please if you do anything useful in your life, don’t scroll past this
watch it
PLEASE
tchaikovsky is proud
In case anyone is baffled by this, there’s a Tchaikovsky piece in which there’s supposed to be a loud sound but he never specified what you should use to make that sound. People have done all kinds of weird shit depending on how they think the sound should, well, sound. Hitting a large piece of wood with a sledgehammer is a relatively conventional one.
TW: oldschool transphobia
The thing about “don’t use x term for x group” is this discussion really only exists online. Offline, there are many predominantly older people who identify in extremely individual ways that they spent decades fighting to be, that now get told they can’t
I know trans men that call themselves lesbians for so many reasons – maybe they never go on T or get any surgeries because its an intrinsic part of their identity and who they are to have the body they do – it bears scars of being in punchups with skinheads and police violence.
They never had the freedom to choose which identity they were – they were dykes for decades before we were born, and they’ve led the Pride parade with Dykes On Bikes and let countless queer women find safe haven in their home and cared for so many gay men as they died in the 80s.
They weren’t able to call themselves transgender. The language didn’t exist. The internet didn’t exist – I can’t stress how small each of our worlds was back then, how the flow of information was so slow and sterile. The idea of BEING transgender/queer DID NOT EXIST for so many.
You’ll see many older trans people that identify as ‘crossdressers’ or have zero intention of medical transition. They’re too old for surgery or too poor or discovered they were trans yesterday. They have ZERO idea wtf a truscum is, they have never heard the term transtrender.
Some get 2 hours a week that they get to wear the clothes they want to, then its back to being an elderly person with a homophobic/transphobic manager and family. Some get fired anyway for misunderstanding who can see what on FB – and older people don’t get employed again easily.
If a trans guy said they were a guy to a medical professional back then, they got put in an insane asylum. I know a guy this happened to. He’s not even that old. Once the asylum was shut down – the only escape – he accessed T by trading E with trans women in the same situation.
He is poor as shit, and he has dedicated his life and money to helping young trans men that come to the support groups he runs and tell him “You’re not allowed to say FtM anymore” and he has that term tattooed in his flesh as a medal of “fuck you” to society.
I know elderly trans women who are the epitome of grace and fire, for whom the term “transexual” was freedom from a cage. They, when given space, patiently point out to me that they are trans-sexual, not trans-gender, as they have always been the gender they are – woman.
Please educate and inform cis people of what the current expectations of them are in the current time in terms of terminology and thought. But you cannot then look back over your shoulder and say “oh and all the trans people that came before me – change your offensive identity”
The online community young trans people have access to is literally life saving, I know from experience. But I implore you to go to your local trans support group, and listen. Don’t interrupt someone – they know their identity better than you. See, and hear, and think.
You will learn so much. You will find things that sit uncomfortably with you, and these are amazing opportunities to confront your internalised transphobia. You may find people you feel might not represent The Community how you want to be represented- what a great time to reflect
on the importance of making space for every nuance and facet of our community, and consider ways that you may not have realised of being more inclusive of everyone. You may see people that might come across as ‘shameful’ to you – and hearing their story, you may come to
understand that the only way they are alive today is by doing whatever it took to survive, however ugly. You may come to the realisation that literally every trans-aware medical professional was taught from the ground up by these elders, who had to literally beg for treatment.
And, hopefully, you will come to find deep and meaningful connection and kinship with people older, wiser, sillier and stronger than us.
Please don’t tell them what they are.
While you’re here, I wrote a similar thread delving into the mental health stats of transmasculine folk and why they stand out from other LGBTIQ identities. This may help you frame older trans masc people in a new light.
TW: everything around depression+++
Adding here – if you feel like an older person is offending you with their outdated language, assume they’ve never heard of twitter or any conversations we have here, and say something like “have you heard why some people don’t use x anymore?”
They’re usually excited to learn.
(If a t*rf shows up, consider not engaging – we have such a wholesome discussion happening here and you deserve better than spending time and energy on someone who won’t listen ♥)
“The problem is
I still call myself a woman
and every time it drops from my mouth
the word feels like a bar of soap slipping
through my fingers,
fish out of water,
something I wish I could reel back into myself.
I call myself a woman and it feels like an accident:
like a six car pile-up just outside city limits, like
you were so close to home.
You were so close.
You could have been exactly
what they wanted you to be
when they wrapped you in a pink blanket,
when the doctor said girl and they were so happy.
But how could the word woman
feel like such a stranger
when I have been wearing it my entire life? The problem is
my gender is language I cannot speak, yet.
