Like yeah. I know that none of us are immune to propaganda. But like. Some of y'all. Holy shit.

What sex positivity should be.

It’s consent-based. Sex positivity should encourage healthy consent practices, not only for sex but for all physical and emotional intimacy. It should encourage personal relationships and a larger society where people not only have the right to say no but the comfort in knowing that if they do say no they won’t be punished, pressured, or condemned for that. It should encourage people to be comfortable in setting their own boundaries and feeling safe calling out people who encroach upon those boundaries.

It’s risk-aware. Sex positiivty should encourage people to educate themselves and be open in discussions with their partners so that everyone knows the potential risks in whatever activity they’re participating in and how to participate in those activities in a safe manner. If, for example, a person is interested in bondage they should be aware of how to practice it safely so that it can be done without doing unwanted or serious harm to them or their partners.

It encourages safe sexual practices. See: risk-aware but sex positivity should also encourage the use of condoms, birth control, dental dams, etc. It should encourage people who are having sex with multiple partners to get tested regularly. It should also educate people about how to properly clean sexual devices and maintain good sanitary habits.

It’s shame-free. Sex positivity should remove the concept of shame from consensual adult sex. It should be based in the idea that if all participants in an act are consenting, adults, safe, risk-aware, not being harmed in a way that they did not consent to then, and that no one who does not want to participate is being unduly exposed to their act then they are doing nothing wrong and should not feel that they are.

It acknowledges that thoughts/fantasies are not the same thing as actions. This also falls under the category of being shame-free but more specifically, sex positivity should make an effort to remind people that their fantasies are not the same as real-life actions that and people with violent fantasies or who are aroused by fantasizing about things that would not be acceptable if acted on outside of their head are not bad for this and that their fantasies are not on the same level as the equivalent real-life action. Sex positivity is not believing in the concept of ‘thought crimes’ and refusing to shame people for thoughts/fantasies as though they were real-life actions.

It supports comprehensive sex ed. Sex positivity should support comprehensive sexual education being taught in every school. The curriculum should be inclusive to LGBTQIA+ people and focus on all forms of sex rather than just PIV as well as teach students about puberty, consent, birth control options, what a healthy relationship should be like, various forms of interpersonal abuse and how to spot red flags in relationships, menstruation (what is/is not normal for a period, different menstrual products and how to use them), and some other things I’m probably forgetting. Comprehensive sex ed should above all be shame free and make an effort to educate children about their bodies, sex, relationships, and selves in a safe and judgment-free environment.

It supports sex workers. Sex positivity should support the decriminalization of sex work and actively focus on improving the rights and safety of sex workers while also actively fighting against people and systems of oppression which force people into sex work who do not want to be there, namely among them being classism as no one should be forced into sex work due to financial circumstances which mean that without doing sex work they would be homeless or unable to afford basic living expenses (an issue that should be addressed not by further penalizing or otherwise harming, shaming or discriminating against these sex workers but by attacking the system of classism and supporting more social welfare and expanding opportunities for the poor).

It supports a person’s right to their own sexuality. Sex positivity should acknowledge that all people have different sexualities, different levels of interest in sex, different kinks, and just different feelings about and experiences with sex in general, and it should embrace this. People who experience no sexual attraction, people who don’t ever want to have sex, people who are attracted to everyone, people who want to have sex with multiple partners, people who are ‘vanilla’, people who are into ‘extreme’ kinks—people with every level of sexual interest and interest in specific kinds of sex should be accepted provided that everyone involved with whatever is going on is a consenting adult. This should include asexuals and people who are sex-repulsed (asexual or not) as sex positivity should encourage and support people who don’t experience sexual attraction or don’t want sex as much as we do people who do.

It refuses to harbor, accept, or excuse abusers. Sex positivity is not worth a shit unless it’s anti-abuse. Consent and safety are the foundation for good sex positivity and people who violate another person’s consent or compromise their safety should not be accepted and their actions should not be swept under the rug. Sex positivity should focus on educating people on various forms of abuse and how to spot them, creating a society where abuse victims are able to safely come forward about their abuse without fear of victim-blaming or punishment, and refuse to allow abusers to continue being part of of our communities. It means acknowledging abuse when it happens, addressing it seriously, and doing everything in your power to support the survivors.

