multiple neuroqueer veganarchists

big (polyfragmented) DID system. Meeresbande is german for "Gang of the Sea". Constantly on a quest for the right tumblr-life-balance. This is the main fronters' blog, we are aro/ace agender – ki or they pronouns (ki/ki/kis/kiself). Allistic. Struggling with depersonalisation, the feeling that we aren't people or don't exist at all. We are observers and always at least co-conscious (aware of what's happening outside) and front-stuck.

[ariaste]

The opposite of grimdark is hopepunk. Pass it on.

[ariaste]

#this is a good post #also I need an example of hopepunk #bc the name #resonates with me #and I need it #please #if you don’t mind (via @lavender-starling)

So the essence of grimdark is that everyone’s inherently sort of a bad person and does bad things, and that’s awful and disheartening and cynical. It’s looking at human nature and going, “The glass is half empty.” Hopepunk says, “No, I don’t accept that. Go fuck yourself: The glass is half-full.”  YEAH, we’re all a messy mix of good and bad, flaws and virtues. We’ve all been mean and petty and cruel, but (and here’s the important part) we’ve also been soft and forgiving and KIND. Hopepunk says that kindness and softness doesn’t equal weakness, and that in this world of brutal cynicism and nihilism, being kind is a political act. An act of rebellion. 

Hopepunk says that genuinely and sincerely caring about something, anything, requires bravery and strength. Hopepunk isn’t ever about submission or acceptance: It’s about standing up and fighting for what you believe in. It’s about standing up for other people. It’s about DEMANDING a better, kinder world, and truly believing that we can get there if we care about each other as hard as we possibly can, with every drop of power in our little hearts. 

Going to political protests is hopepunk. Calling your senators is hopepunk. But crying is also hopepunk, because crying means you still have feelings, and feelings are how you know you’re alive. The 1% doesn’t want you to have feelings, they just want you to feel resigned. Feeling resigned is not hopepunk.

Examples! THE HANDMAID’S TALE is arguably hopepunk. It’s scary and dark, and at first glance it looks like grimdark because it’s a dystopia… but goddammit she keeps fighting. That’s the key, right there. She fights every single day, because she won’t let them take away meaning from her life. She survives stubbornly in the hope that one day she can live again. “Don’t let the bastards grind you down,” is one of the core tenets of hopepunk, along with, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”  Jesus and Gandhi and Martin Luther King and Robin Hood and John Lennon were hopepunk. (Remember: Hopepunk isn’t about moral perfection. It’s not about being as pure and innocent as the new-fallen snow. You get grubby when you fight. You make mistakes. You’re sometimes a little bit of an asshole. Maybe you’re as much as 50% an asshole. But the glass is half full, not half empty. You get up, and you keep fighting, and caring, and trying to make the world a little better for the people around you. You get to make mistakes. It’s a process. You get to ask for and earn forgiveness. And you love, and love, and love.) 

And THIS, this is hopepunk: 

(EDIT: If you are coming to this post from an article elsewhere on the internet, please note that I wrote an article about hopepunk which you can read here if you want to know more: “One Atom of Justice, One Molecule of Mercy, and the Empire of Unsheathed Knives”)

[heavyweightheart]

A lot of heavier people with eating disorders have trouble seeing that they’re restricting bc they’re holding onto a tenuous weight suppression, or the hope of it, and they think that they can’t possibly eat freely bc their natural body size, or weight set point, is too big. It’s not!! It simply occupies a place on the human body size spectrum that has been culturally stigmatized. I say “simply” but in reality this is an extremely difficult obstacle to overcome. It CAN be overcome tho, and people of all sizes can learn to be intuitive eaters. The key is clarifying in which direction the pursuit of health lies, and that is toward accepting one’s natural size, even (especially!) if it’s way over on the right end of the bullshit BMI curve

[femcassidy]

Indigenous Mutual Aid – Mutual Aid support network to inspire and empower Indigenous relief organizing in response to COVID-19.

