the other day i saw a tiktok of a woman talking about how her hyper-militant abusive parents would sometimes punish her by “taking away her name” and referring to her as a prisoner number. genuinely terrible stuff, obviously. but i skimmed the comments and. listen. i truly DO NOT mean to dunk too hard on this person, like they could be a kid or something, but.

just. breathtaking. imagine if your primary reference for the concept of the un-personing of prisoners was (check notes) a book series about owls.

This is why it's important to Include stuff like this in fiction, especially ya fiction. It can be a lot of sheltered and/or indoctrinated children, in the case of a lot of rural "Christians", first introduction to these types of concepts in a way they can understand.

I don't think there's anything weird or shameful about it. Knowledge is knowledge, regardless of where it came from.

I was once listening to one of the ten billion animorphs podcasts out there, with two hosts, one who'd read Animorphs as a kid and one who was reading it for the first time as an adult. For those who don't know, Animorphs is a war story in which a handful of children have to secretly hold off an alien invasion until the "good" aliens arrive to save Earth. It starts off with fairly clear-cut Bad Species of aliens and Good Species of aliens but as the series goes on it becomes clear that there is no such thing as a good, clean or glorious war, that a clean Good Side and a clean Bad Side is usually propoganda, that heroism is a matter of circumstance and that war will chew up and spit out even the victorious; there are no winners in war, just the side that lost less.

It's a lot, for books aimed at eleven year olds who want to read about kids turning into fun animals.

On the podcast, the two (American) hosts happened to get onto the topic of the post-9/11 Iraq War and their reactions to it. They were both children at the time and as such could not be expected to have particularly nuanced views of US military policy. The person who hadn't read Animorphs was unsurprised by the declaration of war; that's what you did. Someone attacks America, America goes to war. That's how a country protects itself, through military revenge. The Animorphs fan, about the same age, had been devastated and against the war from the start. War was a Big Deal and, while sometimes unavoidable, should be a last resort; a lot of people were going to die, and a lot more were going to get hurt, and no matter how the war shook out it was still going to be horrible. They attributed this perspective, of course, to the series that had taught them about the horrors endemic to war in an engaging way at such a young age -- to Animorphs.

That's what kid fiction is for.

“you can’t hate ICE agents for wanting a fat paycheck” ah yes. people who are willing to disregard all morals for cash. congratulations you played right into their hands you uneducated piece of shit

you couldn’t pay me an amount even feasible to do this evil shit. you are lower than dirt

This. You can and should judge people for working for ICE, they're people who willingly signed up for an American secret police force that's violating the rights of people constantly in order to act as enforcers of a fascist government.

Basically everyone is not an ICE agent. Like, virtually all of us, the entire population, are not ICE agents. No matter how steep our bills are, very nearly every single American is not an ICE agent.

We can, and should, judge them forever. It should be the sort of thing their grandkids are ashamed to discover. The sort of thing that hamstrings a career forever. "What were you doing in 2025-26? Oh, you were with ICE? Thank you for your time, get out right now."

They should all be judged and shunned for the rest of their lives.

The funniest thing I've learned in the last day is that the "$50K bonus" only pays out after 5 years of service.

Like, lmao, you thought Trump was gonna give you a big chunk of cash? Silly.

I wonder what the actual pay is, and whether that additional 10K a year makes it a livable wage.

99% of them will never get that money regardless bc agents are washing out and quitting faster than they can handwave more through because, well...

My most old-school internet opinion is bring back chunky scroll bars! I don't want some scroll bar so discreet I can't even find the fucking thing. I want a nice Windows 98-level of obviousness.

Most non-Minnesotans have no idea what this means, but to put it plainly: we're raised with not just the expectation but essentially -programming- to assist others who get stuck during the winter. We'll help people we'd otherwise punch on sight if they're stuck in the snow and ice, for zero reward.

This is the level of rage we're at with ICE. I'm not joking to say it's almost physically painful to not help someone stuck like that, and it's worth it because the people stuck are ICE.

The only way we have to express how mad we are above this is channeling the First Minnesota all over again.

The Scandinavians who settled in Minnesota brought with them their Norse understanding of the laws of hospitality: you do not fuck around with winter, that if someone needs help in the winter, you help them as long as they don't actively try to hurt you or your neighbors. Food, shelter, labour, whatever, if you can help in winter, you do.

ICE has violated the "actively try to hurt you or your neighbors" bit of the laws of hospitality, and thus the hospitality has been revoked. They are free to feel winter's wrath against those who would bring harm to the community.

I like to think that Lady Skaði would be proud of her distant children.

this reminds me of the mud wizard who walked through everything without any problems while the police officers kept sliding and falling and getting stuck, you can watch it right here.

for context, this was during anti-coal protests in lützerath which went on for days and included people being forcibly removed, injured, or otherwise violated by the police. they showed up in riot gear against people simply sitting and camping and wanting to protect their forests. it was a really big deal here.

Secretary (2002)

Sometimes, just to see what they are up to, like to get a sense of what a lot of middle class, educated, middleaged-ish white people in America are feeling, I look at the Bulwark. It's like... former Republicans and centrists.

Anyway, they always seem very surprised at the state of things and always seem to ignore when the state of things turns out to be exactly what progressives and leftists have been saying for a while now. But if you want to know where people like that are on the journey to realizing fascism is happening or that America has a lot of problems even without the fash, there is the Bulwark. I do think they mostly mean well, but you do wonder what America they have been living in. And I say that as a middleaged-ish, educated white person--but I am not middle class and maybe that is the difference.

