bearing stars

cat. ever changing

[honeydewtual]

JUSTIN LONG

hate that i made you love me (dir. Christian Breslauer 2026)

[donnerpartyofone]

It's hard to say this without sounding like a right wing dickhead, but the thing about progressive spaces is that they may naturally attract people who are always on the lookout for excuses to start a fight. Like you can find yourself faced with someone whose political outrage is totally justified, and whose humanitarian ideals are right on the money, but simultaneously they are carrying a ton of psychological baggage about being wronged and getting revenge, and they will exploit literally any opportunity to live out this psychodrama with anyone in their line of vision. I have thought of several related anecdotes since I started typing this post, but I'll limit myself to the thing that inspired it, which is that I just visited this ultra-lefty cafe/bike shop/community gathering space where I've heard that the proprietor is constantly in a fight with everyone around her. When I paid for my stuff I noticed that there was no tip option, but I thought I had heard something about this, so I snuck away to look at the website and it made me really glad I didn't ask! I think there should have been a really enticing and exciting way for her to say "I've decided to be the change I want to see in the world, so I'm paying my baristas a full living wage, I'm making sure EVERYONE feels welcome and comfortable here, and I'm selling products I believe in!" -- but instead all the web copy sounded more like "You're either with me or against me, you're a fucking piece of shit asshole if you can't handle the inclusive atmosphere here, and by the way tipping is for fascist cavemen and if you ever try to tip someone you are refusing to relate to them authentically and you are enforcing a dangerous and evil power dynamic that should be purged from human society (so therefore I pay my staff well)." Like everything she stood for was totally agreeable, but why did she have to put it like it was directed at her worst enemy, rather than at the kinds of people she wants to attract? If the word on the street is to be believed, the reason for this posturing is that she spends quite a lot of energy making as many enemies as possible, and she probably likes it that way. I guess I'm just reminding myself, and perhaps others, that while one might think of "politics" as being broadly social and theoretical, no individual can fully separate the political from the intimately personal. Even somebody who seems to want to uplift and protect their fellow humans may be getting some perverse inner satisfaction out of that valiant crusade, and you may never realize it until you find yourself in a confusing fight with them.

[author-by-night]

I ran a LARP for a few years explicitly aimed at being queer friendly and accessible, and eventually cut it short mainly for this exact reason. You wouldn’t believe the amount of abuse my staff and I took for reasons that felt genuinely insane. I got called ableist for telling someone they couldn’t be invincible in my game of make believe, more than once. Defended myself, multiple Jewish players, and a conversion student from accusations of antisemitism based on alleged lore we’d never written / suggested / that simply and plainly did not exist in game. Had a staffer try to talk to someone about how a joke she made was uncomfortable only for this person to retaliate in epic proportions full white woman crocodile tears style, trying to get this staffer removed and eventually escalating into a full public hate campaign when she didn’t get her way. All that’s still just the tip of the iceberg.

Progressive spaces are naturally populated by traumatized people, and unfortunately trauma makes people more difficult. (I’m not excluded in that. No one is.) Running a progressive space is doubly difficult because a lot of left-facing trauma was inflicted by authority, so you’re setting yourself up to be the windmill that someone tilts their displaced rage at. I don’t really know what the solution is, but I do know that this is one of the huge reasons it’s so hard to find community: the people with a bone to pick can’t reach the ones who actually hurt them, but they’ll sure find you along the way, and the safer they feel around you the safer they’ll feel coming after you.

[ariaste]

Once again I am begging everyone to read Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss.

Voss spent 25 years as a hostage negotiator, meaning that his job was to talk to guys on the phone who had literal guns to innocent people's heads. He KNOWS how to compassionately de-escalate a conflict and have productive, constructive conversations with people who are highly activated and reactive.

Especially if you are neurodivergent, read this book. The communication tools are specific, concrete, easy to implement, and will dramatically reduce the psychic damage you're taking just from trying to navigate the conversation.

[nikkifreemans]

inde navarrette for schön magazine! 🪽

[musespov]

Megan Thee Stallion as Starfire for Halloween via instagram

[suiheisen]

let me hit it (as a bonding activity) PEACEMAKER

[acecroft]

TWIN PEAKS: The Return, Part 2

[nowadayz]

ADELINE RUDOLPH as KITANA MORTAL KOMBAT II (2026) dir. Simon McQuoid

[herofabled]

Mortal Kombat II ( 2025 )

[kafk-a]

[a-state-of-bliss]

Elie Saab Haute Couture Spr/Sum 2025

[atelier1888]

[sashayed]

has anyone figured out how to turn off the thing where you love your pet so much it slides inexorably into grief-borrowing

[boomstab-papa]

[your-cosmic-creature]

“For me this glass is already broken. I enjoy it; I drink out of it. It holds my water admirably, sometimes even reflecting the sun in beautiful patterns. If I should tap it, it has a lovely ring to it. But when I put this glass on the shelf and the wind knocks it over or my elbow brushes it off the table and it falls to the ground and shatters, I say, ‘Of course.’ When I understand that the glass is already broken, every moment with it is precious.”

[realityescapades]

[you-can-be-what-you-want-to-be]

"Immature people crave and demand moral certainty: This is bad, this is good. Kids and adolescents struggle to find a sure moral foothold in this bewildering world; they long to feel they’re on the winning side, or at least a member of the team. To them, heroic fantasy may offer a vision of moral clarity. Unfortunately, the pretended Battle Between (unquestioned) Good and (unexamined) Evil obscures instead of clarifying, serving as a mere excuse for violence — as brainless, useless, and base as aggressive war in the real world."

Ursula K Le Guin at it again, being right as always

[ex0skeletal-undead]

Harpya II by Daniele Valeriani

[maybemayii]

Jacob Anderson talking about the icons that shaped his Louis — Grace Jones & Eartha Kitt (Part ll)

[horrorwomen-deactivated20250525]

When asked about how his music for Silent Hill strikes fear in players, Akira Yamaoka responded: “First and foremost is ‘irregularity.’ People are analog creatures… When things don’t happen as we expect, or when the rhythm breaks, we start to get very nervous… In short, I betray the user’s expectations.” In the game, as Yamaoka notes, individual loops of music contain irregular rhythms and sound events, most of which would defy accurate transcription with conventional Western notations for duration, pitch, and timbre. On a broader scale, however, several of the game’s tracks actually achieve an oppressive effect by repeating samples with unwavering regularity. Much of this music can be parsed into melodic and rhythmic cells lasting no longer than a few seconds each. These recycled noise fragments evoke a hellish labyrinth in which paths toward escape and resolution are persistently concealed or deferred.

Cheng, William, 'Monstrous Noise: Silent Hill and the Aesthetic Economies of Fear', in Carol Vernallis, Amy Herzog, and John Richardson (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Sound and Image in Digital Media, Oxford Handbooks (2013; online edn, Oxford Academic, 16 Dec. 2013)