I was definitely a profit killer when I worked in a pharmacy (which honestly was my favorite job in the entire world, but it was short-lived and nowadays you can’t work at a pharmacy like that, it’s all tied in with corporate retail and no one should ever trust me with a cash register ever). It was not, however, actually a profit killer for the pharmacy, just for the drug companies, so no one cared. These days I do medical billing, which means I actually bill OUT from hospitals so I’m mostly spending my professional time taking money away from insurance companies.
I will now impart all of my profit killing resources onto you, in case you don’t know them. I think most of you know them, now. But just in case you don’t.
THIS IS US-CENTRIC. I’M SORRY.
1. GoodRx – this thing has an app now, so you can look up the best places to get your expensive medicines at the lowest possible prices without insurance on the go, and you no longer have to print coupons because you can just hand over your phone or tablet. Times have changed for the better with GoodRx. Definitely use it before trying to fill your scrip, because it will tell you the best place to go. (You can do that on the website, too.)
2. NeedyMeds– Needymeds is basically the clearinghouse of drug payment assistance. They have their own discount cards, but also connections to many patient assistance programs run by drug companies themselves. They are good assistance programs, too.
3. Ask your county – This is not a link. This is a pro tip. Most county social services will have pharmacy discount programs for people with no and/or shitty pharmaceutical coverage. You can often just find them hanging around at social services offices; you can just pick one up and walk off with it.
4. Ordering online – There are a few safe online pharmacies. I keep a little database in a text file on my computer. Most of them are courtesy of CFS forums, my mother or voidbat, so a lot of that is a hat tip to other people, but if you’re in need of a place to get a drug without a prescription … first I’ll make sure you 100% know what you’re doing for safety reasons and then I’m happy to turn over a link.
5. Healthfinder– A government resource that helps find patient assistance programs in your area. This might also point out the convenient county card thing. RxHope is something a lot of people get pointed to via Healthfinder that’s a good program.
6. Mental Health America – Keeps a list of their best PAPs for psychiatric medications, which can be some of the most expensive and a lot of pharmacy plans don’t cover them at all.
This is so important ppl.
Signal boost the shit out of it!
Booooooooooooooooooost
Good Rx Saved my family a hundred dollars a month while I was getting signed up for CHIP seriously it’s a life savor especially for ridiculously expensive drugs like abilify
Useful info, friends! 😉
Since many of our followers are on medications, I feel like this would be an important resource. -Luna
Also! Some drug companies have patient assistance programs where they send you the drug for FREE if you are uninsured, or if your insurance doesn’t cover that drug.
Do a Google search for “patient assistant programs” + (your med), or search the manufacturers website. Sometimes the info is online; other times you have to call.
Even some of the big name pharma companies have this. It’s certainly not all companies, or all meds, but it is worth a shot.
Before Obamacare, I lost insurance and couldn’t pay for my mood stabilizers (kiiiiinda important to have those when you’re bipolar.) I was on generic Lamictal, but I went to the official Lamictal website, filled out a form with a valid prescription, and they mailed my meds to me every month for free.
If you know anything about bipolar disease, you know that that was a literal life saver. Patient assistance programs ftw!
This is so important given the recent vote to repeal Obamacare. And the cartoon above is so on point They’re literally voting to kill people. Literally.
Some of my meds are no longer going to be partially covered by my ridiculously expensive private insurance. I just used the GoodRX website to look it up, and I can either spend $40 at Target to pay for one of them out of pocket–per month–, or I can get it at Sams Club for $4. No that is not a typo. The drug I need to take every single day to keep my allergies from spiraling out of control (yay auto-immune bullshit) is literally ten times cheaper at Sams Club. Holy shit.
I am a gamer. I followed the call of Cthulhu and ran in the shadows with hackers and shamans. I traversed the ancient lands of Greyhawk, Faerun, and Eberron with companions new and old. I swung from an airship and buckled swash over London for the Kerberos Club. I threw dice and flipped cards and ground men into dust playing table-top wargames.
