I Tried To Be The Good Guy

Ways to support Ukraine 🇺🇦

More than 500,000 people have already left Ukraine due to the invasion by the Russian Federation. The European Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management estimates that roughly 18 million Ukrainians will be affected by the conflict in humanitarian terms, with 7 million internally displaced and 4 million seeking refuge elsewhere. To help those still in Ukraine, as well as Ukrainian refugees, we’ve compiled this list of resources.

HelpUkraineWin.org has a collection of vetted and trusted resources, charities, and organizations to help Ukraine.

Some additional ways to donate:

Vostok SOS provides immediate evacuation support.

Malteser International provides essentials for Ukrainian refugees.

Ukraine Crisis Media Center provides fundraising links and a list of tips for sharing information.

Misinformation spreads fast on social media. It is more important than ever to share accurate, verifiable news and information. Here are some resources to learn how to identify misinformation:

This link from the nonprofit WITNESS shares tips for identifying authentic video sources (available in English, Spanish, Ukranian, Russian, and Arabic).

These visual verification tips, also from WITNESS, provide information on verifying images and videos (available in English and Spanish).

NANCY DREW PARALLELS

I grew up in a family that ate a lot of rice, but the thing I think about most when dealing with rice is the episode of Horatio Hornblower where the ship explodes because it has a ton of raw rice on it and that rice gets wet. I'm super paranoid about putting raw rice down the drain because of a 23-year-old episode of a show I probably saw when I was no older than 10.

Your character can associate eating the soup they're eating with dinners with their grandmother, or they can associate it with that one time when they were twelve and they almost choked on a chicken bone in the soup their sister helped their grandmother make, but they didn't tell anyone because they didn't want to make their sister feel bad.

Your character can remember learning to wear makeup as a teenager, or they can remember that one time when they were getting ready to go on a date with their first boyfriend and they wanted to look kissable so they wore their mother's very red lipstick, and then when they and their boyfriend kissed for the first time he got lipstick all over his face and they couldn't stop laughing.

Best of Platanchors

Why have we allowed and contributed to the framing of vaccines as an individual choice instead of collective action, interdependence and solidarity with disabled people (especially those who are high risk), elders, children who cannot get vaccinated, the global south, essential workers and those who do not have the option to work from home? For those who are able to be vaccinated, getting vaccinated is not about personal choice. It is not like deciding to get an abortion; stop saying this. Not getting vaccinated is not “my body, my choice,” it is more like drunk driving or exposing someone to secondhand smoke.

Smut fics can help people affirm and accept their sexuality. It can help them explore their sexuality in a safe way. They can also just be fun, and having fun is a drastically undervalued way to improve your mental health.

Dark fics can help people face their fears or process their trauma. It can make them feel safer and more secure. It can help them find their courage.

Fluff fics can give people rest and respite and comfort. It can give them hope that soft places exist and that maybe there is one out there for them. It can bring up their mood, which, if they have depression, can be a life saver.

And every fic people write makes someone feel less alone.

Point being, just because a particular thing doesn’t serve you, doesn’t mean it lacks value.