30 Flirty and Thriving

Katie, 33, she/her

[pangur-and-grim]

kneading with all four paws

[homunculus-argument]

The entire range of human skin tones varies from so pale white that it's almost kind of blue, to so deep black that it's almost kind of blue, and I think that's beautiful. Do you love the colour of the guy.

[glorious-spoon]

spent forty-five minutes today helping an 87yo woman who does not own a computer or a cell phone try to set up an email account so that she could then set up a second account in order to access benefits. went with protonmail, because they don't require 2fa, but it turns out that while you can still make a protonmail account without authentication you can no longer use it to create OTHER accounts without it, and the benefits page she needed to get to required both an email and a cell phone to create an account anyway. asked if she wanted to try going in person to see if someone there could help her, and she said that she had, and they'd directed her to the website. she tried signing up with her landline, but of course that didn't work because you can't do SMS authentication that way. finally ended up writing up detailed instructions for how to log in and authenticate her account so she can drive to her severely disabled daughter's house forty minutes away because that's the only person she knows and trusts who has both a cell phone and a computer.

anyway i fucking hate mandatory 2fa and i think the people responsible for it should have to spend a year navigating their lives with no cell phone and no internet access beyond the public library pcs. fuck.

[aromanticduck]

Free service with ads: Well, if I'm not paying for it they have to foot the bill somehow.

Paid service with no ads: Well, if they're not funding it with ad revenue, they need to charge us something.

Paid service with ads: Well that's bullshit.

"We used to be a paid service without ads, but now we're putting ads in it! If you want the ad-free version you have to pay more for preeeeemium": Fuck you fuck you fuck you

[juststarsandthemoon]

Free service with no ads: Okay so these guys are stealing my data

[apjvff]

If you don’t let go of your prejudices and past grudges, your heart won’t blossom. 2013 is coming, let’s make a change. We only have one planet so let’s show each other some kindness.

[crowboy-bebop]

2013 is coming… let’s show each other some kindness…

[gremlininho]

let me. innnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

[icanstillfeelyou-deactivated201]

[gardenxkisses]

Wait is he saying that or is she

[taydivorce]

*scrolling tumblr* hmmm. i agree with the sentiment of this post, but the phrasing feels off to me. it doesn’t really have that Reblog factor, you know? *scrolls* oh good, a post that just says “i jerk off till my penis scrweam” . i better reblog this

[nadi196]

[thecoiledfool]

[misty-eyed-memory]

[deathtofun]

I told a guy his total was 13.21 and he said “wish it were that year, could actually get some good music on the radio”

[regularlesbian]

breaking news from the AP, our boys on the front have just sacked constantinople. take that, heretics. coming up next are the soothing lute dirges of bing crosby

[villainessbian]

*screams of a witch burning at the stake*

THOU ART CURRENTLY LISTENING TO

*Gregorian chanting*

13.21

*leper bell ringing*

HIGH MEDIAEVAL FM

*recording of John Lackland sobbing as he signs the Magna Carta*

WHENCE COMETH NAUGHT BUT LITURGIES

LITURGIES

AND MORE LITURGIES

*Templar knights praying out loud*

THIS ISN’T THY GRANDMOTHERES STATION

*Imagine Dragons - Radioactive starts playing*

[pride-knightess]

just remembered i have a degree in sound engineering and can voice act

[pride-knightess]

Take it back im telling my mother superior about this 😢

[dragon-in-a-fez]

actually I think you should be normal about ordinary citizens of authoritarian countries and yes that applies even to that country you're thinking of right now

[dragon-in-a-fez]

"but they support [dictator] and [violent action]!" okay is it possible that a combination of propaganda, election rigging, and authoritarian crackdowns on dissent could lead a population to look like it supports something most people would find distasteful under more reasonable circumstances

[dykecinema]

Me: okay I am done talking about this thing that's upsetting me. Bye.

*literally two seconds later*: AND ANOTHER THING

[porcelain-dollbones]

it really is kind of interesting how attached people are to the idea of the improvised line and the genuine reaction in film. nearly every single famous moment or line has some sort of claim floating around that it wasn't in the script and was either made up on the spot by an actor or was sprung as a surprise on the actors to get their 'real' reaction. you know, sometimes people do come up with good lines in advance and write them down, and sometimes people can pretend to be have a convincing emotional response on screen

[zootycoon-archive]

i got these knockoff boots online and instead of the brand name on the tag they have the name of an apparently nonexistent martin scorsese movie??? what the fuck

[loseremo]

[syzygy-yzygy]

THE ORIGINAL? ON MY DASH

[this-too-too-sullied-flesh]

this post led to a series of events that had martin scorsese himself reacting to his alleged movie goncharov and it has less than 400k notes almost 3 years later?

