Nah but my guys.

This shit

Is inexcusable. Any of you supporting them when those attached to them say *this* after gloating about a 115 dollar bag *for their honey moon*

And saying they are barely surviving and having trouble making content

Dont deserve your respect as a viewer.

This comment is a glimpse at their true natures whether you like it or not.

This isnt a hate attack. I have an inherent respect for life and the humans that live it. I respect that they are humans that do whatever they want of their own free will. Like yeah spend money. Do things. Live your life buy a house eat good healthy food.

But that is all a privilege. A privilege not many people have at the moment??

I am privileged. I work for my family as a caretaker(paid for by the state btw. My parents can not afford to pay me other wise). I cant buy my own food. I make "too much" to have food stamps. I live off of what my parents, who are also struggling, can provide. I live with my parents at 27 because working conditions and living conditions are so bad and i am so mentally ill i cant be on my own for my own *safety*. Just because i am able to live in relative comfort by the grace of my safety net doesnt mean ive always had that grace. And many *many* more people in the world dont even have the safety net that kept me off the street. I stole food from my old roommates because i was hungry and couldnt afford food. I was feeding my dog *my* food because i couldnt buy his food. I am 5,000 dollars in debt because i couldn't afford health insurance and went to the ER because i was going to end my life. I couldnt pay the 260 dollar bill i was sent so i just hoped and prayed it would go away and now its eating me.

I am also bad with money even when all my bills are paid.

I bought merch. I bought tickets to the live show. I did that because i paid my bills once and had enough to feed my addiction to solving my depression with buying tiny useless things. I know its not a good fucking idea. I know it is but im sure someone out there understands that you cant always control yourself when you arent fully present in your own life. I cant even leave the house because i *know* ill spend money and i *know* i cant.

And i thought i was supporting people who cared about their fans enough to atleast not say stuff like this.

I was staying subscribed to the youtube channel out of the hope that they would change their mind, see reason? Maybe?

But they wont.

This shows that they wont. That they refuse. That all good faith worries and criticisms mean nothing to them because We cant pay them to care.

So yeah. @wearewatcher @watcherfans these are the people you want to be and support, huh? Positivity is nice when you arent eating ramen. When you arent skipping meals to make yourself feel better for living off your equally struggling family. When you have enough around you to feel safe and secure enough to pay for something that isnt even worth the money you put in.

This isnt a post to get pity. This is a post to put in perspective the reality working class people face. What poor people face. What disabled people, who cant even marry or grow savings, face.

Please. Just think of humans as people and not just money and art.

hey i just need to make this post so i can link to it as like an about me/faq

just so i can have some info about me that's not like all up in your face bc who cares honestly but also so that dummies can read about who i am before sending "dont post about autism if youre not autistic!!" messages, u feel?

not that i get them a lot but i would def get them a lot LESS if there was a post like this to refer to

okay hi lets see

i am gay

actually im on the ace spectrum if u must know, thank u so much antidepressants ive taken since i was 7 years old...

i am trans (ftm)

speaking of trans i am legally male but am not able to change my name and have not yet transitioned medically in any way despite having socially transitioned almost a decade ago

ive known i was a boy my whole life because thats another question people asked i just got Very Good at repressing it

i am white!

yes i am a whitey who lives in taiwan, that is because i am an immigrant!

i have lived in east asia since 2018 and plan to be in taiwan forever

i AM... originally... from the US.... ughhhh fuckkkk i know righttttt

i do not identify as american lolololol

actually i dont identify with american culture in general because i wasnt there for covid and life kind of carried on as normal over here during covid so there's like this huge cultural divide between me and other americans now

i mean i dont identify as taiwanese either lol bc that would be... wild...

ok anyway

i am autistic

what else have i been diagnosed with lol astigmatism i guess

i have clinical depression and anxiety lol love that for me

i am colorblind

i have fibromyalgia and occasionally use a cane

i have a bunch of other learning disabilities and a bleeding disorder but jesus christ you dont need my whole life story

ive had ARFID my whole life and it gets dangerously bad sometimes and im also recently "recovered" from anorexia lets hope it stays that way

i was raised evangelical christian but now i have Trauma about it

im still spiritual and am somewhat involved in buddhism

i have trauma about family issues like a shitty dad and fucked up siblings and parentification, all that jazz

i am fluent in english and spanish but my mandarin is actually not that good (like enough to get around obviously but i cant read and write like at all)

oh im a teacher and im trying to finish my masters #privilege

idk what else is interesting

i travel a lot ive been to 15 countries

i grew up between the US and guatemala, i lived for a bit in cuba as a student, and I lived a year in china before i came to Taiwan

