horsecatfairybunny
(They/He) I really like the song horsecatfairybunny.
107 posts
Latest Posts by horsecatfairybunny
One of the interesting things about getting into a long-running series late is that you tend to hear a lot of disconnected spoilers that don't really spoil anything until you get to them and say "oh, THAT's what that was about!" Or, in some cases, spoilers that you then completely misinterpret.
In my case, I went into the Vorkosigan books knowing that Miles was going to end up discovering he had a clone. I also read a thing about LMB saying she liked the throw the worst possible things at her characters...
So I assumed that this clone was going to be commissioned by Piotr, raised to replace Miles as heir: the perfect version of himself without the damage, rubbing his face in the person he was "supposed" to be.
24,07,2024
allan self care cards allan self care cards
bonus:
edit because people won’t shut up about it: yes floss your teeth at least once a day if you can, and wash off the toothbrush when you’re done brushing. ok? ok.
Can you believe I'm having to make this meme even after successfully finishing up taxes and applying to job
your life is not an optimization problem
Reminder that you cannot just work through burnout. You MUST rest and recuperate or it will drain the joy out of everything
About ten years ago I decided that the next step I needed to take in my life was to accept and explore what it meant to be a failure and to have failed. This infuriated almost everybody in my life and clearly terrified a lot of people. People do not want you to accept failure. They dont want you to like... Sit with and think about it and pick it up and turn it arpund in your hands and really examine it. They want you to keep throwing yourself against the impossible walls until your body explodes! They do not want you to say "alright then, I've failed. What does that mean for me? Im still here. What does the life of someone who has failed look like?"
This makes people very angry and panicky.
My mental health improved in ways it had not in the previous DECADE once I stopped. And. Sat. With failure. And thought about what my failure ... Was. And looked at the structures that produced it and examined them critically.
It is so taboo to fail and admit it openly and talk about it. It is so taboo to talk about or think about failure in an accepting way rather than hiding it shamefully until you experience a degree of success in some area which allows you to present the past failure as "a stepping stone" to your current situation. Fuck that. We are put in positions of guaranteed failure by society every day and then punished and shamed for it. Lets fucking talk about failure
biggest reason i make so many flop posts on here is because everything i do reeks of the desperation to make a popular tumblr post. this is deliberate, because it is what protects me from ACTUALLY making a popular tumblr post. so long as i crave it, tumblr fame will never find me. it is only when i turn away, and accept my fate of obscurity, that people will lay their eyes upon me. and it WILL be because i tripped and fell on my stupid face while i was turning
adhd executive dysfunction sucks bcuz im just sitting there and my brain is like
YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME YOU ARE WASTING TIME
no work done no rest gained. literally no point of this at all
(to everyone who reblogged, donate and share @olagaza's initiative!)
people want doing the right thing to be like pulling the correct lever at the correct time but actually usually doing the right thing is more like holding a moderate weight at arm's length continuously for seventeen years
People who self harm only for attention are just as valid as people who self harm for any other reason.
Seriously.
Parents often make the mistake of dismissing their child’s self harm as “attention seeking” when it’s otherwise.
But what always gets me is that, even if a child is harming themselves solely to get attention, that is a huge problem they need help for!
If a person has to go as far as to cause physical harm to themselves in order to gain what they feel as the proper amount of attention, that is someone who needs help ASAP.
No matter the form, no matter the severity, no matter the reason, self harm is a sign of severe distress that deserves immediate, intense attention.
And no one will ever convince me otherwise.
You guys do know you're supposed to reblog things, right
op made the post unrebloggable, can you repost what you wrote about the christan anti sex work group?
Sure thing! I don't blame them for turning off reblogs. I had to block some antisemitic creep who reblogged it from me with a rant about how actually it was feminism's fault, so clearly it had broken containment into the gross side of tumblr. Here it is with OP's handle and icon removed so they don't have to be connected to it anymore.
