The world is quiet here.

Wakes up from hypnosis where he was about to marry a woman he’s never seen before with his mystery girl’s voice, the instant he wakes up then the cute girl he’s actually fallen in love with now has that voice. Then she drops to the floor and has a fish tail, and then the first girl is suddenly cackling “too late!” and bursting out of her skin. So it turns out she’s actually an octopus woman who drags herself over to the real mystery girl - who’s a mermaid?! They’re real?! - and taking her back into the ocean. And Eric has no idea what’s going on here but okay, one of these women is clearly evil and he needs to go after his mystery girl.

And all of this happens/he realizes what he has to do within like, a single minute.

Prior to this he was just living out a sweet romance after having a Meet Cute with a shipwrecked girl, but okay, guess he’s involved in whatever the fuck this is. Acting first, questioning later.

子アヒルたちの水遊び

woof. This is actually a rough question. And it's changed even in the ten years I've been practicing, because Google's in the shitter now!

Good news is, if you're in severe poverty, it's super easy: you tell the court you have no money and they appoint the public defender or a court-appointed attorney of some kind. Our line here is the federal poverty line +25%, and the judges play a little fast and loose with that. The horror of this is that something around 90% of criminal defendants probably fall into this category, depending on jurisdiction.

(If you are on any form of public assistance, you may also automatically qualify for a court-appointed attorney, so be sure to mention that.)

Other than that, if you're looking to hire... you can find lawyers with an internet search of some kind, but finding out whether they're any good is a totally different matter. Reviews are just not reliable, and I hope that doesn't make me sound like a dismissive snob -- obviously, the client's feelings about the representation matters a lot! Client relationships being good are part of the attorney's skill set! However, some of my most pain in the ass complainy clients are the ones where I literally did everything perfectly and got them a crazy good outcome. So that's my bad on managing their expectations. Some of my most grateful and thankful clients are from cases where I lost.

Now, I'm kind of an asshole, so if it was me, I'd probably try to meet with a few that I heard of as being good by word of mouth and ask them "if I wasn't going to hire you, who would you recommend I hire?" Because lawyers know which other lawyers are lazy and shitty. And honestly you can just tell them why you're asking that question. They should understand it's a big decision and they shouldn't get egotistical about it. I have a couple names right off the bat if anyone said that to me.

News articles can also be helpful. Lawyers who have done high-profile cases and not given flashy interviews, who have said neutral things to the press. Lawyers who are reported as having won jury trials. That kind of thing.

But sometimes the lawyer is just an old lady who's been doing this for thirty years and knows the court inside and out and just cannot be fucked to get this website straightened out. So outdated websites I would say are not necessarily warning signs.

If the lawyer seems to do literally any kind of case, their expertise is unclear, and the associates are all white guys that look like they could be brothers, maybe an orange flag.

woof. This is actually a rough question. And it's changed even in the ten years I've been practicing, because Google's in the shitter now!

Good news is, if you're in severe poverty, it's super easy: you tell the court you have no money and they appoint the public defender or a court-appointed attorney of some kind. Our line here is the federal poverty line +25%, and the judges play a little fast and loose with that. The horror of this is that something around 90% of criminal defendants probably fall into this category, depending on jurisdiction.

(If you are on any form of public assistance, you may also automatically qualify for a court-appointed attorney, so be sure to mention that.)

Other than that, if you're looking to hire... you can find lawyers with an internet search of some kind, but finding out whether they're any good is a totally different matter. Reviews are just not reliable, and I hope that doesn't make me sound like a dismissive snob -- obviously, the client's feelings about the representation matters a lot! Client relationships being good are part of the attorney's skill set! However, some of my most pain in the ass complainy clients are the ones where I literally did everything perfectly and got them a crazy good outcome. So that's my bad on managing their expectations. Some of my most grateful and thankful clients are from cases where I lost.

