It's the end of the strain @lliftedup - Tumblr Blog

Every time I see that 911 show trending I always check to see if those two guys have kissed yet and somehow the answers still no like. How many near death experiences does it take

lliftedup

They've got gifsets with the Orestes "it's rotten work" quote. They've got 5+1 examples of all the times they've cared for each other. I don't even know their names why haven't they smooched

lliftedup

They've got another kid together???? DUDE dude

#911 #911 abc #911 show #theyre not married?#they're not #what #what!#answers please

greenfinchg-illustration

🗡️✨🌙

sobcat

#artemis ii #splash!

lliftedup

Every time I see that 911 show trending I always check to see if those two guys have kissed yet and somehow the answers still no like. How many near death experiences does it take

lliftedup

They've got gifsets with the Orestes "it's rotten work" quote. They've got 5+1 examples of all the times they've cared for each other. I don't even know their names why haven't they smooched

#911 #911 abc #911 show #theyre not married?#like #dont they have a son #whats going on

Every time I see that 911 show trending I always check to see if those two guys have kissed yet and somehow the answers still no like. How many near death experiences does it take

#911 #911 abc #911 show #like cmon yall #like its been years dude #i thought they were dating at first but no #theyre just like that

sergal

big and cutes my me at you

deinonychian

#myme

#big my eyes at you vibes

secondbeatsongs

I wish I had stopped to savor it, the last time I saw a kung pow penis. I never knew it was to be my last

somethingusefulfromflorida

For old times sakes.

saxophonechihuahua

onbearfeet

mcnamak

imjustsoscaredallthetime

liminalspacedout

emobandrpf

sentientshrubbery

forgetme-eternally-blissfully

Seeing posts about the update before actually getting the update like I'm sitting atop the castle walls before a siege we only just got warning of. It ain't here yet but lord it's comin'

#how long can i hold out #will i survive #can i escape unscathed #perhaps i shall be spared a moment longer #given a moments rest #tumblr #update #tumblr update

rowlfthedog

a-french-guardsman

Me when I'm a dead knight effigy but I keep smiling through eternity because I know I'm serving major cunt

a-french-guardsman

Update: I have found the full effigy and it's even crazier actually

jkottke

The Color Game. “Humans can’t reliably recall colors. This is a simple game to see how good (or bad) you are at it. We’ll show you five colors, then you’ll try and recreate them.” I scored 39/50 but got a perfect score on one color.

#43.7 #this was cool as fuck #color game #color

forsapphics

CHAPPELL ROAN

on the Red Carpet at the 68th Annual Grammy Awards in Los Angeles, California (February 1, 2026) — photos by Getty Images

#chappell roan #grammy awards #grammys #one chance #i swear

infinitelytheheartexpands

rossini: *writes a grand coloratura soprano scena and puts it in two operas*

“en proie à la tristesse” from le comte ory and the ensuing cabaletta: legitimate emotional crisis about making a religious vow she doesn’t know if she can keep and rejoicing when she is (allegedly) freed from it

“partir, o ciel, desio” from il viaggio a reims and the ensuing cabaletta:

#opera #rossini #gioachino rossini #le comte ory

writeswrongs

I was supposed to give a speech to over a thousand people today at a labor rally, but the rally was planned mostly around white union organizers who have not been to ICE recently or maybe ever. I say this because they planned this as follows: a Rally, with a march to ICE, followed by a second half of a Rally, the second half of which was to include my speech, which seemingly was the only speech to include a Salvadoran migrant speaker.

I was not originally invited to speak, but heard last minute that someone else had fallen ill and was giving up their slot, and begged white organizers through the grape vine to let me speak as a Salvadoran migrant and union steward who came to the US at age 7.

I have long been soured of going to so many rallies and felt alienated that they were allegedly for or about my people, but that no one had thought people /like/ me exist - we are still here! There are migrants in your work spaces and neighborhoods and organizations, we have stories and labor songs and speeches to share, we are marxists and labor organizers and have reasons to speak out too.

