I don't know who needs to hear this but you need to stop dehumanising people even if those people are "abusers" or "creeps" because you need to understand that you are not immune to doing something equally as bad
Abusers and creeps are not some species of especially heinous animal or alien or monster wearing the face of a human. They're people. And you NEED to drill it into your head that they are people because you NEED to remember that people are capable of doingn heinous shit. And you are a person. And your loved ones are people.
By emotionally classifying people who have done heinous things as subhuman filth incapable of thinking and feeling and acting just like you and me, and by using that emotional dehumanization as a reason to deny those people any compassion or support on a systemic level, you risk becoming blind to abuse/violence perpetrated by someone close to you or even yourself. Because if "abusers don't deserve rights", then you won't ever want to admit or accept that you or a loved one is perpetrating abuse, and that makes stopping the abuse or preventing further abuse much harder. This is how you end up excuaing abusive behaviour on the grounds that, since you don't see someone as a disgusting subhuman pile of garbage therefore they can't possibly be An Abuser, Trademark
And here'a the even harder pill to swallow: since the world isn't split into "abusers" and "good people", in the same way you or someone you love can inflict abuse/violence on others, the people who HAVE inflicted abuse/violence on others can, in fact, change and become better people
There is no bottomless chasm of moral uncleanliness that someone can run off and fall into and get stuck in forever. People can do better. Yes, even those people. You HAVE to accept this. Otherwise not only is there no motivation for anyone to try and do better (which is when people become stuck in a cycle of violence and abuse they don't want to escape), but your idea of a perfect justice system doesn't look any different from Literal Christian Hell. And I HOPE you understand that Literal Christian Hell is, to put it very lightly, not a good justice system.
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The Trump administration is cynically exploiting calls for stricter AI regulation to pass broad censorship measures at the federal level.
So, in terrible news, Trump's trying to pull some strings to pass this massive internet censorship bill, featuring all the kinds of internet censorship we're terrified of, including mandatory ID for accessing basically any website, specifically to crush state regulation of AI, because apparently this man will always see the moral bottom of the barrel and start digging.
So, if you live in the US and hate censorship and AI you know what to do, contact your congresspeople and tell them do not fucking dare let this through or so help us god...
IMPORTANT UPDATE: The bastards just worked out a deal on the package, and they're going to try and ram it through the House in the next couple of weeks.
So, if you've been waiting to call, the time is NOW. Do it ASAP, be polite, be informed, but light up those phones like a Christmas tree!
Damien McCarthy really said FUCK nihilism and FUCK your reductive takes on fairytales; kindness isnât stupid, cruelty is stupid. The âtough decisionsâ men âhaveâ to make for the âgreater goodâ are dumb as hell if you stop and think about it. Keep an open mind, look out for each other, and carry a piece of chalk
I have resisted asking for help, outright, for a long time, but I think it's about that time.
My partner and I are Black US Americans who have left the United States and live as immigrants in LATAM. I work in healthcare in the US, remotely, supporting marginalized communities, especially Black and LGBTQIA+ folks. My husband used to work supporting the Headstart Program in the US as a sub-contractor, but lost his job in Feb 2025 due to the DOGE cuts. He hasn't been able to find another job since, partly due to the fact that most remote jobs are not global remote, partly because the job market is so oversaturated, and partly because, as immigrants with temporary residency, getting a work visa where we are is a complicated process.
SO! If you are aware of a fully remote position (Full or part time, or even a temporary contract) for an experienced IT Support, Instructional Design, and/or Customer Satisfaction Project Manager, I would love if you could reach out and let me know. (Mr Dragon, over my shoulder, says: "Resume available on request!") We both appreciate any leads, wherever those might be.
We are extremely lucky that my job is enough to pay most of our bills where we live, and do not take that for granted. We still have outstanding medical and credit card bills in the US, and my business is growing, but it's not enough to support us fully. We are not in the most dire of straits, but we could use a boost to help us stay on track and get things to a sustainable level.
If you have the capacity, I would appreciate any donations to my Kofi, and I'm very proud of Augmentations over on Patreon if you'd like to hop over there to read it and consider subscribing. And even if that's not something you're in the position to do, I appreciate you taking the time to read this!