“While we recognize that there are a lot of crowdfunding campaigns for Indigenous relief funds, we thought it necessary to establish this emergency fund specifically for radical Indigenous Mutual Aid projects and individuals.

We don’t want to see endless fundraisers and non-profit industrial cooptation get in the way of necessary work on the ground. We want to ensure critical resources get directly into the hands of anti-capitalist and anti-colonial organizers that either may not have access to those sources or don’t want to engage with them. No strings or branding attached here.”

[trans-axolotl]

Covid 19 Support for Indigenous Communities

Hi everyone. Native communities are particularly vulnerable in this time of crisis and if you’re able to, please consider making and sending masks or donating money.

Mask Donations: 

Zuni Pueblo Covid 19 Relief: Send PPE, food, and hygiene products to this address.

Zuni Relief House #81, Silt Road Zuni, 87327 

Mask Drive through Seeding Sovereignty

Rosebud Sioux Disaster Relief Fund (taking both money and physical donations)

Monetary Donations: 

Havasupai Tribe Covid19 Relief Fund

Kinalani/Flagstaff Mutual Aid

Southern AZ Urban Native Relief fund

Protect Native Elders

Northern Cheyenne Covid Relief

Navajo/Hopi Covid Relief

Pueblo Relief Fund

 Indigenous Mutual Aid

Please let me know if there’s any more places to donate, and I will add them to the list! 

Thank you. 

[valarhalla]

Ok so there’s these tidal islands in Northern Germany that are connected by little tiny trains that you have to drive yourself, which is already delightfully ghibli-esque.

But then I found out UNTIL THE 196OS, THE TRAINS HAD LITTLE SAILS AND WERE WIND-POWERED?

THAT’S THE MOST GHIBLI THING TO EVER EXIST ON THIS PLANET, BRING IT BACK YOU MONSTERS.

[paddingtonmybeloved]

@pea-green

[ahabixa-deactivated20221211]

“Calling for “more mental health services” starts to look somewhat questionable when one looks at a number of other facts. In the 1970s, WHO conducted a global five-year study in which they found that those diagnosed with schizophrenia —usually considered the most debilitating of all mental disorders— fared better in developing countries than in the U.S. In three of the developing countries in the study —India, Colombia, and Nigeria— only 16% were on antipsychotics, the first line of treatment for schizophrenia cases in the US and Europe. In a repeat of this study, they found the same results, and concluded that living in a developed country was a “strong predictor” that a person would never fully recover. A number of follow-up studies found that patients who had weaned themselves off the antipsychotics, which were said to “fix their brains by correcting an imbalance” had actually fared better than those who continued to take them. When faced with this second set of facts, the idea of mental health treatments being a human rights issue starts to break down.

How do we examine or compare such facts? Do we examine them in relation to all the studies that have been done on psychotropic medication, on hospitalization, and on therapy and simply choose to fund the means with the highest number of “recovered patients” at the end? A number of questions get lost in such an analysis, questions beyond the scope of these studies, questions which perhaps trouble the foundation and presuppositions of the studies themselves. For example: how does one get diagnosed as schizophrenic or bipolar? This isn’t a question about symptoms, but about power. Who does the diagnosing? With what tools? How are these tools legitimated? Against what standard is mental or emotional pathology measured? How did the person getting diagnosed end up in their position? What does it mean to recover from such conditions? And, most importantly in my eyes, what is the concrete experience of the mad person in these relationships?”

— Sasha Durakov, “Beyond Psychiatry and Self-Care: Approaching New Pathways in Mental Health“

[anarchopuppy]

The left has a huge problem with antisemitism and we won’t be able to do anything about that until we admit it and inspect it. But some of y’all don’t even seem to think antisemitism exists

[anarchopuppy]

The amount of people refusing to believe this is sickening and proves that this is even more of an issue than I realized

