the soviet union was not communist

in real communism everyone is equal. the instant there is a superior class, it is no longer communism. communism does not let people starve en masse, because everyone has an equal share of resources. i have had multiple people who were born in communist countries tell me that russia and the soviet union were never communist, and neither is china.

everything western society knows about communism was told to them by capitalists. if a fascist tells you freedom is wrong does that mean freedom is wrong? no.

the soviet union, russia and china claiming to be communist is the same as america and england claiming to not be fascist. its a lie made to control, because a controlled population is easy to exploit.

america and england insisting that communism is a dictatorship is not far removed from america and england insisting that they themselves are not fascist despite killing millions of people and still funding genocide to this day (if america stopped providing the bombs to israel its unlikely the palestinian genocide would last much longer, or at least not be as severe as america allows it to be).

dont listen to the fascists who tell you human rights are the real fascism.

God damn it. One of my least favorite things about being on tumblr.com is the fact that someone is always going to say the main point of my post back to me as if I wasn’t saying it in the first place.

This is definitely a phenomenon specific to this platform for me, but that might be because this is the only social media where I actually write things a bit longer. I have no idea, maybe other sites have this occurring too. But for me, it’s a Tumblr thing.

Basically it feels like no matter what I do, if my posts “breach containment” as one might say, I can seemingly never words things in a way that won’t have somebody at some point re-blogging where they say “ACTUALLY…..” and launch into a slightly reworded but fundamentally IDENTICAL main point a different way than I said it. 

It drives me up the wall. Of course, the solution is to just ignore this and move on with my life. But it’s so hard. I try to be so extremely intentional and clear and detailed with the language that I use when I’m writing. When somebody has so egregiously not comprehended what I’ve said that they think that I’m not even saying the thing I’m saying, well it really gets under my skin. And I know right now we’re in that whole space of being judgmental about other peoples reading comprehension skills, but when you’re on a website for 13 years with this continuously occurring in large and small ways, it’s hard not to notice over and over.

And I might think it was a “me thing” if I didn’t see it crossing my dash happenening to other people all the time as well.

Anyway, it’s pretty much a weekly occurrence for me to wake up and see something in my notes where somebody starts their post with a big ACTUALLY and end it with a thing that makes me think “yeah, no shit that’s what I was saying the whole time.”

Using the internet and technology with high needs autism

I have been trying to put this into words for a while, but due to the exact thing I am making the post about, it has been very difficult.

First of all, a short (ish - I am not the best at concise) background of me and technology: Used to play games on dad's phone, and later watch YouTube videos on family tablet (with parent restrictions). However, ability to navigate devices was very limited, and if something went wrong I just panic and give to an adult.

We used computers a bit in school for work and educational games. Every time we went to the "computer area" I would cry because I knew I wouldn't be able to find the webpage on my own, or sign in to something, or type in a word document. At these times in school, usually another pupil would just sigh loudly and then come and do the computer thing for me over my shoulder.

I had an MP3 player that I got for I think my 8 or 9th birthday. The only thing I knew how to do, was play music and google search. But I still didn't really understand what a "link" was, or how to find important information. We were supposed to learn online research skills in school, but nobody ever explained the most simple stuff to me, so I lack the basic knowledge.

I got my first phone at age 10. This was when I also first get Instagram, my first social media (parents set up for me). I was in a group chat for my school year, but the only time I put a message there is when mum asked me to ask a question, about a non-uniform day for example. Nobody interacted with me in there, and apart from the messages I don't know how to navigate the app. I posted a few pictures a few times, but only when someone else recommended, and I didn't interact online.

I have poor language comprehension, slow processing and take longer to learn new skills. My computer skills and especially typing skills are majorly behind my peers. I have slowly learned some skills allowing me to be even on Tumblr in the first place, but I still need a lot of support and it makes me very anxious. Part of my difficultly on social media, is the social interacting part. Mostly due to low interest.

But my biggest challenge is poor comprehension. I get very anxious and upset when I come onto Tumblr and all the posts I try to read don't make sense to me. Especially when the post is about a topic I care about - if I read it and I can't know what people mean, then I will just be very upset for the rest of the day.

Second biggest challenge, not being able to express opinions on important topics. Often, I can't even understand something. Then, I can't form an opinion because it's too complex. Or, I have an opinion, but I don't understand if someone agree or disagree with me from what they write.

I work so hard to gain skills and learn enough to even be here, and then all I can find about people like me is other people arguing about our existence. Want to express my frustration at this. To even write this post I had support from mum, and it takes all my mental energy.

It is true that I have low interest in socialising - direct impact of autism. So social media maybe not best place in the world for me, by default. But I still want to understand and be included. Not be treated like place to just ask "am I counting as high support needs". I don't understand even my own needs enough to answer this for myself - I definitely can't answer for anyone else.

A lot of my challenges, come direct from autism. That's just a fact. Wish it was easier, very often. But also wish it was easier online - I can't be part of outside community, only online.

I post here to express thoughts and feelings, that is also just what this post is doing. I did less big big edit on my words this time, wanted words to be closest to how I think it (don't think in words so not possible to show abstract thoughts direct, but closest to first translation).

Are you, perchance, a 2013 BBC's Sherlock veteran

No particular reason I'm asking

I watched it and I think I probably reblogged a few things back in the day because I had mutuals who were into it. But I don't recall ever really feeling like I was in the fandom myself.

I'd guess that you're asking because you've recently read my Good Omens essay and your next question is about whether I was a supporter of The Johnlock Conspiracy, and the answer is a hard nah. At least to me personally, all the textual and meta-textual evidence made it abundantly clear, even a decade ago, that the show was not only inhospitable to queer fans, but actively and deliberately hostile towards them (one recalls that utterly mean-spirited depiction of what Steven Moffat thinks a "fangirl" looks and sounds like, as well as more than one occasion when he and others involved with the show mocked fans/fandom/fanfiction in interviews, on camera, with their actual human mouths). I do vaguely remember coming across people on tumblr in those days who were convinced that there was something else going on, that somehow Moffat was going to suddenly change his tune and start loving them back the way that they loved his show, that they would be rewarded for their faith by having their ship made canon, but that seemed extraordinarily unrealistic to me and not based on any concrete facts.

