Category: Uncategorized

your-frenchblondgirl:

starkravinghazelnuts:

“[Tony] has this sort of existential connection to Thanos.” – Joe Russo

“You realize this interesting parallel between Thanos and Tony. They’re both aware of something from an early point and constantly having to deal with being smarter. Thanos is a futurist as much as Tony Stark.” – Christopher Markus

Tony and Thanos appear to be two heads to the same coin. Between them, they share a lot of remarkable similarities. But what separates them is heart. Tony has compassion, while Thanos does not. 

This is emphasized in Avengers: Infinity War. Thanos hurls his adopted daughter, Gamora, off a cliff; while Tony promises his son-figure, Peter, he will catch him when he falls.

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Tony wants to save the universe by safeguarding as many lives as he can, while Thanos believes saving the

universe

necessitates massive loss of life. They are equal, yet opposite. 

Feminist Friday

stayaliveforthekilljoys:

lacqueluster:

5slicesofpepperonipizza:

mailedocumented:

When Robert Downey Jr. was asked about his acting process and Scarlett Johansson was asked how she got into shape 

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Two-time Oscar-winning Cate Blanchett 

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Designer & author Lauren Conrad 

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Award-winning Emma Stone 

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When award-winning actress Julianne Moore was asked to put her fingers into a “Mani Cam” 

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When award-winning Elisabeth Moss did 

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Emma Watson

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Rihanna 

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Megan Fox

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Nicki Minaj 

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All of my role models in my life. 

Speak your mother fucking mind.

this made me feel really strong

beatrice-otter:

kawuli:

Something to remember, as the election approaches:

The work is never wasted.

Even if the Republicans keep control of Congress–yes, that would be terrible, yes, I would be furious and frustrated and sad and it would hurt like hell–EVEN SO: the work we have done to get here was not wasted.

I was part of the previous “biggest worldwide protest ever,” the global protests against the Iraq War in February 2003.

We lost. The war happened. Is still happening.

But some of the people who got involved then worked for Obama’s campaigns, a lot of them are part of the resistance now, and all of us learned something. The work was not wasted.

Even if we lose. There were Democratic primary debates in my hometown for the first time I can remember. Even if our terrible Republican Congresswoman gets re-elected, there’s still a broader and stronger Democratic Party organization in Mike Fucking Pence’s home state.

The election can’t be an end. It will only be an end if we win and get complacent, or if we lose and give in to hopelessness. We cannot afford either. We do the job that is in front of us. No matter what.

The work is never wasted.

The stories our world tells us are about Great Heroic Struggles With Triumphant Climaxes In Which Good Vanquishes Evil And They All Live Happily Ever After. It’s all about the one extreme emergency during which people rise to the occasion.

Problem is, that’s not how the world actually … works. That’s not how change happens. That’s not how societies are reshaped. We hear about MLK and the bus boycott and the protests, but not the DECADES OF WORK that came before, the organizing and the education and the legal challenges and the hundreds of thousands of people, from great heroes to ordinary people, who put in the grinding every-day work to make the world a better place, step by step, bit by bit. The big things–the speeches, the marches–were the tip of the iceberg. Nothing would have happened without the rest of the iceberg.

The 2018 midterms are the tip of the iceberg. They are incredibly important, yes. But without the rest of the iceberg, they mean nothing. Without ordinary people across America organizing and talking to their friends and coworkers and paying attention to politics and getting involved and volunteering (not just politically, but for all the nonprofits out there working to make the world a better, fairer, more just, more merciful place) the election is useless.

This is not a sprint. It is a relay marathon. If you can run a major leg, awesome. If you can help organize the marathon, awesome. If you can coordinate the people running, awesome. If you can hand out bottled water along the route, awesome. If you can cheer along the way, awesome. If you can remind people that the marathon is happening, awesome. It’s not about great heroes or one person doing it all or one climactic battle in which everything magically gets fixed.

It’s about ordinary people doing what they can. What you can do right now is vote. What you do on November 7 and the months and years following (no matter who wins the election) is stay involved and stay working.

Take care of yourself. Take care of others. Don’t hyperfixate and burn out. Be the tortoise, not the hare. Vote. And then keep moving on.

simonalkenmayer:

If you’re discouraged about the election results

Don’t be. You’re hearing media do what it does: harp on one person’s lack of enthusiasm and make it seem that that one opinion is held by thousands.

This race went precisely as I thought it would. Precisely.

And it was absolutely a massive success.

So let me tell you why, so that you feel better and can easily put down the annoying crowing that republicans are going to do, because they managed to cling to a few things.

If the votes fall as I believe they will, the democrats will have retaken the house by some 30 seats. This is impressive and somewhat unique in our country’s history. The GOP, upon taking the house originally, gerrymandered these districts in impressively screwball ways. Wherever that rigging has been overturned, the districts have gone blue. Which is, of course, why they did it. Democrats have the house now, 30ish flips in republican rugged districts. 15 of those being female candidates.

That is absolutely impressive.

A few key candidates to whom many people were paying close attention did not perform as people desired. Abrams, O’Rourke, Gillum. Well…I’m not surprised. Abrams faces absolute state wide fraud. Her opponent being the person also in charge of voter registration, withholding some 50k votes of which 70% were black. Voter intimidation. This is blatant corruption. And yet still…her race was very close. So too with Beto. Ted Cruz was a presidential candidate! When he took Texas, he did so with a wide margin in most districts. Last night in Texas he was fighting tooth and nail. Gillum’s gubernatorial race for Florida was a figurative dead heat. 99% of the vote in—49% Gillum, 49.7% DeSantis. These are CLASSICALLY and FULLY republican regions in which Trump took the presidency by huge margins. That these races, with all those challenges, were as close as they were PROVES that something unprecedented happened.