ok bye have the day u deserve

this is going to sound kinda Cunty™️ of me maybe but i just started my period and im pissed off so idc. i get at least one public display of asshole behavior a month i think. but there is something so incredibly and indescribably frustrating to me about waking up in more pain than i can properly describe because of my endometriosis and taking a few mins to scroll thru my phone in bed because this happens multiple days per month so i know its gonna be A Whole Ordeal trying to drag myself upwards and out of my room to take my meds and seeing on my instagram feed (via Playbill i think?) that another big popular broadway show will be shutting down soon and checking the comments expecting, for some stupid reason on my end, to see people being like "goes to show what a serious financial and health situation the average population is going thru in the US right now if all these uber popular shows cant stay open", but instead seeing literally hundreds of people writing "WHAT IS HAPPENING WITH BROADWAYYY OMG" and 90% of the replies to those comments being 'IKRRR ITS SO SAD WHATS GOING ON'

like FULL offense but are you actually fucking kidding me right now. if some of the people being that dense about whats happening to Us Peasant Folk Who Have Never Been Able To Partake In A Broadway Showë are like. teenagers that are just commenting impulsively then like. whatever thats fine i can get that, teenagers dont know shit sometimes i was one myself once i remember, but full ass grown adults legitimately flipping out over phantom and beetlejuice not being on broadway and focusing that outrage at. like. broadway. and not even stopping to think about the fact that us Disabled And Poor Peasant Folk who are still alive have been screaming at them for almost 3 whole years and way way way more years before those last big 3 years that if they didnt start valuing other peoples lives as much as they do with their own then our pandemic health crisis and shit for-profit health "care" system will not have an end in sight and that means eventually it will affect them too. whether that is by getting sick with the still very real and deadly virus and becoming disabled, or things like classic cherished theater shows suddenly disappearing because their largest source of regular income are 1.) newly disabled or literally dead, and 2.) no longer able to have enough disposable income to spend on broadway shows because they have to prioritize necessities in an economic collapse where only the very rich and privileged are able to get by fine.

like again i know im being mean about it but i really do not care, the logical/rational processing section of my autistic brain just cannot wrap my mind around being so out of touch from the majority experiences of US american life that THIS is like, The Last Straw for so many adults my age (25) or older. get a fucking reality check or its going to affect a lot more personal things in ur life than ur ability to see phantom of the opera every weekend. my fucking god, dude.

My girlfriend refuses to be an organ donor because she doesnt want to accidentally save a fash

Im like, im sure they say the same thing

(but apparently we dont get donor organs anyway for ~reasons~?? like is this why the skin graft came off my own other leg? That whole patch looks 100 years old to this day)

Im sure some people wouldnt want their organs to go to us and we wouldnt want our organs to go to them, so if thats keeping a LOT of ppl from donating, shouldnt there be some sort of proviso element in place, even nominally? ("Nominal stuff" and corpse part harvestings go together like dish and spoon apparenty)

If you can opt in and out of being a donor at all, why are there no further options for people who want more things about their donorship specified. Eg "fine with donated organs going to gender affirming care for cis OR trans people", "just not the eyes, not to anybody", "no consent for donation of organs to ppl who said none of their organs could go to trans ppl" etc

We're not doctors, we're not under any oath to provide universal care (which, you guys suck at that, some hospitals are riddled with malpracticing eugenecists) which is why we get to decide to be donors or not. Make the system better and more people will take part. Its like you dont want organs unless we're philosophically on board with your secular views of the body as spiritually null meat on a platter. Its like the system makers want to punish us for being choosy about donating instead of soooo unnnnqualifiebly objective like they are when it comes to others lives 🙄😒

If i was more seflishly paranoid than religiously motivated, i wouldnt be registered for organ donation either; some cop or friend-of could just walk up and merc me for being on disability and being decadent and gay and satanic and all that. And then theyd claim my body was evidence and that the evidence got lost and theyd eat me, the pigs

Theyd all laugh that in bc you feed whores to the pigs, that we're best fit for pig food

Im not being dramatic, piglevel operators would easily have access to the information that ive "engaged in prostitution" just like anyone that whatever falsehood purveyor, whatever pied piper, said was so evil and unworthy of life. You must not believe youll be haunted, you must really think God's on your side; me too! "Then there's a pair of us"! so which of us is wronger? Ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?

