thetom2002

[thetom2002]

[thetom2002]

I think people need to understand that when someone says the situation in Israel/Palestine is complicated they are not necessarily saying that the discussion of who the oppressor vs oppressed is complicated. The Israeli government has been oppressing the Palestinians for a very long time, that is clear, and it is not complicated to understand that at least since the 80s they have had dramatically more financial and military power to keep control of the territory in the way they like.

However, it is reductive and dismissive to insist that there is no complexity in the potential ways to move forward to bring peace to the region. Despite what people on tumblr.edu like to believe, "Israel should never have been created" is not a practical solution to an incredibly heated geopolitical situation in the present day. Israel was created and it does exist. 10 million people live there. 74% of the population is native born and the country has existed for 75 years. Hand waving these fact away with the opinion that "they should move back to where they came from" may make you feel good about being a Radical Leftist, but it does not give anyone a road map for how exactly millions of people without dual citizenship are supposed to just up and evaporate. Nor does it acknowledge the reality that 21% of Israelis are Arabs, the very people you are claiming to want to give the land back to.

Insisting that there's nothing complicated about expecting an entire country's population to willingly dissappear with no consequences is not a productive way to think about this conflict. It ignores the many massive superpowers that have an interest in proping up different states in the region, the power dynamics involved in any land back movements, and the inevitably negative consequences of totally dissolving an established state without a plan. It is also completely and almost comically unrealistic, so much so that it makes it hard to believe that anyone who's opinion starts and ends with this idea really gives a shit about anyone who lives in the area as much as they care about their online leftist clout.

There's nothing complicated in understanding that the Israeli government is and has been maintaining an oppressive apartheid state for decades. It is, however, very complicated to come up with a realistic way to resolve some of the most intricately entangled land disputes on the planet without plunging the region into total chaos. Not everyone has to be deeply educated on every geopolitical situation, but it is very hard to take people seriously when they know nothing about the politics or history of a region and yet insist that there is nothing complicated about it at all.

There's a lot of people on this website who are getting dangerously smug about their own ignorance, and are starting to go down Qanon type anti-intellectual paths in the name of being sufficiently radical. Not knowing the details of a very convoluted land dispute isn't something to brag about online as you call for intentionally reductive solutions. You can support the Palestinian cause and be aware of the oppression they have faced while also holding off on calling people trying to do real analysis and de-escalation work bootlickers. We need to get control of the urge to fit every global issue into a simplistic YA novel narrative structure that appeals to Western revolutionary fantasies.

[thetom2002]

An issue I have with the Palestine discourse is Israel sympathizers often assume those who support Palestinians praise or passively support Hamas' brutal tactics that involve harming civilians. Rare is it to find people endorsing violence like this. Rather, we are trying to shed light on the conditions that made this tragic reality possible: years decades of Israeli colonization, Palestinian communities forced into apartheid conditions with minimal sympathy, biased news coverage, unwavering Western support for Israel's far-right regime, and no good faith effort on Israel's part to find a peaceful solution. This treatment inevitably boils into hatred against the aggressor in the same way American imperialism creates and exacerbates terrorist groups in the Middle East. It is tragic to see Hamas' recent atrocities. It is also important to see how they came into fruition.

Amidst the violence, you can still support Palestinians, who largely want peace, as you sympathize with innocent Israelis. Many Israel defenders have not once murmured support for Palestinians when the same atrocities are levied upon them, often in even worse fashions. There are Israeli officials who want Palestine wiped out. Their sympathizers pour concrete into Palestinian drinking wells. Israeli troops have killed Palestinian civilians, journalists, etc. It is hypocrisy at its finest to ignore these well-documented war crimes.

[thetom2002]

Listen, y'all outside of the Israel/Palestine situation can have whatever opinions you have, but as someone who woke up at 7am by the sounds of sirens and who has friends and family living in the danger zone, I honestly don't give a shit, and no other israel or palestinian gives a shit either over what some dumb fuck on the internet who's never experienced war or even been in a bomb shelter has to say. I pray that my palestinian friends are safe, and that they will suffer as little as possible. People on both sides are DYING. You can have your bullshit, experienceless opinion all you want, but fact is people here are suffering, and you, person getting angry and writing shitty tumblr posts, are not.

Go to hell, people are dying and you making anti-semetic/anti-palestinian post is helping no one but your pathetic ego

[thetom2002]

So called free thinkers when an newsworthy event happens

#titanic #russia #stock market #ukraine #spn #I'm not upset or anything #I just find it funny that this site has decided that THIS is the only acceptable way to tell everyone whenever something relevant happens #wouldn't have it any other way

[thetom2002]

Look, this is probably going to end up as an unpopular post, because God knows the level of brainrot capitalism and fast consumption caused in people's brains, but I'd rather not get TV shows for a while if it means writers get their rights defended and recognized.