âThe Advantages of Being Quietâ- The Policing of Black Emotions
ââŚamongst the minor nuisances of a West India town, are whistling and singing⌠Negroes are very fond of these execrable accomplishment- execrable as practiced by them; for as they have stentorian organs of noise⌠A negro never seems to be happy but when he is yelling and bawling, whistling or singing, and he cannot understand the advantages of quiet.â
-Five Years Residence in the West Indies, Volume II- Charles William Day
Have you heard these things before:
Everyone claims the Black Character is boring... But then suddenly, White Character that is both the fan favorite and canonically nothing like that, suddenly has some extremely familiar qualities...
There will be Black characters- often women- that are close to an MC, but those characters will be ignored for someone irrelevant who receives an entire plot line... Because somehow it wasnât possible for the Black character to fill that role despite doing so...
Black people are in a public place, and they are laughing. People are uncomfortable because theyâre âtoo loudâ⌠but have never once spoken up against loud white people, men in particular, taking up just as much space and sound.
A Black person says their perspective online, speaking from a place of emotion because they are directly affected⌠and no one listens or shares, worried that itâs âtoo aggressiveâ and will cause conflict. But a white person will share that same perspective, in ânice wordsâ or maybe even really obnoxiously, and suddenly that perspective is shareable, understandable⌠safe.
This really ought not to have been a lesson, that somehow our feelings are not⌠understandable or acceptable. In a way, it feels extremely demeaning, to have to explain something that is so innately connected with the human experience. Everything that Iâve talked about before is going to apply here, because the truth is, it doesnât matter how good the writing and characterization is if you arenât willing or capable of comprehending the characters due to your own pre-existing bias for Black people and our emotions. So if you havenât read my prior lessons, particularly the stereotype series⌠roll on back first.
"it's gonna be a long lesson?" Yes. It very much tis.
âThe Black character (person) just isnât relatable!â
People will often claim, with no sense of shame or forethought, that they donât ârelateâ to the Black characters âas muchâ, and they donât see that on the flip side of that, they do not offer grace or objective understanding for the Black characters âas muchâ. I shouldnât have to be the same type of person you are in order to understand you! To even want to understand you!
Not only will they not understand Black characters, but in a misguided effort to interact with Black characters, will project their own biases onto them: theyâll make the Black character something they are not in order to fit what they unconsciously believe Blackness should be. This happens with real Black people as well- the biases donât come from nowhere!
This includes but is not limited to emotions often associated with this antiblackness: anger, meanness, sneakiness, aggression, hypersexuality, arrogance.
Meanwhile, the emotions we are often really expressing are things we arenât supposed to be: sad, scared, hurt, offended, threatened, anxious, confused, confident, happy.
Very often, our emotions are perceived as âdangerousâ. How many times has a Black person dared to speak up against something and been accused of being a âbotâ, a âpsyopâ, of âpropagandaâ? As if, by having an unfamiliar perspective that conflicts with your comfortable status quo, they must not be someone real- their emotions, their pain, must not be real. It must be a ploy to affect the emotions of the real people that matter, because surely the Black people THEY imagine would not seek to disturb their peace with their realityâŚ
Itâs odd, believing the only Black people that are real, are the ones that serve you, and the ones that donât, arenât real or are threats. Itâs a form of antiblackness that has existed, at least in the US, since the abolition of slavery. A mindset that has been exported globally with the rest of the United Statesâ hegemony- so yes, it is a common mentality with nonblack people of color globally, to think that Black people are speaking âout of their placeâ.
âUppityâ
If youâve ever been in a public comment section of literally any Black creator being happy, confident, charismatic, self-respecting, proud of themselves, or even just minding their own business with a smile⌠Youâll find a range of people who make it a point to be vocally uncomfortable about it. From overt racism to covert yet equally if not more infuriating accusations of âbraggingâ and even ânarcissismâ. As if I need permission to be happy, that my happiness means someone else is lacking. As if the only way to be appropriate is to have humility for online strangers, despite my successes having nothing to do with your failures.
This is not me saying that arrogance doesnât happen! This is me saying that a lot of times, what yâall consider arrogance is not because it actually is arrogant, but because you are uncomfortable with our confidence, particularly when we donât weigh it against your societal approval but against our own.
Think about the quote I posted earlier. West Indian Black people whistling and singing while doing all the labor that white bodies donât wanna do, and Charles William Day has the audacity to say that their singing is âstentorianâ (too loud) and âexecrableâ (terrible). As if it is an inconvenience to him, to their society, to have to HEAR the Black people whose lives they have captured and enslaved for their own benefit!