I don’t do that anymore.
Since July of 2015 fans of the game Malifaux have been attempting to overwhelm me with death and rape threats for no other reason than I am a woman who has opinions on the game. Wyrd Miniatures is silent on this matter and hangs up whenever anyone attempts to discuss the harassment. Given that a large number of threats identify the senders by name as Wyrd staff members, I do not find this surprising.
Birdie and I are SO lucky to have our local game shop, which is owned and run by guys who actively promote a safe, inclusive atmosphere for women, minorities, and trans and queer people. (the store is Critical Hit Games in St. Petersburg, FL btw and if you live in the area I highly recommend them.) I have literally been asked my pronouns without any prompting, because they noticed that my gender presentation and name weren’t the general combination you expect and they wanted to make sure I felt welcome and comfortable.
Like, seriously, it’s so nice to walk in there. It’s majority white and majority male, most days, but not by the huge margin you’d expect – our usual D&D table is 3-4 girls, 3 guys, and me (nonbinary), one of our favorite DMs is a woman in her 60s, and one of my favorite guys to play with sometimes brings his 11yo daughter, and she’s a complete sweetheart. I’ve never felt unsafe or unwanted, and I know that if one of the guys did harass me, the employees would not be okay with that and would do something about it.
But the important thing to know is that we lucked out. One of my friends I met at CHG is trans, and he checked out one of the other nearby stores before he came to us. It was 100% straight white male, and my friend passes thanks to transitioning in his teens, and he said that he was DISGUSTED by the shit that these guys were talking about and doing in their games.
We are lucky. Most non-white non-male gamers are not.
Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. Do justly NOW. Love mercy NOW. Walk humbly NOW. You are not obligated to complete the work but neither are you free to abandon it.
Lo Alecha haM’lacha Ligmor, veLo Atah Ben-Chorin leHivatel Memenah / לֹא עָלֶיךָ הַמְּלָאכָה לִגְמוֹר, וְלֹא אַתָּה בֶן חוֹרִין לִבָּטֵל מִמֶּנָּה / It is not your duty to complete the task, but nor it is your freedom to withdraw from it
– is something which is not shared nearly enough, something which is not repeated nearly enough, something with is not SHOUTED FROM THE FREAKING ROOFTOPS nearly enough.
The sexualization of little Asian girls, especially Japanese, Korean, and Thai, is honestly so revolting. These girls can’t even wear their school uniform without being turned into some Western dude’s Lolita fetish. And you know what, “fanservice” anime where the girls are tiny and innocent but still highly sexualized doesn’t help the problem. It’s not “just a cartoon” because media doesn’t exist in a bubble. It contributes to the harm of real little girls because Western men go overseas to rape young girls who are being trafficked precisely because of the prevalence of this fetish through media. Stop the sexualization of innocence, school, and youth and let these girls have a childhood without gross adult men getting off to them.
@notallbees Remember that thing you were saying (that no one wanted to hear) about the demeaning implications of expressing attraction by saying “I’m so gay”? I feel like this is as neat a real-life demonstration as you could wish for.
The reason this guy thinks “I’m gay for you” would be a sweet thing to say to his girlfriend is because 1) in classic homophobia, gay connotes attraction that manifests not only in the wrong direction, but also to an excessive, unseemly degree; and 2) toxic masculinity proscribes emotional displays from men. To him and many others, gayness is emotional incontinence; silly, over-the-top, can’t-help-yourself, embarrassing-everyone-around-you, blushing infatuation. To them, a gay man is a perpetual teenage girl. This is how a straight boy can carelessly launch himself at the massive hurdle of necessary cognitive dissonance involved in looking at a girl and thinking, Wow, I’m so into her it’s like I’m gay!! and soar over it like a bald eagle in a snapback.
Vera Rubin, the astrophysicist responsible for confirming the first existence of dark matter, died on Sunday night at the age of 88.
Carnegie Institution president Matthew Scott called Rubin “a national treasure as an accomplished astronomer and a wonderful role model for young scientist.”