Yes, Jewish people are a vulnerable and marginalized group that deserves to be accepted and protected. Yes, antisemitism is still a thing, including on the left. Yes, they have repeatedly pointed out this problem, and we should believe them and do something about it. No, this accusation doesn’t only come from Zionists. No, being an atheist doesn’t give you free rein to shit on marginalized people’s culture and faith. No, this isn’t some kind of fucking conspiracy where all Jewish people are trying to divide the left or avoid accountability or win sympathy or whatever other shit by fabricating claims of antisemitism or bringing it up whenever they’re criticized, and if you’re genuinely willing to believe that shit then you’re part of the problem. Yes, antisemitism is just as dangerous as any other flavor of bigotry and it’s not something we can just brush aside. It deserves to be deplatformed and ostracized like the fascistic ideology it is

Keep saying clown shit, y’all. I’ll make a fucking blocklist. It’s time this shit was violently kicked out of this community so our Jewish comrades can feel safe

[evilsufjanstevens]

People forget that Quechua, Nahuatl and the Mayan Languages aren’t just cool relics of past civilisations but still living languages that millions of people love, worry, talk to their children in. People live their lives through the medium of these languages and that shouldn’t be forgotten!

[browneyedophanim-deactivated202]

Happy Lesbian day of visibility

Here are some of my favorite femme looks!!!

🌸💐🏵🌸💐🏵🌸💐🏵🌸💐🏵🌸💐🏵🌸💐

[cannibal-rainbow]

Not shaving and not wearing make up are literally nonbehaviors. They’re a complete lack of action. But doing nothing is considered masculine because women are not allowed to just be. this goes double for trans women.

[cannibal-rainbow]

reblog this version because transmisogynists don’t know how to fuck off.

[anxietyproblem]

[anxietyproblem]

[queeranarchism]

There are prisons, and borders and camps, but the starts are beautiful tonight The climate is collapsing, but the kittens are playing There is so much death in the world, and the taste of hummus

Am I a bad anarchist because I spend more time finding joy in stars and kittens and hummus than feeling sadness and rage for injustice and suffering? I don’t think so.

I think it is joy that lights up our anarchism into action. Surely we do not fight to survive, but to live? We fight not just for an absence of suffering but for joy? for stars and dancing and roses?

Would we break down prisons walls if there were no stars or other joys outside it? Do we protect our planet just for the sake of it, or to play on it and raise kittens? Don’t we fight for life to taste it?

The moment I started denying myself joy would be the moment my strength to keep fighting would begin to wane.

[doctorbluesmanreturns]

I don’t hate the concept of ebooks per se but what bothers me is how our society is shifting from actually owning entertainment in tangible forms like books and CDs and DVDs and game discs, to having to download everything so basically we’ll get to the point where everything is intangible and all of our property can be taken away by a website crash.

[fannish-snailien-deactivated202]

#yeah this is mostly the problem#and stuff like. ebooks that can only be read on one companys app#music that can only be streamed from one place and doesnt let you actually download the files#stuff like that#like sometimes its like you cant tangibly have anything even your own digital file#idk where i was going with this but yeah its capitalism (via @ouidamforeman)

[probablyasocialecologist]

“Almost exactly ten years ago, you may remember, Amazon came stealthily along and deleted e-copies of 1984 (no seriously, they did) and Animal Farm from people’s Kindles — copies they’d already paid for and downloaded — because it turned out that there was a rights problem with the e-publisher. Jeff Bezos wound up apologizing all over himself and taking it all back and promising never to do that ever again, but the fact remains that Amazon has some kind of access to your Kindle files and can literally remove them, if they feel like it, which is downright creepy, and if it were your computer you would not like it one little bit.” 

https://popula.com/2019/06/30/own-paper-books/

[bookphile]

I’m sure that someone already said this in the notes, but you guys are aware that you don’t actually own e-books, e-movies, etc. Right? What you’re purchasing is a license to have that file on your device. Not the actual object. 

I’ve also posted about it multiple times.

Plus, Amazon, Google, Kobo, B&N are all explicit in their user agreements that they have the right to terminate your account, seize your library, and delete anything and everything off of your account at any time, for any reason, without giving you anything in return, including paying you back. 

Like, it super scary that they not only can do that, but are legally allowed to. 

