CURATED @zecchou - Tumblr Blog

also we have GOT to collectively come to terms with the fact that me or any other stranger online disliking or even making fun of something you like is not saying “no fun allowed” “no one can ever enjoy this” you have simply got to grow a spine and be able to like the shit you like. you don’t even have to defend it! like 90% of the media i really enjoy is divisive and half my friends actively hate it. i really don’t give a fuck though because i like it. you can write whatever you want! you’re allowed! even if it’s MY least favorite genre or style of writing and i have active distaste for it!

#r #yall have got to learn to have tolerance for being uncomfortable or disliking things

depsidase

homunculus-argument

in Finland, it is illegal to kill a bear when it’s hibernating. If you ask a hunter why that is, a number of them will tell you it’s wrong simply because it is the law, and they don’t make a distinction between what is right, and what is legal. Most people like that are perfectly normal, decent and respectable people, just like the rest of us.

But if you ask people who think about things, the answer is vague. Killing a hibernating bear would just feel… impolite? You can’t fucking shoot a man when he’s sleeping, that’s just fucking rude. It’s just not the right thing to do.

Long before hunting laws were established in Finland, you couldn’t kill a sleeping bear, and what commands you is something older than law: tradition. Even at a time when hunting was a matter of life and death, and a bear fighting for its life is mainly a matter of death, you just didn’t kill a hibernating bear, you have to wake it up first. Hunters risked their lives, the lives of their brothers and everyone in the hunting party, who were friends, family and men that they loved, to give the bear a fighting chance.

In the modern time, the hunting season of bears is in the summer, for the warmest summer months. There are many reasons for why they are allowed to tread safely in autumn and to sleep in peace through the cold months, almost all of which are rational and scientific, and do not touch the old traditions.

Old faith says a living thing has many souls - henki, luonto, itse. Plants only have one - the one that wills them to grow. Animals have two, both the spark of life and nature that enables them to act. A human being also has the third, one that makes them a person, personality, itse, literally “self”. But the soul that travels in your dreams is not the soul that defines a human - animals have that one as well. When your dog runs in her sleep, her soul is elsewhere, where a dog is needed.

One’s waking soul is elsewhere when they sleep and dream. A bear’s soul is somewhere else when they are hibernating - there are two words for “hibernation” in finnish, one of which is talviuni, “winter sleep”, and that is the one that bears have - and if you kill a sleeping bear, their soul is not in the body, it is still out there, and it can find you, and as a revenge for killing its body, Ghost Bear will kill your entire fucking family.

deaththeforgottentaboo

Through the windows of the space station, Maria stares down at the ruins of earth. The scorched domain of humanities cradle reflected in her eyes.

A stack of papers slammed down next to her. “More stuff Arthur wants erased from the database.”

Maria looked up to Justin and asked rather directly, “Do you think Arthur’s gonna bring us home one day?”

Justin stared down at her and smiles. “I know he will. He has to.”

He looked down out the window. “It’s all we have left.”

Maria opened up the logs and said with a heavy heart, “You’re right. You’re right.” The next purges were early antiquity. She knew it wouldn’t end here. Arthur was giving this to them in doses. They could accept some small chunks of the world vanishing forever, but now eras were vanishing. She knew what to do.

She knew what Arthur would ask her to do.

She took all parts of the database that wouldn’t be immediately useful, and eradicated it.

Technological context, historical minutiae, ideologies, works of art grand and beautiful. It was all gone in an instant. She pondered how all of human legacy could be gone in two keystrokes. Then she printed out the deletion files and handed them to Justin. His face paled, then he organized the documents, taking them to the emperor-to-be.

Maria looked out of the window again to earth. It was all she had left.

#r #go read my friends' short form writing for our mecha blog #its apocalyptic and depressing <3 #ennui of gaia

sergle

ok so this would be my vision for the cigarette cake x

prokopetz

The author's poorly disguised fetish

The author's proudly displayed fetish

The author's fetish you're pretty sure they don't realise they have

The author's fetish which they're firmly convinced everyone has and is just pretending otherwise

The author's non-sexual special interest which just sounds like a fetish because of their habitually unfortunate phrasing

The fetish the author is making a well-meaning effort to cater to in spite of clearly not understanding it themselves

The author's fetish that never quite makes it into the text because they keep getting sidetracked by the requisite worldbuilding

The author's utterly pedestrian sexual preference which the text treats like a bizarre fetish because they've got shit to work through