But seldom if ever do you hear our music or faces or voices near the banners. Instead of Tigres Del Norte we heard Bella Ciao, and none of the singers knew the Italian words or bothered to even translate them, so they sang nanananananana, instead of the powerful lyrics that maybe meant something once to someone somewhere. Instead of Somos Más Americanos we heard Don’t Worry, Be Happy.

Instead of a Salvadoran woman who wanted to speak to the American union workers about the Banana workers unions, we heard from a dozen white people about democracy, and justice, and the constitution, and no one was warned about what would happen if they marched down the street from the park to the ICE facility. They fully expected everyone to come back and complete the second half of the rally.

Instead, marchers with their dogs and children were tear-gassed to hell and back the second they dared get close to the facility, maybe at best 1/3rd of the marchers returned while the rest were bottlenecked towards ICE. There was little to no water to treat the untrained protestors. I returned to the rally quickly realizing I could not get caught up at ICE, knowing who I am and what awaits me.

When I got back a chorus of smiling white faces sang a silly song like a Christmas carol with their heads bobbling, reading the lyrics from some handed out papers. White people with upside down flags cheered. Then a black woman in overalls abruptly got on the mic and said “Well thank you everyone but we have to close the program early because people are getting tear-gassed, please get home to safety righty away,” - and I swore I couldn’t believe my ears.

They had brought us all here, marched all these people down to the ICE facility, and expected us all to march back without encountering teargas? And then when some people had made it back they had them sing a little jingle but turned the one migrant away? I begged them to let me speak for the three minutes I had allotted, noting that I had put myself in serious danger to come out here today. That I needed to be heard just this once, and that all the white people had their fair turn to say many unrelated things, and to sing many unrelated songs.

She said, “you don’t understand, there are children down here,” and I had to say “you don’t understand, there are children in the camps.”

And she tried again, “yes but the gas is spreading,” and I said “yes we have been down here being gassed for six months, don’t you understand?”

She blinked twice and told me they just had to break down. I watched from the sidelines as they continued to blare Caribbean Blue and smooth jazz while people filtered out, stood around talking, chatting - finally I said, “please let me speak, you still have speakers going, it’s been 20 minutes,” and the DJ, a white elderly man in a sweater vest who had a strict “only the classics” policy that seems to actually mean “no hip hop and no curse words,” - barked at me that he had to break down and to help him take down his canopy. I am no maid, so I did not listen. He then turned to my comrades and told them to take his canopy down, which they did not. Then turned to his two other labor organizers who were not paying attention, and they took a leg of the canopy and moved it somewhere without breaking it down.

And one looked at me and said quietly, “it’s okay, take that bullhorn no one will notice,” and we took it and ran.

And we ran to a firetruck which I climbed, and I gave the speech, which was in fact more than 3 minutes, sorry not sorry, to a crowd of workers who were slowly pouring out from the ice facility, some stopping, some going, some who heard me, some who didn’t. And I gave it there and it was the only speech most of these people will ever hear from a migrant in all of this, and I think that is tragic. But I firmly believe that had I not given it, had I not climbed the truck, had I not taken the mic, some people would have never heard this story at all. And I think very much you should hear it. And I hope you will share it, if you have the chance. And I hope I get to tell it again, someday, to people who actually listen, to the masses who came to actually support immigrants, and not just to the dredges after they’ve been gassed and are running for shelter while I’m coughing myself.

This is what I had to say.

transcriptroopers

Transcribed for accessibility + added links for context, but please still watch/listen to the speech if possible. A live speech really resonates. Begin transcription.

Olivia: I came to the United States when I was 7 years old. And I became a citizen when I was 20. But I am on this stage to ask: if you will give me 3 minutes of your time, *cough* I will give you 300 years of American History that has been taken from you.

There are five crops that changed the world as we know it. Bananas. Coffee. Tobacco. Sugar. And Cotton.