Rubin and her colleagues observed galaxies in the 1970s, they learned the motion of stars is a result of a “material that does not emit light and extends beyond the optical galaxy” — also known as dark matter.
Swiss astrophysicist Fritz Zwicky proposed the idea of dark matter in 1933, but Rubin’s groundbreaking work subsequently led to the confirmation of the material.
This finding is what led to the discovery that 90% of the universe is made up of dark matter, a finding some colleagues felt was overlooked and deserving of a Nobel Prize. Read more
Must be nice to be a man and feel absolutely zero guilt or concern while you sit on your arse in front of the tv as your wife frantically runs herself into the ground with the never ending grind of holiday cooking/cleaning/gifting/wrapping/decorating/tidying/arranging/crafts/familial politics
it always bewilders and offends me that at family gatherings all of the women are up cleaning, cooking, clearing the table after dinner, bringing snacks out, etc., and all of the men are just relaxing and sitting around. I’m also up cleaning, clearing peoples’ plates, etc., because I’m expected to do that as a female, while my male cousins get to sit around and chill. Even the male relatives that I like just sit around and chat and don’t seem to notice that my sister and I are constantly being called into the kitchen and they’re not.
so anyway yeah if you’re a male you should seriously try to pay attention to who’s doing all the work and who’s allowed to sit and chill (probably you) and maybe like, get up and insist on helping…
Last Christmas every time I was given a job to do I’d go into the lounge room and take note of how many grown men were standing around, beer in hand, doing nothing (usually about 6), and I’d go back to the person who gave me the job and let them know the names of all the men who also needed jobs to do. This year two of my male cousins joined me helping out in the kitchen, so progress. Don’t accept the status quo, give the boys and men jobs as well.
My dad and brother are not bad at all but the lack of intuition and guilt in male behaviour at these times always astounds me.
(And I am totally stereotyping, I have make friends who I know think just like I do about this).
I can be lazy as hell but I just don’t the ability to not be aware that my mum is in the kitchen sweeping up or something and that I should go and help.
The male ability to not see female work sometimes is incredible.
And there’s a fair amount of comments on this along the lines of ‘tell the men what to do’ or ‘give people jobs’ which kind of misses the point of the problem, certainly of the post. Why should women and girls be the cross mummies telling off the men? We want to be carefree and drunk and all of that too.
Families are communities where people should be attentive to each other’s need for support. Women tend to be better at that only cos they’re socialised to be.
And to those people saying ‘don’t bitch on tumblr just tell them what to do’… we do. But we (those of us who are into men) also resolve never ourselves to be with men like our dads, however much we love them. It’s just not acceptable to be this kind of man any more, and neither do women so readily accept it’s their job to school men on How To Adult. If you’re a heedless shit of a man, women now are less likely to roll their eyes and forbear. They just won’t go out with you.
And if any young women need to hear it… be very wary of boyfriends you see taking this attitude to their mum at home. Don’t let them turn you into the next woman who looks after them. Your time and energy are so precious. And even if you love domestic stuff, skills for cooking, hosting and homemaking are real skills – not to be wasted on people who take them for granted.
*wades cautiously into the wank-infested waters of Fan Discourse, pulls out megaphone*
AS FANFIC IS PRODUCED FOR FREE, IT’S KIND OF SHITTY TO COMPLAIN ABOUT ITS LITERARY QUALITY OR THE FREQUENCY OF UPDATES. THESE ARE COMMERCIAL EXPECTATIONS THAT CAN’T BE FAIRLY APPLIED TO WORKS CREATED AT AND FOR NO COST.
THAT BEING SAID:
AS FANFIC IS PUBLISHED FOR PUBLIC CONSUMPTION, IT’S KIND OF DISINGENUOUS TO COMPLAIN ABOUT READERS HAVING CRITICAL REACTIONS TO THE CONTENT. CRITICISM IS A LITERARY REACTION THAT CAN’T BE FAIRLY DENIED ON THE BASIS OF WHETHER OR NOT THE WORK COST MONEY.