It encourages honesty and open communication. Sex positivity should encourage people to be honest to the people they’re involved with and with themselves as well. It should encourage people to be introspective about what they feel and what they want and it should provide them a safe environment by which to express these things to their partners. People should be comfortable discussing sex with the people they’re involved with and not be afraid to do so.

It’s inclusive to people of all identities and body types. Sex positivity should actively acknowledge and support people of all kinds and make an effort to discuss the sexual issues pertinent to certain identities that are rarely given much attention. It should actively fight against the idea that only a certain kind of body is the ‘right’ kind of body, that only a certain kind of people are ‘desirable’, that conventional beauty standards are the end-all/be-all. Sex positivity should be inclusive towards fat people, disable people, trans and nonbinary people, people of color, mentally ill people, queer people—everyone. Sex positivity should create and encourage the existence of people of all identities being able to talk specifically about sex, sexuality, and how it intersects with different aspects of their selves.

Sex positivity to me essentially should mean consenting adults making their own choices with regards to sex—whether or not they have it, what kind they have, who they have it with, etc—while acknowledging and respecting that other consenting adults will make other choices because all people are different and want different things, and it should focus not only on an individual’s sexual choices but also on building a broader society which is open and honest and legitimately cares about the well-being, happiness, safety, and autonomy of other people.

It’s honestly so close to being funny that the take of “It’s fucked up that there’s a kind of “irredeemable person” you can treat like dirt, especially since you can label anyone as that if you don’t like them.”

Was met with “I didn’t like that, I think she’s an irredeemable person, let’s treat her like dirt.”

i truly think that this recent trend of “if you relate to a post about a different identity than your own you are ~derailing~ and taking over the conversation” is incredibly harmful.

i recently experienced some pretty severe transphobic abuse in my workplace (children’s home) that included having food thrown at me, being called slurs, being told i was a pervert because i am trans. one of the managers talked with me afterwards and shared that he had had a similar experience as an Asian man. this wasn’t him derailing my experience, or talking over me, or making things about himself. he was communicating “hey, i know how it feels and how much it sucks. you’re not alone.”

THAT is what solidarity IS. i don’t know what it’s like to be Asian, he doesnt know what it’s like to be trans, but we both had a similar experience and we were able to turn a horrible experience into an opportunity for bonding and comfort.

stop looking at people’s attempts as solidarity as an attack. and hey, you never know - you could find an opportunity to grow closer to other people.

I've lived on Chicago's South Side for half a decade, and it must be said that black women have a really good batting average for understanding trans stuff and taking me seriously without a sense of overbearing #Allyship

And like. One of my favorite customers at work once told me that her parents grew up as sharecroppers, left the moment they could, and never ever talked about it. My grandmother-in-law, who's still alive, had her Bat Mitzvah in 1943. It's possible that "I started transitioning in the 2020s" might someday summon a similar type of solemn horror, and if I don't extend that solidarity then what the fuck am I doing here

I very genuinely need tumblr to understand that museums are as diverse as historians, egyptologists, archaeologists, and what have you in general. Like from the way people are talking you'd think that only straight white Western men are ever involved in these concepts, because the internet at large just loves to be able to get on their little high horsie about how they are sooo much more morally correcter than the Evil Other

Which is absolutely not a concerning attitude to have, not at all no sir

forgot I'm on the piss on the poor website so I'll spell it out: Western straight white men aren't per definition the Evil Other either

You know where the real danger is? Anti-intellectualism, the concept of moral purity, and opening your damn trap when you don't know shit about fuck

