The Void

Unfortunately the bots HAVE evolved to mimic the absolute genius of a url and title like mine. However, they have not yet reached the level of self-awareness to write this kind of description. Happy Halloween.

[whichstaresback]

This is a vent blog first and a dump for all the posts I want to save but not see on my dash second. There will be personal issues and potentially triggering subjects including child abuse, suicide-adjacent stuff, self harm. Not really interested in followers, but just don't be a jerk about what I put here. If I put something on your post you don't appreciate, let's talk it out.

[whichstaresback]

I would be a much worse person than I already am if I were less/not capable of admitting that I don't know things or that I was wrong. Like. Morally. And intellectually.

[whichstaresback]

Her: I am once again asking that you be able to read my mind. The fact that you answered the question I asked and not the question I meant is offensive.

[maoist-adachirei]

il_2539

[beardedmrbean]

[ophilosoraptoro]

Behold! The printing titty!

[sunder-the-gold]

I normally tag these posts “specific ass machines” after a minor meme that blew through Tumblr, but I was tempted to tag this one “specific boob machines”.

[ahallister]

(Artist meow25meow seems to have had their Twitter account nuked and I cannot find any other original source to link to.)

[muckmagister]

disappearing into the bathroom at the club only to reappear covered in decorative printing patterns followed by a 10ft lady wearing bowls as a bra

[obliviasart]

*chef's kiss* but also oh god her poor back

[ure-0i-art]

[eldritchdilf-deactivated2025061]

Contrary to popular belief the biggest beginner's roadblock to art isn't even technical skill it's frustration tolerance, especially in the age of social media. It hurts and the frustration is endless but you must build the frustration tolerance equivalent to a roach's capacity to survive a nuclear explosion. That's how you build on the technical skill. Throw that "won't even start because I'm afraid it won't be perfect" shit out the window. Just do it. Just start. Good luck.

[writeswrongs]

I was supposed to give a speech to over a thousand people today at a labor rally, but the rally was planned mostly around white union organizers who have not been to ICE recently or maybe ever. I say this because they planned this as follows: a Rally, with a march to ICE, followed by a second half of a Rally, the second half of which was to include my speech, which seemingly was the only speech to include a Salvadoran migrant speaker.

I was not originally invited to speak, but heard last minute that someone else had fallen ill and was giving up their slot, and begged white organizers through the grape vine to let me speak as a Salvadoran migrant and union steward who came to the US at age 7.

I have long been soured of going to so many rallies and felt alienated that they were allegedly for or about my people, but that no one had thought people /like/ me exist - we are still here! There are migrants in your work spaces and neighborhoods and organizations, we have stories and labor songs and speeches to share, we are marxists and labor organizers and have reasons to speak out too.

But seldom if ever do you hear our music or faces or voices near the banners. Instead of Tigres Del Norte we heard Bella Ciao, and none of the singers knew the Italian words or bothered to even translate them, so they sang nanananananana, instead of the powerful lyrics that maybe meant something once to someone somewhere. Instead of Somos Más Americanos we heard Don’t Worry, Be Happy.

Instead of a Salvadoran woman who wanted to speak to the American union workers about the Banana workers unions, we heard from a dozen white people about democracy, and justice, and the constitution, and no one was warned about what would happen if they marched down the street from the park to the ICE facility. They fully expected everyone to come back and complete the second half of the rally.

Instead, marchers with their dogs and children were tear-gassed to hell and back the second they dared get close to the facility, maybe at best 1/3rd of the marchers returned while the rest were bottlenecked towards ICE. There was little to no water to treat the untrained protestors. I returned to the rally quickly realizing I could not get caught up at ICE, knowing who I am and what awaits me.

When I got back a chorus of smiling white faces sang a silly song like a Christmas carol with their heads bobbling, reading the lyrics from some handed out papers. White people with upside down flags cheered. Then a black woman in overalls abruptly got on the mic and said “Well thank you everyone but we have to close the program early because people are getting tear-gassed, please get home to safety righty away,” - and I swore I couldn’t believe my ears.

They had brought us all here, marched all these people down to the ICE facility, and expected us all to march back without encountering teargas? And then when some people had made it back they had them sing a little jingle but turned the one migrant away? I begged them to let me speak for the three minutes I had allotted, noting that I had put myself in serious danger to come out here today. That I needed to be heard just this once, and that all the white people had their fair turn to say many unrelated things, and to sing many unrelated songs.

She said, “you don’t understand, there are children down here,” and I had to say “you don’t understand, there are children in the camps.”

And she tried again, “yes but the gas is spreading,” and I said “yes we have been down here being gassed for six months, don’t you understand?”

She blinked twice and told me they just had to break down. I watched from the sidelines as they continued to blare Caribbean Blue and smooth jazz while people filtered out, stood around talking, chatting - finally I said, “please let me speak, you still have speakers going, it’s been 20 minutes,” and the DJ, a white elderly man in a sweater vest who had a strict “only the classics” policy that seems to actually mean “no hip hop and no curse words,” - barked at me that he had to break down and to help him take down his canopy. I am no maid, so I did not listen. He then turned to my comrades and told them to take his canopy down, which they did not. Then turned to his two other labor organizers who were not paying attention, and they took a leg of the canopy and moved it somewhere without breaking it down.

