Goldilocks & The 3 Bears Joke.

um before you ladies get real hype about the Jonas brothers comeback never forget that joe jonas asked gigi hadid on a date when she was 13 years old…….

I really, really dislike the narrative that surrounds romantic relationships that if you don’t want to spend 100% of your time together, you’re not in a healthy relationship. And I don’t mean “ugh I can’t stand them right now” or the whole “wimmin, amirite? Can’t live with ‘em, but still expect them to clean up after me” heteronormative, hateful bullshit. I mean the fact that romantic ideals have been elevated to such unhealthy peaks of unrealisticness, that even wanting time and space to yourself is considered abnormal. 

Like some of the things people are describing when it comes to their “ideal” relationship? Honestly just reminds me of the codependency worksheet my therapist made me fill out, and I ought to know because I’m extremely dependant on my partner to stay alive. Granted, my situation is a little different from people who aren’t disabled or chronically ill. But this still doesn’t change who we are as people, even if it has changed the dynamics of our relationship.

But we’re still emotionally very independent people, and like doing things on our own. We always have, even before my health issues, we had our own friends. We loved wandering off and doing stuff on our own pre-Corona. And even now we still like having some downtime apart, even if it just means he’s watching TV in the other room, and I’m on the computer talking to all y’all. That downtime doesn’t mean we’re dysfunctional or dealing with unresolved resentment with each other, it just means we don’t feel the need for constant physical proximity to feel close. We’re still getting our needs met, we’re still happy. And yet some people would say that because we don’t feel the need to do everything together at every minute of the day, we must secretly be unhappy. Why? Why are some of you so dysfunctional you can’t spend any time apart? (See how not nice it is for someone to say something like that?)

And also, while I’m at it, erase the idea that you’re so in love with someone you will never be mad at them because that’s also not healthy or realistic. There will be times your partner will irk you. There may even be times that they outright piss you off or vice versa. What matters is how you handle those moments and work through them together. And if you’re continually framing your relationship in terms of “we’re so in love we’ll never be angry at each other, so I don’t even have to think about it,” you’re not preparing yourself to deal with real and very valid emotions that are part of the human social experience. You can be the most in love, most in tune, best-matched couple ever, and still find yourself annoyed by something. And it’s the people who break up who either don’t know how to deal with this, or just plain won’t because it breaks their internal narrative of True Love™ overcoming all, not realizing that love is both a feeling and a choice, and sometimes you gotta choose to work at it.

 And this applies to queer relationships as well. All too often, I see people saying, “we’re queer, so this will never be an issue” when what you really mean to say is, “we’re queer, so these particular problems that are prevalent in heteronormative relationships will not affect us in that way.”

But that does not mean you will never come across a problem that does put a strain on your relationship. Like, say, a fucking global pandemic that locks most people in their homes for a fourth, fifth month in a row with no other means of socialization or stimulation.

Or one of you getting sick and suddenly requiring constant care… 

And that shit ain’t easy regardless of who you love. Being a caretaker is emotionally and physically draining, and I could write for hours about why there need to be better support systems in place for the caretaker spouses of chronically and terminally ill/disabled partners and how they often become chronically ill themselves. (I was a caretaker myself from the age of 9 onwards. I know this shit isn’t easy. It’s why I made ETD go to therapy when we realized I would need him to take care of me if we wanted to keep me alive.) But that’s another topic for another post. 

Like, honestly, maybe it’s me. Perhaps it’s my experiences and how I view love and relationships, but the whole idea of “I don’t need to take time for myself I’m in a loving relationship!” is just… not good. Everyone needs their own space sometimes and demonizing that as unhealthy is, well, not healthy.

Humans are human, we’re social creatures for the most part. But sometimes you just gotta go off by yourself into the metaphorical woods of the psyche and spend some time being comfortable with yourself. And if you can’t do that without feeling like your relationship is in trouble, well, maybe you ought to evaluate why. 

Okay, another “long term The Witcher books fan talking about the series” post from me.

I AM SO SORRY! But I thought that for some of you fanfiction writers here who write Geraskier stuff (and other ship fics, like Geralt and Yen! I respect all ships! ^^) those things might be useful or that they can be just fun in general for some people. Here is a bunch of canon things that I like but don’t often see in fics! Some of those will be totally innocent, but some are slightly more spicy (trying hard to not use any word that tumblr might not like).

