The mystical song of the sea roars

Selkie (she/they/fae, 33) | witchy things, queer stuff, paganism, PC paganism, and occasionally other stuff. bigots get blocked, ED blogs get reported.

[rolling-sea]

So oops Final Fantasy 14's consumed my brain again, but it gave me some covert PC pagan ideas. My best friend and I have our own semi-private FC in FF14 (it's a guild, basically) with our own house and a bunch of alts, so I decided to turn an alt's room into a religious space, or at the very least somewhere for our characters to hang out in together while we do our separate rituals, as we both work with a pantheon from a relatively uncommon source.*

This is our shrine atm. There's also a music player with a customized playlist per god that gets changed out when we change out the altar.

Legit could use this for any deity or spirit you work with as long as they're okay with it, I think. I love games with options to let me do stuff like this haha. *I know I'm generally very open about my practice within reason, but these gods have made it clear they'd prefer I keep things more private than I usually do. Far be it from me to argue.

[heartpeacenquiet]

This user: Loves the night sky

[prettyasapic]

Every person need to be taught disability history

Not the “oh Einstein was probably autistic” or the sanitized Helen Keller story. but this history disabled people have made and has been made for us.

Teach them about Carrie Buck, who was sterilized against her will, sued in 1927, and lost because “Three generations of imbeciles [were] enough.”

Teach them about Judith Heumann and her associates, who in 1977, held the longest sit in a government building for the enactment of 504 protection passed three years earlier.

Teach them about all the Baby Does, newborns in 1980s who were born disabled and who doctors left to die without treatment, who’s deaths lead to the passing of The Baby Doe amendment to the child abuse law in 1984.

Teach them about the deaf students at Gallaudet University, a liberal arts school for the deaf, who in 1988, protested the appointment of yet another hearing president and successfully elected I. King Jordan as their first deaf president.

Teach them about Jim Sinclair, who at the 1993 international Autism Conference stood and said “don’t mourn for us. We are alive. We are real. And we’re here waiting for you.”

Teach about the disability activists who laid down in front of buses for accessible transit in 1978, crawled up the steps of congress in 1990 for the ADA, and fight against police brutality, poverty, restricted access to medical care, and abuse today.

Teach about us.

[dragonofeternal]

Oh! Oh! I got one! Meet Edward V. Roberts-

Ed Roberts was one of the founding minds behind the Independent Living movement. Roberts was born in 1939, and contracted polio at age 14, two years before the vaccine that ended the polio epidemic came out (vaccinate your kids). Polio left Roberts almost completely paralyzed, with only the use of two fingers and a few toes. At night, he had to sleep in an iron lung, and he would often rest there during the day as well. Other times of the day, he breathed by using his face and neck muscles to force air in and out of his lungs.

Despite this being the fifties, Roberts' mother insisted that her son continue schooling. Her support helped him face his fear of being stared at and ridiculed at school, going from thinking of himself as a "hopeless cripple" to seeing himself as a "star." When his high school tried to deny him his diploma because he had never completed driver's ed, Roberts and his mother fought the school and won.

This marked the beginning of his career as an activist.

Roberts had to fight the California Department of Vocational Rehabilitation for support to attend college, because his counselor thought he was too severely disabled to ever work or live independently. Roberts did go to school, however, first attending the College of San Marino. He was then accepted to UC Berkeley, but when the school learned that he was disabled, they tried to backtrack. "We've tried cripples before, and it didn't work," one dean famously said. The school tried to argue the dorms couldn't accommodate his iron lung, so Roberts was instead housed in an empty wing of the school's Cowell Hospital.

Roberts' admittance paved the way for other disabled students who were also housed in the new Cowell Dorm. The group called themselves "The Rolling Quads," and together they fought and advocated for better disability support, more ramps and accessible architecture like curb cut outs, founded the first formally recognized student-led disability services program in the country, and even managed to successfully oust a rehabilitation counselor who had threatened two of the Quads with expulsion for their protests.

After graduation from his master's, he served a number of other roles- he taught political science at a number of different colleges over the years, served on the board for the Center for Independent Living, confounded the World Institute on Disability with Judith E. Heumann and Joan Leon, and continued to advocate for better disability services and infrastructure at his alma mater of UC Berkeley.

