Chalk Revelations

So. Imagine dozens of other teenage girls, being held against their will and brainwashed in Utah, seeing these billboards and going, "huh. I'm having a complicated emotional reaction to all of this. It's possible that I might unpack that in two to three decades."

Both of these situations arise from the same societal attitudes. This guy wanted a teenage girl to be trapped with him and unable to leave, regardless of her feelings on the matter, and for her to act a certain way and comply with his desires. He took her from her home and forced her to be somewhere she did not want to be and would not let her go, and he tried to turn her into a different thing. The difference in societal reactions to when one specific, unauthorized guy does this, compared to when someone's parents pay a fancy sounding institution to do it for them, tells you a lot about how we think about the autonomy of teenage girls.

In Utah, the reason these types of institutions are allowed is because their youth rights laws are abysmal even compared to the rest of the US. Children aren't people, they're the property of their parents. Elizabeth Smart's parents didn't want her to be kidnapped, so it was bad. Our parents did want us to be kidnapped, so it was fine.

tl;dr Amanda Nelson of Amanda's Mild Takes (substack link) has made a spreadsheet of one action you can take every day from Monday, 3 August until midterm election day, 3 November. if you'd like a list of concrete actions to take to help get cheeto guy's enabling cronies and shills out of office, here it is.

(people whining about electoralism and doom-replying about how nothing will change and bitching about "bOtH pArTiEs aRe tHe sAmE" will be summarily blocked and also sent to hell. do something or shut up and get the fuck off my post.)

I have just found out that one of my favourite Ukrainian comedians was killed by russians.

And in the very same breath — five or so fandom people, my friends included, reposting and promoting a russian artist on Instagram.

Ukrainian artists die every day. It's not really a joke, it is true. Ukrainian lives are cut short every single day just because they're Ukrainian.

And for all I know, one day I might be amongst them. It's a scary thought, one that I usually don't voice and chase away from myself as much as I can. But it's true. One day I, a Ukrainian artist, as mid and inexperienced as I may be, with all my dreams and hopes and ambitions, might cease to exist for the sole reason of me being Ukrainian. Some of us already have.

And the world will move on. No, not just move on — it will continue promoting russian narratives, russian artists, it will watch and praise russian sports, movies and content about russia and russians.

Because it's not political, is it? Because people would rather find a thousand reasons to blame Ukrainians than one reason to boycott russian content. The reason being the genocide of Ukrainians and the collective responsibility over said genocide.

I can't help but think, if I died from a russian attack during the Easter vacation, all those people who smile at me, reblog my art, respond to my comments, would they stop to think that the russians are at fault? From the smallest artist to the politician to the member of the russian army — the people who have built and supported the society where genocide has become an acceptable thing?

I don't think so.

I think it would, like many Ukrainian deaths, exist in a hypothetical vacuum.

Oh, how sad. What a tragedy.

I won't quote this bullshit fully. Of course, they also assumed I understood russian, which I unfortunately do, but that's very telling. Instantly blocked, but I wanted to talk about something here, for those that aren't hopeless and are willing to listen.

What's also telling is the fact that they said "someone died". Not even the impersonal "someone got killed".

"Someone died."

Yeah, because Ukrainians dropping dead all of a sudden has become the norm and russia is definitely not murdering thousands of people in my country.

No, someone did not "die". Your shitty-ass country killed him and many other talented Ukrainians, because you don't believe we have a right to exist as our own, separate, sovereign nation.

Using the US crimes as justification does not make yours in any way justifiable.

There's only one thing I agree with in that comment. We should've done something about the russian culture long before the current russian genocide of Ukrainians.

Probably the moment it suddenly became "great". Because no culture is "great", in a sense of greater than the others, but russian is.

Here is just one example of what russians do to Ukrainian artists.

This Ukrainian artist on Instagram had their house destroyed by russians very recently. Fortunately, they've received support from many Ukrainians and their friends abroad. Unfortunately, many people in such situations don't.

russia has murdered, harmed and tortured so many Ukrainian artists, athletes, writers, teachers, doctors, scientists; it has destroyed Ukrainian printing houses, galleries, museums, churches, hospitals and fucking playing yards; they've stolen art from us, diminishing and ruining the lives of my people for generations. Tell me, why shouldn't we boycott russian culture in order to finally, finally hear the noises of the cultures they've been destroying for centuries?

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