Entertainment can't come at the cost of fair pay, healthy work environment and ethical practices.

[thetom2002]

URGENT: 🚨🚨EARN IT ACT IS BACK IN THE SENATE 🚨🚨 TUMBLR’S NSFW BAN HITTING THE ENTIRE INTERNET THIS SUMMER 2023

April 28, 2023

I’m so sorry for the long post but please please please pay attention and spread this

What is the EARN IT Act?

The EARN IT Act (s. 1207) has been roundly condemned by nearly every major LGBTQ+ advocacy and human rights organization in the country.

This is the third time the Senate has been trying to force this through, and I talked about it last year. It is a bill that claims "protects children and victims against CSAM" by creating an unelected and politically appointed national commission of law enforcement specialists to dictate "best practices" that websites all across the nation will be forced to follow. (Keep in mind, most websites in the world are created in the US, so this has global ramifications). These "best practices" would include killing encryption so that any law enforcement can scan and see every single message, dm, photo, cloud storage, data, and any website you have every so much as glanced at. Contrary to popular belief, no they actually can't already do that. These "best practices" also create new laws for "removing CSAM" online, leading to mass censorship of non-CSAM content like what happened to tumblr. Keep in mind that groups like NCOSE, an anti-LGBT hate group, will be allowed on this commission. If websites don't follow these best practices, they lose their Section 230 protections, leading to mass censorship either way.

Section 230 is foundational to modern online communications. It's the entire reason social media exists. It grants legal protection to users and websites, and says that websites aren't responsible for what users upload online unless it's criminal. Without Section 230, websites are at the mercy of whatever bullshit regulatory laws any and every US state passes. Imagine if Texas and Florida were allowed to say what you can and can't publish and access online. That is what will happen if EARN IT passes. (For context, Trump wanted to get rid of Section 230 because he knew it would lead to mass govt surveillance and censorship of minorities online.)

This is really not a drill. Anyone who makes or consume anything “adult” and LGBT online has to be prepared to fight Sen. Blumenthal’s EARN IT Act, brought back from the grave by a bipartisan consensus to destroy Section 230. If this bill passes, we’re going to see most, if not all, adult content and accounts removed from mainstream platforms. This will include anything related to LGBT content, including SFW fanfiction, for example. Youtube, Twitter, Reddit, Tiktok, Tumblr, all of them will be completely gutted of anything related to LGBT content, abortion healthcare, resources for victims of any type of abuse, etc. It is a right-wing fascists wet dream, which is why NCOSE is behind this bill and why another name for this bill is named in reference to NCOSE.

NCOSE used to be named Morality in Media, and has rebranded into an "anti-trafficking" organization. They are a hate group that has made millions off of being "against trafficking" while helping almost no victims and pushing for homophobic laws globally. They have successfully pushing the idea that any form of sexual expression, including talking about HEALTH, leads to sex trafficking. That's how SESTA passed. Their goal is to eliminate all sex, anything gay, and everything that goes against their idea of ‘God’ from the internet and hyper disney-fy and sanitize it. This is a highly coordinated attack on multiple fronts.

The EARN IT Act will lead to mass online censorship and surveillance. Platforms will be forced to scan their users’ communications and censor all sex-related content, including sex education, literally anything lgbt, transgender or non-binary education and support systems, aything related to abortion, and sex worker communication according to the ACLU. All this in the name of “protecting kids” and “fighting CSAM”, both of which the bill does nothing of the sort. In fact it makes fighting CSEM even harder.

EARN IT will open the way for politicians to define the category of “pornography" as they — or the lobbies that fund them — please. The same way that right-wing groups have successfully banned books about race and LGBT, are banning trans people from existing, all under the guise of protecting children from "grooming and exploitation", is how they will successfully censor the internet.

As long as state legislatures can tie in "fighting CSAM" to their bullshit laws, they can use EARN IT to censor and surveill whatever they want.

This is already a nightmare enough. But the bill also DESTROYS ENCRYPTION, you know, the thing protecting literally anyone or any govt entity from going into your private messages and emails and anything on your devices and spying on you.

This bill is going to finish what FOSTA/SESTA started. And that should terrify you.

