The World Of Becca Blake

Art by Dan Schkade

Life lessons.

I had a group of undergraduate students who almost always did their readings for the day, but on this one particular day: they hadn’t. They all said they had midterms to do and chose a class to not do the work for and it was mine. Lesson plan scrapped, I needed to quickly come up with something to do, and all I could think of was this post.

So I gave it a go.

Our lesson for the day was on historical re-enactments and why people did them. My students, having not read their assignments, couldn’t understand why anyone would want to engage in a re-enactment and didn’t understand the point. So I set them up with this game, explained the rules, told them they had 45 minutes to make the largest group without a witch in it, and let them go.

Within thirty minutes they were getting loud enough that I was worried I’d need to tone it down because I didn’t want to bother other classes. Some students went full in character, they created elaborate backstories, they improved their way through the entire thing and in the last five minutes had created an entire imaginary community based on this elaborate tale they’d created and were damn near ready to commit murder, screaming “she’s a witch” and splitting into two distinct groups with a lot of hand grabbing and pulling to get people into the right group.

When I told them the truth, they were stunned speechless. I reminded them of the rules: all they had to do was make a group without a witch in it. I never told them someone would be a witch, and they presumed someone would get the role. Similarly, the salem witch trials presumed that there were witches and invented them in their group.

They told me after we did our wrap up that they had been learning about the witch trials in other classes, but had never understood why anyone would actually believe in witchcraft. They were shaken, not only by the realization they were about to throw hands with their fellow students, but that all it took was someone in authority to imply something was so.

The “re-enactment” helped them to understand something that just reading about the trials hadn’t.

And, it also helped them to understand why some people do engage in historical re-enactments. They all admitted to having A Lot of Fun and that it was something that gave them a chance to just play and engage and do something they’d never done before: actually experience the history they were studying (sort of).

It was an excellent exercise, and I’m grateful for this person for writing about it because it worked so well for our class.

psa for cis people: it's not "women and people who menstruate," it's just people who menstruate. adding "women and" implies that

just say people who menstruate. women who menstruate are people. saying "women and people who menstruate" is a nonsense phrase that only serves to soothe the egos of cis women. they can cope with not having their ciswomanhood centered, I promise.

Also if you think that’s “too long”, sometimes you can just say people and the context implies that you’re talking about people who menstruate. A sentence like “people who menstruate should have better access to menstrual hygiene products” and “people should have better access to menstrual hygiene products” mean the same thing. “women with period cramps are so brave” and “people with period cramps are so brave” is another example. just using people in thag context makes it clear you mean people who menstruate.

Also fuck the weird trend of saying women, trans men and femmes to talk about people who menstruate. Or AFAB people. Not all AFABs menstruate not all women or trans men menstruate. And femmes has absolutely nothing to do with menstruation. It’s so baffling thag people genuinely think this is inclusive language.

people who don't menstruate should also have access to period supplies so they can fetch them for friends and family. people who don't get cramps should still know what's a normal level of pain for their coworkers and employees to deal with, how to tell the difference between appendicitis and cramping in their best friend, when years of excruciating periods might indicate endometriosis in their sibling, what the safe amount of acetaminophen or ibuprofen is for their roommate. people who can't get pregnant should still have access to affordable birth control and contraceptives--as well as knowing how common first trimester miscarriages are, to support their partners' right to reproductive control.

everyone benefits from the assumption that men--even perisex cis men--should be involved in supporting and accommodating uterine care issues.

PSA: Castlevania Nocturne is basically one giant nazi dogwhistle. Here's why and what to do about it.

Netflix recently released a trailer and some information on Castlevania Nocturne, and with it has come a lot of hype and excitement online. While I can understand why, there’s a huge stain on it all that I haven’t really seen anyone talk about outside of certain circles: rampant, undeniable, inseparable-from-the-plot, clearly intentional antisemitism. And in all fairness this isn’t something that’s immediately clear from just the trailer, so that’s why I’m making this post: To inform people who likely just aren’t aware. 