It's not just the advertisers- that's definitely also part of it, but this is also the direct, targeted action of a specific christian fundamentalist group, the "National Center on Sexual Exploitation," previously "Morality in Media" and "Operation Yorkville," a political lobbying organization that campaigns against pornography, who claim "Pornographers are committing the biggest crimes of the century!"
It was*this group specifically* (accompanied by another Christian anti-porn org, Exodus Cry) that put pressure on mastercard and visa to stop facilitating electronic payment for sites that hosted nsfw material. Faced with the risk of losing their ability to process payments, the sites partnered with visa and mastercard had no choice but to agree to porn bans.
They were behind Onlyfans flirting with banning sex workers last year, and they were one of the principle supporters of FOSTA/SESTA. I can not understate just how much influence this one well connected, well funded group has.
From their about page:
NCOSE convinced mastercard and visa to cut ties with porn not for the sake of advertisers, but because they convinced them that they could be potentially liable for facilitating illegal activity- the exchange of CSAM, prostitution and human trafficking- happening on the porn sites they were partnered with, which in NCOSE's opinion is all porn sites, and all porn period, since they believe all porn is human trafficking.
NCOSE has been around since the 60's, but hasn't seen much success until the last decade. Their previous campaigns, focused on pushing for the enforcement of obscenity laws from the 1800's and fabricating blatantly nonfactual research about porn as a mental health crisis, were not as widely received. But they've had much more success since they've started weaponizing concern for victims of abuse and trafficking, appropriating progressive language and trading in on the white moral panic about child sex trafficking that grew directly from the "Stranger Danger" and "Satanic Ritual Abuse" moral panics of the 80's and 90's- both themselves the result of a right wing reactionary movement using concern trolling about the safety of children to rail against drugs, loud music, and tabletop rpgs.
Blaming the sanitization of the internet solely on the vague specter of "advertisers" ignores the real, nameable groups and their extremely straightforward christofacist goals. It promotes apathy, pointing at an ambiguous target that feels as impossible to combat as the machine of capitalism itself. When it's literally just these specific guys, and like two or three similar, equally identifiable organizations!
I'm not saying sites like facebook don't have a vested interest in looking squeaky clean and family friendly, but tumblr, pornhub, onlyfans, patreon and gumroad did not move to ban porn because of advertising. Tumblr has never attracted the kind of advertisers who care, and pornhub, onlyfans, patreon and gumroad don't make the bulk of their money from ads, but from user transactions, which MUST be facilitated by an electronic banking platform in order to be safe and reliable.
Tumblr's porn ban was due to FOSTA/SESTA meaning the could not continue operating unless they either dumped nsfw content or went adults only and implemented costly and draconian age verification protocols that, frankly, no one was going to put up with for a mediocre blogging platform. The others folded under pressure from the electronic banking platforms, which threatened to drop them as partners due to the pressure *they* were under from NCOSE weaponizing public opinion to create a flurry of anger and condemnation towards these companies "facilitating human trafficking."
The enemy is not hiding, we know their names! They come not in the name of capitalism (who merely rides their coattails when convenient) but in the name of puritanical Christian Fascism.
So no, it's not the puriteens. It's their parents and grandparents, on an open crusade to enforce Christian anti-sex beliefs on as much of the world as they can manage.
on colors and being different and not being enough for yourself
(please reblog instead of liking)
TBH maybe more people would rp with real humans instead of chatbots if we sat them down and taught everyone proper roleplay etiquette
It's also important to remember the amount of Cordelia's life that has been wanting more children and not getting them. the story she tells Aral about the boyfriend who cheated her of command in Shards of Honor, got that by promising her children. Children have always been one of Cordelia goals. When she moved to Barrayar, the chance at having more children was shocking and amazing to her, but was then denied to her when another child might hurt Miles. My reading is that you would have to pry Cordelia away from having more children, no matter how much work they are, because she is very competent, and children are what she was always wanted to put her time and energy into.