Senator Blumenthal (Same guy who said ‘Facebook should ban finsta’) pushed this bill all of 2020, literally every activist (There were more than half a million signatures on this site opposing this act!) pushed hard to stop this bill. Now he brings it back, doesn’t show the text of the bill until hours later, and it’s WORSE. Instead of fixing literally anything in the bill that might actually protect kids online, Bluemnthal is hoping to fast track this and shove it through, hoping to get little media attention other than propaganda of “protecting kids” to support this shitty legislation that will harm kids. Blumental doesn't care about protecting anyone, and only wants his name in headlines.

It will make CSAM much much worse.

One of the many reasons this bill is so dangerous: It totally misunderstands how Section 230 works, and in doing so (as with FOSTA) it is likely to make the very real problem of CSAM worse, not better. Section 230 gives companies the flexibility to try different approaches to dealing with various content moderation challenges. It allows for greater and greater experimentation and adjustments as they learn what works – without fear of liability for any “failure.” Removing Section 230 protections does the opposite. It says if you do anything, you may face crippling legal liability. This actually makes companies less willing to do anything that involves trying to seek out, take down, and report CSAM because of the greatly increased liability that comes with admitting that there is CSAM on your platform to search for and deal with. This liability would allow anyone for any reason to sue any platform they want, suing smaller ones out of existence. Look at what is happening right now with book bans across the nation with far right groups. This is going to happen to the internet if this bill passes.

(Remember, the state department released a report in December 2021 recommending that the government crack down on “obscenity” as hard the Reagan Administration did. If this bill passes, it could easily go way beyond shit red states are currently trying. It is a goldmine for the fascist right that is currently in the middle of banning every book that talks about race and sexuality across the US.)

The reason these bills keep showing up is because there is this false lie spread by organizations like NCOSE that platforms do nothing about CSEM online. However, platforms are already liable for child sexual exploitation under federal law. Tech companies sent more than 45 million+ instances of CSAM to the DOJ in 2019 alone, most of which they declined to investigate. This shows that platforms are actually doing everything in their power already to stop CSEM by following already existing laws. The Earn It Act includes zero resources for proven investigation or prevention programs. If Senator Bluementhal actually cared about protecting youth, why wouldn’t he include anything to actually protect them in his shitty horrible bill? EARN IT is actually likely to make prosecuting child molesters more difficult since evidence collected this way likely violates the Fourth Amendment and would be inadmissible in court.

I don’t know why so many Senators are eager to cosponsor the “make child pornography worse” bill, but here we are.

HOW TO FIGHT BACK

EARN IT Act was introduced just two weeks ago and is already being fast-tracked. It will be marked up the week of May 1st and head to the Senate floor immediately after. If there is no loud and consistent opposition, it will be law by JUNE! Most bills never go to markup, so this means they are putting pressure to move this through. There are already 20 co-sponsors, a fifth of the entire Senate. This is an uphill battle and it is very much all hands on deck.

CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES.

This website takes you to your Senator / House members contact info. EMAIL, MESSAGE, SEND LETTERS, CALL CALL CALL CALL CALL. Calling is the BEST way to get a message through. Get your family and friends to send calls too. This is literally the end of free speech online.

[phone] connects you to the congressional hotline. Here is a call script if you don't know what to say. Call them every day. Even on the weekends, leaving voicemails are fine.

2. Sign these petitions!

Link to Petition 1

Link to Petition 2

3. SPREAD THE WORD ONLINE

If you have any social media, spread this online. One of the best ways we fought back against this last year was MASSIVE spread online. Tiktok, reddit, twitter, discord, whatever means you have at least mention it. We could see most social media die out by this fall if we don't fight back.

Here is a linktree with more information on this bill including a masterpost of articles, the links to petitions, and the call script.

DISCORD LINK IF YOU WANT TO HELP FIGHT IT

TLDR: The EARN IT Act will lead to online censorship of any and all adult & lgbt content across the entire internet, open the floodgates to mass surveillance the likes which we haven’t seen before, lead to much more CSEM being distributed online, and destroy encryption. Call 202-224-3121 to connect to your house and senate representative and tell them to VOTE NO on this bill that does not protect anyone and harms everyone.

[thetom2002]

#danganronpa 2 and brothers a tale of two sons

[thetom2002]

Anyway, last thing I wanna say about the wizard game, because quite frankly I'm tired.

All of the anger and vitriol being thrown around on both sides has only helped the game's visibility and sales. As far as the publisher is concerned, all publicity is good publicity, and the games sales have definitely not been hurt at all.

At this point, getting angry at people over it isn't going to accomplish anything, so my suggestion would be to do one or more of the following instead;

Donate to a trans-specific or trans-supportive LGBT+ charity (e.g. Mermaids, The Trevor Project, Stonewall, etc.)