[loveridden1999]

for those unaware today india experienced one of its biggest protests in half a decade. there were protests all over the nation for various causes but the major one was in delhi. all we asked for was the resignation of the education minister because he's failed the students of this nation time & time again. but we were met with brutality, the police had barricaded the main site of protest (jantar mantar). metro stations were shutdown, the public was restrained from reaching the protest site and all the adjoining areas had signal jammers to make sure the crowd had no access to constant updates. they had us blocked from all the sides. they were lathi (baton) charging students from one side & releasing tear gas from the other. you couldn't walk 100 m on streets without having a tear gas shell thrown at you. there were many students, women & kids bleeding — some from their head. some couldn't walk anymore. the police had removed their nameplates & acted with full impunity to resort to unprecedented levels of violence. they were pelting stones at us, beating up people for no reason, forcefully detaining them and attacking us constantly with tear gas & rubber bullets. they wouldn't let you exit either. the crowd was peaceful & looking out for each other yet they were met with violence. i made a friend who was all alone & she asked to join me & my friend because a policeman wouldn't leave her alone. he constantly prodded her for personal info, invited her back to the jeep saying they have food there, wouldn't stop following her around. you couldn't call or ask anyone for help, we were left to fend for ourselves & be on a constant lookout if you did not want to be beaten up to death by police. all for what? asking a resignation? shame on this country.

[loveridden1999]

Tens of thousands of Cockroach party protesters defy police with Delhi march

Youth-led movement calls on education minister to quit in one of India’s largest anti-government rallies in years

Police attack Cockroach activists as thousands march on Indian parliament

More than 10,000 protesters braved tear gas and baton charges in their largest challenge yet to PM Modi's government.

[thesummoningdark]

The last week has been so ridiculous even the satirists can’t take it any more

[the-stray-liger]

the fucking timestamp

[thesummoningdark]

Happy tenth birthday to this post which will apparently haunt my notifications for all eternity.

It’s about Brexit, by the way. The timestamp is a week post-referendum. Newsthump is UK-based and I myself am scottish. And yes, things have 100% got worse since then, but personally I regard the referendum as the point at which we entered the Clownshoes Timeline.

[fuckthisshit-ugh]

please read this even if you're not indian. especially if you're not indian.

you've seen the jokes. india is "dirty", indians are "everywhere", why don't they fix their own country. ok. let me tell you why, and what's happening right now while nobody's watching.

first, the history you skipped: britain ruled india for two centuries and drained it. economist utsa patnaik's research estimates around $45 trillion in today's money was taken. the india that got independence in 1947 was one of the poorest countries on earth. every "why is india like this" question starts there. you don't get to profit off a robbery and then mock the crime scene.

now, what's happening RIGHT NOW:

in may the question paper for NEET leaked. that's the national medical entrance exam. over 2.2 million students took it. cancelled. years of studying, families' savings poured into coaching, gone overnight because someone sold the paper. students died by suicide after. these were kids who wanted to be doctors.

and out of that came a protest movement. a gen z group called the cockroach janta party, started by a 30 year old named abhijeet dipke, got 22 million instagram followers within DAYS. they've been doing a sit-in at jantar mantar in delhi demanding education minister dharmendra pradhan resign.

and then there's sonam wangchuk. if you've watched 3 idiots, he's the real engineer the character was based on. built solar schools in ladakh. invented ice stupas so himalayan villages have water. spent his whole life on education. he's 59 and he's been on hunger strike for 17+ days now. reporters went to see him this week and he was too weak to talk. and the troll armies are calling him "anti national" and "foreign funded". a man starving himself for other people's children. that's the thing here, anyone who asks a question is suddenly a traitor.

it's not one incident, it's everywhere you look:

• infrastructure worth thousands of crores failing within months of the ribbon cutting. tunnels collapsing in regions where heavy rain is a guarantee, not a surprise.

