i really can’t stress enough how much i recommend regularly engaging with older art– movies, books, whatever. like, “Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it” and all that, but also, there’s just something really fascinating and kind of beautiful about reading something written by someone who lived so long ago and really connecting with it, recognizing the humanity of people who once seemed like abstract concepts to you
I started reading The Tale of Genji during the pandemic, figuring I might as well improve my mind during lockdown. It’s considered the oldest novel on record, possibly the first one ever written. Early in the book, there’s an incident where the main character has a crush on a girl, so he tries to sneak into her family’s property to get close to her, and along the way he runs into this ancient old grandma who can’t half see and who mistakes him for one of her grandkids. So she’s standing there going on and on about her digestive difficulties and whatever, and he can’t speak up because if she hears his voice she’ll know he’s not who she thinks he is, so he’s just having to stand there and nod and hope she’ll go away soon. And I’m reading all this and thinking that with a couple of adjustments this could be a modern day sitcom, and it made me happy to think that a thousand years ago someone was laughing at the same sort of stuff we laugh at today.
i read dickens’ great expectations in little fifteen minute installments on my breaks at work, sitting there dirty and tired and sweaty in a hot factory, and it made me think about how a hundred and sixty years ago there were probably tired guys in hot factories reading the story the exact same way, bit by bit, at their stupid jobs they couldn’t afford to quit and were damn lucky even to have, and they too were glad to read the next chapter of mr dicken’s latest weird little story about weird little people
in reading War and Peace I’ve discovered that “doing math homework at the dining room table with your angry dad” has been a common terror since the 1800s
i remember reading tom sawyer, specially the part where he gets chastized erroneusly for dropping the sugar and he just spends minutes sitting in silence sulking and fantasizing about how sad everyone would be if he died and reveling in the self pity of how lonely and misunderstood he is and as a teenager who did exactly that with my 14 years of age i was shocked that an adult in the 1800’s had managed to capture that so well
I was going to make a joke about how people tell their hairdressers so many personal details that I wouldnt be surprised if someone confessed to murder while I was styling their hair but then I remembered that was an actual thing that happened when I was in cosmetology school
SO when I was in cosmetology school i was in the breakroom and I was telling everyone back there about how my client had just told me about how her dead husband’s head was found at the airport along with 63 other human heads (that’s a story for another day) and everyone started swapping stories about weird things that their client had told them
and then this one girl pipes up and is like “Yeah my client told me about how she killed her husband once.” and we were like EXCUSE ME??? WHAT? and she was like “yeah apparently her husband was coming at her with a knife and she managed to get it away from him and stabbed him like three times”
according to the teachers she had A. told that story to at least three other students in the time she had been coming there and B. It was ruled as self defense so it’s not like she was a criminal who was on the run
Okay but tell us the human heads story
op can we PLEASE have the human heads story
OKAY so this one I actually have a lot more context for because it was a firsthand experience buckle the fuck in
So I get this client, she’s an older lady so it was a color retouch and a trim and I was like okay I do this all the time this is gonna be just a super routine and mundane day. So I’m chatting with her just like usual small talk stuff like asking how her day is going and stuff and at some point she says: “I’m actually going to be in the newspaper tomorrow so I needed to get this done so I look good when they take my picture.”
So I’m like “Oh that’s nice! I hope you have fun!” and she goes “It’s not going to be fun, it’s because of a court case. I’m seeking legal action against a funeral home because they stole my husband’s body.” She’s saying this is the most casual tone ever and let me tell you, when someone you don’t know drops information like that on you, it’s the weirdest situation ever
I have NO idea how I’m supposed to react properly to that so I’m just saying “Oh no that’s so terrible!” and she keeps on going
“Yeah his head was found at an airport with 63 other human heads. they removed some of his body parts before they cremated him and sold them illegally. They were using his head at a dental convention in some other country.”
That was the strangest thing a client had ever decided to share with me and i’ve been continuously googling that shit trying desperately to find what she was interviewed for but there’s nothing and I can’t figure out if it’s weirder that she may have lied to me about this crazy story or if it actually happened and she decided to tell a student hairdresser she never met the entire story without being prompted
Different people respond better to different types of therapy, and most therapist will do multiple types of therapy with their patients.