Now, don't get me wrong -- wishful thinking can be really fun, and you're not hurting anyone by hoping for the best and daydreaming about a happy ending. That's just basic human nature. But when someone shows you what kind of person they truly are, pay attention. Balance dreaming with prudence, and don't put all your eggs in one basket--or, rather, don't pin all your hopes on one stranger's artistic decisions.

Part of me wants to say that Steven Moffat is one of several significant contributors responsible for the deep-rooted media trauma that still afflicts thousands of fans today (consider how so many people watching the first season of Our Flag Means Death as it aired were utterly convinced that it was going to queerbait them and exploit their sincere, heartfelt desire for a queer love story on screen, the same way that nearly every other show had done already. So many people met that glimmer of hope with cynicism and pessimism, because when you've been not just disappointed but outright punished for wanting something, the natural trauma-response is to assume that you're not going to get it until you're proven wrong, because that's the only way you can protect your bruised, exhausted heart.

It is true that Moffat's cruelty to the fans of his show contributed to our collective media trauma. However, it is not the only thing that has done so: Particularly in America, we are in the midst of a literacy crisis. Schools have been failing us for more than two decades: They have increasingly failed to teach nuanced reading comprehension and to adequately equip young people with robust and agile critical thinking skills, and this means that an entire generation has been robbed of the tools that would help them to protect themselves from the psychic damage of media trauma before it happens. Moreover, it means that many people now insist on looking to canon to "legitimize" their ships, as if their own interest and enthusiasm was not sufficient. Instead of feeling empowered to reimagine the stories handed to us in order to suit our personal needs, we give away our power into the hands of strangers who do not feel any ethical responsibility to care for their audience as if the audience is a guest in their home. And thus, we get hurt. Media trauma is real, and it sucks.

To return to your original question, no, I don't consider myself a veteran of BBC Sherlock, because I wandered through town, saw that it wasn't worth the fight, and left before the war started.

Remember: In literary criticism and in science, you don't do good work by cherry-picking evidence that supports your pet theory; you do good work by assembling all the data and asking what theory would unify them into a cohesive whole. And if you're really good, you make the effort to be skeptical and look for evidence that might disprove your theory, and you invite others to check your math, because at the end of the day, you are a beautiful, imperfect human and sometimes you make mistakes.

i usually love your blog but i have strong and conflicted feelings about your recent opinion about reading comprehension et al. this has been a public service announcement, thank you for your time.

Is the public service "informing me that people I don't know and whose opinions I'm not invested in don't like a post I made on tumblr.com?" Because that's not actually interesting information to me.

This one has been surprisingly controversial! OP made a post saying it was ableist and discriminatory to talk about reading comprehension and media literacy being good things, and thinking it was a bad thing to only consume media for children into your adult years. As somebody with all of those opinions - who talks about that stuff pretty regularly on my blog! - I felt like putting out there that I thought that was a rotten take, that reading comprehension was not beyond the reach of people with intellectual disabilities or people who struggled in school, that implying they were actually WAS kind of ableist, and that not developing those skills leads to all kinds of bad outcomes, from thinking your ignorance contributes as much to a conversation as someone else's expertise to just run of the mill racism and other kinds of bias.

I don't think you need to be constantly engaged with the world in your best, most curious way. I don't watch Next In Fashion over dinner because I'm trying to be challenged. It's fine to just want to chill with a simple, feel-good pleasure that doesn't ask too much of you. But if that's ALL that you're doing - to the extent that you're making posts about how calls for media literacy are tantamount to saying you're better than people who had a hard time in school (!!!) and a desire for a more educated and curious world is biased against people with intellectual disabilities (!!!) - hey, maybe you need to take a second to think about that one! Maybe you're saying something real fucking stupid, wrapped in the kind of language that makes Tumblr cream its shorts.

If you disagree with me, uh, that's fine I guess, but it's weird that you "usually really like my blog." If you think I was mean about it, like, I could have been a LOT meaner, but whatever, I'm comfortable moving forward into the rest of my life with your disapproval. I promise I won't lose any sleep over it.

Ever since Kit Connor was forced to out himself due to accusations of queer-baiting, hetlors love to bring it up as a take-down against gaylors. They'll come into TikTok comments and Tumblr asks and be like, "what about that kid from Heartbreakers?" (they do not seem to care enough about Kit to learn his name or the show he is known for). They've hear, from a distance, that an 18-year-old was outed because of Twitter discourse and assume that this is the same thing that gaylors are doing to Taylor Swift.

But it's not. It's not the same thing. At all.

If the people bringing up Kit Connor took the time to understand the context of what happened and why, it would be glaringly obvious that these things are not at all the same. They're virtually opposites.

Kit was accused of queer-baiting, and while definitions of words change (I know about linguistics), queer-baiting was coined as a word to describe pieces of media whose creators purposefully hint at queer relationships in order to retain their queer fanbases (think Supernatrual/Destiel, Teen Wolf/Sterek, etc.). People (mainly youths on Twitter) accused Kit of queer-baiting because he played a bisexual character in a TV show and was then seen with a female friend. These absurd claims were the result of fundamentally misunderstanding queer experiences and identities outside of the internet. Most of these accusers were likely too young to have witnessed clear examples of queer-baiting or understand why it's harmful and why queer people call it out. Kit wasn't queer-baiting. He was an actor who hadn't labeled his sexuality (something he discussed in interviews). He was 18, in his first major role, getting a slew of unanticipated media attention, and his privacy was violated. He was forced to out himself because people refused to listen to him, refused to consider that choosing to not label their sexuality (especially a young person!) is a thing that queer people do sometimes (frequently).

