The thing about radical kindness (or any kindness, for that matter) is that there are going to be times when someone or something makes you regret it. There are going to be times when you show someone empathy and grace that they don't "deserve". There are going to be times when someone takes that kindness and uses it against you. The world doesn't magically transform into a perfect place when you decide to choose kindness and people will take advantage of it. People will continue to be shitty.
But the thing is...that's not a flaw of kindness. That's not a you problem. That's a them problem. People who are happy with themselves and their lives don't go out of their way to misuse someone's kindness or grace. The "normal" response to kindness or empathy is not to find a way to exploit it. People who are happy with themselves don't look for ways to hurt people for no reason. Kindness will never be the problem. No matter what some shitty person decides to do with it. It should go without saying not to be a doormat, yes. Don't allow people to treat you badly just for the sake of being kind. But also don't let shitty people make you bitter because of how they treated you when you were kind.
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
I love lying to my landlord. “We’re currently looking at a comparable unit in the area at $[a hundred dollars less than our current rent]/month, so if your offer has any flexibility to come down on the rent, that would help us reach a decision about whether or not to renew our lease here” and the comparable unit exists only in my own beautiful mind
Actually, no! And since several people have replied asked for my script for negotiating lower rent, I’m gonna share that below, as well as the philosophy behind it. Full disclosure that I’m not a leasing office person or a realtor or god forbid, a landlord—I’m just someone who has been a renter for 10+ years across different states, and I know for a fact that I have saved myself thousands of dollars by successfully negotiating a lower monthly rent on almost every lease I’ve ever signed. (Also, I’ve only ever rented in the U.S., so this advice may not be as applicable elsewhere.)
Step 0: Know Thy Enemy
The key thing to understand about all residential landlords, whether they’re corporate conglomerates or Just Some Asshole, is that their asset—the property—is a Cinderella carriage that magically turns back into an expensive ass pumpkin of a liability any time it’s sitting empty. The property taxes, insurance, mortgage, HOA fees, and maintenance costs all still come due every month/quarter/year whether they have a tenant to cover it all and then some, or not.
Because of this, at the end of the day, their ultimate goal is to fill every unit at all times with someone who will reliably pay the rent on time and in full. And because everything else is secondary to that goal—and because with the exception of Just Some Asshole landlords, the person responding to your emails and writing up your lease paperwork is several degrees of separation removed from the shareholders who profit off your rent money—they’re almost always willing to negotiate with you. As long as it gets the liability converted into an asset faster or keeps the carriage from turning back into a pumpkin for longer, then in the long run, it’s actually in their best interest to give you a better price.
Step 1: Identify Your Leverage
If you understand how supply and demand works, you can figure out how much leverage you have pretty easily. High supply and low demand = you have more leverage, and vice versa. Do they have an “AVAILABLE NOW - MOVE IN TODAY” sandwich board on the sidewalk or a web banner that says “First month free”? Does their website and/or Apartments.com show a bunch of currently open listings? Do you already live there and know at least two families on your floor have moved out in the last several months with no one new moving in to replace them? These are all indications that they have more than one unit currently sitting empty, meaning higher supply and lower demand. No sandwich board and a website that just says “call for availability”? They might just suck at marketing, but more likely, supply is lower and demand is higher.
You have the least leverage if you’re a prospective tenant looking to move in somewhere that has a waitlist. They have no reason to offer you a discount if six other people are already in line to pay full price for apartments that aren’t even vacant yet (but you can still ask!). You also have no leverage to negotiate if you’ve already signed a lease and you’re in the middle of the lease period; you legally agreed to pay $X/month for Y months, so you’re stuck with that until the lease is up.
At the other end of the spectrum, you have the most leverage if you’re a current tenant who has always paid your rent on time and you’re being offered a renewal on your existing lease with higher rent than you're currently paying, especially if they already have some units that have been empty for a while. If you move out, not only is your unit going to sit vacant for at least part of a month, they’re also probably going to have to put in some work to “turn” the unit (repainting, professional cleaning, etc) to get it in move-in condition for the next tenant.
