I gotta naysay here. Seatbelts do a LOT of harm. Not everyone can wear one and not everyone wants to risk it. Just among my own friends and people I know in general; 4 females had a breast cut completely or partially off due to a seat belt. 6 people had their throats cut, to an obviously non-lethal degree. 2 had their stomach’s cut open to a horrifying degree that I won’t elaborate on.
Not even counting the uncomfortably awkward belt locations for particularly large, small, fat, skinny people. Females with large breasts get the joy of holding the belt in place or adjusting it every couple seconds.
They’re awkward, uncomfortable, painful, and can often cause the injuries in an accident. Sometimes it’s just better to forgo the belt.
Those injuries caused by seat belts more than very likely would have been deadly had they not been wearing them. To have enough force to cut skin or cut off a breast in an accident is far more than enough to cause someone to go flying through the windshield of a car, to slam them into the steering column, or through a window resulting in deadly injuries or causing an even bigger accident for other drivers now that your body is in the road along with your crashed car. Are you really going to risk being a smear of ground meat on the pavement because your seat belt was a little uncomfortable or it might cut you? Then I got good news for you, there’s a wide variety of devices made specifically to make seat belts more comfortable and reduce that risk.
These make it so that your seat belt won’t cut your neck, a simple sleeve of padded fabric that velcros around it, meaning you can put it anywhere on the belt.
This one does something similar, by readjusting the positioning of the seat belt to move it farther away from your neck and hey, helps a bit with having boobs in the way.
They even make ones for children too.
Boobs still in the way? While it’s pretty silly looking, this helps keep the seat belt in place so you don’t have to keep adjusting it.
And if you’re overweight, they make seat belt extenders so you can still be safe.
But maybe you’re still unsure, then listen to the CDC and all of their sources.
“More than half of the people killed in car crashes were not restrained at the time of the crash.1 Wearing a seat belt is the most effective way to prevent death and serious injury in a crash.Seat belt use is on the rise. Laws, education, and technology have increased seat belt use from 11% in 19812 to nearly 85% in 20103, saving hundreds of thousands of lives. “
“Most drivers and passengers killed in crashes are unrestrained. 53% of drivers and passengers killed in car crashes in 2009 were not wearing restraints.1Seat belts dramatically reduce risk of death and serious injury. Among drivers and front-seat passengers, seat belts reduce the risk of death by 45%, and cut the risk of serious injury by 50%.4Seat belts prevent drivers and passengers from being ejected during a crash. People not wearing a seat belt are 30 times more likely to be ejected from a vehicle during a crash. More than 3 out of 4 people who are ejected during a fatal crash die from their injuries.5Seat belts save thousands of lives each year, and increasing use would save thousands more. Seat belts saved almost 13,000 lives in 2009. If all drivers and passengers had worn seat belts that year, almost 4,000 more people would be alive today”
The number of those who escaped injury [by wearing a seat belt] increased by 40% and those with mild and moderate injuries decreased by 35% after seatbelt legislation. There was a significant reduction in soft tissue injuries to the head. Only whiplash injuries to the neck showed a significant increase.”
Fifty-five percent of those killed in passenger vehicle occupant crashes in 2008 were not wearing a seat belt…”
“Wearing a seat belt reduces the risk of fatal injury by almost 50%. For children, the risk of fatal injury is reduced by 71% with the use of child safety seats.“
“Of those thrown completely out of a vehicle in a car crash, 75% died. Only one percent of people totally ejected from their cars had on a seat belt during the crash. Over 30% were not wearing seat belts.“
Conclusion? Wear your fucking seat belt. Tell your kids to wear their fucking seat belt. Tell your friends and family to wear their fucking seat belts. Time and time again it’s been proven that you are significantly more likely to survive a crash if you’re wearing one. Most people think they’re uncomfortable, but when you’re in a crash it can save your life. I’d rather be mildly injured than dead.
Wear your seat belt.
2017 and people are still trying to spread the myth that you don’t need to wear a seatbelt.
People really don’t wear a seatbelt????