Now, I'm kind of an asshole, so if it was me, I'd probably try to meet with a few that I heard of as being good by word of mouth and ask them "if I wasn't going to hire you, who would you recommend I hire?" Because lawyers know which other lawyers are lazy and shitty. And honestly you can just tell them why you're asking that question. They should understand it's a big decision and they shouldn't get egotistical about it. I have a couple names right off the bat if anyone said that to me.

News articles can also be helpful. Lawyers who have done high-profile cases and not given flashy interviews, who have said neutral things to the press. Lawyers who are reported as having won jury trials. That kind of thing.

It's rude. You're making someone take their time to read something you couldn't bother to write. You're telling them they were so unimportant you couldn't be bothered to actually take the time to say something yourself. And frankly, you're lying about it while you're at it.

Currently, it's marking season for us in the UK. I have an exam board in four hours, in fact, which is where we all go over every profile of every student on our courses, see what results they've achieved, and work out their "decision" - if all is well, the decision is to let them continue the course, or the final degree grade calculated if they're in final year. If it hasn't gone well, the decision is about whether they get to rework the pieces that failed, resit exams, repeat the whole year, or be required to withdraw.

And, as has been the case for the last two years, the profiles are now littered with plagiarism investigations. Every one of those - every single one - will have come in as an assignment that the lecturer received, and started reading, and then with a sinking feeling thought "This isn't your work." Every one had to go to an academic misconduct hearing. Every one is an enormous draw on time and resources, including the emotional reserves of the lecturer.

And I know that's not the main issue! I know in the grand scheme of things, our feelings aren't the most important part of this equation! But as we're talking about rudeness, let me explain:

Firstly, the work itself. You begin reading, you see it's AI. Contractually, we have to read it anyway, and give feedback on why it's shit, and what makes it bad, and that is absolutely fucking soul destroying. Most students who use AI are doing so because they've managed to train their brains to find reading something boring abhorrent, and they want to skip that part; but a ChatGPT-generated report is bland, vague, and utterly devoid of any passion, insight or personality. In short, it's boring. You simply passed your boredom on to us.

Secondly, regardless of your personal feelings about the assignment, it at least had a purpose. It was there to stretch you, and make you think about the topic so you could learn about it, and to test that learning so we can all make sure you have actually learned what you need to. But the slop you handed in, that I now have to mark? What's the point? Literally what is the fucking point of me marking it? You didn't even write it. None of the feedback I'm obligated to give means anything to you. I'm marking ChatGPT, and it can't read.

Which means, not only is it fucking boring, it's actively pointless. Ask anyone in the world what a boring but pointless obligatory task does to your mood. Imagine that.

Thirdly, the misconduct hearing. Because listen, again, the lecturer's feelings here are, once again, not the main point. Students who cheat like this aren't doing so because life is hunky dory. They're stressed and overwhelmed and struggling, and they think they've found a magic way out, and so being pulled into a misconduct hearing - where the best they can hope for is to have to redo the whole piece for a capped mark, on top of all the rest of the work they have (functionally, a bonus assignment), and the worst is expulsion - is a mental breakdown-inducing experience. That, obviously, is the biggest issue.

But, the lecturers know all that, which means we know what we're triggering if we do report it. I cannot tell you how upsetting it is to receive a slop assignment, realise what it is, and then have to make the call to report it. I know damn well how upsetting that's going to be for you. I know how stressful and painful that's going to be. I know this might mean you're going to be thrown out of university. In some cases, I know it means you will be.

I know I could look the other way to spare you that

And oh, that gets tempting. When things are really bad for you, and I see you struggling, and this is your third strike; fuck me but it's tempting to pretend that I can't tell.

I cannot do that.

Which brings me to number four: the soul-bleachingly fucking horrible ordeal that is the misconduct hearing itself. Most people are non-confrontational; I'm no exception. I also simply do not enjoy a sobbing, panicking student sitting in front of me, telling me about how stressed and scared they are and how they're terrified they're going to fail. But that's how these things go.