So how does this relate to Taylor Swift? (Spoiler alert: it doesn't.)

Taylor Swift has been releasing music since she was 16. She is currently 33 years old, more than twice the age she was when she started. She has been massively famous for the majority of her career. Taylor is rich. Taylor is powerful. Yes, she's a human being, but we (the general public) typically only see what Taylor chooses to show us (there are few exceptions to this, though they definitely do exist). Taylor encourages analysis of her music, public appearances, and promotional material. She has a highly skilled PR team (shoutout Tree Paine).

Kit Connor was outed because people cling to the belief that straight is the default. If someone doesn't explicitly come out in a way that is fully comprehensible to non-queer people, they are assumed straight. This is a belief rooted in homophobia. "Speculating on someone's sexuality" isn't gross. It's been a necessary part of queer life since the inception of homophobia.

Queer flagging isn't new. There are documented codes and symbols and phrases that have been used for decades to identify yourself as queer without making it obvious to straight people and homophobes. Friends of Dorothy, hairpin dropping, a variety of flowers (violets, carnations, lavender).

Queer artists have been encoding their queerness into their work. Emily Dickinson likely coined the term bearding by using bearded pronouns—using masculine pronouns for herself or her female lover in poetry. She wrote "from the male perspective." Reading her poems about Sue Gilbert Dickinson, it's glaringly obviously gay—romantic, sexual, queer. And yet, to this day, her queerness is erased from the narrative. It even happens to Sappho. And all these years later, the presumption of heterosexuality dominates analysis of art and music.

The "hetero until proven homo" philosophy has lead to queer erasure for centuries. Taylor Swift has consistently used known queer codes since the 1989 album (see: New Romantic, Wonderland, the I Know Places tour performance, How You Get The Girl). When these songs, etc. have been pointed out as being literally queer-coded, Taylor hasn't backed down. She's stepped it up. She wrote "you could hear a hairpin drop" in Right Where You Left Me, queer people pointed out that "hairpin drop" has implications involving important queer history, and then she did it again in the Great War ("your finger on my hairpin trigger"). She intentionally subverted a common phrase, and it wasn't accidental. Queer people claimed Dress as a sapphic song, and Taylor used excessive bisexual lighting in her performance and then dedicated that performance to Loie Fuller, a queer artist. She wore a blue, purple, and pink wig in the You Need To Calm Down music video, on a production set drowning in LGBTQ folks perfectly qualified to tell her those were the colors of the bi pride flag.

There are countless examples of Taylor Swift using historical queer symbols and pride flag colors. These are symbols she actively chooses to use. She isn't stupid.

You know what Taylor Swift hasn't done? She has never said she is straight. At most, she has implied it. She hasn't said people saying she's gay makes her uncomfortable. She hasn't stopped using queer symbols or themes.

Before I really became a gaylor, I spent a lot of time wondering if it was weird or invasive or gross. But is it weird to read her lyrics? Is it invasive to look at publicly available photos of her? Is it gross to think that Taylor Swift isn't straight?

No. Obviously.

We're not trying to "force her out of the closet." We barely think she's in a closet. She is so loud to the people who are listening, who understand what she's saying, to other sapphics.

I'll end with this: When Taylor Swift and Karlie Kloss were photographed at the 1975 concert, I refused to believe they were kissing. The only reason I didn't believe it is because I was a homophobic 15-year-old. I clung to her being straight because of my internalized homophobia, because I needed the one non-Christian artist I listened to to be morally pure. And that's what this is about. Homophobia, internalized or otherwise.

tl;dr: Taylor Swift is speaking loudly about her queerness to the people that are listening. She has made queer references and doubled-down on them when people pointed them out or claimed it must've been accidental. Assuming people are straight until explicitly stated otherwise is rooted in homophobia. She is a fully grown adult who controls the narrative of how people see her. What if I told you none of it was accidental?

social media is now rampant with lando's quote on oscar pushing him more than he's been pushed in the past two seasons, and of course, we have the obligatory full-grown men who have zero critical thinking skills and the reading comprehension of the average six-year-old whose parents don't deem it necessary for them to practice reading at home.

there's a lot of talk about how lando (and oscar) only got points in aus because half the grid dnf'd, but that is a skill in itself. to avoid crashes and not working the car until it gives up, says a lot about a driver. i would also like people to remember that the 'only driver to get a mclaren win in a decade' got a win in a race where both lewis hamilton and max verstappen dnf'd. if we're nitpicking lando getting points in a race where a merc, a williams and a ferrari dnf, we have to do the same for monza '21 (i'm not including the mass disaster at the end of aus '23 because lando would've been in the points regardless).

then there's sochi. yes, people who hate lando love to bring up sochi. especially considering how he's the only f1 driver in the sport's history to make a mistake and lose the lead. he's the only driver who has been annoyed during radio comms. he's the only one who ever does anything remotely wrong on track.

people don't have a leg to stand on when it's about hating lando and so they make up stuff. they cut audio and video to make it seem like he's misogynistic (is the tumblr that did that still popular? are people still salivating at them and the fact that they're a beyond fucked up person?), they take headlines that have been cut from his quotes and make it seem like he hates his fellow drivers (lewis fans love doing that). they manipulate, cause for some reason, they can't stand lando and the fact that he is talented and skilled, popular, and that daniel didn't "send him to fe" like they all thought he would. reverse uno on that.

but you know what? the fact that sochi is the only thing people can throw around to try and demean lando, after he has been in this sport for over 4 years, is absolutely fucking fantastic.

i can't wait to see him blossom even more, and to keep hearing about how the top teams want him 🫶

I seriously think I’m speaking to a three year old because there’s no way you can be older than a toddler with how stupid you are. If you are older, please consider going back to school because you’re not gonna get far in life with your lack of common sense and underdeveloped brain. There is no way you can call me illiterate when you literally started your reply with, ‘not you’re mad’ and ended with ‘stay one that Jujutsu Kaisen season two’. And in your first reply you did get your ‘your’ and ‘you’re’ mixed up - you used ‘your’ when it should’ve been ‘you’re so scared’. Now please tell me if that made any sense. Take your head out of your ass and admit how much of an imbecile you are.