Roberts also took part in and helped organize sit ins to force the federal government to enforce section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which stated that people with disabilities should not be excluded from activities, denied the right to receive benefits, or be discriminated against, from any program that uses federal financial assistance, solely because of their disability. The sit-in occupied the offices of the Carter Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare building in San Francisco and lasted 28 days. The protestors were supported by local gay rights organizations and the Black Panthers. Roberts and other activists spoke, and their arguments were so compelling that members of the department of health joined the sit in. Reagan was forced to acknowledge and implement the policies and rules that section 504 required. This national recognition helped to pave the way for the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990.

Roberts died of cardiac arrest in 1995 at the age of 54, leaving behind a proud legacy of advocacy and activism. Not bad for a "hopeless cripple" whose rehab counselor thought he was too disabled to ever work.

[egg-squid]

Partners in Time

Visit the post for more.

Here is a great online course for disability history!!

[cwipple]

“Black Panthers saved the 504 sit-in.” – Corbett O’Toole, participant in the 1977 504 protest in San Francisco

”Along with all fair and good-thinking people, The Black Panther Party gives its full support to Section 504 of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act and calls for President Carter and HEW Secretary Califano to sign guidelines for its implementation as negotiated and agreed to on January 21 of this year. The issue here is human rights – rights of meaningful employment, of education, of basic human survival – of an oppressed minority, the disabled and handicapped. Further, we deplore the treatment accorded to the occupants of the fourth floor and join with them in full solidarity.” – Black Panther Party media release on the protest, from website Disability Social History (click thru to see pictures of BPP news about the success of the protest!)

According to disability rights activist Corbett O’Toole, these advocates “showed us what being an ally could be. We would never have succeeded without them. They are a critical part of disability history and yet their story is almost never told.⁠”

They were running a soup kitchen for their black community in East Oakland and they showed up every single night and brought us dinner. The FBI [guarding the building entrance] was like, “What the hell are you doing?” They answered, “Listen, we’re the Panthers. You want to starve these people out, fine, we’ll go tell the media that that’s what you’re doing, and we’ll show up with our guns to match your guns and we’ll talk about who’s going to talk to who about the food. Otherwise, just let us feed these people and we won’t give you any trouble” – and that’s basically what they did.

Please read up on the Black Panthers' involvement in the 504 movement, they were integral to the occupation lasting as long as it did and were INCREDIBLY ACTIVE PARTICIPANTS! They are more than a footnote in that part of disability history, and I want more people to know this part of their legacy!

Read about Bradley Lomax (and his aid and fellow organizer Chuck Johnson, who I've struggled finding sources on outside of articles on Mr. Lomax :( ) here and here! Together the two were integral in bringing Black Panther Party organizing and activism to the disability rights movement!

I wish there were more information on Mr. Johnson, as his work is dear to my heart as someone who also requires caregiving. ;3; <3 Considering how little information there even was available online for Mr. Lomax just ten years ago I am hoping we get more coverage of Mr. Johnson's contributions to this important part of disability history sooner rather than later. I do not want his activism ignored!

Do not let the full richness of our history be whitewashed! The Black Panthers kept the protestors fed, they HEAVILY publicized the protests in their paper The Black Panther and agitated on the protest and protestors behalf, and paid organizers' way to Washington to pressure the HEW secretary to actually sign the damn act. In turn, the Panthers did this because the Oakland ILC did outreach to them, and helped Mr. Lomax with transportation. This is solidarity buried under focus on the white organizers. Please please please cherish it. Keep it close to your heart, read about it, celebrate it, share it!

Obviously there were more Panthers who helped but I have already lost the first draft of this and I'm starting to fade -- here's two more detailed sources to read for more, and I highly recommend you do!

The Intersections and Divergences of Disability and Race

Lomax's Matrix: Disability, Solidarity, and the Black Power of 504

[lastoneout]

Sorry to add to an already long post, but re: the sanitized history of Hellen Keller, I highly recommend this video:

It's not perfect, and the creator openly admits that at the beginning, but it does a really good job of bringing issues around disability to light AND tackles the absolutely abhorrent way misinformation spreads online.