Theyd be scared of my organs taking people over, so theyd fail to save even those lives, theyre exceptionally stupid like that

Those falun gong people are very insistent that involuntary organ harvesting is a highway to motivated execution...im fascinated that the fash would accuse anyone else of it when they're the ones doing regular murders squarely along ~oooohhhhh soooo coincidental~ "social hygiene" lines...and nominally throwing the organs away!! Not fit to harvest they say! But that just makes them madder. They get so triggered thinking that while theyre toiling away, humbly making huge money and getting free stuff and wide acclaim, other people are getting .000000001 of a cent from them every year to not die in the street and the demonic busy-idiocy-pantomime-addicts keep dragging them back to deaths door anyway because WHY, daddy issues? Both shoulders just have angry nuns with rulers on them????

"You did butt stuff so your organs are too icky for me to benefit from and thats your fault for being misbehaved! I MAKE PERFECT SENSE!"

Like they really think they do, theyll give you the whole story if you give them half a chance. Have fun.

Citizens should be assessing degree of fashiness plus relative power of authority (licence-to-kill privilege), and making up their minds about the big either-or BBQ at which so many see us poised to arrive. Dont let the crowd around you get too thin, folks, survivor bias is a rotten thing in a psychopathic paradigm.

There shouldnt BE people so fully above the law that they can run people over and not think twice about consequences. "Internally review" my fucking ass, eh. We should drag that one out into the street and run HIM over, he's "not worth much" in MY universe.

Just my opinion 🤷

I guess we could be nice and re-educte him but he'd probably get hella depressed/suicidal so its like, thats just torture basically. In many cases i find myself doubtful of reform. If we're not killing them we have to devote considerable effort/resources to monitoring them; are they so merciful, would they be? Theyll winkle and wriggle and try to regain hegemonic sway, always working against progress. Where is mercy getting us: a more humane future? Or two steps back from getting there for every step forward. Anyone remember the great leap forward? Panache.

Sorry, thats my shoulder Mao

being depressing and longwinded again irls scroll away please tyyyyyy

another shitty evil thing abt mental illness is unless youre unusually privileged you cant really do anything to keep it from fucking up every single aspect of your life and making it practically impossible to live comfortably. and if youre like me and youre from a low income background you probably want some relief from all the stress and exhaustion that comes with not having enough money. i want a financially secure lifestyle, i want to splurge and go on vacations and eat whatever i want and own a home and not be below the poverty line for the rest of my life because its fucking miserable. but i cant do anything to escape it lmfao!!

im terrible at school and cant afford it anyway so idk if ill ever be able to go to college. i cant handle stress or uncomfortable lighting or noise or crowds or excessive human contact or total isolation or fast paced work or strict routines or nonspecific routines or average work hours or understanding and following instructions or interviews or emails or phone calls or video calls. i cant even drive yet because it's such a severe stressor and it requires me to pay attention to too many things at once.

so like what the fuck am i supposed to do lmfao. even if i landed a job, with my limitations it would definitely not pay well. and getting a job is hard enough, but keeping one is a whole other thing. at my best i can accomplish a few small daily tasks around the house. i can go see a friend once or twice a week. i can do some moderate exercise and i keep up with my hygeine pretty well. i'm still tired and agitated and living feels hard but all around things are pretty good.

but i also have periods where my symptoms prevent me from functioning at all. i dont sleep for says at a time because im so hypervigilant, my nightmares are worse, or i do nothing but lay in bed all day, i dont eat, i cant think, i cant remember anything, i struggle to speak, i cant change my clothes, i can't shower, i feel phantom hands, i forget my age and where i am, i make plans to kill myself, i have violent urges, i can't be touched or spoken to or even handle people being in the same area as me. it's not a matter of "if", its a matter of "when" because thats just the reality of my symptoms. it'll happen again inevitably, and then i wont have a fucking job at all.

i've been told in the past that i may qualify for disability but even if that's true i would need to stay below a certain income level to keep my benefits. so basically im going to struggle financially for the rest of my life on top of trying to survive with my symptoms and it will literally never end. lol

lately ive been coming to terms with the fact that due to my sleep disorder (non-24) i will most likely never be able to live on a conventionally acceptable schedule no matter how much my mental health improves and its making me really fed up to realise it

i think for a long time ive been subconsciously hoping it would one day magically disappear or there would be some perfect cure but the reality is thats impossible. i will never be able to maintain a job or go to university or anything of that sort. maybe i can force myself for a max of 1 year before my immune system breaks down under the weight of extreme sleep deprivation but would there be a point when id be performing so badly id probably get fired or kicked out anyway?

