Given that my post about why you are not obligated to blog about Current Events (whatever they are at any given time) is going around again, I'd like to say the same thing from a slightly different angle and state what you ARE obligated to do.
You are still not obligated to blog about ANY specific subject, no matter how serious, no matter how urgent, no matter how grave. You never will be. The impact of social media on real world atrocities has the potential to be great, but it is cumulative. No one is going to die in a ditch somewhere, barely uttering the tragic final words, "if only...if only...tumblr users wormhentaiafficionado and mothmanbutthole...posted about how sad they are...then maybe things would be different..." - nor are policymakers going to change their minds because some tweet has 749,845 cumulative likes and retweets instead of 750,000. Make no mistake, if you have the energy to be sharing these kinds of things, it can be good to do! We live in a society, it's always good to help where you can, even if all you can do is show public support for people who are hurting - but if you can't do that, for any reason, you're not obligated to. Period. End of.
What are you obligated to do?
1. Give people the benefit of the doubt. Social media accounts are not most people's entire lives. Just because someone isn't blogging about whatever tragedy is occurring does not mean they don't care. Sometimes it does mean that, sure, and that sucks - but not only are you not going to change that by yelling at them, sometimes it means they care too much. Sometimes it means they're closer to it than you assumed and need a moment to think about something else, anything else. Sometimes it means it's not safe for them to be blogging about it, be it due to abusive family potentially finding out, being at risk of getting fired and quite possibly dying of poverty sooner rather than later, or even taking very illegal direct action that they do not want to be linked to on record in even the vaguest possible way. Sometimes it means dealing with it is their day job and they're on the internet after a long and exhausting day of trying to make things better. You don't know. You'll never know unless they decide to tell you. No one owes you that explanation. You are obligated to make peace with that fact.
2. Slow the fuck down.
Listen. When bad things happen, from natural disasters, to manmade horrors beyond our comprehension, it's only normal to get scared and desperate to do something, anything about it. That heightened emotional state is very vulnerable, and because of that, there will always be people out there looking to take advantage of the chaos for ulterior motives - and no matter how good your intentions, and in fact no matter how right you are in your values and at the core of your strategy, you will never be immune to garbage-in-garbage-out. Misinformation can be deadly, even in the hands of someone who means well. You need to pause long enough to sort out the garbage. You need to learn to fight the impulse to trust every single post that tells you that your share/comment/etc. is URGENT and WILL mean the difference between life and death for someone, somewhere. Do your fact checks. Scan for dogwhistles before you end up passing around a post that implies [insert group that is marginalized in most of the English-speaking world but has hegemonic power in some other part of the world and is committing some atrocity there] is coming after you next if you stay silent. Vet charity and advice links before you accidentally send scared, desperate, and vulnerable people to a scammer - or worse, hand them over to a honeypot operation or give them a recipe for poisonous "medicine".
Or, to put it another way, you are obligated to make an attempt to stay informed enough to avoid making things materially worse. You are not obligated to doomblog. In fact, doomblogging can be antithetical to your obligation to not make things worse. Choosing neutrality in times of great tragedy and injustice is bad, yes, but you should immediately be wary of anyone who says that simply not blogging about a subject - let alone not sharing a specific post - is inherently "choosing neutrality".
So remember: breathe. Be careful out there. Mourn for the people that whatever atrocity has this or my other post circulating has taken from us or will take from us, and do your best to be kind to the people who are still alive - and remember that kindness includes using social media responsibly.
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Zhao Lusi is the sole reason I watch and rewatch (nearly) all the major dramas she starred in. She’s so damn convincing in all her roles. Not to mention she’s charming and utterly adorable.
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Having Jasnah Kholin thoughts
Specifically, like, if the way Trish is reading the implications of her childhood "lunacy" is correct, that her family forcefully institutionalized her as a child, and what impact that had on her
She plays her cards so close to her chest, she doesn't trust easily, yet she loves fiercely
Based on her narration, her takeaway from the trauma (or, more likely, a takeaway from the trauma) was that the people she loved could still hurt her, even withour meaning it
How much of this was Gavilar, and how much was Navani? Did this have reverberations through the family to Renarin, the other neurospicy Kholin who likes to keep secrets?
Trish doesn't know, just... big feelings
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THINKING ABOUT THIS AGAIN cuz its literally not a ‘what if’ its CANON that their hatred is based on false memory implants that are specifically made to make them hate eachother when triggered (same treatment was given to the other team x members as well) and they WERE best friends before that!!!!!! and they even find that out multiple times!!!!! but the writers keep making them forget bcuz they gotta stay enemies……i feel the pain and frustration of whoever made this strip. they were so real for this.
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I was rewatching the Hidden World earlier, specifically this scene (which sends me btw)
And one detail I loved was this line when Ruff was talking about the love triangle stuff, because her calling them her harem wasnt good enough lmao:
"Snotlout's a beefcake but almost too pretty, you know?"
My boy is CANONICALLY a pretty boy i know thats right
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