As-tu rempli ta vie de belles choses ?

— Ruth Hubbard, “The Political Nature of ‘Human Nature’“ (via gothhabiba)

Yes.

Here, have a study (x) showing that mothers underestimate their daughter’s physical capacity from as young as 11 months old (though in reality it’s identical to that of their son’s at the same age). And if you think that parents acting on those expectations won’t alter their children’s development, then I have a sloped bridge to sell you.

#people always massively underestimate just how good even very young children are at reading social expectations#long before any kind of intellectual understanding has the chance to develop#and so a lot of “oh but you were so normal as a child”-nonsense is like#yeah i was “normal” because i could tell what you expected of me even if i didn’t know why#even small children learn what’s “taboo” for them really fucking early on#but people keep pretending like it’s all nature#but it’s not#there’s so many things i wanted to do as child i never did because i knew on some basal level *weren’t allowed for me*#i never even asked#i knew it wasn’t allowed#something something “playing seal” for those who get the reference#expectations have real physical effects#bias has its own gravity#and most people have a choice between orbiting or crashing#because it’s very hard to leave it altogether

screw it im not leaving this as tags after all

still can't believe that the french prime minister wants middle schoolers to now stay at school from 8am to 18pm each week day in order to reduce juvenile delinquency

oh and if they are troublemakers (whatever the hell that means), it will be written on their file for their entire scolarity and their parents will have to do community service

It makes me happy when they listen

Can you do something for me, please?

I want you to reblog this if you believe that two people can be very close and physically affectionate with one another, but still have a completely nonsexual, non-romantic relationship. 

Even if the two people in question are capable of being sexually or romantically attracted to one another. 

Because the friendship I share with someone I consider family in a way that transcends blood has been typecast as a romantic relationship ENTIRELY too many times, and I’m beginning to get sick of it. 

hi I'm from your pseudo-medieval fantasy city. yeah. you forgot to put farms around us. we have very impressive walls and stuff but everyone here is starving. the hero showed up here as part of his quest and we killed and ate him

yeah umm actually everyone kinda lives, inside.. the walls yeah. no yeah theres not any surrounding farming communities or villages to levy taxes from so we're pretty much just in a stone pit all together. Theres a massive stone castle tho! where did the infrastructure for the stone quarring come from? I dont know... Evil wizard maybe?

If you actually want to know how medieval (and overall pre-industrial) cities interacted with its rural enviroment, check out these articles:

Long story short, cities weren't islands in the middle of nowhere. If you're a generic fantasy character approaching a city, you wouldn't find a lonely Shining City Upon A Hill (hmm, interesting imagery there, wonder what it means...), but actually a highly populated area of farms, orchards and all that feeds and maintains a city.

I think it's unfair that dressing boys in maid outfits is more popular than dressing girls in butler outfits. There should be solidarity and equality.

Tomboy subgenre where instead of wearing sporty clothes and being athletic she's wearing formal uniforms and fetching your smoking pipe. For the council's consideration I submit: the jarvisboy

So Fox News ran a story about how they think libraries are turning into drug-infested sex dens and I am shocked, shocked that I was never offered any drugs during my 15+ years working in libraries.

Where do they think the sex is happening?? Every single aisle is lit in that horrible LED lighting. The teens don't even make out here anymore.

As a state certified librarian I can assure you that you just have to go into your local library and ask if they're participating in the new Fox News Hysteria program smh. If they're not, you'll just have to renew your library card and use the fun and valuable resources they're offering right now, such as wifi hotspots, museum passes, dvd lending, mid level adult erotica, ebook lending, and printing! 😔

Maybe this is the wrong platform to pose this question given the average tumblr user but

Is it just me or did our generation (those of is who are currently 20-30 ish) just not get the opportunity to be young in the 'standard' sense?

Like, everyone I talk to who's over 40 has all their wild stories about their teens and 20s, being young and dumb, and then I talk to my friends and coworkers and classmates, and we just... dont.

My mom tells stories of skipping school to sneak across the border and spend the day at a bar in Mexico. I was threatened with not being allowed to graduate because of senior ditch day. One of my friends had to go to his first hour class on senior ditch day because the teacher, who almost exclusively taught seniors, arranged a huge exam that day with no available makeup days, specifically to punish kids who took part in ditch day. Our wild and crazy ditch day was playing mini golf and then stopping for ice cream on our way back to one of our friends' houses to play cards against humanity.

Don't get me wrong, we had fun. But all of that, threats of not graduating, threats of failing classes over a single test, over some mini golf and ice cream?