Love don’t worry about if I have a job or not, I know I am and will be fine but it’s you that you should be worried about right now. I don’t think you can get a job with your stupidity and illiteracy - no wonder why you read manga, bro just follows the pictures and ignores all the actual writing. Please do yourself and everyone else a favour and log off of Tumblr and every other social and pick up an actual book.

Oh come on now, don’t be a coward and avoid my question. I’ll stop bothering you when you either answer what media you are planning to consume soon or admit that you putting a Gojo spoiler without any spoiler warning and under a Toji tag was idiotic and insensitive (even though you strongly disagree - I’m sorry I didn’t know we had a new Joker over here- not that you have the IQ to be able to pull that off). I’m sorry that I’m the only honest person in your life to say you are insensitive. I bet you don’t even know what that word means given that your literacy and comprehension skills are very limited. So I’ll help you out a bit (because I doubt you can even spell it) and give you a definition, ‘insensitive’ (an adjective) - showing or feeling no concern for other’s feelings. A synonym would be ‘inconsiderate’. You can’t prove me wrong that those words don’t describe you. It was a big spoiler and I know it because you were probably crying over it and in your post you literally say you’re not ‘reading jjk anymore idc’ - therefore, you had no right in spoiling it for others, get that into your thick head and small fish brain.

I’m sorry I didn’t know you were a sheep and posting spoilers without warnings because, ‘literally everyone on here isn’t’. Are you that daft? Just because everyone isn’t, doesn’t mean it’s not wrong. Bro are you saying that if the purge happened and everyone was out wreaking havoc, you’d do the same thing and still say it’s not wrong? Are you a child that doesn’t know right from wrong? Please for the love of God, for your own future and safety, go back to school.

TLDR: stfu and tell me your opinion when you have a present dad x and sorry if this was too much writing for your bozo self to process mwah.

I think I'm speaking to someone who dropped out of school, like literally dropped out of school in the 7th grade. Because if YOU'RE SO SCARED OF SPOILERS WHY ARE YOU ON TUMBLR?? LIKE I FUCKING SAID YOU PEOPLE HAVE SERIOUS ISSUES. IF YOU DONT READ THE NEW CHAPTERS THEN THATS, ON WHO??? ITS ON YOU. and why are you harassing me about my spelling?? Bitch it's fucking Tumblr, I'm not writing a thesis, a research paper or even a fucking essay. If I wanted to write a whole fucking article and then yes I would make sure that my spellings of both 'your' and 'you're were correct. However IM NOT. AND IDGAF. So why tf would I care if I spelt something wrong or mixed a few words up???. You bitches are talentless, jobless, bored and can't fucking read nor write and still live with YOURE parents in their BASEMENT. AND WANNA COME AFTER ME BECAUSE YOU GOT SPOILED. BITCH I DONT CARE IF YOU DIDNT READ THE CHAPTER AND FOUND OUT GOJO IS DEAD!!!!! BECAUSE SOCIAL MEDIA HAS SPOILERS E V E R Y W H E R E. DONT COME ONLINE AND YOU WONT GET SPOLUED THEN YOU FUCKING ASSHAT. YOUR mother must have dropped your special ass on the head as a baby, because why are you at YOUR grown ass age GOING ON DIFFERENT PROFILES TO HARASS ME ABOUT A FICTIONAL FUCKING CHARACTER. I just fucking know you don't take baths OR EVEN WASH THAT FUCKING FILTHY ASS OF YOURS. it's fucking disgusting that YOUR Neanderthal ass came on here to give me a hard time because you what??? Can't keep up with the chapters when it releases??? Not my problem fucktard. And I'll tag my fucking posts with whatever I want. And I did answer your question, I said and I quote I don't care sweetie. So why don't you go to sleep and roll over on that cockroach infested ass floor mattress you sleep on every night. Roll over and go get caught up to the new chapters. Imagine trying to harass someone because YOU live in a section 8 apartment, with 15 other family members, have roaches and rats crawling all over you while you sleep and mad at me. NOBODY GIVES A FUCK ABOUT YOU!!! I'm just sure YOURE a fucking foster child whose mother and father left your Crack baby ass in foster care. Because there's no way that someone who had a loving, family or SUPPORT SYSTEM IS THIS BOTHERED. AND IF YOU'RE SO FUCKING BRAVE WHY WERE YOU POSTING ANONYMOUSLY??? GET A LIFE YOU SMALL BRAINED, LONELY, PATHETIC, NEANDERTHAL ASS BITCH. I HOPE YOU TOSS AND TURN ON THAT FLOOR MATTRESS YOU SHARE WITH YOU 8 SIBLINGS EVERY NIGHT.

and stop coming on my page, mad ass., stupid ass, MONKEY ASS BITCH.

How is tsuki part of the anon hate?? For all I know she just answers to asks and translates the aot manga panels since she's a Japanese speaking person. You two have different views but she has never mentioned your name ever.

Are you threatened by the points she makes so that's why you want Levi stans to block her because she actually writes good analysis you don't want anyone else to come across so you want them to block her? If not, then why would you want anyone to block her.

You're a grown woman for fuck sakes, act like it. This fandom drama is stupid and especially targeting Tsuki who only keeps to herself. Smh

The other people you mentioned I don't know so I can't speak on their behalf but Tsuki doesn't deserve this. Anyone can check her posts and see how respectful she is.

