IDGAF if the women in my fiction are empowering or aspirational, I'm an adult, I don't need role models, I want the women in my fiction to be interesting, and if that involves being pathetic, hypocritical, amoral, or trapped in a delightfully dysfunctional relationship so be it

#'this is so illegal/toxic/unhealthy'#yeah bestie thats why im reading about it instead of doing it

is it a hot take to say that i think you need to understand why something is bad, not just that it simply is?

this is a part of the problem

you need to be able to explain why you shouldnt use ai rather than “oh well its obviously bad and you shouldnt use it or else youre a bad person” because that isn’t logic. “ai generates child porn based off of real children and whether or not it does is entirely up to how it is built and if pedophiles are able to find ways around those safeguards, because ai cannot in itself discern right from wrong” is a genuine criticism. “amazon tried to build a data center the size of tuson outside of tuson just to power their ai that would’ve increased the inability to stay alive outside in parts of arizona” is a genuine criticism. even “using generative ai teaches you not to learn how to do things yourself even when they’re difficult, devaluing necessary skills out of practice” is a genuine criticism when you look at the amount of people who think they are able of doing a difficult major when they couldnt write their own papers in high school.

but “ai is just bad because it’s bad” will convince no one and is a morally lazy position to take. about anything!

you need to know why reading someone’s diary is wrong if you want to learn about privacy and respect. you need to know why child sexual assault is wrong if you want to be able to help children form healthy age appropriate relationships. you need to know why capitalism is bad if you want to replace it with something else. you need actual concrete ideas and ideologies rather than “you should agree with me because i have the right vibe”

Us, arriving to Austria to a tiny family hotel owned by an elderly lady

Us: speak only limited German

Lady: barely speaks English

Us:

Lady:

Lady: Czech? Slovak?

Us: Czech

Lady, to herself: Czech, that's a Slavic language right

Lady: understand Yugoslavian?

Us:

Us: yeah that works

Shit like this can really only happen in Europe. Reminds me of the time I took my best shot at ordering at a restaurant in Spain in spanish. The closest language to spanish that I actually speak is latin.

Waiter: Germany?

Me: No, Czechia.

Waiter, in a heavily accented but intelligible Czech: Why didn’t you say so before! We get you guys here all the time!

Já v roce 2019 na Ukrajině: OK, takže když použiju tohle staročeský slovo, přidám polský sloveso, své chabé znalosti záhoráčtiny a řeknu to s ruskym přízvukem, tak to projde.

[Me in 2019 in Ukraine: ok so if i use this Old Czech word, add a Polish verb, my poor knowledge of the Záhorie dialect of Slovak and say it with a Russian accent, it might pass]

Reminds me of the time when we were in Poland and I tried to order a burger using a truly unholy mix of Slovak, Russian and Ostrava dialect (which in itself is like an unholy mix of Czech and Polish).

I did get the burger

[#my grandpa called this "Slavic Esperanto"]

I know Ukrainians who can do this on purpose and masterfully, and it was mind-blowing to hear a speech as immediately understandable to an audience of native speakers of three different native Slavic languages, not just two languages as is common

During one student exchange I (a Pole) got acquainted with two students from Czechia and Russia. At first we talked in English or German, but after a while we’ve noticed, that we could understand each other’s native languages just fine. And if some word was unknown in one language, another one had the right synonym.

*Each of us talking in their mother tongue*

Me: Bla bla bla.

Russian: I don’t know this “bla”.

Czech: Oh, we have “bla”! We also call it “that”!

Russian: Oh I know “that”! It’s a very old version of “this”.

Me: Oh, we have “this” too, but it means something slightly different.

German acquaintance: Was für nen Scheiß zieht ihr da ab? o_O

the reason there aren't slavic people in the bible is that they wouldn't have been surprised or awed to hear the disciples speak in tongues and be understood by people of many nations at once

Slavs walked away from the Tower of Babel mildly inconvenienced.

As a non-native speaker of Czech who is only conversationally proficient and has terrible grammar, let me tell you, no one was more surprised than I was to discover that I can understand Slovak just fine. And when the two moving guys finished hauling my furniture to my new apartment and we were chatting a bit before they left, I discovered that the reason I'd had a little trouble understanding one of their "accents" was because he was speaking Ukrainian the whole time.

"Slavs walked away from the Tower of Babel mildly inconvenienced." killed me

I can’t speak for other social media webbed sites but I really enjoy how tumblr seems to just completely spin a wheel on whatever media is hot right now. Like yeah sometimes it’s a new show that’s big and actively coming out but also sometimes there will be a solid month where half my dash is Columbo memes. Defy authority. Get really into an book from the 1800s. Watch shows that haven’t aired in 40 years. Celebrate the anniversary of the Boston Molasses Flood. Become unmarketable

oh shit i almost missed it!

Portrait of a Young Woman, Jean-Etienne Liotard 

Girl with a Pearl Earring, Johannes Vermeer 

#they look like theyve been having a chat about u and u just walked in

I’m on mobile, somebody edit them into this please

Y'all take too long

Same energy

No worries guys, they’re there too

Say it with me folks:

My uncle was one of the top surgeons in the country. He was upper middle class definitely. When he got cancer, his insurance didn’t cover all the treatments he would need and after 5 years he drained his savings on cancer treatments (while still working most of that time) and eventually died because he couldn’t afford the expensive treatments that might have saved him.

If you are upper middle class and you get sick, it will likely bankrupt your family. It’s fucked.