But first a disclaimer! I am not sharing this to bash any fanfic writers for not being canon-friendly enough or to make anyone feel worse about their lore knowlage! You are an amazing fan, no matter if your knowlage is based on books, games, series or all of those! I am not an expert myself, I just randomly remembered some stuff so I thought I might share them. And fanfiction should be fun, it is about what you want to explore no matter if it’s canon or not! You do you! ^^ I just think some of those things might be fun to point out! So here we go:

Geralt:

- Witchers can’t blush – it’s due to blood system mutation.

- Geralt can’t get hard for some time after using his potions – Yennefer was able to get him “ready” in this kind of situation only by using a spell.

- Geralt is NOT an aggressive lover – while the scenes in the book are not really explicit, from reading them you can still see very clearly that Geralt is careful and gentle in bed. I am not saying that he can’t go rough if his lover wants that, because I am sure he can do it very well, but he definitely is not brutal. He cares about his partners, even if they don’t really know each other. He is also well aware that the way you act in bed affects your partner’s comfort.

- Women don’t find Geralt repulsive – while many people fear Geralt or find him disgusting, many women also find him extremely attractive. Some find him way more attractive than other men around them. He never has any troubles with finding someone to spend a night with him. In many cases those women are the ones suggesting something more. In the books there is even a scene where two women are thirsting over him, talking about what they would do with him and when he hears this, he is the one being uncomfortable.

Jaskier:

- Jaskier means “buttercup” - which is a very small yellow flower popular in Polish meadows and often growing close to roads.

- He looks about 10 years younger than he actually is - someone points out that he is nearly 40 but looks nearly 30.

- Jaskier was sometimes mistaken for an elf when he had his hair longer.

- He is really scared of pain – while he can be very brave while he travels with Geralt and he can be badass af, he is also a big drama queen when the smallest things happen to him. He is not really experienced with being injured so he overreacts. And despite being very proud, he can ask for mercy when he is afraid and helpless.

Yennefer:

- She can be very loud in bed – she is not ashamed of it and she thinks it’s actually healthy to let everything out.

- After l o v e  m a k i n g (I am really trying to not use the s-word XD) with Geralt she would often say “o jejku jej” or just “jejku jej” in Polish version – I couldn’t find how it was translated to English, but I would roughly translate it to “oh my my”.

- She is able to draw a bath with her magic - and she does that often.

I will update this list when I remember more things that have fanfic potential and please you do it too! :3

To start, I need to say that August was pretty much the best character the show’s created (well…second best…because Mulan exists and is perfect). They created this great multifaceted character, who had huge flaws. Flaws that were destroying him, flaws that ruined other people’s lives, but flaws that were totally relatable. Flaws that he owned up to before we even met him, flaws that he was completely focused on ridding himself of. He wanted to make amends, he wanted to fix his mistakes after a lifetime of embracing them. August may not have been an epic fairy tale hero, he didn’t wield swords or lead armies, but he was a real life hero. Obviously one of the things I love about August is the complete openness that he’s an addict. There’s a lot of metaphorical allusions to Regina/Rumple’s magic being like a drug and they’re both addicted but seriously it is so refreshing to see a lack of allegorical bullshit in fantasy sometimes. August was a drug addict and an alcoholic and had a fear of commitment and responsibility and was basically the least trustworthy person ever. So of course he ran away from his destiny. That’s part of who he is. He was a 7 year old under way too much pressure so he ran away from his destiny. Emma’s done the same thing at four times his age. It makes him human. You know what doesn’t make him human? What steals all his layers and turns him into a plot device? Having him be the one who told Neal to leave Emma. Like really think about it for a second. August left when he was 7 to live his own life. Then 17 years later, for reasons we don’t know, he comes back to face his destiny. He wants to help Emma. We don’t know what changed his mind all of a sudden, but he wants to help Emma. How did he find Emma? We also don’t know that. But he’s going to help…I guess. And of course by help, I mean get her thrown in prison. And to do this, he’s got like a real plan. He’s going to blackmail her boyfriend into framing her. How does he know her boyfriend is Bae? Another thing we just don’t know. But it was for the best. Emma was going to be okay (in prison), because August was ready to face his destiny. Except lol no he runs away again. Maybe getting the money was just too much pressure and triggered him into a relapse. That’s a legit possibility because he’s a freaking addict it happens. But here’s another question. Why did he never tell Emma this? Because he comes back remember. His decision to come back is fueled by selfishness because he doesn’t want to turn back into a puppet, but that’s a better explained reason for coming back than the first time he came back which was for…….??????? oh right we have no idea. But please remember that when he came back, he forged deep connections. He tried to rebuild something with his dad, he became a confidant of Henry, a friend to Emma. He helped Emma by telling her the truth. Not just that Henry was right all along about the curse, but the ugly truth that he abandoned her. He came clean about that because he was trying to better himself as a person and have their friendship be absolutely honest. He was confessing all the ways he’s done people wrong. And yet, he didn’t tell her he’s the reason she’s in jail. Why didn’t he do this? I mean abandoning her at birth is kinda the more traumatic thing he did wrong to her, why would he be more embarrassed about sending her to jail? She never would have gone in the first place if he had stayed by her, right? All these questions I’m bringing up have an obvious answer: retconning. August didn’t tell Emma he’s the reason she gave birth to Henry in a jail cell because the writers hadn’t decided that was true yet. He decided to come back because the writers didn’t want Neal to have abandoned Emma on his own, they wanted to blame someone else. They wanted people to sympathize with this new character who they had already kind of introduced as being a complete and utter jackass who Emma wishes were dead, so they made him follow the orders of a character they knew wouldn’t be around much longer. August finds Emma because the writers needed him to. August knows about Bae because the writers needed him to. August leaves Emma because the writers needed him to. After season 1 August ceased to be a character and became a scapegoat. This is the fucking textbook definition of character assassination. They stole everything that made August a person to force him into the role of a prop. He was a goddamn macguffin. What really makes this bad is that all of this character assassination is done over the span of ONE FLASHBACK EPISODE. HALF and episode really. I mean he’s gone for half a season with barely an acknowledgement that he ever existed in the first place and then they utterly destroy everything about him in half an episode? Then we don’t see or hear from him for another half a fucking season until his completely pointless death (destroying his memories and experiences and de-aging counts as death, okay, there’s a whole Doctor Who episode about it).

