14 years ago when I had recently moved to Alaska, I went hiking with an Aleut friend, and she pointed to a feather lying on the ground and said "hey that's a bald eagle tail feather, you should grab it!" and I was like "uhh I'm very white and that's very illegal" and she went "they're fuckin everywhere up here man. I have 20." so she grabs it off the ground and hands it to me and says "there, now it's a ceremonial gift from an indigenous person."

and I'm like, okay, cool, I guess this is how we do things in Alaska. nice.

so I keep this bald eagle tail feather around for years. display it in my home among other cherished memorabilia from places I've lived and visited, etc.

on a whim, I have just now looked it up. there is no exemption to that law for a ceremonial gift from an indigenous person. the last 7 years I lived in the US, I was technically a bald eagle poacher.

the law against 'picking feathers up off the ground' means that you can't go shoot an eagle then sell the feathers on etsy by saying you 'just found them'. you can't own them no matter where they came from, which makes sure that they're not going to come from any birds killed and then secretly disposed of.

It could be any kind of struggle; not knowing a basic skill, having financial issues, a medical problem, an accident, doing something poorly, having a crime committed against me.

Every time, I would hear that nasty 'See, you can't take care of yourself. We told you so. You should have stayed in your place. We told you this would happen if you left.' I would become overwhelmed with shame of being a bad human and proving them right. Even if I never went back, the humiliation would sit with me and I would feel consider whatever happened to me, completely my fault.

This happened because abusers connect inevitable life struggles against victims; it just isn't connected. Their twisted logic says, if you escape and then fail at being perfect, it's a proof you never should have gone. If an accident or crime happens to you, it means you're stupid just as we suspected and also somehow means you now deserve to have your agency taken away from you and be tortured forever.

People have accidents every day, they mess up, do things poorly, they struggle, and get sick, and they deal with crimes. And nobody says to them 'this is proof you should go back to being tortured' because that's nonsense! If those people have good family, what they hear instead is 'Oh my god, are you okay. How can we help you. It's not your fault. You'll get through this. It can happen to anyone.'

Nothing is taken away! Nothing is threatened. Their agency and their life remain theirs, despite the accidents, or mistakes, or struggles. Getting trapped and controlled is not a logical consequence to struggle! It isn't done to anyone else, so why are we the only ones singled out and told that anything short of perfection means pain and control.

The answer is abusers. They changed the rules for us. They decided every mistake or accident should be used to strenghten their hold on us. They created this twisted world where we can't do anything without getting punished. And for what. Because it makes them feel good and gives them power over us. Disgusting. Being a toy in their world is more important to them than us having agency and freedom to learn and navigate the world on our own.

its also how abusers get the upper hand because they will not teach their kids a damn thing then get mad at their children for not knowing how to do "basic stuff" and struggling. how is yelling, threatening, hurting, etc going to help teach life skills that are only learned through experience? they just want to be in control of everything and feel like they are the smartest best human ever, when in reality they failed to teach and guide their kids through life.

you cant shame yourself into change. mistakes should be treated like a learning experience and struggling should be met with support and kindness not shame and abuse. never let anyone shame you into thinking you're not good enough for freedom. you escaping against all odds is proof enough of your skills.

Russian destruction of the Kakhovka dam flooded around 620 km² of land between the 6th and 9th June, including 333,000 hectares of protected areas, 10,000 hectares of agricultural land and more than 11,000 hectares of forests. More than 14.7 km³ of water was released, affecting 80 settlements along the Dnipro and its tributaries and directly impacting 100,000 people. 10 settlements on the occupied left bank were most severely affected with Oleshky and Hola Prystan remaining flooded for more than a month.

More than 1,000 potential pollution sources were inundated by floodwaters, including fuel storage and transit infrastructure – a large oil spill occurred in Komyshany when an oil pipeline was damaged. Numerous chemical, industrial and agro-industrial sites were also affected, such as the major shipbuilding and port complex in Kherson. Waste was mobilised from landfills, sewage facilities and properties. In Oleshky alone, flooding affected cemeteries, tailings piles and 37,000 homes. 11 Minefields and at least 47 military positions were flooded, dispersing military pollutants and transporting unexploded ordnance. The dam itself was also a pollution source, discharging around 150 of the 450 tonnes of fuel oil it was thought to have held.

The huge water volumes caused flooding and physical changes to the ecologically sensitive wetlands in the lower Dnipro. In the Black Sea, the rapid outflow of polluted freshwater impacted coastal and marine ecosystems.

Agriculture rapidly began to be affected, impacting livelihoods. The reservoir had been a source of drinking water for one million people; emergency water trucking, well drilling and costly pipeline construction was launched to restore supplies.

if you were mentally healthy, you wouldn’t be tortured by the existence of your body , and you wouldn’t feel the need to medically or cosmetically alter your otherwise healthy body . idk why it’s so hard for them to admit that yes dysphoria is a mental illness … maybe because it clashes with the “ being trans is innate and something you’re born as ” bs ?