Promote indie games made by trans developers

Call out transphobia when you see it, and stick up for trans people both online and IRL

Getting mad at people over the internet isn't going to accomplish anything good. It's only going to keep the game trending, keep it in the public eye, and keep the sales of it high.

You may as well just channel that outrage into something productive instead.

#THIS #The mere act of talking about the game is going to give it attention #So it's best to not support the game both economically and by not talking about it #Outrage should be channelled into doing productive actions to support trans and Jewish people.

[thetom2002]

Seeing as we all seem to be giving our thoughts on this: From a Harry Potter fan whom has enjoyed the books and the overall world since she was 10-

DON'T BUY HOGWARTS LEGACY. DON'T PIRATE IT. DO. NOT. TOUCH IT. YOU CAN ENJOY THE WORLD WITHOUT SUPPORTING TRANSPHOBIC, RACIST AND ANTI-SEMITIC VIEWS.

But on the other side of the coin, don't harass people, don't send death threats, don't cross boundaries.

CRITICISM ISN'T HARASSMENT.

You can criticize someone for playing this game with out telling them to die or to threaten them or whatever. You are absolutely entitled to being hurt or disgusted or to dislike or to even hate someone who plays it, block people, do whatever you feel like you want to. I just don't think it's worth it.

This doesn't have to be so complicated. Be an ally. Don't be an asshole.

[thetom2002]

Joanne Terfington Rowling is coming out with a video game, with the help of a Dev who's a Nazi, it's a whole shit-show. The money she earns from it will fund her anti-trans campaign.

There is no separation of artist and artwork here.

Screw that!

In an attempt to overshadow the release, I am joining 250+ other streamers in #G4TR where we will be raising funds for

Check my twitch schedule to see when I personally will stream on my Twitch channel.

I have 3 years experience in serious creative Minecraft Building, so I'll be building donators commissions!

Also playing two custom Age of Empires II maps with my bestie Auberrose (she/they) and maybe a third game?

You can find more info about my stream on @bin-of-frogs 's pinned post.

To watch the other streamers, you can check out the tag on Twitch

(The image was made before the project grew in size)

Are you a streamer who would like to stream on that day too?

If you're seeing this before Feb. 9th...

There's still time to sign up

Feel free to reblog.

The more streamers and viewers, the louder our voice will roar! <3

[thetom2002]

Anti-voting rhetoric will be the death of the left. Literally.

Not a single fucking Republican voted to protect roe. It was fucking overturned in the first place bc trump got three Supreme Court appointments.

Every fucking thing wrong in this country is almost certainly the result of Republicans being in power. In 2020, Texas cut half of the polling places in black neighborhoods, and doubled them in white ones, regardless of population. It was Republicans bitching about mail in voting, and constantly, constantly fearmonger about voter fraud. Literally, their platform is about making civil rights harder to practice.

Would you like to know why? It’s because Republican politicians know better than anyone that higher voter participation means higher republican loss.

But what do I see from the online left, champions of the oppressed?

“Voting doesn’t do anything, the parties are the same, the system is rigged, etc, etc”

Don’t sit here and tell me you give a fuck about marginalized people if you aren’t ready to march your ass to the voting booth and vote out the party actively stripping their rights away.

Protest, donate, community build, unionize, and vote, vote, vote.

By the time direct action is the only option, it will be too fucking late.

[thetom2002]

When you get to the Temple of Sinnoh

#This #This is the kind of content for which I got on Tumblr

[thetom2002]

Hecate's washboard abs.

RB if you agree.

#looking respectfully #hades 2 #hades #hecate #It's like that where do you work out meme except she works out at the library AND at the gym

[thetom2002]

Stained glasswing? More like,

eyestrain glasswing

#DAMN #ngl I wanna see more of them #Because the design is genuinely creative #cw // eyestrain

[thetom2002]

Howdy newbies and welcome to Tumblr, it takes a bit of setup to get this site running well so here’s what works for me. One of the neat things about this site is that its a different experience for everyone, so tailor these settings towards what you want from this site. 

New XKit 

[thetom2002]

About the rumours surrounding the ending of Bayonetta 3, (I'll make clear that I might be getting into SPOILER TERRITORY)...

Apparently Bayonetta is said to be getting into a romance with Luka and people are not happy about it. I gotta say...

So what?

I don't know how many saw the trailers of the game, but it's made clear that one of the themes of Bayonetta 3 is the multiverse.

Just because Bayoluka happened in ONE universe, it doesn't mean that it is a constant in every universe. It doesn't undo every headcanon.

Also assuming that Bayonetta is 100% straight because of this is bi/pan erasure.

#bayonetta