An example of this is the âshut up and dribbleâ situation. During the height of Black Lives Matter, Black athletes were speaking out about injustices towards Black Americans, and this pissed off a LOT of people who expected them to⌠well, shut the fuck up and dribble. As if their only value was in entertaining audiences, but not to consider their humanity. Because youâre not supposed to be heard!
Another example of this is when Black people arenât sorry. This is one of my favorite and most commonly used tactics against racists and racism- and it always works. Iâve stopped apologizing for respecting myself, for pointing out when Iâve been mistreated and standing on that, for demanding that Iâm the one who deserves respect.
You would not believe how angry that makes a lot of people! If a Black person is not willing to be demeaned or is nonplussed, it throws off the equilibrium. Socially weâve taught Black people to lower their heads and be non-intimidating for the sake of maintaining order- not peace, order. But at this point, if youâre already intimidated or insulted due to my Blackness, then thereâs no point in lowering myself any further!
Consider Afromanâs two trials:
To be clear: Afroman is Black MAGA đ this is not to say he is a role model. HOWEVER! This court case showed that as much as he might want to dance for white conservatives, at the end of the day he is Still Black and Still Subject to what that means. Which means, he was supposed to bend the knee and submit here when the police raided his home. Instead, he was not sorry! They tried to LEGALLY- in a court of law- use the embarrassment and tears of the white woman cop who barged into his home illegally and threatened his and his childrenâs life. And it didnât work. Not only was he not sorry, but he mocked them- publicly! And won! Despite the on-stand display of white woman tears and white male insecurity⌠he still won! Thatâs not the norm, but it goes to show that hurt feelings do not equal violation of rights.
Itâs much harder to deal with when it comes to the professional world; unlike peopleâs bad takes online, not bending your head to microaggressions at work may cost you a job. Once again, itâs why racism is more than hurt feelings- as demeaned as I may feel, when I am in a room where Whiteness is the prevailing mindset, I cannot always risk respect over loss of livelihood.
As an extreme example of this: weâve discussed the Mammy and the Uncle Tom in prior lessons, so I wonât repeat myself with definitions. But the core part of why these archetypes were so palatable to white people as the standard of Good Blacks is because they were âselflessâ. They never questioned authority, they always placed the needs of others over their own, their role was to coddle and comfort Whiteness, to act as though being a slave was the most natural thing they could be to prioritize their owners. Consider what the alternative of not obeying a slave master/mistress was!
âIâve never seen this beforeâ Yes, you have. If you have never seen it called out, itâs because you havenât spent a lot of time around Black people that trust you. It reminds me of the time someone said âthat parents demand respect, but what they mean is authorityâ. The world expects to have authority over Black expression, and is appalled when we reject that.
âIsnât That a Stereotype?â
I admit, I am getting a bit exhausted of this question. Not even because I donât want to encourage curiosity or understanding- I am glad that weâre trying to avoid being racist! But it is tiring to realize that people believe stereotypes are âBlack people not behavingâ, essentially. Of Black people being âbadâ and people seeing it. As if antiblack stereotypes are because of Black people and not the racists that came up with them, as if that mindset is not equally as racist.
Black people shouldnât have to be âgoodâ for you to not treat them as inhuman. When I think of all that villainous and antagonistic white characters in media- why canât it be like that? Why is it that white people donât have to defend their entire race every time one of them is violent on screen? Especially when- being honest- people of color have a lot more reason to believe that that white violence is more likely in real life? Why do I have to explain why a Black person doing things on screen is not a reflection of ALL of us?
Anywho, I chose movies that were emotionally charged as low branch examples. All of our stories deserve to be told, but if you can only stomach the easy ones, of course youâll never realize just how much of the bad youâve internalized. Can you watch a movie with us (and UNDERSTAND it) in a nuanced light? The way you would expect your own story to be treated and understood?
Moonlight
Yâall want to know about how it might be for a closeted gay Black boy in the hood growing into a closeted young gay Black man, this is certainly an option. For taking us through the journey of a dark-skinned queer Black boy?? And how he grows big and strong but is still quiet and unsure, the way society acts like he cannot be?? Because heâs from the hood?? As if those experiences are mutually exclusive? Masterclass in writing and acting. Beautiful movie all around, all Black cast. It deserved film of the year.
Moonlight is a story that, for all intents and purposes, Tumblr should have loved. Angst, gay, bad parenting and seeking forgiveness, found family and mentorship, discovering sexuality while being in love with the straight best friend, compulsory heterosexuality, the homoeroticism of the trials of boyhood, vengeance on the childhood bully, reconciliation, touch starvation and yearning... Tumblr LOVES these concepts. So why is Moonlight not held as a top standard of this sort of storytelling? How many of you- at least if you're in the United States- have even watched it?