Our most recent example is an international Masters student. I don't know the particulars for him; but I do know it's not uncommon in his part of the world for families to go into obscene debt, often to loan sharks, to send their kids to UK universities. Failure means more than just academia for him. Having to sit through him turning white and quietly begging us to give him another chance before he left in tears he tried to hide from us was, obviously, much worse for him than us; but it was honestly traumatic. Even now, two weeks later, I can't get it out of my head. There's nothing we can do; but, I feel guilty anyway. I could have looked the other way.

(It wouldn't have passed anyway. It was terrible. But at least he'd probably be allowed a resit - we're still waiting on the outcome of this one, but he may well be withdrawn)

To bring this back to the point of the post:

So many good points here, but the most important is in the tags. A lot of students get confused or overwhelmed and don’t know what to do which is when they turn to AI in desperation. It never even seems to occur to them to ask for help. Ask for help! Ask for clarification! It’s not a weakness. I have office hours twice a week just for you to ask for help and no one ever comes. I love giving help! It’s not a burden to me; it’s literally what I’m here to do. And I won’t think less of you. In fact, I’ll think more highly of you because it shows that you care enough to try. These are also the students who I get to know as people instead of just faces.

If you have social anxiety, psych yourself up and ask for help anyway. I know it’s hard, but every time you do it, your anxiety lessens a little bit. Every time you don’t, it gets worse and it will be that much harder to try the next time. Some professors are dicks, but consider it a learning experience because you’re going to have to deal with dicks throughout your life and at least you’ll know that you tried, which is good for your self esteem. If you want agency in your life - if you don’t want to be a passive victim of your own fears and insecurities - you have to learn to ask for help when you need it.

When my younger brothers went to the same high school, my dad said that one of them was staying after class to receive help from a teacher, and why didn’t I do that? I was floored. There are hundreds of students, I had assumed that a teacher has their own life they’re ready to get back to, and they can’t spend time after hours helping a bunch of kids. But more importantly, at the time I was enrolled, it hadn’t occurred to me to ask. It just… wasn’t part of the schedule, and I followed rules with a rigidity.

At least ask.

I would have, if someone told me I could.

When I was teaching, if a kid turned something in that they obviously hadn't written, and I quizzed them on it and found they didn't understand what they'd written, it was a disciplinary issue, but not usually one which had lasting consequences beyond a slap on the wrist. Granted I left teaching in 2022 when the problem was far less widespread than it is today.

But after about a year as a money adviser I realised there was a major disconnect between the way some clients presented, and the content of their emails. When they wrote to me it seemed like they understood what they were getting themselves in for, but when I spoke to them face to face it was clear that they didn't.

It was only when I asked one client if she was receiving help writing emails (she disclosed having dyslexia, but there were never any typos) that she admitted she often used AI because she didn't always understand the info I sent, so would ask Chat GPT to read it for her and write a response.

Obviously I felt like I wasn't doing my job properly that she should be put in that position, and have since spent a lot more time explaining things to clients with low-level literacy or who are easily overwhelmed by text-heavy resources, but when I spoke to colleagues or those working for other advice services it was clear that it wasn't just me.

So I cannot stress enough, if you don't understand something your money adviser/financial planner/solicitor/accountant or any medical professional involved in your care has sent, DO NOT use AI to respond, ask them for clarification. They need to know they have your informed consent to do things on your behalf.

In finance in particular, capability is always assumed, until institution taking your money is told otherwise. If you ask AI to respond to an email with serious financial implications, you may end up agreeing to something you shouldn't, because AI is pre-programmed to try and be as agreeable as possible (to the point it make stuff up to appease you)

“But Rue, where will these kids stay? Do you want them on the streets?”

of course not. In an ideal world, a kids would have multiple adults other than their parents they could look to for care, but I recognize that that will never be a reality for every single child. So: youth shelters, if they have nowhere else to go. There should be clean, warm shelters where anyone under 18 can stay for as long as they need, no questions asked. (And of course shelters that aren’t just for kids, but we’re talking about youth rights right now)

“But Rue,” I hear you say, “what if some moody teenager runs away after an argument?”

