Higher Archon of Dishevelment

He/Him, all-around dweeb.

[bowlifecomics]

It makes me happy when they listen

[cheap-pink-mints]

[bowlifecomics]

YES. YES YES YES THANK YOU

[ayviedoesthings]

Saying this with all the love in my heart, "Trans" is not a magical title that erases all social biases and discriminations you hold in your mind the moment you transition.

You have to actually ACTIVELY unlearn all that shit. You can actually be trans AND hold TERF and racist beliefs, it is in fact very easy.

Read studies and essays, Engage with the works of other minorities, Don't think you're just better by virtue of losing *some* privilege.

[ayviedoesthings]

I hope all the red usernames reblogging this post have read it veeery slowly!

[daughter-of-sapph0]

when i was a kid i was taught to be safe online. never give out my name, location, or any personally identifying information. i was told to immediately block people who ask for A/S/L. i was taught to always hide who i was, use a pseudonym, only share my email with people i absolutely trust.

and now im supposed to give my legal driver's license to every single porn website and use my email and sign up for ads and junk mail every time i want to read an article and agree to webcrawling ad tracking surveillance to do anything online anymore.

but yeah, its for kids safety. sure. i bet the panoption is much safer than the club penguin and nickelodeon dot com that i had as a kid. so glad we got rid of kid friendly spaces and in turn had to make the entire internet advertisement friendly. so glad we tore down that public park and replaced it with a strip mall and parking lot next to a police station

[krasnoarmeyets]

anyway you should always remember that all those foreigners you see dying on the news are just as real people as you are who have just as much interiority as you do. there is nothing about you that makes you more important and it is by pure chance that you are not in their position. in fact, this holds for all of history. every person, no matter the horror of the fate that befell them, had just as much interiority as you do. i feel like some people haven't fully internalized this.

[depsidase]

[haunted-hideaway]

I’m glad that OP:

1) Figured this out.

2) Shared so others can learn from their mistake.

[sapphireh3arts]

if it's terminal im just gonna say fuck it and become a porn star

[sapphireh3arts]

did y'all forget about my go fund me and the breast lumps i found? its okay if ya did cuz i've been talking about transfeminism instead and fundraising for others. 🫂💞

i need to update it. we still are looking for housing in Portland but now we have medicaid to tide us over and that will be easy to switch to OHP once there. our current housing is no longer safe and we need out asap.

Donate to Help V and Andrea Move to Portland for Medical Care, organized by Victoria Morris

Hi there, my name is Victoria (or V) and I've made this campaign t… Victoria Morris needs your support for Help V and Andrea Move to Portlan

[dailymanners]

If at all possible, when you have an issue with someone, whether they're a neighbor, classmate, co-worker, if you feel safe doing so it's always more considerate to try taking up any issues with someone directly before reporting them to any authority figure.

For example, if your neighbor has their TV or music turned up way too loud way too late at night, it's more considerate to go knock on their door and politely ask them to turn it down rather than immediately reporting them to housing authority or calling the cops on them for a noise violation.

Or say your co-worker forgot to fill out a form for something they're supposed to fill out a form for. It's more considerate to talk to them directly and politely remind them, rather than immediately going to your manager and reporting them the first time you notice they didn't fill out the form.

We're all human and we all make mistakes, and we all deserve some grace for our mistakes rather than immediately getting in trouble with authority and/or management. Some people lose track of time and don't realize how loud their T.V. and/or stereo is, and feel bad if a neighbor brings it to their attention how loud it is, and they will feel grateful if you just talk to them instead of immediately trying to get them in trouble.

Maybe someone had to show up to work on only 2 hours of sleep, or is going through a rough patch in their personal life, or is struggling with a disorder like ADHD, and as a result made a careless mistake at work like forgetting to fill out that form. They will appreciate it if you just politely talk to them rather than getting them in trouble with management.

You've probably made careless mistakes yourself, like not realizing how loud you were being, or making a careless error at work. Would you rather someone shows you some grace by just talking to you, or immediately tries to get you in trouble for it?

Of course this is about mistakes that can be solved by just talking to someone. This doesn't necessarily apply to situations where someone is really out of line, or makes you feel unsafe. Say a co-worker keeps harassing you and calling you derogatory slurs, and it's really obvious that they know how hurtful and out of line what they're saying is. In that case by all means, just go straight to management and/or HR.