i have been this way since i was born. i have tried everything i can think of to sleep at the "right" times and every attempt results in nothing but exhaustion. i only got through school because i was forced to go and even then i performed very poorly and had extremely low attendance due to the days when i was so tired i couldnt move. when i went on to college the hours increased and became even more impossible to maintain. i had to go to college every day when i was so tired i was shaking and hallucinating and then i was held to the same standards as all the normals in my group who got to sleep every night because their body has the privilege of a functioning circadian rhythm. i have been at a constant disadvantage my whole life that nobody understands. i am just expected to function on no sleep and if i say anything i am told "well why dont you just go to bed earlier" because people actually fucking think i would choose to be this way. they think that "i stayed up late on purpose and now im tired" and "i am entirely incapable of sleeping at the same time every night and am under constant stress and exhaustion because of this" are the same fucking thing

spoilers they are fucking not the same thing and living in this world which refuses to accommodate my disability has absolutely wrecked both my mental health and my physical health. i am struggling so badly right now just with getting up for my support 3 times a week. it is support that i need to live alone and yet i still have to cancel it fairly regularly because ive reached the point in tiredness where i just cant keep forcing myself awake. right now it is 12am and they are coming at 1pm and i woke up at 8pm feeling thankful that at least im past the point where i was waking at 4pm. this hell never ends.

i really just don’t understand how we are meant to function, or i don’t understand how to function, how other people seem to function, under the weight of human suffering and pain. i dont understand how we’re are expected to or ever could just deal with it and i dont understand how so many, especially in this fucking country just seem to not care and not think about it and not understand or delight in that suffering and do whatever they can to add to it. i dont know how to google or what book to read to help me figure out how to not just drown in it and drown in my inability to cope with it  and part of the problem is that i understand my own immense privilege and luck and comfort of my life and i’m really not trying to whine and white guilt about it but its hard to seperate guilt from not being able to do anything? and i feel like the way we discuss these things is kind of counter intuitive because i don’t know how to openly ask like what are we supposed to do how are human beings supposed to try and fix this how do we just not die without it reading as me being whiny about how hard it is for me that other people are being tortured in poverty and war and sickness and slavery

and like i dont have any money. i dont have an ability to work a normal job. i dont have resources to offer. i can barely leave my house or speak to strangers. my mental illness has disabled me to the point where i feel like just a completely worthless pitiful pathetic little child, especially since i am so incapable and so incapacitated for reasons i cant even articulate when i live in such luxury compared to most human beings on earth? i kind of feel like, i dont know, how dare i be wasting my time existing like this. how dare i not be...helping more? but literally how do i do anything meaningful and how do you mentally get passed and inability to deal with the weight of human pain so that you can start taking action to lessen it? how do i start finding and joining and helping out with community action and chairty and mutual aid when i can’t speak to people?

and honestly like. i really dont know who to talk to about like. what is the worth of being an artist or a historian in a world like this? what is the point of spending my time making pretty pictures and little made up stories and learning about people that haven’t existed for hundreds of years? i hate saying it because i do think that like movements in the past and present that think art and history are useless are stupid but on some level at the moment i’m kind of wondering if thats true because? what tangible good am i adding to the world other than maybe distracting people from their own suffering for a bit? is that even good? how much of distracting someone from their suffering is really just distracting them from doing anything about the like Whole suffering? i dont even know how to say what i really mean

everything just seems so stupid in context. all of it just seems so disgusting. how much money and resource in the global west goes into publishing and making and selling and buying fiction novels. what could all that money do to keep human beings in the real world from literally dying. whats the point? what does it mean that i put so much time and effort into something that i can’t see any real societal value in at this point? am i interested in these things in the first place because they allow me to distract myself from how little im actually doing for anyone? or because they make me feel like im some fake kind of helpful?

the amount of lesbophobia in the biphobia tag was like 👀👀👀👀 shocking its from mostly whites and nbpoc no shocker

like replying and screenshotting shit that makes me stressed isnt making them love the dykes any better!!!! like wow gbt people really are out here blaming the whole sum of biphobia on lesbians, saying we dont experience comphet bc there sum how privilege in loving only women, seeing folks call lesbians nasty queers in the notes of shit, like nigga am i bugging or fucking what!!?! like 👀👀👀 im not shocked because if your a dyke of color online u been gettin rape/death threats from everyone undet the sun but like why do i feel like theres been such a shift into blaming/ignoring/erasing/harassing/condeming lesbians and lesbianism as a whole

and then theres white gbt folks and wlw that lothe me for being apart of the "community" once they find out im a lesbian im given like socially the cold shoulder

and non black lgbt folks dont like me either!!!! when i see how you treat everyone else better than us!!!!!!

