Heads-up Boston-area antifa! This is probably a good time to remind everyone to take common-sense security precautions when reaching out to antifa groups you don’t know IRL.
When a player is accused of assaulting a woman, perhaps the team doesn’t have to trot him out, front and center, every time it holds an event. Maybe we don’t need to schedule a bobblehead night for a player accused of raping a woman before the police investigation is completed? It’s possible a trial for domestic battery should be a disqualifier for being named first star that particular week.
Currently, the league and teams pretend everything is hunky dory and practically dare anyone to mention accusations against a player. When one does dare question a team’s handling of an accusation, a dedicated hoard of online attack-dog fans routinely threaten and harass the interloper into silence. It works out great for the NHL.
From time to time, NHL teams make announcements that they’re “reaching out” to female fans in an attempt to grow the fan base. Women don’t want “ladies nights,” pink jerseys or Hockey 101 sessions with the hottest players. What women do want is to feel that the league and their team values them as much as their male counterparts.
That starts with the way the league addresses violence against women.
This used to be prominent slang within the community, and I don’t hear it much any more, at least not in my corner of the world. I remember times in which I was approached in public and someone asked, “are you in the family?” And proceeded to ask me about the local gay scene when I said yes
My coworker just reminded me of this. He’s an older gay man that is often afraid to be himself because of homophobia, but we’re getting close so he’s pretty open around me, as a fellow “member of the family”. Another gay guy we work with did something pretty flamboyant, so my coworker looked at me and said, “that’s family”
I mean I just love it it was definitely a term used during a time when homophobia was pretty severe, but you were safe around your “family” you could be yourself with family
Plus can you imagine how much “”“family values”“” conservatives would lose their minds it’s a win win
Yeah! This was used by the gaggle of older queer folk I hung out with in Montgomery, AL back in the day. Reminds me of better times… Which is hilarious because they weren’t actually better it was just we huddled together in abject terror of the world instead of knifing everyone who was a slightly different flavor of queer like we do these days lol
Oh my goodness, is this old enough that people don’t remember it anymore? It was definitely the vogue term when I was coming up as a wee baby queer. It doesn’t work in all contexts, but I was sure it was still in use in places, at least.
(It did used to cause some confusion. I asked a gay friend once if someone was a family member and they thought I meant also-gay rather than what I actually meant which was ‘Is he related to you’?“ lmao)
a friend of mine is a science educator. not a classroom teacher – he does the kind of programs you see in museums, fun experiments with lasers and dry ice and shit.
yesterday, a young girl asked him why he was allowed to pour liquid nitrogen all over his own arm but he didn’t want her doing it. I braced myself for some dumb “well I’m an adult so I’m allowed” non-answer, but instead he surprised me by giving some of the best science (and life) advice I think you can give a young person:
“well, it’s one of those rules designed to keep you safe. and following the rules really can help you stay safe, but they’re not perfect. sometimes, usually because they’re too simple, the rules let you do things that aren’t safe, or don’t let you do things that are safe if you know how to do them. one of the reasons I’m good at what I do as a scientist is I try to understand how things work so I can figure out my own rules for keeping myself safe. and sometimes my rules are little more complicated than what I might hear from other people, but they work better for me. like, I let myself play with liquid nitrogen, but only in really specific ways that I’ve spent time practicing. you should follow the rules you’re given at first, but if you take the time to understand how things work, maybe you can make your own, better rules.”
I loved this response. it’s a great encapsulation of two really important things I think people need to learn and re-learn all the time: on the one hand, listen to genuine authority figures; when someone knows more than you about a subject, don’t treat their expertise as “just another opinion” and act like your ignorance is just as good as their knowledge. but on the other hand, don’t obey anything or anyone blindly. recognize that rules and systems and established ideas are never perfect. question things, educate yourself, question things more.
and then, of course, a parent had to butt in and spoil this wonderful lesson by saying:
“but not the rules mom comes up with!”
everyone in the room laughed. except me. I gave her a death glare I’m pretty sure she didn’t notice.
because no. no. your rules are not above reproach if you’re a parent. the thing about the dictates of genuine authority figures – people who deserve to have power, and to have their positions respected – is that they are open to question. genuine authority figures are accountable. governments can be petitioned and protested and recalled. doctors must respect patients’ right to a second opinion. journalists have jobs terminated and credentials revoked if they fail to meet standards of integrity and diligence. scientists, to bring us back full circle, spend their entire careers trying to disprove their own hypotheses! you know who insists on being treated as infallible? megalomaniacal dictators, that’s who. oh, and parents.