http://ouafeels.tumblr.com (via once-upon-a-plot-hole)

This whole “Salazar Slytherin wasn’t REALLY  a bigot” post going around is like…very reaching, but okay, if you really want to defend the dude so badly. The dude who put a giant-ass killing snake in a school. which he definitely did, Voldemort would not have been able to raise a Basilisk in a few years. 

It’s a minor pet peeve, but it is everywhere today so errrr…. please keep in mind that “Rest in Peace”/RIP literally comes from a latin phrase and is a very very deeply Christian expression.

When talking about the departed, Jews say “may their memory be a blessing.”

So please, when talking about a dead person who is Jewish, try to keep in mind that RIP is a Christian phrase.

another important thing about solidarity within queer communities is that so many of us will identify with different labels (especially when we are young/still figuring out that we aren’t straight & cis to begin with) before figuring out how we identify longterm. E.g. gay people who start out identifying as bi, trans men who initially identify as butch lesbians, asexuals who at first identify as bisexual (because hey, that’s technically being equally attracted to multiple genders), and so on. In fact, most queer people, at one time or another, identified as cishet. So we of all people should be aware that figuring out our identities takes time, and is a winding path. 

And this is why solidarity in our communities is so important. And why gatekeeping is so dangerous. Because not only is each part of our community a longterm home, sanctuary, and support system for people of a certain identity, we also provide a path and an unofficial Welcoming Committee to new members of the wider LGBTQA+ community (especially young queer people, for whom a supportive welcoming is so important). And in turn, many of the people who find their way to us will be coming from a different part of the rainbow path. This is also why bigotry is so so damaging when it comes from within our communities, and why we each of us have a responsibility to examine our prejudices and acknowledge that being queer doesn’t automatically give us a pass–we are just as capable of bigotry as anyone on the outside, and in a unique position to do harm from within. Fight transphobia, fight aphobia, fight biphobia, fight racism and ableism and discrimination wherever you see it in our communities. And more than that, celebrate ALL the colors on our flags, and all of the diverse communities they represent. Solidarity makes us so much more powerful, as a community and as individuals. So I’d like to start by saying:

Welcome, everyone. It’s good to have you here.

[Image: Tweet by Emily Mullin (@EmilyLMullin) and tweet by Isobelle Winter (@IsobelleWinter), both about the dangers of Facebook’s new preventative health screening tool. Images have been modified for visual ease but information has not been changed.]

Something to know about Facebook’s new “screening tool,” and advice/info that can most certainly be used outside of this specific situation.

For spoonies, the biggest deal is how this data, if leaked, could affect you in professional and insurance spheres.

Here’s Emily’s full thread, which discusses the details of the tool, and here’s Isobelle’s full thread, which extrapolates on specific dangers.