All the moments Little Chiron (pronounced SHY-roan) had with Juan and Teresa, the way he suffered deeply with his own drug-addicted, tormented mother and his peers, his confusion for his sexuality with Kevin. It warms my heart to see Chiron had SOMEBODY willing to show him kindness, in a world that felt like it had none for him. So often little Black children are abandoned to deal with their own emotions because God forbid they have any. It can fester into anger. But the moment he felt safe, he began to open up.
I loved to see how YES, his mentor Juan (Afro-Cuban!!!) is a drug dealer. However, that does not make him a stereotype- you see how he helps the community around him, how he was willing to pick a severely depressed and scared child from inside an abandoned drug den, feed him, and take him in, teach him how to swim, and began teaching him how to self-actualize. They even sat down and had an open, honest conversation about his sexuality when someone called Chiron a f****t. This was all in the first thirty minutes! The movie is two hours!
So⌠why doesnât Tumblr love and adore this movie? Why doesnât anyone see their queer experience in Chiron? Why doesnât anyone write endless meta? Why donât Chiron and Kevin have endless coffee AUs and fantasy worlds and canon fix-its (not that I would want any of that)? I can give you a hint, but Iâm sure you figured it out.
Precious
TW: incest, sexual assault, parental abuse, ableism
Hard watch. Monique truly portrayed the villain of the year. The novel, Push, was hard too. I didnât fully understand it as a middle schooler when I read it, but walking in as an adult, I realized quickly it was going to be HARD. Anybody who has had traumatic experience with incest or sexual abuse, this movie probably isnât for you.
Precious is from the perspective of Claireece, a dark-skinned, fat Black teenager who struggles with writing, spelling, multiple forms of abuse and PTSD, trying to better her life despite the odds. You want to know how to write this kind of story without being stereotypical? Because hereâs the thing- a lot of people within the story at the beginning treat Precious like a stereotype, like a statistic. But Precious herself is the voice of her diary! You understand how her reality and mentality is warped due to the life sheâs lived! She is the victim! Hers is the voice that is centered! She is not the statistic that they belittle her to be- sheâs human!
Within the first ten minutes of the movie, the principal threatens to suspend Claireece for being pregnant with her second child at 16. âIs there something going on at homeâ- there is OBVIOUSLY something going on at home for this to be a reoccurring situation. Nonetheless, society consistently punishes Claireece for her circumstances. There is always SOMETHING standing in the way- bullies, bills, standardized testing, the social workers, her own parents. Because who would love a fat, dark-skinned, Black girl that canât read? It must be her fault!
And that is not just something that the story tells us to feel- that is something that people genuinely feel already, reflected by the story! Society consistently lets down its most marginalized, blaming them for âbadnessâ, âunworthinessâ. Does that mean that these stories donât deserve to be told? Because they are judged as âbadâ?
Or Preciousâ abuse- some Black children have abusive parents! But her mother is not a bad mother because sheâs Black, and thatâs the part that we have to be able to separate. We see that there are good Black people throughout this story who are trying, in varying levels, to reach her. Claireece herself wants to be a good mother to her children, no matter how they came about.
To be clear: her mother is a terrible person! Anyone that forces their child to eat, blames them for their own sexual abuse and weight gain, calls the child with Down Syndrome born of that abuse âMongoloidâ, doesnât even know her own childâs birthday, and even more Truly Unspeakable things- horrible person!! No question!
But if youâre watching this movie with the expectation that thatâs how Black mothers are (evil welfare queens and bad mothers), or if you are not taking the time to recognize that itâs she herself that is the problem, then that is all youâll perceive! Because I can find a long list of evil white mothers- does that mean we should never discuss those stories? That youâre all terrible?
There is still beauty in the story! Her trauma and her circumstances are not all she is- her multicultural friends at the alternative school get along, they show up for her pregnancy, they write stories! She has a good (lesbian!) Black teacher! Sheâs learning! Her son is born healthy and surrounded with love! She gets her daughter back!
It is not that Claireece was guaranteed to live the life that she had because of who she is, itâs just one story of an infinite amount. But that doesnât mean it doesnât deserve to be understood with dignity. Our stories shouldnât have to be perfect to be told.
