle.health

The at home test kits can test for Chlamydia, Gonorrhoea, Hepatitis B & C, Syphilis and HIV. For other STIs you will need to make an appointment with your local GP or sexual health clinic.

Testing at home is really simple and each kit comes in discreet packaging for your privacy, clear instructions and means to post your completed test back. Making it super simple and easier to fit round your schedule - no more waiting rooms, social anxiety, mobility or travel stress or awkward conversations! What's not to love?!

It's really important you both get tested before engaging with a new sexual partner, and if you are in a committed sexual relationship, you should still get tested once a year.

Image & text descriptions in ALT

[dogcunt]

reinstalled grindr and this was thee last dm someone sent me lmfao

[starlitbeetle]

Hey all, while we're busy normalizing women with hairy legs, hairy armpits and bushy pubes, let's also normalize women with hairy upper lips, hairy chins, hairy side burns, hairy chests, and all the other places where women are supposedly magically hair-free.

[sandumilfshous]

^ winner of the best comment award

[tgirl-tamag0tchi]

Mistakes aren’t death sentences, people tell you things because they want you to work on them and improve and be a better friend and healthier… not cause they want you to disappear or die.

[lawbutch]

when people bring up an issue it means they want to keep having you in their life! it means they trust you enough to be vulnerable, and they believe in your ability to get through tough situations together! and if you both handle it respectfully, you will likely end up with a stronger relationship. a friend recently told me that it was triggering for them when I drink alcohol when we're hanging out, and I felt guilty and ashamed but I said "thank you for telling me! I love learning more about you!" and I changed my behaviour and we're better friends about it 👍

[laurbailey]

CRITICAL ROLE: CAMPAIGN 4 Episode 32: Road of Dreams

[ratajota]

Part two of this commission and one of the big complex ones I managed to make this month. Big public thank you to the client for the patience. Full picture and process below

[obscenereference]

everyone look at this beautiful art of my darling beast

[fivetrench]

I sees it witj my eyedballs

[redstonedust]

theres a lot of jobs i think would be cool to automate but the people being automated out of a job are given no alternatives because this is being done for the employers benefit not the employee. so we're in a weird situation where im lookin at jobs that i really dont think any person should be forced to endure and still having to go "well i guess id rather a human do it than a robot" which kind of sucks major ass actually. why am i on the side of employment. god damn it.

[yrbeecharmer]

literally everything people say about public defenders on the internet is so wrong and frustrating even when they’re trying to be sympathetic to us. and I certainly said some of that same kind of shit before I did this job. I didn’t get it yet. I get it now. the only people who really do get it are the people who’ve done it and the people who are in or also working with the communities we serve. representing a factually guilty person is the absolute least of any public defender’s fucking problems at any given time and the last thing I would ever lose sleep over lol

[yrbeecharmer]

what a lot of people in the notes on the post that inspired this train of thought seem to imagine public defenders struggling with and getting upset about: finding out a client committed the crime they're accused of and having to grapple with the morality of defending a person who Did Harm To Others and what that means for the attorney as an individual immortal soul or whatever the fuck

Things that I have actually struggled to deal with in my 2 years as a public defender so far (non-exhaustive list):

Having to put the criminal records and self-esteem and livelihoods of clients I believed were factually innocent, people I'd developed relationships with and knew how much they had to lose if something went wrong, in the hands of a group of strangers who I'd had no more than 20 minutes to question about their knowledge and beliefs and biases.

Worrying those strangers would favor the young, handsome white male prosecutors' arguments over my innocent clients who've had rough lives and it shows on their faces, because of whose voice sounds "authoritative" and who "looks like a criminal".

Never feeling like I had enough time to prepare a case for trial because I also had over 100 other cases pending at the same time.

Put simply, it is harder to represent a factually innocent person than a factually guilty person. I think basically all defense attorneys agree on this. It's more emotionally taxing because of the stakes. There are always material stakes for all of our clients, but for a factually innocent person there are also moral stakes.

Representing people who are technically guilty of the crimes they are charged with, but no one was actually harmed, and maybe the law itself is unfair, and also my client was certainly racially profiled and overcharged. And having to put that in the hands of a jury, because my client wants to maintain whatever dignity they can to the bitter end.

Not being able to just say to the jury, I don't give a fuck whether my client is technically guilty. He's a poor Black man, so he was guilty in the eyes of the American legal system before he was ever arrested. He gets that. I get that. Do you get that? Who gives a shit whether he's factually guilty of a technicality DUI that happened 2 or 3 years ago? What the fuck are we doing? Are we all just here to give another black father a criminal record? Fuck you all.

Representing multiple very young men charged with DV assaults who grew up with fathers who abused their mothers, or parents who abused them, in and out of foster care, multiple generations of cycles of violence and substance abuse passed down from parent to child. It doesn't excuse it. Of course it doesn't. They have done harm to their own partners and they know this isn't the example they want to set for their own kids. But they're human - the idea that abusers are somehow inhuman just sets you up to fail to recognize abuse when someone you love is the person doing it - and what the fuck other ways of dealing with difficult situations and relating to other people were these guys ever supposed to learn? They didn't have the opportunity to learn anything else. They never had a fucking chance.

