ephel

i love history, reading, sewing, dnd, fashion, traveling, languages, trains and knitting. they/them

[podcastwizard]

hey sorry it's just that i don't think i'm very good at being a person. thanks for letting me try with you, anyway.

[geniusbee]

these are getting weird

[fforsythiaaa]

Once when I was in undergrad, someone described something as “problematic” in class and our professor was like, “That’s cool, but ‘problematic’ doesn’t really mean anything. It means that the thing you’re describing has a problem, and in and of itself that’s not bad. Art, especially, should always have problems, or else it’s not interesting and not art, either. It sounds like you’re trying to say that this is bad, but you don’t want to say ‘bad.’ Is that right?”

So from then on whenever one of us called something problematic, he would make us talk it out until we could name the “bad” thing we were hinting at. In this particular class, 7/10 it was some type of oppression, and the remainder was like, “I’m uncomfortable because this is very new/confusing/pushing boundaries that made me feel safe.”

Once we stopped calling things “problematic” and stopping at that, class got way more interesting and... we all had to say, like, “that’s racist” or “that’s misogynistic” or “ew capitalism gross” out loud, which a lot of us had never done in a classroom before. Or we had to be like, “Uhhh... I’m not sure what’s so bad?” and confront our own beliefs and that was maybe even more useful.

Anyway. Whenever I see the word problematic, I can’t help but think of this professor being like, “Good starting point, now let’s get specific.” I think when we have to commit to saying “that’s ___” it requires a lot more careful thought about the truth and impact and complexities of whatever we’re claiming. Sometimes there really is some bullshit afoot, and also sometimes it’s art, and it should be full of problems, because that’s what art is.

[hypokeimena]

#'this is present in the text' is often a good first step #but those second and third ones (naming it; describing its function) are vital (via @elucubrare)

[cdzen]

burnout from not doing anything

[wintercorrybriea2]

[lesbianshepard]

one of the funnier incidents of me assuming someone knew a meme irl was when a new coworker was talking about some woman who got arrested for tax fraud and I went "God forbid women do anything" and he got scared and thought I was accusing him of being sexist, so he started apologizing and saying how tax fraud isn't even bad, actually.

[salmon-n-hazel]

Apple blossoms

My print shop: INPRNT

[mzmzmzmz-deactivated20260529]

[lostcherry90]

Too lazy to explain myself, just judge me

[theonion]

Local resident Alan Bower’s particular brand of sardonic, no-holds-barred commentary about everything around him has firmly established the 31-year-old policy writer as an absolutely terrible person who is always ready to crack a joke, sources reported Monday.

According to friends of the modern-day Oscar Wilde, Bower has a singular knack for sucking every last bit of genuine enjoyment out of any situation with his hilarious, nonstop incisiveness.

Full Story

[shieldofiron]

Many people forget when writing bdsm that the dom also wants to get a good grade in dom. And is trying so hard and is often nervous about it.

[ot3]

guys as much as I believe ai will never in a million years reach the kind of ubiquity its snake oil salesmen want us to believe it will, it will not be going down in history alongside NFTs and the metaverse as a complete embarrassing failure in the same way and you're probably setting yourself up for disappointment waiting for it to happen. because the thing about NFTs and the metaverse is they were literally just rebrands of worse versions of stuff that already existed but, regardless of how you feel about what it does, gen ai actually Does do something. even if you don't want it to be it was a legitimate technical breakthrough. unlike "what if adoptables were on the blockchain" or "what if second life was shovelware"

[fairycosmos]

theres a big conspiracy theory going round that you can be horribly flawed and also genuinely loved. crazy if true

[perplexingly]

Don't be shackled by the idea that going out can only be done with a group of friends, learn to feel comfortable going alone [remembers that encouraging consumerism isn't progressive] into the deep dark woods

[filmphotofranz]

[kosmogrl]

[wormsdyke]

it would be so nice if you were allowed to start working on projects before you hit the 12 hour until deadline mark but sadly it’s not possible with our current technology. scientists are hard at work but for now this is one of the limitations we must face as a people