#it's a problem in that of it's a non-problem. i.e. no one notices so it never gets addressed. the straw hats just leave

[dykealloy]

one piece filler ep where they run into another peto-peto villain of the week guy but this time instead the devil fruit power rearranges people's brain chemistry so they have the thoughts behaviours emotional intelligence etc of a dog. zoro gets hit but he's just exactly the same

#it's a problem in that of it's a non-problem. i.e. no one notices so it never gets addressed. the straw hats just leave #zoro starts growling and barking at an enemy mid-fight and nami's like i really wish this was new for you but we all know it's not. #sanji finds zoro in the store room like 4 weeks later on all fours gnawing on a bone and is like yeah nothing out of the ordinary here #(kicks him out) #his tactile needs increase marginally but luffy's already on top of this so it goes entirely under the radar #he catches a rabbit with his bare teeth and starts shaking it around and usopp just starts screaming CAN YOU FUCKING STOP WITH THAT SHIT #(normal usopp-zoro interaction) #zoro gets flocked by children one time and he just. accepts it. Lets them pile up and crawl all over him. And Robin's like ''actually....' #''No. Nothing new.'' #the gang only start getting suspicious 4 months in when zoro gets into a habit of sitting between luffy's legs or at his feet #but the suspicion is honestly more directed towards the relationship status there #one piece #op #opla #zolu #roronoa zoro #zoro #CJ's op watch-through

[silksongeveryday]

Drawing Hornet everyday until Silksong comes out - Day 200!!!

(huge thanks to this person for the art suggestion!! <3)

I genuinely can’t believe that I’ve made it to 200 days, it’s truly been wild how time flies by like that and the amount of doodles I’ve made during that time. Over 200 doodles (217 to be exact if we’re counting double pictures/extra doodles) have been made over the past 200 days. :0

And thank you all so much for the love and support! Not only have we reached 200 days but also 1400+ followers about a week ago! <3

But, having said that I’d like to make a few announcements—some good, some not so great—about a few things regarding the blog, myself, and other stuff.

Putting it all under the cut so the post isn’t long if you’d like to know more

______________________________

Announcements!

My pfp!

1.) I’ll be changing my pfp again!! I’ve officially decided that after every 100 days or so I’ll change up the pfp so it’s up to date with my doodle style (assuming it changed at all lol), but generally it’ll look relatively the same as the last!

Possibly more admins?

2.) As of right now I’m looking into the idea/possibility of having a second (maybe third?) person help me with daily doodles! As much as I’d like to keep doodling everyday there are some days that it can be tough or some situation might be happening. (i.e. recently got injured)

See, the problem is I don’t exactly have a proper way of trying this out??? My idea was to maybe do this through dms or more preferably Google Forms. I also don’t really know what form of communication afterward would be best either, suggestions to help me work this out would be great! (as you can tell I’m not very good at this stuff lol)

Commissions!

3.) After much consideration and a lot of thought, I’ve decided that in the near future, I’ll be opening commissions again for the first time in years. I don’t have everything set up quite yet, but expect more info in the near future!

About requests:

4.) You may have noticed recently that I haven’t been doing as many doodle requests recently. Sure, there’s usually quite a few in a row at once but you may have noticed I’ve also been doing “non-requested” doodles aka ones that I just do on my own.

Expect this to become a very normal thing going forward. I probably won’t be doing as many requests as before because frankly with the amount of requests I get daily when it’s open is a lot to handle sometimes. Does this mean requests will be stopped entirely? No, I’ll still do some occasionally, but not as much as I have in the past.

Also I’ll likely be doing strictly anonymous requests.

About Burnout:

5.) Alright let’s address the elephant in the room.

There have been quite a few instances where people have wondered if I would ever have burnout and have occasionally joked about “dying” from said burnout because “Silksong will never release, you’ll be doing this forever” etc etc.

In the past I’ve been fine, motivation has been great, but recently I’ve noticed it a little bit.

Unfortunately life has its own plans so it can be a little hard for me to make a doodle that day, expecially recently since I’ve been experiencing personal/medical issues. It’s part of the reason I’m hoping to get a second (maybe third) person to help me do daily doodles so I can take a little bit of the load off my shoulders.

So what does this mean for this blog?

Not much right now. But in the future, there may be some changes. My current plan is to keep going on daily doodles/posts for the length of a standard year, so roughly 365 days. After that, if things in personal life keep up the way they have, I may have to stop daily doodles and instead will post only if I have time. That likely means doodles every other day or every three days or something. At the very least I’ll still post a doodle once a week.

Not to worry though! I’ll still try my best even after I reach day 365 :)

I’ll discuss how things work a little more on my main @miizori later, but that’s as much as I can think to explain rn.

———————————————

Just a few more things I wanted to say!

This community has been so cool to interact with, so much tamer than some others I’ve been apart of in the past. I’m genuinely thankful for how much support and how nice everyone has been. I truly didn’t expect to get this far, I was fully expecting to have stopped like 10 doodles in lol. I especially love to see all your comments in the tags and people sharing their art. You’re all so cool :)))

I have a dtiys from back when I reached 300 followers that’s still available if you’re feeling up to it!

Also my main (again, @miizori) is where I make updates on doodle stuff, regular art stuff and so on if you’re interested at all in that lol

I think that’s all that I can remember wanting to say, so thanks!! I look forward to more doodles for you all :)

#hollow knight #silksong #hk hornet #hollow knight hornet #silksong hornet #hk shade lord #shade lord #hollow knight shade lord #hollow knight fanart #hk fanart #silksongeveryday

[gemsofgreece]

Hello! Firstly, I wanted to thank you for the work you do on this blog. My mother's side is Greek and came to the US around WW2, and as I've gotten older and tried to learn about Greek culture, I've found that it's hard to find sources that aren't inundated with American pop-history. It's been really lovely being able to learn more from your blog for the past couple weeks.

Second is my question -- re: the pop history issue, I've noticed that people in the American queer community have a knack for "reclaiming" figures in history and mythology without always having an abundance of evidence for their claims. And like, I'm trans. Obviously the idea of some of things being true is cool, but it also feels disingenuous sometimes. Do you know of any good resources or books written by actual queer Greeks about either their contemporary experiences, or the history of queer people in Greece that isn't just conjecture?

Thank you again! Have a great day :)

Hello! It makes me so happy that you found my blog suitable to inform yourself on this part of your ethnic / cultural background. I hope the blog will keep being a useful source of information.

Because I am not going to lie, the way Greek history and culture, more like a snippet of it, has been almost forced into American pop culture is indeed through a disingenuous conjecture. Honestly, it's not so much a matter of accuracy per se. It's more that a niche piece of the culture has been taken and presented as almost the entirety of this culture, which eventually leads to tremendously false impressions, no matter how earnestly this niche part is explored. There is also the tendency to shape ambiguous evidence into unquestionable conviction.

I will attempt to explain why this can be a problem. Let's take the axiom - because it has reached the lengths of being treated as an axiom - "Ancient Greece was gay or Greece is gay or Greek culture was gay culture or Greece is / was a gay haven". If we really study Greek history and culture in its entirety, in a span of 3,500 years or more if we also take into acount the pre-Greek civilizations which eventually helped produce the Greek, while the existence of gay people (i.e Sappho), non-straight sexual practices (i.e erotic amphoras), ambiguous literary relationships (i.e Achilles & Patroclus?) and varied expressions of sexual desire observed especially in male deities are 100% well attested and recorded, they still comprise overall a very tiny part of the Greek civilization. Whereas it is often portrayed in western pop culture as the very essence of Greek civilization, exploration and studies of sexuality and gender identity throughout its history could amount to maybe a 1-5% of all documented knowledge associated to the Greek ethnos, its history and its legacy. Think of it this way; Greece happened to be in the epicenter of many formative achievements of humanity; spreading, contributing or improving on science, arts, extant religions and linguistics. It has been an area extremely ravaged by war because it has a very strategic position on the map. It has been in the core of three of the world's largest empires and it has been positively or negatively influential to all three (and the generator of one of them). There are so many things, struggles and achievements, to study and explore and draw from as part of your identity, that a constant foreign obsession and trivilization and sensualization of the sexual practices of people long gone eventually will start sounding disingenuous or lacking or even demeaning. Just like every individual aspires to be acknowledged and respected for more than just their sexual or gender identity (i.e skills, feelings, talents, achievements, personality), it is the exact same with culture and heritage. People want their culture to be appreciated in its entirety and not for a super niche area that is also exaggerated, if not exploited to serve foreign agendas, trends and marketing (because let's be real, not all have noble representation motives).