3-400% voter turnout increases for a midterm election. Mostly with the youth.

But let’s talk about what it means to have the house.

Now I know you’re probably concerned about the federal judgeships that are about to pop up for consideration, and it’s true that the Senate was needed to stop approvals of those candidates, but…

Control of the house means that Democrats now take hold of some critical committees. These committees are the very ones that will be overseeing corruption allegations. Ways and Means, energy and Commerce, Financial Services, Intelligence, appropriations, foreign affairs, armed services, judiciary, transportation and infrastructure, and…government reform.

How do you feel now?

The worst political fallout of a GOP controlled government, the worst sound bites that weren’t Trump’s, the worst slaps across the face? All came from footage of those very same committees. Those committees now belong to Democrats.

Massive policy shifts also occurred in many classically conservative states—legalizing marijuana votes, Florida giving the vote back to former criminals who’ve served their time thus giving the vote back to a HUGE portion of the African-American Community that has been held in check by a racist and classicist policing method, then there were upsets in many small ways too.

I promise you…this is all excellent and it will have truly important and forceful impact. In 2020, if we can keep that same enthusiasm and rage, the entire government will shift. But that can only happen if we keep moving forward, if the candidates who won keep their noses to the grindstone and push back hard, if you and I and everyone on the ground continues to talk about this and force out bigots and greed.

Do not be discouraged. I promise you…this was an amazing election. Don’t focus on a few bright stars and think that all is lost because they fell. There is a great deal happening here, and one thing I know from being at sea—when a wave is building, there is first a terrifying shift, as the water level begins to rise. The ship will first dip, surrounded by walls of water, and then of a sudden, the swell. The ship raises and passengers suddenly realize that they are much higher than before, with an incredible view. Then the wave crests and takes the ship with it.

We didn’t see a wave crest tonight. So what? That means it’s a much larger wave than we realized. It will crest in the future. But only if that fluid pressure is maintained.

This is good. It is. So long as everyone keeps working. This is good.

Calm down. Have a glass of champagne. A cup of tea. When they Trumpet all their noise…say nothing. Nothing needs to be said. You’re higher than you were with an excellent view of the ending. So relax. Don’t fret.

obesecamels:

There’s a lot to unpack here.
+the flexibility to get in that pose
+the balance to stay on the skateboard
+the strength to pull back a bowstring with your toes
+the dexterity to hit a target while moving
+the coordination… not hand-eye, but foot-eye
…I don’t know what to do with these things now that I’ve unpacked them…

sixth-light:

heyheyrenay:

I am going to tell everyone a secret, especially people in rural areas. 

You…can do a slow social progressive takeover of your local Democratic party, probably. You just need to carve out some time for it.

“Renay”, you say, exasperated, “that sounds fake, but okay.” But I’m here to tell you that if you’re in a rural/red state (or even blue states), you have an excellent chance of infecting the Democratic Party in your area with some straight up radical empathy. And you can do it in sneaky ways. It’s a long game. Here is a list:

1. Find your county Democrats. You may have to start at state level, but eventually you should be able to track down the chair of the county party and find out where and when they meet. Start attending meetings. If they’re not having meetings, hoooooboy. That’s a totally different thing. I spent two years fighting that battle, but if you want help, ping me. 

2. At the very first meeting, if the group isn’t using a microphone, bring it up. Ask if the committee can invest in a portable PA system to bring to meetings to help people who have trouble hearing. If they balk (ables often will), don’t worry. Make the request once, and then make the request at every subsequent meeting, kindly, until they get so sick of you they cave and/or start empathizing with you. My position here: who cares why it gets done. Just get it done.

3. Keep going to meetings. Generally county parties meet every month.

4. If there are nametags at meetings, always use them and put your pronouns on them. Yes, even you, cis people. ESPECIALLY YOU.

5. At your third meeting, if the group is using sign in sheets, ask the secretary, or meeting chair if the former is unclear, if the sign in sheets could have a field for pronouns. It’s not about getting people to use it yet—that’s later—we just want it on the template so YOU can use it and set an example. Yes, you can make this request even as a cis person. In fact, it’s probably better that you do because it will cost you less. You can do the emotional labor instead of making trans and enby friends do the labor. This goes back to nametags: if you do it, you create a safe bubble for others to do it, or a social pressure situation for people to do it. Social pressure is sometimes toxic, but we can use it for positive things!

These are Very Simple things you can do to Increase Inclusion in local Democratic spaces and shove them left. This is just the start, too. There’s language scrubbing (kind of advanced because you need to have relationships with the people), requesting the committee invite guest speakers from marginalized communities, and becoming a delegate to the state party annual convention. This is Very Advanced because it generally means travel, but I plan to do it myself because in two years I’m going to make the Arkansas DPA adopt gender neutral language in their platform instead of this “he or she” business.

I mean, maybe you think of going to county meetings and go, “ugh I would rather eat glass” but you can always take an ebook on your phone or something (I do this…soon I will have time to knit again and I’ll be doing that). Take 3-4 hours out of your month and invest it.

What shoves the Democratic Party left? We do. A bunch of people taking small steps in their local communities. And then the candidates coming out of those committees get more progressive and thoughtful, too.

The world doesn’t change just because we want it to. We make it change.

Go do the work.

Additionally: show up to enough meetings and there’s a non-zero chance you could be running things, which is also helpful for the whole slow radicalisation process.

(in NZ if you show up to enough local meetings of a major political party you basically get elected to Parliament if that’s a thing you’re into, you think I’m joking but I’m not really, so I figure for the US ‘running things on a local level’ is totes achievable)