A âUniversalâ Perspective
We read White Tears/Brown Scars in #CBC Book Club, so I wonât go into deep details when you can find the quotes and even read it yourself. In short, it is about the insidiousness of White Womanhood and how it actively contributes to white supremacy throughout history while masquerading as a net benefit for all women. I have said before that I donât like watching TV and movies with a white woman as the main character anymore. And I know saying that will have me accused of misogyny. However, it works for the example Iâm about to explain.
The reality is, Iâve spent my entire life watching things from the perspective of white women. Iâve been told that this perspective is something I need to prioritize as much as my own, that this perspective is a sign of my own power and presence. And frankly, while I have been able to enjoy it, Iâve grown to realize that this perspective is often in conflict with what I have known to be... Well, white women. I have been told my entire life that yâall represent the underdog, the victim, the one that has to rise up above, girl boss girl power. And that makes sense... From a misogyny perspective!
But from a race perspective... the way I see white women portrayed is not the experience that I have had. They are not powerless, they are not the underdog, they are not the one that needs the come up, very often they have been the actual antagonists when it comes to women and people of color! You have not been forced to see my experience the way I have been forced to live through yours. And I donât enjoy doing that as much anymore, especially when I also have to consider it in real life, the way mine... Wonât be.
And yet, that experience hasnât stopped me from objectively understanding a white female character when a story is told. I donât see an image of one âbadâ white woman on screen and assume âwell, this must be what the expectation for real life white women isâ. Because Iâve interacted with real life white women and know they can do and be a whole of things. So why is that mentality not respected in kind? Why is that not something that white and nonblack people can do for us, and our stories?
Literally Policed Emotions
As I explained earlier, one of the most powerful tools in white supremacyâs tool belt was treating our emotions as invalid, as dangerous, as threatening. By constantly making us question our voices, question even using them, it is bullying everyone into being silent about their systemic abuse.
So I asked my Black viewers these questions, and I found a couple interesting patterns amongst the responses. One of them was that a lot of people would claim that they werenât being policed... Before proceeding to describe the obvious policing of their emotions. And itâs sad, in a way, that itâs so normalized to close oneself up in anticipation of poor treatment that we donât see that!
âIf I donât do something wrong, this person wonât hit me.â That is a quote of someone being abused, dear! The fear or concern to emote didnât come from you naturally being afraid- if you were worried about experiencing what others are experiencing for emoting while Black, THAT is a part of being policed!
Just like policing in real life. The police presence isnât just active, itâs the threat of being harmed. The threat of their existence, of knowing what would happen if you went against âthe rulesâ. Of what would happen if they were called. If you walked into a room and knew you wouldnât be accepted for yourself without conflict and therefore did not try... If you hid who you were to avoid problems⌠I would call that policing!
For those who are nonblack reading this: knowing that Black people are often hiding their full range of emotions from you⌠how does that make you feel? Do you want them to show those emotions? Are you willing to accept the discomfort that may come with them expressing them openly? Are you safe?
Offering Grace
When we were playing South of Midnight, I noticed how frustrated with Hazel my husband got during one of the chapters. And to be fair, she was deeply incorrect and willfully blind, and it had devastating consequences! The chapter was meant to be that moment of failure for Hazel, of a deep miscalculation on her end! Every hero is meant to have one!
The thing is... She is a child. She is allowed to be wrong. We are allowed to be wrong in the narrative! Especially Black girls and women, God knows thereâs a higher expectation for us to either always be right or let down the entirety of what is ârequiredâ for us to be respected. We are expected to carry heavy weight and NEVER express upset with any of it- which, ironically enough, was a major part of Lacey and Laurentâs- Hazelâs mother and her ex- story! Emotions and dealing with them is a major theme of the game!
Disconcerted, I discussed the bias with him. That we have to be willing to allow Black characters to be wrong, to go through the traumas, to lash out, to misunderstand, to go through the messiness of the human experience. We donât have to like what they do, but we cannot expect them... To never do it.
We especially cannot judge them for doing so on a different level that we do their nonblack counterparts... And that happens a lot! I cannot stand the Precocious White Girl character, where she ends up hurting those she loves thinking sheâs in the right, and the narrative, if not outright agreeing, offers her the grace to fix it. Not because she doesnât deserve the chance, but because I envy the opportunity to do so.
Hazel gets the chance to redeem herself, to grow, to do better in the next chapter, and it was so nice.