I ask that if possible, please don’t just tick off a box on a list of shows that are “problematic” and keep scrolling. Please read this post carefully, so you can understand what exactly the problems are and why they’re a problem. 

i was talking with a friend in her mid 20s on discord about this and i realized it might be worth saying out loud but as an older transfem one of the biggest societal changes i have seen in my lifetime has been not necessarily the lessening of socially acceptable homophobia and transphobia but the increase of love for us

like in some ways there is less transphobia and homophobia sure, but in other ways there's more and i sorta see it as a conservation of energy type deal like less ppl have that kind of hate in them but the people who do have more of it

they still kill us when we're vulnerable obvs but now we don't let comedians make jokes about our deaths without pushback and social cost

that image of the sf gay mens choir showing how many of them died to aids haunts me and i can't help but think that similarly, there's a reason there's not many transfems my age who have been transitioning since their teens or 20s and it's because a lot of us are dead from violence or self harm. like i cannot believe how much more blasé the average cis person is about a trans person now, and if you are reading this and thinking wow she is full of shit it's still bad etc i want you to know it used to be so much worse

most of my peer group now is dead or they didn't start transition until later in life like me and are now being positioned as elders

so yeah if you've ever raised the social cost or took a visible stand for us thank you for sewing that into our quilt

i needed to read this today so im sharing it to all of you!!

Important tags from @parsio

Research has shown that pleasure affects nutrient absorption. In a 1970s study of Swedish and Thai women, it was found that when the Thai women were eating their own (preferred) cuisine, they absorbed about 50% more iron from the meal than they did from eating the unfamiliar Swedish food. And the same was true in the reverse for the Swedish women. When both groups were split internally and one group given a paste made from the exact same meal and the other was given the meal itself, those eating the paste absorbed 70% less iron than those eating the food in its normal state.

Pleasure affects our metabolic pathways; it’s a facet of the complex gut-brain connection. If you’re eating foods you don’t like because you think it’s healthy, it’s not actually doing your body much good (it’s also unsustainable, we’re pleasure-seeking creatures). Eat food you enjoy, it’s a win-win.

what

no seriously

what?

PLEASURE IS A NECESSARY PART OF HUMAN HEALTH, BOTH PSYCHOLOGICALLY AND PHYSICALLY

this is why you should be eating your chips with salsa and guac instead of beating yourself up for not eating a salad with tomato and avocado (unless you are a salad bitch like me then enjoy both of them!)

here’s a recent systemic review of all the research done on the subject

Lemmings don’t jump off of cliffs unless they’re being chased. Frogs don’t stay in boiling water unless they’ve been lobotomized first. Crabs don’t pull each other back into the bucket unless they are desperately and randomly grabbing for anything to try to get themselves out, out of fear for their lives.

Actions taken in specific, negative conditions don’t exemplify the nature of all beings.

Before you mock a sheep for staying with the flock, ask what dogs nip at its heels when it strays too far, and what wolves wait just beyond the edge of the pasture.

FUCK tenderqueer we're starting the violentfag movement. We hit people with chairs.

Are we, as a fandom, ready to admit that Mai’s entire backstory, personality, coping mechanisms, character traits, strengths, weaknesses, self image, belief system, and arc, are literally almost exactly the same as Toph but like, slightly to the left

Sheltered and coddled rich kid, “better seen and not heard,” “don’t speak unless you’re spoken to,” “stay in your room and stay out of trouble,” both painfully bored and stifled to the point of being incredibly depressed and borderline self destructive, Toph turned to earthbending matches, Mai taught herself how to throw knives, neither ever learned how to interact with people their age or how to have friends and struggles with social interaction, neither expect anyone to respect their opinion or even listen so they always either just keep their opinion to themself or when they boil over, they boil over completely and turn to shouting or violence because they don’t believe anyone will listen to them otherwise, both slowly had to learn to love and to trust that someone would be there, while also learning that they deserved better and should defend their boundaries because being treated like a human instead of a prop isn’t an unrealistic expectation

People talk about Toph’s ability to dress up all fancy and fit in perfectly as a sophisticated, model daughter, while also being like “hehe violence, lets go commit crimes” but no one talks about how Mai is literally exactly the same way, from a political perspective she’s like the perfect, calm, cultured, girlfriend for Zuko, she can absolutely play the role she needs to, but she also carries knives on her at all times and committed arson with her friends at a beach party for fun

That similarity is also 100% part of the reason that Zuko and Toph get along so well, because once she warms up to him Zuko immediately recognizes her as a kindred spirit. Out of the entire gaang, Toph is the one that Zuko understands and empathizes with the most/vice versa. 

