I'm Attention Deficit in High Definition

"Let's take a word from our sponsor."

*Skip ahead a minute* "You can-"

*Skip ahead a minute* "Use code-"

*Skip ahead a minute* "300,000-"

*Skip ahead a minute* "300,000-"

*Skip ahead a minute* "T-shirts-"

*Skip ahead a minute* "Motherfuck-"

If you care about Animal Cruelty in Factory Farms, you need to get legislation passed. It must become a crime to mistreat animals in those ways, and when malfeasances occurs, the onus of responsibility for those crimes must fall upon wealthy shoulders. That, also, requires legislation. It requires regulations, and regulators.

The largest source of Microplastics is wear and tear on automobile tires. It doesn’t matter what brand of shampoo you buy. It doesn’t matter which company you support with your dollar. The issue of Public Transit is too large-scale to be handled at anything less than the municipal level.

It’s not enough to just not participate in society

If you want the world to Change, you must leverage the mechanisms of political power.

When Life Gives You Corpses is a brilliant YA about a cursed praying mantis who falls for a young witch. Yield Under Great Persuasion is a raunchy, but surprisingly sweet story about two men repairing their relationship. Fabulous Bodies is a horror story about a queer rockstar rising from the dead.

This is Where the Future Bleeds is a fantasy set in a vividly imagined land, where two women (who happen to kiss) are the key to healing the broken sky. You're No Better is a story about a teen struggling in the shadow of his murderous parent. Oil on Canvas is about a woman who finds disturbing paintings in the home of her dead mother.

(Some) Queer Presses:

Lurid Editions are "a publishing project committed to intentional and conscientious acts of archival repair". They are "attentive to how marginalised histories are forgotten and remembered, [and] hungry to rediscover overlooked queer books". They've just received funding from Arts Council England to engage queer readers in a project to contribute to the archive!

Cipher Press "We’re really keen on the idea that queer and minority stories are for everybody, and we want to make our books – and the stories they tell - accessible to all" (what an amazing mission statement!)

Anamot Press "Anamot [Անամոթ] means shameless in Armenian. ⁣⁣Anamot Press publishes poetry and prose on intersecting experiences of gender, sexuality, race, migration, class, belonging and loss - with no shame."

(Some) Queer Bookshops

Queer Lit Oh man, I remember when this was just a tiny little shop, and now they're the biggest LGBT+ bookshop in Europe! They do amazing work in donating books about being trans to schools and parliament! They have a pay-it-forward board that will make you sob with its notes of love and support. (You can tell I wish I still lived nearby)

Lighthouse For Scottish friends - "a queer-owned and woman led independent community bookshop. We are an unapologetically activist, intersectional, feminist, antiracist, lgbtq+ community space"

Gay's The Word The OG Queer bookshop in the UK. One day I will make my pilgrimage!!

the tldr and most important thing to know is: i do not recommend you plan, discuss plans, or use any kind of hyperbolic (or not) language about violence to government officials or anyone in that vicinity on discord. please use signal instead.

a discord trust & safety employee is technically able to see any message you’ve sent under your account, going all the way back to the beginning of your account. unless you have manually deleted a message, it is viewable to a tns employee. now: it is a tremendous part of being on a tns team that we did NOT invade user privacy without cause. cause was usually: another user reported something you said, and we thought the reported message indicated you might be doing something elsewhere that was illegal (for example: a user says “i’m talking to this girl but she’s in high school lol.” i would then try to find evidence as to whether or not there was a child safety issue there. in this example, we’d require clear admission of age from both the user and the alleged high school girl, and then clear evidence of sexual talk between them, and go from there.) finding evidence required looking though all of that user’s messages.

most of the tns team, as i know them, are pretty resolute about not going further in looking than would be needed for action. most of the tns team that i still speak to is very much on the side of blue. your general conversations are probably perfectly safe, and we were very good at figuring out quickly if someone has reported you maliciously. i don’t believe you need to worry too much about your porn and fanfic and all that.

HOWEVER: reported content must be investigated, and discord can, and has been, legally subpoenaed to turn over user information. again, this has nominally been in Very Evil cases (CSAM and grooming, school shooting threats, murder admissions, etc.) but that could change, either at the federal level, or at the discord policy level. discord, like any social media company, could easily be pressured or forced into taking on different internal policies that could get you in serious trouble if you are organizing violent or “illegal” resistance. if that happens, there is a scenario where this incoming administration is given access to your messages.

again: please do not organize your political or social resistance on discord from now on. please use signal to ensure your maximum safety. do not panic if you have already talks about things on discord: you can easily delete your messages, and that WILL remove from an employee’s view. do that and use signal from now on.