The reason Miles wants so many children seems much more complicated to me. Is it because of the expectation of the Vor to have children and carry on? His desire to make sure the District goes to a vorkosigan? His experience as mostly only child, with Elena (who was only there during the summer) and Gregor (who was always The Emperor, and disappeared when Miles was 5)? Did he know how much his mother wanted more children, and did that effect his decision? How does Hara (the baby who was killed by her grandmother) play into it? How does proving to himself and others that he is capable and not a mutant like they claim, even as he insists it does not matter if people think he is a mutant anymore?
I think there is no way that Cordelia would stop having children before she got all of them, with the exception that it would hurt them. But I am less sure about Miles, because I don't know how important children are to him.
I think my biggest struggle with the Vorkosigan Saga is that... everyone wants kids. And like, I know that's part of the point. That given the chance to have children without the physical burden of literally bearing a child and all the risks involved, that people would have more children.
I had to turn Cordelia's decision in Gentlemen Jole & The Red Queen over and over. I just. I live in Texas.
me when the disability disables me: oh what the fuck? this sucks. what the hell man!
The way most autism literature describes "literal interpretation" is often not at all similar to how I experience it. Teenage me even thought I couldn't be autistic because I've always been able to learn metaphors easily.
In fact, I love wordplay of all kinds. Teenage me was fascinated to learn all the types of figurative language there are in poetry and literature.
But paperwork and questionnaires are hard, because there's so much they don't state clearly. Or they don't leave room for enough nuance.
"List all the jobs you've had, with start and end dates." What if I don't remember the exact day or month? Is the year enough?
"Have you been suffering from blurred vision?" Well, if I take off my glasses the whole world is blurred, but I'm fairly sure that's not what the intake form at the optometrist is asking.
Or the infamous (and infuriatingly stereotypical) "Would you rather go to a library or a party?" What sort of party? Where? Who's there? I work at a library. Am I currently at the library for work or pleasure? Does it have a good collection?
It's not common figures of speech that confound me. It's ambiguity, in situations that aren't supposed to be ambiguous.
it’s such a shame that even 30 years into the reign of Gregor Vorbarra, Barrayar’s government is still fundamentally non-transparent with a tight hand on the press, because can you fucking imagine watching Ekaterin tell Richars to fuck off then propose to Miles in the Chamber of Counts live on Barrayaran C-SPAN
I cannot overstate how much I love Tom Lehrer's story. It sounds so fake but is entirely real.
He's a goddamn genius- he started studying mathematics at Harvard when he was 15 and graduated magna cum laude. He worked at Los Alamos for a few years before being drafted and working for the NSA, where he claims to have invented jello shots to get around alcohol bans.
He then went back to Harvard for a couple years before starting to teach political science at MIT.
Through all of that, he was writing and performing both some of the funniest shit you'll ever hear (Poisoning Pigeons in the Park, Masochism Tango) and absolutely scathing political satire (Who's Next, Wernher von Braun, Send the Marines). Until the mid/late 60s counterculture gained momentum. He didn't like their aesthetic, so he stopped making music.
Shortly after, he moved to California and started teaching math and musical theater history at the UC Santa Cruz for the next 30 years.
I don't know if non-Californians understand just how goddamn funny that is. It's where stoners and math (and now computer science) kids who couldn't get into Berkeley go. Leaving Harvard/MIT for UCSC is peak academic phoning it in. And by all accounts he had a blast.
Plus the whole putting all of his music in the public domain thing. That fucked.
Oh no. MAGA is mad that the NYT shared the names of DOGE staffers. Don’t share this! Would be a shame
cleaning up your own living space: sucks ass
cleaning up a friend or romantic partner's living space: deeply satisfying and even a little entertaining
scientists can't explain this
@stvksn on ig
"A cishet person must have made this, no queer person would ever portray queerness in this way."
"This artist must be white."
"No SA victim would ever handle the subject in this way."
"No woman would ever write women like this."