I’m beyond sick and tired of this “my house my rules, this family is not a democracy, I want my child to think critically and stand up for themselves except to me ha ha” bullshit. my friend gave this kid the kind of advice that doesn’t just help people become good scientists – if enough people adopt the mentality he put forth to that girl, that’s the kind of advice that helps societies value knowledge and resist totalitarianism. and her mother shut it down because, what, she didn’t want to deal with the inconvenience of having someone question her edicts about whose job it is to wash the dishes on Mondays?
we already know you’re more likely to be a Trump supporter if you’re an authoritarian parent – and that this is a stronger predictor of your views on the current president than age, religiosity, gender, or race. I’ll say this another way in case you didn’t catch the full meaning: people who believe in the absolute, unquestionable authority of parents are more than two and a half times as likely to support Trump as people who don’t, and that’s just among Republicans. we can’t afford to treat the oppressive treatment of children or the injustice of ageist power structures in our society as a sideshow issue any longer. the mentality that parents should be treated by their children as beyond reproach and above dispute is a social cancer that has metastasized into the man currently trying to destroy the foundations of democracy in this country.
in short: parents, get the hell over yourselves before you get us all killed. and kids, learn as much as you can, and then make your own rules.
Ppl be like “ I want an actual male gem, not just Steven.”
Jeez, it’s like having only one character
to represent your whole gender
in a group composed all of another gender
is a bit upsetting huh?
I wonder
what
that’s like
no really
can you
even imagine
what this lack of representation
MUST
FEEL
LIKE
This
post
isn’t
long
enough
none of the listed shows are named after the one female character, either
it’s actually physically impossible for me to not reblog this post.
I want to say I’ve reblogged this before, but I’m reblogging again for the brilliant addition of, “None of the listed shows are named after the one female character, either” because FUCKING THANK YOU.
mmmmmhm.
Every time I reblog this, there are new shows on the list.
Wow
it’s almost
as though
this happens
almost constantly
But normally you don’t notice, because it’s not about you.
– It was a pack of 15 people driving cars/trucks decked out in confederate flags, banners, and US flags. All 15 are being brought to justice, and this is just the latest news on the whole debaucle. – They did this in a predominately black neighborhood. – The caravan passed a public park, and these two schmucks decided to take a detour over to a group of black people – These people were a family having a birthday party for their kids – The witness concensus of what they did when harassing the party was “yelling racial slurs and displaying a crowbar, a knife and either a rifle or a shotgun". – Threatening the lives of children likely earned some brownie points with the judge and lengthened their sentences. – Georgia has some strict laws regarding gang activity, which applied to a large group of armed individuals actively setting out to harass a community with very openly racist motivation. – On top of the sentence, these two are also banished from the county this incident occurred in. This means they’ll also have to sell or give up property they own. – I’m seeing a lot of people try to argue this is unjust because they have the right to ‘freedom of speech’, but I hope that’s just because these people defending it haven’t read any of the details. This is not freedom of speech, it is domestic terrorism, and was labeled as such by the police.
The intent of anti-trans “bathroom bills” is not to make trans women use men’s rooms, or to make trans men use women’s rooms. No one really wants that. No one is even trying to pretend that things would be okay if we used the “correct” bathrooms but still dressed and acted like ourselves.
The intent of these bills is to drive trans people out of the public space entirely.
Toy manufacturer Lego Group has
announced it will be creating a set of Legos based around the women of
NASA, Community Specialist Hasan Jensen wrote in a blog post for the company on Tuesday.
The idea for the project was originally pitched by Maia Weinstock, who submitted it to Lego through the company’s Lego Ideas program.
The set will include five women who contributed to NASA’s
mission, including computer scientist Margaret Hamilton, mathematician
Katherine Johnson, astronaut Sally Ride, astronomer Nancy Grace Roman
and astronaut Mae Jemison, the first African-American woman to enter
space in 1992. Read more (2/28/17 5:53 PM)
“Much like Jimmy Kimmel, however, Americans are socially conditioned to feel the most empathy for what white folks are losing rather than for what black folks are rightfully, finally winning. Certainly Kimmel was not being malicious when he said to the La La Land producers, “I think you should just keep it anyway.” He felt bad that anyone should have to lose in such a public way. But notice that what Kimmel didn’t say is, “Let’s get Moonlight up here right now and let them have their moment.” His empathy, like that of many others, went towards the people who looked most like him on stage.”
Steel Phoenix Studios 