I’ve seen people suggesting using the program called Calibre  to transfer and  convert your files from whatever program you purchase them on, so that if one of those companies do decide to be a dick, you will retain your e-copies safe and sound on your hard drive. Just don’t be an asshole and post those copies to pirate sites. 

So read your content agreements and digital ownership laws cause they’re not great. 

[rsfcommonplace]

Paper books still have their uses.

[branch-and-root]

And that very fact, my friends, is why products like Epubor Ultimate DRM removal tool (my personal choice) are legal to write and sell and use. 

https://www.epubor.com/drm-removal-tools.html

Because yes, the terms of service sure say that. But every time they’ve /tried/ on a significant scale, they’ve been challenged and backed down. And every time they tried to stop DRM removal tools from being made and sold, they’ve failed. What they’re doing relies on keeping off enough toes that a significant bloc never gets pissed enough to push through a class action suit.

So, yes, absolutely, know this and, if you (like me) have book-gasms over having my library of 2000 books always at my fingertips to read whatever I like, get Calibre (https://calibre-ebook.com/) and then get one of the DRM removal applications. Jailbreak your library, back it up in at least three locations, and then pass this tip on in the joyful knowledge that all the major distributors are praying you don’t tell anyone else how easy this is.

[actualaster]

We are absolutely aware digital content is a use liscense rather than owning the product and that is 100% the thing we have a problem with because it removes our ability to own products and be secure in that ownership.

[intelligentdrumandbass-deactiva]

tiktok feels like gentrified vine. ive only ever seen teens on there with like really nice bedrooms covered in led strip lights and tyler the creator posters

[intelligentdrumandbass-deactiva]

i was right

[dwagom]

it gets worse than the title suggests, emphases mine:

Under this policy, TikTok moderators were explicitly told to suppress uploads from users with flaws both congenital and inevitable. “Abnormal body shape,” “ugly facial looks,” dwarfism, and “obvious beer belly,” “too many wrinkles,” “eye disorders,” and many other “low quality” traits are all enough to keep uploads out of the algorithmic fire hose. Videos in which “the shooting environment is shabby and dilapidated,” including but “not limited to … slums, rural fields” and “dilapidated housing” were also systematically hidden from new users, though “rural beautiful natural scenery could be exempted,” the document notes.

The document, presented in both English and Chinese, advised TikTok’s moderators that for videos shot in someone’s house with “no obvious slummy charactor [sic],” special care should be given to check for slummy features such as a “crack on the wall” or “old and disreputable decorations.” The mere appearance of residential disrepair or crooked teeth in the frame, the document shows, could mean the difference between worldwide distribution and relative invisibility.

(…)

Gartner, the TikTok spokesperson, told The Intercept that “the policies mentioned appear to be the same or similar to those published by” German publication Netzpolitik in December in a story about how TikTok was artificially suppressing access to videos created by disabled, overweight, and LGBT users and represented an effort “at preventing bullying, but are no longer in place, and were already out of use when The Intercept obtained them.”

(…)

A “Personal live broadcast about state organs such as police office, military etc,” would knock your stream offline for three days, while documenting military or police activity would get you kicked off for that day (would-be protestors, take note).

Gartner refused to clarify whether the substance and intent of these restrictions are still in effect under different phrasing, for example, whether there is any current rule whatsoever against “harming national honor” or documenting police movements.

(…)

TikTok’s community guidelines also omit any signs that the content policies obtained by The Intercept — used behind the scenes by the service’s invisible moderator teams — have threatened free political expression and provided for the censorship of large swaths of the world’s population based on genetics, economics, and arbitrary decency standards. The matter of who decides what ugliness means for hundreds of millions of people in cultures around the world, what “disreputable” decor might mean, or how many wrinkles are considered “too many wrinkles” remain glaringly open and unaddressed, even in the internal moderator documents.

[buglite]

hi just wondering if i were an otter and you were an otter and we were sleeping would you hold my paw so we wouldn't drift away from each other. just wondering

[dreamsequencer]

Sokka is simultaneously a complete idiot and the smartest member of the Gaang and I love him