Can I watch a great film knowing the actresses in it were terrorized and mistreated the entire time? Can I watch a football game knowing that the players are getting brain injuries right before my eyes? Can I listen to my favorite albums anymore knowing that the singers were all beating their wives in between studio sessions? Can I eat at the new fancy taco place knowing when the building that used to be there got bulldozed eight families got kicked out of their homes so they could be replaced with condos and a chain restaurant? Can I wear the affordable clothes I bought downtown that were probably assembled in a sweatshop with child labor? Can I eat quinoa?
Can I eat this burger? Can I drink this bottled water? Can I buy a car and drive to work because I’m sick of taking an hour each way on the subway? Whose bones do I stand on? Whose bones am I standing on right now?
On one hand, it’s a privilege to be able to choose to acknowledge these horrors or not–we’re going to acknowledge that privilege. On the other hand, I once attended a lecture by the explorerer-conservationist Jacques-Yves Cousteau’s daughter and son and they had a lot of opinions about what we could do to help the environment and the ocean and I talked about how in my country, we have to drink bottled water, because it’s a desert and there’s only salt water all around, but we’re contributing to pollution and all of these things…
And she looked at me and told me not to fall into the trap of “activist guilt.” I couldn’t remember the exact words, but, it was the first time I’d heard the term and it took a weight off my shoulders.
We do what we can. It’s so much better than giving up entirely or not doing anything at all because we can’t do it perfectly. It doesn’t benefit anyone in the end if we just sit around feeling guilty about every little thing in life. I’d just joined tumblr back then (haha, so like, eight or nine years ago at this point?), I was being exposed to way more than I’d ever been before (I was previously just into feminism and animal rights/wildlife conservation/environmentalism since I was a kid), and it was weighing on me.
As long as humans are humans and living flawed lives, many consumed by greed, there will not be anything in this world untouched by evil.
I usually avoid stuff that says it was made in China or other cheap looking knockoffs, out of fear of them being made in sweatshops (now, I know even a lot of big brands use those…), it’s exhausting. Then, I read something about how people who actually lived and worked in those would still buy this cheap stuff and how this shocked the foreigner reporting on it, but they just looked confused like, it’s what they can afford and them avoiding consuming it isn’t going to change the whole system from the ground-up.
… it went on about how “money talks” and choosing where to put your money still feeds the whole capitalist system and is nearly a way of comforting yourself, but you not buying doesn’t mean everyone else isn’t. What needs to be tackled is at a much higher level than any of us can reach.
Of course, I’d still, given the choice, give my money to companies I agree with and I’ll boycott what I know to support awful stuff, but I also feel no superiority over this and know now it’s not as black and white or easy as I thought it was.
This is the same reason that moral purity “you can’t enjoy [x] because it’s Problematic ™” is such nonsense, because nothing is pure. There’s something bad about everything if you dig deep enough. As long as we lived in flawed human societies we’ve got to make the best of what they offer us. If you have the choice and means, please, do support those who do good, but also, don’t beat yourself up over not living up to an unattainable ideal.
No one can. You’ll just make yourself so miserable, you either burn up and stop fighting entirely or you’ll make yourself a non-productive, depressed heap just out of a bleeding heart left unchecked. You can’t make a change to this world if you refuse to engage in it.
This is what Republicans try to demonize for political gain. Think about it.
“Death Panel” is an easy manipulation. Know why? Because death is FUCKING SCARY! For everyone involved – patient and family.
Know what else? Hospice care is FREE for Medicare and Medicaid patients. And it’s typically covered by private insurance at a high percentage (and realistically, if you qualify for hospice care, you’ve likely already met your deductible).
Here are some (American) hospice facts:
– hospice care is for anyone who receives a prognosis of six months of life or fewer.
– hospice care isn’t just for cancer or dementia patients. Any life-ending diagnosis qualifies for hospice care.
– hospice care isn’t just for elderly. Again, anyone who has a life expectancy of six months or fewer should quality for hospice care.
– every licensed hospice provider is required by federal law to use a team approach. The team includes the medical director (who is an MD), nurses (RNs and LPNs), CNAs, social workers (MSWs), chaplains, and volunteers. These people are death experts.