And if they don't have a lot of history yet, maybe there's still time to turn it around. One of them talked to me about how badly he wanted to break the cycle and not have his kids grow up to be like that. I hope he can do it. I don't know if he will. That's what haunts me about that situation. Not the fact that I had to represent his interests in court. That's just my job.

Family after family after family who call 911 for help for a loved one in a mental health or substance-related crisis. And then the cops show up and throw their loved one in crisis in jail sometimes over the weekend because if you lash out at someone you live with for literally any reason that counts as domestic violence which means the cops legally have to arrest someone. And 24-72 hours later the family is in court upset telling the judge if they knew this would happen they never would have called 911. Cannot stress enough this happens like weekly in misdemeanor court.

A prosecutor submitting victim impact statements for the sentencing of a colleague's client who absolutely had killed their partner, and it was awful - but the victim impact statements were provided by the victim's family, many of whom she was estranged from, and many of them misgendered and deadnamed their dead "loved one". And the prosecutor just threw them all into the public record unredacted. Because of pressure to "listen to victims", in this case coming from the transphobic family.

A 16-year-old getting held in juvenile detention on unproven charges an 18-year-old would get released from adult jail on, because while the 18-year-old is presumed to have the autonomy to find another place to stay, if the charge is related to someone who lives in the 16-year-old's parents' house - or their parents straight-up just don't want them going home - well, then, they can't go home, which means they have nowhere to go. so let's keep them in jail.

On the flip side, having 18-year-olds get released to homelessness because their well-intentioned parents called the cops for whatever reason (see above) and now the court is imposing a no-contact order with someone who lives at their house.

A kid who got pulled over and charged with DUI/physical control of a motor vehicle while under the influence on her 18th birthday. She was a senior in high school. She had never been in trouble before. She had no criminal record. The law doesn't require someone to be booked and held in jail for a first-time DUI charge with no history, so the jail's policy is that they usually don't do that. If it was just the DUI she would have been cited and released. But the cop also cited her for 2 counts of minor in possession. So, because she had non-DUI charges, I guess, they booked and held her in jail. If it had been just one day earlier she would have been in juvenile detention. She cried. I almost cried. I sat in the attorney meeting booth with her for an extra half hour until they kicked us out for the lunchtime visiting area closure, just so she could be in a quiet space with a friendly face instead of back in the adult jail dorm. That was all I could do.

Tiny old people in jail. Tiny old people, deep in dementia, deeply upset, who got angry - personality changes including becoming very quick to anger are common with dementia - lashed out at family members and got arrested on domestic violence charges. (Again, see above.) And all I could see was my own late grandmother, who was a tiny old lady with dementia who lashed out all the time, but she was a rich white lady who could afford to live in a home with professional caregivers who were trained to handle those situations and deescalate, instead of having to rely on overwhelmed family members. And getting praise from teammates for how well I handled those clients and their jail hearings, and knowing it was because there but for the grace of god go we.

A guy who stole 2 beers from a grocery store, products that cost like $13 total, getting held on $1000 bail because he has warrants in other counties. $1000 bail when he's charged with taking $13 worth of beer. From a gigantic corporation. And he stayed in jail. Because if someone is stealing from a grocery store, they probably don't have $1000 to pay.

I think people who talk about the moral conundrum of public defenders get too stuck on the defender part and forget the public. Public defenders, by definition, simply do not represent the worst of the worst. People who hurt others because they can, quite literally can, because frankly most of them don't end up getting arrested and prosecuted for the ways they hurt people in the first place. And if they do, they can usually afford to hire a private defense attorney. I think most of us know the actual statistics about rape and abuse reporting, but for some reason that goes out the window when people talk about public defenders. (The reason is racism.)

Acting with (perceived) impunity is a privilege. It's for rich (and mostly white) people. The vast majority of crimes prosecuted in the U.S. are crimes of poverty and addiction (and that includes many violent crimes - yes, really), and that vast majority is where public defenders operate. There aren't moral quandaries in knowing what our clients did. The part that hurts is understanding the systems that have led them to this place, and knowing what those systems are going to keep doing to them once their case is resolved, and not being able to do jack shit to stop it.

[badassdemonsword]

[gwendolinechristie]

something I haven’t seen mentioned much is Dolly being childfree. We have so few lauded childfree women in positions of power. The connotation of childless women as selfish, cold, and cruel…and Dolly was the complete opposite and gave so much to underprivileged youth…she was and will always be a beacon for independent women, who live and love on their own terms. And she never had children…she said we were all her kids instead…

[ilsawasanacrobat]

Came here for these tags. I knew someone would say it better than I could.