But otherwise, if they're likely just making an honest mistake with no malicious intentions (like forgetting to fill out a form or accidentally being too loud) why get them in trouble and do something that might risk something like their job, or something else important, when you can just talk to them like a person?

[tpwrtrmnky]

I haaaaaaaaaaate the "affirmation only" framing of trans rights that some ostensibly pro-trans advocates take like there are actually more pertinent issues than feeling affirmed going on here.

I didn't go through the bureaucratic process of changing my Norwegian personal ID number, which encodes gender in it, because having an odd number there made me feel bad.

I did it because for someone with my name and outward appearance, having "man" on my IDs reveals private medical information to everyone who sees the document, information that they aren't entitled to know, which they might act on in deeply undesirable ways.

Taking HRT also isn't something I'm doing to be affirmed, it's something I'm doing because the biological processes signaled by having high levels of estrogen and low levels of testosterone are both something I want, and something that helps my overall well-being and functioning in daily life. Material, real, physiological effects that are well understood, easy to look up, and not about some vague sense that putting estrogen in my bloodstream is a badge of validity handed out by the doctor.

Like at some point I just want to ask these people if they actually believe trans people exist or if they just feel obligated to humor the idea to be nice. Have they actually understood that there are people walking around today with the full effects of transition care already sorted? Have they comprehended that the surgeries exist beyond the occasional picture of someone who's still in recovery?

Do you live in the same material reality as trans people, or are you just being polite to shadows on the wall?

[tpwrtrmnky]

Oh and this is also part of the broader centrist "every material claim the far right makes is true, I just disagree with their tone and think we should be nice" tendency. Like what I'm outlining here is a worldview where the anti-trans notion that trans people Do Not Exist is taken for granted.

[shnowyfox]

it would be so awesome

it would be so cool

[kayla-denker]

Hey, you, cis girl that's very (correctly) vocal about women being allowed to talk about their periods, do you include trans women in that?

I ask because every single time I've tried to talk about it to anyone that isn't a trans woman they get fucking angry. Which has caused me to have to just suffer in silence every single month. So I really relate to cis women when they talk about literally the exact same thing; being shamed by everyone around them their whole lives for talking about their periods, so they just suffer in silence every month as it negatively impacts their work and social lives. But I don't even feel like I can voice that I am literally dealing with the same exact thing because most of y'all react like you want to throw me in front of a bus for saying it, even those of you who act like your such big great transfem allies.

[kayla-denker]

I guess I'll take this opportunity to talk about trans women periods. The first thing any tme person thinks when they hear this is always "how can trans women have periods? They don't have uteruses!"

The answer is: the uterus isn't what causes your period, it is effected by your period. What causes your period and what causes trans women's periods is the same thing: the endocrine system.

HRT changes the sex of your endocrine system. Feminizing HRT makes it a female endocrine system, giving us a 28-day hormone cycle just like cis women. At the end of that cycle, the hypothalamus floods the body with prostaglandins. Those are what cause all but one of the period symptoms, because they make muscles inflame and contract. They are what make the uterus shed its lining, they are what cause intestinal cramps, they are what cause body aches, they are what cause headaches and migraines. The only period symptom not causes by the release of prostaglandins throughout the body is depression, and that is caused by your endocrine system simply not processing as much estrogen and from simply feeling like shit.

So, the only symptoms trans women don't get every 28 days is menstrual cramps, because yes we do not menstruate since we don't have uteruses. But migraines, depression, body aches, intestinal cramps, and the infamous "period shits" don't exactly add up to us having any better of a time. Except we have to pretend that we're fine and nothing is different because no one believes that we get periods, not even cis women.

"But you can't call it a period then because that refers to MENSTRUATION!" is another one I hear all the time. This is incorrect. You use the word "period" instead of just "menstruation" because it doesn't just refer to menstruation. It refers to a period at the end of the hormone cycle where we experience a host of symptoms. And not all cis women experience all of the symptoms that encompass the period. Not all cis women get migraines, or body aches, or have severe depression. If a cis woman gets a hysterectomy she doesn't menstruate either! In that instance she experiences an identical period to what trans women experience. Yet, I doubt you'd insist that cis women who've had hysterectomies don't have periods.

[kayla-denker]

Oh, another thing that I personally discovered after bottom surgery: vaginal odor changes for trans women during our periods too. I was not expecting that because I always thought it was just from menstruation. But nope, the ph levels of a trans woman's vagina are the same of as a cis woman's vagina, and it changes during our periods just the same.