This reminds me of a story from WW1
When they first introduced Helmets to the troops fighting in trenches the number of head injuries suddenly skyrocketed and people wanted to take the helmets away again.
Until they realized that the reason for this was the fact that most of these head injuries would have been fatal if it wasn’t for the Helmets.
Not entirely willingly, mind. I was young, religious, and I made
the naïve mistake in thinking that all Christians were like the ones I had
encountered at my home church: warm, tolerant, kind. I fell in love, and we did
what young, hormonal Christian teenagers did: rushed into a marriage.
I realized my mistake almost immediately, but it took far
too long to get out.
Personally, I endured abuse at the hands of my new husband—mental,
physical, sexual, economic, emotional. You name it, he did it. Brutal is an
understatement. He systematically broke me down until I was a shell of a human
being. I’m still dealing with the emotional fallout and physical side effects,
and I probably will be for another decade at least.
That’s personally, but let’s talk his family. Because he was
an extreme case, yes, but he was raised with the idea that women existed to
keep their mouths shut and their legs open. I spit out two children faster than
I could whip my head, because birth control wasn’t part of god’s grand plan for
my life. I was fulfilling my purpose as a mother, and wasn’t that great? My
husband didn’t want the first baby. He wanted me for himself, see? Abortion was
unthinkable, but he fully expected to carry a baby—my baby—to term, then give
it away.
Keeping him was my first rebellion. Keeping the next one was
my second.
In the time I belonged to that family, I watched my
mother-in-law endure the same, though less extreme mistreatment. I watched every
young female family member be groped by the family patriarch. “That’s just how
it is.” I was shamed for making a fuss about it. I watched an older cousin try to sexually assault my teenage
sister-in-law and she was the one who
felt ashamed. We women made family dinners while the men sat on their asses. My
husband and I lived with his parents for a short time. She and I would go to
work each morning—an hour each way—with our husbands sitting in their robes in
the living room, playing video games. When we returned hours later, weary,
exhausted, they hadn’t moved. The standard greeting? “What’s for dinner.”
That’s his family, and yes, some families are sexist, but let’s
talk about church. That’s where all of this is validated, encouraged, taught. Imagine
my shock, when I went to my new husbands’ family church and encountered muted
xenophobia and racism, a heavy dose of homophobia, and some damned overt sexism
(see above.)
Equal roles, but different. Sound familiar? This is still
being taught to little girls today.
In church, I listened with quiet disgust as pastors preached
about how awful my sister—one of the gays—was. I piped up and asked how that
sexual sin was any different than the two young church kids who’d just been
caught “in a bad way”, soon to expect their first baby. Sexual sin is sexual
sin, isn’t it? I sure did get an earful for that one. We did church boycotts:
Disney, Target. Every Sunday School class: Job, cookies, and lets pray God
saves the moos-lims before they all come over and blow us up. We revered
people with white savior complexes who went to be jesus’s hands and feet and
save the poor, helpless Africans.
Hate and ignorance, wrapped up in the holy Scripture.
Hallelujah.
Meanwhile, I endured this abuse. This abuse, and every door
slammed in my face as my husband hit me, tortured me. “Stay true to your vows,”
the pastor would say. “You have communication issues,” our sister-in-law
would tell us. My mother-in-law: “Linds, you just have to accept it. Love is a
choice.”
“But what about the part where it says that husbands are to
love their wives like Christ loves the church?” I asked.
My brother in law, joking: “This is why women aren’t
supposed to speak in church.”
This America is alive and kicking, kids. It’s never gone away; it’s just been lurking,
behind closed doors. “Pass the casual racism and meat loaf, would you? And get
me a glass of water while you’re up. Ketchup, too.” What I’m scared about,
truly, is that I know this. And these ideas are now validated. Now mainstream. Almost
50% of our population believes this is
a good idea.
“It’s our time to take America back.”
What in the hell, if they’ve been saying these things behind
closed doors, and if they believe them In The Name Of God—what in the hell are
they going to say in the open, now? What in the hell are they going to do?
The 50s are revered as the aspirational yester-year, days
gone by. Progress, as we call it, is godlessness to them. We, the godless libs,
took Jesus out of schools. We’ve gone wrong ever since.
