tolstudies

[tolstudies]

There is genuinely no such thing as an inappropriate book for a child.

#beside the point but i read anna karenina at 11 and it changed my fucking life and is still my favourite book to this day #even though it was too hard for me really! i didn't finish it completely until like 6 years later

[tolstudies]

SPREADSHEET OF PALESTINIAN ESCAPE FUNDS‼️TIME SENSITIVE

Operation Olive Branch is a continuously updating spreadsheet of Palestinian escape funds where progress towards their goals is being tracked. As of right now, there are over 100 funds listed there.

Any amount of money can make a difference. With their recent decision to bomb Rafah, the only remaining “safe” territory in Gaza, Israel has forced Palestinians into a corner by giving them nowhere else to go. The international community has given Israel the ability to act with impunity - it is long past the point in time to rely on those in power to hold Israel to any standard of compassion.

Today, I want you to look at this document, choose a fund, contribute to it, and share it. The people in Rafah are living on borrowed time. Free Palestine.

#the fund i've been donating to every week just met its goal so i picked a new one off here! super useful resource #palestine

[tolstudies]

save me partial credit...... partial credit...... partial credit save me

#do you ever have no fucking idea what youre doing #gessie.txt

[tolstudies]

It has been brought to my attention that a large number of people probably don't know why Campbell's "monomyth" is bunk when discussing anything other than a piece of modern literature written under the direct influence of Campbell, in much the same way that a Freudian analysis of any story that was not written a) after Freud and b) based on acceptance of Freudian theory is bunk.

If you've studied English Lit and haven't done genuine rigorous dives into the serious studies of folklore, mythology, religion, anthropology and a number of other things, then you may have unfortunately been told by your literature professors that Campbell is not bunk. This is, indeed, unfortunate.

This is a solid takedown of why, both in terms of the fact that even Campbell's theory in and of itself is honestly so vague that it's much like a newspaper horoscope (you could shove anything in there and make it match if you tried hard enough), and then also in terms of engaging with the ethnocentric and also intellectually lazy nonsense it is.

Campbell was a literature prof who fully and completely believed in the Jungian (or at least branch of Jungian) premise that humanity has a collective psychic unconscious that is shared across the globe. He took single versions of stories, many of them in translation, massive numbers of them from cultures he did not know and did not understand, and hacked them up and reinterpreted them, out of context and based on Freudian and Jungian principles, to make a claim about a Universal Human Understanding.

This, of course, is ethnocentric bullshit.†

Now much like Freud was incredibly influential on the European literature of the early and mid 20th century and as such you absolutely should keep Freud in mind when reading, say, Sons and Lovers, Campbell was influential (and sadly continues to be influential) among lit and other creative spaces and is certainly applicable to, for instance, Star Wars and Labyrinth.

But much like Freud, you should not actually apply him to anything that wasn't written under his influence, because in terms of application to anything else, his theory is bunk.

It's also not taken seriously in literally. any. field. outside European lit circles and the visual media/etc that are their heirs. In fact the renowned folklorist Alan Dundes* said at one point, "there is no single idea promulgated by amateurs that has done more harm to serious folklore study than the notion of archetype".

tl;dr: fuck Joseph Campbell, stop letting him collapse the gorgeous array of human storytelling, mythmaking, meaning-making and metaphor into a boring tawdry (heterosexist and hetero-sex-obsessed) pastel, he is bunk.

But he's relevant to Labyrinth bc Lucas was a fanboy and also a producer, and the guy managed to convince a lot of people that he was legit.

†for instance just to start with the idea that there is only one version of literally any major cultural/folklore story is itself deeply silly; this is basically never the case. Even stories we here and now are used to thinking of as having one authoritative version - like the story of Achilles being only the Iliad - does not reflect the actual reality of the people of the time. Or us, for that matter: the cultures between the first written form of that epic and now have all of us reinvented, retold, reinterpreted and repurposed the story of Achilles to suit ourselves a million fucking times. There are a billion Achilles.

