TALK TO ME ABOUT NICK MY DEARLY BELOVED MUTUAL

O_O oh hiii!! i shall put this under a read more because uh. it got long

Honestly one of the things I like to think\explore the most about Nick (but this goes for his whole species I suppose) is how different the world appears to him. He's a little guy, a prey animal, so the way he sees\interacts with the world is just so fundamentally different to a human. He might seem silly or unnecessary jumpy but for him even little things have a different impact on him, like the way a person moves, or how he can never be comfortable in a fully open room with no hides, or how he might "suddenly" or “for no reason” freak out, but instead something that might seem meaningless or insignificant to a human had startled him. Like everything can be so incredibly overwhelming in his pov!!!.

Even when perfectly safe and indoors he can’t help but look around and upwards constantly because his subconscious is always seeing invisible owls circling him, or how even in said safe and comfortable environment, he will still place himself in a way he can easily hide or escape if necessary. I even think his natural fear of humans still plays tricks on him sometimes, at which point it gets frustrating for Nick, because when he learns that humans are not bloodthirsty monsters he doesn't want to jump and be startled by their presence, plus the fact they have such different body language....yeah. Like you can't just look him in the eyes for too long or approach him confidently and directly or give him a toothy grin, especially when humans are so big to him, it freaks him out!!! but this feels like an easier thing to get around with just some clarifications and accommodations.

He does not have self esteem issues (if anything he's very proud of himself and his kind) but he is not confident, in the way he will hesitate to approach something he doesn't know or try new things even as a naturally curious person, because anything can mean danger to him, and he doesn't have the luxury of confidence that a human can have, like how some people will just pick up animals and shit and explore, He Can't Do That, in fact he thinks humans are out of their minds for their seemingly absence of self preservation instinct (untrue, especially considering the setting, but for Nick it still seems like that). Humans are confident!! They are tall and at the top, they don't have anything to fear, but Nick is at the bottom, he is jumpy and held back and cautious. (this also changes with the fact that humans in hl have very much LOTS to worry about between the combine and so on, they absolutely do not have all the freedom and laid back lives that Nick always thought they had, but the difference in…niche? is that a fair word to use? still makes this somewhat true).

I don't want to attribute all of this to Instinct, Nick is a pretty anxious man, but when you're in that position in nature you have to be full of natural phobias to keep yourself alive.Like I feel like I'm just rambling and struggling to convey what I mean but yeah T_T.

Or also i reaaally like to think about how he lives through the hl world. Like observing, studying and surviving alien wildlife, or scavenging an old, abandoned and infested building, or watching combine soldiers sweep the forest or being forced to listen to some rebels talk late at night because the place he wanted to take supplies from is still occupied. Like be them mundane or big things, just how he copes with the world he is in. And how he’s kinda ignorant of it too, he knows something happened, he knows the environment is not as healthy as it used to be, he watched species disappear before his eyes and lakes of toxic waste pool up around, he knows the humans are in a  vicious war, but other than that? no clue, he doesn’t know just how massive and critical the situation is, how global. His life is far from easy and safe, but at the same time it all seems so small to the magnitude of what’s going on on earth, he really is just a simple survivor having to face immense cosmic horrors that, at least before being explained everything, were far beyond his comprehension.

Rowling isn't denying holocaust. She just pointed out that burning of transgender health books is a lie as that form of cosmetic surgery didn't exist. But of course you knew that already, didn't you?

I was thinking I'd probably see one of you! You're wrong :) Let's review the history a bit, shall we?

In this case, what we're talking about is the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, or in English, The Institute of Sexology. This Institute was founded and headed by a gay Jewish sexologist named Magnus Hirschfeld. It was founded in July of 1919 as the first sexology research clinic in the world, and was run as a private, non-profit clinic. Hirschfeld and the researchers who worked there would give out consultations, medical advice, and even treatments for free to their poorer clientele, as well as give thousands of lectures and build a unique library full of books on gender, sexuality, and eroticism. Of course, being a gay man, Hirschfeld focused a lot on the gay community and proving that homosexuality was natural and could not be "cured".

Hirschfeld was unique in his time because he believed that nobody's gender was either one or the other. Rather, he contended that everyone is a mixture of both male and female, with every individual having their own unique mix of traits.

This leads into the Institute's work with transgender patients. Hirschfeld was actually the one to coin the term "transsexual" in 1923, though this word didn't become popular phrasing until 30 years later when Harry Benjamin began expanding his research (I'll just be shortening it to trans for this brief overview.) For the Institute, their revolutionary work with gay men eventually began to attract other members of the LGBTA+, including of course trans people.