All of this means that if you move out, even if they can fleece you out of your security deposit and find a new tenant the very next month, it’s still gonna cost them at least a few thousand dollars to turn that pumpkin back into a carriage again. They’re probably willing to come down by $100-$200/month or so on the renewal offer rent if you ask, because they know it’ll actually save them money in the long run. Similar situation if you’re a prospective new tenant—if they can’t get you or anyone else to sign a lease and move in this month, that’s $[whatever the monthly rent is] down the drain, and they’ll never get it back. It’s a perishable item about to spoil.
Step 2: Get Their Opening Offer
This is the first number they’ll quote you for the rent—the sticker price that you’ve always just accepted as set in stone. The truth is, they’ve built some buffer into that number. There’s almost always some room for them to come down, and depending on your leverage, they will if you ask nicely. But for reasons that baffle me, most people don’t!
Step 3: Wait, Research, & Counter
Don’t reply to their initial offer right away—unless there’s a waitlist (in which case, you have little haggling power anyway), wait a few days. It makes them sweat a bit, and it shows you aren’t desperate. The person who is rushing to reply is not the one who has more leverage in the negotiation, and making them wait reminds them of that. In the meantime, use Apartments.com or Zillow to get an idea of what similar units in the same area are currently going for. Then you come up with your counteroffer.
As a general rule, anything more than about 20-25% below their opening offer (or below market rates) will probably just piss them off or make them take you less seriously. But when we’re talking about your monthly rent over the course of a year or two, even a 10% discount adds up to a lot of money!
When I negotiated our original lease for my current place, I also asked for and got a two year lease term instead of the standard one year. But whatever automated calendar event system they use to remind their leasing office staff when it’s time to send out renewal offers didn’t get the memo about that, so they mistakenly sent me a renewal offer the following year, meaning I got to see how much they would have jacked up the rent if they could’ve. For that second year of the lease alone, my negotiating saved us $3,000!
Step 4: BDE (Big Dick Emailing)
Here’s the tricky part. You need to write an email—always negotiate over email if you can, it’s too easy for a salesperson to bowl you over on the phone and anything they say that isn’t in writing means nothing—which simultaneously makes it sound like you would sign a lease with them in a heartbeat and like you are actively flirting with five other apartment complexes right now who all want you so bad it makes them look stupid, because you are just so sexy and fun and your credit score is eight inches flaccid. You need to make them believe you are both highly motivated and ready to sign on the dotted line and willing to just walk away from the table at any second, but if they could just come down a little bit on that number, you’d delete those other hoes’ numbers forever! Here’s the rough script I use every time:
“ Thank you for [your email/the tour/sending over the offer letter/etc]. I have had a chance to review and consider it. I think [name of apartment complex] would be the perfect fit for me, but I am also exploring and touring other options in the area, including a comparable unit nearby at $[a little below your counteroffer number]/month.
If we could come down to $[your counteroffer number]/month on the rent, I would be prepared to sign the lease today. Let me know your thoughts. Thanks! "
Step 6: You Win Either Way
Sometimes they really do just accept your counteroffer without question and send you over a revised lease to sign. (When this happens, I make a note for next time that my counteroffer was probably too high and I should’ve asked for more!) More often, they get approval from The Powers That Be and come back with a number that’s higher than your counteroffer but lower than their initial offer. Assuming I can afford it, I always accept this offer; you’ve achieved your goal of saving yourself money from sticker price, and they’re likely to lose patience if they have to keep going around and around with you. And sometimes (though only very rarely), they may come back and say the price is firm—in which case, guess what? You still didn’t lose anything by asking!
THIS!!! Exactly this. I didn’t mention it above because I just couldn’t fit it neatly anywhere, but once while negotiating a lease renewal, I got as far as receiving their counteroffer, which was basically “price firm :(”, but then life happened, so I forgot to respond and accept. The email sat in my inbox for a week. And then, completely unprompted, they magically replied again saying, “actually, nvm, how’s $[number that is lower than our opening offer] sound?”
