Day: December 9, 2018

The Gait of the Elephant

London is a cacophony of words, sounds, languages. And it recognizes me. Knows where to slot me in its ancient filing system complete by gender, race, class, sexuality, region, religion, ethnicity, age, ability. Its creaking, ancient, ad infinitum system of fitting human beings into boxes is covered with a shiny gloss and many colours so at first it feels exhilarating. Like throwing oneself out of a plane. And it creates a kind of dreamscape where things, images, people from the past and other places disappear and reappear in different order each time. But over time, the exhilaration wears off and I begin to notice that words sound the same but mean different things.

I realise that I am visible in London. But only as the other, the foreigner, the lesser than…the natives. To be despised, demeaned, feared. When the island’s natives call me Asian, it isn’t necessarily a compliment. When they call me Indian, they are making assumptions of my political ideology and class rather than my country of origin. After a while, I begin to feel relief when they call me Paki. It is a slur and not quite true but at least the word means what they intend.

There are others like me who also face these insults. This British ability to invent a dizzying variety of racial and ethnic abuse is perhaps one of the less pernicious legacies of ruling the world. I seek out others targeted by these weapons to check if they too feel relief, if we speak the same language even if we converse in English. And often they agree.

The slurs are at least honest because at most other times, the natives tell us that we do not understand their words and actions. That we do not see truly, hear correctly. This island and its natives are very good at playing a special mind game where truth is declared false.

But we, the newly arrived, the colonized, also speak in foreign tongues even when forming the same words. I begin to worry that the Empire Mothership excises our ability to seek freedom of the mind as a condition of entry.

The Gait of the Elephant

gallusrostromegalus:

bogleech:

bogleech:

apparently one whale years ago was observed doing this for hours and now more and more whales in the area are seen copying it so we think it’s a whole new behavior and it seems to be a response to shrinking food sources.

Instead of expending any energy actively hunting, the whale just holds its mouth open wherever fish are being hunted by birds. To escape the birds, the fish try to hide in the whale’s mouth because it’s a darker area that looks like shelter.

…They’re turning into giant, sea-mammal pitcher plants.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/mms.12557?referrer_access_token=bXLTS5BeSw_vlIKHkM0bYIta6bR2k8jH0KrdpFOxC654HjreJ8D19K86UreR5JPsSRb0CuGhiJSV1L1ht-N1Gf_K_1a9MREFzQGU9oJDNctsKDin_HXcYEdsLg3EbcTl

sparklecritter

What is interesting is there is a heron (black heron) that hunts via similar methods (using shade as bait for fish). I do not think it is a learned behavior for them though. Paralel evolution is buck wild. You can reach similar outcomes through wildly different evolutionary methods and paths. Eg – in whales it is their big brains at work – with herons it is instictual – and with pitcher plants it is automatic.

Yeah little creatures love to hide so a number of predators have taken advantage of that and what’s EXTRA fucked up is that another example includes a starfish:

the Ambush Star, pretending to be a shrimp gazebo

THE GAZEBO HUNGERS…

Source: bogleech

autmystic:

fierceawakening:

missmarthanightingale:

showmesomeoneinnocent:

aro-bot:

idk can we stop…treating a.ce disc.ourse like it’s some haha funney cringe compilation or whatever the fuck because it fucking destroyed the entire ace and aro communities. there is no solid aspec community on tumblr anymore (which was by far the biggest number of aspec ppl). exclusionists took our community and fucking smashed it to pieces and y’all treat it as this fucking stupid joke when they traumatized, gaslit, and abused an entire group of queer people back into the closet. fuck every single person who doesn’t take that seriously.

My personal experience is just that, but it’s really indicative that I have watched almost every single ace and aro person I know, irl and online, actively recloset themselves as a direct result of the consequences of The Disc Horse™

I watched irl queer groups disintegrate bc a few ppl who got into leadership positions used that to make the space hostile towards ace ppl (among others as well), saw friends go from being loud and proud aces n aros to actively avoiding any mention of it and letting ppl assume their sexuality. I myself, having been IDing as ace for 10 years at least, have in the past couple since this whole “"discourse”“ came into being, actively and intentionally stopped telling anyone at all that I’m ace. To put that in some kind of perspective, I am incredibly out as trans and will actively out myself pretty constantly except to total strangers I will never see again. I feel safer telling ppl I’m trans than ace. Especially in queer spaces. It’s fucked me up so much I didn’t even quite grasp how much but today my therapist asked me for the first time about like romantic relationships and I physically could not say I am aro and ace. Completely incapable, utterly frozen, and I just kinda let her believe what she will. Ironically the fact that I’ve gone from being willing and ready to tell ppl I’m ace as just another facet of myself to entirely unable and unsolicited to tell anyone, is probably a thing one might want to talk w one’s therapist about.

This has really fucked not just the community at large but fucked up individual ace ppl in so many ways. It’s not something “funny” or remotely harmless, it’s absolutely devastated us.

like even if you believe that ace people aren’t truly oppressed or what the fuck ever can you maybe realise that when i, a Confirmed Lesbian who will share that identity with anyone who stands still to listen for two minutes:

a) will no longer tell people i am ace until months into a knowing each other & even then am completely prepared for rejection, bc that is what my online experience has taught me to expect.

b) am more afraid to tell queer people that i’m ace than straight people – genuinely! i am more concerned that queer people will react badly to that than straight people!

can you maybe then accept that somewhere along the line we fucked up? can you accept that whatever your belief is on what the experiences which, as a community, ace people share – & boy oh boy do i wish you would listen to us about that – the real effect that all of this has had on individual people is unacceptable? bc it is not acceptable, not at all, & i am so tired of keeping my mouth shut about it

I used to be an exclusionist, because I legitimately thought that meant “let’s create two communities that sometimes overlap and that are generally allied with one another.”

I stopped being an exclusionist in part because I rethought things in general, but mostly? Because BOY WAS I WRONG ABOUT WHAT OTHER PEOPLE WERE ENVISIONING, and boy was i NOT OKAY WITH THAT,

Since joining this site I’ve gone from being comfortable with being asexual to actively avoiding telling people. Thanks so much, Tumblr.

ayeshanura:

prolicidal:

envyadams:

This Man Did Something That’s Already Expected Of Women But He Gets Extra Praise Cause He’s A Man

No. A lot of women don’t go to cosmetology classes to learn how to do hair, they have the experience from growing up-their mom doing their hair, Then experimenting which what they can do themselves. This guy probably had short hair his entire life with no clue on what to do. He didn’t just look up how to do a ponytail, he paid for actual classes so that he could do his little daughters hair in cool and creative ways so that SHE gets the learning experience and learns how to do it her own and then can go to school with fabulous.
This is A+ daddy right here, he went above and beyond because he knows that he lack in certain areas where a mom would pick this up. Please don’t destroy nice things that men do simply because they are men and you want to hate them.

Please don’t destroy nice things that men do simply because they are men and you want to hate them.

Shots fired.

Source: archive95205-blog