Okay, now I have to ask: do you know Greek? Because I can recommend you some sources, however Americans do not translate Greek works unless they are from 750 BC :)

Here's a quick heads-up:

The Greek society is a pseudopuritan society - one where people act like puritans when it comes to judging others but not at all when it comes to themselves. The gay male community has by far the biggest visibility nowadays. Lesbians come second. Other sexual orientations follow i.e bi, poly, pan. Gender (trans, non-binary, fluid etc) identities have less visibility. Asexuals also have near non-existent visibility. Most non-het non-cis people face problems in their families rather than in their studies or in urban environments. Non-cis people, especially AMAB people, might also face hardship in the workplace (like not getting easily hired).

Because the society is pseudopuritan, it tolerated and embraced and worshipped several LGBT people, except if they attempted to communicate their experience. Great composers and authors were openly gay and Greeks knew it and loved them, because they didn't explicitly involve their sexual identity in their work or because they didn't expose the pathogenies of the Greek society. If they had done that, the reception could have been different. Because of all these reasons, most of my sources will be from the perspective of gay cis men (the most visible LGBT+ community) and it will be mostly the great work and legacy they left behind, rather than their explicit documentation of the experience of living as LGBT+ in Greece.

LGBT poets and authors:

Constantine Cavafy (1863 - 1933), one of our best poets. This can be useful to you because his works are actually translated in English.

Napoleon Lapathiotis (1888 - 1944), openly gay in such times, he wrote a lot of erotic poetry.

Augoustos Korto (1979 - ), a married gay man, successful writer and activist, he has written extensively on the topics of death, depression, motherhood and love, often drawing from personal experience.

Kostas Tachtsis (1927 - 1988), poet, distinguished author and activist for gay rights during the Colonel dictatorship in the '70s. He suffered in his life and in his death as well. His murder has not been solved yet. He has written an autobiography and numerous novels with autobiographical elements. He was gay, either cross-dressing cis or maybe trans or non-cis (we don't know that back in time how exactly he identified) and had also been a sex worker for some time.

Napoleon Lapathiotis

Music:

Music won't give you direct information however it could be a way to bond with people you could connect with over similar experience.

Manos Hadjidakis (1925 - 1994), one of our two greatest composers and a rare genius, was openly yet "discreetly" gay, not out of shame but because privacy on all aspects of the human experience was absolutely essential and sacred to him. He was also an Oscar winner, although he would hate me for saying this (he threw his Oscar in the trashcan). Besides listening to his music, I would recommend watching interviews or listening to excerpts from his radio shows, because of the ease with which he could challenge anyone's intellectual capacity.

Sotiria Bellou (1921 - 1997), a lesbian or perhaps bisexual woman, she is worshipped for her unique voice, which became the ultimate symbol of the heavy-duty (underground at the time + now part of UNESCO's cultural heritage) rembetiko music genre.

TV Shows with representation:

Maestro in Blue on Netflix, a big part of the story is the romance of a gay couple suffering in oppressive families in the province

Milky Way, one of the main characters is pansexual and non-binary, and the actor is gay IRL. There is also a brief lesbian romance or a side narrative of supressed female homo- or bi- sexuality. This show will soon get in some international platform but I don't remember which one (not netflix), so keep it in mind.

Milky Way

YouTube:

There are a lot of LGBT+ people in Greek YouTube but my faves are:

ΚΡΙΜΑ by ZoePreTV: Zoe is a lesbian or bi herself (not sure but I know she's openly in a relationship with a woman) and she makes lengthy very informative quality podcasts with celebrities or everyday people, often belonging to marginalized groups, and they talk about their experiences. If you can understand Greek, this might be the best source for what you ask. I watched a fantastic episode with a trans woman and sex worker talking about her life. It is one of the greatest podcast episodes I have ever watched, hands down.

Eponimos. Zoe's best friend, who is an openly gay man, although he approaches matters of sexuality very delicately as he values his privacy a lot. He doesn't talk often about such matters (recently he did) but his channel is awesome for his lighthearted humour and the maturity of his positions. I love watching his content.

The podcast I mentioned.

LGBT+ Magazine: ANTIVIRUS. ANTIVIRUS also has this list with recent queer literature, featuring both Greek and foreign writers. Here is the link. It's in Greek though, like everything above...

Art: Yannis Tsarouhis (1910 - 1989), one of the most influential and successful Greek artists. He painted a variety of themes, he was inspired and developed Greek folk and Byzantine art, however he was also particularly notable for his love for the masculine physique and he established the classic image of the "Greek sailor" in art, theater and cinema internationally.

A great photo of Tsarouhis in his atelier.

I wouldn't consider myself well-versed in the topic, so I invite anyone who knows sources that could also ideally be easily accessible to the Anon, to give some recs in the comments. From my side, Anon, hopefully I was of any help.

#greece #europe #lgbt #lgbtq community #lgbtqia #queer community #representation #greek culture #discussion #anon #ask

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for asking my coworker about her schedule too much?

I work in a grocery store. Employee turnover is pretty high and a lot of people are just a pain to deal with (bad at their job, call out frequently, etc) so I like to get a vibe of new people to see whether they’re cool or not. I tend to ask people about their schedule (“What time are you here until?” “What days do you normally have off?”) partly just to make small talk but also so I can notice if someone is missing (i.e. someone always works 8-5 on Monday but it’s 9:30 am and there’s no sign of them) so we can call them and see if they just forgot when they’re scheduled and also so we can maybe try and call another person in to cover their shift. I’m not a manager, just a clerk, but I’m the most senior non-manager in my department so a lot of stuff falls on my shoulders that is technically not in my job description and I want to make things run as smoothly as possible.

This lady (Betty) got hired about six months ago. She seemed pretty short with me anytime I tried to talk to her and she was also very good at her job, so I left her alone after her first couple weeks. She’s been very short with me though and it’s only gotten worse. I’ve asked other people if she’s said anything bad about me to try and figure out if I offended her somehow but no one had any idea. Today I finally got up the nerve to ask her what her problem was and she said she didn’t like me babysitting her. I was walking out the door and she was on her smoke break so I didn’t get a ton of detail, but she basically took me asking about her schedule frequently as me thinking she was bad at her job.

Of the new people that have been hired in the past year, only three have stayed more than a few months, one of whom I do have to “babysit” (will constantly come to me asking what to do/how to do something) and the other who has since become an assistant manager. I feel like it’s not unreasonable for me to be a little nosy or overbearing until someone proves they don’t need training wheels, but it’s also not technically my job. I’m also a bit peeved that she gave me the silent treatment instead of talking to me like an adult. AITA?

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

[hero-israel]

What do you think of Reform Jews? I don’t have a problem with it necessarily, but I have noticed it has been the movement of choice for many anti-Zionists to convert into and it’s been making me feel iffy about reform Jews I meet lately bc I don’t know if they’re just a Jew who have been burned by Orthodoxy for their sexuality for example and just want a safe(r) space for them to be both Jewish and Gay, or if they’re a Jew who just converted to legitimize their antiZionism and antisemitism shdjdk which I know is my problem bc I shouldn’t make assumptions about ppl just bc they’re reform

You shouldn't make assumptions about Reform Jews. Or about converts either.

Converts are Jews - full stop - and must always be welcomed, as their souls were welcomed at Sinai. I find it next to impossible to believe that there is any significant trend of people converting to Judaism in order to be anti-Zionist troublemakers. Given how long and involved conversion is (and Reform conversions are just as valid), "haters coming in to attack us" probably happens about as much as razorblades in Halloween candy.

When it comes to anti-Zionist Jews, the call is coming from inside the house. To an overwhelming extent they were born Jewish along one of two paths:

Ultra-Orthodox haredi Judaism (Neturei Karta, Satmar, "True Torah Judaism," etc), who hate Israel both because it was formed by mortal men with smelly armpits instead of by Moshiach with a red heifer, and because Israel is much too tolerant and liberal with too many rights for minorities instead of being a theocratic kingdom where all non-Jewish faiths have been totally eliminated. They "support Palestine" only because it isn't time to wipe out the Palestinians yet, and are every bit as cynical and apocalyptic as the Christian Zionists who want Israel to persist until it is destroyed in the Rapture.

Raised lapsed and unobservant, with Jewish identity totally irrelevant to their lives, to the point that even antisemitism meant nothing to them, so from either the "push" or the "pull" aspects a Jewish state was senseless to them. Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky, Eli Valley, Norman Finkelstein, Alan Rickman, Jackie Walker, Arthur Hays Sulzberger.

It is very hard to convert to Judaism, and we should want more people to persevere through that. It is very easy to throw away a culture and history that seems totally irrelevant to oneself, and we should want those conditions to stop entirely. The latter is a much more real cause of anti-Zionism. It is totally backwards to presume converts must be bringing weakness and subversion with them. I always expect they have joined us out of love and I have never met a case otherwise. The way we slow down the growth of anti-Zionism within the Jewish community is by helping to build dialogue and warmth among people who were born Jewish but for whatever reason feel disconnected and apathetic about Judaism. Show them the community they can still have with us; when we don't, they enter college with a gnawing void of meaning inside them and are easy prey for "Jews for Jesus in Palestine" groups (i.e. If Not Now, formed and led by evangelical Christians).