First grown by slaves in the New World, these crops all happened to also grow in a little bean-shaped country that my parents lived in near the Caribbean called Cuzcatlan, ‘The Land of Precious Things.’ It would be renamed El Salvador in the 1800’s.

But the precious things remained after the name changed. And the people were captured, and they were forced to work for pennies on the dollar to dredge the precious things from the soil, and the sea, and the mountains, and the sand. Cuzcatlan was not precious just to us, you see. It was coveted by the Americans. And once they saw our jewels, they would never be satisfied again.

The people suffered. And how we suffered! Dying in the fields, raped by their masters, buried in the shining black volcanic sands, their blood fertilizing the crops.

Of Bananas. Coffee. Sugar. Cotton. And Tobacco.

Until one day, the people of Cuzcatlan said, ‘We can bear it no more.’ And they broke their shovels in half, and they plunged the stems into their masters, and they rode through the streets on their masters’ Spanish horses, and they cried out that Cuzcatlan would no longer belong to the American companies that demanded their precious things without paying precious prices. Perhaps, soon, those business leaders would learn to negotiate for the labor and crops they so needed.

And the Americans? The Americans could not stand it! They would not abide such a story be told. And so you never heard it! The American companies, and all of their corporate masters came down on Cuzcatlan, with a fury seldom seen before. They killed everyone.

Instead, you heard a story about “Communists” and “Terrorists” in Central America, spreading a disease that would destroy your country and families. You heard a story that we have no good will towards you. That we wanted you to starve, that we were lazy, and formed gangs, and were lawless, and wore weapons to sell you drugs and fund terrorism.

But you never heard the story of Cuzcatlan, because it was a sad story, and sad stories do not sell fruit, and coffee, and cigarettes!

No, they came to my country, and they wiped out entire villages. The Archbishop, Don Remar - er, Don Romero, himself, was shot by the military during his Sunday Mass, for having dared to wonder whether the workers deserved some mercy. Assassinated for having dared to wonder, and he was left bleeding on the pulpit, even as worshippers bowed their heads.

EVERYBODY was KILLED.

EVERYBODY! The women, with their children still in their arms. Anyone looking for cover; people who found cover, people who didn’t. People who worked, and people who had no jobs. Communists. Catholics. Those who didn’t know how to read, those who didn’t know what labor rights were. Simple folks. Smart folks.

And they didn’t stop there. They went through the countryside, and they killed everyone they thought was hiding labor organizers or communists sympathizers. Banana union men and women, who they labeled terrorists. And in one village, we still only speak about in whispers, called “El Mozote.” The Americans tied women and children to trees, and they threw their babies in the air, and they shot them. Everyone was killed, to send one message, and that is: “A union is a threat to the American Empire. Not one union man or woman will hide in your village, or any other. And if you hid one here, now or ever, you will never breathe to hide one again."

And I tell you this because I am you from the future. You and I, all of you, are very much alike. You worked very hard to buy the precious things you have from the ground, the sky, the water, and the aether. You all wrote stories, you filed insurance policies, you taught children, you rung people up, you made sure whatever sorry system they had worked, not because you believed in it, not because you wanted it, but because it was all you could do.

And in exchange, they offered you cheap bananas. Coffee. Sugar. Tobacco. Bananas.

But I will tell you a secret. They were never cheap. They were precious. And so are you.

And they stole you, and they stole us, and they stole it all, and they told you: if you look the other way, you get to be satisfied and at least well-fed. But who can afford the luxuries of cigarettes or vapes or groceries anymore? Even that is being taken from you. And even if you have them, your food or your small pleasures won’t satisfy you. Not more than knowing the truth about Cuzcatlan, not more than knowing the truth about El Salvador. Today, where our precious land once stood, they built a concentration camp called CECOT. And not just for our precious things, our people, but yours. Your citizens, your dissenters, your unwanted disappeared into the hole that America built.

And what will we do when they start building incinerators at the camps? What will you do when they open up mass graves?