First of all, I’d rather a thousand moody teenagers run away than one abused child be trapped. Second, so what if one does? A kid needs time away from their parents, so they leave. The vast majority of them will get some time to cool down and then go back home, and if they don’t want to go back, period? Then nine times out of ten, they have a good reason. (Because yes, as hard as it is for you to believe, kids are humans who have common sense.)

“Okay, but what about the one time out of ten the kid doesn’t have a good reason?”

1. The court holds Google responsible for statements made by its AI, considering them Google's statements (search engines have limited liability for results in their engine as they're the words of other sites/companies/people), meaning when their AI lies/hallucinates they're liable for the defamation/harm resulting from those statements.

2. Google's defense that customers are generally aware of the lack of reliability and are responsible for fact checking was dismissed. As the court pointed out, that would "significantly diminish" AI Search's stated purpose and it can't be distinguished from Google's business practices/statements as a search tool.

3. Studies have found about 91% of Google's everyday AI responses are accurate, leaving millions of searches per HOUR with potential liability for falsehoods. 56% of correct responses weren't supported by the sources the AI listed. Both of which mean Google is now liable for a LOT more AI "errors."

4. Google was held liable for 80% of court costs in this case and this precedent is expected to reverberate around the world. This is a massive shift from the 3rd-party search provider role Google has previously played and it comes right as they've tied ALL searches to their AI search.

She has a truly ancient tiny dog whose pastimes include shitting on my driveway and picking fence fights with Fenris. Occasionally she will ask me to do his nails and he's actually wonderful for them so it takes like 3 minutes tops. She also will usually hand me whatever bill she has in her wallet for it- sometimes it's a 1, once it was a 50, usually it's like 5 bucks.

Now I have tried refusing her money and even gave the 50 back and wouldn't accept it. I then came home to the $50 bill taped to my back door the next day after work. So, you know, I'm kind of stuck accepting whatever she tries to give me because she WILL tape the money to my house somewhere otherwise.

(Once she gave one of her granddaughters a gift that required batteries and was distraught that it didn't come with any. Knocked on my door to ask if I had any. I haven't used my spare batteries in ages so I just gave her a whole pack. Refused to let her pay for them. Three days later a pack of batteries plus ten bucks was taped to my door. So this is not an uncommon occurance.)

Anyway this time she didn't have any money to pay because we're all fucking broke as shit on this block and she was really upset because his nails were starting to curl and once again I did them in like 3 minutes and when she apologized for not being able to pay me I just waved her off and told her not to worry about it.

I came home on Monday to my backyard being totally cleared of winter debris and the growing collection of winter dog shit as well as my fence repaired in two of the places that broke when the tree fell on it. I texted her adult son whose number I have and he confirmed he did it because he was happy that I helped his mom out with her dog. I tried to explain that it really does not take a lot to do the dog's nails but he similarly refused to hear it and said he'd be back in a few days to finish fixing the fence.

When we look at celebrities with eating disorders, we are confronted by two conflicting realities:

1) we know all the ways that the film industry has enforced eating disordered behavior among performers regardless of age, gender, or embodied risk, and ultimately every celebrity with an eating disorder is ultimately a victim of the industry, as are the people in the audience.

2) these celebrities have undue influence in our society and they often go on to actively push disordered eating behaviors firmly into the public eye where they go on to kill thousands. At best, this means these celebrities are collaborators in the film industry's behavior and, at worst, it makes them perpetrators. Regardless, they have some level of culpability for their actions.

I think that this is a question we never really successfully confront: what do we do with/to/about the victims who are also perpetrators of the violence they are victimized by? How do we acknowledge BOTH their status as a pre-existing victim, regardless of what they do with themselves after, and as someone who is presently making choices that endanger others?

It's a question I expect we're going to have to think about a lot in the coming while, across a lot of different realms of life. But eating disorders feel like such a clear cut example of how difficult this question really is. How do we intervene with victims of eating disorder culture who are so far gone from their own maltreatment that they are unable to see the harm done to others in their name and by their hand?