THAT BEING SAID:
REGARDLESS OF WHETHER A WORK IS COMMERCIAL OR FANNISH, GOING OUT OF YOUR WAY TO SEND HATE OR CRITICISM DIRECTLY TO THE AUTHOR IS A DICK MOVE. YOU CAN DISCUSS THE CONTENT, MERITS AND/OR FAILINGS OF A GIVEN WORK WITHOUT THE NEED TO MAKE THEM AWARE OF YOUR FEELINGS. EVEN WHEN A WORK IS CREATED COMMERCIALLY, CREATORS ARE NOT BEHOLDEN TO THE PREFERENCES OF INDIVIDUAL FANS, NOT LEAST OF ALL BECAUSE THIS IS A PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE STANDARD FOR ANYONE TO MEET. SOME WRITERS ARE HAPPY TO BE MADE AWARE OF CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM IN WHATEVER FORM, BUT MANY EXPRESS A PREFERENCE NOT TO SEE ANY, OR PREFER TO DO SO ONLY AT CERTAIN TIMES. IF YOU’RE NOT SURE, ASK FIRST. THIS IS BASIC COURTESY, BOTH PERSONALLY AND PROFESSIONALLY.
THAT BEING SAID:
SOME INTERACTIVE ONLINE SPACES – SUCH AS AO3, GOODREADS AND TUMBLR – ARE FAIRLY USED AND INHABITED BY BOTH CREATORS AND READERS. AS THESE SITES ENCOURAGE READER RESPONSES AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT VIA COMMENTS, REVIEWS AND REBLOGS AS A BASIC FUNCTION, IT’S GROSSLY UNREALISTIC FOR CREATORS POSTING IN THESE SPACES TO EXPECT TO ENCOUNTER ZERO CRITICISM EVER. SOMEONE EXPRESSING ABUSE OR UNWANTED COMMENTARY DIRECTLY TO A CREATORIS NOT THE SAME AS READER/READER ENGAGEMENT TAKING PLACE WHERE THE CREATOR CAN SEE IT. YOUR MILEAGE MAY VARY AS TO WHERE THAT LINE EVENTUALLY BLURS, BUT THE POINT IS THAT IT DOES BLUR AS A MATTER OF COURSE, AND THAT THIS IS A FEATURE RATHER THAN A BUG – ONE THAT WE ALL HAVE TO LEARN TO NAVIGATE.
THAT BEING SAID:
THE FACT THAT SOMEONE HAS WRITTEN SOMETHING THAT YOU FIND QUESTIONABLE, IMMORAL OR OTHERWISE AWFUL DOESN’T MEAN THE CREATOR SHOULD LOSE THE RIGHT TO CREATE MORE THINGS, OR THAT SUCH WORKS OUGHT TO BE ILLEGAL. YOU ARE WITHIN YOUR RIGHTS TO OFFER UP CRITICISM OF THE WORK ITSELF, THE TROPES IT EMPLOYS AND THE CONTEXT OF THEIR USAGE, BUT THE PROBLEM WITH ADVOCATING FOR THE TOTAL BAN OF PARTICULAR TYPES OF CONTENT IS THAT FICTION IS INHERENTLY LIMINAL. GIVEN THAT DEPICTION DOES NOT EQUAL ENDORSEMENT AND THE FACT THAT THE IMPACT OF A NARRATIVE IS ULTIMATELY DETERMINED BY THE INDIVIDUAL READER, IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO BAN ALL STORIES WHICH USE “IMMORAL” DEVICES UNCRITICALLY WITHOUT SIMULTANEOUSLY BANNING STORIES WHICH EXAMINE AND ACKNOWLEDGE THEM IN DIFFERENT WAYS, AND THAT’S BEFORE YOU TRY TO GET A ROOMFUL OF PEOPLE FROM DIFFERENT COUNTRIES, CULTURES AND BACKGROUNDS TO AGREE ON WHAT “IMMORAL” MEANS IN FICTIONAL CONTEXTS IN THE FIRST PLACE, WHICH DEFINITION IS NEVER GOING TO OVERLAP PERFECTLY WITH WHAT “IMMORAL” MEANS TO THE SAME PEOPLE IRL.