Fuck, man, you can't even claim there's only one version or one myth-set for fucking Batman, and he really was made up by one dude less than a century ago.

*who is himself not at all perfect, but who was at least an incredibly serious, dedicated scholar of folklore in its inception as an academic field

#literature

[tolstudies]

Orientalism is the worst its been since the 1800's. Palestinians are not your OCs, your props, your narrative devices, we're not your saviours, we're not your models, we're not your objects.

Go fucking read Edward Said's Orientalism. We already hashed this shit out!!! And by we I literally mean Palestinian scholars specifically!!!!

#free books

[tolstudies]

Orientalism is the worst its been since the 1800's. Palestinians are not your OCs, your props, your narrative devices, we're not your saviours, we're not your models, we're not your objects.

Go fucking read Edward Said's Orientalism. We already hashed this shit out!!! And by we I literally mean Palestinian scholars specifically!!!!

#free books

[tolstudies]

2024.02.14 | Day 25/100 days of productivity

Happy valentine’s day with this little graphic from my most recent R tutorial!! I’ve had classes all day and I have a formal dinner with my college in a little over an hour. It’s been a fairly good day but I hate not having time for assignments and research.

#oh cute! #studyblr

[tolstudies]

@drdemonprince

[tolstudies]

WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU'RE DOING IT ALL BY HAND??? LIKE BACKSPACING OUT EVERY LETTER BEFORE YOU SEARCH THE STRING???

String identified: AT A ' G T A A??? ACACG T TT AC T TG???

Closest match: Crassostrea gigas strain QD chromosome 2 Common name: Pacific oyster

#also true of social scientists. knowing index match in excel will blow the mind of an economist

[tolstudies]

boa constrictor digesting an elephant?

speaking of statistics. i have a normal distribution tattoo on my shoulder that i got in graduate school and i want to blastover it one day. but what with. what represents my journey away from quantitative methods and social psychology and into the realm of narrative and anti-psych. do not say anything botanical bc plant tattoos are a huge thing in the chicago tattoo scene so i hate them

#do americans know the little prince? unsure

[tolstudies]

ppl using "indigenous" to mean "~place where an ethnic group was originally from~" (as if that's something that can even be objectively determined) instead of as an ongoing political relationship to a colonising power is really giving race science lol

#politics

[tolstudies]

#prev.......... what frequentism will do to a mf #statistics

[tolstudies]

19.01.24 🍵 beginning of a new semester

#studyblr #statistics studyblr #economics studyblr #yellow #langvillage #yes it's the same flowers as last time. aren't they lovely? #gessie.png

[tolstudies]

they have a point though. you wouldn't need everyone to accommodate you if you just lost weight, but you're too lazy to stick to a healthy diet and exercise. it's that simple. I'd like to see you back up your claims, but you have no proof. you have got to stop lying to yourselves and face the facts

Must I go through this again? Fine. FINE. You guys are working my nerves today. You want to talk about facing the facts? Let's face the fucking facts.

In 2022, the US market cap of the weight loss industry was $75 billion [1, 3]. In 2021, the global market cap of the weight loss industry was estimated at $224.27 billion [2]. 

In 2020, the market shrunk by about 25%, but rebounded and then some since then [1, 3] By 2030, the global weight loss industry is expected to be valued at $405.4 billion [2]. If diets really worked, this industry would fall overnight. 

1. LaRosa, J. March 10, 2022. "U.S. Weight Loss Market Shrinks by 25% in 2020 with Pandemic, but Rebounds in 2021." Market Research Blog. 2. Staff. February 09, 2023. "[Latest] Global Weight Loss and Weight Management Market Size/Share Worth." Facts and Factors Research. 3. LaRosa, J. March 27, 2023. "U.S. Weight Loss Market Partially Recovers from the Pandemic." Market Research Blog.