The author's seemingly innocuous recurring trope they're going to have a personal revelation about ten years down the road

The author's fetish you missed on a first reading because it's so far out of pocket, it never occurred to you that you could sexualise that

#r #legendary

nickyandmikey

when two musicians sing into the same microphone and lean in very close to each other… like omg are you guys gonna kiss now to relieve the homoerotic tension?😳

nickyandmikey

THIS IS NOT ABOUT ONE DIRECTION I DON’T KNOW WHO THIS “HARRY” PERSON IS GO WATCH BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN AND CLARENCE CLEMONS KISS ON STAGE RIGHT NOW

irrelevantlyvalid

op is the only valid person i’ve ever met. everyone else needs to come to the light

chokolattejedi

Okay, but this is really important: Bruce Springsteen occupied this really weird place in music history. His songs were all from this pessimistic, nihilistic view of an America that had let him down:

Just like the anti-Vietnam War protest songs that we associate with the 1960s, or the early nihilism that spawned punk music in the 1970s. But he didn’t *sound* like a punk anarchist; he sounded like a country rock singer. When he released Born in the U.S.A. people completely misinterpreted (or possibly ignored) the lyrics in favor of the tone of the music.

Politicians used his music to promote their ‘Murica Yes! brand, and he had to literally explain that that was not what he was about. He’s over here asking when we’re going to have jobs and heathcare, not stanning the politicians who weren’t helping the people.

It was also kind of a big deal that he had an integrated band, because even as late as the 1980s music was still kind of segregated and MTV was straight up racist. They refused to play and promote black artists and then claimed that were no black artists in the first place. Michael Jackson’s record company had to threaten a boycott of their white artists to get MTV to play his Thriller video.

Plus, the first black/white interracial kiss on TV was in 1968 (OG Star Trek). Also it took us until the 70s to get sympathetic gay characters on screen, and the 90s to get gay characters to kiss onscreen. And all of those firsts were met with outrage.

So keep that in mind when you see Bruce Springsteen not just playing with an interracial band, but engaging in an interracial, gay kiss on stage repeatedly.

Passages from American Popular Music by Larry Starr and Christopher Waterman

executeness

I used to think that Bruce and Clarence kissing onstage was exuberance, showmanship, and telling racist homophobes to fuck off. Like, they picked up a certain kind of audience and went “Racist homophobes? Not in our house!” And started the kissing then but then I actually looked it up and

https://www.gq.com/story/this-fucked-me-up-bruce-springsteen-singing-about-clarence-clemons

It was a story where… we remade the city. We remade the city, shaping it into the kind of place where our friendship and our love for one another wouldn’t have been such an exceptional thing. - Bruce Springsteen

It wasn’t about showmanship or rejecting bigots or anything it was just. Damn right that was one of the loves of his life and damn right he was going to kiss him onstage

It gets me a little that Bruce has had a divorce, that he’s been married twice, but he loved Clarence for the rest of Clarence’s life and will presumably love him the rest of his own

Clemons said in one interview. “Bruce and I looked at each other and didn’t say anything, we just knew. We knew we were the missing links in each other’s lives. He was what I’d been searching for.” In another version of the story, Clemons says “He looked at me, and I looked at him, and we fell in love.”

I’m having some emotions about it!

“He was elemental in my life,“ Springsteen adds, “and losing him was like losing the rain.”

Not just! I love you pure and deep and true but! I am going to love you like that in front of the whole damn world!

We have fewer narratives about taking risks and making statements for platonic love rather than romantic and supposedly it would be easier to downplay this onstage than romance and! They refused! They fucking refused! In front of hundreds of thousands of people, over the course of years! In the spotlight, in word and deed, I love you!

God I’m not okay about it

ramshacklefey

Now I’m mad that this is not among any of the things I was ever told about this artist.

jbbartram-illu

I knew about this in general (& via all those fabulous photos), but this just adds even more beautiful context <3

eregyrn-falls

Just to add to the pile: this was the cover of Springsteen’s break-through album Born to Run, in 1975:

I mean, will you LOOK at this:

This was the pic chosen for the album cover from an extensive photoshoot, too. A few others:

There’s a lot more online if you search. They’re all pretty amazing. But the photographer is right, the one chosen for the album cover just pops.