For all of the idiots in the notes ^

Honest to god - even if you make 6 figures a year? you're closer to poverty than true wealth. Check your shit and remember who your real allies and enemies are guys.

A 6 figure income is a lot right? That’s say: 223,000 dollars a year Which is 112 dollars an hour. Most people would consider that upper middle class. That’s enough money to have a nice house, go on fun vacations. That’s slight more than the average doctor makes.

223,000 dollars is what Jeff Bezo makes in a minute

the well-off and the rich are not the same. 

There was a wonderful study done about 15 years ago I think, that shows that people cannot accurately identify their income bracket. Most people who own a home think they are upper middle class when in fact they are closer to the poverty line. Even people living well below poverty often identify as middle class. The wealth gap is even worse now. I wonder if anyone actually knows their financial standing.

This post is from 2020. Things did not improve.

*pounds a monster at 9pm* why can't I ever sleep at night

WAIT.I MEANT. THE DRINK LIKE I.M

what a post to post on the monsterfucker website. pure gold

rip to you guys but i love assembling ikea furniture its so fun its like legos

people complain about how confusing assembling ikea furniture is and meanwhile i rise above their understanding and exist beyond their pitiful mortal comprehension as i spend a wonderful day assembling two twin beds with nothing but two hex keys, hope, and a whole lot of screws. 10/10 experience would do again

I thought I had something

But it quickly fell apart...

PSA: This just happened to me so beware:

Fortunately, I don't trust anyone online, so instead of using the help they suggested (a Discord link), I searched for Tumblr help and contacted them instead. Always ALWAYS search for the website's real help centre first.

Here are screenshots from the interaction for awareness:

and from support:

Stay safe out there!

I just got this again and the message came from a very real looking blog who had been following me for two years, so that's new. Maybe they are spoofing messages?

Anyway, I called them a "fucking evil minion" and they ran away.

But this does seem to be happening more frequently the last few days so be aware.

One of my friends was actually hacked and they tried to pull this on me from her account, so that's also a thing that can happen.

(Was super easy to recognize in that instance though because even if I didn't know about the scam, she wouldn't have written to me in English.)

I’d like to live through a week that’s not a whole new verse of “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”

#dated three years ago is really what makes this one#sorry op if you still have notifications on for this one#but hoo-wee did you hit on the sentiment of the decade

I do have notifications still on for this post because I love the sense of community it gives me. We're all just staring at each other blankly and occasionally screaming.

Also for the people who have post dates turned on and just go JESUS CHRIST FOUR YEARS AGO?!

#hey op how’s this week going for you

IT'S NOT GOING GREAT

You are Edmund Bertram from Mansfield Park. Your elder brother, the heir to the baronetcy and most of the family's wealth, is very ill. If he dies, you will instantly attain the girl of your dreams.

Edit: Probably worth mentioning that Tom gambled away half of your far smaller inheritance and then didn't even feel badly about it.

I think, based on the timeline, this would also prevent the affair.

(I will begrudgingly admit that Edmund is a good person for never considering this)

Edit: I wonder what the mourning period was for an elder brother because Mary and Edmund waiting out that time would be interesting too...

now say it with me: authors/artists dont owe you moral purity. an author/artist job is not to hold you by the hand & tell you exactly what is Good™ & what is Bad™. you should be able to think for yourself

"yes but depictions of (morally questionable thing) are only okay if its punished in the story" thats the hays code. you just reinvented the hays code

The duality of man is thinking “children cannot help themselves and we all need to be patient with them as they explore what it means to be human in public” and also “damn, I wish this crying baby was not on the plane rn :/“

Just as courage is not the absence of fear but doing the brave thing in spite of it, patience is not the absence of irritation but doing the kind thing in spite of it.

for no reason whatsoever here’s a reminder that if you consider yourself a leftist/punk/abolitionist/anarchist/radical in any sort of way and get called into jury duty, you are to become the most square person on earth during the jury questionnaire!!!

don’t be that guy who says fuck the police in the jury questionnaire! that just gets you sent home! if you want to generate change, interact with the case and use your jury vote for good! ESPECIALLY if it’s a high profile case!

Remember, when you're on the jury, a good "that cop's story didn't add up" will sway a lot more Chads and Karens than "fuck the police."

Had jury duty, can confirm!

An innocent man is home with his family instead of spending his kids' whole childhoods in jail for "resisting arrest" when none of the cops could agree on why he was being arrested in the first place. (But it definitely had nothing to do with him being a Black man in a nice car, honest! 🙄)

And it still took like two hours of delibration after we'd heard all the evidence because one lady was so gung ho about believing everything the cops said, even when not a single goddamn one could agree with their own testimony, let alone their colleagues'.

Pointing out all the inconsistencies and admitted misconduct and letting people slowly come to their own conclusions as the trial played out was fucking hard, I won't lie. I can be patient, but it doesn't come naturally to me.

But. Yelling about how this was obviously a bs case would have shut everyone down and made them stop listening. Asking questions and letting people discuss how the cops tried to make xyz sound suspicious but it was totally normal, or about how if things played out the way the cops said then logically events should have proceeded in a totally different direction, and positing different theories that actually lined up with the evidence presented?

That got people thinking, and everyone realized that for a variety of reasons we all had reasonable doubts that the defendent had committed any of the crimes of which he was accused.

Being able to raise reasonable doubt among a jury of one's peers saves lives. If you get the chance, take it.

"Jury Room / The Holdout" (1959) by Norman Rockwell. One of my favorites of his. Particularly the gendered dynamic he depicts here.