killjoys make some noise

I get a lot of versions of this question, and I answer it seriously every time, because it’s both important and not important at all. Anyone who asks respectfully gets my whole ass answer.

It’s just not really about that. My job isn’t about defending the idea of hurting someone else. It’s about stopping the state from inflicting further hurt, torture, pain. It’s about pushing back for some fairness against a monumentally stacked system. And it’s about stuff that’s normal human stuff that counts as crime for some reason.

Yeah, it’s hard to do a sex abuse case. Sometimes the images stick around and it bothers me. But honestly? Mostly those cases have real plausible theories of innocence or they’re cases that I will lose because the evidence is there, and the question is not whether the perpetrator will go to jail but how long.

Those cases are so rare, though. I get so much pointless bullshit. Felony of a teen taking mom’s car without permission. Two kids that try to break into a car and get so scared by the alarm that they run away. Trespassing on dad’s house because his new girlfriend wants you to stop coming around. It’s just human stuff, and the violence of the state is not necessary or helpful.

I also reject the idea of punishment completely. The state has a responsibility to stop people from hurting other people again. But inflicting pain doesn’t do it, we know this by now. So I argue for mercy and for real solutions to real problems. I’m here to build a future, not get caught up with doing violence to someone because of the past.

So yeah, sometimes it’s hard, but mostly my conscience is dead clear: I’m not responsible for the crime. The damage has been done. I want to start the healing process, and I want it for everyone involved. When that’s not possible, I just want to tell the authorities they don’t get to just Do What They Want.

The more I do this job, the more I am a genuine pacifist who is against violence in all forms, and actually I don’t see a contradiction between that and what I do for a living. State violence is a pervasive evil that tears apart families, communities, and countries, and it’s far more damaging and awful than any individual crime. The average prosecutor has more blood on their hands than a serial killer, but it’s invisible: people who died in jail, who froze to death on the street, who were shot in a drug deal. Their violence begets violence.

When I get blood on my hands, it’s because I put my hands over the wounds and try to stop the flow. I’m okay with it.

a) i forgot how fun this is

b) it's really hard not to like, re-write for them and stick to just "hey add descriptions here, change this grammar, really cool ideas!" bc i'm an adult and not trying to talk over/railroad these kids, but i'm just so excited for their ideas!!!

c) little boys write cool stuff like "what if we went to mars but it sucked so we left, but left behind all our technology and the technology rose up and created its own society and then went to war with us for abandoning them? what if transformers had 100x the war crimes? what if the earth blew up. what if we were the robots all along?"

teacher: little girls have really rich inner lives to combat the way they're puppeted by society in real life. they'll learn to censor it out in a couple years, but it doesn't go away.

About 25 years ago, Tom Harrington was a CBC sports reporter and host of the Sports Journal magazine show. He was researching a story about an NHL player who was gay while working with a go-between who ran a support group in Toronto that helped professional and amateur athletes who were gay. Harrington was told there was a “prominent” NHL player who had been thinking about coming out. During the next year-and-a-half, Harrington said he worked with his go-between trying to convince the NHL player to do an interview, but the player was “extremely reluctant and afraid he’d be exposed.” Harrington tried to arrange a phone interview or a meeting with the player, who asked if his voice could be disguised in a phone call in case Harrington recognized him. Harrington promised the go-between he would never reveal the player’s identity unless he permitted it. “It was a step closer to the beginning of something, but it was also a window into just how terrified he was, and it said a lot about the culture at the time in professional male sports, where players didn’t feel they could even take the initial step to come out, let alone reveal themselves,” Harrington said in a phone interview. Harrington said the player eventually decided not to come out, saying he was too scared of the impact it would have on his family, hockey career and his life after hockey. “I remember saying at the time (to the go-between): ‘You know, there are a lot of people who would be very supportive of him. There would be businesses lining up to sponsor him to have him as a spokesperson. I’m telling you, there’s an untapped market for someone like this … the Jackie Robinson of gays in sports.’ But, ultimately, it failed. “I never knew who the player was and to this day I still don’t know who it was,” added Harrington, who retired last year after almost 44 years at CBC.

like the first signs of a flare up from stress/over exertion used to be red face + fever + rash on my hands

but the lines of my tattoo will become raised and then a little itchy before it progresses to that point

and im discovering that, yeah, if i just listen to the wizard and rest/recuperate/stop pushing myself when it starts acting weird, i can sometimes avoid triggering the other symptoms

Rocky hums. “Close. Skip first note.”

“Why? You always include that.”

“This means… of Rocky, possessive. Of the speaker.”

“My.”

“Correct. But only for names.”

“So you’re calling me…?”

Rocky repeats the word: “My Grace. Yes.” 

1: Stratt looking out of a window having Grace tranquilised + "affirmations: you are not real, you don't have feelings, you don't want anything, this will be over soon"

2: Stratt watching Grace run away + "fuuuuck my pet peve got loose"

3: Stratt after telling Grace he has to be replacement science officer + "*bottles up emotions* this coping shits easy*"

4: The two of them looking at eachother + "matching best friends t-shirts that say 'the wound they will carry for the rest of their life ➡️' and the other. just says '⬅️best friend'." The 1st points from Stratt, and the second from Grace.

5: Stratt in Grace's classroom + "you've heard of the man, the myth, the legend. Now get ready for the woman, the omen, the potent"