I go wide-eyed-jealous, sticky-handed child
reaching for the bodies of the strong-limbed boys
I have always wanted to look like.
I think of how many things I’d be willing to give up
so that I could look so long, so that I could look so flat,
look so sharp and so boy.
But my curves are something I am not ready
to be divorced of, yet.
I look down at my body and think
no, I will not abandon you. Not yet, not again,
not like the rest of them.
I think—Girl.
I think—Girl.
I think,
Girl, you have been unwanted in so many hands.
And I can’t turn traitor to my own powder pink.
I can’t bleed the woman out of my lungs.
I have tried.
She does
not
go
easy.
Instead, I wear woman like a coat two sizes too small.
It doesn’t fit, anymore, but it smells like home. When I was thirteen, all my daydreams
were technicolor:
taking these heavy, useless things
on the front of my body
and chopping them off with a hacksaw.
I say I want the reduction because my back hurts–
because they have crippled my body into
something unusable.
What I am afraid to admit
is I want the reduction
because I don’t want
them, anymore. What do you do when you are given the choice
between two costumes
and neither of them has enough elbow room?
What do you do when the word woman
is the only one that shares all the violence
that’s been done to you for daring to look so
sweet?
What do you do when the word woman isn’t
wrong—it’s just not the whole story?
And you don’t have a word for your story.
What do you do when you love that word–
woman. Girl. She. Her. Her’s–
but you don’t like how it looks on you.
But “he” just looks like it’s missing something–
the word man has never belonged to me without
woman in front of it. Sometimes
all these words feel like an ancient text
that don’t have the degrees to decipher.
They don’t make sense to me.
I don’t want them. But I live in a society that says
I have to be one or the other, that there is no
in-between, just accidentally mismatching
of body parts. At the end of the day, I have no quarrel
with my body—only the things everyone else seems
to assign to it. Only these words that feel useless
up against the person I have worked so hard
to love.
Only woman: ill-fitting as it sometimes is.
What I want to know, is
am I allowed to hold woman at arm’s length
and love it like my favorite dress?
Am I allowed to put it down
when it is too heavy
to carry?”
— QUESTIONS FOR GOD, OR JUST ANYONE WHO’S LISTENING by Ashe Vernon (via latenightcornerstore)
You’re almost done, there’s two sips left and then you can have another two cigarettes on the walk home and that’s comfort enough to make the rest fade. You turn and lean against the smooth walnut bar and raise the glass to your lips and it takes all of two seconds for your whole life to change forever.
It’s a gut punch:
his eyes on your eyes.
Dark. Intent.
He’s dressed in a navy blue uniform, one of many RAMC officers standing in the far corner. A matching beret sits on top of his neatly trimmed blonde hair. He’s tanned a sweet tawny brown and he’s watching you. Blood pounds up to pinch your cheeks and tingle in the very tips of your ears.
He’s been watching you, you can tell the instant your eyes meet.
He’s been watching you and his gaze doesn’t skitter, doesn’t waver, doesn’t flee. He’s been watching you and the way his gaze rakes over you, like two hot, smouldering coals, he sees you and he wants you.
Wants you.
Desire like the bite of a needle and the euphoria that unfurls through your veins after a hit, he’s all of these things and more. He’s a calm placid pool with untold fathoms stretching beneath. He’s commanding in a quiet way that makes you stand up straighter and take notice. He’s reined in and on parade and yet you catch tantalising glimpses through the veneer he’s painted. Glimpses of the heart of him. He’s soft jumpers the colour of marshmallow and biscuits with milk tea and that place called home you’ve never really known.
Across the room, he’s drenched in candlelight. He burns against the soot black window, the colour of the spirits cupped in his hand; the deep topaz gold of a whiskey neat. He has the same effect: heady, intoxicating. You watch as he licks his lips, drawing his tongue, deliberately slow, across the coral pink seam, and a shiver cascades down your spine: rippling. You watch him, utterly bewitched, as he tilts his head ever so slightly towards the door.
Write us a fic, whether long or short Write us a fic tonight ‘Cause l we’re all in the mood for some Johnlock now And you’ve got us feeling alright
Now John and his Sherlock are cuddling There’s only one bed, you know But they won’t be too quick to see each other’s dicks ‘Cause the burn it has got to be slow
Well the sexual tension is killing us And the misunderstandings are dire But we’re sure that they could be compatible If they’d only light true love’s fire
Oh, la la la, di da da La la, di da da da dum
It’s a pretty good hit count, for a Saturday And the kudos they give me a smile ‘Cause I know that it’s me they’ve been comin’ to read To forget about life for a while And the podfics, they sound like a carnival And the pub scenes they smell like a beer And we read in our car and reblog from afar And say, “Man, I just love bein’ here!”