Also do you know you interact with a known Levi x Eren shipper named V_onth on Twitter who is the one who has been writing hate messages on ao3 to Eruri fandom. She was also writing anon hate on curious cat telling people to kill themselves while posing as an Eruri until she was recently caught out to be a liar who only wants Eruri to have a bad reputation because she's threatened by the ship popularity and that it might surpass ereri. She was even banned from other Eren x Levi shipping fandom spaces on discord when she was found out. She's unhinged and is mentally unstable. Taking things too far. She even has about fifteen alt accounts on Twitter where she dox eruris and other Levi x Eren shippers who disagree with her. She's now on Tumblr as 7m7n7. And yet every Levi stan interact with her. Whether ignorantly or not. Idk

You guys are gullible enough to believe eruris are the ones sending you those vile messages when it's vont who has simply migrated to Tumblr to play the Eruri weird shipper all over again. I don't know whether you're on Twitter or not but if you are or if you have a friend who is then they can easily verify.

The two eruris you posted that were harassing you did not write anything that shows they're capable of telling someone to slit their wrist like the one who has been sending anon hate for months now did. Do you really truly believe they are capable of the hell rain that that anon brought down?

I guess you'll keep being a gullible person played by that ereri until you find out the truth. Until then I guess she can keep playing you guys like a drum.

I never said tsuki was "part of" the hate, just that their followers are. Which, they are, unquestionably, and that they know, at least to some extent, about it. I never accused tsuki in my post of sending anon hate, just their followers, because, again, that's proven.

You really aren't too bright if you think I'm "afraid" of their posts and that's why I made the post I did. I made the post I did because the harassment has been non-stop, really, since the end of last year, and I'm sick of it. People can read tsuki's posts and agree with them all they like. Again, I think you should maybe learn to read more carefully, because I never said tsuki was sending anon hate, but they have been without doubt vague posting about me, which is clear from their posts and how they align with my own. This isn't paranoia on my part, it's evident using simple logic. If you think they haven't been referring to me, whether by name or not, then again, you need to work on those reading comprehension skills of yours. Not everything has to be explicitly stated in order for the meaning or intention to be clear.

I don't know about any of that mess you're talking about with some Levi/Eren shipper posing as an eruri shipper, so , whatever. Unlike you, I don't have time to scroll through every social media feed in existence and track and trace every move made by randos on the internet. If that person really is a Levi/Eren shipper, I haven't seen them "pose" as you say, as an eruri shipper, but if they are doing that, or trying to cause trouble in the eruri fandom, then that sucks and they should be called out too. But if you don't think there's plenty of actual toxicity in the eruri fandom space, then you're simply living in denial. I've been harassed nonstop almost exclusively by eruri's for the past, several months, and that's a fact, not people telling me to "kill myself", but people like yourself who can't just drop the issue, who constantly monitor what I write on my blog and, within minutes of me posting it, send me messages screaming at me about how I'm "biased" and have a "black and white" view of AoT and how I think Levi is "perfect". And it all, magically, started when I was a little short with an eruri shipper several months back who, despite me asking them to please stop asking me questions which tried to get me to admit that eruri was somehow "proven canon" by nothing but, at best, vague and indefinite evidence, kept sending me asks, one after another, until I blocked them, and then, in their rabid obsession, continued to make more accounts to continue to harass me with. I'm not saying all eruri shippers are this way, but they're definitely there in the fandom, dragging the whole thing down with them.

If you're so offended by me calling out the toxic behavior of some people from that corner of the fandom, I have to wonder why? Maybe you're one of them, huh? In fact, I feel pretty confident in saying that you are, since you know I'm a "grown woman", which, I only ever posted about my age and gender ONCE, in response to an ask I got several weeks ago, really a few months ago, and which only someone who follows me would have seen. So, clearly, you're following me, for some, not all nefarious reason, I'm sure. Funny how so many of this anon messages I get constantly bring up my age and gender, too. Almost like it's all the same group of people making the same, stupid complaints over and over. Too bad, because I gave ample warning that I was going to do it, and yet, they just couldn't help themselves. This is the price you pay. You get called out and now everyone knows who you are.

Whatever. Next message you send, gets an automatic block and report.

A couple weeks ago I saw this post going around about 'techbros' not having critical thinking skills because they dismissed literature courses in school by saying 'it's not going to be useful in the real world'.

And while I see how this is a viewpoint that you can adopt I resent the way this post went further into this and lumped scientists and most specifically engineers in this group of people who lack critical thinking.

Because honestly? This is just an absolutely baffling take. Maybe your science course in highschool was terrible or perhaps you just dismissed the subject because you disliked it. (You know, what you are accusing your opponents of doing with English classes?) However one of the first and most important thing any decent science oriented course teaches you is critical thinking. You can not do science in any meaningful way without this because science as a concept relies on the questioning of information. Scientists create experiments to try and disprove their own beliefs and they change them accordingly.

I feel like tumblr and 'art-oriented' social media as a whole give a lot of importance literary subjects, often at the expense of scientific fields. This is probably because, by virtue of their very object of interest, (fan)creators on this tend to rely on their literary skills and interests to reach an audience. Disliking and not understanding science is treated as a funny quirk while at the same time lacking media litteracy/'reading comprehension' is underlined as a major flaw of tumblr users as a group. I follow a math blog that regularly has to block people saying they would rather kill themselves than work with/understand what their posts are about. That is not a normal thing to say to people!

I am not saying you have to enjoy science, as you will not make me start some literary pursuits I have no interest in. However you have got to understand that science is not your enemy. Science is people is thing is life is the world. 'Scientists' aren't making dumb or useless studies because they don't understand how the real world works! (Notice how this argument is reversed when compared to the way the Techbros don't want to read books because that 'doesn't appy to the real world'.) Deep critical thinking is not only a requirement of science, it is its entire functional basis!

