Professional lurker

I give it MASCLES

And I wanna stress that when i say “top of the leg” i’m not talking about the crotch (please don’t flag me tumblr it’s an anatomical term) i’m talking about the point where the femur connects to the pelvis, which is higher up on the hips:

It’s easier to see what I’m talking about in this photo of a man squatting: 

So yeah if you use that measurement when using this technique you should get fairly realistically proportioned legs:

But remember! messing with proportions is an important and fun part of character design! Know the rules first so you can then break them however you please!

Sure, it's the “simple”, “surface-level” things that people tend to think of, like

In your culture, how many meals a day are you generally expected to eat, and when are you expected to eat them?

In your culture, which clothes are considered “formal”, and when would you wear such clothes?

But it's also so much more:

If you were dating someone, at what point in the relationship would you be expected to introduce them to your parents? That's culture!

How much respect is given to artists? Are people like poets or musicians revered as an integral part of society, or is the predominant attitude “get a real job”? That's culture!

How much value is given to education? What's considered more socially embarrassing - academic failure, or academic achievement? What's the intellectual landscape? Do people tend to respect experts, or denigrate them as “elitists”? That's culture!

Which things are generally considered to be “high culture” or “low culture”? Which kinds of media and art are considered “for the masses” versus “for the elites”? That's culture!

How are politicians treated? Do people tend to respect them as their “betters”, their “leaders”? Or are they assumed to be lying, conniving, corrupt, the worst of society? What kind of thing would end a politician's career? That's culture!

What's considered more egregious behaviour - bothering other people, or asking someone to stop bothering other people? That's culture!

If you were attending a job interview, how would you want to come across? How would you be expected to dress and behave? Would it be better to come across as very bold and confident, or humble and subservient? That's culture!

If you found yourself in a tricky situation - say, broken down at the side of the road - would you confidently expect strangers to come and help you? Or would it seem really weird for some random person to come and involve themselves in your situation? That's culture!

How are you expected to communicate? Is it seen as rude to be very blunt and straightforward, or is it considered rude to beat around the bush and make allusions and try to soften what you're saying rather than quickly getting to the point? That's culture!

I could go on (boy could I go on). This is so not meant to be all-inclusive; this is just a tiny sample of the things that make up “culture”.

To put it bluntly, a lot of the time the word “culture” seems to be used to mean, essentially, “the things that make people of colour different from white people”. Oh, this guy eats this different kind of food; that's culture. This lady wears these clothes to a wedding; that's culture. But we white people, we don't have “culture”; we just do what's normal. But it's all culture! Everything! All of it! And culture isn't just the result of where in the world you come from - class, occupation, rural/urban location, minority status, political affiliation, all these things and more can result in cultural differences even within a small area. Multiple cultures often co-exist, blend, overlap, and borrow from one another within the same place, which is especially noticeable in places with legacies of migration. People bring different cultures from around the world, and these interact with the dominant culture in all sorts of interesting ways. But a culture being dominant doesn't mean that it ceases to be a culture.

When the Good Place said “Why choose to be good every day when there is no guaranteed reward now or in the afterlife… I argue that we choose to be good because of our bonds with other people and our innate desire to treat them with dignity. Simply put, we are not in this alone.” 

In life you're going to encounter ethical questions that you've never considered before or you'll find reasons to question ethical questions that you always thought that you knew the answer to. And when that happens, you have to be comfortable thinking the whole things thru from all angles, even though your gut instinct tells you to settle for the easy answer that makes you comfortable.

You have to be able to ask questions like 'but is anyone harmed by the thing that disgusts me?', 'is this about improving the world or just about punishment'?, 'what if my assumptions about why people do this thing are wrong'?

You have to be comfortable not being sure yet what your conclusion will be. You have to be comfortable exploring opinions that differ from what your friends think. Thought experiments teach you this.

I work the door at a feminist club sometimes. We've got a big sign at the door in bold letters reading "No touch of any kind without consent, you will be kicked out". When new guests show up, we point out the rule and ask them to confirm that they'll follow this rule.

Every night, there will be a few guys whose response to this is to immediately put a finger somewhere on my body, like my shoulder or my arm, and ask "not even this?". If those guys are allowed to enter the club, they ALWAYS end up groping people. Their response to a boundary that was put in place to prevent harm, is to immediately push it, test it, see if they can do a little bit of harm, see how much harm we will tolerate. That's what that finger and "not even this?" shows.

In this club, little innocent touches without prior consent definitely happen. It's loud and it can get crowded on the dance floor and around the bar. Shoulders touch, people tap each other on their arm to signal that they want to get through the crowd. No harm is done. But "No touch of any kind without consent" stays up at the door because its an effective filter to keep out the predatory guys.

Social conventions around the n-word are a lot like that. While it is technically true that the sound of the n-word does no harm on its own and it's the intent that makes a slur into a slur, to point that out is to misunderstand why the "don't say the n-word ever" social rule is there. It's a test, like our "No touch of any kind without consent" rule. People who see that rule and respond by pushing its boundaries are telling on themselves. They're showing that they want to explore how much harm we will tolerate.

Clever, insightful thought experiments have no clear answer and challenge us to examine all sides of an issue, to dig deeper until we get to a more complex nuanced understanding of moral issues.

I am sick of hearing sad books or movies "traumatize" their readers. I simply do not believe that happens. A traumatic experience might be adjacent to books (I have vivid memories of books I was reading around certain experiences and even how the contents of those books affected my processing of the experiences). But it's not caused by the book. And, y'know. The weather is Christofascist Censorship Attempts outside.

We have got to be cautious of talking about books as if they're dangerous

We've got to be wary of the idea that talking about upsetting topics in general is dangerous (usually silence is far more harmful!)

Self Care Tips From Tumblr: When you feel like everyone hates you, sleep. When you feel like you hate everyone, eat. When you feel like you hate yourself, shower. Someone out there feels better because you exist.