[girlballs]

Guh. Anxious. Need to get groceries and hygiene stuff soon but I have like 20 whole dollars. Need to sleep so I can be a human and stream tomorrow but my brain is full of bees...

[girlballs]

Bluh you're probably right. Hi my ko-fi is here and if you want to get some music I've made for oyur troubles I have an itch.io page here

[socialmaya]

Occasionally forget people genuinely think capitalism is thousands of years old

[sylestial]

One time I was talking about Robin Hood with some coworkers and one guy was like “he was bad because the people he helped learned to expect handouts” and I wanted to be like… okay can you explain how that flawed capitalist propaganda applies to feudalism

[scallioncreamcheesebagel]

reminder that capitalism was literally invented in the 16th century

[tayefeth]

That’s an exaggeration. What was invented in the 16th century was mercantilism. Capitalism really dates for the beginning of the nineteenth century, with the rise of industry and cash crops over artisans and merchants. Vulture capitalism, with the notion that companies have no duties other than generating profit, is even younger.

[antique-scarecrow]

Capitalism is only 200 years old and I have to say, they have not been an impressive 200 years

[downtroddendeity]

I think a lot of this comes from the fact that most people don’t know the formal definition of capitalism. We all know the word, we’ve all seen the jokes, but very few people bother to actually define it unless they’re talking about political theory and philosophy, so it’s easy to end up with the impression that Capitalism = Money Can Be Exchanged For Goods And Services.

Capitalism is the economic system where most of the means of production (i.e. everything people need to have to make the stuff that everyone wants) are owned by private individuals or corporations, who then hire people to provide the labor necessary to produce things, with the intent of selling the output at a profit. It’s the difference between “you’re a carpenter and you make a chair and you sell it” and “you’re Richard Q. Richington who owns a chair factory, and you pay people to sell the chairs you paid other people to make and then all the excess money goes back to you.” There have been Richard Q. Richingtons on and off throughout history, but that being the norm for every single industry is a pretty recent development.

[antiterfbutch]

An alarming amount of people seem to think capitalism = all trade, and I don’t think that’s a coincidence.

[bebsi-cola]

actually pigs shouldn't be at pride even outside of uniform. fuck those guys

[bebsi-cola]

if you decide to become a police officer then that outweighs any other marginalised identity you can rustle up like. not sorry, who asked you to willingly become a pig

[pekkhum]

I have heard of black people warning their kids that the race of a police officer is cop and you should not expect solidarity from them. The same applies to other types of minorities.

The sexuality of a police officer is cop.

The gender of a police officer is cop.

When you become the enforcer and protector of capital, you are making the deal to be slightly favored by the system over others like you, in exchange for being its servant. Your solidarity is with the system that you serve, even if it hates you.

If you want solidarity with those the system hates, you cannot be the system's servant and defender.

[dataandphilosophy]

“For example, if you’re trying to convince people to boycott a segregated store, your object is to convince them that boycotting the store will have a strategic effect, not that desegregation is morally important. For whatever reason, on a cognitive level human beings have a really hard time with this. Smucker cites an example of a Lefty roleplaying session where people were tasked with selling an action to people who agreed with them on principle but didn’t see the strategic merit of the action. Surprisingly, the sellers couldn’t make the conceptual switch to sell strategic merit: instead, they doubled down on THIS ISSUE IS IMPORTANT — even though it had been stressed to them that the people they were selling to bought into the importance of the issue. People react poorly to “this is important, so do WHATEVER I SAY”; they want to be convinced that what you’re proposing will work.”

Source.

[myfootyrthroat]

Also from above:

“Bob Wing, a grassroots organizer, explains this nicely: “If winning feels impossible, then righteousness can seem like the next best thing.” But righteousness is not conducive to getting normies to join your team if your team cannot demonstrate ability to, at least sometimes, win. Nor does righteousness help you make real inroads with regular people.”

[bbcwhereareyou]

Somewhat related, my favorite comic strip of all time:

[trippedintoa-volcano]

Imagine that everywhere in the mechanical engineering world suddenly got infatuated with lasers.

Lasers have a lot of uses! Measuring things, heating things, cutting things, entertaining cats, particle physics. Lasers are pretty cool. Very versatile, very useful, potential to be very powerful.

Someone shows up one day and says "I have developed a never before seen technology! I call it a Death Star."