“I never learned my Navajo language and I was never inspired to learn it. As I got older, I realized how valuable our language is to the livelihood of our Navajo Nation. ” -Dr. Shawna L. Begay
Our Navajo or Diné language is in danger of becoming extinct. Help us create and develop the first Navajo-English educational media TV puppet show, “Diné Bí Ná’álkid Time” which means ‘The Navajo Movie Time.’ It will inspire and teach our youth basic language skills using media as a technology tool. Parents, grandparents, children and grandkids can learn to speak Navajo fluently together within their own homes.
Long-time friends and educators, Dr. Shawna L. Begay and Charmaine Jackson have teamed up to create this new TV pilot for an all-ages audience or for anyone who wants to learn the Navajo language.
With your support, it’ll be the first educational Navajo and English puppet show that will teach and preserve the Navajo language and culture through digital media.
After several years of extensive research on the Navajo Nation, Dr. Begay recently completed her PhD from the University of Nevada-Las Vegas with her doctorate thesis, ‘Developing A Navajo Media Guide: A Community Perspective.’ As project director, she quickly realized she was a pioneer on the topic.
“When I decided what topic to study I realized there existed very little research in Indigenous educational media, especially with our Navajo people,” stated Dr. Begay. “As Navajo people, we have our own learning objectives and Navajo way of knowing is completely different for Euro-Western schooling. I decided that I had to research and develop our own curriculum guide that is meant to teach Navajo through media.”
Dr. Begay and Jackson, co-writers of the show, developed the first 3-puppet characters and plan for many more. The pilot features Nanabah-a young Navajo girl, Gáh (Rabbit) and Dlǫ̀ǫ̀ (Prairie Dog) who will go on endless adventures learning about language, gardening, the environment and the importance of family values. Nanabah is fluent in Navajo and likes to teach children about life on the reservation with her animal friends and special guests. Children who want to learn Navajo will also be an important part of the show by interacting with Nanabah, her friends and storyline.
Dr. Begay’s research concluded there exists very little research in the area of Indigenous educational media. Currently media is a very powerful tool that can be used to teach. She is cognizant of the digital age we live in and the opportunities to utilize media to revitalize the Navajo language.
“Star Wars and Finding Nemo,” dubbed in Navajo, was a great place to start and it has garnered national exposure of our language. However, we need a show based on our own Navajo learning principals our ancestors set out for us to learn and live by. I don’t think a non-Navajo, non-Native or non-Indigenous person can do that for us, nor should they. We, as Navajo, need to produce this show ourselves, if we are to be truly sovereign,” added Dr. Begay.
Both educators, Dr. Begay and Jackson, of Naalkid Productions have been talking about this educational language project for about the past four years and still have a long way to go to finance their dream.
“With the support of Navajo TV Anchor Colton Shone, our team of Navajo artists, filmmakers, family and friends, this video pilot is a huge step forward,” said Jackson. “Our journey has just begun and the big next step is finding financial support to create a whole new puppet TV series.”
We aim to raise $50,000 with this project which will allow us to continue with pre-production and production aspects of making this digital media project become a reality. We need your help to save our language by teaching Navajo to our future generations.
Pre-Production: -Script writing for the pilot show -Puppet Development/Creation -Casting for puppeteers and other talent that will be on screen -Hiring of all key cast and crew
Production: -Locations and permits -Rental of Studio space -Equipment: cameras, sound, lights, etc. -Cast and Crew budget
Despite all the notes on this post, they’re still at $13,155 of their $50,000 goal.
Another photo of the Navajos banning the swastika.
The document they are signing starts off: “Because the above ornament, which has been a sign of friendship among our forefathers for many centuries has been desecrated recently by another nation of peoples.”
[second paragraph] “Therefore it is resolved that henceforth from this date on and forever more our tribes renounce the use of the emblem commonly known today as the swastika or fylfot on our blankets, baskets, art objects, sandpaintings and clothing.”
“But I’m using it in it’s ORIGINAL meaning!”
Nope.
My respect and my heart goes out to the Navajo nation for the willing amputation of a symbol that belonged to them. I had no idea.
That’s some deep solidarity right there.
And they smile as they do it – give up something dear to them to stand with their fellow oppressed. That aspect is the most moving to me.
Ok, white edgelords. It’s time to stop pretending there is any “good” use of the swastika.