Throughout high school and early in college, my friend group got kicked out of malls, stores, and even a parking lot just for being there wrong. Not being loud of disruptive. Not causing problems. Just being there too long, or without buying anything.

My mom graduated high school, after repeating her senior year, without a single grade above a D, and was offered a full ride scholarship to a state university to play on their women's football team. I had a 3.8 GPA, multiple extracurriculars, a summer job, and over 100 hours of volunteer work, and barely got into that same university, and then couldn't afford to go there anyway.

We've made getting into college so important and yet so difficult that kids are sacrificing their childhoods for it.

Then they become adults and it doesn't go away. Your employer/ potential employers are searching your social media and internet presence so you'd better hope no one has ever posted a picture of you at a party, or with alcohol, or wearing revealing clothes, or whatever else they've deemed unprofessional. And if you want to go out it's a 10 dollar cover and drinks are at least 8 dollars, and you need to tip if there's any kind of live entertainment, who can afford to do all that regularly?

My physical therapist, when I was 18, told me about his 21st birthday, how the last thing he remembers is people taking body shots off him. I spent my 21st birthday alone, was in bed by 10pm because I had to be at work the next morning. My boss had already told me that they knew it was my 21st, and if I called out, she'd write me up for improper use of sick leave because you're not allowed to use sick leave for a hangover. I don't know anyone whose 21st birthday was a big deal. No one went out and partied for it.

I dont really know where I'm going with all of this. I guess I just don't understand the point of it all. We spend our youth working hard to provide a future that we still can't afford. We have to be responsible and professional as teenagers. And we get nothing out of it. We can't afford life or friends or fun. At least our parents got to have fun being young and dumb, we just got groomed on kik.

So I'm not the only one noticing this. I wish I had an answer or at least something to say about it. But I dont. I'm just tired.

Original report (waybacked PDF) is from 2007. That's Gen Z kids.

When I, Gen-Xer, was about 12 - in my rural home, I had about a three-mile range. (Could've pushed it to more, but didn't want to walk that far.) In the city, it was about a mile. Not that anyone was checking; again, that was about the distance I wanted to walk, and besides, that covered all of "downtown."

My kids? Closer to that 300 yards limit at the same age. Not because I wanted to restrict them, but we live next to a freeway on-ramp and between two sets of train tracks... and there is absolutely nothing kid-friendly within a half-mile for them to visit.

I spent my 21st birthday bar-hopping. My kids spent their 21st birthdays at home with a nice meal. I don't think either of them wanted to go bar-hopping - but yeah, as a society, we've removed a LOT of teen-friendly options.

See also: End of Third Places, switch from video game arcades to home consoles (hey, then every kid has to buy their own copy--great for game-makers!), shutdown of malls or restrictions on youth at them, closure of public parks, reduced/removed after-school programs, etc. Plus the places that think it's illegal for a 12-year-old to walk to the corner store unsupervised.

I am, however, DELIGHTED to hear that the booze & other vices industries are panicking over Gen Z not going out to party. Like, you spent 30-odd years removing all the places and ways people can hang out together and have fun outside of someone's personal house, and... guess what, when people hit milestone events (graduation, milestone birthdays, job promotion, whatever), they don't immediately flock to the Party Zone that they have never been welcome at. How shocking.

It sucks that Gen Z does not get to party, does not have good celebration options. REALLY sucks that that's often because school or job has decided to tell them not to celebrate, rather than just not having places to go. I'm just not upset over party capitalism taking a hit.

Most people really don't seem to know what this mysterious "residential care" means when it comes to disabilities.

"This person is severely disabled, they have to live in residential care."

Do you know what happens when a severely disabled person with high support needs who isn't aware of dangers and needs constant supervision applies for residential care?

They get turned down or kicked out a couple of days later.

This happens regularly, btw. Kids grow up and parents think "Oh, residential care sounds good", and then suddenly every institution, etc. goes "Sorry, we don't specialise in that, sorry, your child is too aggressive, sorry, your child can't stick to our sleep schedule, sorry, your child is too noise sensitive, sorry, your child HAS to participate in our weekly activities even though their disability makes it impossible for them to do so, sorry..."

People who can live in residential care aren't your "the worst of the worst" example. There is such a thing as "too disabled for residential care" and it's more common than you'd think! ☝🏼

"But what happens when someone is too disabled for residential care and their family can't take care of them? Surely everyone eventually ends up somewhere!"