And one looked at me and said quietly, “it’s okay, take that bullhorn no one will notice,” and we took it and ran.

And we ran to a firetruck which I climbed, and I gave the speech, which was in fact more than 3 minutes, sorry not sorry, to a crowd of workers who were slowly pouring out from the ice facility, some stopping, some going, some who heard me, some who didn’t. And I gave it there and it was the only speech most of these people will ever hear from a migrant in all of this, and I think that is tragic. But I firmly believe that had I not given it, had I not climbed the truck, had I not taken the mic, some people would have never heard this story at all. And I think very much you should hear it. And I hope you will share it, if you have the chance. And I hope I get to tell it again, someday, to people who actually listen, to the masses who came to actually support immigrants, and not just to the dredges after they’ve been gassed and are running for shelter while I’m coughing myself.

This is what I had to say.

[transcriptroopers]

Transcribed for accessibility + added links for context, but please still watch/listen to the speech if possible. A live speech really resonates. Begin transcription.

Olivia: I came to the United States when I was 7 years old. And I became a citizen when I was 20. But I am on this stage to ask: if you will give me 3 minutes of your time, *cough* I will give you 300 years of American History that has been taken from you.

There are five crops that changed the world as we know it. Bananas. Coffee. Tobacco. Sugar. And Cotton.

First grown by slaves in the New World, these crops all happened to also grow in a little bean-shaped country that my parents lived in near the Caribbean called Cuzcatlan, ‘The Land of Precious Things.’ It would be renamed El Salvador in the 1800’s. 

But the precious things remained after the name changed. And the people were captured, and they were forced to work for pennies on the dollar to dredge the precious things from the soil, and the sea, and the mountains, and the sand. Cuzcatlan was not precious just to us, you see. It was coveted by the Americans. And once they saw our jewels, they would never be satisfied again. 

The people suffered. And how we suffered! Dying in the fields, raped by their masters, buried in the shining black volcanic sands, their blood fertilizing the crops.

Of Bananas. Coffee. Sugar. Cotton. And Tobacco.

Until one day, the people of Cuzcatlan said, ‘We can bear it no more.’ And they broke their shovels in half, and they plunged the stems into their masters, and they rode through the streets on their masters’ Spanish horses, and they cried out that Cuzcatlan would no longer belong to the American companies that demanded their precious things without paying precious prices. Perhaps, soon, those business leaders would learn to negotiate for the labor and crops they so needed.

And the Americans? The Americans could not stand it! They would not abide such a story be told. And so you never heard it! The American companies, and all of their corporate masters came down on Cuzcatlan, with a fury seldom seen before. They killed everyone.

Instead, you heard a story about “Communists” and “Terrorists” in Central America, spreading a disease that would destroy your country and families. You heard a story that we have no good will towards you. That we wanted you to starve, that we were lazy, and formed gangs, and were lawless, and wore weapons to sell you drugs and fund terrorism. 

But you never heard the story of Cuzcatlan, because it was a sad story, and sad stories do not sell fruit, and coffee, and cigarettes!

No, they came to my country, and they wiped out entire villages. The Archbishop, Don Remar - er, Don Romero, himself, was shot by the military during his Sunday Mass, for having dared to wonder whether the workers deserved some mercy. Assassinated for having dared to wonder, and he was left bleeding on the pulpit, even as worshipers bowed their heads. 

EVERYBODY was KILLED. 

EVERYBODY! The women, with their children still in their arms. Anyone looking for cover; people who found cover, people who didn’t. People who worked, and people who had no jobs. Communists. Catholics. Those who didn’t know how to read, those who didn’t know what labor rights were. Simple folks. Smart folks. 

And they didn’t stop there. They went through the countryside, and they killed everyone they thought was hiding labor organizers or communists sympathizers. Banana union men and women, who they labeled terrorists. And in one village, we still only speak about in whispers, called “El Mozote.” The Americans tied women and children to trees, and they threw their babies in the air, and they shot them. Everyone was killed, to send one message, and that is: “A union is a threat to the American Empire. Not one union man or woman will hide in your village, or any other. And if you hid one here, now or ever, you will never breathe to hide one again."

And I tell you this because I am you from the future. You and I, all of you, are very much alike. You worked very hard to ply the precious things you have from the ground, the sky, the water, and the aether. You all wrote stories, you filed insurance policies, you taught children, you rung people up, you made sure whatever sorry system they had worked, not because you believed in it, not because you wanted it, but because it was all you could do. 

And in exchange, they offered you cheap bananas. Coffee. Sugar. Tobacco. Bananas.

But I will tell you a secret. They were never cheap. They were precious. And so are you. 

And they stole you, and they stole us, and they stole it all, and they told you: if you look the other way, you get to be satisfied and at least well-fed. But who can afford the luxuries of cigarettes or vapes or groceries anymore? Even that is being taken from you. And even if you have them, your food or your small pleasures won’t satisfy you. Not more than knowing the truth about Cuzcatlan, not more than knowing the truth about El Salvador. Today, where our precious land once stood, they built a concentration camp called CECOT. And not just for our precious things, our people, but yours. Your citizens, your dissenters, your unwanted disappeared into the hole that America built. 