Over 50 years of research conclusively demonstrates that virtually everyone who intentionally loses weight by manipulating their eating and exercise habits will regain the weight they lost within 3-5 years. And 75% will actually regain more weight than they lost [4].

4. Mann, T., Tomiyama, A.J., Westling, E., Lew, A.M., Samuels, B., Chatman, J. (2007). "Medicare’s Search For Effective Obesity Treatments: Diets Are Not The Answer." The American Psychologist, 62, 220-233. U.S. National Library of Medicine, Apr. 2007.

The annual odds of a fat person attaining a so-called “normal” weight and maintaining that for 5 years is approximately 1 in 1000 [5].

5. Fildes, A., Charlton, J., Rudisill, C., Littlejohns, P., Prevost, A.T., & Gulliford, M.C. (2015). “Probability of an Obese Person Attaining Normal Body Weight: Cohort Study Using Electronic Health Records.” American Journal of Public Health, July 16, 2015: e1–e6.

Doctors became so desperate that they resorted to amputating parts of the digestive tract (bariatric surgery) in the hopes that it might finally result in long-term weight-loss. Except that doesn’t work either. [6] And it turns out it causes death [7],  addiction [8], malnutrition [9], and suicide [7].

6. Magro, Daniéla Oliviera, et al. “Long-Term Weight Regain after Gastric Bypass: A 5-Year Prospective Study - Obesity Surgery.” SpringerLink, 8 Apr. 2008. 7. Omalu, Bennet I, et al. “Death Rates and Causes of Death After Bariatric Surgery for Pennsylvania Residents, 1995 to 2004.” Jama Network, 1 Oct. 2007.  8. King, Wendy C., et al. “Prevalence of Alcohol Use Disorders Before and After Bariatric Surgery.” Jama Network, 20 June 2012.  9. Gletsu-Miller, Nana, and Breanne N. Wright. “Mineral Malnutrition Following Bariatric Surgery.” Advances In Nutrition: An International Review Journal, Sept. 2013.

Evidence suggests that repeatedly losing and gaining weight is linked to cardiovascular disease, stroke, diabetes and altered immune function [10].

10. Tomiyama, A Janet, et al. “Long‐term Effects of Dieting: Is Weight Loss Related to Health?” Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 6 July 2017.

Prescribed weight loss is the leading predictor of eating disorders [11].

11. Patton, GC, et al. “Onset of Adolescent Eating Disorders: Population Based Cohort Study over 3 Years.” BMJ (Clinical Research Ed.), 20 Mar. 1999.

The idea that “obesity” is unhealthy and can cause or exacerbate illnesses is a biased misrepresentation of the scientific literature that is informed more by bigotry than credible science [12]. 

12. Medvedyuk, Stella, et al. “Ideology, Obesity and the Social Determinants of Health: A Critical Analysis of the Obesity and Health Relationship” Taylor & Francis Online, 7 June 2017.

“Obesity” has no proven causative role in the onset of any chronic condition [13, 14] and its appearance may be a protective response to the onset of numerous chronic conditions generated from currently unknown causes [15, 16, 17, 18].

13. Kahn, BB, and JS Flier. “Obesity and Insulin Resistance.” The Journal of Clinical Investigation, Aug. 2000. 14. Cofield, Stacey S, et al. “Use of Causal Language in Observational Studies of Obesity and Nutrition.” Obesity Facts, 3 Dec. 2010.  15. Lavie, Carl J, et al. “Obesity and Cardiovascular Disease: Risk Factor, Paradox, and Impact of Weight Loss.” Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 26 May 2009.  16. Uretsky, Seth, et al. “Obesity Paradox in Patients with Hypertension and Coronary Artery Disease.” The American Journal of Medicine, Oct. 2007.  17. Mullen, John T, et al. “The Obesity Paradox: Body Mass Index and Outcomes in Patients Undergoing Nonbariatric General Surgery.” Annals of Surgery, July 2005. 18. Tseng, Chin-Hsiao. “Obesity Paradox: Differential Effects on Cancer and Noncancer Mortality in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus.” Atherosclerosis, Jan. 2013.

