[kosmogrl]

I hate change, I’m scared of change, I need something big in my life to change soon or else I’ll go crazy

[waltzingbi]

*me, literally sick with want* whatever

[segamascott]

[ismenes]

you know those studies showing that cursing helps with pain tolerance or whatever. that’s how i feel about making my weird little noises to get through my basic daily activities. sometimes you just have to go hggblaaaah for a minute so you can find the strength within yourself to get up or wash the dishes or send an email. mmmnneh. urgh. the torments are unending but you can always make some little sounds about it.

[girlballs]

my crinkling scrinklet

[girlballs]

no it's good for her

[key-pair]

in case folk outside the UK aren't abreast of our news, the British press just hounded a black academic to death

[key-pair]

a rough timeline of events (from memory, there may be inaccuracies, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong)

Cambridge professor of sociology Jason Arday is accused of plagiarism by another academic

the accuser is a "race realist" who believes that in a true meritocracy all university professors would be white. this is somehow not acknowledged much during the entire ordeal

this leads to several days of media coverage demanding an investigation, or that Arday is expelled from his post immediately

somehow this accusation that has no effect on the lives of 99.99% of the population becomes FRONT PAGE NEWS in all the newspapers for multiple days, above anything else happening in the UK or the world at large

following intense media scrutiny, Arday resigns his post as a Cambridge professor

today, august 14th, days after resigning, Arday is found dead at his home in Battersea

the British tabloid press remains, and will always be, fucking evil

[cantdrawtosavemylife]

Went to google more news about professor Jason Arday, and I swear to God the first two pages of research are rancid propaganda sites smearing the man's reputation, up to and including popular Brazilian news magazine Veja.

This article by professor Kehinde Andrews clarifies more about the story of racist harassment Arday has been suffering since he fucking got a teaching job at Cambridge in the first place, in 2023, as the FIRST Black professor in that fucking stupid institution, who sure is taking it's sweet time defending their worker, despite already fucking checking his work for plagiarism and saying he didn't do it:

https://www.voice-online.co.uk/opinion/comment/2026/08/07/ardays-resignation/

A dark agenda lies behind Jason Arday's resignation - Voice Online

Arday's resignation has reignited questions about race and who is truly accepted at the highest levels of British academia

Several of the academics who harassed this man into suicide do not seem to have suffered at all in their academic careers. Actually, Dave Harris, who lost his Emeritus title for his racist behavior back in 2024 (something the news only call "criticizing Critical Race Theory", instead of "sent racist emails to fellow black academics"), was defended by Plymouth University, where he used to work, and fucking got the title back earlier this year.

[cannibalgender]

A couple things about the above.

1. He wasn’t the first Black Professor at Cambridge, but he WAS the youngest X

2. He was ALSO autistic, and nonverbal for the first 11 years of his life X

The rest of the story unfolds pretty much as described. And he was a fucking Sociologist studying racial equity in schools and academia. They publicly bullied a black autistic man to suicide for being imperfect whilst asserting a place for blackness in academia.

[legallybrunettedotcom]

[inbabylontheywept]

Until death, all defeat is psychological.

[yellow-cat]

hey sorry for being so snappish earlier i was in a bad mood. and im still in a bad mood so can you fuck off

[milfsisyphus]

how to relax and enjoy life for beginners

[literaryvein]

L. V., writing under a watchful moon

[crazy-brazilian]

[papayajuan2019]

but that's beyond the scope of this post

[bagelbarr0n]

Really funny one two punch on my dash this morning

[amberautumnfaebrooke]

has anyone noticed recently that it's expensive

[sociallyawkwardrevolution]

times like these really make you appreciate pouring river water in your socks

[bulljumpingfresco]

Minoan octopus fresco

[bark-barkley]

I WANT TO LOOK AT THINGS MADE BY HUMAN BEINGS

[softwetmoss]

And also occasionally by pufferfish

[ms-demeanor]

Performance art is good and listening to people who don't understand art talk about performance art is a unique type of torture.

[ms-demeanor]

Which is probably a thought that could be the core of a pretty fun, masturbatory piece of performance art.

[ms-demeanor]

Oh. Oh actually. Actually.

[ms-demeanor]

Okay, so the name of the piece is "It's what you make of it" and you have a setup that's a cross between a zoltar fortune-teller machine and a crank penny press. The room the piece is performed in has a warning about recording the performance and cautions the viewer to only interact with the piece of they consent to being recorded and photographed.

The artist is in the box, made up as a marionette and the viewer can use pulleys and switches to position the artist's limbs and to change the background and lighting of the box and can type a short prompt for the artist to repeat and act out verbatim.

The viewer has to drop a token (provided as part of the piece) into a coin slot and work a crank to complete the prompt. While the artist is acting out the prompt, the prompt is printed on a photo strip that includes a picture of the prompter (taken by a hidden webcam on the booth). One copy of the prompt and photo is spit out along with the cranked token (which has the phrase "it's what you make of it" and an image of a clown pressed into it) for the viewer to keep, one copy of the prompt and photo is spit out inside the booth where the artist can collect it after completing the prompt.

What the artist is going to do with the photo strip is not explained, the artist doesn't speak or move except as a response to a prompt.

[ms-demeanor]

People will prompt the artist to say "this is stupid." People will prompt the artist say explicit phrases, or to swear incessantly. People will prompt the artist to say slurs.

And they will walk away with their prompt attributed to them with their photo and a coin they used their energy to mint into a reminder that the art is what they made of it. And their creation is documented in the hands of the artist as well. What did they put into the world? What did they decide to say when they had a chance to say anything? What were they comfortable saying before they realized that someone would quote them on it? What did they make of it, and how would they feel if their photo was attached to their prompt in a book or video or somewhere that people might see it?

How did they approach the piece? How would they approach it a second time?

[ms-demeanor]

Also the artist goes hog fucking wild on the prompts. They're acted out *loudly* and melodramatically with as much emotion as the artist can put into the performance.

And whenever the machine is not in motion the artist is still and vacant, but the performance of the prompt involves as much eye contact and emoting as possible.

[ms-demeanor]

The piece is dead and meaningless until you approach it, and as soon as you start interacting with it it should become disconcertingly alive with your intention.

[everbright-mourning]

That sounds like an actual, literal nightmare I had as a kid where I fucked up giving instructions to a mimic-biological construct and didn't say anything b/c I didn't want to get in trouble and the construct was killed for not following the instructions correctly.

I absolutely would never want to be put in a situation where someone couldn't refuse my orders.

Well. Clearly as performance it it works already. I need to go drink of a cup of tea about this to stop being upset. I'm sure it would also make other people feel things they perhaps didn't realize they were going to feel.

[digitaldiscipline]

Marina Abramović, Rhythm 0 (1974)

[ms-demeanor]

This post was directly provoked by stumbling across a reddit thread of non-artsy people reacting to Rhythm 0.