• youth unemployment near 10% for ages 15 to 29, 13.6% in cities. in a country of 1.42 billion where more than half the population is young.

• only about the top 3% of indians earn above 10 lakh a year. meanwhile billionaire wealth keeps ballooning and the headlines celebrate it.

• manipur burned for over two years. an ethnic conflict, tens of thousands displaced, and the prime minister barely said the word manipur while it happened.

• journalists raided. critics' houses bulldozed. activists sitting in jail for years without trial under laws like UAPA. our press freedom ranking has cratered.

• even the petrol is a fight now, ethanol blending pushed through while drivers complain about their engines and get no straight answers.

and through all of it, the PM, who came to power on religious polarisation (americans, sound familiar?), travels abroad for photo ops and has not held one single open press conference in over a decade. not one.

what i'm asking:

if you're not indian: share this. our media mostly won't cover any of it because the big outlets are owned by the same billionaires the government serves. the only reason wangchuk's fast is getting any coverage is people refusing to look away.

if you ARE indian: speak up even if you're comfortable. especially if you're comfortable. join the protests. add to this, correct me, translate it. staying quiet is a choice when nothing in this post touches your life.

india is not "dirty". india was robbed, and it's being robbed again, from the inside this time. but it's also the country where a 59 year old will starve for strangers' kids and 22 million young people will rally behind a party literally named after cockroaches, because cockroaches survive everything.

we can still save her. but only loudly.

reblog. share. don't scroll past.

[standwithdaanes]

India's youth-led Cockroach movement vows to continue protest after police crackdown

The movement, which began as a satirical protest, has evolved into a nationwide challenge to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government.

Supporters of India's youth-led Cockroach movement said Tuesday they will continue their protest in New Delhi, refusing to leave their sit-in site a day after police used tear gas and batons to disperse thousands of them as they tried to march toward Parliament. Hundreds of protesters camped at Jantar Mantar, a designated protest site, under heavy police presence, saying they would stay until Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan resigns over alleged failures in India's examination system. "We are going to continue our protest," said Abhijeet Dipke, founder of the Cockroach Janta Party, which emerged just two months ago. The movement, drawing students, professionals and families, marks a rare public challenge to Prime Minister Narendra Modi 's government in its third term, reviving criticism over its handling of dissent and its use of force to respond to protests. [...] Sona Bisht, a 20-year-old student who was part of the protest, said the confrontation strengthened her resolve. "If the government thinks that doing this with Gen Z, they can stop us, then that won't happen. We are here talking about education, talking about securing our future. And till the time our demands are not met, we will not move from here," she said.

"Definitions developed thus far about youth, like the Gen Z narrative, have largely been linked to roles attributed by the dominant system. The rulers have invented a whole range of terms — rebellious, irresponsible, apolitical, extremist, consumerist — not to understand youth, but to neutralize it. They know as well as we do that whoever wins over the youth wins over society. [...] Thus the question is not whether youth is powerful, but in whose interest this power is directed. Today’s uprisings — such as those in Nepal, Bangladesh, Madagascar, Indonesia, Kenya, Morocco, and beyond — demonstrate that youth continues to emerge as a decisive actor. Young women like Deniz Ciya have proven this with their lives. These uprisings are not expressions of generational temperament. These „Gen Z uprisings“ are expressions of a social force confronting structural crisis inherent in the current system. [...] Recent youth uprisings — whether in the form of environmental justice protests, labor movements, or uprisings against authoritarian governments — are proof that youth worldwide are not only responding to a set of circumstances; they are consciously and collectively rejecting the narratives that seek to define them. Thus, it is crucial to analyze what transpired, and draw lessons from these uprisings, particularly in the context of building a global youth democratic confederalism. For the power of youth movements is interconnected, despite being geographically distant." — "Beyond "Gen Z": Defending Revolutionary Youth Spirit" by Lêgerîn

"The youth in general, and especially the young women, are the spark of every revolution.We can’t look at the history and found a revolution without the youth. We are a fundamental factor. We should be aware of this reality, we should take conscience of our historical role. By doing this we will provide ourselves with a plan that will allow us the unity of action and objectives. The Youth should not be condemned to be a slave of the capitalist system. [...] If we reject the labels and mentalities imposed by the system, taking consciousness as Internationalist Youth in a global level and organizing ourselves, is there someone who can stop us?" — "The youth is the spark of every revolution" by Lêgerîn.