#also our job market is a hellscape and a lot of us aren't wealthy either and neither are our workplaces #many museums especially have SUCH a hard time affording anything rn #the days of museums as institutions and the humanities being a realm of wealth and prestige are well and truly over #this is a field that is being devalued constantly in a world that would love to believe everything important is digital #or about making money #and that's a fucking problem bc the whole thing of museums is that they offer easily accessible education #HOW is the “go to your local library” website so indifferent or even hostile towards museums#academia (via @veilchenjaeger)

slightly worried by how many people seem to have been taking the things they see online at face value before genai was a thing

"it sucks that genAI means i have to verify everything i see online now!" you shoulda been doing that anyway though

remembered im posting this on the infinite chocolate website

The world prefers empty, suicidal doormats of "boys" over girls who know their own worth and fight for their voices. Don't give them the satisfaction!

Take ahold of your destiny today!

I reeeeaaalllyy don't like how widespread gender realism is in supposedly feminist circles on this website. You are one step away from becoming a radfem.

"Woman" is a socially constructed category and "women" have nothing intrinsic in common, other than viewing themselves as whatever "woman" is defined as in their society, or being judged by the standards of whatever "woman" is defined as in their society. Gender is as "real" of a category as race or neurotype, which is to say, it's not objectively real at all. It's an artificial category created on the basis of perceived shared traits among certain people. The people came first, they were grouped into their artificial category later. There are no intrinsic differences between men or women or nonbinary or multigender people.

Do you actually believe gender is a social construct or are you just mindlessly repeating the phrase because it sounds cool

Watching the queer way of interacting with gender go from "Gender is a social construct that can be fun to play with but at heart is a dangerous toy because it has been used for generations to oppress and divide people." To "Everyone has a perfect crystal of true gender which you must deeply introspect to discover, and you can be wrong about its nature." Has been a disaster.

If your language lost, it should die with dignity, not be put on artificial life-support because ‘reasons’

#Sorry but I have no sympathy for that fight#let the dead languages be dead#grumping#controversial opinions#because people always get annoyed with me when I say this#but Gaelic (for example) shouldn’t still exist

———–

Gaelic hasnt been lost.  It’s never died or been brought back.  There’s an unbroken line of native speakers going back to the beginning of the language.  That doesn’t seem like a ‘lost’ language to me.  Furthermore I’m not sure what ‘artificial life-support’ means in this context.  Gaelic is given funding for schools because there’s still native speakers of the language.  It’s no more artificial than money being given to schools for English language lessons.

If anything is ‘artificial’ its the imposition of a foreign language (English) into a Gaelic majority zone and native speakers having to fight for decades to be able to be taught in their own language.  Native speakers being forced to learn English to exist within their own regions because a central government would not allow services to be given in a people’s own language.

But then the clock only goes back so far with people who wish that minority languages would just die.  There’s nothing artificial about shooting someone but suddenly it becomes an ‘artificial’ act to maybe phone an ambulance?

“There’s nothing artificial about shooting someone but suddenly it becomes an ‘artificial’ act to maybe phone an ambulance?” — THIS RIGHT HERE

Also just gonna point out here:

In the UK, the languages Gaelige, Gaelic, Cymraeg and Kernewek (that’s Irish, Scottish, Welsh and Cornish respectively) didn’t just “die out.” There was a concerted effort by the English to kill them off. 

For example, in Wales, if a child was heard speaking Welsh in a classroom, they’d be given a “Welsh Not”, a wooden plaque engraved with “WN” to hang around their neck. They’d pass it onto the next child heard speaking Welsh, and whoever had the Welsh Not at the end of the day was punished - usually with a beating. 

Kernewek was revived after a long hard struggle by the Cornish folk, and is now being taught again, but a lot about it has been lost because everyone who grew up speaking it has died.

And languages are never revived “just because.” The language of a place can offer so much insight into its history, so if you’re content to let a language die then you’re content to let history die.

People talk about “dead” languages as if they dwindle away gradually, naturally coming to an end and evolving into something else, but that’s rarely the case. Languages like Cymraeg and Gaelige and especially Kernewek didn’t have the chance to die with dignity, they were literally beaten out of my parents and grandparents. 