I think OP is spot on that we need to learn to talk about all this more. It's not easy to talkabout things this loaded, and that can contribute to the silence and the lack of vocabulary to express the violence being inflicted on us, a secondary victimization we all often suffer through in silence. It also means that when we DO speak on the subject, we are often limited by existing language, much of which is tainted by moral judgement and eating disordered cultural implications themselves. I think a lot about Lin Farley when she coined the term sexual harassment and how much more nuanced my own understanding of behaviors like that became when the phrase was taught to me.

The more we talk about what eating disorders can do to us, what factors contribute to the culture of starvation and erasure, the acts we take to self-police and to police others in our communities, the easier it will become to challenge, interrogate, and change these very same toxic behaviors and environments.

It starts with trying to thread the needle here, you know? How can I talk about this thing in a way that acknowledges that me and the latest Ozempic celeb representative both have the same deconditioning, malnutrition, even a lot of the same health risks (yes, even with the financial gap, amazing what starving yourself can do to erode the wealth gap in healthcare), but we are all the same not having the same experience of our actions, influences, and needs. How do we acknowledge the full spectrum of victimization by these social trends without pardoning those who play a dual role? And when and why does it matter that we do so?

It's rude. You're making someone take their time to read something you couldn't bother to write. You're telling them they were so unimportant you couldn't be bothered to actually take the time to say something yourself. And frankly, you're lying about it while you're at it.

so here's a super long post about strokes in general, and mine in particular/what I went through.

Remember you are a guest in this space. I don’t know a single person who would rather you shit yourself or get assaulted than use the disabled toilet, but please remember that these toilets are built and designed for disabled people after a huge amount of campaigning and activism.

Don’t touch or move things you don’t need to. If you’re not familiar with how things work or why they are where they are just leave it be. The position of a bin might not mean anything to you but it could be really important to a wheelchair user who needs to change their tampon. Don’t touch things like grab rails either – while they’re fairly tough and you’re unlikely to cause any damage it’s not impossible and if you don’t touch it, you can’t break it.

Related, but important enough to have its own point: please don’t touch the red cord. Do not tie it up, do not wrap it around anything, don’t tuck it behind a bin. Don’t touch it (The only exception to this is to untie a cord that’s been tied up) If the cord doesn’t fall freely to the floor it could prevent a disabled person calling for help in an emergency. If you’re worried about accidentally pulling it there’s almost always at least one reset button in there with you. Press that and it cancels the alarm.

If possible allow other people waiting to go first. A lot of disabilities, both visible and less apparent, can cause problems with incontinence, urgency or pain that make it difficult for someone to wait to use the toilet. If there’s someone else in the queue and you are able to do so, offering to let them go first might really help them out.

If you want to get a radar key, get it from disability rights UK or give a small donation to a disability charity (again only if you’re able to). I’ve seen a couple of trans orgs giving away free radar keys and it’s unclear how they are being sourced. Knockoffs are common but only “real” RADAR keys are from Disability Rights UK and any profits help fund their charity work. Bear in mind that most disabled people also have to pay for these keys which are about £5. (Disability Rights UK say their keys are to be sold to disabled people or organisations only, this is a legal thing they have to say about VAT relief. There is no real way of following up how disabled someone who buys a radar key is because you don’t need to claim any benefits to be eligible for VAT relief and keys are a low value item that isn’t worth anyone looking into when things like adapted cars exist. Be gay, do crime, support disabled people having rights.)

Know the difference between a standard accessible toilet and a changing places toilet. Don’t use a changing places toilet if there is any other safe option. These have a different symbol and are bigger and fitted with extra equipment for severely disabled people and our carers. That equipment is more sensitive than anything you’ll find in a standard accessible toilet so if you do find yourself in one touch nothing. Especially don’t move the hoist (lifting equipment) as it can cause it to run out of power and make the whole space functionally useless if it’s not in the right space on the track. (To be fair this is an unlikely scenario as there aren’t that many of these toilets, but just in case)