Imagine having control of more money than you could ever spend in your lifetime, and then going out of your way to try and bleed even more money out of people who can barely make ends meet. Imagine being the kind of person who could literally just spend all your days painting or writing or playing with dogs or helping to nurse orphan baby sloths, with no worry that you will ever lack the funds for housing, entertainment, health care, vacations, etc, imagine reaching that point, and then deciding you are going to work your ass off to screw everyone else over instead. You are going to spend your days bribing politicians so that you can charge some minimum wage single working mother an extra $40 a month for her ability to use Facebook. So that you can charge some uninsured kid so much for his insulin that he can’t afford it and ends up dying while he begs strangers on the internet for help. That’s what you want to do with your life.
I do not understand billionaires.
There are psychological conditions imposed by having a lot of money; it’s quite hard to imagine how or why a billionaire acts the way they do, because you have to orient your brain in a way that probably isn’t natural to it.
People with inherited wealth have a very strange view of the world and part of that really does involve the sense of being separate from other humans. We point out that they don’t have empathy; they would not be interested because they don’t recognise that we are the same species to even begin emphasise with. We point out that they are socially irresponsible; they don’t see any reason why they should care about your society. We point out that society cannot function in this matter: this is not a concern to them. They have not been raised as humans, really, so humans telling them “you should care about humans because humans” is met with blankness. the part where “caring” and “sharing” are rewarding to the brain is supposed to be programmed in by parents, to make the baby fit in with society and be loved. If the parents don’t have that mechanism, and it isn’t important that to them that strangers love and help their baby because of its inherent worth, (because the parents can simply pay strangers to do so), then where does the kid learn better? Their caretakers are not paid to teach the child how to love. And if the baby loves the paid caretaker too much, the caretaker will be taken away. So emotional appeals to the super-wealthy are a bit like asking a snake to herd sheep for you.
Not only that, but people with inherited wealth overidentify with their money. So they perceive our attempts at reason, and our emotional appeals, to be the yammering of scary creatures – rodents, maybe – trying to steal from them. Trying to trick them. We are only interested in their money, and we are coming up with all these tricksy plans to take it away!
And further, the human brain isn’t very good at the reality of numbers (we are best with numbers that we can comfortably count to.) So humans can usually conceive of fifty minutes, fifty people, fifty dollars, fifty apples, fifty days. We can understand the concept of fifty years, or imagine a room with fifty cats, or wince at the idea of fifty people being injured; if a scientist says there are fifty things, we nod happily. We know the shape of fifty dollars and the impact its gain or loss will have on our month. We can just about picture the reality of a “thousand”. We cannot really manage a million.
Billions are fake numbers. A human will nod politely, but will never understand. You have to break the billion up – “a billion dollars is forty thousand dollars spent every day for life!” – for the human to comprehend it.
The wealthy don’t perceive their billions either. They don’t comprehend them as a billion; they count numbers the same way as everyone else . They don’t drop a fifty in a homeless guy’s cup because they don’t feel like they have that kind of money (and also, fuck the homeless guy.)
Pretty much the only positive/affectionate thing I can say about Britian’s royals (apart from 👍Meghan Markle) is that they are reared with an immense sense of duty and social responsibility. This is an expectation of the nation, and the children are brought up accordingly. So even though they are a bunch of squinting gibbering lemurs, they are trained to empathise, to look human for the cameras, to hold pleasant conversations with everybody (even if the royal gives the impression of being an early design of chatbot while doing so), and to spend their lives doing Vaguely Positive Things for the Public. Even if they don’t have the mechanism where caring for people is rewarding, they can spend their lives miming it, because the world has tremendous social expectations, and royals are raised to meet those expectations since birth. Because we’ve all decided that the rich can do literally whatever they like, but the royal are still expected to have public appeal! So one set is deliberately trained to be approximately human, and the other is not.
It would be horrifying for Prince William to be accused of colluding with the Russian government; people around the world would consider it a personal betrayal. But a president’s children, apparently, may do so with our blessing.
So is it possible to be human and rich?
Well, there is an actual quantity of money that gives comfort and happiness; people research this. Below that number, you worry about money. When you reach the number, you are okay. After that number, it causes anxiety and outrage and feelings of scarcity again. Worse, because (like a cursed hoard of dragon’s gold) when the money reaches a certain size, then you stop having it because of the things it can be traded for (comfort, security, pleasure, happiness) and start keeping it for itself. Which is a toxic and terrible thing to do to that poor money…
So I think that wealth should be capped at that number and redistributed thereafter. It’s quite a high, happy number, but not an unreasonable one. It’s generous. A generous amount of money. And we will say gently to the crying billionaires, who will perceive this as us killing them, that it is for their own mental health. They were being cruel to the money, and it was a health hazard.
Beltainefaerie's Flights of Fancy 