CBT - Most common type of therapy because it works well for all mental health problems.
ACT - Especially helpful for treating anxiety disorders, depressive disorders, OCD, psychosis and substance abuse.
DBT - Specifically created for BPD. This type of therapy works really well for personality disorders, PTSD, eating disorders, substance abuse and impulsive control disorders.
Interpersonal therapy - Created to treat major depressive disorder but is now also used for other depressive and mood disorders.
There are lots of other types of therapy too (:
Gonna add my two cents as a research psychologist:
CBT does NOT work well if the individual has a history of being emotionally manipulated or gaslit, nor does it work well when the individual is working through traumas that have been used against them or disbelieved. CBT can feel like gaslighting, toxic positivity, denial of the seriousness of a situation, or emotional manipulation if not done very carefully. As such, it might be best to avoid it and find something else if you have a history of problems with the aforementioned experiences.
ACT also works REALLY WELL for individuals coping with sudden and “devastating” changes! It’s often adapted for use by disability specific clinics to help newly diagnosed patients learn to cope with the limitations on their environments. People with disabilities (PWDs) tend to feel pressured to not express their disability related distress around non-PWDs and, as such, tend to see those feelings as shameful. There’s a lot of “I should be more grateful” or “it’s not as bad as it could be” feelings around disability as a result of this pressure and ACT is great for undoing them!
DBT is generally amazing for stress disorders and preventing stress disorder symptomatology in at risk populations. It teaches you stress tolerance skills and how best to avoid or diminish conflicts, allowing you to avoid the sorts of environmental triggers that commonly worsen stress disorder symptoms.
Interpersonal therapy is also great for neurodivergent folks, victims of childhood emotional abuse, and children of parents with untreated/unmanaged psychiatric disorders. Essentially, if you grew up with difficulty interacting effectively with and relating to others, interpersonal therapy can help you understand why and change those interactions in the future. Healthier relationships and social interactions are a great way to break the cycle of abuse for those of us raised by parents who were emotionally abusive and/or had untreated mental illnesses.
Since no one has mentioned it on this post, I’d like to add that most therapists these days practice a sort of integrative therapy. They’ll take what they find most effective from each type of therapy for each individual problem, and piece together something a little more tailor made for their patients. This is part of why seeing an actual therapist is so important. Not every aspect of the aforementioned therapies will be relevant to every problem. Some aspects may even be harmful to handling some problems. The therapist is trained to pick out these things and adjust accordingly, unlike the average self help book or online resource. But knowing the types of therapies available and what you want to get from therapy is an immense part of finding a therapist that will suit your needs, so please research things carefully and think over what you need before selecting one!
So I was told that Human Planet had a segment about pigeons in the Cities episode that I might be interested in and I was honestly so underwhelmed. I haven’t finished the episode so maybe there’s more pigeon stuff but I feel like all I saw was more Birds Of Prey Are The Only Cool And Acceptable Birds and pigeons are Trespassers In Our Urban World Who Shit On Everything And Are Useless On Top Of It. Which isn’t true and I’m so tired of this being framed as some horrible burden that humanity must face. Pigeons are the victims here, not us.
Hate of pigeons didn’t start until the 20th Century. Before that was about 9,900 years of loving them. The rock pigeon was domesticated 10,000 years ago and not only that, we took them freaking everywhere. Pigeons were the first domesticated bird and they were an all-around animal even though they were later bred into more specialised varieties. They were small but had a high feed conversion rate, in other words it didn’t cost a whole lot of money or space to keep and they provided a steady and reliable source of protein as eggs or meat. They home, so you could take them with you and then release them from wherever you were and they’d pretty reliably make their way back. Pigeons are actually among the fastest flyers and they can home over some incredible distances (what fantastic navigators!). They were an incredibly important line of communication for multiple civilisations in human history. You know the first ever Olympics? Pigeons were delivering that news around the Known World at the time. Also, their ability to breed any time of year regardless of temperature or photoperiod? That was us, we did that to them, back when people who couldn’t afford fancier animals could keep a pair or two for meat/eggs.