But Iâm always asking people to remember that the same way everyone else gets to have a moment of weakness, of wrong, of confusion... Allow Black characters, Black people, that grace! Our entire image should not fall apart just because you were- however consciously or not- looking for a reason not to care about us. Stories would be pretty boring if everyone was always happy and always correct all the time! If we only told stories where everyone did everything right, we wouldnât have a lot of myths, legends, and fairy tales!
Treat People The Way You/They Wanna Be Treated
This first one is one we all learned in like... Second grade. âGolden ruleâ. The goal was to teach us empathy. And I can tell that, in the Internet age, we are all deeply lacking in it. If you wouldnât want someone to judge you at your lowest moment- especially when it isnât a reflection of you, but of your stress in the circumstances- maybe you should take the time to consider that for others.
And no, Iâm not saying that the response with every emotion is valid. Obviously not. However, thereâs a difference between someone being a horrible person consistently through their actions, and someone having a horrible day and responding poorly, and you thinking this must mean that they are a horrible person. Remember what I said about the stereotypes- is your character an Angry Black Woman, or is she a Black woman that is angry? Because Black women are allowed to be angry! Is your character a Hypersexualized Mandingo, or is he a Black man with a high sexual libido? Because Black men are allowed to like having a lot of sex!
Sometimes theyâre not even horrible characters, the crowd just doesnât like them đ and it would be a lot easier if we just SAID that, instead of trying to apply some sort of âmoral failingâ to them. Especially because that dislike, circling back around, often is held from a place of bias. Anyway, Iâm asking you to practice empathy, but more importantly, Iâm asking you to practice emotional intelligence towards Black people. Be able to identify your own emotions and recognize when youâre being less gracious towards us. This is a skillset that will benefit you in your life as a whole.
Move to Innocence/Right to Comfort
This section is going to upset a lot of you, and Iâm asking you to sit with that discomfort. As a segue from the last section, consider this: how often do you find yourself going âBut maybe/but what if they-â when someone mentions something is racist? Or âIâve never seen this before!â
Why?
Why is your first reaction to counter, or deny, what is happening? Or to stand in awe as if this is so new? Why is it not empathy and an attempt to understand the situation from their perspective? Do you understand how that shows a lack of concern for the Black person, prioritizing your own feelings and that of the person who harmed them?
Move to Innocence: "The term white innocence in the critical race, critical whiteness, and Social Justice literature usually reflects the idea that white people, in that they experience the privilege of dominant racial status in a white-dominant society, are generally naive about the realities of race and racism, particularly in systemic and structural senses. In particular, they are afforded the luxury (deemed a privilege) of not having to engage with race or racism unless they choose to do so intentionally (see also, antiracism). As critical race educator Robin DiAngelo points out (above), white innocence reflects the idea that âracism is not a white problem.â"
I am of the belief that this sort of response is a way to deflect harm from the self. It is not because you care about that person, but because if THEY are racist, it might mean that YOU are racist- if you do or have potentially done this behavior before. And rather than allow that to sit, and then respond with âI will work on changing my behaviorâ, it is a self-defense mechanism to fight against it, because you are Good and would not do that, and would want someone to defend you if this happened.
The problem here, is that weâre finally showing empathy⌠for the wrong party! You are pulling out the very skills asked of you to listen to Black voices, to defend those that harm us! This isnât me saying that Black people canât be wrong. But if you find yourself fighting against our words far more often than you do standing with us⌠well, the pattern of actions is not avoidable.
Or sometimes, you get the more well-intentioned but sometimes still damaging âyeah this happened to me as a [some other marginalized identity]â.
Right to Comfort: Essentially the idea that any conversation, particularly about racism, should be done in a way that never makes anyone uncomfortable. Which is not possible, because discussing race is always going to be uncomfortable for someone who doesnât to discuss it. That white people are entitled to comfort at all times, that if something interferes with that comfort, it must be an attack on their rights. It is a core tenet of why Black emotions and perspective upset everyone.
The response itself is not always a bad thing, and yes, it is done as a way to empathize. But again, I often feel like this is an unconscious tactic to maintain oneâs own comfort and place in the conversation that they were not involved in. In order to not feel uncomfortable, to sit with the idea that someone like me harmed you, that I need to make sure that I do not do these things to you and others⌠it centers that âoh, Iâve gone through this similar thing, so I am safe and understand completelyâ when that is just⌠not true. It is not some automatic guarantee of your allyship.
It is so hard to find space to express yourself and your disappointments when it comes to Blackness. Sometimes what we need is the space to be heard, to vent, to be the center of care for once. Itâs not a reflection of YOU, or that YOUR experiences donât matter; itâs just what THEY need. Treat us the way WE want to be treated.