like white lesbians have ignored the fact in a whole ass lesbian too and cant be lesbophobic to her!! lesbian/bi/pan folks still are mad antiblack and fully able to throw some misogynoir your way when you dont fit the narrative they created for u the same as all white wlw, black gbt men will still act like they own you and your shit and will ignore all of the black wlw dying bc nobody on this earth cops for us even when yall our damn brothers

like at every turn im faced with the reality that nobody likes black women!!! dont call me that tho like nobody likes me bc im a lesbian either!!! like im nigger and im dyke and im tired of having 0 support and actual community

lesbianism online might as well look like a women of the klan meetup

posts made in the name of wlw solidarity is ending up coming off as "were all fucking ugly unloveable dykes am i rite!!! loving women is so funny and gooberishh!! haha cant belive were all so horribly fucking stupid!!!"

any popluar "positivity" for wlwoc/lesbians of color is like nobody is darker than a paper bag and has "mixed" features aka white features bc im "mixed" but i look black and is never gender non conforming or fat and if they dare include and actual black person she must look like every hypersexualized image of darkskinned black women doesnt matter if everyone else is fully clothed!!!

and like id youre like most poor black lgbt folks you have atleast 3 of the following

•no access to safe/accesible lgbt healthcare bc you live in a poor neighborhood and are underpaid to even uber/bus/train there

• the worst living situation on earth, some of us are stuck at home in the closet with parental abuse in our 20's bc we dont have accumulated wealth like whites to get out, some of us are living in horded, packed cramed housed bc how else are we susposed to make rent, so many of us are homeless or like just a step above that!!

• severe isolation generational trauma and alienation has turned you into a traumatized bitter mess who fully distrusts all "authority"

•you cant keep your job or get hired for being black and lgbt so you know owe people/your bank money, cant buy enough food to eat, make rent so u have to live with your S.O or hella folks, you have a car but cant afford the gas or monthy payments, if your disabled like me you also are killing yourself at work bc we only have empathy for white cishet disabled folks

•you hate your family but are required to stay attached for reasons non black people might not have too

•you have an addiction to sex, drinking, smoking weed, nicotine, caffeine, or anything that makes life bareable

•mental illness so severe you really dont tell anyone bc you know how easy it would be to have it used against u

im just upset about how alone i am and how like again nobody is showing up for me other than black wlw and like the 4 non black lgbt folks who care

TW heavy

For once I don't feel like asking advice would be a sign of weakness.

I WANT AND DESERVE MORE. I WANT TO LIVE. I DONT WANT TO KEEP WANTING TO DIE. I DONT WANT THIS AND I WANT SOMETHING DIFFERENT. LIFE AND STRENGTH AND LOVE SEEMS SO FAR AWAY TIL RECENTLY. BUT IM STILL SO TRAUMATIZED AND SO PRONE TO DEREALIZING. HEALTH AND HAPPINESS ISNT A PRIVILEGE RIGHT...? I WANT MORE. ISNT LIFE A RIGHT

Even if my parents have done their middle class most to feed house and even help get me out of credit pits and even though they aren't physically abusive they have been abusive to my older sister who committed suicide after secretly being a victim of child sexual assault dismissive neglectful emotionally mute narcissistic feudalistic and ableist and rape apologists. I HAVE built up this role and this mask where I am tolerable to them so they do not find me problematic day to day. I keep telling myself that I can be bitter but I just can't shake this feeling that maybe I'm just an entitled millennial who got cucked and I'm wrong. But I have been formulating a plan to get a diploma while I am under their roof then run away one night with some money saved and live alone instead of doing this song and dance of bad class analysis where I pretend like I'm not supposed to be doing anything remotely political just put my head down work make money be less of an embarassment go to a bank get loans just to get degrees certificates jobs get cars move around be socially pleasant meet someone to make babies with (I'm bisexual/pansexual and poly...But I am trans and my parents have major issues confronting that even if they pretend to be absolutely progressive minded" (TM) like being literate and half way informed is the same thing as actually really thinking about microaggressions and oppressive behaviours they enact in oorder to be better supports which they haven't) and while their ~support~ of me being mentally ill/disabled and actively suicidal is something that did come across the first week of our bereavement--literal days before the funeral-- their twisted toxic manner of mourning has made me suicidal at least three times as of 27th December 2018; and their responses to coming out as transmasculine and bi was dont get all PC snowflake on us (Read:shut up about it unless we feel ready to go ask you curtly and rudely) and then two days after when I actually felt soft and tender enough to say I had visions of dying violently because of how terribly small and useless I currently feel they begged and begged me to make calls on my own and handle things myself because Hey We Are Really The Ones Who Are Suffering And Mourning Why Are TWO of Our Daughters Suicidal I Am Truly Suffering. Implied--"we will have insurance cover this therapy shit you should be happy haven't we mentioned it to your idiot face already just leave us alone about this shit". I may have had to survive day after day through my depression since 2014 by thinking they weren't people to open up to but that doesn't mean that they can say that. Imply that. They CANNOT

They cannot.