Rooftop pigeon keeping isn’t new, it’s been around for centuries and is/was important to a whole variety of cultures. Pigeons live with us in cities because we put them there, we made them into city birds. I get that there are problems with bird droppings and there’s implications for too-large flocks. By all means those are things we should look to control, but you don’t need to hate pigeons with every fibre of your being. You don’t need to despise them or brush them off as stupid (they have been intelligence tested extensively as laboratory animals because guess what other setting they’re pretty well-adapted to? LABORATORIES!) because they aren’t stupid. They’re soft intelligent creatures and I don’t have time to list everything I love about pigeons again. You don’t need to aggressively fight them or have a deep desire to kill them at all. It’s so unnecessary, especially if you realise that the majority of reasons pigeons are so ubiquitous is a direct result of human interference.
We haven’t always hated pigeons though, Darwin’s pigeon chapter in The Origin of Species took so much of the spotlight that publishers at the time wanted him to make the book ONLY about pigeons and to hell with the rest because Victorian’s were obsessed with pigeons (as much as I would enjoy a book solely on pigeons, it’s probably best that he didn’t listen).
My point is, for millenia, we loved pigeons. We loved them so much we took them everywhere with us and shaped them into a bird very well adapted for living alongside us.
It’s only been very recently that we decided we hated them, that we decided to blame them for ruining our cities. The language we use to describe pigeons is pretty awful. But it wasn’t always, and I wish we remembered that. I wish we would stop blaming them for being what we made them, what they are, and spent more time actually tackling the problems our cities face.
I just have a lot of feelings about how complex and multidimensional hating pigeons actually is
ALL OF THIS
And also pigeon poop was a very valuable fertilizer before we had other options, people would hire guards to stop thieves from stealing their flock’s poop.
#LovePigeonsAgain2016
Late night, reblogging, so bear with me here…
Thank you for posting much of my thoughts over the past year and a half! I am known by many as “that guy who keeps the raptors”. Yes this is true, I do keep and handle raptors for educational purposes, but what many fail to realize is, I am fascinated with pigeons. My interest with birds began with the obvious, the raptors, corvids, and parrots. Then I discovered pigeons. These wonderful little birds with big attitudes and the incredible ability to thrive among people.
The organization I work with got its first pigeon a little over a year ago. She was a rescue with nowhere else to go. I was quickly drawn to her character and attitude about life.
We rarely handled her, but we did spend time with her.
She grew attached to our volunteers very quickly because their were no other birds she could socialize with in our facility.
We never intended to train her for educational programs. It was a job reserved for our raptors. It was our pigeon who decided she would be a part of what we were doing. One day, when we entered her enclosure to change water and food, she decided to fly to my hand and perch like our raptors do.
No training, no treats, just the reward of being with us.
What we hadn’t noticed for the couple months prior was her watching us. This brilliant little bird had been watching us every day as we trained and worked with our raptors. Finally she decided she didn’t want to be left out any longer. She made her place on our hands.
This occurred several times before we finally put her on a glove and brought her into the public. Needless to say, she was right at home. She fluffed up and preened the entire evening while people gawked and asked us why we had a pigeon on one glove and a hawk on another.
Since then, we’ve added 5 more rescued pigeons to our growing flock. And our pigeon (Tybalt) has become a mainstay ambassador for our programs. Each of our pigeons are incredibly fun to watch and interact with. Pigeons simply don’t get enough love. They are marvelous creatures incredibly suited to life alongside people both physically and mentally.
Raptors my have been my introduction into birds, but pigeons opened my eyes to a new appreciation for them and the fascinating world of bird cognition.
NOT ONLY are pigeons very amazing, worth our respect, and INTERESTING (did you read any of that stuff above?), but they are beautiful too!
Not chickens, but I feel compelled to spread this gospel.
hmmm. this is making me rethink my new york pigeon hate
and, AND, haven’t you ever wondered why city pigeons come in a magnificent rainbow of unusual colors?
Most wild animals all look alike within a species, with TINY, RARE individual variations in terms of rare color morphs, unusually big or small animals, different facial markings and other subtleties. But there is no evolutionary benefit to having species where everyone looks slightly different, and in fact, it’s beneficial for species to be similar and consistent, with a distinctive aesthetic. Especially if you’re trying to blend into the environment - a black wolf is all very well, but it looks positively silly in the summer tundra, where its grey/brown/brindley cousins blend in. A white deer has a great aesthetic - and a very short lifespan in the forest. Distinctive Protagonist looks are rare in the wild, simply because natural selection usually comes down heavily on them.