#r #long post #history #music #bruce springsteen #clarence clemons

jareckiworld

František Kupka (1871-1957) — A Thought [oil on canvas, 1923]

mech pilot

#r #vkei #dir en grey

sldgefactory

櫻井敦司

#r #vkei #buck-tick

warmfigure

i am massively overdue for a very very good week where not a single bad thing happens and everything is easy

unlettered-heathen

reblog to give prev a very good week where not a single bad thing happens and everything is easy

myfootyrthroat

When the health food store unionized, something wild happened that I thought was just a goofy one-off, but makes more sense now.

There was a big push to eliminate "degrading jobs" but the strategy was to eliminate the position, then create a new position outside of the bargaining unit to do the work. So like, we wouldn't have dishwashers, but we'd have people who washed dishes that weren't eligible to be in the union.

I was like A) what the actual fuck? Dish washing isn't "degrading", it's fucking vital. B) What the actual fuck? You want to create a union just to exploit different people?

There were enough of us to be like "Absolutely the fuck not," and put a stop to it, but I was absolutely flummoxed that people involved in a union would say that out loud. Working with more leftists now, it makes sense.

myfootyrthroat

I think it was coming from a background that viewed labor as necessary to accomplish anything, but advocated for the equitable distribution of the gains made by labor... and then being thrown in with people who just thought labor was icky.

The first time someone told me that busing tables was "degrading", I was like "Oh, uhh, yeah, like it's very necessary work but under compensated for how vital it is?" and they responded "No, touching plates that other people have eaten off of is disgusting."

But I want to eat off of clean plates. So somebody is going to have to touch/clean those plates. And I respect that person and want them to be able to afford to live.

official-torfmoor

Those people sound like a guy I'd make up to be mad at.

myfootyrthroat

I mean, that job definitely had a Truman Show vibe. If they hadn't been in-person interactions, I'd think I was getting trolled.

myfootyrthroat

Just to put a bow on it:

In bargaining, someone on the Union side suggested that we eliminate all the cashiers and exclusively use self-checkouts (they were a cashier and didn't like it). The organizer told them that the union wasn't in the habit of eliminating bargaining unit positions. (This is the same person I've talked about how said that "as a prison abolitionist" we just needed to execute most criminals.)

When I explained holiday scheduling (time off requests granted in order of seniority, shifts assigned in reverse order of seniority). Someone was angry and said that time off requests potentially being denied "wasn't in the spirit of the union". When I pointed out that our departments made like 30% of our annual revenue between Thanksgiving and New Years and that required production staff to be working, they said that we just needed to create a class of positions ineligible for the bargaining unit that wouldn't be able to request time off. (Which again, most of us figured we'd just rotate holidays or something, but assumed that some holiday production was mandatory.)

bees-and-mice-and-frogs-and

I was on leftie tiktok (as a creator) for a bit and I saw this attitude there as well. I specifically remember one argument around cleaners where someone said that employing a cleaner was, like, ethically bad, and that "after the revolution" we wouldn't have cleaners.

It got me thinking, along with Ann Russell talking about how to treat cleaners (being a cleaner herself), about how we conceptualise domestic service as particularly degrading in all its forms, when, really, why is that? Why is paying someone to do something intrinsically bad?

Like, even in a moneyless, gift economy society, there would still be people whose primary contribution to their communities would be cleaning. Some people like to clean, and are really rather good at it.

I've talked ad nauseam in the past about how British attitudes towards cleaners and other service based positions today are the descendants of Victorian attitudes. That is, both the attitudes of conservatives and many progressives of that time. The trade union movement was particularly exclusionary towards service workers.

I think people on the left thinking about forms of labour can sometimes be worse than people on the right. People who have taken these positions generally just conceptualise them as something you need to do to get by, and there are particular employers where these positions are degrading but in general the jobs themselves aren't.

myfootyrthroat

Yeah, that really sums it up. There's stuff that needs to get done, so I'll never be of the opinion that it's degrading work. I worked in kitchens for a long time, and every other position is reliant on having clean dishes, so nobody can really be "above" washing dishes. The shitty thing about washing dishes or busing tables is how people treat the people doing it. The work itself is vital.