Contrary to what Anon says, sex reassignment surgery was first tested in 1912. It'd already being used on humans throughout Europe during the 1920's by the time a doctor at the Institute named Ludwig Levy-Lenz began performing it on patients in 1931. Hirschfeld was at first opposed, but he came around quickly because it lowered the rate of suicide among their trans patients. Not only was reassignment performed at the Institute, but both facial feminization and facial masculization surgery were also done.

The Institute employed some of these patients, gave them therapy to help with other issues, even gave some of the mentioned surgeries for free to this who could not afford it! They spoke out on their behalf to the public, even getting Berlin police to help them create "transvestite passes" to allow people to dress however they wanted without the threat of being arrested. They worked together to fight the law, including trying to strike down Paragraph 175, which made it illegal to be homosexual. The picture below is from their holiday party, Magnus Hirschfeld being the gentleman on the right with the fabulous mustache. Many of the other people in this photo are transgender.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of a group of people. Some are smiling at the camera, others have serious expressions. Either way, they all seem to be happy. On the right side, an older gentleman in glasses- Magnus Hirschfeld- is sitting. He has short hair and a bushy mustache. He is resting one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him. His other hand is being held by a person to his left. Another person to his right is holding his shoulder.]

There was always push back against the Institute, especially from conservatives who saw all of this as a bad thing. But conservatism can't stop progress without destroying it. They weren't willing to go that far for a good while. It all ended in March of 1933, when a new Chancellor was elected. The Nazis did not like homosexuals for several reasons. Chief among them, we break the boundaries of "normal" society. Shortly after the election, on May 6th, the book burnings began. The Jewish, gay, and obviously liberal Magnus Hirschfeld and his library of boundary-breaking literature was one of the very first targets. Thankfully, Hirschfeld was spared by virtue of being in Paris at the time (he would die in 1935, before the Nazis were able to invade France). His library wasn't so lucky.

This famous picture of the book burnings was taken after the Institute of Sexology had been raided. That's their books. Literature on so much about sexuality, eroticism, and gender, yes including their new work on trans people. This is the trans community's Alexandria. We're incredibly lucky that enough of it survived for Harry Benjamin and everyone who came after him was able to build on the Institute's work.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of the May Nazi book burning of the Institute of Sexology's library. A soldier, back facing the camera, is throwing a stack of books into the fire. In the background of the right side, a crowd is watching.]

As the Holocaust went on, the homosexuals of Germany became a targeted group. This did include transgender people, no matter what you say. To deny this reality is Holocaust denial. JK Rowling and everyone else who tries to pretend like this isn't reality is participating in that evil. You're agreeing with the Nazis.

But of course, you knew that already, didn't you?

Edit: Added image IDs. I apologize to those using screen readers for forgetting them. Please reblog this version instead.

Here's a tough one:

You have to remove an animal from a room. Your equipment is a long stick, a bucket and a hoodie.

Of the 19 hijackers who carried out the Sept 11 attacks:

15 were from Saudi Arabia (a powerful/oil-rich country the U.S. works hard to maintain diplomatic relations with)

2 were from the United Arab Emirates (also a powerful/oil-rich country the U.S. works hard to maintain diplomatic relations with)

1 was from Egypt, 1 from Lebanon.

None of the hijackers were from Iraq.

None of the Sept 11 hijackers were Iraqi.

None of the 9/11 hijackers were from Iraq.

i consider myself a connoisseur of What Makes Chilchuck's Brain Fry

i hope that sometimes fifteen's psychic paper shorts out and shows what fourteen's thinking back on earth. he tries to sneak in somewhere and the guard's like this just says 'need to pick up cat food'? and fifteen's like 🥺 they got a cat

just two guys sleeping in the dungeon

im playing disco elysium for the first time and it might be too early to call it but i think ive come across the funniest goddamn exchange in the game

continuation/aftermath of danny pulling nightwing out of a dumpster

don't let danny fool you with his innocent geek act. that's a working ectogun that he made to look like a phaser. he's absolutely a geek but he's not innocent

spins him around trying to understand the pink mop he calls hair

should've hate fucked ngl.

SHOUTOUT @seagiri for drawing chilchuck here <3333

The singular thing i contributed to drawpile last night

this is lee’s bartender senshi au