The largest dam removal in U.S. history. So successful that the salmon that haven’t run freely in the river for literally over a century came back the next year. Not steady progress over a decade as expected, the very next salmon run they came home. No one alive saw salmon in that river outside the hatcheries kept by native’s tribes and the Department of Fish And Wildlife scientists desperately trying to save them. One of the activists who helped bring the suit spoke of their dying grandmother making them promise to bring the fish home, and they didn’t know how that was possible, but they spent decades doing it.

The legal basis for successfully suing the power company who owned the dams was Indigenous treaty rights to eat the fish. Eating the fish was the one thing in a century that succeeded in being a clear and legally binding right that superseded the desires of white capital and industry. I have been going to the public interest environmental law conference off and on for 20 years where a lot of organizing for Undam The Klamath happened. I’ve heard updates about every legal tact they tried as they happened, and they tried everything.

There are healthy, thriving salmon, trout, and lamprey in a rewilding and recovering Klamath River right now as a direct result of Indigenous people eating them. Of their legally binding right to eat them. They sure as fuck care more about those fish than any white vegan ever could. They are salmon people that the Creator sent Salmon to feed, while charging the People with protecting and stewarding them. It’s not possible to learn about salmon and trout in the Pacific Northwest without learning this, and it’s unambiguously racist to dismiss this symbiotic relationship.

The white vegans are trying to get all hunting and fishing banned in Oregon, and that’s quite possibly the single most catastrophic thing that could be done to the animals here because we killed off all the major predators of creatures like deer and without anything hunting them their numbers will explode, eat all the vegetation, destroy the ecosystem, and then die along with everything else in that failing ecosystem. Controlled hunting of deer is vitally necessary for the deer to survive. This is something Native people know, but patronizing racist savior-complex white people refuse to listen to.

I have a whole collection of Oregon’s Public Broadcasting’s documentaries about Klamath River or the larger story of fish and people in the region. If you watch nothing else, watch Klamath Dams Are Coming Out, First Salmon Ceremony, After The Dams, and First Decent (Native made). It could not be clearer that the salmon are being protected and nourished by the people who eat them, and that stewardship is a massive part of their creation myths. But it contradicts political vegan dogma so they don’t listen.

MY LORD?? there is no way I can follow you there!

Made this post about 15 minutes after the repair guy who fixed the pump on my dishwasher packed up his tools and left, as the dishwasher was whirring along doing my dishes from that morning.

As a former music teacher, I can also say that "learn the fundamentals first" is the death knell for a vast percentage of beginners, especially adult learners.

I've run into this with drawing several times, where some well-meaning artist has lectured me on needing to study anatomy properly or not use shortcuts like CSP brushes. And oh, believe me, I know. I know exactly how to learn an artistic discipline in a structured way. I just...don't want to!

The thing is, I'm not aiming to be a professional artist. I want to draw my gay little anime guys. I would undoubtedly improve at art much faster if I approached every gay little anime guy drawing as a study exercise. But I would also have quit drawing a decade ago if I couldn't just let myself enjoy drawing imperfect fucked-up little guys with whatever shortcuts I needed to body myself across the finish line.

With my adult piano students, my approach was always "What's your goal?" If their goal was to learn exactly one Elton John songbook to play at parties, then...that's what we did. We'd put tape on the keys to label the notes, and just fuckin go for it. Learning exactly one Elton John songbook is a good and noble musical goal, full stop.

Some of my students needed and enjoyed a more structured approach to learning; if they wanted to be able to play classical music, then yes, scales were going to have to enter the equation at some point. And yet others would learn the Elton John songbook, catch their white whale, and realize they wanted to explore more of the ocean. The scales were still there for them to learn!

Often the choice isn't between "learn art well" and "learn art imperfectly" - the choice is between "learn art imperfectly" and "don't do art at all." To which I say, learn imperfectly! Or, what the hell, don't 'learn' art. Just do, and enjoy the doing of it.

Sometimes when an action makes NO sense to us ("he's like a stupid alien"), it's bc we are not understanding its true motivation/purpouse. If his goal was control, financial pressure and limiting her options due to lack of funds, it makes perfect sensie to buy the truck.

Therefore, here is an alternative explanation based entirely on his impulsive feelings:

She's getting near the end of her degree, she's going to be making a lot more than him when she finishes. This makes him angry and jealous. The closer she gets to finishing, the stronger his anger and jealousy gets.

Well, if she's gonna be making so much more than me, the least she can do is pay for my truck. And maybe if she had to pay for this truck she wouldn't even be able to finish school. Then I'd still be man of the house. That would really show her whose boss. Now I feel more in control and less jealous.

"Honey, I bought a truck."

I think we often talk about abusers like we talk about evolution. We say polar bears evolved to have white coats for camouflage. We talk about evolution like it has a plan and is doing things on purpose. But evolution doesn't care about camouflage. Birth rates are all that matter, but evolution doesn't even "care" about them.

I think the majority of abusers don't actually plan things out. They just act impulsively on malicious feelings. It makes them feel good to have lots of power, so they take whatever power they can find. It makes them feel good to make their victims uncomfortable so they do that.

Most abuse tactics can be explained (and should be defended against) as if they are strategic. Just like evolution, it's just easier to talk about that way. But I think most abuser tactics are really just the consequence of impulsively acting on malicious feelings.

Strategy is big picture. It’s about asking “what do I even really want here?” You say you want to Win. What does Winning mean? What does Winning look like?

In an argumentative context, Strategy is about the frame around the picture, so to speak. Are you approaching the conversation as a confrontation or a confession or a Conversion?

Tactics are about individual goals. In wargaming, Tactics are things like pincer attacks and flanking maneuvers; things like armor penetrating ammo and anti-cavalry fortifications.

In an argumentative context, Tactics are things like making an attack ad hominem, or shifting the goalposts, or turning the tables.

Abusers tend to be excellent Tacticians but terrible Strategists. They often do not even recognize good/healthy relationships as such. Their Strategy is a mess. They would not recognize victory if they stood in the midst of it.

But. They are very good at not losing. They are very good at making sure that the other person doesn’t win.

A good relationship is win-win; both parties benefit mutualistically from the symbiosis.

Apparently you can do a saliva test kit at home:

this image? we have every reason to think it is a cucumber, like it was made in clay models in burials period, it's painted green, it's on the small side of things (9.6 cm or 3 3/4 inch)

oh right and it was placed on a model offering table with small model bread and drinking cup