so. about that weather

"What do you call a bad miracle?"

I've spent a lot of money on moving around, trying to be there for my family and I'm out of everything. I don't even know if I can fucking pay rent, so. If any of you have read this long I guess, thank you? And if you wouldn't mind sharing? Because I'm at my wit's end.

If you'd like to help, I'd really appreciate it.

P*ypal: [email protected]

Rent:

The United Nations recognises it as a form of torture.

It increases suicide risk by 191 times.

It increases the risk of dying from heart disease and stroke by 3.5 times (no shit on that one, forcing extremely high doses of heavy drugs on someone without even titrating it does that)

45% of patients in psych wards have experienced sexual violence during an admission.

The UN Humans Rights Council report which includes discussions of how stripping the rights of people to accept or decline care erodes their dignity and personhood. Section V: Recommendations subsection 2 explicitly advocates for an end to involuntary hospitalization. This report also cites lots of other relevant data and is worth reading.

“Danger to Self and Others” a study that showed that in “compliers” (ie: people who are edge cases and are committed by some physicians but would not have been by others) rates of suicide and violent crime within three months of involuntary hospitalization rose significantly.

A comparative study that assesses a lot of other studies’ conclusions about the harm of involuntary holds compared to voluntary holds. This one is dense but worth it to understand that this isn’t an issue of data collection, the harm is visible in the aggregate

2023 study that found 45% of patients report being sexually assaulted in the psych ward. This study also notes that the numbers could be more, due to patient fears of reporting.

Here’s an article I personally find fascinating on the odd legality of psych holds in the US (do the cops have the right to seize your stuff if they think you’re a danger? Why the fuck are cops being allowed to make these assessments? How the fuck is this legal? Should it be legal?)

Having a loved one going through a mental health crisis is a horrible feeling. And it can feel right to try to send them to a “professional” or call in a wellness check when you can’t handle it or can’t get to them physically. But it really can’t be overstated: involuntary psych holds are proven to harm those who are struggling far more than they are proven to help.

That’s often true, that it takes a lot of outside perspective to be able to reflect on privileges you have. However, that’s kinda also the thing, someone from the outside perspective should be able to actually point out concrete privileges which come about as a result of whatever that identity is that brings about privilege.

And when I ask, never once have I seen anyone manage to point out supposed transmasculine privilege which is actually an observed privilege I have. They’ll give abstracts from feminist works like, “your male sounding name will give you preferential treatment in early hiring stages,” which is a privilege people AMAB and who happen to continue to identify as men will receive from their parents, and not something that is an inherent privilege of being transmasculine. There’s a lot of legal hoops to jump through for most transmasculine individuals to have a male sounding name, it’s something he has to think deeply about and fight for. That’s not what privilege looks like.

Or, “cis men will treat you as one of the boys club and invite misogyny from you as bonding,” which is a privilege that not even all AMAB people who identify as men receive, just ask effeminate cis gay men. The odds of a trans man being accepted if it’s known he’s trans is low because of the transphobia and already rigid standards of what makes a real and good man. If a trans man is closeted, the situation in which he is surrounded by a bunch of cis men and is being invited to partake in misogyny is often one where the trans man is also fearing for his own safety in a way a cis man never would in that situation. That’s not what privilege looks like.

This is true in the sense 90% of people attempting it have absolutely no business doing it, and end up acting in a way more consistent with the logic of the abuser than anything actually helpful.

Most people's instinctive knee jerk reactions to these situations actually just make shit worse. And people don't take the potential damage seriously enough when encouraging each other to take on this role.

Acting like you know someone's identity better than they do, their words can't be trusted, and they can't make their own decisions because they're doing it wrong - This is operating from the logic of the abuser. I don't care if you think you're right. If you think you've seen the same situation a million times. If you think you do know better and they would be happier listening to you. You are not helping, this is not how effectively helping people works.

You ALWAYS have to keep this in mind and make a concerted effort to act in ways consistent with logic that oposes abuse. This means: 1. Remembering and reinforcing autonomy 2. genuinely listening in an open, curious, compassionate manner 3. Treating them as someone who deserves to make their own decisions, and can be trusted to choose what's best, because they are the expert in their individual circumstances.

> ask the people if it's objects or gambling

> they don't understand

> pull out illustrated diagram explaining what is objects and what is gambling

> they laugh and say "it's a good collectible sir"

> look up how to buy a collectible

Labubus are blind bags but they're also blind bags with some of the most insane dark patterns stacked on top. The online store for them has a thing where they tell you what you got the second you order it online so that you can immediately try again if you didn't get the thing you wanted.

The last one (acquired sometime in 2012) finally died, so it was time for a replacement. The new model 105 is the cheapest one they make but by golly it's an upgrade in every conceivable way.

However.

The startup/unpacking procedure has changed. Where, before, you just charged the thing for 8 hours then turned it on... now you gotta configure it:

download the app

create an account & login

connect Roomba to the app/internet

use the app to configure Roomba

use the app to designate "forbidden" areas

use the app to schedule Roomba's start/stop times

Etcetera. Upon unboxing it I was >this< close to returning it, because nowhere was it stated on the web store that the app was REQUIRED to utilize the small floor cleaning robot.

But then I had an idea.

I set New Roomba down and pressed the Power button, without installing any apps or connecting it to wifi. And you know what?

IT STARTED CLEANING

It bumbled around the house mapping everything itself and did a marvelous job, without my having to do any of the recommended crap in the Quick Startup instructions. And without configuring its wifi there's no way it's sending data to iRobot's servers. Yayy.

I have installed exactly none of these apps, and have connected exactly zero of these appliances to the wifi.

They all work fine.

Like seriously 99% of my dishwasher cycles are "auto" and the remaining 1% are "express", neither of which I need an app for. Allegedly the app can tell me when the dishwasher needs more rinse aid but so does the little red light on the display. Which is handier than the app because the rinse aid lives in the cabinet next to the dishwasher and so when I see the little light I fill the rinse aid and am done, instead of an alert on my phone stressing me out everywhere and impinging on my brain.

The washer? 95% of what I was is cold water on the colors cycle. The rest is towels in hot water or delicates in cold water. Sometimes I get fancy and delay the towels an hour so it's not competing with the dishwasher or the shower for hot water. None of that needs the app. Allegedly the app can tell me when the washer is done but so can a timer I set to the wash time handily displayed when I start the washer, and that doesn't send any data to the manufacturer.

Honestly I don't even know what the stove app does because I can do fancy things like "turn the oven on in 3 hours" without it.

Yes, it is incredibly shitty that these all have apps now and that some features are app-only and that we are all pushed to give up more and more of our control and privacy in order to feed the gaping maw of corporate "profit". HOWEVER. Sometimes you can still just not.

We don’t have any of the large predators we used to (black bears, mountain lions, or gray wolves) but still retain large deer populations. If nothing is removing animals, they’ll quickly overload the carrying capacity of the environment and have massive losses to starvation and disease that can also pass on to livestock. Human hunters replace the large predators that our landscape can no longer support.

It’s kinder to euthanize an un-releasable hawk rather than try to find it a permanent home with humans. Wildlife rehabs have extremely limited space and resources and are usually run entirely on donated money and volunteer time. Only a few are large and stable enough to care for permanent residents long-term, and those spots are few and far between.

An invasive species poses a danger to threatened native wildlife. I will admit- Australian possums are adorable. But not in New Zealand, where they’re an invasive species that eats the eggs of ground-dwelling birds that previously had no such predators. The landowners I worked with replanting native bush, all native Maori, had no qualms about setting the dogs on them.