Anyway, they are currently surprised that America has a high tolerance for violence. America.

School shootings and police state and imperialist violence and uncontrolled military budget and censoring sex but not violence in media and ICE and race riots every 30 years or so and unacknowledged scars from slavery which is an inherently violent institution and almost zero legal consequences for rape and sexual assault America. That America. They are shocked.

I too scan the Bulwark on occasion, because their blind spots are unobscured by obeisance to Drumph. They think they deserve to take over the conservative banner once Drumph is removed, and their friends are already running the corporate wing of the DNC, so the worst Dems and they have a chance to do just that, unless there's just smoking ruin in America after Drumph dies or his party does.

I expect, if you know, something survives this, for there to be a split in the Democratic party anyway. With either the name shifting meaning (like with Republicans from Lincoln's time) or a new party altogether. It's already happening, to some degree. So these people merging more with the few Republicans left standing after all this (cuz that party is dying. It's MAGA now.) seems like something they would do, so they don't have to ever examine their blind spots at all. I watch them, but I don't trust them.

But I watched that Bulwark where their lone woman tried to talk to a Gen Z woman, and she (the older woman) seemed so... so out of touch, even with the younger woman trying to clue her in, that it feels sort of like watching the NYT right now to me. The New York Times is trying to appeal to the center, mostly, and in doing so, in losing younger audiences and any potential to appeal to younger audiences. And I don't know if they've even considered that. They are not the future but they think they are.

Maybe the NYT bosses believe they will be around forever no matter what, and maybe this brand of middle-of-the-road Democrat/Independent also thinks that they will always be around to be "smarter" than the youths. They certainly can't govern the country we are actually in because they don't live in that country with us.

I wonder... hope... they either course correct or get in their own way the way the Republicans/Heritage people are currently doing. All of them destroying each other to reach the top of the heap that no one in the younger generations is even looking to.

Sorry. (avoiding work again, as always. so I babbled)

Happy to see this in places where I usually find white nationalist stickers.

Local house witch telling you to please learn basic housekeeping skills.

It’s not your fault if no one ever taught you but YouTube is a magical place and can teach you at your own pace.

Someone asked me what housekeeping skills I’d recommend learning.

Keep in ming that this is not me shaming you, I know you have your reasons, folks. This is just a guy who enjoys clean spaces asking that you start learning now.

Here’s what I suggest as an adult who has lived with other adults who didn’t have housekeeping skills:

First and foremost, learn about all the places in your house that need to be cleaned and understand how often they should be cleaned. the American Cleaning Institute (I guess that’s a thing) has a good article about basic cleaning info. Plus this video on cleaning tips is great!

Learn how to do your dishes. HOT water is the only way to clean your dishes.

Learn how to clean your shower head, especially if you live in a place with hard water. Same goes for your sinks.

Learn how to do your laundry correctly. Even without the whole “separating whites and colors” thing, there are things you need to learn about washing your clothes. Learn what the tags mean, too.

Also, you don’t have to use fabric softener and you shouldn’t use it on towels or any fabric meant to absorb. (Learn about laundromats) And please learn how to clean out your dryer vent, it’s a safety hazard!

Get a disinfecting cleaner for your high-touch areas, especially the gross ones like the bathroom. Just because it doesn’t look dirty, doesn’t mean it’s clean!

Learn how to sweep, mop, and vacuum effectively.

You’ll also want to make sure to change out your home’s air filters.

TL;DR, here are some cleaning videos.

How to Clean Everything in Your Bathroom

How to Clean Everything in Your Kitchen

Livingroom Cleaning Routine

How to Clean Everything in Your Bedroom

Now these resources are not the end-all-be-all, but I think if you don’t know much about cleaning your space this is a good way to start.

here’s some of the things that are helping me actually clean (as an adult who had messy parents, and has a hard time getting threw my nurodivergency about cleaning specifically) that may be helpful to you:

Favorite Cleaning Book: it helps you work through the emotional side of cleaning (and other care tasks)

Current Favorite Decluttering Method/Concept: it helps you know how much is too much to keep and how to get started when you’re overwhelmed. (having too much stuff makes it incredibly hard to clean/organize.)

Basic Cleaning Skills: this channel is amazing! this man has a special interest in cleaning and cleans people’s spaces who deal nurodivergence that make it hard to clean. he does this for free (or at a deficit because he pays for supplies and dumpsters and transport and such) and does it all with empathy and kindness working With the people as much as people can handle instead of just coming in to “fix” an issue. these videos are a bit different from his usual ones, (the last one’s most like his usual videos) but i find having the sped up cleaning videos with a voiceover can help fill in for body doubling when im too ashamed to bring people into my messy spaces.

I’m gonna queue this as well so you’ll be seeing it again from me in a few months without any comments on it, but this is all good things to know

I fear a fresh wave of the plague

Update from twitter

i want to explain to people- the lower bit is accurate you probably pay way more in taxes/rent then a medieval peasants well as have less time off of work

hate when mummy movies use Imhotep as the big bad. He was an architect. Imagine a mummy movie but the mummy is Frank Llyod Wright. And he was buried at the House On The Rock. Ok nevermind that would be a sick ass movie.

Bone meal very good fertilizer yes

Today at the hay auction there was a pony for sale and I stopped to let her sniff me and she bit the holy hell out of me. She was sticking her head through the pipe gate to bite passersby. I can see why she was for sale.

Literally her while I’m just standing there

Supposedly a “former lesson horse”. Yeah life lessons maybe.

She sold for $200 lol