"This creator is obviously neurotypical. Everyone with autism/ADHD/depression understands-"
Nope.
People who make these blanket statements are very frequently proven wrong when the creator comes out as a member of that group. And even when they aren't proven wrong, even in cases where the creator isn't from the group in question, actual members of the group who don't fit whatever arbitrary criteria are being expressed will see these statements and feel excluded and erased.
Not everyone in your group is going to share your experiences. No single individual gets to personally decide what does or doesn't count as a "valid" expression of trauma or being part of a particular group, and creators are also not obligated to out themselves in order to "prove" their validity.
If something doesn't resonate with you, all that means is that it doesn't resonate with you. You don't have to like it. But you don't get to decide what it means to someone else.
If you don't want advise, please ignore this. But this is the something that I do to make it better for me. My sensory issues are not your sensory issues, think about weather this would actually be helpful or unhelpful for you.
Some tricks I have developed to help me brush my teeth (but they might not work for anyone else) are
non mint flavored toothpaste. This is typically "kids" toothpaste, but it works just as well, just with diffrent packaging. This is most helpful for taste, and there are alot of non mint flavors, see if you can find one that works for you (just make sure they contain floride)
just flossing. Find some non flavored floss (I prefer the little plastic picks so I don't have to hold the wire), and just floss your teeth (this is a diffrent sensory experience from brushing, and might still be bad, but it is better for me)
Use your finger to scrub your teeth with toothpaste instead of the brush (means your finger is involved with the sensory nightmare, but is sometimes significantly better for me, might make it worse for you tho)
they make lollipops and other things that are supposed to help clean your teeth. The brand I found is called ZOLLIPOPS the clean teeth pops and they are supposed to be helpful in clean teeth. They have their own taste and are not as good as brushing, but they are soooo much better then not brushing (or brushing and making yourself miserable)
If you can't tell from this list, I mostly have a problem with the taste, but there is other (better) advice out there somewhere.
(I also have a whole other list for remember to brush your teeth, so if you want that one, let me know.
I have trouble taking care of my teeth because everything that involves doing that is a sensory nightmare. I decide to do some research to see if there's anything I can do about this. The results?
"How to make your autistic child brush their teeth"
"Autistic Children and Sensory issues relating to tooth brushing"
"How to get your little shit to brush his fucking teeth"
Like, yeah Google, thanks, that really helps. And like, even if I was a child, some of the advice seemed... unhelpful. Like, doing a dance and singing a song while brushing your teeth? Even for a kid, I don't think that would help distract from a sensory experience as intense as brushing your teeth. Like, the extremely intense and unpleasant flavor, the intense feeling of the brush against your teeth scraping across it, even mouthwash has such an intense and disgusting flavor that I have difficulty keeping it in my mouth for more than a few seconds. I wish there was SOMETHING that could be done.
Then when you start asking clarification for every ambiguity you think might maybe be a problem, they are annoyed at you for asking for many questions and being unable to think. they might even start refusing to answer questions, saying "figure it out yourself". Like what do you want from me??????
I didn't know that I didn't know.
And so often people don't believe you about the struggle, and are like "but thats so easy, just do it" and you can't afford to strangle them, because no it is not easy, it is very hard
How do we know/guess how Latin was pronounced?
I can't find the post where I talked about this before, but basically there are two ways.
1) Because Latin transitioned from a living language (in the Roman Empire) to the language of scholars and clerics (in the Middle Ages) without a gap, the pronunciation was passed down from teacher to student. It almost definitely shifted a bit over time though, due to human error and the lack of recording devices. This handed-down version is called Ecclesiastical Pronunciation.
2) In the early 20th century (iirc) scholars attempted to compensate for shifting pronunciation by reconstructing how Latin might have been pronounced in Ancient Rome. The version they came up with is called Classical Pronunciation.
There are valid reasons for choosing either pronunciation, and you'll meet latinists hotly in favour of each. 😜