Maybe this therapy shit is working

Made me wheeze. Adopting this tag into my brain, thank you

"Interstate 55 carries 10s of thousands of abortion seekers out of southern states to Illinois, where abortion is legal. I-55 is covered with horrific, shaming billboards. Shout Your Abortion put up 6 good ones, to show love & affirmation to those making the journey." x

“you wore that yesterday!” have you not heard of a washing machine?? (i didnt wash it)

That tiny Human spirit has shat himself 4 times today if you’d shat yourself 4 times by noon you’d be in hysterics too

He fell asleep in his bed, at home, and woke up at the goddamn grocery store with an overhead light in his face if that happened to you you’d become The Joker

Poor guy’s only been here for like a dozen weeks he doesn’t even have a favorite show to distract him yet he’s just raw-dogging reality unfiltered with no goddamn Blorbos to rotate whatsoever

Dude has, at this point, one communication signal.

Fortunately for him, it is a very important communication signal, especially given what he's going through right now. It says, "This is, in some way, unsatisfactory." Unfortunately, it's not very specific and he doesn't understand much about how to deploy it.

You have to understand, the stomach ache that he has right now is the worst stomach ache in the universe, because as far as he's concerned, the universe is maybe a month old and there's been a limited number of stomach aches in it. Or, the loneliness and anguish he felt when he couldn't see you was the most terrifying isolation in the universe, akin to being adrift in the Boötes Void, for the very same reason. He does not have guidelines to cope with these things. He has barely accumulated enough of a dataset to start evaluating things like, "Most times, when people I know go away, they will reappear eventually," or, "that particular stomach ache will go away if I eat something." He doesn't even know which particular problems can be cured and which can't. He just knows that "technique: scream like fucking banshee" does have some sort of a success rate.

And it's his only move, you think he's not gonna spam it? Get real.

as much as we all joke about the concept of a nearly decade long situationship, i am forever grateful to rachel reid, and the entirety of the heated rivalry experience, for reminding us that there is still time. there is always still time.

there is still time to leave the home that never deserved you. there is still time to change your routine and find something new to live for. there is still time to figure yourself out. there is still time to build new friendships. there is still time to realise you don’t have to fight all the time. there is still time to learn your identity. there is still time to unlearn your prejudice. there is still time to unlearn your internalised hatred. there is still time to unlearn all you’ve been taught about yourself and love. there is still time to make your loved ones proud. there is still time to make yourself proud. there is still time to find new loved ones. there is still time to do things that scare you. there is still time to confess. there is still time to love others. there is still time to love yourself. there is still time for love. there is always still time for love.

and i think, right now especially, we needed this reminder that There Is Still Time.

when the world is burning and when there are new laws against our existence day in and day out, and when the hate is so loud we can barely hear our own heartbeat over it?

there is still time. there is still time to figure out who and what it beats for. there is still time to figure out the rhythm.

there is still time for it to beat. there is always still time for queer joy, and queer existence.

and there is enough time for you to have that. all of it.

"public schooling in america is by and large not designed for ideal learning and has a lot of fucked up incentives and structures that encourage mistreatment of children" ✅

"it would be preferable to have no structure or standardization and just go by vibes" ❌

"education itself is the problem, knowledge is fake, math and writing are unimportant, and ignorance is wisdom" ❌❌❌

I am gently taking your hands and begging you, BEGGING YOU, to understand that humans are not inherently harmful to the planet. We are animals who are part of the ecosystem. We belong here. This is our home. We belong here. You belong here. Yes, you belong here.

"humans are animals too" means both that we are not uniquely worthy or valuable and that we are not uniquely terrible or harmful. We have the capacity and the responsibility to do better.

^^^^^

This got me utterly sick i cant stop thinking about this video

He was done and then he just. Kept. Going.

I skimmed through the first two episodes of Heated Rivalry and wrote down dates. Here's a rough timeline:

The dash is feeling Tennant-y tonight, I see.

i found this ancient post from my blog so if you want to know what tumblr looked like from an ipod in 2010……

WOW

happy 15 years to this post

fish dont know im wet 

every single translator: get his ass

Hungarian translator: I'm on it

I owe so much to Heated Rivalry for its depiction of Ilya's bisexuality and how he's forced to navigate queerphobia.