They get passed around from institution to institution, but everyone eventually goes "Sorry, we can't keep them here", and it won't stop. Until, maybe, one day they're lucky and a fixed team of carers "adopts" them and tries to create some kind of assisted living from scratch.

Nobody talks about it, which is why it's always a big shock for parents who found a really good residential care place for their soon-to-be adult child and their child looks forward to moving out, and suddenly this wonderful residential care company turns their child down because it's too disabled. And then the next one. And the next.

So no, residential care isn't for "those with the most profound disabilities" - people with the most profound disabilities can't be in residential care at all.

Corrected a typo

Okay but (aquarium buzz?) that's actually (blanket matches projector case) (something stuck under thumbnail) not a bad (left the chip bag open) way of (comic books on table out of alignment) (should adjust them) (is that an OCD symptom? (Don't have that) (Mom used to tell you you did) ("I don't have OCD mom, I just like things a certain way.")) demonstrating (demonstrating, defenstrating, shove a man out a window for a defenstration demonstration (should I post that seperately? Kinda funny)) (this is getting long) (I should put some letters in bold so people can actually read what I'm saying) what it's like (buzz changed frequency) (neighbor made a noise upstairs (what's he doing?) probably his kid) (Microwave) to have to (to have two, halve two too) focus through (threw, thru, throo) (has that frame on the wall always been crooked?) all this ("look at all those chickens!") other bullshit

Not that I do anything of the sort, since my mental processes are (mostly) straightforward and direct, with no inclination - unless distracted by something else (SQUIRREL!) - to wander down a different branch of discourse (which would make it datcourse, of course).

See also en-dash... :->

(guy stuck in a timeloop) fuckkkkk i got yesterday tomorrow

Random worldbuilding: A culture where everyone's social status is expressed through how their hair is braided.

Children all have the same kind of a simple, unisex "child's braid" which is meant for their parents to be easy to do - traditionally boys were only taught how to do a "wife's braid" while women braid both their husbands and their children, but a modern man is naturally an attentive father and contributes to both cleaning and feeding, and clothing and braiding his children.

While this kind of knowledge is more accessible in the modern age, the art of braiding is still seen as an intimate family thing, and it's not unusual for a youth to come out to their parents by the way of braids - for example a daughter asking her father to teach her how to do the "wife's braid", or a son asking her mother how to weave the "husband braid" for their future spouse. Or a trans kid asking their parents to give them the other gender's braid when it's time to transition from the child braid into the "unmarried youth" one.

It is nonetheless still somewhat common to see an older gay man with a "wife's braid" or two older women both wearing "husband braids", because that was the only way they were taught to braid a future partner's hair when they were young. They could learn the "appropriate" braid now, but it has become a part of the culture, an old-fashioned gay thing to do. It's pride - if you wear this braid to show that you're an adult with a spouse, why try to hide who braids your hair every morning?

The only braid that one is expected to do on themselves is the widow's braid - the only one that is also unisex, braided in reverse from the simple children's braid. Sometimes, young unmarried adults who have no interest in starting a family switch directly into wearing a widow's braid to signify that they are not looking for a partner and are independent adults on their own.

I've been thinking and, what if we (mother of learning tumblr fandom) had something like an annual event week to create fanworks for?

It could have prompts for each day, also allowing people to just do whatever, and it wouldn't need to only encompass fanfic/fanart— memes, analysis, theories, drabbles, headcanons etc type of posts could all be welcome

For the dates/timing, maybe either October (to celebrate the anniversary of MoL's first chapter on October 17th) or February (to celebrate the anniversary of MoL ending on February 10th) could be a good idea?

I don't know. Thoughts? Would anyone be interested in participating of something like this? Should I just have made a poll?

I think this would be super fun! And would be nice for the fandom to keep things going. But I would need a lot of time in advance for prompts to work on something since I'm also a super slow writer/artist. Another idea could be a gift exchange event? People could get matched with prompts and ideas they like in any format.

Oh, that's an interesting idea!! I've never been in a gift exchange event (that i recall), but I don't think it should be too hard to organize if people are interested in it :D

me when people ask me how to say "I don't care" in french

(description:)

Also, "collège" doesn't mean college but middle school. Graduate school is fac, short for faculté (faculty). Oh yeah, and it's pronounced fuck. NB: shit I forgot an i! It's librairie, actually.

Je parle couramment l'anglais et ça fait dix ans que je dois prendre une seconde pour savoir si je suis en train de parler d'une bibliothèque ou d'une librairie en anglais.