And since I am Reform, my family is Reform, my children are Reform, "what I think of Reform Jews" is that we're just fine, thanks. The basic "point" of Reform Judaism is to attempt to realize equal treatment for women, LGBT Jews (with gender-neutral ceremonies if requested), and children of interfaith parents, with clergy roles available for all of the above (rabbis, cantors, mohels, etc.), and girls reading from the Torah at their bat mitzvahs; this used to be really distinctive but with overall social trends it no longer is. In terms of social politics, inclusion, and Hebrew-to-English ratio during services, a Conservative shul in 2023 is pretty much a Reform shul in 1993. Where Reform congregations do still stand out is in their full embrace of patrilineal Jews, and in my opinion other congregations should follow that lead as well. I expect they will.

I deliberately left out Jews of color from that list as I think all denominations have been poor at welcoming them. Anyone who wants to give it a go first, please feel free.

#this post has more personal information about myself than I have put on this blog in 8 years #judaism #zionism #anti-zionism #jumblr

[viviennelamb]

The denial of Karma is killing y'all lol. It's totally understandable to not believe in things you have to buy to physically obtain to engage in i.e tarot cards & crystals.

I also totally get that Karma seems like it's always "gonna happen soon," but Karma is immediate.

The fact that almost everybody is literally describing how horrible to world is in detail while denying Karma is a sign of non-presence and y'all will continue to suffer until you come to terms with reality.

Until you stop blaming a definitive group for the source of all your problems instead of yourself, cause everybody loves sex, wine and drugs more than they love a clean brain, then the world will remain the way it is.

Spirituality is real - more real then what the made up "reality" you think you're experiencing. The unseen is the cause, you're the effect.

If you're miserable, that means you have done something to reach this present moment of misery because that's Karma you must pay for.

I'm talking about real sacrifice to obtain what you want right Now.

Don't you think hoarding bodies on a commune would've worked by now? You need a different strategy.

Once these individuals come down form the high of chasing a goal, they're going to want the opposite.

Then they're going to start thinking of ways to reform separatism so it includes beasts. This typically takes a generation or two, and everything that the foremothers created was destroyed by their very own.

This is a result of a filthy mind.

If you don't have stringent standards of purity in place, none of the customs will remain in place. This happens time and time again.

This life really is a Game and absolutely everything starts with your mind, which is the unseen. If you don't believe that your own thoughts exist, there's no hope for you in this lifetime.

The best strategy is to kill all defects within humanity to ensure perfection. The best way to do this is to kill all defects within yourself first.

Evil people will never create anything good. It doesn't matter how good they think they are or the sweet-sounding words they use.

You either have the results in yourself first or you don't and almost nobody has the results they're talking about. It's always far out into a "future."

For me, somebody needs to show me a track record of never having a boyfriend, let alone married to a male, before I listen to anything they say on this subject.

There are so many grifters with ex-husbands, or are even actively married, and once again, the people who are the living examples of what your supposed movements wants are ignored because male-worship is always the agenda of the day in some manner...

whether it's an actual male being promoted by them or a female who has idolized him at some point. These people just want your money because they're empty inside. Notice how sexual they are too.

They're al overt occultists boast about pimping women, abusing drugs and are obsessed with sex, but have the nerve to talk to you about "reality."

Only an absolutely pure mind and body matters.

What were seeing now is the beginning of mass horror.

Everybody is running and hiding from Karma's Wrath just as biblically predicted.

There's nowhere to go because you'll be there, but good luck.

Separatism and 4b on a large scale won't work because your minds are weak.

When you see those so-called "women" in their animalistic state, you'll be calling for yet another separation until you realize that there is no salvation in a deluded and fearful Ego.

But it's good that it won't work because you'll be one step closer to reality that there's nothing to look forward to in hell but your individual bliss.

When you clean your mind, that radiates to others. When you talk about it, it strengthens. When you one-pointedly dedicate your life to purity, you become the pinnacle of holiness.

If you have "cheat days" or "lazy days" you only fuck yourself up and you will lose momentum then decide it "never worked."

Before you have the privilege of allowing God to keep physical filth away from you, you must separate your mind from depravity.

The test for its success lies in your ability to separate yourself from depravity in thought first because the physical manifestation of depravity is man.

Man didn't come "out of nowhere" for "no reason." They're your lesson and the longer you deny this, the more you will die on repeat. If you keep fucking your lesson, he'll fuck you and your lineage 100x harder.

Oh, and if you don't reincarnate, where does your motivation to create change come from?

If you truly believed you wouldn't come back here, and this world is as bad as you say it is you'd just kill yourself and stay gone, but common sense isn't a strong suit of deniers of reality.

You're either born with this kind of Will or you work like hell to strengthen your Will.

And those who work to get it will understand that peace isn't a given nor is it something you ask for from others.

If you really know what Peace was, you'd sacrifice everything to obtain it, and most people aren't there yet. So they have to learn about the opposite of Peace: Terror.

[downforthegas]

Wa//lly Dar//ling eprocto/eructo headcannons (cw: lot of fart/burp talk)

Wa//lly's very polite about farting. If he's around company, he'll get up and quietly leave to let it out. He's not embarrassed about farting, but he knows it's rude to do it in public. He will get embarrassed, however, if he does it on accident in public, or if he tries to go somewhere private, but a neighbor was there and he didn't realize (seems pretty basic, i know, but that's how our little man is)

Wa//lly's not a gassy person all the time. That's mainly because he's always seen eating plain foods (i.e. plain hotdogs, vanilla ice cream with no toppings, etc.) So I like to think it's not just a texture problem. He's probably sensitive to a lot of non-plain foods. He can't eat anything with too much seasonings or else it'll give him a bad stomach ache

Wa//lly's farts aren't anything special in terms of size. Or smell really. Just little *brrt*s and *plbrt*s that's you'd hardly notice if you weren't paying much attention. He'll let them out and give a little sigh and wave his hand over his bottom. He doesn't really need to, but he's seen one of the neighbors do it before. On the rare chance he rips a long fart, it'll sound sort of like a mosquito buzzing.

His farts usually sound like that because of his rainbow pants hugging against his butt. But without them, his farts usually come out silently

But what do they smell like? Rotten apples (bc what else lol)

He (and the other neighbors) produces rainbow colored clouds

He's fully comfortable farting around Ba//rn//aby and Ho//me. Those is his best friends after all. For Ho//me, he likes to give them a quick warning so Ho//me can open his door and windows. Sometimes the clouds can be seen billow gently out of Ho//me's chimney if Wa//lly's gassy enough

His pants are very tight around his mid section, so an accidental toot/burp is more often than not

Speaking of burps, Wa//lly's aren't much special either, usually being little *urp*s.

Sodas really get him going, however. Since he drinks with his eyes, like how he eats with his eyes, he slurps it up pretty fast, which leads to him getting a painful, bloated belly (my favorite). Just pat him real good on the stomach or his back and he'll explode with a LOUD, long burp that'll shake the ground. Of course, he ends it with a little "excuse me". This is why he tries not to drink his sodas too fast, but sometimes the flavor is too good to do so

He gets embarrassed if he accidently burps while talking, especially when he's on the phone

Sometimes he apologizes to his pants after a particularly bad fart

Alright that's enough for now. Tune in next time for the same bullshit. And I know what you're thinking: how does a puppet fart? idk man, don't ask me. Goodbye

#eproctophilia #eprocto #playfellowxxx #gassyfellowxxx #wa/lly dar/ling? more like wa/lly brapling #lolllllllll #im sooooo funnnny and epiccccc #i would 100% let him use me as a fart cushion as he paints #he's so small and his farts probably don't smell that bad #so i should be fine #put me under ba/rn/aby and I'm dead lol

[nothorses]

a question for you and your followers: what is a binder supposed to feel/fit like? I just bought my first one from For Them bc I wanted to support them over a larger brand, and thought I had a decent chance at a good fit because you get fit for one based on your actual measurements. It came in the mail today and there's lots to like about it - not itchy, doesn't give me a rash, I feel like I can breathe in it. But I feel like it doesn't actually compress me much, even though it's fitted to my measurements. I feel a little flatter than a sports bra, but they're still noticeable through my shirt. My partner is cis, and he's got some pretty big moobs, but it looks normal on him because he's quite muscular. I feel like i've got the gym bro moobs now, but none of the muscle in other places that make that moobs rather than boobs. for context I'm between a B and C cup, so I don't have particularly large breasts. Just wondering if my binder should fit tighter, or if this is generally what i should expect from binding.

It's harder to tell when a binder is too big vs. too small, but in my experience:

Your binder might be too small if...