Shane says, "But you like women, right? You could find someone you'd want to marry for real," and it explicitly addresses one of the most common ways people dismiss the existence of biphobia, and how it affects bi people as much as gay people.

Now, Shane wasn't making the point "You aren't actually oppressed for being bi like I am oppressed for being gay." But those same words have been used to argue that.

It's like people are aware that you can't choose who you love - until it's bi people. Then, suddenly, people obviously have a say in who they fall in love with, and they can just fall in love with the "opposite" gender and marry them and avoid any discrimination or persecution.

What makes it hit home even harder here, is that I think - and I couldn't prove this, I don't have any evidence, but it has always been my suspicion - a lot of bi men are closeted because they have this same mentality. They'll just find a woman. That way, they won't ever have to come out and face biphobia because of it.

But Heated Rivalry straight-forwardly counters this argument, making the simple point that, no, Ilya can't just find someone he wants to marry "for real" because the person he wants to marry "for real" is a man. That's not how it works. He doesn't get to choose. He's tried. He has so many women he could choose from, and he can't just make himself want them instead - no differently than Shane can make himself want to marry Rose.

But this isn't the only time Heated Rivalry refuses to suggest biphobia is actually just homophobia lite.

Ilya is bi, and yet that won't make any difference if anyone finds out he's attracted to men. It means so much to me that out of the two of them, the one that's bi is the one who would never be able to go home again. The one who is bi is the one that has to fear being arrested or even killed. His attraction to women would not save him.

If Ilya wanted to hide his bisexuality, he'd have to work as hard and sacrifice as much as any gay man, and his life would be exactly as hollow for it, and he would be exactly as miserable for it. Just by having ever been with a man, just by being attracted to men, he is as much of a target as any gay man is.

And the show even makes a point of showing that Ilya can't even save himself from biphobia by never getting caught, or by exclusively being with women. Ilya has a reputation as a playboy, a ladies' man, a womanizer. He's been with many women. He goes clubbing often, and his teammates and friends see him with women. Everyone knows Ilya is attracted to women and so far, no one has seen him with a man. No one could prove he's been with men or is attracted to them.

Yet, it doesn't save him, does it? People can tell. Svetlana, for one, but his brother too. Alexei calls him the F-slur. Ilya says that Alexei has always hated him, and that he knows why. I believe the intention there was to imply that Alexei can tell Ilya's queer and has always hated him for it.

Just like gay people can't always pass as straight, bi people can't always pass as straight either. When you're queer, it's part of every facet of you, and there are some people who can't ever truly be closeted, not completely, because they can't truly hide it. Bi people aren't exempt from this. Ilya is a bi man who is evidently not fully exempt from this.

I know I've criticized the show for not using the word bisexual before - I still wish they would have. But I can't deny that the representation of Ilya as a bisexual man, and the depiction of how that affects him, is probably the best I've ever seen. It means so much to me that they handled it so empathetically, and that they didn't trivialize it in the slightest.

On the portrayal of Russians in Heated Rivalry...

So I've been thinking a lot about this, and mostly what comes up for me is gratitude. Gratitude that, for fucking ONCE, a Russian character is a fully realized human being and not a stereotype or pastiche. I cannot describe to you how often I think about that horrible storyline from The West Wing where Bartlett goes, "Where do you people get the nerve?" and the Russian ambassador says, "A long hard vinter, Mister President."

It's so stupid. It's so offensive. It's so xenophobic. And it's not even trying to UNDERSTAND Russia or Russians. Fucking Sorkin. Anyway.

This is...the opposite of that. This is a show (and I can only speak to the show so far, I haven't read the books) that profoundly cares about its portrayal of everyone, and pays attention to details. For the purposes of this post, I will be writing about its handling of Russians and Russia, but it goes beyond that, obviously.

Anyway.

First of all, they hired an accent/dialect coach for the language (the actor who plays Ilya's father (who is, I believe, Ukrainian)) as well as actual Russian-speaking actors, which I always appreciate (usually, with some notable exceptions, Hollywood will hire Polish actors at most, for some reason). Svetlana, the unnamed Russian minister, Alexei, and even the initial Russian hockey team coach in episode 1 are all Russian-speaking, and it shows. (Svetlana's actress has the LIGHTEST accent, but I bet I might at this point, as well, so I can't fault her for it.)