And some of those jobs are like, sure, you can throw almost any warm body at it and get it done adequately, but you still run into people where you're like "Holy shit, you're good at this."

leebrontide

People doing a job most people don't want to do should be paid MORE in order to get people to do it. That's how it would work if we weren't mired in a schema assuming that less-frequently-desired jobs are the province of people who "can't do better" and "deserve" poverty because they have less value as people.

toreblogallthethings

Peer reviewing the tags: #these attitudes are also why ppl are weird about sex work#and weirdly enough visibly disabled people working - like esp thinking of like#places that employ ppl w LDs as workers and volunteers#what they FEEL is 'these people make me uncomfortable'#and they say 'they shouldn't have to do that'#so the solution is. no visibly disabled people getting to work#the fact that. they want to work. and want jobs#is irrelevant#too many people base their politics off their like. gut feelings of discomfort and unease#which are completely disconnected from both practicality and actual morality

#r #long post

rylandgraces

there’s a friday ass vibe about this wednesday boys keep your wits about you

textpostscymraeg

mae 'na ffwc o deimlad dydd gwener am y dydd mercher hwn bois peidiwch â cholli'ch pennau

dagenssvenska

det är en jävligt fredagig vibb på den här onsdagen grabbar håll era huvuden kalla

#r #legendary

fullmetalfisting

Tbh germ theory DOES sound crazy. Like if you told a regency-era nobleman that tiny creatures lived on the surface of everything and THAT’S what causes consumption, they’d be like “ah, I see you are a lunatic. Would you reside in my hermitage? Rantings and ravings do so amuse my guests”

mysteryteacup

But if you told a Medieval person this they would probably go "Ah, so when the miasma settles on surfaces it gains evil life. I understand."

alarajrogers

Yeah, actually, it would probably be pretty easy to explain germ theory to a Medieval person as tiny evil spirits that live on everything, but they can be purified by soap and water, or by alcohol, because that is why God has granted us those things. And because they can float in the air, if you cough or sneeze after they have infested you, that can cause them to infest others. And when you are sick, the angels God has deputized to defend the bodies of His beloved children are at war with the evil spirits, and, sadly, sometimes they lose, but the best way to help your angels win their battle is to rest, drink plenty (this would probably be small beer in this time period, not water, because the water was also infested), stay clean, and for the sake of God do not allow anyone to let your blood, for the angels need that blood in their war against the evil spirits. Bloodletting is good for some types of illnesses but not the kinds caused by the tiny evil spirits.

chekhovs-raygun

boiling as a sterilization measure is also easy to explain. water returns to the air when heated and it rises as steam back up to the floodgates of heaven; we know God created the world in seven days, He's not up there making more water every time it rains. it circulates. the returning of water to heaven also purifies the water of unclean and malign influences. you know wormy water from a muddy puddle will kill your kid. you know you wouldn't wade into a bog and have a slurp. water that remains in the low places of earth absorbs all that is unclean from our waste and it may also sponge up new diseases from hell, we're not totally sure about that one, but it seems likely. God set up the heavenly water cycle so that the earth's waters wouldn't totally fill up with gunk.

what does this have to do with boiling your surgical tools? well look, the boiling water releases bubbles of steam which carries the malign influences up to heaven. you boil a knife, you send all the miasmic particles off with the steam to heaven. if you rinse the knife off in a bucket the water isn't hot enough, the particles go into the water and then right back on to the knife. you gotta boil it to get the particles all the way away. how can a tool or rag or a bed have miasmic particles on it when you can't smell them? humans have a lousy sense of smell. look at your dog on the hunt. are there no rabbits in the woods just because you can't smell them? we know that miasma is carried on the air, and is what makes stench so dangerous, and we know that humans can't smell worth a damn compared to dogs cats horses etc. a dog can smell if a rat died in a corner of the room last week. you can't. do you think licking the spot where the rat died is going to go well for you? luckily, what humans lack in snout we make up for in brains. we have extra brains where our sniffers should have been. God set that up for a reason.

and why does a rinse with wine spirits work? man, look how fast alcohol evaporates. my guess is that because wine contains a lot more vice than water, it evaporates a whole lot faster, in sort of an equal and opposite way that a rock falls faster than a feather. if you want the miasmic particles to get off there FAST, you dunk it in something that's going back to heaven at a gallop.

what's up with honey? it just preserves things against corruption. doesn't clean them off. honey doesn't evaporate at all. probably because bees don't sin. it's not good for ridding a tool of particles-- it's sticky-- but fine for preserving anything you don't want to go to heaven OR hell. this is why you wash the wound with wine spirits or purified water FIRST, to sluice the miasma out, then slap the honey on AFTER. and boil the damn bandage, too. you wouldn't put a rotten door in a sound doorframe and expect it to keep out bandits, would you? cmon.