The compression panel (non-stretchy fabric in the front) is either not long enough, or only barely long enough to cover your chest (i.e. breasts poke out underneath).

The compression panel feels overly scratchy (esp. if you do not have a history of sensitive skin).

You notice how snug/tight your binder is throughout the day (it feels unnatural or even uncomfortable).

You can't take a full, complete breath- your lungs won't expand past a certain point.

You can't cough easily with it on.

Your ribs are sore/ache when you wear your binder, or even after you take it off.

Your ribs feel stiff even after the binder comes off.

After wearing your binder consistently for a while, your lung capacity is impacted even when the binder is off.

Your binder might be too large if...

The binder moves around on it's own (riding up, twisting, etc.).

The binder doesn't feel (comfortably) snug on you, even when you're actively paying attention to the feeling.

Your binder is probably appropriately-sized if...

You can forget it's on most of the time.

When you do notice the binder, it's not because it feels uncomfortable or tight.

You're able to take full, deep breaths with it on.

You can cough with it on.

When you remove the binder, any feelings of stiffness are gone within a couple of minutes.

After consistent/regular use, your body feels the same with it off as it did before you started wearing your binder: your lung capacity and rib movement are the same.

Notice that I'm not referring to how well it binds here; binders work differently for everyone, particularly if you have a larger or denser chest. Fit is determined by comfort/feel first.

You might try a size down, or a more trusted company first (gc2b has sizing specialists who can help you get a correct fit for free!), to figure out whether it's a binder size issue or just an incompatibility with compression binders- but if a binder feels too tight, stop wearing it immediately.

Transtape might also be an option if compression binders end up not working for you (folks with larger chests do also tend to run into problems with tape, but this is more dependent on shape as well), or you might even combine methods (after you ensure both the tape and the binder are correctly and safely fit/applied, and that neither alone works well enough for you- and with extreme caution.)

#resources #binding #transmasc #advice

[radioactiveradley]

PATHOLOGY OF THE URINARY SYSTEM (aka: STUFF WHAT GOES WRONG WITH YER PISS BEANS)

(AND YER PISS TUBES)

(and the pretty pictures I take of them)

[a warning: this post contains radiographic images and non-graphic description of serious kidney pathologies, including paediatric cancer]

Let's kick off with an old familiar friend! Yeah, I'm talking -

UROLITHIASIS (the humble kidney stone!)

Wanna know something horrific? The biggest kidney stone on record weighed over a kilogram. It was 17 cm across. Just. Imagine. Trying to piss that out…

Urolithiases are formed anywhere among your urinary tracts. They’re commonly found in the kidneys, giving rise to the more common term, renal calculi, or kidney stones.

Urolithiasis occurs when compounds within your urine crystallise. If your urine becomes too acidic, too base, contains too many of these compounds for them to remain in solution, or simply… sits around too long without flowing, it literally petrifies into a solid lump!

Some unlucky souls are just… predisposed to developing them. If you have had a kidney stone in the past, you are far more likely to get another one in the future. There also seems to be a genetic link – so if someone in your immediate family gets kidney stones, you have a higher risk.

Kidney stones typically hang out in the pelvis of your kidney and don’t cause an issue. Until you try to piss them out. Remember our kidney diagram (drawn on a conveniently shaped bean)?

You might notice that the ureters are significantly smaller than the renal pelvis. In other words…

Most renal calculi are made of CALCIUM (oxalate, usually). This is very, very good (for us. Less so for you) because calcium attenuates x-rays – meaning, it glows all pretty and shiny when we take a radiograph!

Here’s a kidney stone on an Abdominal X-Ray!

And a twinkly artefact caused by a kidney stone on Ultrasound!

But the best way to assess urolithiases, is, of course, with CT!

For realsies. We don’t need to inject contrast intravenously, because the kidney stones are (typically) shiny – which cuts down on time and worry, as it means you’re at no risk for having an adverse reaction! So a CT KUB (checking Kidneys, Ureters and Bladder for stones) is basically just a quick tumble in the washing machine (CT scanner), with a lovely clear picture as a result!

Look at these babies!! So sharp!!! So clear!!!!!! So shiny!!!!!!!!!!!! That’s a beautiful matching pair of renal calculi right there – and to make things better, they’re (currently) non-obstructive, so this patient isn’t in suffering The Agonies!

Speaking of The Agonies…

Most kidney stones are passable, albeit with extreme pain.

However, some ain’t going anywhere. Especially staghorn calculi, which, um. One, stags have antlers. Two…

more like a fuckin' MOOSE ANTLER amirite????

But yeah, those buggers aren’t coming out. That’s almost definitely going to require surgery!

Smaller calculi can still cause problems when they become obstructive – i.e., they block the passage of your peepee. They can lead to:

HYDRONEPHROSIS (dilation of the renal pelvis due to retained urine, seen here in the Left kidney [right side of image])

HYDROURETER (dilation of the ureter)

So, what do we do with bothersome calculi? How about some...

EXTRACORPOREAL SHOCKWAVE LITHOTRIPSY (ECSWL, because we love a sexy little acronym here in medworld).

We blast the stone apart with shockwaves, from outside your body! Ultrasound turned up to 11! Unfortunately, it only works on certain densities of stone, and on small stones.

LASER LITHOTRIPSY

(same thing but…. ZIP ZAP LASERZZZZZ]

SURGERY – PERCUTANEOUS NEPHROLITHOTOMY (PCNL).

(I totally haven’t added to this diagram in any way. This is how it works. Trust me.)

LOADS of other stuff can go wrong with The Ol’ Piss Beans

We have:

RENAL CELL CARCINOMA

The most common form of kidney cancer.

For suspected malignancies, we do a CT Urogram that assesses the whole urinary tract. This takes significantly longer than a KUB, but is well worth the results. This is a three-phase scan. We do...

A regular KUB non-contrast scan to check for calculi and to get our baseline Hounsfield Units ('grayness' and densities) for the kidneys. Then we inject contrast in a 'split bolus' - one load immediately, and another roughly 8 minutes in, scanning roughly a minute after the second injection is given. We scan 80 secs after the first contrast bolus is administrered, for the 'nephographic' phase, which enhances the renal cortex & medulla, and makes neoplastic changes and renal masses obvious (see image above). Then we wait 10-ish minutes and scan for the 'excretory' phase, after the contrast has worked its way through your kidneys, to detect 'filling defects' (anything that stops contrast opacification of the ureters) and pathologies related to the urinary collection system.

NEPHROBLASTOMA

This is one of the more common cancers found in kids. Although paediatric cancer is never exactly a happy topic, this cancer is now curable in roughly 90% of cases, thanks to the early removal of kidneys and the possibility of transplants.

Autosomal Dominant (and Recessive) Polycystic Kidney Disease

An inherited renal disease that can cause you to go into End Stage Renal Failure due to the healthy tissue in your kidneys becoming completely overtaken by cysts. As a result, your kidneys can grow more and more, until they practically fill your whole abdomen. 45% of patients will be in ESRF and need dialysis by the age of 60. Thankfully, transplants are an option.

Other commonly encounutered renal pathologies include trauma, which I talked about in my first kidney ramble (linked here!), infections, and more.

I hope you enjoyed this whistle-stop tour of Stuff That Can Go Wrong With The Kidney, And How We Look At Them Gnarly Beans!

....And, um, I spent way too long making this and now need to pee. This is your reminder to go empty that bladder if you need to! Stop those stones!

#medblr #radiography #radiology #pathology #human biology #radley irradiates people

[young-astro]

I can't help but notice that all of the people in your anti-colonialism by "marginalized people" book rec list are people who were born and grew up in either the US or, in one or two cases, another white Anglophone country. I.e. the imperial core.

As a non-American I wonder whether, due to the cultural hegemony of the US and other Anglophone countries, the perspectives of people who have spent their whole lives in the Imperial core (even if marginalized in other ways due to their race or some other attribute) can be considered "authentic" depictions of the effects of colonialism in the way that you are presenting them. I find that people from the US, even POC people from the US, are often pretty incapable of understanding non-US perspectives on social justice issues because they're rarely exposed to them and because they grew up brainwashed with media that treats the US as the center of the world, so they overlay the US framework over everything.

I would perhaps have liked to see more recs for authors writing about colonialism who actually grew up in countries that have been affected by colonialism, or at least in countries that aren't as rich and powerful as the US and are therefore heavily dependent on the political whims of powerful Western ones. I'm sure there's a bunch of people in South America writing SF/F, for example, considering their long tradition of awesome magical realism. Or South Africa. Or India (I note that Salman Rushdie is not on your list, for example). I'm not writing this to be pettish, because I don't know enough about it either and would actually like to know, I just feel like perhaps we should all be a bit humbler when talking about this since a strictly US-centric perspective is still a VERY limited one when talking about colonialism (by definition an international, intercultural phenomenon), even when written by POC.