In the end? It’s another data grab. Data is worth money; don’t give yours away, especially not to Facebook.

Advocates say the fastest way to help immigrants separated from their children: Post their bail

When undocumented immigrants are detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), they are held in detention until they go to trial where the court will decide whether they can stay in the country. In some cases, the immigration judge will let them go while they await trial if they first pay a bail bond. Bail is set at a legal minimum of $1,500, but can be much higher. The bond is meant as a deposit to ensure the accused will report to their trial. If they attend all of their court appointments, they can get the money back. But many people have trouble coming up with the funds. The average bail bond issued by the San Francisco immigration courts in 2014 was $3,411 and the average cost of bond in immigration courts nationally is $6,500. Bond amounts could be as high as $80,500 on Central District of California immigration bonds, according to a 2015 study by USC law professor Emily Ryo. Donating to community bond funds can immediately “lead to freedom,” she said. Community bond funds are charities, like RAICES, that use funds to post bail and provide legal defense for detained people.This is one of the fastest ways to reunite immigrants with their family, said Pilar Weiss, project director at the National Bail Fund Network.

DIRECTORY OF CRIMINAL SYSTEM BAIL FUNDS

National organizations funding bail across the U.S.

National Bail Out

The American Bar Association

Queer Detainee Empowerment Project

Freedom for Immigrants

Local organizations funding bail for immigrants

Arizona Tucson Second Chance Bail Fund Colorado Colorado Freedom Fund California Bay Area Immigration Bond Fund Immigrant Families Defense Fund The Orange County Justice Fund Connecticut Connecticut Bail Fund Immigrant Bail Fund Florida LGBTQ Freedom Fund Hawaii Hawaii Community Bail Fund Illinois Champaign County Bailout Coalition Chicago Community Bond Fund Iowa Eastern Iowa Community Bond Project Kentucky Louisville Community Bail Fund Louisiana New Orleans Safety & Freedom Fund YWCA Greater Baton Rouge Community Bail Fund Massachusetts Massachusetts Bail Fund Minnesota Minnesota Freedom Fund Nebraska Omaha Freedom Fund Nevada Vegas Freedom Fund New York City Bronx Freedom Fund Brooklyn Community Bail Fund Lorena Borjas Community Fund WSLS Bail Fund New York State Columbia County Bail Fund EOC of Suffolk Inc. Charitable Bail Fund OAR of Tompkins County Bail Fund Syracuse Jail Ministry North Carolina Southern Coalition for Social Justice Bail Fund Alamance County Community Bail Fund North Carolina Community Bail Fund of Durham Oregon Portland Freedom Fund Pennsylvania Dauphin County Bail Fund Philadelphia Community Bail Fund Philadelphia Bail Fund Tennessee Hamilton County Community Bail Fund Memphis Community Bail Fund Nashville Community Bail Fund Texas Detained Migrant Solidarity Committee Fianza Fund Community Bail Fund of North Texas Virginia Richmond Community Bail Fund Roanoke Community Bail Fund Charlottesville Community Resilience Fund Washington Northwest Community Bail Fund Wisconsin Free the 350 Bail Fund

DIRECTORY OF IMMIGRATION BOND FUNDS National organizations across the U.S.

Freedom for Immigrants National Bond Fund

Haitian Immigrant Bond Assistance Project

LGBTQ Freedom Fund

RAICES Bond Fund

Arizona Pima Monthly Meeting Immigration Bond Fund California Bay Area Immigration Bond Fund Immigrant Families Defense Fund Orange County Justice Fund San Diego Immigrant Rights Consortium – Borderlands Get Free Fund Colorado Immigrant Freedom Fund of Colorado Connecticut Immigrant Bail Fund Iowa Eastern Iowa Community Bond Project Massachusetts Beyond Bail & Legal Defense Fund Michigan Kent County Immigration Bond for Our Neighbor’s Defense Fund Minnesota Minnesota Freedom Fund New Hampshire NH Conference UCC Immigrant and Refugee Support Group New York LIFE Bond Fund (New Sanctuary Coalition)New York Immigrant Freedom Fund Ohio (includes Northern Kentucky) 3R Fund for Immigrants Texas Fronterizo Fianza Fund Hutto Community Deportation Defense & Bond Fund RAICES Texas Bond Fund Vermont Vermont Freedom Bail Fund  Virginia Cville Immigrant Bond Fund Washington Fair Fight Immigrant Bond Fund