But they did.

They did it. They fucking did that when my heart finally came around to a place of, "Well I understand that they haven't experienced surviving and being a victim of violence and victim blaming and being transgender is foreign and even vilified so that's fair and here are all their siblings coming to the funeral to feed and help us in the aftermath and to keep us housed through all the preparations so how come, among and amidst all this compassion, they seem so hit by Stupid Bitch disease? Wtf why *shouldnt* anybody deal with depression by themself!

" I don't know that all the fear you felt before this bereavement of being in the same room holds up when they can just be seen as foolish and immature. You can 100% deal through therapy with the ableism and gaslighting you endured the silence around your constant issues with being fired at jobs you hated the the moments of realizing they want to be white passing and are sociopathically happy to be alone and have no hobbies and live in codependent relationships where they treat others like infant children or wayward siblings who need a firm hand but not heart to heart talks or reassurances or loving toughness... so just try to be uncomfortable and just shore up and bolster your underlying hope of seeing your long held affectionate blindly loyal love reciprocated.

"Keep up that small hope and bury all your pain and your furious and sour resentment if it means their happiness is number one in my life. Just do it Isagani! Do that... because it is Good." I tried it and I fell apart. I functioned for a week or two but now I am just as prone to sleeping and alcoholism and moreover, I want to escape but now I feel like hiding my desires to just pay my own way through art college and transitioning in a nearby city is nothing compared to our long history of living as a dysfunctional but somewhat stable household. /:

I FEEL like I understand I should leave but I suddenly feel ... IDK like I'm sinning before Jesus himself. What would it mean to pick up a backpack my laptop and a suitcase of clothes and some money and just go...and... Wouldn't it destroy their happiness and their legitimacy as NOT bigoted parents and NOT bad community members and NOT hypocritical and NOT at all to be blamed. ////:

I would leave them a note... I would say to meet me in 2027 in a town I feel has a small leftist community called Tavistock in South Devon in Britain and I would leave a blog entry where I detail my grief and my pain.

I wrote the post one evening on the 19th where I realized I've been covering for them even though my little lesbian moderately autistic and anxious sister had her birthday and needs my brutal honesty and my parents to stop dismissing me the most.

It (the blog post that is) speaks to my analysis of their issues and I don't want to leave without a note because they might feel like I have just gone away in a panic and might turn up dead just as my late sister did... What I want to know is should I make an escape, or should I stay with them.

I need to decide but I feel so confused. Please help I think I ... can't see a way out

■

isagani \ 26.\ marxist feminist \ communist \ atheist \ very bi. \ filipino migrant. \ transgender nb. \ femme in the s.g.a. woman sense.(anons are open) \ 4 years past a severe depressive breakdown. \ scorpio passing

im watching the shane meets a blind person series and tbh im getting a little emotional bc like. thats future me with how badly my eyes are going. like ive pretty much accepted that one day i might just be blind but hearing molly talk about how this was her whole life since she was little of learning to accept it is wild. like she was younger than i am when she almost completely lost her sight and like i feel bad bc i will never know how that feels and i joke about how blind i am all the time when in reality at least i can see shapes and light right?? and if i force my eyes to focus i can see my hands almost clearly and i can see the hairs on my arms and stuff but she cant just squint and flick a piece of glitter off her or something. like when i take my glasses off im in like close to unbearable pain and everythings a huge blur but i can see shapes and light and stuff i just cant walk around and do shit like i can with my glasses. im really lucky to have my glasses bc i have insurance and a lot of other poor people dont and they just have to live with basically half blind eyes and this is a privilege i get to have and im glad to have it i just like. i wish i would either hurry up and go blind or hurry up and magically be cured. i hate this in between stage where i can tell like every week somethings off like my eyes are twitching more than usual or it takes longer to make them focus even with my glasses on or im getting more headaches like i have been recently. i hate not knowing whats going wrong with my eyes so the only thing i can say is my eyesight is deteriorating because thats literally all i know and i could never get a service animal because im allergic to literally anything with fur and i dont know if our insurance covers that and i dont know anything about buying a cane or if theyre expensive or anything. and she had to deal with that as a little kid but it was like 10x worse for her because she couldnt have understood anything but that her eyes werent working right bc she was just a little girl and she had to deal with blindness when she was a teenager and she lost all her friends like oh my fucking god thats genuinely so fucking sad to think about and im so proud of her for gradually accepting and loving herself and i hope if its true that im just. not gonna be able to see in a few years that i can be like her and be happy anyway. not to be one of those disability fetishists because ew but shes genuinely a huge inspiration