To them, it looked like I was staring them down cold as ice like
I was literally just busy with other stuff! and they were sweating!!! BULLETS!!!
i guess now's as good a time as any...... ive been working on a pjackk archive (screenshotting every post he's made and categorizing them) for a while now and i think im on 2023 at the moment? i had and still do have big dreams of making a website to host it all since google drive isn't really the best option or anything but in light of his death i figure i might as well share what ive got so far.... some of it isn't categorized yet and it only goes up to a certain day AND some of the screenshots look like shit. and im sure it's not the best way to categorize it either. it's probably all just as he'd want it though so i think it's basically fine. i hope this can help you find a post you like or discover some new ones!
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
ohhhh shit. target is recalling their up & up baby wipes (fragrance free & fresh cucumber scented) because they're contaminated with Burkholderia cepacia complex and Burkholderia gladioli, multiple people are reporting discoloration & infections. i just got a call about it cuz i had purchased those but i've already gone through them 😅 so no refund for me. but im fine. if you have these they're saying you need to immediately stop using them and bring them back to target for a full refund. this bacteria can cause life threatening infections in children/infants and people with compromises immune systems (ESPECIALLY cystic fibrosis!!) and i know lots of other chronically ill people follow me!!!!
this is soooo unironically eye opening. hearing why people are choosing what they're choosing and why they think the other option is wrong. we literally just live in a world of misunderstandings.
when they think we’re mutilating ourselves to the point that they pose as SRS doctors and literally mutilate us for their agenda. cis ppl don’t forget this
topsurgery.net is a site with lots of before + after pics categorised by surgeon. I encourage everyone with other resources on srs surgeons and their results to share them here, for mtf/mtx surgeries too please
-become furiously angry over what seems to be small things
-hit a self destruct button over and over again
-lose all sense of reality
-becoming straight up unable to communicate
-view every situation as life or death
-experience delusions/become vulnerable to irrational worldviews
-perceive hostility where none exists
-become extremely nauseous and/or throw up
-stop engaging in sleeping/eating/basic hygiene
-stop processing sensory input
-process way too much sensory input all at once
-lash out at others/themselves
-and more!
being able to recognize when a human (ie. you or another person) is so stressed out they cannot think clearly is VERY important for conflict resolution and diffusing emotional crisis. highly recommend trying to train yourself at being able to recognize that state of panic- there is a point in which logic and rationality is useless and you have to address the underlying emotional issue first. knowing that saves everyone a lot of pain and struggle.
This is literally what people are talking about when they say AI will be used to mainstream widely held bigotry. LLMs are trained on frequency and probability -> straight relationships are more well represented in the dataset -> straight pronouns and terms become the "correct" normal.
This is a form of backdoor bigotry from both normative facts (there are more straight than gay relationships) and well represented bigoted beliefs (men are superior to women).
Combine this with the mass of people inclined to believe (and being encouraged to believe) that if AI says and does something it must be correct
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
Often, when I interviewed survivors of the violence in 1965, they assumed I would want to ask them about the torture. What it was like to be beaten, to be starved, to be called a witch or a devil, to lose all contact with your family. To be gang-raped and thrown into the corner of a cell afterward, as if you were nothing. This was not usually what I wanted to talk about. To the extent that journalists or academics have ever spent much time asking survivors to tell their stories, they have already asked them this. Too often exclusively this, with the underlying assumption that it was only the excesses of the repression that were the problem, that if they had just arrested two million people, then proved in a court of law that those people were really communists, and executed half of them, that would have been OK. Personally, I was happy to let the survivors just sketch the worst parts of their stories in quick terms, if it became clear that going through those moments again would retraumatize them.
Unfortunately, though, I did have to ask a question, in two parts, that often proved extremely difficult for them to answer. It took me a long time to perfect the wording of this query in Bahasa Indonesia, so as to make myself very, very clear. At least when talking to those who really had been leftists, I would always say, “Think back to 1963, 1964. In those years, what world did you believe that you were building? What did you believe the world would be like in the twenty-first century?” Then I’d ask, “Is that the world you live in now?”
Often, their eyes would light up when answering the first part. They knew the answer. They were building a strong, independent nation, and they were in the process of standing up as equals with the imperial countries. Socialism wasn’t coming right away, but it was coming, and they would create a world without exploitation or systemic injustice. The answer to the second question was so obvious that it felt cruel even to ask. It might have been one thing if their government had committed horrible atrocities, but recognized the mistake, and built a just, powerful society. This did not happen. They are living out their last years in a messy, poor, crony capitalist country, and they are told almost every single day it was a crime for them to want something different.