And it's a 3.4mW laser. Well no, we haven't seen this exact size of laser much since that's not really standard, but that's a bit of a misnomer, and I wouldn't call it new -

"HOLY SHIT GUYS! This Death Star is so entertaining! My cat loves it and it has such a nice color!" The Death Star becomes a viral novelty, and is mildly entertaining, as laser pointers often are.

Somehow, seemingly overnight, this leads to mania. "Lets stick lasers in EVERYTHING! The public loves them!"

More companies make 3.4mW lasers to jump on the bandwagon. Everyone that makes anything vaguely mechanical starts sticking lasers into their designs.

Everyone is calling them Death Stars. Any time there is a "Death Star innovation", it is just that they made a bigger laser.

Ford's next truck comes out and it has "Death Star integrated headlights", where they have just stuck giant lasers in place of their previously functional headlights.

An electric toothbrush is now "Powered by Death Stars" and shoots a laser at the tooth its cleaning. You think that maybe this could have actual applications as a sanitizing device if you're being generous, but when you actually look at the product, its laser has no purpose but to point at the tooth and drain the battery.

Mechanical products across the board get noticeably worse as everyone starts stuffing lasers in places where lasers have no right to be.

The lamp business gets in on it. "Here's a Death Star powered lamp!" These guys haven't even tried to stick a laser in their damn lamps. They've just started calling their light bulbs Death Stars and hoped you bought it before you could tell the difference. You at least appreciate that they haven't ruined their lamp about it.

Death Stars are lauded as the solution to all the world's problems. If it's not working, you should stick a laser in it! That'll fix it, everyone says. Once in a blue moon, it's even true! Weather prediction is really good now. But most things are garbage. Like "Death Star powered washing machines". What the fuck does that even mean?

Meanwhile, since all functioning mechanisms are being replaced with lasers, problems start showing up. All mirrors now cost $1000+ dollars, because the whole supply is being used up to make more lasers. The earth heats up, because everyone's blasting lasers at everything. People keep going blind, on account of all the lasers.

You, in fact, study optical mechanics. You know what a laser is, and how it works, and that it was invented many years before any of this nonsense actually started. People keep asking you about Death Stars, since surely you must know so much about them.

You explain that this is not really what lasers are for, except you have to call them Death Stars now, and that they're causing a lot of harm, so you don't like them much.

"Oh, but they're still such new tech!" they reply. "They'll figure out how to make Death Stars that don't burn your eyes out soon, and then it won't be an issue anymore!"

Somewhere, deep and buried, you remember lasers being used in particle accelerators, or in telescopes, or in laser cutters, or funny cat videos. They are, in fact, still interesting. Still cool.

But by this point they have replaced roads with "Death Star Powered Pathways", which are just laser pointers propped up on tooth picks pointing vaguely through the forests.

And you think you are going mad.

And they are still just FUCKING LASERS.

This post is about AI.

[mysharona1987]

[lynati]

If the trash pickup people stop doing their job for two weeks you'd be throwing a fucking tantrum. Same for the janitors who keep your office spaces and bathrooms clean. (And that's before the various illnesses start to spread all over your city from the build up of pathogens.)

The people responsible keeping our spaces clean (and thus, mostly disease-free) should both be paid more AND thanked more.

[bogleech]

Garbage service is one of the ten deadliest jobs in the United States.

And police work isn't even on that list.

[viviprotrudes]

"I will never swim again until and unless I get surgery."

"This is why I try so hard to protect my trans sister, she has to deal with so much of this all of the time."

"And this is why I will never learn how to swim"

"I never go swimming, unless it's an event that explicitely mention that Trans Women are welcome"

And other such tags I am vaguely paraphrasing are ones I have had the horror of reading on my post. The trans girls are not swimming. It feels like there is a hole in my body where my heart should be, through which all my blood is pouring. I can't.

[viviprotrudes]

This is just the tiniest fucking window into how transmisogyny affect people. This is about a space that was held by trans people and for trans people where the transphobia targeting a transfeminine person was prioritized over everything else.

[viviprotrudes]

If anyone doesn't believe how badly transfems want to swim and how badly they fucking don't get to, don't feel/aren't safe enough to do so, whatever the fuck else, just look at the comments and tags. I thought there were already too many for it to be random on a post with, at this time, about ten times the reach of this one hereabove.

And yet I have ten times as many tags and comments on this here post about trans women and transfems not swimming. Heartbroken doesn't fucking cover it. I am trying to stay sane in the face of this but I am seriously not doing a great job at it. Fucking hell.

[estrogenesis-vaporeongelion]

i miss swimming.