This is the America people want back, and that’s my first
fear.
The second is this:
I got out. And I’m terrified that this, my success story,
won’t happen anymore.
I’m the rare statistic. I un-brainwashed and educated myself.
I got counseling (against every Christian advice) to treat severe post-partum
depression. In the process of becoming a healthier person, I realized
what a goddamn mess I was.
It took three tries and a pastor-pseudo-therapist legitimately
telling me, “You know if he hits you again, Linds, I’m going to have to tell
you to leave.”
All regretful, like it was bad news.
“Why should I stick around and wait for it to happen again?”
I asked.
He didn’t have an answer. I left the next week.
It took a few boldfaced lies (it’s temporary, it’s just a separation), and a few miracles, and a
large support system of family and friends who all but plucked me out of that
hell.
For leaving? My price was excommunication. From his family,
our friends, our church. I am the heathen who Divorced my Husband and broke our
home. In that entire city, only three people talk to me now.
(No loss, but it took a long time to recognize that.)
I never, ever would have made it on my own. I had two small children,
a new job that barely paid a living wage, and I was, as I’ve said, a shell of a
human being. I left him and went straight to the human services office. Without
subsidized childcare, healthcare, and food supplements, we would have starved
or been homeless. It never would have been possible.
These are the services that will probably be cut first.
How will anyone in my situation ever be able to leave? They
won’t. Not to mention federal funding for shelters, crisis counseling for
families, healthcare for abused women, and legal services for domestic violence
victims. Throw in a court system that doesn’t value women, and a cultural mentality
that believes what happens behind closed doors should stay behind closed doors… What hope do abused, trapped women have? None in hell.
If this is what makes America great again, I want out. I’ve
been there, done that, and I’m never, ever doing it again.
You’ll take it back over my cold, lifeless body.
This is the dark, dirty secret of Amerika: Women are not free.
First Home in the U.S. specifically for sex-trafficked boys is set to open in late 2016. Of course neighbors pulled a stink and tried to get the house shut down before it even opened.
The founders are still trying to take donations to help cover maintenance costs. You can find more information about this ministry and donate here.
OOOOH THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT FOR MANY REASONS
Excellent
I CANNOT believe how much resistance they’re facing.
People are worried about their property values when these young boys have literally been sold as sex slaves and raped and abused in who knows how many other ways. They just need a safe place to heal and protection while they testify against their abusers so we can put the actual criminals in prison.
And people are worried about them “taking their medicine” like we’re trying to cure them of something. These are trafficking victims. But apparently people are more worried about these boys than they are about making sure the people who abused them go to prison.
Oh man, as soon as I get a little extra money I’ll be donating to this fine cause because this is just fucking great. I hate all the shit they’re getting for it, but shit or no shit I want to support these people.
This is very important
I love that every few months this post gets another surge of notes, and now is good a time as any to give an update.
In late Fall last year, the area of North Carolina where this house is set to be opened experienced a lot of very bad flooding. This has set them back. They wanted to be open by now, but they have finished restoring the house and are now working on furnishing it so they can open soon.
The link above is broken, so here is an updated one. You can see they now have a registry for Target and Walmart open. If you want to donate by buying items they need to furnish it, you can do so this way.
never NOT reblogging this. When people say this, they’re implying that a mans natural state is ‘rapist’ – that when they see a woman, they must CONTROL themselves so they don’t rape them – as if they have no control over themselves because they’re some sort of sexual beast.
A good thread on whether “queer” is a slur and if it should be used or not.
“If I am unashamed of being queer, you do not get to give that word BACK to the fuckwits who made it a slur.”
you do not get to give that word BACK to the fuckwits who made it a slur
EVERYBODY WHO CAME OUT BEFORE YOU HAS TAKEN THE ROCKS AND BOTTLES AND MADE THEM INTO SHIELDS AND WINDCHIMES
Holy motherfucking shit. Don’t fucking come at me about Queer is a slur. I FUCKING KNOW IT IS. It was hurled at me like a fucking spear all through my youth. I know it’s a god damn slur. And it’s mine. You don’t get to take it away from me because you can’t take also away the scars it gave me while I was standing in front of my younger queer siblings in this community.
always, always reblog this one.