I also wonder about your definition of "marginalized" and if it doesn't fall into the same US-centrism that I talked about in my previous paragraph (even if we assume that "marginalized" means "marginalized as it relates to colonialism" and ignore other forms of marginalization). Is a person from, say, the Balkans, marginalized enough to write about anti-colonialism, or are they exactly the same as a white American in your perspective? Does it matter where from the Balkans? Does it matter if they're Muslim or Christian? How about a Ukrainian person? How about a Ukrainian Jew? Is a person from Bosnia or Ukraine, who went through a war in their lifetime, less qualified to write about war than Kuang, who grew up middle class and went to an Ivy League school (and honestly did a really shitty job of portraying a war in The Poppy Wars), just because they're "Caucasian"?

Also, people are allowed to acknowledge flaws of books written by POC without being automatically labeled as racist, you know. Finding Babel too heavy-handed or on the nose has nothing to do with finding POC characters annoying or unrelatable and sorry but, yeah, IMHO it's really on the nose and annoying about it. It's the writing style that's the problem, not the themes. Also the central metaphor, IMHO, makes it completely useless as a colonialism allegory because if you can destroy colonialism by destroying one magical uberpowerful whatsit, your book is kinda not serious enough about nuanced representation of sociological and political forces to be considered impactful anti-colonialist literature. Saying that as someone who loves Butler and Jemisin. Thea Guanzhon, for example, is a Filipina born and raised in the Philippines and still lives there, which makes her book way more of an "own voices" account of colonialism than Kuang's could ever be in my accounting, but that doesn't mean that her account of colonialism has any particular nuance to it (so far it's just the backdrop for the enemies to lovers romance). So even assuming that Kuang's account is resonant enough with enough people (which I know it is because her book is super popular), who is more deserving of being on your "own voices" list, Kuang or Guanzhon?

I also wonder why white women in particular?

The simple response to all of this is that the post you're referring to broke containment.

I debated replying, because I can't help but feel your message was written in bad faith. But I'm going to try to give you the benefit of the doubt.

You are absolutely right about the limitations of the original list. I truly didn't expect it to reach so many people, and I am not nearly as well-read as I'd like to be when it comes to literature written outside of the West. Please take a look at the reblogs, where a bunch of awesome people have done incredible work filling the gaps I left.

I struggle with the rest of your message. I explicitly stated that I do not expect people to enjoy specific books written by BIPOC authors, simply that I've noticed a very frustrating pattern. And yet you suggest I'm saying that if someone doesn't like Babel or The Hurricane Wars, I'm saying they're racist. Be serious.

Even as a child of multigenerational immigrants, I'll freely admit that I personally have a very US-centric perspective on social issues that I need to work on, but it's wild of you to say that all POC people born in the US are "pretty incapable of understanding" global issues.

When I wrote "marginalized" in the original post, what I really meant was "BIPOC and BIPOC queer people.” I should’ve been more careful about the wording.

Why white women in particular? When it comes to anti-colonial and anti-imperialist fiction (written by Anglophones) the authors that I see most highly and frequently praised are white women. I'd list the specific ones I'm talking about here, but 1. I don't want to be hunted for sport by their fans, 2. I've actually enjoyed some of their work, and 3. they're only a small part of the problem and I think people should be allowed to write whatever they want as long as they can handle the criticism. But I'm sorry, white women. I'll do better next time. I also want to use this moment to apologize to all the dumbasses complaining about my tone/me being "shouty." Reverse racism is real, and we must all stand vigilant hahaha miss me

You telling me to be humble feels a tad hypocritical, but sure, I'll take that under advisement.

#science fiction #fantasy #babel #the hurricane wars #the poppy war #books #asks

[mcclainwilla]

Writing Fight Scenes Part 6 - Body Type

Depending on your character's body type, they are going to have very different fighting styles, and very different strengths/weaknesses. Body type can also have an impact on which type of martial arts a character excels in (see part one for a non-comprehensive list)

Really, there are two main considerations: weight and height. I'll write about the opposite ends of each spectrum and their strengths and weaknesses, as well as the things I've noticed whilst fighting each

(Please note, I'm breaking this down into very large boxes - most characters will exist in the in-between. As such, please take this with a grain of salt)

Weight

'Slim' characters:

Pros:

Slim characters have less weight to move around, so they tend to be faster

As such, these characters do better in drawn-out confrontations

Cons:

Because they don't weigh as much, they likely won't have as much power behind their hits. Remember, power comes more from weight than it does from strength! (see post number two for a more in-depth explanation)

Slimmer characters also don't have as much muscle and/or fat to 'pad' their body, so it is easier for them to be hurt

I never had much of a problem sparring with short slim people - I myself am 5' 4" and sometimes, it's just easier to fight fire with fire. Tall slim people were a different story - I found it difficult to get within my personal striking range. More on that in a minute

'Stocky' characters:

Pros:

Stocky characters have more powerful strikes

More muscle/fat -> more padding. Some heavier characters can actually injure their opponent simply by blocking their strikes!

Intimidation factor; anyone who knows what's good for them wouldn't pick a fight with someone who looks like they could beat their ass

Cons:

Carrying around more weight gets tiring - movement will be slower and endurance will be lower

Adding to above, these characters are easier to 'pick apart' - someone who is smart will throw lots of well-placed strikes to squishy spots in order to wear them down

I fucking hated sparring with beefy people omg. It didn't matter if they were tall or short, one good hit from them and I was checking my ribs for cracks (I never broke any but I had the wind knocked from my lungs Multiple Times). I also refused to throw certain strikes (i.e. roundhouse kicks) at some of my larger opponents because all they had to do was lift their knee, and I'd break my leg on theirs. The only good thing about sparring them was that I could generally dodge their strikes. When I couldn't...

Height

'Short' characters:

Pros:

Shorter characters have a lower center of gravity, which makes them more balanced/harder to knock over. This is way better than it sounds (more on this in the next post?)

Cons:

Short characters will have a much harder time landing hits because they have to actively step into their opponent's range (the danger zone) in order to have even a chance. This is way worse than it sounds (most of my worst sparring memories happened at the hands of tall mfs)

I don't think I sparred with anyone shorter than me by more that a couple of inches, excluding children. Yes, I sparred with children. There is one guy tho, he was short and stocky and he had the most devastating front kicks. Vomit-inducing. I broke his nose (sorry dude)

'Tall' characters:

Pros:

Longer reach! One decisive kick to the ribs from a tall character can stop lots of fights before they start. If you want to write a character who is a bitchass bully, make them tall. No I'm not mad (lie)

Cons:

More body to control will make it harder for a character to stay balanced

Tall characters are often, to some extent, slow; their strikes have a wide range, but they're very vulnerable as they pull their arm or leg back. A dashing, intelligent, good-looking short character can use this opportunity wisely

It was SO frustrating to spar tall people because they all knew how to bully me out of their range. I could either keep my distance and risk not being fast enough to dodge (bad) or trying to close the distance and running straight into one of their hits (worse)

This has become a tall people hate post. You know who you are. I'm in your backyard

I hope this was helpful! If you are above 5' 10" start running. Begging for someone to ask me to tell the story of the time I broke a grown man's nose

#writing #writing advice #writing help #wip #wip stuff #fight scene #martial arts #willa mcclain

[is-the-primate-vid-cute]

Sorry if this comes across as insensitive, but what do you mean that sex isn’t a binary in primates? I am well aware that sexual dimorphism isn’t fixed (i.e. a female proboscis monkey with a big nose) but if sex wasn’t binary, how would we know the monkey is female despite that? There are only two gametes in the animal kingdom and in primates, we can only produce one or the other and never both. I’m also not really sure how that relates to being trans but I don’t know much about that stuff. Just a biologist who studies sex change in fishes and I’m very curious about what you mean!

What I refer to specifically in saying sex is not a binary in this context, is that rather than sex being two fixed biological points in opposition to each other, sexed traits fall along bimodal distribution and are not only a biological concept but a sociocultural one as well. I will refer specifically to humans in this as this is where the most research has been done.

Sex as a concept includes not only chromosomes, but the expression of primary and secondary sex characteristics. When we sex a mammal it is done by observing the genitalia, and if we arent able to get up close and personal (or before we do) we can make an educated guess using the secondary sex characteristics, which tend to be in line with the primary sex characteristics and the sex chromosomes. However, while these characteristics tend to line up, they don't always.

In humans, being intersex can happen in many ways. While typically sex chromosomes are either XX or XY, it is possible for a person to have only one X, have XXY, XYY, or XXX chomosomes. While these are uncommon, they aren't as vanishingly rare as they might seem. In live human births, approximately 1 in 400 babies designated male and 1 in 650 babies designated female.