[ladyknightthebrave]

Also there's a documentary about, I believe, that longest sit-in that was mentioned earlier in this post, it's available in full on YouTube and it's really good

[fireandfennel]

Housing is a privilege.

“Fewer than 5 percent of units have the features needed to accommodate a person with moderate mobility difficulties. The percentage of wheelchair-accessible units is even smaller; less than 1 percent of all units are equipped with features that would allow a wheelchair user to live independently.”

Marriage is a privilege.

“The [SSI] monthly maximum Federal amounts for 2023 are $914 for an eligible individual, $1,371 for an eligible individual with an eligible spouse.”

Minimum wage is a privilege.

“Section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act authorizes employers, after receiving a certificate from the Wage and Hour Division, to pay special minimum wages — wages less than the Federal minimum wage — to workers who have disabilities for the work being performed.”

We still need to fight for accessibility and equity for all disabled people.

Despite the ADA, equity is still out of reach.

[sixty-silver-wishes]

feeling the ace pride strongly tonight

I love being asexual. I love how it lets me understand the world. I love the ace community. I love headcanoning characters as ace. I love finding value in friendships and interests and knowing there’s more to passion than just sexual attraction. I love making dumb sex jokes despite being ace. I love flipping off purity culture by being ace and still advocating for the rights of allo queer people. I love accepting myself. I love being silly about society’s view of sex. I love how being ace lets me interpret and create art in unique ways. I love being able to live my ace life

[digi-moe]

[bambi-lesbian-posts]

Happy Eid ul-Adha(or Bakrid, or Eid Mubarak) to any people of the Muslim faith this year! This is for 6/29/2023

[evilios]

By the way, if you’re a witch/mage or a worshiper and you’re neurodivergent, I love you so much. If you struggle with your craft or with worship, if it feels too much to take up due to your neurodivergence, if you get easily overwhelmed with spells and rituals, if you need extra time to recharge after, if your practice is irregular and messy because of it, I love you so much and I hope you keep it up at your pace if that’s where you’re comfortable at being.

[itsc]

if youre fat and queer i hope youre having a really good day

[dovewithscales]

Pat Robertson celebrated Pride month by dying! Talk about commitment.

Rot in hell you evil bastard!

[amariofthenight-deactivated2024]

Content Thieves PSA

If you write spirit work posts or witchy posts in general I seriously suggest you check out this blog and it’s discord for potentially stolen content.

Witchy Library

A tumblr account for the witchy discord library known as the Cobalt Athenaeum. Pro hex, eclectic witchcraft, educational witch blog.

They have stolen from a lot of prominent bloggers trying to pass off their info as written by their mod team. 3 of my posts were stolen and one was even posted on their tumblr as if they wrote it themselves. When I confronted them they claimed being neurodivergent as the reason they are plagiarizing posts. They deleted my stolen content from their blog but them sharing my resource as their own was blatant plagiarism.

Their discord is here https://href.li/?https://discord.gg/6cgfB7rV3g where they have posted 100s of stolen blog posts with NO sources. This is one of multiple discord servers they have. They also have servers for pagan spaces, crystal, herb magic and others.

href.li

According to other mods I have spoken to they have done this a lot and are banned in other spaces for plagiarism and stealing content.

No where on their discord does it say the content is not theirs and they do not link the original posters or give credit anymore.

Check for your content as there was a lot of common posts that float around on there without any sources.

Link to my plagiarized post.

[not-on-the-styx]

The mod team had been working with you to fix the issue. We remove broken links until we can find the post again to get a new one. We have stated in the servers that not all of it is ours.

If someone finds their information has been used without credit we are MORE THAN HAPPY to give credit where it is due!!

[amariofthenight-deactivated2024]

You were working with me by lying to me about stealing my work in the first place. You never state anywhere that the sources are not yours. I looked. But then you posted my WHOLE POST as your own here on tumblr where you could easily have found mine and reblogged. So no you were calling me crazy for being upset.

