found this in my gallery and got immediate whiplash

the funniest meltdown ive ever had was in college when i got so overstimulated that i could Not speak, including over text. one of my friends was trying to talk me through it but i was solely using emojis because they were easier than trying to come up with words so he started using primarily emojis as well just to make things feel balanced. this was not the Most effective strategy... until. he tried to ask me "you okay?" but the way he chose to do that was by sending "👉🏼👌🏼❓" and i was so shocked by suddenly being asked if i was dtf that i was like WHAT???? WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME?????????? and thus was verbal again

i went to get my t-shot yesterday and it took me an hour and a half to get to the clinic and as soon as i got on the bed the nurse dropped my t-shot and it broke and now they're trying to make me pay for the replacement. i think the fuck not lmao

frankly, the people whose kneejerk reaction to bisan asking for a global strike form the 21st-28th is to say that it takes years to organize a general strike are really unhelpful! no one is saying otherwise, but palestine will be a smoking crater if we all wait for years to do anything - bisan is asking us to do something now. Like are we only supposed to do something if we can do it perfectly??? At some point it’s a valid critique about the work that goes into social movement, and at another point I feel like some people are just trying to absolve themselves from not putting any effort into observing a week of economic inaction.

like idk! I get it, okay! People have bills to pay that don’t magically go away for a strike, we don’t have nearly enough social infrastructure in place to support people to fully stop going to work for a week. But fuck, dude! Stop immediately responding in such a defeatist way! Cut out unnecessary purchases! Try to shop local! Put more effort into promoting Palestinian voices online! Attend a protest, call a local rep, do something!

Some things about Allan:

He’s the only one who reacts to the narrator

He’s the only doll (besides the Weird House) who isn’t swayed in some way by Ken’s takeover

He also declares himself as “Ken's buddy" (making canon his official box description) which makes his inability to be swayed more interesting

He has bendable legs (probably the only reason he tries to jump the fence instead of going around like everyone else)

He easily decked a half-dozen construction Kens and could probably singlehandedly win the Ken fight

He seems to know more about the real world than most Barbies

He knows what NSYNC is 

He knows about other Allan copies living in the real world (I’m trying to figure out if he made this up to convince the humans he can live in the real world, but even if he did, how does he know what NSYNC is???)

There are no other Allan models

See THIS is why I trust the writers because the whole point of the deadline passing was so we could SEE Poseidon surrendering for Percy. The show has given Poseidon a more active and loving role in Percys life. The gods pride would never let them surrender to one another. But Poseidon knew his brother wouldn’t spare his son’s life. And he knew the only thing that would spare his son’s life was him surrendering. ALSO FURTHER CEMENTING THAT PERCY IS HIS FAVORITE CHILD! The writers pens this episode>>>

Yearning

“When I first heard it, from a dog trainer who knew her behavioral science, it was a stunning moment. I remember where I was standing, what block of Brooklyn’s streets. It was like holding a piece of polished obsidian in the hand, feeling its weight and irreducibility. And its fathomless blackness. Punishment is reinforcing to the punisher. Of course. It fit the science, and it also fit the hidden memories stored in a deeply buried, rusty lockbox inside me. The people who walked down the street arbitrarily compressing their dogs’ tracheas, to which the poor beasts could only submit in uncomprehending misery; the parents who slapped their crying toddlers for the crime of being tired or hungry: These were not aberrantly malevolent villains. They were not doing what they did because they thought it was right, or even because it worked very well. They were simply caught in the same feedback loop in which all behavior is made. Their spasms of delivering small torments relieved their frustration and gave the impression of momentum toward a solution. Most potently, it immediately stopped the behavior. No matter that the effect probably won’t last: the reinforcer—the silence or the cessation of the annoyance—was exquisitely timed. Now. Boy does that feel good.”

— Melissa Holbrook Pierson, The Secret History of Kindness (2015)

thats a red flag narinder, get that crown back while you still can

+ top panel without text below the cut

Hatsune Miku visits her dying grandfather (IBM 704) in the hospital (2023 colorized)

what if the cambrian period was in hazbin hotel

an angle i enjoy in cosmic/eldritch horror is when, instead resorting to the old classic "the horrors being so incomprehensible that they break your brain and drive you mad" cliché, the premise is that in comprehending the horrors you are so changed by the experience that your new state is indistinguishable to an outside observer from madness. you comprehend the unknowable just fine, but actually communicating that to anyone else is impossible because they just don't have the mental framework required to understand it. the eldritch horrors don't drive you mad. what does is the ordinary everyday horror of finding yourself isolated, ridiculed and doubted at every turn, no matter how hard you try to make yourself heard and understood.

i wonder where the idea of chilchuck being a deadbeat came from when theres like. no textual evidence for it ?

he knows what all of them are up to; he still writes to flertom and she sent him his neckwarmer, so that to me implies that they at least have a somewhat positive relationship?

its more ambiguous with meijack and puckpatti, but since meijack is also a picklock, i wouldn't be surprised if he taught her himself, considering how trades are often passed down through families, and because he talks about sending people to her if he dies.

also the way he talks about puckpatti is very like... it's obvious he wants her to take things more seriously, but he's accepting, and his tone here reads more fond to me than anything else.

like, he keeps his daughters' old toys under his desk? that doesn't scream 'deadbeat' at all, it screams 'empty nester' who doesn't know how to reach out or is scared to do so

EDIT: i know a lot of the 'deadbeat dad' stuff is jokes, but some people are Not joking and genuinely think chilchuck is a bad dad. this post is not saying that you cant joke about it; it is just outlining what canon shows regarding his (clearly positive) relationship with his kids.

chat i dont think i can explain this one

Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".

Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"

And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".

Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.

At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.

So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!

Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!

Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!

Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.

the continued adventures of an internet user who was frozen in 2004 and defrosted in 2021: some things are just the way you left them

previous 2004 internet user comics are here: one, two, three, four, five; or just in my 2004 tag