Everyone else took a really long time to understand Toph because Toph is so different from the main group but Zuko had half a conversation with her and went “oh she’s Mai but baby”

Link

Both Parties are not the same.

my controversial opinion is that real progress in the north won't be achieved until the world decides to consider the native irish people a white indigenous population like the sámi

the decision to call the fighting here "catholic vs protestant" is literally to make it seem like a religious disagreement rather than a fight between the native people of the land and their colonizing oppressors

the complete lack of infrastructure in primarily irish areas as well as the total suppression of the irish language should genuinely be considered a human rights abuse internationally. why isn't it?

Humans Are Weird

So there has been a bit of “what if humans were the weird ones?” going around tumblr at the moment and Earth Day got me thinking. Earth is a wonky place, the axis tilts, the orbit wobbles, and the ground spews molten rock for goodness sakes. What if what makes humans weird is just our capacity to survive? What if all the other life bearing planets are these mild, Mediterranean climates with no seasons, no tectonic plates, and no intense weather? 

What if several species (including humans) land on a world and the humans are all “SCORE! Earth like world! Let’s get exploring before we get out competed!” And the planet starts offing the other aliens right and left, electric storms, hypothermia, tornadoes and the humans are just … there… counting seconds between flashes, having snowball fights, and just surviving. 

To paraphrase one of my favorite bits of a ‘humans are awesome’ fiction megapost: “you don’t know you’re from a Death World until you leave it.” For a ton of reasons, I really like the idea of Earth being Space Australia.

Earth being Space Australia Words cannot express how much I love these posts

Alien: “I’m sorry, what did you just say your comfortable temperature range is?”

Human: “Honestly we can tolerate anywhere from -40 to 50 Celcius, but we prefer the 0 to 30 range.”

Alien: “……. I’m sorry, did you just list temperatures below freezing?”

Human: “Yeah, but most of us prefer to throw on scarves or jackets at those temperatures it can be a bit nippy.” 

Other human: “Nah mate, I knew this guy in college who refused to wear anything past his knees and elbows until it was -20 at least.”

Human: “Heh. Yeah everybody knows someone like that.”

Alien: “……. And did you also say 50 Celcius? As in, half way to boiling?”

Human: “Eugh. Yes. It sucks, we sweat everywhere, and god help you if you touch a seatbelt buckle, but yes.” 

Alien: “……. We’ve got like 50 uninhabitable planets we think you might enjoy.” 

“You’re telling me that you have… settlements. On islands with active volcanism?” “Well, yeah. I’m not about to tell Iceland and Hawaii how to live their lives. Actually, it’s kind of a tourist attraction.” “What, the molten rock?” “Well, yeah! It’s not every day you see a mountain spew out liquid rocks! The best one is Yellowstone, though. All these hot springs and geysers from the supervolcano–” “You ACTIVELY SEEK OUT ACTIVE SUPERVOLCANOES?” “Shit, man, we swim in the groundwater near them.”

Sounds like the “Damned” trilogy by Alan Dean Foster.

“And you say the poles of your world would get as low as negative one hundred with wind chill?” 

“Yup, with blizzards you cant see through every other day just about.”

“Amazing! when did you manage to send drones that could survive such temperatures?”

“… well, actually…”

“… what?”

“…we kinda……. sent……….. people…..”

“…”

“…”

“…what?”

“we sent-”

“no yeah I heard you I just- what? You sent… HUMANS… to a place one hundred degrees below freezing?”

“y-yeah”

“and they didn’t… die?”

“Well the first few did”

“PEOPLE DIED OF THE COLD AND YOUR SOLUTION WAS TO SEND MORE PEOPLE???!?!?!?”

My new favorite Humans are Weird quote

“PEOPLE DIED OF THE COLD AND YOUR SOLUTION WAS TO SEND MORE PEOPLE?”

aka The History of Russia

aka Arctic Exploration

aka The History of Alaska

Being from Alaska, this was sort of how I felt going to college in the lower 48′s and learned that no one else had been put through a literal survival camp as a regular part of their school curriculum, including but not limited to:

1. Learning to recognize all forms of animal tracks in the wild so you can avoid bears and moose and search out rabbits and other small animals to eat.

2. Extensive swimming and climbing on glacial pieces with competitions to see who could last the longest, followed by a group sit in the sauna so we wouldn’t get hypothermia (no, not kidding, I really did this many times as a kid!)

3. How to navigate using the stars to get back to civilization.

4. How to select the right type of moss from the trees to start a fire with damp wood (because, y’know, you’re in a field of snow. Nothing is dry.)

