Pervert Solidarity!

you mentioned mountains! a majority of our mountains are volcanic. mt ngāuruhoe is an active volcano and you know it as mt doom. tourists who love LOTR keep trying to summit it for photos which is really not great, seeing as it's an incredibly important site for the people there (ngāti tūwharetoa). our most densely populated city also happens to be the city with the most volcanic sites on earth (53!!!!).

when you think of the landscapes and sheep here, you're probably imagining rolling pastures and fields. practically ALL of that used to be native temperate rainforest that was slashed and burned to be converted into fields. sheep also aren't supposed to be here at all, really! we have only two native land mammals, and they're both bats. LOTR was filmed here because sir peter jackson delcared that it was even more idyllic than the english countryside. which is kind of fucked unfortunately because our "countryside" was directly inspired by english countryside (thanks to colonisers) and was set on fire in the past to achieve that affect.

it's great that people know about our maunga, our coasts, the sport that unites us, and how prevalent farming is here! I do wish that wasn't all the general public knew. we have living prehistoric reptiles, forest dwelling sea lions, the most colourful variety of fungi on the planet, a rich history of māori life spanning almost a millennium (continuing of course into the present day, where there are huge efforts to treasure and celebrate māoritanga in everyday life despite the government's best efforts), crazy natural landscapes including huge geothermal areas, native tussock grasslands, fjords, native palm groves, rainforests....

Masks have been identified as the visual trigger for a problem, not the solution to multiple pressing public health issues.

To please right wing elements in the desperate hope of stealing *checks notes* fascist support for an openly fascist party, the center-right Democrats in the US with Joe Biden as their figurehead worked to downplay the continued necessity of masking even as studies on viral genetics find that vax-only methods for controlling covid cause more rapid and effective viral immune escape to become dominant, does little to actually prevent spread of the illness (especially in enclosed spaces), and has showed that doctors are willing to toe a political line instead of following scientific and medical best practices for halting the spread of a communicable disease which is still killing more Americans than breast and prostate cancer combined.

People who refuse to mask in public spaces, stay home when sick, use tests, or otherwise refuse to take covid seriously as a public health threat have shifted politically to the right.

People who mock and belittle those still taking precautions have adopted political positions identical to the "cough in my mouth" pandemic deniers of 2020 and are pushing full blown eugenics about who should be allowed to safely navigate public life.

"Has been" implies a past tense, an end to the pattern. Masking *contines* to be politicized. A public health tool has been narratively relegated to the bin of "public health tools that don't work" as it continues to be roped in with ideas like enforced distancing and face shields to prevent the spread of airborne illness.

Public health agencies refuse to take the scientifically confirmed threat of aerosols spread just by breathing seriously, pushing handwashing as the number one prevention for illnesses that can linger on poorly ventilated indoor air for dozens of minutes to dozens of hours given the right conditions.

This is a global effort to deny responsibility for a continuing crisis as covid continues to spread and long covid rates have skyrocketed, especially in children where the condition has surpassed asthma as the leading chronic illness in children. This is a failure by medicine to keep up with science and remain apolitical. This is a failure of public health to act in the defense of all. This is the normalization of fascist eugenics in daily life.

"Masks have been politicized" is trying to say ^ all of that ^

i want to abolish bus fares so the drivers don’t have to process every rider and we can fucking get there faster

Imagine that as an already-too-disabled-to-work trans woman in an actual sundown town.

Imagine you lose Medicaid and SNAP since you aren't working or considered Disabled Enough not to.

Imagine watching debt pile up while you have no choice but to use credit cards to get through.

Imagine not being able to reliably get to appointments because your car is too expensive to fix up and your city has no transit (hence, the bike in the first place!!).

Imagine seeing your partner who works full-time as a student struggle to support you while you feel overwhelming guilt that you can't do anything about it.

Please donate and share if you can. Anything helps.

We aren’t women to any of them, we aren’t people, and we sure as hell could never be the *actual* victims. All any of these freaks can see us as are predators and rapists and abusers in waiting.