Is it any wonder every other country hate the English? We invade their country, steal their history, claim pieces of their history as ours or flat out re-write it, and kill every part of their culture that we can. 

It’s a miracle that any of the Celtic languages survived, so even if you don’t see the point in keeping them alive, the actual natives of each country we’ve fucked over are clinging onto what heritage they have left through the only thing they can: their language. 

aren't gorillas gentle giants or something. i stay out of his way, he doesn't maul me, we have a nice time picking out clothes together in opposite sides of the mall

Male gorillas are super aggressive and territorial. Also they interpret nearly every human mannerism as a sign of aggression or a challenge. Smiling and eye contact are both things that zookeepers have to be taught to suppress when they’re in the vicinity of gorillas.

Well unless the mall is his native territory I think I'm fine, I wasn't planning on smiling at him

This is all irrelevant because the obvious answer is five black mambas. I mean, that’s not actually very many snakes, and malls are fucking huge. And unlike a gorilla you can definitely outrun a snake if it does show up. Find an open space in the mall where you can see any snake coming and just hangout out there. Fucking easy.

Misguided! I would much rather have a mallmate I can easily see and hear coming. I'm confident I can stay out of the gorilla's way, but if I step on a snake or one otherwise gets the jump on me, it's all over.

It's not just about the physical danger either, it's about my mental health. One gorilla, unless he's actively mad at me, I just keep a healthy distance between us and make sure I never get trapped. With the snakes, it requires a lot more constant vigilance

They should substitute "chimpanzee" for "gorilla" in this hypothetical.

if it was a chimp i'm taking the fucking snakes

Black mambas have a reputation build on being very venomous and very fast. I'm not sure why you would think you could outrun one (or five) in an enclosed space like a mall.

Malls usually have pretty slick floors, and escalators. I’d choose the gorilla simply because I think that would make an more interesting story (and a better-selling autobiography, I Survived the Mall Gorilla) but I think I’d stand a pretty good chance at avoiding the mamba. They’re fast and aggressive and will chase you but unless we started immediately beside each other I think my sneakers would have the terrain advantage over scutes.

this is too good to leave hidden in the replies

fucking enamored with the implication that this gorilla is fully intelligent but is trying to manufacture plausible deniability like the movie barnyard

wasnt that the plot of nope

Teachers have tried this and are amazed when their classes don’t go feral like in the book.  It’s almost as if the book was supposed to be satire and not a treaty on the nature of humanity.

there’s a timeskip

THERE’S A TIMESKIP

THERE’S A TIMESKIP

THERE’S A TIMESKIP

after losing control of the signal fire there’s a FUCKING TIMESKIP and when the next chapter starts everyone’s hair is several inches longer and their clothes have rotted to shreds and they’re still just kind of chilling!!!!

IT TAKES THE TERRIBLE IMPERIALISM MIND-POISONED EXCESSIVELY BRITISH BOYS IN THE ACTUAL BOOK SEVERAL MONTHS TO COMMIT A SINGLE ACT OF INTENTIONAL VIOLENCE, EVEN THE ONE (1) CHILD WRITTEN AS AN ACTUAL SOCIOPATH

AND then when they DO turn on each other it is because

THERE’S AN UNSPECIFIED WORLD WAR HAPPENING

AND A PILOT’S CORPSE CRASH LANDS ON THE ISLAND POST-DOGFIGHT AND THE CHILDREN MISTAKE THE PARACHUTE FOR A MONSTER AND SPIRAL INTO PARANOIA

BECAUSE CHILDREN INHERIT THE LEGACY AND TRAUMA OF VIOLENCE FROM THE ADULTS WAGING WAR AROUND THEM

HURR DURR IN THE REAL WORLD IT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN LIKE IN LORD OF THE FLIES -

IT DIDN’T HAPPEN THAT WAY IN LORD OF THE FLIES EITHER YOU JUST HAVEN’T READ IT SINCE HIGH SCHOOL IF EVER AND DON’T REMEMBER WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN THE GODDAMN BOOK