For our people, the most precious gift of all: do not take my warning lightly. The story of Cuzcatlan is not just from the past. It is from the future. The workers face the same enemy, and the enemy never had your interest in mind. From the moment they had you, the plan was to have a worker. From the moment you existed, it was to create another soldier against the people of Cuzcatlan and the rest of the world. You were a commodity to them.

But we have written you a new future. One in which we no longer point guns at each other. One in which our billionaires fear the land of precious people from learning they are no longer precious things.

Turn to me now! And tell me you will not forget the last three minutes. You will never again be ignorant of this story. And you will not let it happen here. You will close the camps. You will destroy ICE.

Spectator: Yeah! Olivia: You would rather have seasonal bananas or never see one again than have it covered in blood.

Spectators: That’s right! Yeah!

Olivia: You would rather trade fairly with other union workers than kill your fellow man, wouldn’t you?

Spectators: Yes! Olivia: Tell me you love me, and that our fates are tied! Tell me you’ll stop them from dragging me down from this place, and I’ll never let them do to you what they did to us. I promise. El pueblo unido…

Spectator: JAMÀS SERÀ VENCIDO!

Olivia: Nunca será vencido. Amen.

End Transcription.

writeswrongs

It means a lot to me, that someone wrote down this speech for me, that I in the middle of the night wrote for as a love letter to the American labor movement.

I know I stuttered a bit, as I had just been gassed, as it took place not but 400 feet maybe from the Portland ICE facility.

One correction among many tiny ones:

“You worked very hard to /ply/ the precious things you have from the ground, the sky, the water, and the aether.” - And that work, it is very precious.

May the message make it to you all regardless.

velvetvexations

Weird Fantasy (1950) #18 written by Al Feldstein and drawn by Joe Orlando, with editor Bill Gaines

velvetvexations

So he said it can't be a Black. So I said, "For God's sakes, Judge Murphy, that's the whole point of the Goddamn story!" So he said, "No, it can't be a Black". Bill just called him up and raised the roof, and finally they said, "Well, you gotta take the perspiration off". I had the stars glistening in the perspiration on his Black skin. Bill said, "Fuck you", and he hung up.

Al Feldstein, Tales of Terror: The EC Companion

iconuk01

Just to add context for those not aware of the impact of this story.

The reason it was so important for narrative purposes, was that the plot concerns the visit of the Astronaut, in his completely opaque spacesuit, to a planet populated entirely by self-aware robots (originally from Earth) who have built their own society and are petitioning to be allowed to interact with Earth again as equals.

They have a democratic government and free choice of careers etc. as the orange robot serving as guide tells the Astronaut.

The Astronaut notices that there are two different types of robot on this world; the orange ones, who are in charge, gifted access to all information and facilities. and the blue robots, who are seen as more limited in function, have less access to information and resources, and are not allowed positions of power or as wide a choice of employment opportunities. Even transportation is segregated.

The Astronaut investigates further and discovers that the blue and orange robots are actually structurally identical, there is absolutely no difference between their potential or capabilities, and it is only because the orange robots are instructed by their Educator system to consider themselves superior, that the difference exists.

The Astronaut tells the robots they are not ready for re-alignment with Earth, until they come to terms with their own unfairness, and how Earth had had to deal with this issue themselves. When that time comes, the robots will be able to ally with Earth.

Then he leaves in his spaceship, and it's only in that one final panel that we see the Astronaut is black.

Not subtle, nor should it be, but for 1950 this was a breathtakingly powerful statement, perhaps the first of it's kind in the genre.

The black character was not a caricature, or comedy relief, he was a main character in his own right, a human who "simply" was black.

assortedinsanities

Ok, but this story is sadly revolutionary even now. That is not just a human who happens to be black, as far as every other character in this story is concerned this is the most important, maybe even the only human they ever see, who happens to be black.

As depressing as that is, but a black person just casually representing the entirety of humanity is a breathtakingly powerfull statement even today, a quarter of a century later.