Every single person I know who did football in high school, without exception, has a chronic injury. Many regret what it's done to their knees and back, even major organs like the brain.
There is no serious legislative push to ban high school football.
Also, like, if you want to talk about social pressure on minors to undertake activities that will result in regrettable, irreversible damage to their bodies:
No one, *ever*, tried to persuade me to transition.
My gym teacher tried to persuade me to try out for the football team almost every single day that I was in junior high.
#i firmly believe that the reason why concussions and brain damage in general#are not taken nearly as seriously as they should be#is because of football#if we take concussions and brain trauma seriously then we have to acknowledge the risks that children are undertaking at even#high school level football#but we can't do that#because the kids need to play football in high school so they can play football in college so they can join the NFL#This time I'm really gonna queue it.
I recently watched this video by hydn called “The Great Concussion Denial” and holy fucking shit. Made me sick to my stomach. The tldr is that it’s all the NFL pushing football on kids but that’s really diluting the story
here's another idea for a poll! I think this will have some interesting results. this sentence is here to pad out this paragraph so people who don't read posts will be more likely to accidentally miss these instructions. if you're reading this, please select option eleven. here's another sentence to make this block of text look longer. anyway here's my fun poll idea!
Now, one might look at these numbers and be lead to believe that half of all tumblr users don't read posts. However, in the replies to this post you will find over a hundred users who will happily clarify to you that actually the reason why they voted the way they did isn't cause they didn't read the post but actually because they didn't bother to look at the words in the post and process them as language, a technique commonly referred to as reading the post.
My grandpa was one of the last to work for La Forestal. They came to the Argentine Chaco to extract tannin from the quebracho tree. He tells me that every time a huge quebracho was cut down, it fell on the new little trees, not giving the forest time to grow back. A job from sun to sun, on lands stolen from the native peoples of the Chaco, who, along with criollos and immigrants, were also forced into gangs to cut down trees so hard that broke down axes, with trunks meters in diameter, to be pulverized in sweatshop factories and sent as tanin podwer to European industries. La Forestal did not pay you in pesos; you had a coin (my grandpa still has his, it says "Obrero N° 14"), which you presented at the company store, and they gave you whatever (food, booze) they cared to give you, or what they said they had; after all, as my grandfather says, if you didn't know how to read or write, how would you know you were getting less than they said?
And if you went on strike? And if you formed a union? And if you wanted to resist, like the indigenous peoples did? Some boys with a blood-red cap, the Cardenales, criminals taken from prison, would come and kill you, in broad daylight if you were striking, in the middle of the forest if you were alone. Many books tell about hacheros yelling one last long sapucai before killing themselves, because they couldn't stand it anymore.
Who were the owners of this terrible company? English. In the La Forestal HQ in the north of Santa Fe, a beautiful mansion (I understand that it is now a ruin) while the workers lived in mud huts with roofs of palm leaves, every day, the Union Jack was hoisted over Argentine soil, and of course, at five o'clock it was tea time, while all the tannin, loaded on barges and on railways worked by Argentines but owned by the British, went to Europe, and the wealth, of course, to London.
My grandfather lived through the last of this. Perón already came by that time, with worker's rights, unions, rural schools and clinics, the nationalization of railways... Nevertheless, he still had to hunt to eat and work from a young age at the machines of the company, as the company was leaving the country and couldn't even bother to pay a pittance to its workers. It eventually closed most of its operations and came into Argentine hands. But don't think it was because the English had a change of heart. They just found a better source of tannin, the acacias in their African colonies. God knows what crimes they committed there, if this is what they did in the territory of a 'sovereign' country.
And this is the side of the story I know. I cannot yet speak for all the territories the British owned in the Patagonia, some of which are still owned by English millionaries today. Don't come to tell me that the poor innocent English had nothing to do with the genocide that was done to the indigenous peoples in this country.
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
capitalism is crazy because you really do have soda companies committing human rights violations on the level of like, more stereotypically evil industries. to sell and make soda