To humans, most wild animals are visually indistinguishable from each other.
As a result, most wild animals are like
“Oh it’s obvious - you can tell the twins apart because Kara has a big nose.”
Wild animals usually have a pretty consistent aesthetic within their species. It’s important to them!
SO WHAT IS GOING ON WITH PIGEONS?
Look, in one small picture you’ve got a red color morph in the center, several melanistic dark morphs, a few solid black birds, a few variations on the wildtype wing pattern, a PIEBALD, a piebald copper color morph…
Like, there are LAYERS UPON LAYERS of pigeon diversity in most flocks you see. Pure white ones with black wingtips. Solid brown ones with pink iridescent patches. Pale pinkish pigeons.
WHY IS THAT? When other wild animals consider “being slightly fluffier than my brother” to be dangerously distinctive in most circumstances?
BECAUSE CITY PIGEONS AREN’T TRULY WILD.
MANY OF THEM (POSSIBLY MOST OR ALL) ARE FERAL MIXES.
THEY WERE ONCE BELOVED PETS, SPECIAL MESSENGERS, EXQUISITE SHOW-WINNERS, AND PRIZED LIVESTOCK.
THEIR PRETTY COLORS WERE DELIBERATELY INTRODUCED BY HUMANS.
AND NOW THEIR HUMANS DON’T LOVE THEM ANY MORE.
See, pigeon fanciers bred (and still breed!) a huge array of pigeons. And the resulting swarms of released/discarded/escaped/phased out “fancy” pigeons stayed around humans. What else were they going to do? They interbred with wildtype pigeons.
Lots of the pigeons you see in public are feral. They’re not wild animals. They’re citizen animals. They’re genetically engineered. And now that’s what “city” pigeons are.
These “wild” horses are all different colors because they’re actually feral. Mustangs in the American West are the descendants of imported European horses - they’re an invasive domestic species that colonized an ecological niche, but they are domestic animals. Their distinctive patterns were deliberately bred by humans. A few generations of running around on the prairie isn’t going to erase that and turn them back into wildtypes. If you catch an adult mustang and train it for a short period, you can ride it and have it do tricks and make it love you. It’s a domestic animal. You can’t really do that with an adult zebra.
No matter how many generations these dogs stay on the street and interbreed with one another, they won’t turn back into wolves. They can’t. They’re deliberately genetically engineered. If you catch one (even after generations of rough living, even as an adult) you can make it stare at your face, care about your body language, and love you.
City pigeons? Well, you don’t have to like them, but they’re in the same boat. They’re tamed animals, bred on purpose, living in a human community. Their very bodies are marked with their former ownership and allegiance; they cannot really return to what they once were; if you caught one, you could make it love you (in a limited pigeon-y way.) They have gone to “the wild,” but not very far from us, and they’d be happy to come back.
So next time you see a flock of city pigeons, spare a moment to note their diversity. The wing patterns. The pied, mottled and brindled. The color types.
“oh we don’t wanna consume problematic media–” i unironically think everyone should consume problematic media at some point in their life. obviously not to say that people should monetarily support hp or aot or that, but i think it teaches you critical thinking skills when you say “yeah, objectively kingdom hearts has a lot of issues with the writing of their female characters” instead of “if you play kingdom hearts you’re a sexist”, you know?
if the only thing you consume is cookie-cutter “good“ than how are you going to act when something bad happens irl? when you do something bad irl? what do you do when your favorite Pure media suddenly a Not Good??? cause that’s the thing, NOTHING is perfect. NOTHING and NO ONE. we’re all flawed people and the stuff we create is going to be flawed and that’s what makes us human. stop trying to be perfect, it’s literally impossible, and learn how to say “this thing has problems and i’m willing to look at and discuss them, but it’s also something i enjoy and i am going to also celebrate the good”
i just. when i was a kid i was That™ warriors kid on the playground. running around on all fours hissing and doing clan meetings with my friend group on the slide. i read every fucking warriors book that existed, which is not an easy feat
looking at it now, i can tell you the treasure trove of Problematic Content™ it has. the rampant sexism (despite all the authors being women??), lack of care for continuity or exploring the world outside of our protags, one-dimensional villains, indigenous stereotyping/appropriation, even more sexism, the age gaps and incest-y relationships that the authors either don’t notice, refuse to acknowledge, or defend for some fucking reason, the INSANE ableism and heteronormativity… it’s a MESS.