#tbf the dude wrote it to be a dick

yes. yes he did. i’m also gonna direct you to the real life ‘lord of the flies’ which occured in the 1960s, when six tongan schoolboys got stranded on a desert island for over a year before being rescued by an australian fisherman (who, it should be noted, later took on all six as crewmembers because the reason they were out in the first place was because they wanted to see the world, and named his ship the Ata after the island they were stranded on). nobody died. the only injuries that occurred were accidental, and when one of the boys broke his leg falling down a cliff, the others braced it and looked after him so well that it healed perfectly. if they argued, then they would literally go to opposite sides of the island until they’d cooled off. after leaving the island, they remained friends for the rest of their lives. here’s a photo of them as adults, with their rescuer (who is third from the left) and other members of his crew.

i read about this in rutger bregman’s human kind, a book i cannot recommend highly enough, but if you don’t want to go and read a whole book about the inherent goodness of humanity (which again, you really should) then the relevant excerpt can be found here.

> sees nihilistic depiction of human nature

> looks inside

> hope :)

My favouritest sport fact ever is that in 1990s 2 cardiac surgeons watched an f1 race to save the lives of countless kids. The Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children (GOSH) kept losing the lives of patients after successful heart surgeries. Specifically the 10-15 minutes after a bonefide clinically successful surgery patients would die:

And so the two surgeons filmed a handover after heart surgery and sent it to the Ferrari pitcrew who were told to critique and improve handover process

And from this:

we got this:

The error rate during patien handovers dropped from 30% to 10% with the F1 informed protocol.

I literally love this fact so much because being an pitcrew member is such a thankless job because theyre underpaid and overworked mechanics and they literally saved lives in this instance.

I love this!

And it that it wasn't a one and done.

The doctors went to the race tracks to watch the car changes and the pit crews went to the hospitals and watched a live transfer and offered suggestions and they kept working with them to improve.

After there was a successful improvement of the most vital metrics of a handover of a patient from surgery to ICU, the pit crews also worked with other hospitals for other procedures and it's now a whole thing of trying to apply the specialized, streamlined and speedy teamwork and nonverbal coordination of pit crews to other high-risk fields.

This is a perfect example of how two very different fields of knowledge meeting can make a huge leap forward in progress.

you know how "the brain doesn't finish developing until 25" was a misinterpretation of a study where subject age capped out at 25? and you know how the ongoing Chernobyl meltdown was handwaved away because the radiation readings didn't seem that high, when they were actually reaching the max level their cheap dosimeters could read and the real amount was thousands of times higher? anyway i'm wondering what other instances of that we're just living with without realizing

"trans women's breasts stop growing after 3 years on HRT" the study capped at three years.

So many people never learned to live with harmless discomfort at any point in their lives and holy fuck does it show

“But I wanna know!” You’re gonna have to learn to be ok with not knowing some things, especially when those things involve personal details about strangers that they’re not comfortable sharing.

“But it’s confusing!” If you take the time to educate yourself it’ll no longer be confusing. Otherwise you’re just gonna have to learn to be ok with being confused.

“But it’s weird!” You probably do weird things all the time. Everyone does weird things sometimes. Life goes on.

“But it scares me!” Is it hurting you? No? You’ll be fine. Being scared and being harmed are not always the same thing. Learn to tell the difference and then act accordingly.

“But I want it!” And I want a million dollars. You can’t always get what you want.

"Friends outside of Minnesota please read. I'm sharing a post written by a personal friend and medical doctor: Friends outside MN, you need to know what is happening here. Everyone knows that ICE shot and killed a woman here on Wednesday. But that’s not the only thing that’s going on:

Here's an AP news brief with a little more info. It's limited in the way major news outlets are right now but provides context that supports the personal account shared.

lowkey children are right about homework

when an adult says "i did work for eight hours starting at 7am i shouldnt have to answer emails at home" people clap about how relatable it is but when a kid says "i did work for eight hours starting at 7am i shouldnt have homework" people start going on about the importance of academics and calling them a delinquent brat