@artsy-auror

i want someone to tell kim seon ho that reddit has started referring to him as ‘kim swoon ho’ like i just need him to know

omg

This has been in my queue for months.

I missed it last year and I vowed that would NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN.

YES

omg i didnt reblog this last year!

I love posts like this that require like six levels of meta understanding to comprehend them.

this is so funny because the original meme (of the last repost) is about “blood orange”

take a step back. breathe. you can handle this. take a minute to compose yourself; rest and regroup. you have grit, you can make it through this.

Do any other american high schoolers have intense survivor’s guilt and trauma with school shootings even though they weren’t at your school?

Like. A laser tag place opened geared towards teenagers and it got no business, we tried to enjoy it but when someone pointed a laser machine gun at me and I instinctively dropped behind the nearest wall and reached to turn off my phone I cried, I wasn’t the only one. The announcements system turns on at an unexpected time and everyone holds their breath until they say something besides “locks, lights, out of sight,” nobody even jokingly pops chip bags anymore, a door slammed really loud during a class change and everyone dropped and ran. Everyone cries during drills, even the toughest ranch kids. Every drill comes with a full day of teachers crying and telling us that they love us all so much and will die for us, and every kid in every class looking around wondering who would I die for? Who would die for me? You walk to the bathroom and wonder every second if it happens right now, where will I go? You test supply closet doors to see which ones are unlocked, you memorize which furniture in the teachers’ lounge your English teacher says is light enough to barricade a door with. The fire alarm goes off and nobody moves, instead you wait for gunshots—it a trap? You stand with a group of freshmen and realize that you’re the oldest, you know you’ll have to die for them. You forget your ID tag and worry that now the police won’t be able to tell your parents if you’re safe, or not safe. Your stats teacher has a baseball bat by the door, your math teacher keeps a stapler under each desk to throw, your drama teacher asks who will be willing to stand by the non-locking door with the Shakespearean swords. Your yearbook teacher tells you don’t worry about breaking a camera because you heard about the kids who died holding them. You don’t use the bathroom during classes because you don’t want to be the only target to shoot at. You keep your phone on silent 24/7 because you worry the one time you forget will be when you get your whole US History class killed. You have a snap saved with your class schedule and school and full name to send in an instant to your internet friends so they know if you were on that wing, you have a note saved with the things you want your mom to know and the things you’re sorry for. At the age of 12 I was told I needed to know who I would die for and that it was okay if it was nobody, that was my decision to make. School shootings control us more than adults and non-Americans could possibly imagine and nobody moves to change anything unless we’re actively screaming for it. Have you considered we’re too scared?

This my friends, is why America is a dystopia. And I live in it. I’m a college student and we have alarm tests. They warn us beforehand but it’s still freaky because you wonder: “What if this goes off for real? Where will I be? What building? Fucking outside?” The fear continues past high school.

I haven’t been at a school that runs these kinds of drills, but I find myself running them in my head anyway. In classrooms, I’m always assessing where a shooter could come from/where I could hide. I get pretty anxious if my back is turned to a door or window, especially an open one. Any crowds out loud noises on campus have me panicking before I’ve processed them.

It doesn’t end after high school. That’s so true. I’m in college and we don’t do these drills. We don’t live in an especially high risk area. We’re surrounded by farms and hippies and ocean. But the second there was a school-wide alert about a possible gunman on campus, it turned into every nightmare we’ve ever had since we were IN high school. Lights out, doors closed, window curtains drawn. People were texting family and friends. Several people had police radio apps. Others got out the rubber door stops we keep in our bags. Three people took off their belts to help tie down the hydraulic door lock. We don’t do those drills here - but we all knew what to do. We all had experience from our high schools, from our friends, from the news. We tried to keep on with the lesson, but we were too busy looking around the room, trying to figure out who we’d protect. We were choosing how we die right up until they confirmed it was a false alarm. 

My school had an actual threat and i remember all the freshmen/sophomores in my art class (I was the only junior) hurriedly hiding under our desks to make sure they couldnt see us from the door or from the windows. I remember watching people text their friends and family with tears in their eyes. I remember doing the same, and wondering if I’d leave school that day, and if i did would it be with dead friends. I remember hearing a door slam near my classroom and resigning myself to the fact that that was where i was going to die. Even after it was all clear (no one had died. the shooters were apprehended before they even got into the schools. two schools were threatened. both girls were expelled and couldnt be admitted back to either of the schools without appeal. i dont know what happened to them) i remember crying with my friends and no longer feeling safe at school. And i think about all the kids at all the schools that werent as lucky as mine, and my heart aches. because I know the fear, but i don’t know the pain of losing friends/classmates/teachers, and hopefully i never will. This fear and this pain is unique to this generation of children, and it shouldn’t be. It shouldn’t exist, and the government doesnt care because ‘wah wah money’. and im sick of it. im sick of being terrified for myself, for my little sister who’s school is just down the road from mine but still too far away for me to get to her in time, and for all my friends, and peers across the country. im sick of adults telling me my fear is irrational when they’ve never had to live through it. im so sick of it, and it needs to change. im going to help make it change.