A Last-Ditch Effort

grace one(1) earth day later, immediately risking his life again:

Rocky: Why has Grace's face changed? Why does Grace's face have a bump? CANCER????

Grace: oh thats acne Rocky. It happens when hormones go funny or if diet changes a bunch, and Ive recently gotten my hands on chocolate again. Synthesised but chocolate nonetheless.

Rocky: How? Skin is shield for humans.

Grace: how do I get it? Uh well, the skin is made up of these tiny tiny holes called pores-

Rocky *who is about ready to jump out of his carapace*: MANY HOLES?!?!?!!? IN YOUR SKIN?!?!?

Grace: jeez rocky chill, theyre super tiny and we have a lot of them and sometimes our natural skin oils can block them or make-up. But they wont kill me

Rocky: WHY DIDNT YOU TELL ME THIS SOONER HOLES IN YOUR PRIMARY DEFENCE?!!?!?!?

Grace: Well I thought I had told you to be fair.

Rocky: Im gonna have an aneurysm. Stupid human memory, Grace forgot he hadnt told me. *skittering away*

Grace: YOY CANT EVEN GET ANEURYSMS ROCKY!!!!

do you think some human conditions horrify the Eridians when humans get older.

As a species that cannot forget, dementia must be a horrifying to witness as a concept.

If grace develops it in his old age, not only does he forget Rocky and when or where he is, his mind also regresses; old in body, but younger in mind...

Remember the sixpencee child slave thing? What happened there, exactly? Was the kid freed? No? They were just run off the website? OK so what good exactly did that do?

Remember the bone stealing witch? What exactly did that witchhunt accomplish? The person got arrested, oh that's great, the american justice system surely rectified the situation

And again, those are instances where the accusations were true and involved real substantive harm to another person. We used to joke on here how callout posts were shit like "receipts below: [several paragraphs of petty fandom drama] [three paragraphs of petty interpersonal drama involving cheating on partners or stealing food out of the fridge or something] [fabricated evidence that the person is responsible for the murder of JonBenét Ramsey]"

And that was back in the 2010s. The meta has changed. Callouts used to be a tool people used to point out actual harm a person had done, rarely, and more commonly were used as a means of bullying somebody over petty drama. Nowadays they're used to manufacture outrage and harassment against marginalized populations. They are a weapon bigots use to turn us against each other. A few manufactured accusations here, some out of context or clipped screenshots there, and people who should be standing in solidarity with each other against white supremacy, patriarchy, cisheteronormativity, are instead devouring each other.

It's sinister as shit, dude, and people will still share these accusations without a second thought. So, why? What is the point? What's the best case scenario here? Raising "awareness?" what the fuck is that supposed to accomplish? Will we get the oh-so-trustworthy authorities involved? Are we hoping for an arrest? A conviction? Throwing a queer or poc person in prison so they can be abused and assaulted and humiliated behind bars? Is that who we are?

Callouts and the like don't serve any real good in the world. At a macro scale they divide us when we should be standing together, and at a micro scale they result in deeply traumatic never-ending harassment and threats and doxxing and worse to a person who almost definitely does not deserve it. And again, for what? A sense of "justice?" this is not justice. This is retribution. It is punishment.