– the RN case managers see everything. EVERYTHING. Every imaginable living condition, every insane family dynamic, and every conceivable physical condition. They know wounds. They know symptoms. They know pain. Can’t poop? Ask a hospice nurse. I guarantee they’ll have a dozen recommendations, including their own secret recipe for a “brown bomb” or “crappuccino” or “loosey goosey”. They all taste like garbage, but YOU WILL POOP!
– hospice CNAs are maybe the most gentle people on the planet. They care for a patient like they’re caring for their own grandparent. They’ll wipe your butt and wash your armpits. They’ll hold your hand and cry with you. They’ll sing to you or paint your nails or trim your ear hair and they’ll do all of it without an ounce of judgement.
– hospice social workers know death. Lots of families hear social worker and think family drama. That’s not what hospice social workers do. (Though they do that too, when necessary.) They help with anything not directly medical. Moving the patient from the hospital to home? The social worker can help with logistics. Questions about money? The social worker probably knows, or knows where to send you for answers. Need help with a living will or DNR? Ask the social worker. Terrified about what the final moments might be like? The social worker can walk you through what to expect.
– a patient or family can choose hospice care at any point, whether immediately after receiving a diagnosis or within hours of death. Obviously, the longer the hospice team is involved, the better they can guide the patient and family along the journey.
– hospice care can be revoked at any time, should the patient or family choose to seek active treatment or discontinue the care. Hospice care can be reinstated as well – it’s typically just a matter of paperwork.
– here’s what Medicare and Medicaid cover for free
the team home visits (home is considered wherever the patient currently lives, whether it’s the hospital, a long-term care facility, or their actual family home)
the medications needed to treat the symptoms of the qualifying diagnosis, plus the pain management meds and anything else the medical director prescribes
supplies – bed pads, diapers, gloves, bandages, etc
equipment – hospital bed, oxygen, lifts, etc
room and board isn’t covered if a patient is in a facility – that cost falls to the family.
Choosing hospice care isn’t giving up. It isn’t a death panel. It isn’t euthanasia. Choosing hospice care is acknowledging the reality that time is limited and that the patient deserves expert, specialized end-of-life care.
Hospice care is a choice. It’s not that surprising that Republicans are anti-choice.
Everyone going shopping on Black Friday, be aware of three things:
The retail workers are working 12 hours shifts. We are threatened with losing our jobs if we don’t show up unless we’re dying in the hospital. I had an assistant manager show up with fucking strep because he would’ve been fired otherwise. Yes, he did infect 7 and hospitalize 2 coworkers; who knows how many members of the public he infected.
The stores have, maybe, 5 of that special cheap thing you’re after. Corporate does this on purpose, and stores are not allowed to order enough. The prices aren’t even that much lower. They lie about how expensive something is to fool you into thinking you’re getting a discount. You aren’t.
Most of the workers you will come across will be new hires for the sole purpose of being bodies for about three months before they’re fired. They actually don’t know anything because they’ve been working there for maybe two weeks, and have had no real training. I was once hired at Staples a week before Black Friday and expected to know how to deal with phones, coupons, the online ordering site, and AS400 after five 6-hour shifts. This is the kind of person you will likely be dealing with at Black Friday.
Do me and my retail family a favor and don’t shop Black Friday. Any company that needs a sale day like Black Friday to get their sales out of the red doesn’t deserve to be in business.
This also goes for anyone that works shipment too. We’re suddenly expected to stay as late as they want you to even if they know you don’t have a car and rely on a ride to get you to and from work and know you can’t stay late. Shipment workers will suddenly start getting berated for not getting things done and it is by far the most stressful time to be a shipment worker for any store. Especially when they throw in new hires that don’t know how to process things and are expected to work at the same pace as the people that have worked there for a while.
Retail is shit around the holidays, especially Black Friday
ok fellow millenials, it’s time to kill black friday
the DA didn’t make the case for the crime and i went into the deliberation room knowing that. i also knew a half-dozen white orange county folks might not see it that way. the defendant was latino, there was a gang charge in addition to robbery.
sure enough, as we went around the table to give our first impressions, the white ladies used language around “gut instinct” and “he shouldn’t be hanging out with bad people” and the like. others were undecided because there was so much unreliable testimony.
they got to me and i flatly said “i have reasonable doubts.” i stated some of my reasoning and heads started to nod. the next 3 jurors to talk after me were hispanic. they stated that they understood why this might be confusing, and then gave some personal perspectives about growing up in disadvantage neighborhoods, how not everyone is a gangster just because they live there. one white lady said “well, you know, they should really move if that’s the case.”