And what will we do when they start building incinerators at the camps? What will you do when they open up mass graves? 

For our people, the most precious gift of all: do not take my warning lightly. The story of Cuzcatlan is not just from the past. It is from the future. The workers face the same enemy, and the enemy never had your interest in mind. From the moment they had you, the plan was to have a worker. From the moment you existed, it was to create another soldier against the people of Cuzcatlan and the rest of the world. You were a commodity to them. 

But we have written you a new future. One in which we no longer point guns at each other. One in which our billionaires fear the land of precious people from learning they are no longer precious things. 

Turn to me now! And tell me you will not forget the last three minutes. You will never again be ignorant of this story. And you will not let it happen here. You will close the camps. You will destroy ICE.

Spectator: Yeah! Olivia: You would rather have seasonal bananas or never see one again than have it covered in blood. 

Spectators: That’s right! Yeah! 

Olivia: You would rather trade fairly with other union workers than kill your fellow man, wouldn’t you? 

Spectators: Yes! Olivia: Tell me you love me, and that our fates are tied! Tell me you’ll stop them from dragging me down from this place, and I’ll never let them do to you what they did to us. I promise. El pueblo unido…

Spectator: JAMÀS SERÀ VENCIDO!

Olivia: Nunca será vencido. Amen.

End Transcription.

[sometiktoksarevalid]

[1989nihil]

the fact that the captions didn't translate gora pakoda is a crime!

gora means somthing along the lines of fair skinned, or outright white

pakoda or pakora is a fritter made with various vegtables in a gram flour batter and then fried

gora pakoda thus means white fritter and is often used as a term of andearment for white people or as mild, but friendly insult (depending on context)

[stayoutofitnick]

[charlesoberonn]

White boy shocks tiktoker by cooking in perfect Indian.

[sedlex]

Impeccable music choice here:

[emeraldhyacinth]

On the American broadcast, about five seconds after the music started the announcer said about the woman, “she lists her hobbies as ‘forgetting things’ and ‘existential crises’”, and I can’t imagine a more delightful one-two punch

[duckbunny]

"historically people had servants" incorrect. historically people WERE servants, and many of us still are.

[teachagainstfascism]

i just have this persistent feeling of “i’m not doing enough” combined with “i don’t have the energy to do anything” and it just really fucking sucks

[darkskinwomen]

In 2026, Ilia Malinin made headlines for landing a backflip at the Winter Olympics after the move was officially re-approved under updated competition rules.

But this moment did not come out of nowhere.

In 1998, Black Olympic skater Surya Bonaly executed a one-foot backflip at the Nagano Winter Olympics, officials had deemed the move unacceptable at the time. She completed it, on one blade, in an iconic defiance of standards that repeatedly limited her innovation and expression.

What governing bodies labeled as “not allowed” in 1998 is now celebrated as history-making in 2026.

Bonaly’s backflip wasn’t a mistake or a gimmick. It was skill, athleticism, and vision, long before the sport was willing to reward it. And while rules may change, her contribution should not be erased or reframed as an afterthought.

This moment isn’t about taking anything away from today’s athletes.

While Ilia Malinin is being credited with making Olympic history in 2026, the truth is that Surya Bonaly made that history in 1998.

Her one-foot backflip was revolutionary then, and it remains iconic now.

[thestarlightforge]

*sighhh* (AP News)

[gothgerry-deactivated20251121]

having poor circulation is great because people will touch your hand and go 'oh! you're so cold!' and for a moment you get to experience what it's like to be a vampire in a romance novel

[the-overthinktank]

I feel like it's a really common trope to have a non-biological entity disgusted by squishy bio things like secretions and flesh and stuff but. Wouldn't they utterly lack revulsion to those things? The reason we are repulsed by things like blood and shit and corpses is because they are intimately connected to our bodies, are uncomfortable reminders of our animal mortality, can be vectors of harm, or are a signal of danger. A being made of energy, metal, or plastic does not have the same sympathetic connections to these things that we do, except as a kind of intellectual sympathy for what people they care about fear. Disgust is repulsive, and you can only repel something if it's close to you. I think the things that viscerally repel a non-biological mind are not going to be biological.

[the-overthinktank]

Hmm... Maybe not as extreme as a corpse, but if you handed someone composed of mostly metal an extremely corroded piece of copper, I could see them reacting like you just handed them a very moldy orange.

To reach "handed a decomposing roadkill squirrel" level, maybe give them something with identifiable parts similar to what is in their body, like corroded circuit boards, batteries, wire connectors. That's a more direct reminder of mortality.

[aphotic-4]

OP can GET IT

[whichstaresback]

Sorry to vent first thing Christmas morning, but it sucks that my present from my mom was irresponsible viral contagion. She could have prevented this by masking up and sleeping in a separate room, but I'm stuck on this road trip with her on holiday. I syold have stuck to my guns and stayed home.