Fatness was associated with only 1/3 the associated deaths that previous research estimated and being “overweight” conferred no increased risk at all, and may even be a protective factor against all-causes mortality relative to lower weight categories [19].

19. Flegal, Katherine M. “The Obesity Wars and the Education of a Researcher: A Personal Account.” Progress in Cardiovascular Diseases, 15 June 2021.

Studies have observed that about 30% of so-called “normal weight” people are “unhealthy” whereas about 50% of so-called “overweight” people are “healthy”. Thus, using the BMI as an indicator of health results in the misclassification of some 75 million people in the United States alone [20]. 

20. Rey-López, JP, et al. “The Prevalence of Metabolically Healthy Obesity: A Systematic Review and Critical Evaluation of the Definitions Used.” Obesity Reviews : An Official Journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity, 15 Oct. 2014.

While epidemiologists use BMI to calculate national obesity rates (nearly 35% for adults and 18% for kids), the distinctions can be arbitrary. In 1998, the National Institutes of Health lowered the overweight threshold from 27.8 to 25—branding roughly 29 million Americans as fat overnight—to match international guidelines. But critics noted that those guidelines were drafted in part by the International Obesity Task Force, whose two principal funders were companies making weight loss drugs [21].

21. Butler, Kiera. “Why BMI Is a Big Fat Scam.” Mother Jones, 25 Aug. 2014. 

Body size is largely determined by genetics [22].

22. Wardle, J. Carnell, C. Haworth, R. Plomin. “Evidence for a strong genetic influence on childhood adiposity despite the force of the obesogenic environment” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition Vol. 87, No. 2, Pages 398-404, February 2008.

Healthy lifestyle habits are associated with a significant decrease in mortality regardless of baseline body mass index [23].  

23. Matheson, Eric M, et al. “Healthy Lifestyle Habits and Mortality in Overweight and Obese Individuals.” Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine : JABFM, U.S. National Library of Medicine, 25 Feb. 2012.

Weight stigma itself is deadly. Research shows that weight-based discrimination increases risk of death by 60% [24].

24. Sutin, Angela R., et al. “Weight Discrimination and Risk of Mortality .” Association for Psychological Science, 25 Sept. 2015.

Fat stigma in the medical establishment [25] and society at large arguably [26] kills more fat people than fat does [27, 28, 29].

25. Puhl, Rebecca, and Kelly D. Bronwell. “Bias, Discrimination, and Obesity.” Obesity Research, 6 Sept. 2012. 26. Engber, Daniel. “Glutton Intolerance: What If a War on Obesity Only Makes the Problem Worse?” Slate, 5 Oct. 2009.  27. Teachman, B. A., Gapinski, K. D., Brownell, K. D., Rawlins, M., & Jeyaram, S. (2003). Demonstrations of implicit anti-fat bias: The impact of providing causal information and evoking empathy. Health Psychology, 22(1), 68–78. 28. Chastain, Ragen. “So My Doctor Tried to Kill Me.” Dances With Fat, 15 Dec. 2009. 29. Sutin, Angelina R, Yannick Stephan, and Antonio Terraciano. “Weight Discrimination and Risk of Mortality.” Psychological Science, 26 Nov. 2015.

There's my "proof." Where is yours?

#ref #health

[tolstudies]

8.29.2021

Working on some stats reading after a fun weekend of seeing friends, shopping, and going to museums. I'm super ahead in my work which is a refreshing change!

#studyblr #inspo

[tolstudies]

⋆ ˚｡∘ photos ⊷ goodreads ⊶ language community ∘｡˚ ⋆

[tolstudies]

9.1.2021

Basic statistics on a rainy day

#studyblr #inspo