literally everybody who has ever been kind to me has made me kinder in return

Haywood County, NC

a little mock postage stamp i did a while ago. free to download (X) and print as stickers, posters or whatever you like.

shit like this should be radicalizing people

ai artist pushing the two minute button and then start on their microwave: 'i feel bad for the people who arent learning prompts right now theyre gonna get left behind by us tech-forward chefs'

ai artist stares at buckaroo chef as they pour heart and soul into a homemade meal. 'you can just get those at costco in a bag of 30'. ai artist goes back to soggy burrito with ice cold middle and takes another bite 'sucker has no idea he will be obsolete when costco has the tech for 300 per bag'

I see a lot of posts saying "teach boys about consent".

While that is true, a lot of parents will do that and fail to see how their own actions are the problem.

If you've spanked him, he's less likely to understand consent.

If you've forced him to sit on Santa's lap, he's less likely to understand consent.

If you've forced him to give hugs and kisses to family members, he's less likely to understand consent.

If you've grabbed him in order to force him to sit still, he's less likely to understand consent.

If you've labeled him as "too sensitive" for not wanting to be touched, he's less likely to understand consent.

If you've assumed he's okay with something because he technically allowed it even though he felt pressured, he's less likely to understand consent.

If you're only going to criticize his actions but not your own, it won't work.

I am a firm believer that it's not just what he experiences in his life, but what he witnesses too. Okay so you don't do any of those to him but you do those things to his sisters? His cousins? His mom? He is learning consent is for him hut not for women.

One of my sisters has young children, both of whom are some flavor of neurodivergent. She is too, and as a result she often lost patience quickly with some of their quirks. The biggest offender is that her kids are extremely wary around anyone they deem to be a stranger, making social connection very difficult for all participants.

When I first met her daughter, she was 3 or 4, and was extremely reluctant to come and meet me. My sister began to shame and push and pull her towards me and I stopped her. I said "don't force her, don't teach her that she has to let men she doesn't know touch her, she doesn't need to hug me"

My sister froze in place, processed it for a moment, and let her daughter go. She went back to hiding behind mom. We continued our conversation and her son slowly approached me, hugged me, and climbed up onto the chair I was in to sit beside me and partially in my lap. After a few minutes, her daughter joined him. She didn't hug me, but she came over to touch and talk to me.

My sister was speechless. Her kids DON'T do that. I've heard many complaints from many family members about how antisocial they are. All I did was stick up for their right to offer or withdraw consent- and really just her daughter's, as her son had met me pre-covid and had already gotten over the hurdle at 2 years old, but her daughter was born during covid and thus it made her severe distrust of strangers even worse.

Now her kids are in elementary school and making friends easily and I regularly get stories from her about how she witnesses them connect with other socially withdrawn kids and stand up for both themselves and their quieter friends. She took my advice to heart and started allowing them to voice whether they consented to something and now her little boy will approach a crying kid on the playground and say something like "do you want to play, or do you want me to just sit with you, or do you want to be alone?" and then actually listen to what the other kid tells him.

My niece has an incredibly traumatized boy in her class who escaped war with his family, and he doesn't talk to anyone. But he visibly relaxes when my niece goes to sit next to him when he's too scared and curled up in the classroom's Quiet Corner. She reads to him and shows him her toys and holds his hand on field trips and yells at anyone who is mean to him. I'm told she's the only person who can approach or touch him without causing a meltdown besides his family, and it started because the first time she sat with him she asked if it was okay if she did so and she waited several minutes for him to nod before she sat down.

But they still avoid the family members that forced them to interact even when they were uncomfortable. I still hear those complaints, hundreds of miles away, and the jealousy that I've only met the kids a few times but they talk incessantly about me. If I call one of my family members and the kids are over, I can hear them in the background trying to talk to me if they figure out it's me on the other line.

Anyway. Long story short I didn't have to advocate for my nephew the way I did my niece, but advocating for my niece in front of the both of them dramatically changed the way both of them were taught to manage social interaction. Consent isn't just about teaching the boy. It's also making sure he sees that consent being practiced with everyone.

“Oh boo hoo you shouldn’t ask your friends for favors we’re all adults”

I just spent three hours pulling up carpet and staples for a friend’s home renovation and we all did nothing but chat and joke and have wonderful conversation the whole time.

Helping somebody move or renovate or giving them a ride to the airport is functionally the same as going mini-golfing or playing a board game: it’s an activity that you do that is made more fun by having good company, and which provides something to talk about when the conversation lulls.

“Shared joy is double joy, but shared sorrow is half a sorrow.”

I know it's a thing on here to treat ppl who are unamused by horoscope shit as wet blankets but frankly there is something uniquely aggravsting abt telling another person your star sign in order to participate in what you assume is lighthearted convo and watching a respected adult peer actively adjust how they feel about you as a person in real time bc of the day of the year you happened to be born on

I do like characters who do not exhibit any hint of sexuality in any way because they’re too busy being tormented by the narrative. like “yea I might be gay or whatever but the labyrinth is growing so I can’t worry about that shit rn”

strange omens gather at the end of the street

i actually dont give a shit if hamas did everything and worse that israel accuses them of it still doesn't justify killing 30000 random civilians

this is literally the least radical position you could have btw it's literally just normal fucking morals. every day i live in disbelief that people are saying "it's complicated". there's nothing complicated about saying "killing 30000 civilians including children, journalists, doctors, and human rights officials is bad"

We should really not go along with the corporate lingo on these shifts to automation and AI. Always remember this: They don't want to pay people to do the work.

Companies aren't replacing cashiers with self-scan machines for the customer's convenience. They don't want to pay people to do the work.

Companies aren't using AI to produce a better product. The product produced by AI is notably inferior - they just don't want to pay people to do the work.

Corporate America is not hurting for money. It's not that they can't afford employees -- profits are soaring! They just don't want to pay people to do the work.

that post going around where op is like "I love having sex with my friends, a fine and normal thing to do" and the notes are filled with people going absolutely fucking nuclear melting into goo screaming about how "hookup culture" is disgusting... genuinely what's going on there

the replies do have some "what is this liberal degeneracy" (lmao) but it seems to be predominantly other queer people making what they clearly think are very enlightened leftist arguments about how sexualizing your friends is wrong and how they, personally, would never have sex with a friend and man it's exhausting. we are never getting free of anything if you can't even get a grip on you knee jerk disgust towards other people's completely harmless sexual practices.

I've seen a lot of sentiment across both the original post and now mine that boils down to people expressing support for having sex with friends in the ground that it's superior to having sex with someone you just met and have no pre-existing connection with and nope. uh uh. if that's your personal preference rock on but "better for you" is not the same as "better objectively." fucking a friend and fucking someone you barely know are both morally neutral acts. we can't support boning your friends in the grounds that it's better than xyz other types of sex that it's okay to dunk on; you should be supporting both on the grounds that other people's bodily autonomy and sexual choices are really none of your business.

the only thing you can do. keep moving foerward

i havent been on my computer in a week what do i used this for again

you can move files around on your desktop using click and drag. try it now

this is so fuckign stressful

another tlt comic, ianthe's new arm.

(guys this took me 60 plus hours... please say something nice to me..)