THAT BEING SAID:
THE FACT THAT FANFIC IS FREQUENTLY WRITTEN IN THE SPIRIT OF NARRATIVE COUNTERCULTURE DOESN’T STOP IT FROM CONTRIBUTING TO THE SPREAD OF TOXIC TROPES OR STEREOTYPES THAT ARE ALSO PRESENT IN MAINSTREAM CULTURE AND/OR COMMERCIAL MEDIA. DEPICTION IS NOT ENDORSEMENT, BUT IT IS PERPETUATION, AND THE FACT THAT SOMETHING WAS WRITTEN FOR FREE DOES NOT MAGICALLY BALANCE ITS POTENTIAL NEGATIVE IMPACT AT EITHER AN INDIVIDUAL OR COLLECTIVE LEVEL. WRITING FIC IS OFTEN DESCRIBED AS A HOBBY, BUT AS IT IS LARGELY A SHARED ACTIVITY UNDERTAKEN WITHIN A DEDICATED COMMUNITY, IT IS A PUBLIC HOBBY, AND CAN THEREFORE POTENTIALLY IMPACT MORE PEOPLE THAN JUST THE INDIVIDUAL WRITER. KNITTING IS ALSO A HOBBY IN WHICH INDIVIDUALS CAN INVEST A GREAT DEAL OF TIME AND FEELING – AND, INDEED, MONEY – BUT IF SOMEONE IN YOUR KNITTING CIRCLE STARTED BRINGING IN SWEATERS THEY’D MADE EMBLAZONED WITH RACIST SLOGANS, THE IMPACT OF THIS ACT ON OTHER GROUP MEMBERS WOULD NOT BE AMELIORATED BY THE REMINDER THAT ‘IT’S A HOBBY’. IF THIS IS A VIABLE DEFENCE, IT IS A DEFENCE THAT CAN BE USED EQUALLY BY THOSE WHO WANT TO ACT WITHOUT CONSIDERATION FOR OTHERS IN THEIR COMMUNITY AND THOSE WHO WISH TO ENJOY THAT COMMUNITY WITHOUT FEAR OF BEING PERSONALLY DISPARAGED, AND IS THEREFORE LESS A DEFENCE IN EITHER CASE THAN A STATEMENT OF FACT WITH NO ACTUAL BEARING ON HOW TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM.
IN CONCLUSION:
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN GOOD MANNERS, PERSONAL POLITICS AND FREEDOM OF SPEECH IS A COMPLEX ONE. IN THE WHOLE OF HUMAN HISTORY, NOBODY HAS YET SOLVED IT TO THE PERFECT SATISFACTION OF ANYONE OTHER THAN THEMSELVES, AND WHILE THAT DOESN’T MEAN THERE ISN’T A BETTER SOLUTION TO BE HAD IN THE FUTURE, I GUARANTEE THAT NEITHER CREATIVE ISOLATIONISM NOR BLANKET CENSORSHIP WILL GET US THERE, BECAUSE THE ONE THING BOTH THOSE POSITIONS SHARE IS FEAR OF CRITICAL ENGAGEMENT WITH A PERSON WHO DISAGREES WITH YOU, WHICH IS THE ONE THING YOU ABSOLUTELY NEED IN ORDER TO PROGRESS A DISCUSSION PAST WHATEVER STALLED YOU IN THE FIRST PLACE.
*flings megaphone into the distance, dons portable sharkcage, wades irritably back to dry land*
Using your Presidential transition website to promote your own business properties is not normal.
Calling for millions of federal employees to sign nondisclosure agreements apart from standard government forms is not normal.
Blasting journalists with product placements for the labels your child, who is on your transition team, is wearing is not normal.
Having a wide range of senior figures in your own political party distance themselves from your transition team, citing the profound irregularity of it and worrying about future ugliness, is not normal.
