I appreciate how it’s perceived jews are 30% of the population, muslims are 27% of the population, and atheists are 33% of the population. nobody wondered why christians were 10% huh

I honestly don’t even think this is as much “minorities being extremely visible”, and more just that the most people don’t understand fractions and statistics.

To most people, anything less than 10%, in any context, is basically “insignificant, not even worth your attention.”

The idea that Asians could be “only” 4% of the US population, and yet you still see a couple Asian people every day of your life, is deeply counterintuitive to most people. People don’t truly grasp that they pass by hundreds if not thousands of strangers every day and about 1 in 25 of them are going to be Asian.

Right now annual inflation is at a pretty high 9%, which is more than triple what the usual inflation rate is. But I guarantee if you asked the average person on the street what the inflation rate is right now, they’d think prices have gone up by anywhere from like 30-100%, because “9%” just doesn’t feel like a substantial or noticeable amount in their minds, even though it is.

Obsessed with the fact that 92% of people live in NYC, California, and Texas

This reminds me of a different post I saw recently, wherein OP was - understandably - irked that so many professionals will characterize something that affects 1%-2% of the population as “a rare illness”. In actuality, if you’re in a lecture hall with 300 people, that means 3-6 of people who are in the same room with you. It means you might meet people with [disorder] every day, and not realize it.

reblogging for that last comment. I’ve been saying this for years

same thing with “only” 1% of the world is trans, and “only” 1% of the world is ace. I saw somewhere on here that if you do the math, there’s more trans people than there are Canadians. This is where the jokes about aces conquering Denmark/Belgium/the Netherlands come from. There are more aces than the populations of some countries.

okay you can't just leave this tag there

The MAJORITY of human trafficking is for labor; factory work, garment/textile work, agricultural work, construction, and domestic work/cleaning.

And that's without counting -legal- human trafficking: Prison labor.

https://www.ilo.org/topics-and-sectors/forced-labour-modern-slavery-and-trafficking-persons

Also, like, benevolent sexist stereotypes are definitely used to make those who don't fit them feel like failures as women (especially queer women/trans women/woc/neurodivergent women/etc).

And on the flip side, they're also used to deny women who are skilled at those things credit for their accomplishments. It's easy for people to dismiss an excellent childcare worker when her "~magical gender intuition makes her naturally good at it~".

i remember when utah's (republican) governor ended up vetoing a law banning transgender students from playing high school sports when he looked at the numbers, and there were only four trans students in the state playing sports at all. he released a clumsily worded but surprisingly compassionate statement about the decision.

I must admit, I am not an expert on transgenderism. I struggle to understand so much of it, and the science is conflicting. When in doubt, however, I always try to err on the side of kindness, mercy, and compassion. I also try to get proximate, and I am learning so much from our transgender community. They are great kids who face enormous struggles. Here are the numbers that have most impacted my decision: 75,000, 4, 1, 86 and 56.

75,000 high school kids participating in high school sports in Utah.

4 transgender kids playing high school sports in Utah.

1 transgender student playing girls sports.

86% of trans youth reporting suicidality.

56% of trans youth having attempted suicide.

Four kids and only one of them playing girls sports. That’s what all of this is about. Four kids who aren’t dominating or winning trophies or taking scholarships. Four kids who are just trying to find some friends and feel like they are a part of something. Four kids trying to get through each day. Rarely has so much fear and anger been directed at so few. I don’t understand what they are going through or why they feel the way they do. But I want them to live.

of course, it didn't amount to much. they overrode his veto. it's just so cartoonishly evil. an entire state's political body so desperate to terrorize this one little trans girl.

Important additional context:

"Sodomy" does not, in a legal context, mean "anal sex."

It means "any sexual act the court has decided is deviant."

BDSM? Sodomy.

Crossdressing for sexual pleasure? Sodomy.

Jacking off to nude photos or video your consenting adult lover sent you of themselves? Sodomy.

Het oral sex? SODOMY!!!

If you're starting to think "but how could anyone prove that happened without breaking down the door?"

Ha. Haha. Ahaha.

First, I'll give you one guess how they did prove it.

Two, these were often scapegoat charges--basically they couldn't actually nail you on anything because you hadn't done anything actually illegal, only things they didn't like, and they relied on public disgust against your "degenerate character" (yeah there's a very big reason we keep saying not to use that word and it's not to be killjoys) to make sure you knew your place.

Which means that in practice:

Went to a socialist meeting? Sodomy.

Male kindergarten teacher? Sodomy.

Mixing races? Sodomy.

Not Christian (or the right kind of Christian)? Sodomy.

Kink is only the beginning. They'll come after the kinksters because they're low-hanging fruit, and you'll gleefully help them dig a hole, laughing all the way and never consider that it's way too big for the number of bodies you need to bury.