im a little angry though bc my mother didnt believe i couldnt see things until 4th grade because she thought i was faking for attention like when i cant see your face anymore theres a fucking issue. shes never believed me about shit and i think this wouldnt be a problem if she actually stepped up and did something sooner. im straight up calling this medical neglect at this point because ive needed a corrective mouth surgery or whatever it is since 7th grade. well longer than that actually thats just when she finally let my yahyah take me to the orthodontist and they told me i have an extra tooth on the wrong side growing out of the roof of my mouth and my yahyah drove for hours to take me to get a checkup at the hospital but it turns out only my mother can bring me even for the checkup. so not only have i not had the checkup but i doubt ill ever actually have the actual surgery because she doesnt want to take time off. i cant fucking brush my teeth properly bc of these braces and i probably have a shitload of cavities and ive needed these tightened for literal years at this point. i was supposed to get them off next year but thats probably fucked. two brackets are broken and my teeth are fucked up even fucking worse now because of how long theyve been without proper aligning braces but she doesnt want to take one fucking day off to even make an attempt to help. my teeth keeping getting loose and tightening and i keep getting tooth pains and the fucking insides of my cheeks are literally coated in scar tissue from how often i bite my cheeks bc my molars are crooked and the little wire keeps stabbing them because like i said two brackets are broken. but no it doesnt fucking matter because my physical and mental health dont matter. none of this shit would be an issue if my mother actually did shit rather than giving us food clothes and a roof and calling it a+ parenting. i would give back my keyboard and my drawing tablet and hell id give away my art supplies and like. literally all the other nice shit i get to have if it meant i could go back and make her do it right. i wouldnt be sitting here this fucking close to crying about a blind girl talking about her life because i wouldnt feel or fear the same things at all. and yea being on my phone a lot doesnt help but at least a phone can easily adjust and help me see and once my eyes are too far gone it can read shit to me and still help me do a lot of things. a mother doesnt care about that in the fucking slightest

The American University System: Oppressing the non-elite.

So let me get this straight...in the 70's there was a community outcry to lower the amount of tax money that got put towards college tuition for future generations? American tax payers used to cover over 70% of college costs, allowing the young students straight out of highschool the ability to work a minimum wage summer job to literally pay their entire tuition. Those with part time jobs while in school were not very common. This allowed for an ability to succeed without the unnecessary baggage of financial stress and lack of sleep at 18 years old while taking 14+ credits, which for those of you who dont know is a true 40-60 hour work week alone. All of this hard work and achievement paved the way for these kids to enter adulthood as educated, debt free, and with the world at their fingertips. Not to mention, they had the incredible privilege of not having to become a self sufficient adult in the middle of the worst economic crisis since the depression...

Compare that romantic reality to our drastically different reality today. I will use my experiences as an example for this, while probably on the extreme spectrum of experiences, they are valid and carry merit nonetheless. I was always told as a child, "you have to go to college, its not an option" Yet, when i graduated highschool, my parents grew quiet. I grew up in a 5 person household in Orange County, CA (one of the most expensive places to live in the country) in a family who made roughly $40k a year, give or take (thats poverty folx). My step-father was an electrical contractor so income was often spuratic. Anyway, needless to say they had not one penny saved for my college tuition. My parents failed to put a single penny aside for anything regarding my well-being honestly. With no car, no money, no job, and no idea when or how I could recieve a college education, I was kicked out of my parents at 17 years old with nowhere to go. I couch surfed and was able to get a couple jobs, one at a crafts store and one at a sandwhich shop. After 2 long years of working my way out of homelessness, all I wanted was to start college! So, at age 19 I applied for financial aid. However, I was told because I was under 25 I needed my parents tax information. Well, my parents never filed on time and were incredible dodgy with communication. So, after months of going back and forth I ended up paying out of pocket for a full time coarse load at a community college. I was able to work my jobs and pay this, but with nothing left over for rent or food. I ended up getting kicked out of my place, had to apply for foodstamps, and had to start over from square one. Little did I know I would have to wait 5 years before I could finally give college another shot.