BTW, I know what Iâve cited here is from the perspective of white supremacy, but keep in mind that one doesnât have to be white to participate in white supremacy. We ALL gotta work on these things! Purposely stopping yourself from making their experience about you and how you feel about it is an action you can take, to practice being a better ally. Sometimes, I would like to be the one that receives care without having to give it back!
Conclusion
Everything you feel, I FEEL! In addition to that, I have to deal with everything else affecting why I am and am not âallowedâ to feel! Why would that be hard to understand? Why would that be hard to sympathize with? You might not understand it from a âBlackâ perspective, but you can understand feelings. You can understand why things would cause joy, cause pain. Do you actually want to, is the question. Do you actually want to understand Black emotions and the Black perspective, at the risk of it conflicting with your own?
If nothing else, this one lesson is the one that guarantees bettering your relationship with Black peers. It is the easiest and most palpable action you can take to make us feel safe around you... To actually CARE and allow us to feel. Because itâs the thought that counts, but the action that delivers.
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Youâd never know the meaning of unc or its origins in black culture if you looked to mainstream media.
Really good write-up on the origin of "Unc" as a term used in AAVE, and how it's been turned into a generic disparaging term when it didn't even have negative connotations to begin with.
Every day i think about those black musicians whose songs were made into covers by white people and now everyone thinks that these are the originals. Youtube comment sections are full of people like "is this what it feels like to find out you're adopted?" instead of celebrating and promoting the original creators of the songs.
There's so many horror games about having to try to weed out and deal with inhuman imposters, but I want one where the script is flipped. You are something inhuman, you are an imposter, and if you want to survive you have to blend into a world that is trying to hunt you down and destroy you. You aren't human, but you must masquerade as one and infiltrate their world, or you will die.
I actually think we need to start inverting more Horror premises/tropes.
Like "You have to venture into the scary insane asylum!" VS "You're a patient who was admitted by force to an asylum, and you are very clearly in real danger, but everyone is pretending that you're just deluded, and are essentially leaving you to die because they don't really see you as a person."
I feel like there's a lot of Horror tropes built off of the fear of the other, when in reality it's actually often the other who is in danger. Maybe we could start recognising that more.
Interesting how the first half of the post has picked up popularity while the second part, which perhaps clarifies the idea of the original post, hasn't.
It's been interesting to see what media people are recommending based on the first post alone. A lot of recommendations for games/franchises like World of Darkness, Carrion, Kill All Humans, Among Us, etc. It's interesting because these are games that put you into the shoes of the violent other that has to infiltrate, without actually challenging the idea that the other is a threat. They actually parrot the ideas of the other as violent.
Funnily enough, the people recommending the comedy game Octodad understand the post much better than most of the people recommending horror media. A few mentions of Am I Nima, which isn't finished yet but does look like it could be what I am describing, so brownie points to the people recommending that.
But everyone saying stuff like "This is just being Trans/Autistic/Etc" really gets it, like really really gets it. Horror always communicates the fears and anxieties of the people who create it, this post was basically: "What if instead of communicating the fear of the other, we communicated the fears of the others, which are actually vastly more legitimate than the dominant groups fear of the other. We should recognise that it is overwhelmingly the others who are the ones who actually suffer and die, all for the perceived "saftey" and "comfort" of the dominant group."
This idea is about transphobia, it is about ableism, about anti-imigrant rhetoric and white supremacy, about queerphobia, it's about all of it. It is horror from the perspective of minority groups. It is the twisting of a trope built upon reactionary fears and narratives in order to critique them, it is a direct allegory for all those experiences you are describing.
Overall, it's just interesting to see who gets it and who doesn't.
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I think we, as a general community, need to start taking this little moment more seriously.
This, right here? This is asking for consent. Itâs a legal necessity, yes, but it is also you, the reader, actively consenting to see adult content; and in doing so, saying that you are of an age to see it, and that youâre emotionally capable of handling it.
You find the content you find behind this warning disgusting, horrifying, upsetting, triggering? You consented. You said you could handle it, and you were able to back out at any time. You take responsibility for yourself when you click through this, and so long as the creator used warnings and tags correctly, you bear full responsibility for its impact on you.
âChildren are going to lie about their ageâ is probably true, but thatâs the problem of them and the people who are responsible for them, not the people that they lie to.
If youâre not prepared to see adult content, created by and for adults, donât fucking click through this. And if you do, for all thatâs holy, donât blame anyone else for it.