I say designated because if we are defining female as XX and male as XY, these babies are not male or female, strictly speaking. Beyond chromosomes there are many intersex variations that may be noticed as early as at birth such as one resulting in ambiguous genitalia, at puberty such as androgen insensitivity syndrome, or if the person in question is experiencing fertility problems later in life. As there is such a wide variation of the traits we categorize as sex, conceptualizations of sex as a binary fail to account for 1.7% of the human population. While this number is small, it is significant.

A big reason we know so much of this in humans and so little on this topic in non human primates is that where primates don't care as long as they are able to go about their lives, humans care a lot. While some intersex conditions carry health issues with them, the biggest struggle intersex people face is stigmatization due to sex being socially enforced as a binary system. Many treatments for intersex people are not focussed on health, but rather on keeping up the appearences of fitting within a binary model of biological sex, including genital surgery on newborn babies to make them appear more phenotypically male or female.

To answer how we can know whether an animal is male or female while understanding sex as a bimodal distribution rather than a binary, we don't need to upset the apple cart too much. If a monkey, to follow your example, has observable sex characterisitcs that allow us to categorize it into one of two groups, thats no issue. If a monkey has traits belonging to both labelled sexes, we can further investigate but ultimately, a monkey is a monkey and isn't burdened by the sociocultural impacts of our labels the way we are.

While sex as a concept and mode of categorization primarily impacts humans, I bring it up in the context of non human primates because while they don't care what they are called, when we consider our methods to be complete and infallible, we miss out. In scientific inquiry I think it's important to question the assumptions that we bring in, even if we don't anticipate them causing problems. We can assign one of two sexes to primates and other mammals while acknowledging that when it comes to what we observe, there is often far more than meets the eye.

#mod J #primate biology #inquiring minds want to know

[is-the-fish-tank-big-enough]

hello wonderful fish person,

my mustard betta has been sluggish. he has attempted to eat, but spits the food out after a much or two. he has been seen lying on his side at the bottom of his tank quite often recently, and I'm beginning to notice a white patch on his underside....

I've tried doing research but it all seems overwhelming and i don't exactly know of any solid sources i can trust. do you know how i can help my Betta, Sir Samuel?

When assessing fish diseases there's some important things to consider and check off your list:

Water quality - can you test your water? Are your nitrate, nitrites, and ammonia at reasonable levels? Even if your tank is cycled something may have happened to cause a spike in ammonia (I had a plant die suddenly once and cause a mini uncycling event)

Water changes - when was the last time you've done one? Did you vacuum the substrate (if applicable)?

Consider the most common fish diseases: parasites, air bladder disease, bacterial infection, fungal infection

Consider the common diseases specifically for bettas: non wild type bettas have been selectively bred for their showy fins and colors and tend to have a poor gene pool and common diseases for them because of this involves tumors and generally short lifespans.

Bacterial and fungal infections are typical but are usually brought on by poor water quality (which weakens fish immunity, which allows opportunistic microorganisms to increase and cause harm).

---

It sounds like your fish being at the bottom may be causing the belly abrasions, but I don't have eyes on your fish like you do, so I could be wrong. Lying at the bottom of the tank immediately makes me think stress or water issues. Food may be too big, unless he's previously not had issue eating it before.

I'm sure you know, but Bettas often sleep at the bottom of their tanks and when recently bought they've been known to change their colors as they grow in healthy environments.

TLDR: always check water parameters and then go from there. If you suspect it's an infection, you may be able to treat with Seachem Metroplex, but you may be shooting in the dark with medication (i.e. not a guaranteed cure). If you've only had the betta for a while, then it may be stress versus typical old age problems.

#not a rating #asks #so sorry for the length #there's a lot of bases to cover #I'm posting this with a migraine so sorry if the flow isn't great

[chiefmysticmia]

Why I Read Cassie Cage from Mortal Kombat as a Lesbian

(p.s apologies if the formatting is awful on here I honestly don’t know how to do it properly HAHA)

Hi! So I’ve been getting into Mortal Kombat recently and a character that particularly caught my eye was Cassie Cage. I’m not sure why but I absolutely adore her character and whilst reading into her backstory, the story modes of MKX and MK11 (which I have yet to finish) and her intros, I have noticed a lot of her traits relate to both my own and other’s experiences as a lesbian.

For context I myself am a lesbian, and during my coming out journey I have discovered many things about myself that I originally thought were universal experiences until I started reading up on lesbianism and the experiences of other lesbians in discovering their identities. I could just be reading into Cassie’s character a bit too much (or projecting onto her), but I think one of the reasons I find comfort in her character is because of these traits.

So! I’ve decided to make a post going into more detail about this because it’s pride month and I have nothing better to do with my time, plus I love talking about my interpretations of characters.

(Just as a disclaimer, I’m absolutely not saying ‘“all these things mean that Cassie is a canon lesbian and any other interpretation is wrong!!!”. Nor am I forcing anyone to agree with me. Her sexuality isn’t confirmed at all. This is just how I, a lesbian, interpret her and I am open to other points of view. Any lesbiphobia and general LGBTQphobia will be deleted)

Cassie in Mortal Kombat X

To start with, I want to discuss how Cassie was presented in MKX.

I read this post the other day, and it put how I felt about Cassie in MKX versus MK11 very well. Unfortunately, queer/queer-coded characters are often full of stereotypes, and MKX Cassie fit in pretty well with the typical stereotypes lesbians face, i.e her lack of traditional femininity and her cocky attitude. Also, the fact that when Johnny said he was worried when she started dating, Cassie responded with “Afraid I’d come home with someone like you?”, with no gender specified. The fact that she shows no romantic interest in men whilst sporting those stereotypes speaks volumes in my opinion. I believe that in MKX, Cassie was intended to be queer-coded, but NRS backed out in MK11 after fans started to pick up on this.

Of course this doesn’t mean queer characters who fit into the stereotypes are inherently bad. I absolutely love characters who are lesbians and are portrayed similarly to Cassie.

I’m gonna use this opportunity to talk about the link (or lack of) between lesbianism and womanhood:

Due to the severe amount of misogyny and sexism in history, womanhood has almost exclusively revolved around empowering men. Thankfully, this is nowhere near as bad as it was years ago, but it still impacts all AFAB people and transfem people in one way or another

Lesbian is the only sexuality that doesn’t involve men at all. In a society where men are considered ‘superior’ to women, this makes our experiences in the LGBTQ community unique to others. All sexualities experience their own unique problems, discrimination, prejudice etc, and ours tends to revolve around the fact that we are non-men who are not attracted to men. Therefore, having a female/non-binary character who does not show any signs of attraction to men makes that character somewhat relatable to lesbians. Growing up, almost all the female protagonists and supporting characters we see in media end up with a man or are at least attracted to one. We lesbians had barely any characters whom we could look at and see ourselves in.

Obviously I am not saying that the discrimination lesbians face is worse or even comparable to the rest of the LGBTQ+ community. I’m just stating how it affects us in society.

How does this relate to Cassie, you may ask? Well:

Like I mentioned before, MKX Cassie doesn’t show any sign of being attracted to men, unlike a majority of female Mortal Kombat characters (Kitana, Sonya, Jade etc). Obviously this alone did not mean she was inherently a lesbian, but that along with the typical ‘masculine girl’ stereotype gave an implication that she was meant to be queer. Whilst I do not fully identify as female (I do not label my gender but I go by she/they pronouns), I am much more feminine than masculine in the way I present myself, yet I was still able to see aspects of myself in Cassie because of this.

Obviously, not all lesbians are ‘masculine’ and not all straight women are ‘feminine’. It’s just unfortunate that stereotypes play a big part in queer-coding.

tldr; Cassie’s lack of traditional femininity and attraction to male characters, despite being stereotypical, gives us lesbians something to relate to which we don’t often get in media

I think that’s all I have to say for this section, so let’s move on!

How Cassie changed in Mortal Kombat 11

Unlike the huge time skip between MK9 and MKX, the events of MK11 take place soon after those of MKX. However, Cassie’s character changed significantly; she became much more ‘typically feminine’ (long hair, makeup, painted nails etc). Whilst I love both versions of her, it is clear that the reason NRS changed her was partly due to the rumours of her being a lesbian for a number of reasons.

Now obviously if she was intended to be lesbian-coded, this could be a good thing as she would no longer represent as many stereotypes as she did. However, NRS added in a random boyfriend (or ex, we don’t know) who has absolutely no plot relevance, which leads me to believe that the only reason Dylan (or ‘Bob’ according to Sonya) was added into one intro between Cassie and Sonya was to combat the rumours that Cassie was a lesbian. Obviously lesbians can have dated/been attracted to men in the past, that doesn’t mean we’re any less valid, but the fact that Dylan was mentioned makes me think it had something to do with players picking up on Cassie being queer-coded. I’ll touch on this intro later on in the post because I have some things to say about it (not necessarily negative).