If my enemy swings a sword at me and I take that sword away from them, it’s my sword now. And the person telling me I can’t use it because it belongs to my enemy and I have to give it back to them sounds quite a bit like an enemy themselves.
i can’t wait to see this shithole of a nation burn to the ground!
“A coroner in western Illinois is facing sharp criticism for how he handles poor people who can’t afford to bury their loved ones: He has them sign over their rights to the deceased, leaving them without the death certificate, then cremates the body and keeps the ashes until the family pays $1,000.If they cannot come up with the money, the ashes are eventually buried, along with others, in an unmarked grave. If the family needs the death certificate to access bank accounts or life insurance, the coroner first arranges for the county to recoup its costs from any proceeds.“
What if birthmarks are the places that actually killed us in our past life? Like there’s this girl from school whose birthmark is a line on her neck. What if her throat was cut? I know this guy who has his birthmark on his whole left cheek. What if he was shot? My little sisters birthmark is a line straight down her stomach. What if she died on the operating table?
“The officer who fired the fatal shots at the 16-year-old, however, was cleared of all charges by a grand jury.”
W T F
There is absolutely no justice in this. First of all why is he being tried as an adult?
basically the reasoning behind this bs is that he was an accessory to murder because he was involved in the robbery, which “caused” the officer to have to fire his gun. laiketh was offered 25 years if he plead guilty, 65 if he took it to trial. (long sentences like this are basically used to scare people into pleading guilty.) he decided to fight (because, you know, he didn’t actually shoot anyone) but he lost. it’s so sad and stupid.
“I don’t think Mr. Smith will be smiling long when he gets to prison,” District Attorney C.J. Robinson said. “We are very pleased with this sentence. Because the sentences are consecutive, it will be a long time before he comes up for even the possibility for parole, at least 20 to 25 years.”
This adult is speaking with joy about sentencing a 15-year old kid to prison for the rest of his life, knowing full well the kid isn’t guilty for the crime he’s being punished for, because it was proven to be the police who murdered his friend.
there is no grain in this that isn’t the most absolute form of evil , and C.J Robinson deserves to die
HOW DO YOU SENTENCE SOMEONE FOR ACCESSORY TO MURDER AND THEN LET THE (FOLLOWING THE CHAIN OF LOGIC) MURDERER GO FREE????? WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK IS THIS FUCKED UP LEGAL SYSTEM OVER THERE IN THE USA??
Fifteen. He is fifteen.
We live in a horrific dystopia and I hope someone gets this kid the fuck out of prison. Somehow. I will even accept “through a hole in the prison wall and successful, permanent escape to a country that doesn’t have extradition treaties.”
if you are not in fandom and you see somebody in fandom describing themselves as ‘anti-pedophilia’ or ‘anti-abuse’ I want you to take a moment and apply some critical thinking to that label.
who has to explicitly state they’re anti-child molestation or anti-abusing people? Is this not the normal position? This is like saying ‘I’m anti-cancer’. of course you are. Even actual child molesters and domestic abusers are going to claim they’re morally opposed to what they do in the dark, when they think they can’t get caught.
And if that’s the case, do you really think that self-described ‘antis’ are running into open opposition for their views on pedophilia or incest? do you really honestly think that’s likely? Do you really, honestly think a bunch of people leading otherwise normal lives are going to bat for child sexual abuse and beating your spouse? OPENLY going to bat for it, even?
Is it remotely realistic for there to be such a huge amount of unmaskedsupport for csa, rape, and abuse that people have a reason to label themselves as ‘anti-pedophilia’ or ‘anti-abuse’?
Or … is ‘anti-pedophilia’ actually code for being anti-something else? Something that isn’t utterly reprehensible to the overwhelming majority of people. Something that people would reasonably be willing to go to bat for with their name and reputation attached.
Which is more likely: that fandom is overrun with people who unapologetically and openly support child molestation, incestuous rape, and domestic abuse? Or that people who say they are ‘anti-pedophilia’ – a position so normal, so common it’s hardly worth mentioning – are signaling they oppose something actually controversial to oppose?