the discussion opened up and it went right to gangs, right to how the defendant shouldn’t be hanging out with gang members. everyone had an opinion about how the defendant looked, or talked, or that he was drinking a 40 just before the robbery, or that he was related to a gang member. they went right to that.
but that’s not what we were supposed to decide on. we were there for a robbery as the primary charge. a robbery that i very clearly felt the state had not be able to pin on this guy.
so… being the loud mouth that i sometimes am… i interrupted and said “let’s all turn to page 14 in the jury instructions and go through what would make the charge ‘guilty’, line by line, and see where we all stand.”
sure enough, when we focused on the actual charge, and the facts actually required for someone to be found guilty, most in the room agreed it wasn’t there. well, except for two white ladies.
so i, also a white lady, helped to walk them through the list. when “gut instinct” or “it’s a bad neighborhood” came up, i kindly pointed out that those are not facts of the case. when i requested that they use the facts of the case to provide reasoning for their position, they both quietly agreed there weren’t any.
and that’s how, in about an hour, we came to a unanimous decision of ‘not guilty’.
i don’t have experience with the court system. and i don’t watch court room based tv dramas. so i was really a blank slate to all this.
i was taken aback at the very clear inherent bias that some jurors displayed, and all the while realizing they didn’t think of themselves as bias. but i was also taken aback by how focusing on the process, the rules, and the facts quickly squashed that line of reasoning.
this has buoyed me a bit, in light of the actions of the aclu over the muslim ban. but it also feels so fragile. so very fragile.
And this is exactly why I have never tried to get out of jury duty. We need clear thinking, intelligent people on juries. I get so frustrated with people I know who are always looking for a way out of serving.
somebody offer this hero a cape
Fellow whites. THIS IS WHAT WE SHOULD BE DOING.
Which means -get yourselfs on juries-. Don’t skip jury duty. Don’t skip don’t skip don’t try to sneak out of it, get on that jury, and make sure you are keeping all the other white people in line.
So anyway I saw Bohemian Rhapsody (2018) yesterday and I liked it a lot. It made me emotional, I was mouthing along to the songs, Rami malek is fucking wonderful. Queens a big BIG thing in my family and so I know that there were some historical inaccuracies but honestly? It was a fun, inspiring portrayal of an amazing man. Its well shot, the actors are great. Maybe the dialogue gets clunky but it’s still good.
And then I see that it’s only got 50 odd percent on Rotten Tomatoes which, whatever, critics suck. THEN I read a review to see what everyone’s mad about and let me tell you I am fuming.
I read an economist article that worried that stopping other biopic in 1985 “might prevent an excellent performance from being a prize-winning one, of the sort that earned Oscars for Tom Hanks in “Philadelphia” (1993) and Matthew McConaughey in “Dallas Buyers Club” (2013).”
What. The. fuck. One of my favourite things about this film is that it didn’t show the horrible, pain-porn, graceful and yet horrific decline into aids that every other film about queer men in the 80’s milks out. The LGBT community knows about the aids crisis. Everyone knows that Freddie died of AIDS related illnesses. I’m so fucking sick of gay tragedies.
I loved this film because instead of being a glorification of his death it was a celebration of his life. You want to know when Freddie Mercury informed the public he had AIDS? The day before he died. He didn’t want to be a poster boy, a spectacle. He was a person outside of his illness.
Queer people don’t exist to die peacefully on your screen, leaving you with a hopeful majestic quote about how really everything’s going to be a alright. Growing up gay I truly thought I wouldn’t be able to be happy. Why? Because in every portrayal of a queer character they either died horribly or died alone.
So yes. I like this film. I like having a film about a queer person that focused on their life instead of their death
Reblogging this because I have been absolutely dreading the end of the movie, knowing that it was going to get into the gory details, or at the very least knowing that it was going to show him looking like every other fucking victim in the 80s and I knew I would have to cry the ugly tears because AIDS still evokes such a visceral reaction in me. (Watching half of your family die of that disease will do that to a person, but i DIGRESS.
THANK YOU op for writing this because honestly, we don’t need another sad AIDS story.
We need a story that celebrates a band and its leader for all of the joy they’ve given us, all these years on.
Steel Phoenix Studios 