Please. I am so tired of people on here looking at me and what I enjoy and saying that we obviously lack understanding of humanity because we don't write essays about classical authors. Read a scientific paper about a subject you have some interest in. Read a scientific paper about something you have no understanding off. Read On the Origin of Species (Darwin, 1859) if you must. A lot of scientific paper are available for free in open access databases (the internet archive scholar is what I found in 1 minute on wikipedia but there are many more). Understand the way other people think!

I'm sorry if this post is upsetting to you. I don't mean to attack anyone with this. I like seeing posts about things I don't understand here. But it's making me upset that the people who are leading society are dismissive of science and that the Public follows their lead. And saying that studying science strips you of critical thinking is neither true nor helpful.

Is blogging still relevant in the age of TikToks and Instagram?

The question of blogging's relevance has arisen as an engaging and thought-provoking subject in a digital culture dominated by fleeting TikTok videos and fascinating Instagram stories. While platforms like TikToks and Instagram provide rapid gratification and immersive experiences, blogging is still a potent tool for anyone looking to engage with their audience on a deeper, more genuine level. Today, lets explore the question ‘is blogging still relevant in the age of TikTok and Instagram’.

What is Blogging?

In the digital era, blogging has developed into a dynamic and significant medium that gives individuals as well as organizations a forum to express their ideas, exchange knowledge, and engage with a worldwide audience. Blogging, which derives its name from the combination of the word’s "web" and "log," first appeared as online diaries in the early 2000s. Since then, it has developed into a comprehensive communication medium that covers a wide range of subjects, from personal experiences to professional insights

Depth of Content

Blogging allows for in-depth exploration of topics that may not fit into the short and ephemeral formats of TikTok and Instagram. Blogs offer a venue for in-depth conversations, in-depth analysis, and long-form narrative whereas these platforms thrive in rapid amusement and visual storytelling. Blogs provide an unrivalled platform for depth and skill, whether it's a travelogue, a thorough exploration of a specialized pastime, or a thorough instruction.

Communities

Bloggers frequently establish devoted communities around their writing. In contrast to the transient interactions on TikTok and Instagram, these communities encourage bloggers and their fans to form long-term connections. A feeling of community and common interest that goes above the like-and-scroll culture of other platforms is fostered through comment sections and discussion forums on blogs. Compared to TikTok where users will spend most of the time on the ‘For you page’, users will follow their favorite bloggers to check on what is new and interact with bloggers and other users based on the topic or discussion of the blog.

Digital Data

Blogs are built to be search engine friendly. They are indexed by search engines like Google, making it easier for readers to find specific information on topics of interest. Because of this, blogs are a vital resource for anyone looking for in-depth information or studying certain topics, which helps explain why they are still relevant in the era of information retrieval. Blogger have also incorporated a variety of material types into blogs, such as podcasts, videos, and interactive components, has helped to bridge the gap between conventional blogging and contemporary media consumption practices.

Is TikTok and Istagram bad for blogging?

Don’t get me wrong, Instagram and TikToks are great platform for bloggers to share their stories. Each platform has its unique feature and audience. Since Instagram is largely a visual site, bloggers that can produce aesthetically engaging material should use it. You may exhibit your blog's topics by sharing high quality images and videos. You may produce longer-form video material or quick, interesting shorts to convey your blog content or way of life using Instagram tools like IGTV and Reels. TikTok is known for its short-form video format. Bloggers may use it to make attention-grabbing and educational videos that immediately draw in your viewers. The comment section on TikTok can be a fantastic place to engage with your followers and respond to inquiries about the subjects of your blogs.

In conclusion, blogging continues to be a relevant and essential medium for people looking to explore, educate, and connect on a deeper level, even if TikToks and Instagram have revolutionized the way we engage with material and social interactions. Blogging thrives in the digital age thanks to its capacity for depth, community-building, search engine visibility, and monetization opportunities, as well as its adaptability to changing content formats, complementing rather than competing with the current generation of visual social media platforms.

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Are you a Gold Star lesbian? (Just in case you don't know what it means, a Gold Star lesbian is a lesbian that has never had the sex with a guy and would never have any intentions of ever doing so)

So I got this ask a while ago, and I've been lowkey thinking about it ever since.

First: No. I am a queer, cranky dyke who is too old for this sort of bullshit gatekeeping. 

Second: What an unbelievable question to ask someone you don't even know! What an incomprehensibly rude thing to ask, as if you're somehow owed information about my sexual history. You're not! No one—and I can't reiterate this enough, but no one—owes you the details of their sex lives, of their trauma, or of anything about themselves that they don't feel like sharing with you.

The clickbait mills of the internet and the purity police of social media would like nothing more than to convince everyone that you owe these things to everyone. They would like you to believe that you have to prove that you're traumatized enough to identify with this character, that you can't sell this article about campus rape without relating it to your own sexual assault, that you can't talk about queer issues without offering up a comprehensive history of your own experiences, and none of those things are true. You owe people, and especially random strangers on the internet, nothing, least of all citations to somehow prove to them that you have the right to talk about your own life.

This makes some people uncomfortable, and to be clear, I think that that's good: people who feel entitled to demand this information should be uncomfortable. Refusing to justify yourself takes power away from people who would very much like to have it, people who would like to gatekeep and dictate who is permitted to speak about what topics or like what things. You don't have to justify yourself. You don't have to explain that you like this ship because this one character reminds you a bit of yourself because you were traumatized in a vaguely similar way and now— You don't have to justify your queerness by telling people about the best friend you had when you were twelve, and how you kissed, and she laughed and said it was good practice for when she would kiss boys and your stomach twisted and your mouth tasted like bile and she was the first and last girl you kissed, but— 

You don't owe anyone these pieces of yourself. They're yours, and you can share them or not, but if someone demands that you share, they're probably not someone you should trust.