i’m still glad i read it. i still reblog fanart of hollyleaf and leafpool, still point at cats and give them warrior names, i still think fondly of the island in the lake behind my friend’s house that looked exactly like the meeting spot in the books, still joke with friends about which clan we’d be in or our favorite characters would be in
as a kid, i didn’t notice all the issues, but there were others i could spot. i could spot the accidental incest and say “that’s weird, i don’t like that.” i didn’t notice the sexism in the way the female characters were always shoved aside and ended up becoming Doting Mothers™, but i did notice the ableism of assuming cinderpelt and jayfeather couldn’t be warriors despite their disabilities not being something that would stop an irl cat from finding a way to hunt or fight. and i was able to say “i don’t like these parts, and there would be a way to do them better.”
contrast to when i was in… fourth grade? third? i remember i was in public school, and i borrowed a book from the library that offhandedly mentioned a ouija board. i asked my mom how to pronounce this strange new word and she immediately took the book from me until it was time to return it. this didn’t teach me what my mom wanted me to learn, which was “we don’t fuck with demons in this house,” it just taught me that i couldn’t go to my mom with questions about books i was reading because she would take them away.
it was way better for my young, learning mind to say “what is wrong with this, why does it feel wrong, and what could they have done better” than to just take the Problems™ away
and obviously i dont think people should actively seek out shit media, but like. reading or watching something with Problems™ isn’t the end of the fucking world
SO funny how people in the notes are like “but what about media that’s actively harmful like hp or aot???” as if i didnt mention them explicitly in the first post lol
tell me u cant read without telling me u cant read
also for everyone saying “consume media not made for children”: fun fact my original draft of this post was talking about shit like 1984 and Lolita but long story short 90% of the internet hasn’t read past a 4th grade level so i figured warrior cats would make my point better lol
i made a comic in google slides for some ungodly reason
the long-awaited sequel, Untitled #2
Untitled #3 explores the formulaic entertainment mass-produced by the pawns of capitalism. Or I just wanted to say ass. One of the two.
Untitled #4: the plot thiccens. also there’s a plot apparently
Untitled #5. This whole comic is 23 strips long, and I’ll be doing daily uploads until it’s all posted. Thanks for the great response y’all.
Untitled #6. Okay so firstly, HOLY FUCK Y’ALL. I did NOT expect this comic to get notes, let alone fanart. The most recent strip will always be linked at the bottom of my pinned post, so you can check there to see if you’re caught up.
Untitled #7. Not much to say here. I hope you’re having a good day!
Untitled #8. The true plot begins.
Untitled #9. The Creator can possess Red because I, like Red, have a phenomenal ass. That’s it. It’s not that deep.
Untitled #10. *slaps roof of blue square* this bad boy can fit so much fucking existential despair
Untitled #11. Bet you didn’t expect the ass jokes comic to come to this now did you
Untitled #12. Red is fucking pissed at me. sorry buddy
Untitled #13. I indeed cannot have a comic without characters. Well played, Red.
Untitled #14. Red has his priorities straight.
Untitled #15. It would be funny if this were the last strip but I promise it isn’t. I put too much effort into the end of the comic to stop it now.
Untitled #16. Nice try, Red. Nice try.
Untitled #17. The paradox of omnipotence perpetually vexes me :(
Untitled #18. Let’s not have any ambiguity: Red’s dead. Hey, that rhymes! Neat!
Untitled #19. While strip 18 coincidentally did fall on April Fool’s, it wasn’t a prank. This comic has two characters now. Remember when this comic was about ass jokes?
Untitled #20. Three more strips to go. Holy shit.
