woeful maiden

Pluribus, in-text: yeah so the hive is like when forced assimilation and subjugation and cultural genocide in the name of global peace and safety, and gay conversion therapy, and pacification through forced addiction, and punishment via solitary confinement to coerce cooperation, and how blackboxed and forced from above simulacra is built on and sustained by stolen labor and leads to dehumanization, and the cult logics of impossibility of refusal and escape, and the lack of respect for what is at the core of bodily autonomy and consent, and the lack of cross-species empathy or feeling of responsibility for continued husbandry, and the fallacy of the innocent bystander. oh yeah, also they eat people. metaphorically but also literally. btw did i mention cultural genocide, check it out. *shows an aborted ceremony and abandonment of an entire community upon finalized conversion*

not a super high effort piece but i liked the play of contrasts and letting myself be messy

i love hatching, it can be rly time consuming but so so worth it when done right . a friend told me the chaotic hatching for the shadow is a bit much and i almost agree but idk i just enjoy that technique too much

Tears that are driven by white guilt are self-indulgent. When we are mired in guilt, we are narcissistic and ineffective; guilt functions as an excuse for inaction. Further, because we so seldom have authentic and sustained cross-racial relationships, our tears do not feel like solidarity to people of color we have not previously supported. Instead, our tears function as impotent reflexes that don’t lead to constructive action. We need to reflect on when we cry and when we don’t, and why. In other words, what does it take to move us? Since many of us have not learned how racism works and our role in it, our tears may come from shock and distress about what we didn’t know or recognize. For people of color, our tears demonstrate our racial insulation and privilege. I asked the woman of color I refer to in the opening of this chapter if I was missing anything in this list. This is her response: It’s infuriating because of its audacity of disrespect to our experience. You are crying because you are uncomfortable with your feelings when we are barely allowed to have any. You are ashamed or some such thing and cry, but we are not allowed to have any feelings because then we are being difficult. We are supposed to remain stoic and strong because otherwise we become the angry and scary people of color. We are only allowed to have feelings for the sake of your entertainment, as in the presentation of our funerals. And even then, there are expectations of what is allowed for us to express. We are abused daily, beaten, raped, and killed but you are sad and that’s what is important. That’s why it is sooooo hard to take. - White Fragility, Robin DiAngelo

This is back on my dash! And listen, I love to see Amir Khusrau getting appreciation, but this translation ignores a lot. The original rhymes! And scans! And does playful things with register! And conveys a tone of affectionate banter between the two speakers, not least because it has them both addressing each other as sakhi (translated above as “girl”) in the last two lines. I think taking some liberties with line order is worth it to preserve more of the rest—and I think there’s a better translation of sakhi. And so:

3 hours of sleep = i hate people who laugh