Third: The idea of gold star lesbians is a profoundly bi- and trans- phobic idea, often reducing gender to genitals and the long, shared history of queer women of all identities to a stark, artificial divide where some identities are seen as purer or more valuable than others. This is bullshit on all counts.

There's a weird and largely artificial division between bisexuals and lesbians that seems to be intensifying on tumblr, and I have to say: I hate it. Bisexual women aren't failed lesbians. They're not somehow less good or less valid because they're attracted to [checks notes] people. Do you think that having sex with a man somehow changes them? What are you so worried about it for? I've checked, and having sex with a man does not, in fact, make your vagina grow teeth or tentacles. Does that make you feel better? Why is what other people are doing so threatening to you?

Discussions of gold star lesbians are often filled with tittering about hehe penises, which is unfortunate, since I know a fair few lesbians who have penises, and even more lesbians who've had sex with people, men and women alike, who have penises. I'm sorry to report that "I'm disgusted by a standard-issue human body part" is neither a personality nor anything to be proud of. I'm a dyke and I don't especially like men, but dicks are just dicks. You don't have to be interested in them, but a lot of people have them, and it doesn't make you less of a lesbian to have sex with someone who has a dick.

There's so much garbage happening in the world—maybe you haven't noticed, but things are kind of Not Great in a lot of places, and there's a whole pandemic thing that's been sort of a major buzzkill? How is this something that you're worried about? Make a tea, remind yourself that other people's genitalia and sexual history are none of your business, maybe go watch a video about a cute animal or something. 

Fourth: The idea of gold star lesbians is a shitty premise that argues that sexuality is better if it's always been clear-cut and straightforward—but it rarely is. We live in a very, very heterosexist culture. I didn’t have a word for lesbian until many years after I knew that I was one. How can you say that you are something when your mouth can’t even make the shape of it? The person you are at 24 is different to the person you are at 14, and 34, and 74. You change. You get braver. The world gets wider. You learn to see possibilities in the shadows you used to overlook. Of course people learn more about themselves as they age.

Also, many of us, especially those of us who grew up in smaller towns, or who are over the age of, say, 25, grew up in times and places where our sexuality was literally criminal.

Shortly after I graduated high school, a gay man in my state was sentenced to six months in jail. Why? Well, he’d hit on someone, and it was a misdemeanor to "solicit homosexual or lesbian activity", which included expressing romantic or sexual interest in someone who didn’t reciprocate. You might think, then, that I am in fact quite old, but you would be mistaken. The conviction was in 1999; it was overturned in 2002.

I grew up knowing this: the wrong thing said to the wrong person would be sufficient reason to charge me with a crime.

In the United States, the Defense of Marriage Act was passed in 1996, clarifying that according to the federal government, marriage could only ever be between one man and one woman. It also promised that even if a state were to legalize same-sex unions, other states wouldn't have to recognize them if they didn't want to. And wow, they super did not want to, because between 1998 and 2012, a whopping thirty states had approved some sort of amendment banning same-sex marriage.

Every queer person who's older than about 25 watched this, knowing that this was aimed at people like them. Knowing that these votes were cast by their friends and their families and their teachers and their employers. 

Some states were worse than others. Ohio passed their bill in 2004 with 62% approval. Mississippi passed theirs the same year with 86% approval. Imagine sitting in a classroom, or at work, or in a church, or at a family dinner, and knowing that statistically, at least two out of every three people in that room felt you shouldn't be allowed to marry someone you loved.

Matthew Shepard was tortured to death in October of 1998. For being gay, for (maybe) hitting on one of the men who had planned to merely rob him. Instead, he was tortured and left to die, tied to a barbed wire fence. His murderers were both sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison. This was controversial, because a nonzero number of people felt that Shepard had brought it upon himself.

Many of us sat at dinner tables and listened to this discussion, one that told us, over and over, that we were fundamentally wrong, fundamentally undeserving of love or sympathy or of life itself.

This is a tiny, tiny sliver of history—a staggeringly incomplete overview of what happened in the US over about ten years. Even if this tiny sliver is all that there were, looking at this, how could you blame someone for wanting to try being not Like This? How can you fault someone who had sex, maybe even had a bunch of sex, hoping desperately that maybe they could be normal enough to be loved if they just tried harder? How can you say that someone who found themself an uninteresting but inoffensive boyfriend and went on dates and had sex and said that it was fine is somehow less valuable or less queer or less of a lesbian for doing so? For many people, even now, passing as straight, as problematic as that term is, is a survival skill. How dare you imply that the things that someone did to protect themself make them worth less? They survived, and that's worth literally everything.

Fifth, finally: What is a gold star, anyhow? You've capitalized it, like it's Weighty and Important, but it's not. Gold stars were what your most generous grade school teacher put on spelling tests that you did really well on. But ultimately, gold stars are just shiny scraps of paper. They don't have any inherent value: I can buy a thousand of them for five bucks and have them at my door tomorrow. They have only the meaning that we give them, only the importance that we give them. We’re not children desperately scrabbling for a teacher’s approval anymore, though. We understand that good and bad are more of a spectrum than a binary, and that a gold star is a simplification. We understand that no number of gold stars will make us feel like we’re special enough or good enough or important enough, or fix the broken places we can still feel inside ourselves. Only we can do that.

The stars are only shiny scraps of paper. They offer us nothing; we don’t need them. I hope that someday, you see that, too. 