Untitled #21. ass haha
Untitled #22. What am I going to do? Who knows… Find out tomorrow at roughly 8:30 AM EST!
so the magnus archives 2 official title is “the magnus protocol” (revealed by jonny sims on the rusty quill pre-kickstarter launch livestream)
jonny says that the video game “control” inspired him and alex to develop the magnus protocol
jonny also said that while the magnus archives focused more on the significance of your personal choices and their effects in wider systems and academia/science, the magnus protocol will focus more on the organizational/bureaucratic side of the magnus universe (which makes sense given that control was a major inspiration).
alex has confirmed they will be revisiting existing tma lore and metaphysics, but there will be things we don’t know and things we “think we know”
jonny has confirmed that they will also be revisiting existing characters and the impact of their actions and choices (though how exactly was not specified)
there will be 2 protagonists and both of them are completely new characters
if they hit a certain (unspecified) stretch goal on their kickstarter there may be more tma bonus content
they’re considering expanding the formats of storytelling they use in universe (i think this means things other than statements or tape recordings?) and the writing team has been expanded. they also mentioned the possibility of bringing on guest writers.
i’m doing this one in shitty greentext format because i think it’s funnier that way
ANNIE LORE (ANGELVERSE)
>be me
>be the angel of retribution
>act as an executioner in countless heavenly wars and for multiple equally terrible political regimes (against my will and with no other options because i was created for this sole purpose but it doesn’t really make any difference)
>basically i’m a celestial war criminal
>hate my job
>hate my boss
>hate my life
>throw myself from the spires of the republic of heaven in a fit of despair and guilty self loathing after 600 years of this shit
>don’t die
>decide to live as much like a human as a 600 year old immortal eldritch abomination wearing the human meatsuit of a corpse i scraped out of a dumpster can
>one day after a bad night of performing vigilante justice (since i’m still the angel of retribution and compelled to protect and aid those who were wronged) i go to the desert to give my body a break and stretch out my True Form a bit (this is a normal weekend for me)
>this really crossfaded dude who came out to stargaze stumbles across my corpse
>ohshit.jpg
>freak out on him because i’m traumatized and have very poor experience with people respecting my boundaries and consent and am scared of him messing with my corpse
>he asks me if i’m god
>bruh moment
>end up stargazing with the guy and sharing his weed
>he’s actually pretty cool
>arrange to hang out again
>start to become friends
>start to develop a crush on him
>find out he’s engaged
>find out he’s in a cult
>find out he’s being possessed by another fallen angel who the cult worships and who torments him for his own sick amusement
>i’d still hit though
>realize i’d totally die for him too
>he’s going to be sacrificed at his own wedding so that’s actually a likely possibility
>FML
i’m doing this one in shitty greentext format because i think it’s funnier that way
ANNIE LORE (ANGELVERSE)
>be me
>be the angel of retribution
>act as an executioner in countless heavenly wars and for multiple equally terrible political regimes (against my will and with no other options because i was created for this sole purpose but it doesn’t really make any difference)
>basically i’m a celestial war criminal
>hate my job
>hate my boss
>hate my life
>throw myself from the spires of the republic of heaven in a fit of despair and guilty self loathing after 600 years of this shit
>don’t die
>decide to live as much like a human as a 600 year old immortal eldritch abomination wearing the human meatsuit of a corpse i scraped out of a dumpster can
>one day after a bad night of performing vigilante justice (since i’m still the angel of retribution and compelled to protect and aid those who were wronged) i go to the desert to give my body a break and stretch out my True Form a bit (this is a normal weekend for me)
>this really crossfaded dude who came out to stargaze stumbles across my corpse
>ohshit.jpg
>freak out on him because i’m traumatized and have very poor experience with people respecting my boundaries and consent and am scared of him messing with my corpse
>he asks me if i’m god
>bruh moment
>end up stargazing with the guy and sharing his weed
>he’s actually pretty cool
>arrange to hang out again
>start to become friends
>start to develop a crush on him
>find out he’s engaged
>find out he’s in a cult
>find out he’s being possessed by another fallen angel who the cult worships and who torments him for his own sick amusement
>i’d still hit though
>realize i’d totally die for him too
>he’s going to be sacrificed at his own wedding so that’s actually a likely possibility
Anonymous