And Connor Storrie has put in the WORK, man. I've said this before, but where I mostly notice people struggling with Russian is the vowels - they're just different. This is where most languages differ, actually (to my ear, at least). And there are certain Russian vowels that are harder than others ("ы" is notoriously difficult for English speakers to pronounce correctly, it's what gives most of them away, actually) and all the vowels, pretty much, sound just a LITTLE different from their English equivalents. And Connor Storrie is pretty fucking impressive, ngl. There's no, like...pretending with him. (And no eyebrow acting like with Scarlett Johannson in the Avengers. Lord give me strength, they didn't even try.) He really embodies the Russian vowels (and even his "ы" is pretty impressive) and therefore the language itself. He isn't perfect - but he makes a monumental effort, which I appreciate SO fucking much.

Attention to detail is also impressive: in the first episode, you hear the Russian coach call out Ilya and pronounce his last name correctly, which isn't done by any of the English-speaking people in the show (it's "Ro-ZA-nov," if you're curious, not "ROH-za-nov" but such is the way). The Russian cursing is pretty good, too, actually (and there's a whole post to be made about Russian cursing, which is its own language and is SO much more harsh and impactful than English cursing could even hope to be) although there was one instance of it where I am not sure it made sense, but whatever, once is fine. (I'm actually curious if Ilya only cursing in English during sex with Shane is a specific choice they made, because he isn't fully comfortable with Shane yet, and so holds himself at arm's length, including during sex, or if they just wanted to have him say "fuck" instead. I hope it's a deliberate choice on their part.)

Outside of language, all the Russian characters feels just as fleshed out as their Canadian counterparts, which is where a lot of my gratitude comes from. Everyone is different, everyone has their own motivations, and nobody is vilified just for being Russian. His brother's an asshole - yep, that happens. His father is a hard-ass and clearly emotionally unavailable, but he is also losing his grip on reality, and Ilya is shown as both frustrated and hurt by his father, as well as worrying about him, because that's his dad. And Ilya himself contains so much depth, and pain, and hurt, and worry, and it's never played as anything other than a fully-embodied character with his own motivations. It's hard to explain, but I cannot tell you how frequently Russians are dehumanized in Western media. It's been the go-to since the Cold War, and it's not exactly gotten better. I've been in America since 1993, I've seen a LOT of this happen throughout the years.

Anyway, if I had a bone to pick, it's that I'm not sure the show-runners quite understand how Russian names work. I just don't know that Ilya would call his brother "Alexei" instead of "Alyosha", even though he's younger and they're not on the best of terms, because it's very rare you call a peer, especially a family member, by their full first name. It's just weird to me. And now I can't remember if Ilya calls Svetlana "Svetlana" to her face, or if he just refers to her as that to Shane, but in his head and between the two of them, he would absolutely call her "Sveta." His brother DID call him "Ilyushka," which I appreciated because that is exactly what an older brother would call a younger one, but that's once. Oh, and the childhood friend is Sasha, which is exactly right - he would not go by "Alexander" with them. We'll see what happens later, I guess, but that's my one tiny problem.

Other than that, this show is a gift in SO MANY WAYS, but this is the main one for me, personally. The relief of it is incredible. Thank you, Jacob Tierney, I owe you my LIFE

Oh, and PS: when Ilya wins the Cup, he yells "This is for you, mom!" which they didn't translate. Now you know.

meanwhile the irony of all the speculation and pressure around the heated rivalry actors’ sexualities is not at all lost on me. like you have a book series and then a tv show adaptation where “coming out is an active threat to your livelihood, which is precarious on the best of days and you will realistically only have said livelihood for like twenty years if everything goes ridiculously well” AND “even if you personally as a public figure are comfortable and willing to take the risk of coming out, you have to consider the impact of that kind of pressure and speculation on your loved ones, including your partner, who will have little shot of anonymity or privacy ever again, before you take that step” are MAJOR THEMES and people take that and go “so why aren’t these public figures who just want to do their jobs telling me every detail of the private lives??” Well, see, you’re not gonna believe this but