There was also the instance of Cassie apparently stealing Jacqui’s prom date, which I honestly cannot see Cassie doing out of genuine spite. Going by my lesbian headcanon, it seems more like an unobtainable, unrealistic crush, which a lot of lesbians experience and hold on to to try and convince themselves that they aren’t lesbians.

Cassie also had barely any interactions with female characters who weren’t her mother or Jacqui (who is technically family to her). If what I’ve theorised so far is correct, this could’ve been done to avoid fans shipping Cassie with other women (shoutout to Frost x Cassie shippers, y’all have an admirable amount of willpower).

tldr; The changes to Cassie in MK11 seem like they had something to do with the rumours that she was a lesbian amongst fans, leaving me to believe she was originally intended to be queer in MKX but NRS backed out of it in MK11.

There’s more to add, but I’m gonna break them up into different sections. Moving on:

The Intro referencing ‘Dylan’

(FYI: This part is more of a headcanon/me projecting rather than actual canonical evidence)

Like I said above, in one of the Cassie versus Sonya fight intros, a character called ‘Dylan’ (AKA ‘Bob’) is mentioned and implied to be either a current or previous romantic interest of Cassie’s.

Dylan has no plot relevance and, like I and others have theorised, exists to combat the rumours of Cassie being a lesbian.

However, what Sonya says about him (“Why learn his name if he’s not sticking around?”) implies that the relationship between him and Cassie is doomed. This line implies that Cassie has a history of relationships that end poorly, to the point where Sonya doesn’t know the name of her daughter’s current love interest. Obviously this could mean that Cassie struggles to keep stable relationships (possibly due to her parents’ divorce when she was young, which I can relate to), but since this is a lesbian headcanon I’m going to take a different interpretation.

A lot of lesbians experience ‘compulsory heterosexuality’, AKA comphet. This is term, originally coined by Adrienne Rich in her essay ‘Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence’ is used to describe the idea that in a heteronormative society, lesbians subconsciously devalue their relationships with other non-men, as AFAB people and even transfem people’s existence has majorly revolved around men in the past. Comphet comes in many forms and can feel like expecting yourself to date a man to feel worthy, forcing yourself to have crushes on men and many other ways that I cannot list on here because we’d be here all day.

Cassie being unable to keep stable relationships with men could be seen as comphet; dating men but not actually feeling a proper connection to them, leading to the relationship ending in disaster (another example being Cassie stealing Jacqui’s prom date). Considering NRS seems to have no problem confirming characters as bi, I’m sure that if Cassie had dated women in the past they would confirm that, which leads me to believe that all Cassie’s past relationships have been with men.

Again, this could just be me projecting onto her, but I find a lot of comfort in headcanoning Cassie to have comphet. It makes sense to me.

I was actually talking about this with my friend the other day and we came up with some funny hypothetical dialogue:

Cassie: “No woman really has any connection to the guys they date right? Like it’s all just for show, right you guys?”

The rest of the Kombat Kids: “…Um…”

*Takeda eyes Jacqui, who is profusely shaking her head to assure him that that is not, in fact, how most women feel*

tldr; Cassie’s relationship with Dylan was comphet because I experience comphet and I said so (/hj)

“But Mortal Kombat has confirmed Kung Jin, Mileena and Tanya to be LGBTQ+, why would they avoid doing the same with Cassie?”

This is a fair point: if there are confirmed gay and bisexual characters in MK, why would they not confirm a character to be a lesbian? Well…

As I previously stated, lesbianism is the only orientation that men cannot be involved in at all. In a society where men have power over non-men, lesbians are often excluded even by our own community (speaking from experience).

Sapphic relationships are often idealised and not seen as ‘proper’ relationships. I have seen many lesbians + other sapphic people who go through awful breakups be shocked because of how they’re always made out to be ‘perfect’. This is deeply rooted in misogyny, as AFAB people have always been seen as ‘dainty and fragile’ and in need of a man to complete them. This deeply affects transfem sapphics, too.

Considering Mortal Kombat is a series of fighting games, confirming a character to be a lesbian could make the character seem inferior to the rest of the fighters due to the fact that they wouldn’t need a man to ‘complete’ them. This is probably why NRS backed out of Cassie’s queer-coding after MKX; if they continued with it, people would expect her to end up in an idealised sapphic relationship, which could change how players, especially cishet men, view her and make her much less popular amongst fans.

Whilst Tanya and Mileena are confirmed to be WLW, they’re both bisexual. I’m so happy this series has really good bi representation, but unfortunately a lot of media is afraid to include lesbians due to backlash from certain cishet men who fetishise us and/or get unnecessarily angry when their favourite media includes lesbian characters.

Similarly, Kung Jin is confirmed to be gay. I think he is one of the best gay characters I’ve seen in media, because it’s not his whole character development; he just happens to be gay and I think that kind of representation is something we need more of for ALL members of the LGBTQ+ community. However games like Mortal Kombat tend to have a male-dominated fanbase, and many will see themselves in certain characters. I’ve seen many cisgender straight (usually homophobic) adult men treat female characters like objects (doesn’t help that they’re often hypersexualised, especially women of colour) and get extremely defensive if someone sees a female character as queer. Again, this could be why NRS changed Cassie in MK11; they could lose a lot of their male audience if those men could no longer ‘ship’ themselves with a confirmed lesbian, though this wouldn’t stop them fetishising her.

Speaking of Kung Jin, I love how he and Cassie are frienemies. They give off gay/lesbian hostility energy and I love it.

tldr; Because of misogyny, lesbians are fetishised, slandered and not seen as valid by straight men who want to gatekeep female characters, which is why lesbian rep is hard to find because companies want to keep their male audience. Therefore, it’s easier for them to make a sapphic character bi/pan/etc rather than a lesbian.

Other Things That Aren’t Totally Canon/Relevant but I Think Should Be Mentioned Anyways

This section is just gonna be various things that I think are amusing and will use to back up my headcanon.

First up, we got this MK11 Cassie skin:

Apologies for the atrocious quality, but this skin reminded me of the colours of the lesbian flag so I colour-picked them. This is proof that she’s a lesbian /j (Ik the colours are kinda off but I promise this is is meant to look like the sunset flag and not the lipstick flag. Pls do not use the lipstick flag, it’s transphobic)

Secondly, this line during one of Cassie’s intros with Sheeva (PS I am absolutely not implying that I ship them, I’m just pointing out this line and nothing more):

I know this is meant to be a pun, but it makes me cackle so much. ‘Girl Crush’ yes totally straight /s

I’ve reached the image limit unfortunately, but her and Frost’s fight in the MKX comics was insanely homoerotic, too.

I think that’s it so far, but I may add to this section in the future.

Conclusion

Phew, that was a LOT,,, Once again this is just for fun and I’m open to all other interpretations of Cassie and her character. I just like to analyse and relate myself to my favourite characters, lol.

I do hope that one day lesbian characters are more common in media like MK, but we still have a lot of work to do in order to make that happen.

Thank you so much for reading if you made it this far! <3

#mortal kombat #cassie cage #number 1 lesbian cassie theorist strikes again #lesbian #lgbtq #mortal kombat 11 #mortal kombat x #character analysis #lesbian coding #izzie’s rambles #sonya blade

[studyblr-perhaps]

I noticed mathy looking notes in your post earlier. I've just returned to school after a 10 year break and I've never been particularly good at math. I'm taking a remote double time math course over the summer semester that starts in a few weeks and I'm a bit nervous as I've never taken math remotely. Do you have any pro-tips? :)

Hello! Tbh I don't think I'm the best person to ask for tips related to math, considering I barely just pass all my math courses. But I haven't failed any so yes. Disclaimer: I don't really know what remote learning is, but I'll assume it's similar to either the online classes we took during covid, or pre-recorded classes which we can watch later on. So my tips will be considering these two scenarios.

First of all, I think it depends on what course you're taking. Is it a specific course, like linear algebra, geometry, calculus, or any of the sort. If it is, I'd advise you brush up on the basics of those once (i.e. trigonometry and stuff for geometry, limits and all for calculus etc). Although I am sure your teacher will definitely go over the basics, most of the times the difficulty in solving maths lies in not being able to understand the basics.

If your math course is a non-specific course, whenever they start a new topic, they'll probably provide some basic info. Same as above, always understand that first. A lot many times in maths, I have come to realize, you can solve a lot of questions by knowing just basics, and not formulae.

Second, Solve questions. This is something I myself don't do often (thus the barely passing marks) and karma has bit my ass a lot many times for this. Maths is a skill, and you can only hone it by doing as much problems as you can. Now, don't overwork yourself and stress over all questions, sometimes some just don't solve no matter what you try.

You don't need to do every question in your practice problem sets, just to the most varied one. That is, if two questions have a similar approach for an answer and you know how to get to the solution after doing one, don't do the other. You can save that time and brain space for a different question which has a slightly different approach. Warning: some questions look solvable but then you sometimes get stuck on it halfway, be careful while judging which questions you know and can skip.

