#and TIL that a frightening number of people won't even do THAT

[sword-and-lance]

and yeah sometimes you'll fuck up on trying to expand your cultural horizons or shit like that, sometimes you WILL just do something wrong or just Not Really Great and get called on it

yeah it fuckin sucks! acting like it doesn't is a disservice! but you gotta get called on your bullshit when you do bullshit or you don't learn any better and then you're very much no better than the dinguses who are being racist assholes on purpose

go wallow in your own neuroses in fucking private for a minute if you absolutely must and then dust yourself off and learn from it and then do your best to do better

it is legitimately better for fucking everyone including yourself that way and you cannot let fear of maybe being called a bit of a dick drive you away from connecting with a large swathe of other human beings who just...grew up different than you or live somewhere not where you live ffs

#; mun ranting #just...speaking as someone who HAS kinda Cocked It Up a few times #you still gotta squash the impulse to not touch anything not-white/non-USian or non-European just because you MIGHT get it wrong #and I'm still trying to punt that impulse outta my head MYSELF mind you #that impulse can get /pretty/ bad I fucking get it #but goodness you /cannot/ limit yourself like that if you wanna ACTUALLY unlearn your societal -isms #that isn't a spectator sport you actually gotta go DO IT #something I still struggle with? yeah! but I still fuckin TRY #and TIL that a frightening number of people won't even do THAT #ALSO people outside of the Asshole Spaces of Tumblr are a bit more forgiving of 'He A Little Confused But He Got The Spirit' #JUST. GO /TRY/.