For proof:

My stolen posts with NO credit. Until I said something.

I’ll post more in another reply it wont let me add all of the pictures.

[amariofthenight-deactivated2024]

More proof

The ticket where you came at me originally with a horrible attitude until you realized you were in the wrong.

I want to clarify. As seen in the above posts it is NO WHERE stated clearly that it was copied. I looked in their rules, their info, the posts and channels themselves. It’s not. They lied.

[amariofthenight-deactivated2024]

And lastly. This is me being very upset so I did come on very aggressive but this is when I found they had posted and claimed my post as their own.

Claiming that the reason you steal works is because you’re neurodivergent is abhorrant as that perpetrates a false narrative. I cannot believe that was your excuse. You don’t steal works because you’re neurodivergent. I am autistic. That doesn’t make me thief.

But the thing is this isn’t even the first time y’all have been called out by this according to other mods. Why are you continuing to steal works and pretend they are yours?

[amariofthenight-deactivated2024]

I just want to say this is a false narrative and not what happened. I called them out the second time and called them out here because I saw my post reposted on their blog as if they had created it. Without acknowledging that it was not their work. It was linked in this post:

With my earlier posting of discord user names if you contact me and let me know you’re not involved with the situation I will gladly remove your name from the list. However this is not doxxing as it’s public information.

[amariofthenight-deactivated2024]

Update: they are harassing mod members who have left or that they removed due to this situation. Even going so far as to create fake tiktok accounts to harass @randomthingsandthings and their partner.

[afeelgoodblog]

After seeing the dad how do I channel, I really wanted this one. I searched for it and, tada! Mom how do I? Seems rather new, but I love it anyway.

[cloudfreed]

This is such a cute and helpful idea, especially since some people either didn’t grow up with someone who could teach them this stuff or they grew up with parents who did everything for them. I knew a lot of guys in college who didn’t know how to do laundry or cook!

[w00dchips]

Mom How Do I

Dad How Do I

[notbomb]

My parents were not very good teachers of life skills so this is G R E A T.

[danamartist]

One of my darker pieces from Folktale Week.⁠ Kelpies are Scottish shape-shifting fey of lakes and rivers. Sometimes a man and sometimes a horse and never to be trusted.⁠

[hashtagloveloses]

if you’re a new tumblr user from tiktok or IG or something and only like posts and dont reblog them yeah people will think you’re a bot and block you but you will also make this website actively worse. they want “algorithmic” users like you, served recommended posts through likes, not people who just follow each other and respond to the direct chronological feed. there is a reason this website is still better than the rest, even with all its problems, do not ruin this

[hashtagloveloses]

ok i need to make this clearer: if you do not reblog posts and only like them you are contributing to this site actively getting worse and becoming like all the apps you hate. keep likes to things you just wanna keep off your blog. reblog everything else. ESPECIALLY fanart, which always needs a reblog.

[hashtagloveloses]

and FYI: what i’m saying here is backed up by tumblr themselves. they admit this publicly.

if you want a good RECENT (as of the end of February 2022) overview of what is going on behind the scenes at tumblr, it is basically what i’ve been saying for years: the core staff is tiny, constantly not being listened to when they advocate for us, the community, and working there is a nightmare:

The inside story of how Tumblr lost its way

And how it can find itself again for a new generation.

[taikeero-lecoredier]

Reblogging to encourage people instead of only liking is really not that fucking hard if you dont want people to be discouraged cuz their stuff get zero interactions and 99% useless likes and be driven off the Platform.

[pixel-mess]

Thank yall for this! I thought reblogging wasnt good because that it just puts stuff out there that is already out there, but now i am going to reblog bc I learned and stuff ig. IDK what i was going to say

ig thanks bc now im not scared to reblog out of fear of hate

[adhbabey]

also recommend making multiple blogs if you like multiple things!!!!!!! i have many different sideblogs for aesthetics + stuff. And this blog is a sideblog too! Enjoy blogging! do whatever you want!! :D forever!!!!

