We're Ecogoths

and in the one hand, did i enjoy spending hours researching housing regulations in my state? not especially. drafting this email was stressful. but on the other hand, did i learn a lot by doing that research? yeah, i did. i’m more prepared for my current and future leases. i used some of that info to make decisions about a new renter’s insurance policy. i already told three different people about things i learned that are relevant to their leases that they didn’t know yet. (pro tip: see if you’re supposed to be getting annual interest payments on your security deposit! also look up what specific appliances your landlords must legally provide as of 2026.) i also got to reconnect with my cousin for a bit because her job gave her specific insight on part of the situation, and i’d much rather do that than have a chatbot make shit up for me.

also, i drafted that email with the power of friendship (friends angry on our behalf) and spite (from landlords telling me not to do my research). chatgpt could never.

I am a raccoon biologist and one of the few people in the state allowed to take in captive bred raccoons that had been possessed illegally. The raccoon in the photos is Moonshine, but she is currently at the animal sanctuary where I work as I had been quarantining multiple new intakes from an abuse case. I still have two males (Rum Tum Tugger and Electra) left in my home enclosure as we are getting them neutered and then hopefully sending them to an AZA accredited zoo.

O-okay, let’s get into this, shall we?

*grumbling* Would you rather work for Lex Luthor or the Joker- *shouting* Lex Luthor, by like, a fucking mile!

Yes, yes, working for Lex Luthor is basically like being an Amazon employee that makes weapons of mass destruction, which is bad. Lex is like Donald Trump mixed with Mark Zuckerberg mixed with Jeffrey fucking Bezos, it’s not a great mix. He does not treat his henchmen well. Their lives still suck, and they are probably monitored on how long they take piss breaks for.

But let’s analyze what working for Lex Luthor is like versus the fucking Joker. With Lex you probably get a dental plan, a health plan, a paycheck, and the guy that you’re fighting really cares about human life. Superman will hit you just long enough to knock you out, so you’re not a treat, so he can stop the problem.

If you work for the Joker, your payment is you’re not fucking dead. You say one wrong thing? Bang. You don’t laugh at his jokes? Bang! You do laugh at his jokes? Bang! You think Joker gives a fuck about a henchman?

Who’s Lex Luthor’s right-hand-man? It’s a woman, you sexist, her name is Mercy, she’s awesome. Who’s Joker’s right-hand-man? Bob? Nah, he’s dead. Harley? Tried to kill her multiple times. Slappy? Who the fuck is Slappy?

The best case scenario of working for the Joker is that you fight the fucking Batman! And that presents its own fucking list of problems. If you stop Superman as a Lex Luthor henchman, Lex’ll be pissed, but he’ll be at least happy that Superman was caught. If you stop Batman as a Joker henchman, you better have a fucking coffin picked out yesterday.

This isn’t a fun hypothetical question, this is a screening technique that the doctors at Arkham use to determine your mental health! There is a right and a wrong answer to this question, and the correct one is Lex fucking Luthor. Thank you for coming to my fucking Ted Talk, have a nice day.

The sharpest, best-trained pilots make worse decisions when they're tired or sick or stressed out, so there's two of them. The most dedicated and experienced air traffic controllers garble an instruction over the radio sometimes, so pilots are trained to always repeat clearances back to catch misunderstandings quickly. The best and brightest maintenance mechanic still overlooks a screw or misconnects a wire once or twice in her career, so aircraft systems are built with two or three or four layers of redundancy, and pilots are exhaustively trained to deal with failures safely. 

if you cook a penguin egg, the egg white just kind of. stays transparent.

Tumblr en concreto es muy anglocentrista y un gran número de los usuarios no habla más que inglés. Si quieres que tus cosas lleguen a gente con gustos u opiniones similares, escribirlo en inglés asegura que la gente por lo menos lo pueda leer. Suma a esto el hecho de que bastantes series y tal son originalmente de habla inglesa (y a veces ni se traducen a tu lengua madre), lo que crea un fandom principalmente angloparlante.

Más allá de eso, también hay que tener en cuenta las diferencias culturales que surgen entre fandoms de distintos idiomas. Por ejemplo, durante mucho tiempo el fandom de Vocaloid angloparlante y el hispanohablante han chocado con respecto a temas como la piratería. En ocasiones es complicado manejar estas expectativas, y si sabes varios idiomas, peor incluso.

A mí me gustaría subir cositas en español y encontrar a gente que comparta mis gustos, pero en Tumblr en concreto es casi imposible. Tumblr ya es de por sí mucho más «nicho» en espacios hispanohablantes que otras RRSS como TikTok o Instagram, y si tus intereses no son muy populares, despídete.

La lingüística de los espacios de fans también está hipercentrada en el inglés. No es una pareja, es un ship; no es un universo alternativo, es un AU; no es destripar, es hacer spoiler, etc. Incluso las siglas: en español es LGTB, pero lo que sueles ver es LGBT. Parece una tontería, pero esta disonancia cognitiva hace que resulte muchísimo más complicado hablar en tu propio idioma en un fandom. Por no hablar de las innumerables referencias a posts o a memes... en inglés todo, por supuesto. Como te atrevas a hacer cualquier referencia cultural no inglesa, no te entiende nadie. Pierde la gracia.