5. How to carve out a small igloo-like space to sleep in the snow to preserve body heat and reduce the windchill so you won’t freeze to death in the arctic.

“I’m telling you, I don’t think we need to worry about territory conflicts with the humans. You know all those deathtrap hell-worlds in the Argoth Cluster?” “Those worthless rocks? Yeah.” “80% of them are considered ‘resort destinations’ by those freaky little primates.”

“I’m telling you, they terraform for fun!” “Don’t be ridiculous” “No, seriously. Some of their most celebrated cultural loci are built on swamps. They have an entire city that is literally in a body of water. Not, like, an artificial pontoon city, they literally sunk the foundations into water. For Grilp’s sake, they build elaborate structures out of frozen water AND THEN SLEEP IN THEM.” “Dear Thilak. Think we could get them to terraform our moons?” “Psh, they’d probably pay for the privilege.”

Eventually, it occurs to someone that humans are the perfect terraforming shock troops, as it were. They think it’s fun to be sent to horrible planets! They’re really good at surviving and then taming them! All you have to do is sit back and wait until the planet is habitable, and then move there yourself! It’s genius.

It only takes one try before the reality of the situation sets in: human definitions of ‘taming’ and ‘habitable’ are woefully incomplete.

“Why did you not eliminate the venomous plant life?” Grahssk’ti moans, clutching one limb.

“Those?” The human laughs. “Why bother? They’re not that bad. And they eat the mosquitoes.”

Grahssk’ti shudders. The ‘mosquitoes’ are… not to be mentioned. Just one swarm of them caused a landing shuttle to crash three planetary daylights ago.

“And the acid storms? Why did you not warn us of them?”

“I mean, they’re annoying,” the human says, shrugging, “but we figured the cool sunsets made up for it.”

Grahssk’ti flails helplessly. “What about the ten-meter tall Fanged Death Bringers? They can eliminate an entire settlement in under an hour!”

“They’re so cute!” the human says, brightening. “Have you met mine? Her name is Spot!”

Humans are told of some planet or region of space that is considered “completely and utterly inhospitable - it would be folly to try and settle there.”

Without fail, a decent number make it a point to settle there because “Fuck You That’s Why.” It doesn’t matter how uneconomical it is, how difficult the conditions are, how utterly ridiculous it may seem, there will be at least one human who will attempt to do it only because someone else regardless of species says it is improbable or WORSE impossible. 

“This moon is still forming as such it is primarily soft - by that I mean most of the magma is close to the surface and-” ‘OH BADASS you mean its like Mustafar right!?!?!?! I’m totally going to build a castle there.’ “What. I mean. There is NO fertile ground there whatsoever. No ecosystem. It is molten rock and minerals only.” ‘Which will make my castle there look METAL AS FUCK am I RIGHT!?!??! Come on. COME ON. I TAUGHT YOU HOW TO FISTBUMP COME ON.’ “….you….you are going to die, you know this right?” ‘I’m getting the feeling you don’t want to come to Lava Castle for some reason?’

“Listen, lad. I’ve built this kingdom up from nothing. When I started here, all there was was molten magma. All those aliens said I was daft to build a castle on a molten planet, but I built it all the same, just to show ‘em. It sank into the magma. So, I built a second one. That sank into the magma. So I built a third one. That spontaneously combusted, turned to ash, then sank into the magma. But the fourth one stayed up. An’ that’s what your gonna get, lad – the strongest castle in this solar system.”

“I’m gonna need for you to explain ‘hurricane parties’ to me again.  You humans have the technology to track these apocalyptic storms of wind and rain and predict where on the landmass they’ll hit up to a week in advance.  And you…have social gatherings during them?”

“Well yeah, but only up to about Category 3 strength.  Then it’s time to pack the car and head inland for most people, although a few hardy souls stick around and ride them out.”

“Oh good.  Category 3 is what again?  Winds up to 75 kilometers per hour?”

“No no, Category 3 starts at 175 kilometers per hour.  You left off the one.”

I’m sure I’ve reblogged some version of this before, but I needed the STRONGEST CASTLE IN THIS SOLAR SYSTEM on my blog.

“This planet is so cool!”

“It’s a planet completely made of ice.”

“Yeah! Let’s send some scientists! Or I could be the youngest person there!”

“You’d die, it’s below freezing level!”