[only-knives]

hi you! here's your daily/nightly reminder that:

your voice should be heard.

your health is important.

your pain is not insignificant or lesser than others'.

you are not on this earth to be "productive."

you are the only one who can define your experiences.

you are cared for, even if only by strangers. we care.

now go stretch, hydrate, nourish, and lay down (if you can). just do your best, and don't worry if other's think it isn't enough. it is, and im proud of you.

[hagoftheholler]

Unfriendly reminder that if I see any Harry Potter/JK Rowling terf shit on your username or bio I will block you. We don't support terfs and antisemitic bitches on this page. Feel free to unfollow me if that bothers you.

[stardewspellshed]

Farm Pet Associations And Ideas For How To Use Them In Your Craft

note that these are my own personal correspondences and what each pet symbolizes will likely vary from person to person! Adjust according to your own personal practice for best results.

Cats

I associate cats with love, magic, liminal spaces, boundaries, protection magic, concealment, and a little bit of mischief!

Dogs

I associate dogs with love, comfort, loyalty, friendship, nostalgia, and a feeling of safety.

My personal pet choice

Personally I always take a dog, specifically the hound with the floppy brown ears. That said, it's... admittedly less for magical reasons and more because he looks enough like my late heart dog that I haven't been able to pick any other pet since 1.4 dropped.

So What Can You Do With Pets? A Couple Suggestions

please note that these are just suggestions and deliberately vague— that way you can adapt them (or not) to your own practice in ways that work for you!

if you have a dog or cat of your own, use the one that looks closest to yours (or use a mod to make the critter look like yours, if that's a thing you want to/can do) and cast a spell so when you bond with the critter every day in game it helps strengthen your bond with the real critter

use energy work to program your farm pet to do some basic magical chores for you while wandering around. Stuff like refreshing your wards, cleaning up spell debris, etc.

work their daily movements around your farm into a spell or sigil and use them to charge it

if you work with a deity or spirit who's connected to cats or dogs and they're okay with it, consider using watering/petting the critter as a mini offering!

[evilios]

I want to speak positively about something that’s a matter of personal care for me: messy devotion.

Sometimes watching other people online might make you feel like you are doing everything wrong. That’s not true. Don’t let yourself overly focus on curating a flawless schedule of devotion and altar-keeping if this is not your thing. I know that sometimes seeing “guides” online might make you feel like doing something “off” such a guide is a direct insult to the Divine, but that’s not true.

It is true that Greco-Roman Gods were often praised according to strict rites, but please remember that this is true for a state cult mostly and usually applies to very well-known and written down cultus forms. Some were different. Regions of the Ancient world worshipped differently. Cult of XYZ in one area of the Mediterranean is not comparable to the cult of the same Deity in the nearby city, etc. It’s okay if your devotion is not like devotion of state cults. You’re not doing it wrong.

You’re not obliged to have a fancy altar. You don’t have to buy a bunch of stuff. You don’t need to own rare herbs or precious stones or expensive statues. Some people do it because they can, some people put money away for it willingly, and some just… never do it. And it’s okay. You don’t necessarily need an altar, but if you feel like getting one - it can be as simple as an object of your choice laid out at the spot of your choice. Sacred space, sacred thing, and devotion make up an altar. Don’t feel obliged to put money into things you can’t afford.

Not only that, but you don’t need to follow schedules of holidays either. Not every single citizen of the Ancient cities followed every single holiday. People split into groups of followers for a reason, and not every holiday is an all-Gods day. It’s also okay if you skip your Deity’s sacred day, too; there’s not a single proof that these days are appointed by the Gods - it’s sort of an extra way to show respect, but They will understand if you can’t.

You don’t have to learn Greek or Latin to read prayers. You don’t need to read them or sing them or remember them in the first place. There are countless of prayers written by people who were not priests. This is an individual experience. You don’t have to have a scheduled prayer time, you don’t even need to talk to pray. There are so many ways to call onto a God.

I assure you there were mentally ill, disabled, health-compromised devotees before. There were people who could not do things neatly and there were people who couldn’t afford it. There’s not a single record of exclusion of such people from worship. You’re not excluded either.

All in all, you need very little to be a “proper polytheist”: you need faith. That’s all.