Interesting how everyone on Tumblr is slamming Sebastian Stan for playing Tommy Lee yet no one else is slamming other actors for playing real life murderers, corrupt politicians…any evil person really.

this is such a funny fucking take because like it's just so clear that you have absolutely no reading comprehension skills for why what sebatsian stan is doing is wrong

gather round y'all you heard it here you can't make any piece of media about anyone bad or else it's unfair to sebastian stan!!!!

there's a big difference in playing corrupt politicians where they are in that piece of media, corrupt

or murderers and serial killers in documentaries about their horrific actions

and glorifying tommy lee and his relationship to pamela anderson against her wishes and without her consent

tommy lee is not a figure with which we can't talk about long periods of our history without mentioning

he is simply not that important

and this show is not just about him but about him and pamela anderson who her and her kids were abused by tommy lee for years and she deserves to not watch the worst parts of her life be shown back to her in some glorified shitty entertainment tv

this isn't a story about the awful things tommy lee did

it's not a gritty biopic or documentary

it's shitty entertainment tv and at the expense of real people

not to mention that his admittance and defense of watching her leaked sex tape is so fucking gross

it is not source material or research but a blatant and disgusting disregard for her privacy

especially for seb who has publicly discussed being a private person it's fucking horrendous for him to turn around and do this and back it up as an okay thing to do

i'm not saying you have to hate him

but if you can in good conscience defend this show and his actions as they pertain to it you really need to think about that and readjust your morals and perceptions cause there's really no excuse for this

and on the subject of i know people have been saying behind my back why am i only talking about sebs role in this vs lilly james' too it's only because i was once a fan of seb and now am not

i was never lilly's fan really so me no longer liking or respecting her at all isn't a big shift in opinion

however i did really like seb stan and now have no like or respect for him personally after this being the end in what i consider to be quite a few things that i don't find justifiable or okay so i'm discussing him vs her

not to mention that this is quite literally a marvel blog

you aren't going to change my mind and you're not going to convince me that any aspect of pam and tommy is okay or that he 'didn't know better' or whatever he's a 40 year old man fully grown as fuck and there are consequences to actions

I started reading more Chinese web novels after I watched cql, and I used to stand in the middle in the whole mdzs vs cql mess, since I watched the drama first I just didn't really understand why it was such a big deal, but now that I've read and enjoyed more novels that are getting adaptations in the future... I get it, I completely get it, the thought of all these people thinking they are sooo morally superior for not liking problématique stories written by authors who only want to fetishize gay men and instead enjoying the watered down versions made by woke directors who said gay rights... it's terrifying, I feel like it has already aged me just thinking about it.

Hi anon,

I think it’s very normal for people, at first, to think of the situation as just another fandom wank of “why is it such a problem that some people prefer the series and others prefer the book?”. And if that was really just what was happening, it indeed would seem like the reactions on both sides would be out of proportions! Live and let live, enjoy and let enjoy; to each their own, no?

But the more you become exposed to the arguments, the more you understand what is really at the crux of saying the novel is bullshit and the series is a masterpiece, it’s where it gets more fraught. And that’s where you realise people are generally not making statements of personal tastes, or simply wanting to highlight what they liked in one of the properties, but making arguments that are moralistic and political, either about fandom, media engagement or media production in general. And that’s where you get a lot of disinformation, bad reading comprehension and lack of critical thinking skills, frankly mind-boggling takes on how media is produced (in China or otherwise), smear campaigns, and pitchforking couched under the veil of social justice--and, let’s not kid ourselves, a hefty serving of racism, orientalism and general cultural insensitivity. 

Honestly, I am still reeling over people who think of themselves as social justice/leftist-oriented people cheering at rumours that MXTX had been put in jail by the CCP because she wrote a book they did not approve--as if in this case the CCP would have been punishing her for ‘writing homophobically about gay people’ and not just, you know, writing same-sex relationships that feature sexual content. The only way I can make sense of that complete disconnect and willingness to cheer on state repression is that excerpt from someone who used to run a tumblr cancelling celebrities: “I just wanted to see someone face consequences; no one who’d hurt me ever had. There’s something almost quaint about it all now: teenage me, teaching myself about social justice on Tumblr while also posturing as an authority on that very subject, thinking I was making a difference while engaging in a bit of schadenfreude. “

Some of you know I’ve been working on a longfic lately (Naruto - KakaYama). It’s by far the most comprehensive writing project I’ve ever attempted. (Side note: I have finished the outline for half of the chapters and just that is at 25 pages.)

I know a lot of us are writers. I follow a lot of you who are far better at it than I am, but I also love how sharing experiences on tumblr helps people see that we’re all in essentially the same boat. Other social media platforms are about putting your best face out there while here on good old tumblr dot com we are all about putting literal garbage on display.

So in the spirit of that, here are some things that I am finding very challenging!!

1) Pacing - how do I decide when I want to do a time jump? what’s worth skipping? will jumping too much make the story feel choppy? do a I need a chapter break to do a time jump successfully?

How I’m working on it: re-reading fiction books I love and making note of how they handle this

2) Character description/world building - This is just something that I straight up do not have to do ever because I don’t write AU. But, for the purposes of developing my writing skills, I’m writing this fic like the readers don’t know the world or the characters. How do I sneak this stuff in in an organic way? How do I explain stuff without it being taxing on the reader? How do I cram backstory in and how much is actually necessary?

How I’m working on it: re-reading fantasy novels to see how much they explain how quickly and how much the reader has to figure out

3) Continuity/math - Wow I hate math so much. “ok so if they leave the village at x o’clock and it takes y hrs to arrive to the location then they get there at...3am. Well that’s no good. So I guess I’ll have them leave at z o’clock instead...but then it would be early morning and I already wrote that scene as a late afternoon scene?? So I guess they need to eat...breakfast, then...” I have 100 of these conversations with myself a day and it’s a living nightmare.

How I’m working on it: no clue still struggling here

4) Developing believable motives - I haven’t really written any “bad guys” before. I know what bad things I want to happen to my main characters, but backing into a motive that makes sense and humanizes the perpetrator is hard! I think I’m pretty much finished here, and a side effect is that I am now very sympathetic towards my villains (and if that’s not ‘Naruto’ then I don’t know what is)

How I’m working on it: asking my villain “why” over and over again until I have something that makes sense to me.

What do you find most challenging about writing?