“But the blizzards are so pretty!”

“The storms of dEATH ARE NOT PRETTY!”

“No, of course not.  Nobody ‘sent’ anyone, they just went up there on their own.”

“They WHAT?”

Oh my fuck nuggets, the actual thread

@hellsite-hall-of-fame

I HAVE BEEN SEARCHING FOR THIS THREAD FOR MONTHS

This is truly amazing. I love humans.

@hellsite-hall-of-fame

I remember reading this post chain long before I wrote on this site. Always reblog the OG humans are weird/space Australians post.

Btw if I say things like “by god” or “good lord” in posts please be aware I don’t mean it in a catholic way I mean it in a 1950s scientist reacting in horror after they create an evil creature in the lab set in the distant future year of 2005

io che nonostante sia atea dica “grazie agli dei” e simili perché si io non credo in niente ma miliardi di persone hanno religioni e dei differenti ed io non voglio far sentire escluso nessuno

im frankly lucky the above reblog is about how theyre an atheist because there is nothing more terrifying than saying something slightly blasphemous and seeing a paragraph of italian in your replies

The union busting firms are scared

As a fine dining cook, I found work in a union workplace around a year ago. My 40 hours a week are guaranteed except for Jan/feb/mar when there’s not enough customers, I get paid almost twice what I did at any other restaurant, if I work overtime, (more than 8 hours in one day, or more than 40 in a week), I actually get overtime pay, (and it’s 1.5x my normal rate!). I get holiday pay, and in addition I get to either bank or pay out my holidays if I work those days, (either a paid day off when I want it, in addition to the holiday pay, or I get paid an add’l 8 hours at 1.5x that week). I also get two floating holidays, 4 paid random sick days, 2 paid family sick days, and 4 paid “doctor’s note” sick days, (paid out by our health insurance), as well as general allowance to take as many unpaid sick days as I want without worrying for my job security. (I’ve been told that taking multiple months off is where we start to be concerned about abuse, so if I want to do that, I can go through our leave of absence procedures instead, where I’m allowed three 2-week periods a year generally for whatever reason I want, (If my manager wants to disagree, he has to get the union president’s approval), and after that it’s up to my manager to decide if he’ll accept them). I get two weeks of paid vacation time a year, and an add’l week per year for every 5 years I work there. We get our legally mandated breaks, which, I know that sounds like a low bar, but taking anything other than a smoke break in a kitchen?!?! Unheard of! I get two 15′s and a lunch every shift! I get to sitdown and rest my legs and not get flak for it! I get a bonus at the end of the year, there’s official procedures for if my manager isn’t happy with me or wants to get rid of me, (three meetings, during which my union representative has to be present), (and getting rid of my classification doesn’t work, there’s rules for how someone ‘bumps’ other people if classifications are gotten rid of), and severance pay for when full-time employees that are downsized out of the company, there’s a pension plan, like . . . Guys, I have a 40-page handbook which details all of the rights my union has won me, and believe me, I’ve never had any of these at any prior workplace. And you know what my union dues are? $4 a paycheck. Of course I’m going to pay my union dues for all of those benefits.

Reblogging for this incredibly thorough explanation of what it's like to actually have a contract in place at a union workplace. I reblog a fair number of posts about how people should organize, but if you're like me, you might not know exactly what that can get you until you've actually gone through the process. Every contract is different because you bargain for what makes sense for your particular workplace, and every few years you re-negotiate with the employer to improve things in the next contract, but some things (like the right to have union representation when you talk to your boss about leave or discipline) are universal.

It's worth every penny of your dues, I promise.

The wealthy state should provide. Desperate economic straits are a construct of capitalism.

it's literally insane to me that if you steal enough televisions you can go to prison forever. like we effectively go "okay your life is less important to me than a panasonic TV". we literally value property more than human life

ok so this post is insane right? like the concept of imprisoning someone forever because they've stolen TVs is really crazy right. ok now replace "televisions" and "panasonic TV" with FOOD. you can go to prison forever if you steal food to survive. if you literally are like "i'm going to starve to death if i don't steal this food" and then get caught enough you can go to prison forever.

Prisons are inherently and ideologically unethical. Prisons exist to house society's undesirables and create a slave labor force that is legal. The "violent offender that needs to be housed away from society" is a myth used to proliferate this concept. Criminality is a symptom of social inequity and can be solved with better social and economic infrastructure. Abolish prisons.