I had almost given up the idea of higher education. I was making good money in the food industry at this point and had a nice company car and a great home with an awesome roommate. But then, I met a boy. We traveled the country for three months with his bluegrass band and saw 32 states. Afterwards, we again found ourselves broke and homeless. We hunkered down, worked 80+ hour weeks, saved up, and moved to Portland Oregon, "where young people go to retire". Little did we know, retire would be the LAST thing we did when we got there. Cost of living was rising in Portland, but still nothing compared to Orange County, CA. We got good food jobs and nested for about a year. My boyfriend (we will call him N) got great grades in highschool and high test scores in his exit exams, so in 2014 he chose to get back into school as a Music Composition Major at age 26. His journey is a whole other terrible story. I wanted to return to school so badly, but knew I had to wait until I was old enough to not warrant my parents tax info. Finally, at age 24 I filed my FAFSA and went to a career counselor. I was directed in the career of Civil Engineering. Having no prior knowledge of this career or topic, I dove in blindly headfirst. I chose a community college due to the fact that I barely finished highschool and did not take ant exit exams. To my surprise, I did very well in my college settings. After one year I was able to transfer to a university! Me! I WAS GOING TO A UNIVERSITY! I could not believe it, and was soo excited. I had no clue how hard this would be, not the work, but just surviving through it. I should mention here that I have a mild dissability. I have endometriosis which is a chronic illness linked to hormones, ovarian cysts, and all that jazz which can result in disabling pain and in my case an emergency surgery from time to time. I also suffer from a mild form of PTSD. So, with those alone handling high stress loads can be very hard on my mental and physical well being.

Ok, so I was a 24 year old first generation college student (first person in my family to go to college) disabled lower class person wanting a higher education. Seems logical right? Well, once I got accepted to the university, I chose to change my major to Architecture, I had taken an intro class for general ed and fell inlove. My beginning of my first year was great! Lots of lectures and reading. Aside from my tuition multiplying literally 3x from my community college tuition which did not affect my financial aid disbursement, I was fairly stress free. Now keep in mind, my partner and I are both working 20-30 hour weeks to make ends meet while taking 12-14 credits. Its basically having 2 full time jobs. Anyway, the last term of my first year came around-my first studio class. I was so excited! Time to actually do architecture! I got the syllabus and was told was supplies were needed to be successful in the class. I was also told that doing all of the requirements for the assignment would result in a C grade, if any grade above that was desired extra work had to be put in. I thought, no biggie, bring it on. The next thing she said was, "absolutely no sleeping in the studio!" Thats when I had a feeling I was gonna be in trouble. After class I went to the art store got my supplies. I almost started crying as they read my total to me: "$682.80, please." And that was with my student discount and not including all of the future supplies I would need just for that term, which I will tell you now after all the drawings and models ended up being about $2,000. That is a whole lot. These studio classes also require many all-nighters just to have enough time to complete the assignments. Many times, due to having to work outside of school I could not complete my assignments or had to do them with less craft and care than I would like just to turn it in. This year, I recieved less in financial aid, my rent has gone up significantly, tuition went up, and there are new grade requirements: if you get anything less than a B-, youre immediately dropped from the school of Architecture. So, not completing assignments isnt an option anymore. This last term costed my much less money, but once I told my instructor I was out of money, his response was, "well, this is Architecture school." What the fuck am I supposed to do with that!? A roll of Velum (drafting design paper) costs $50-$70 pencils are $2 a piece, models cost like $100 each, the list of tools go on and on. I am already paying $10k a year for tuition, ensuring at the very least $70k of debt including my masters degree which you need to get your Architecture license. And at least $100k with the $500 a month I need to borrow a month for rent. I should not need to add thousands more of that for supplies my school should be providing. And this insane pressure of pulling all nighters to get done the amount of assignments it would take us to do in a whole week last term in 2 days!

The moral of this very long story is that college is not meant for those of us trying to climb the life ladder. Its meant for the already elite. Its meant for kids right out of highschool with parents who make enough money to pay their tuition, their rent, their whole lives! Meant for kids who travel to Europe for the summer instead of working 60 hours a week to make up for the money lost during school cuz you physically cannot work more than 25 hours. Its meant for kids who can call their mommies and complain about how mean their teacher is, not for those of us who cry every night about being afraid of ending up back on the streets in the snap of a finger. Its meant for kids who can work and think about school all day every day, not those of us preoccupied with being able to pay all of our bills and being able to afford food and health insurance.

HOWEVER, even if you are like me, worse, or better, YOU CAN DO IT! I have a damn 3.7 GPA. I may only get 3 hours of sleep a lot, cry almost weekly, probably have lost years of my life due to stress, and feel scared for my health, but shit IM FUCKING DOOOOIN IT! Even though our government, or school presidents, and pretty much everyone in power disagrees, you are so worth it and you are so capable of success no matter how much harder you have to work than everyone else. Because we have to work so much harder now, we will get to party that much harder when we make it. I WILL GRADUATE IN SPITE OF THE SYSTEM! I WILL SUCCEED IN SPITE OF THE SYSTEM! I WILL CHANGE THE FUCKING WORLD CUZ I AM A BADASS AND CAN DO ANYTHING YOU PRIVELEDGED FUCKS CAN DO, JUST BETTER!