Third, make notes. It seems basic enough but I don't just mean the lecture notes. Make a separate sheet of just formulae or theorems which you require. You can use that sheet when you're solving practice questions. As you keep solving, you'll realize after a while you wouldn't need that formulae sheet at all. And if your examinations allow cheat sheet, you've already made one!

Fourth, google. Don't know the question, google the entire question word for word. Don't know a concept, google it. Can use chatgpt? Use it. Be honest when you're practicing, but when you can't understand or solve a question, be honest and just google it. 8/10 times the answer (or related similar question's answer) will always be there.

On the same note, youtube has some really good teachers. I do not know what level course you're taking, but Khan Academy and Organic Chemistry Tutor's videos has helped me way into two years of college. You can try these channels, or you can try other ones you find and like, too!

Lastly, find past questions. This is an occupational disease (if you can call it that) which has been ingrained into me after high school and the ridiculous amount of college entrance exams I had to give. Also Asian. Definitely also because I'm Asian. Questions which come in the exam are barely anything which you use practical knowledge for. I have done many many projects with my friends and none of us have ever used maths in the way we use and write in exams. Exam taking is a skill (I am bad at it) and it measures how good you are at taking an exam than how good you are at the subject. Sadly they do in the end judge us based on scores, so past year's question papers is absolutely necessary! A lot of times the questions are similar (my quantum mechanics midsem was the exact same as the previous batch's only the values were different. Same question, same concept, same approach to solution.) This will definitely give you an upper hand at solving exam questions.

And that's it! That's all I can think of right now. But please remember, learning is unique to each individual. What works for me may not work for you. Always, tweak and twist and experiment on what works best for you, and go with that. Sometimes it's exhausting, and it's okay if you spend an entire day binging a show (definitely not speaking from experience, nope). Just know that the next day, you'll pick up your pen and continue on your journey with maths!

TL;DR: brush up on basics, practice questions, use google and youtube to it's fullest, get past year exam papers, take rests and don't feel guilty, it's alright sometimes.

With that being said, thank you for the ask! I hope your course goes amazing and you have a wonderful time with it!!!!!!

Happy learning!

#studyblr #study #studying #studyspo #studyinspo #tips #study tips #maths #mathematics #mathematics tips #study motivation #honestly the day i got this ask i was crying over how much i dislike maths ldskfdsklf #(and the one crying with me was a math major so) #ask #misa's undergrad journey

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A key piece is missing from discussions of “generational trauma” explained through “they’re just continuing the cycle because that’s all they know,” or even “they’re doing it because they’re traumatized but haven’t processed that yet/gotten ‘therapy’ and that means they’ll take it out on others.”

If people will necessarily abuse just because they are traumatized and can’t help it (unless they ~get therapy~), in general, then we’d see a lot more kids start abusing their parents, or other adults, right? Because hurt people hurt people? But such “abuse as a reaction to my own abuse” is distributed unevenly—adults aren’t getting abused at huge rates by abused kids; those abused kids, if they do, will generally abuse other kids.

One might automatically assume they explain away the disparity through bringing up children’s lack of physical strength relative to adults’ as the reason for this, but clearly their explanation isn’t entirely such a biological one, as they also apply this logic to adult survivors of other forms of abuse who “hurt because they were hurt.”

So much emphasis is placed on trying to “break the cycle” in terms of interrupting the chain through “education” which alters one’s ideological beliefs. Persuasion to not harm their own children in the future, assuming that abusive parents were just mistaken or confused, just lacking in such education. When convenient, fault for that lack of education is laid upon “differences in culture” (and from there, the common narrative of the white man’s burden, to “enlighten” POC with ~disproportionate intracommunity abuse problems~ on their superior non-abusive moral values).

One begins to wonder, too, when looking at these patterns and noticing that those “finally cycle-breaking generations” are disproportionately people who experience intersectional marginalizations, i.e. being queer or disabled or mad, and that heavily informing their experience as they develop an anti-abuse politic. Strange how that’s so often underlooked as a potential factor, isn’t it?

If trauma equals likelihood of taking it out on others, and more trauma means more likelihood of more violence, why is it that the rich, the whites, the cishets etc still hold such overwhelming monopoly on violence/abuse/ability to commit violence or abuse. If we have such huge amounts of trauma, and if that rule is true, then why haven’t we gotten our revenge yet?

Because revenge is a luxury. Revenge is for those with the power to carry it out, as are all interpersonal acts, especially acts involving nonconsent or violence. But a large number of factors limit the oppressed’s ability to carry out such acts upon their oppressors--“you are locked up in a prison right now and physically unable to attack some billionaire thousands of miles away” is one such example (and the state uses this reasoning, the idea that this degree of limitation is necessary to prevent abusive violence, to justify locking people up). But these factors do not just include regulations upon physical space; it also manifests as leverage, disproportionate power to coerce.

When traumatized and marginalized people are pro-revenge, pro-abuse, and feel the need to take their anger/pain out on others? They will find the targets they can actually hit, not the ones mostly out of their reach, and that violence is generally directed sideways, or down. See all the scapegoating going on right now, painting an even more abused group of i.e. deviants/freaks as what must have been responsible for your own abuse, projecting nominally similar traits of your oppressors onto a class which both of you oppress, how intracommunity abuse so frequently relies on other preexisting societal bigotries/punching down, etc. Much of reactionary fearmongering about leftist revolution focuses on if they get even with us then where will they go next? they’ll start oppressing us too. Fearing that once they gain power they’ll turn it back on oppressors, and drawing false equivalence between holding power over others and escaping from others’ power over you. But also coming near a point that they’re not very comfortable making.

Some current axes of marginalization not moderating through “innate and inherent biology[/other traits considered inherently a part of You and your identity]” are things which you can, technically, change your status of, and change from oppressed to oppressor or vice versa with. i.e. abled people getting an injury which disables them, or rich people losing all their money or poor people gaining all their money (though structural factors work to make this extremely rare / more bound to personal characteristics to decrease the possibility of such class mobility). Some other things too, maybe (though murkier territory). But there’s one glaring example of “oppressed gaining privilege to become the oppressor,” which occurs consistently, and which conservatives love to ignore: ageing, teenagers becoming adults and becoming a part of the adult oppressor class, and with it vast newfound abilities to abuse and get away with it.

Liberals, and people further right of them, love viewing the problem of “abuse” as a problem of individuals, mapping on the atomization of the nuclear family into an assumed total atomization of all interpersonal acts throughout society, with all violence occurring in isolation, as a product of isolated motives and enablers, and thus the solution for violence being individual solutions. “Let’s get this person therapy to teach them how/why to not abuse.” “Let’s chop this person’s brain parts so their brain stops making them abuse (normal people wouldn’t do this, obviously, so it must be the fault of something unique to them).” “~Values~.” Just intervene individually, pick out the trauma survivors because trauma makes you do it. “Making it possible for this child to escape their parents if they want to” never even enters their heads. That solution seems even more obvious, more effective, more efficient, “how could they abuse them if they’re not even living in the same household as them anymore and they have zero other ties, even if they do still believe child abuse is fine”--but no, that can’t be an option, because “anti-abuse” activism is only allowed to stretch so far, can make changes as long as those changes don’t destabilize the foundations of hierarchical society itself (because those are still more valuable than actual people themselves, for some reason).

This mindset is much easier to deconstruct when you’ve done the work to get outside of it, but to those who still have a liberal value system and mode of interactions, it can be difficult to move past. Especially for traumatized people approaching some relative power previously unknown (i.e. getting older, or getting in closer proximity/more access to other people less powerful than you, some social shifts) and not even acknowledging where “the abused’s abuse” is going is heavily impeding most anti-abuse analyses and activism.

Lefty activists for other marginalized groups focus on material liberation over “debating bigots into not hating us anymore.” Youthlib activism must operate on a similar principle: while ideological discussions and persuasion and deconstructions of adultist talking points are helpful, they cannot be all you stake your activism on. You should not expect that while doing nothing else you can just argue your way to a child-abuse-free society. You should not keep waiting for abusers to have a “change of heart” or “realization of their trauma” crossing your fingers that they’ll just wake up one day and choose to stop using coercive power that they still hold. Get them that therapy when the givers of therapy are no longer collaborators in such institutionally abusive practices and when they are no longer holding youth hostage. ****** wants to say I/the comrades play dice with our own possibilities of “gaining rights.” We do not. We are here because we’ve tried their handholding and assimilation and concessions and nonprofit bullshit for years (decades, even, for those of us who started early trying to “debate”/heart-to-heart our own abusers out of abusing us and ended up continuing to be abused), and we’re ready for something a bit more direct.

#OP #adultism #abuse #the carceral state #materialism #youthlib #against liberalism #+ a dash of vaguepost