Placing your children in charge of your business empire, then placing them on your transition team, then seeking top secret security clearances for them, is not normal. The conflicts of interest that this represents are almost too many to count, but at a basic level: you do not give someone with a financial interest to work against U.S. policy access to sensitive information — at all, ever.
Putting one’s children into senior positions of a government is the behavior of a banana republic, not a constitutional democracy with strong institutions. This is not normal.
For a president who ran on his business acumen to refuse to disclose his taxes to the public, which in turn denies anyone the ability to see if financial conflicts of interest are driving his policy decisions, is not normal.
Asking if he can decline the President’s salary, so as to avoid paying taxes, is not normal.
Owing hundreds of millions of dollars in business debt to a foreign bank and refusing to fully divest yourself from those finances is not normal.
Ascending to the White House while your eldest son, who is also on your transition team, and for whom you also seek a top-secret clearance, seeks out seven-digit business deals in Russia, is not normal. When Russia then names the President elect an “honorary Cossack,” it is not normal.
Asking a hostile foreign intelligence agency to hack into the emails of your opponent in the campaign is not normal. Refusing to comment while they expand those hacks into other institutions is not normal. Watching that same government’s propaganda network dramatically change its tone in order to benefit the incoming president is not normal. That this foreign government is also the subject of numerous investigations into the President elect’s improper business conduct is not normal.
Threatening to cut off Europe from NATO if payment is not received, like a gangster demanding protection money, in a way that benefits said foreign government, is not normal.
Chanting for the summary imprisonment of your political opponent despite repeated conclusions that she has committed no crime is not normal. Refusing to back down from that call to summarily imprison her is not normal. Essentially suggesting a show trial before you’ve even assumed office is not normal.
Hiring an avowed white supremacist and proud antisemite to be the chief of strategy at the White House is not normal. That the new White House chief strategist has bragged, openly, of his desire to destroy the United States is not normal. That the cofounder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center raised money for this is not normal.
Staff participating in authoritarian victim-blaming and antisemitic conspiracism is not normal. Collaborating with cable news channels in that antisemitic conspiracy about protests is not normal.
When one of the new administration’s most senior proxies and spokesmen calmly discusses committing war crimes in the Middle East, it is not normal. When he is shortlisted for the Department of State — despite lobbying for terrorists who killed Americans, despotic regimes in the Middle East, and the tyrannical government of Venezuela — it is not normal.
When that proxy is simply following in the footsteps of the new President-elect, who has called for reinstating torture and summarily executing the families of alleged terrorists, it is not normal.
The leading candidate for the department of education (who himself has no background as an educator or in education policy) openly suggesting to censor speech on universities is not normal. Nominating an oil executive as the Secretary of the Interior is not normal. Nominating a climate change denialist funded by the oil industry to run the EPA is not normal. When the leading candidate for Defense Secretary having a long history of openly racist comments toward his own staff it is not normal.
The FBI intervening decisively in the last week of the election to alter its outcome for one candidate is not normal. But the FBI refusing to address the president elect’s violation of sanctions against a communist country is also not normal.
When a woman accuses a presidential candidate of having raped her as a child, but then refuses to go forward with her allegations because of a barrage of death threats yet still receives almost no media coverage, it is not normal.
It is not normal for a president-elect to have 75 pending lawsuits against him, ranging from business fraud to illegal hiring practices. It is not normal for his lawyers to demand those lawsuits be delayed until after his inauguration for not discernable reason other than to retreat behind the immunity of the office.
Relentlessly attacking the legitimacy of the media (to be distinguished from criticizing media conduct) is not normal. Threatening to sue the media because you don’t like being criticized is not normal.
Being so steeped in the language of fascism that you and and your staff mirror Hitler (“make the trains run on time“), appeasing Hitler (“America First“), or Mussolini (“drain the swamp“) is not normal.
Trying to appoint an attorney general who was once called “too racist to be a judge” is not normal
Steel Phoenix Studios 