Just something to consider.
Interesting concept.
Sorry but am I having a stroke or
so there’s a thing people will do where they want to campaign against something, but if they were honest about what the thing is, they wouldn’t be able to garner much support. they can’t say “I’m against romantic YA literature” or “I’m against porn” because people won’t back them as readily. so what they do is attach a buzzword that people are automatically sensitive to and try to connect the two. “romantic YA lit” becomes “pedophilia”, “porn” becomes “abuse” etc etc, even though they’re not remotely the same thing.
you see this happening all over fandom now, where fanworks exploring dark themes, or adult ships with an age gap, or even real life adults engaging in consensual kink play, are all labeled “pedophilia” in an attempt to make an emotional argument against them. the actual definition of pedophilia, as a serious mental illness causing attraction to prepubescent children, is completely ignored in favor of watering down the word to apply to anything that makes certain people uncomfortable. and this is really dangerous, because it creates alarm fatigue and causes confusion over what this word actually means, which leads to real world cases of child abuse being ignored or misrepresented.
making a big deal about being “anti-pedophilia” is like hollering about being “anti-slavery”; of course you’re anti-slavery, what kind of society do you think you live in where that’s something you need to broadcast! certain people cultivate the impression that fandom is full of abusers and predators so that they can hold the moral high ground and use that leverage to police how others engage with fandom, and they misuse the terms for very serious crimes to do so. that’s what this post is about.
thank you so much for this excellent, level-headed explanation of the point I’m trying to make. (My own addition was less eloquent and much more ‘loud’.)
there are a few reblogs from fandom antis on this post now as well. their reactions have shown me something that I hadn’t fully considered: that many anti-shippers actually buy their own press to the point that they genuinely believe things like:
saying they are ‘anti-pedophilia’ is the same thing as saying they are against the inappropriate sexualization/objectification of teenagers
there is no difference between fandom being full of objectified teens wrestling with their own objectification via fanworks and the objectification/sexualization of teenagers in mass media
it is inappropriate to ever acknowledge or address that adolescents can have sexual desire or sexual feelings and express those feelings
simply acknowledging that adolescents can have sexual desire or sexual feelings and are capable of expressing those feelings (in fiction or irl) is the same as justifying adults who have inappropriate interactions with adolescents irl
no matter what the reason for its creation, fanworks containing fictional adolescents having sexual feelings or sexual interactions of any kind are exactly the same as objectification/sexualization of adolescents in mass media and have exactly the same effect
I knew that fandom antis conflate fiction and reality (and fanworks and mass media) because it makes their cause look much more legitimate and builds the assumption that people who defend fanworks are proponents of awful things irl: that’s literally what this post is about. but the reblogs on this post make it clear that fandom antis either can’t or won’t distinguish between a fanfic writer depicting child molestation and a real life pro-contact MAP or a person who collects and consumes cp of real children.
They can’t or won’t tell the difference between a person who has been sexualized and objectified their whole life against their will now sexualizing and objectifying a fictional character (which, being fictional, can’t even be hurt by it) and a person who sits at the top of a media empire and authorizes a line of ads that uses sexually provocative images of real people to sell a product.
They can’t or won’t differentiate between interest in nsfw fanworks about fictional, animated characters based on ‘looking good together’ or ‘interesting character dynamics’ who happen to be assigned adolescent ages, and interest in a porno film that kinks on a character being young and inexperienced.*
(*in the sense that interest in the porno may be founded on objectification/sexualization of teens, just as purity culture kind of drives up the ‘value’ of inexperience and youth and the taboo of sex as inherently corrupting. the porno itself would be a symptom of the problem more than the cause, imho.)
it’s all the same to fandom antis. they believe their own hyperbolic labels because from their POV, all of these things are equally dangerous, equally corruptive, and equally present in fandom. (Which I guess makes sense, seeing as anti-shipper rhetoric is predicated on black and white thinking. when you can only depict concepts in two shades of morality, it’s hard to see or care about nuance.)
Steel Phoenix Studios 