It’s interesting how diseases rip through schools at incredible speeds despite being in an arguably modern, clean(ish) environment. I wonder if it has something to do with the whole “you need a doctor’s note to excuse your absence of even one day” combined with the average price of going to a doctor, the lack of education on things like “you’re still contagious even after the fever goes away”, and the overwhelming message of “if you don’t struggle through it, you’re a failure!”

On my campus there tends to be a problem where even I you have the doctors note professors will still take points off of your final grade regardless of how sick you are. I’ve seen people show up to class with the stomach flu, pneumonia, respiratory infections and all sorts of other contagious ailments.

Here’s a fun story:

The school system I grew up in put an absolutely ungodly amount of pressure on kids to Show Up Every Day No Matter What. Many schools are like this, but looking back, my town’s was borderline fucking dystopian. They asked me why I didn’t just “postpone” a surgery at one point— when I was fifteen— to give you an idea of how monumentally obtuse these people were.

So, in elementary school, I started having chicken pox symptoms, right? They were mild because I was vaccinated (yay!) but my mom recognized them quickly and took me to the doctor, because my mom is a reasonable human being with standards. The doctor said “yup, you’ve got those pox, it may seem mild but please for the love of god DO NOT take her to school, she is very contagious even though she may FEEL okay.”

So I had to stay home from school until I got clearance from my doctor to go back. I was an angry little gremlin the whole time, because I wanted to go to the school library and read books about the human skull, but my mother said, “no, you cannot leave this house, and do not scratch the bumps please.” So I sat at home and tried not to scratch the bumps, like a good little gremlin.

A few days into my Chicken Pox Related House Arrest, we got a letter from the school. I was far from the only person with chicken pox, as it so happened. Like… a tenth of my second grade class had Confirmed Pox. We all fell ill within DAYS of each other.

So how did this happen, you ask? Well, a kid had chicken pox, and he came to school anyway. “Ah, well perhaps they didn’t know,” you may very well say. “Maybe his parents didn’t notice!” No. No, they noticed. In fact they KNEW it was CHICKEN POX. They sent him to school anyway.

The kid’s parents…….. were, in fact, teachers at the school. And they KNOWINGLY made him go to school sick, because they didn’t want to risk hurting his precious “perfect attendance” record. They figured that since he wasn’t, like, Literally Dying, it was better for him not to miss school. Never mind the fact that they were actively endangering hundreds of little kids.

Fast forward to my freshman year of college. A kid came to class with mumps because he ‘couldn’t afford to miss’. Guess what happened? Mumps outbreak! Diseases are, as it turns out, good at being diseases! Vaccinations are phenomenal, but they can only do so much, and some people rely on herd immunity to not be killed by preventable illness.

This entire attitude needs to die. It’s dangerous. Food service workers are forced to show up sick, little kids are forced to show up sick, college students show up sick because they’re afraid of flunking out.

And on top of it all, misinformation campaigns are encouraging people not to get vaccinations! It’s 2019 and we’re flirting with the plague! Next thing you know some blogger is gonna be like “actually we should all be fucking rats and eating our meat raw, death to all science and god bless america”

Many kids at my school will show up really sick because we only get like three days of excused absences without a doctor’s note.

this is what those in literary academia call “foreshadowing”

(note the dates)

please god above can someone explain to me why we're still working on self driving cars when trains exist

"we're training them to interpret road signs!" Train goes same place every day. No road signs.

"when forced to choose between old lady and child, which is more ethical for the car to hit?" Fence around train track. Nobody on the road.

"people with disabilities preventing them from driving themselves can be independent" Yes but also. Train.

"reduces the dangers of fatigue with long distance trucking" Train.

"the technology is not yet price effective for the average driver" Train.

Seriously come on choo choo bitches let's goooooooooo

We will never invent a car that's as eco-friendly as increasing our rail infrastructure.

for the redditors coming here, this is how we spread news of important events in the world, with a Destiel meme

For everybody who's been here a while and felt like Wiley E. Coyote just after running off the edge of the cliff when they scrolled down to find nothing below

The Adorable Spider-Nyan

across the spiderverse must have really flipped some timeline irl because this is the first time I've seen a character in media engineered as tumblr sexyman material (faceless, overly personable, quirky mannerisms, awkward and goofy but also dangerous, hole) ignored for the actual handsome character. feeling like someone's middle aged dad rn going "isn't this spot guy kind of like sans? I thought you and your friends loved this kind of thing" to my son who is lining the walls of his room with pictures of miguel ass.

Snesbian comic I made for a pride-themed washi tape collection you can get here. the final thing is in the shape of stamps and it comes together like this:

PSA for Across the Spiderverse:

Do NOT see the new Spiderverse movie if you have any form of epileptic condition or conditions affected by bright lights and rapidly changing colors.

I will not be spoiling the plot or anything happening in it, but it is important that people know, because ohhh my god the AMOUNT of flashing lights and rapidly changing colors from beginning to end was so rampant that even I, a non-epileptic autistic person, got a severe headache and wild overstimulation. They do not give a warning in theaters at all that this movie is NOT epileptic friendly from the literal beginning with the beginning credits - which is so, so sad!

This is a beautifully made film, it's wonderful, it's amazing, but unfortunately, it's not a good time for anyone super affected by bright flashing lights in rapid succession, especially those seizure prone.

I wanted to put this out there BECAUSE there are no theater warnings. Idk if anyone else has put it out there, but it is SUPER IMPORTANT!!!

I wish you all a lovely day and hope they eventually have a remaster that will be much more friendly to epileptic and other people affected by bright, flashing lights.

[plaintext: Do NOT see the new Spiderverse movie if you have any form of epileptic condition or conditions affected by bright lights and rapidly changing colors. /end plaintext]

an important update:

The ability to turn the post above you into the speech bubble of a character of your choice is an essential weapon of tumblr pvp.

— My phonetics teacher, a phonetician with a Ph.D.

my dad took some ancestry tests and eventually found out who his father was (and that he has 5+ siblings who are also finding all of this out) and honestly it's been pretty bizarre and emotional so far, naturally

but one of the biggest changes for me is no longer having to give the whole spiel of "oh i know i'm racially ambiguos but hey there's a whole story behind it because this that and here's my father's backstory"

like no i... i just have a grandpa from Nigeria now

...that's way less mysterious >:(

edit: my brother has made a tiktok on the whole situation

Congratudolences OP, your family are hilarious

put your hand in front of your cat and

sniffs it: gentle nature

press its face into: loving nature

bites it: a warriors heart

I am once again explaining that in order for walkable cities and public transit to work for disabled people, there also need to be more public bathrooms available in and around those areas. Not just places to sit down or rest. Bathrooms. We need accessible, clean bathrooms. With sharps bins. With multiple wheelchair accessible stalls. With an area to set down supplies needed to maintain one’s body. Even if it’s not being used to get rid of bodily waste, bathrooms are one of the few spaces disabled people have to maintain some sort of privacy when they’re in the middle of a flare up or they need to take medication or what have you. Designing a public space? Include bathrooms.

we really need to start telling people ‘dont feed the trolls’ again because ragebaiting is getting like. disturbingly effective on the internet again even to young people who should know better

we need to put all train autistics in office and any government positions possible so they can eviscerate the automobile industry

As climate change increases the temperature and makes larger portions of spring and summer days unbearable we can, must, and should bring back and universalize the siesta. I want to clock out after lunch and go tf to bed. Humanity already solved the "it's too damn hot out to work" problem in tropical and subtropical societies the world over and more than ever we need to unionize for naptime.

they should invent a future that is livable and comforting instead of so so scary all the time forever