Except this is the last line of consent before the actual work. So if youâre at this button you have already done the following:
1) chosen to go onto AO3 in the first place
2) chosen the fandom you wish to read about
3) had the chance to filter for the things you do want to see like a specific pairing or a specific AU
4) had the chance to specifically filter out any tags you donât want to see like, oh I donât know, incest and non-con and dub-con and paedophilia
5) had the chance to set the rating level if you wish to remove any explicit content at all
6) have read the summary of the story, which arenât always great but are the only indicator of what the story will be like writing wise so something about it was good enough for you to click on it.
7) have read the tags of the story which will tell you what is actually in the story. If you have used filters to remove stories with things you donât want then there shouldnât be anything in here thatâs a shock to you but maybe there is. Thatâs why the tags are there for you to check for yourself.
8) Then you have to actually click on the story. You cannot see anything other than the summary or the tags without personally deciding that you are going to open and read this story.
9) Only here, at step number nine, do you get to the adult content warning pictured above. You have been through eight different steps, the last six of which have also been opportunities for you to see that this has adult content. And AO3 has *STILL* stopped you to ask one last time âare you sure you want to read this because it has things that only adults should see in itâ.
If after this point you are reading incest and paedophilia then itâs probably because you specifically went looking for it.
When I was in college, my Creative Nonfiction professor would regularly have us do something she called "hotspotting" (she didn't know that this was already a term tbc) with our rough drafts. Basically, hotspotting is when you look at your draft and pick out your favorite sentence, or one of your favorite sentences--one that you're really proud of--and write it down in a blank sheet in a notebook. Not a new document, a physical notebook. (You are not allowed to use technology for hotspotting.) And then you set a timer for however long--like maybe ten to twenty minutes--and you elaborate. You treat that one sentence as if it's the opening sentence to a new draft, and you write from there, until the timer is up.
It sounds like a gimmick, but honestly, some of my best writing in that class came from hotspotting. Usually, the sentence you consider the "best" is the one that really gets to the heart of something you're trying to convey. In a rough draft, it tends to be that you're fumbling around a bit before you really hit on the heart of things. So with hotspotting, you're starting from a less fumbly place, which means you're able to dig into your subject in a much deeper and more precise way. It makes you feel like a surgeon, a little bit.
So I do recommend trying it, even just for fun, even if you think the rough draft you have is already good. You might surprise yourself with what you come up with! :)
white ppl will steal every aesthetic from black culture and then call it something so stupid like bo derek braids instead of box braids or hasbin hotel core instead of black southern dandism. yall will bend over backwards to call my culture barbaric/scary just to drool over the aesthetic the moment no actual black people are involved (21 pilots vs actual reggae). And if ur white/nonblack reading this just reblog. I dont need any comments talking about how not racist you are + speaking up over actual black people.
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Aid organizations & Community Kitchens operating in Sudan
SudanFunds - website compiling verified campaigns and organizations
Khartoum Aid Kitchen - they operate 12 kitchens across sudan, including 2 hospitals
Saving Al-Geneina / Hope and Haven for Refugees - provides food, medical care, and education to refugees in sudan
Sudanese American Physicians Association's medical aid program - they operate a hospital in khartoum, **the ONLY hospital still delivering babies in sudan**
One Million Sustainable Pads Campaign - distributes reusable pads
FAH Supporting Sudan - financial assistance to sudanese hospitals, backed by the FAH / federation of american hospitals
Community kitchen in Cairo - provides food to refugees who have fled to egypt
Community kitchen in Sudan - provides food for 1200 families
Another community kitchen in Sudan - provides food, only ÂŁ1,500 raised so far
Sanad Initiative - raises money to keep sudanese medical students in school
Sudan Solidarity Initiative - run by sudanese diaspora, provides direct funds to all kinds of sudanese including farmers unions and low cost clinics, also runs awareness-raising workshops
and, finally, this isnt a community organization, but @lgbtq-refugees is a large group of LGBTQ refugees who have reached out to me personally. they have been kicked out of multiple IDP camps because of their queer identity. i can personally attest they are real refugees who really need help. you can donate to them here
hello fellow artists. google has fallen. pinterest/duckduckgo AI filters don't work. do not despair; here is a list i made of places to find reference images without having to sift through piles of worthless garbage. (for future editing convenience i am just linking my blog post on dreamwidth.)
⨠good places to find art reference that are not full of AI trash đ