This Post Is About Transitioning And Dancing And Sex, But It's Also About Everyone Whether Or Not You

WE HAVE A PEACOCK MANTIS SHRIMP AT WORK NOW AND I AM OBSESSED WITH HER. EVERYONE SAY HI TO SCYLLA!! PLEASE ADMIRE HER BEAUTIFUL COLORS AND SASSY LITTLE GRAVEL KICK. SHES INCREDIBLE

[Image descriptions: a series of 2018 tweets from user "G. Willow Wilson" (@GWillowWilson) reading:

It's a mistake to think a dictatorship feels intrinsically different on a day-to-day basis than a democracy does. I've lived in one dictatorship and visited several others--there are still movies and work and school and shopping and memes and holidays.

The difference is the steady disappearance of dissent from the public sphere. Anti-regime bloggers disappear. Dissident political parties are declared "illegal." Certain books vanish from the libraries.

So if you're waiting for the grand moment when the scales tip and we are no longer a functioning democracy, you needn't bother. It'll be much more subtle than that. It'll be more of the president ignoring laws passed by congress. It'll be more demonizing of the press. End image description.]

Keita Morimoto.

Downright astonishing paintings from Tokyo-based artist Keita Morimoto.

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Thailand is on FIRE LATELY. First gay marriage and now this?? Hell fucking yes!!

UN News

‘Historic development’ in Thailand as it moves to end statelessness for nearly 500,000 people

In a landmark move towards ending statelessness, Thailand’s cabinet has approved an accelerated pathway to permanent residency and nationali

"In a landmark move towards ending statelessness, Thailand’s cabinet has approved an accelerated pathway to permanent residency and nationality for nearly half a million stateless people, marking one of the region’s most significant citizenship initiatives. 

The decision announced on Friday [November 1, 2024] will benefit 335,000 longtime residents and members of officially recognized minority ethnic groups, along with approximately 142,000 of their children born in Thailand.

“This is a historic development,” said Ms. Hai Kyung Jun, UN refugee agency (UNHCR) Bureau Director for Asia and the Pacific. The measure is expected to dramatically reduce statelessness, addressing the situation of the majority of nearly 600,000 people currently registered as stateless in the country.

Thailand’s commitment to eradicating statelessness has positioned the Government as a leader in addressing this humanitarian challenge, the agency said.

The country recently pledged at the Global Refugee Forum 2023 to resolve statelessness and was among the founding members of the Global Alliance to End Stateless, an initiative launched by UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, in Geneva last month...

UNHCR has expressed its commitment to continue working closely with the Royal Thai Government on the implementation of this groundbreaking decision and to ending statelessness overall."

-via United Nations News, November 1, 2024

Daily reminder that we do not actually live in a dystopian movie put the apocalypse down and back away slowly. You know when your cleaning a room and you pull everything out of it's draws to sort through it and you're like "what the fuck have I done I'm never going to be able to tidy all of this" I think that's the stage we're at in the world. Thanks to social media we've pulled out all the messed up shit from the cupboards of the world, it was always there but now we can see it and we're going to have to sort it all out we made this mess and we can fix it. Falling to the floor sobbing will not clean a crusty room. A group of people working systematically (preferably with music in the background) will.

Studies show that approaching youth with a bystander-intervention model is actually a lot more effective for reducing sexual assault, and it is also more enthusiastically received than programs that bill themselves as anti-rape.

We can tell youth that they are basically “rapists waiting to happen” (anti-rape initiative), or we can tell them that we know they would intervene if they saw harm happening to someone and we want to help empower them to do that (bystander intervention). The kids jump in with both feet for the latter! It was amazing to see children (and young boys in particular) excited to do this work and engage their creativity with it. Also, studies show that not only do they go on to intervene, but they also do not go on to sexually assault people themselves. Bystander intervention also takes the onus off the person being targeted to deter rape and empowers the collective to do something about it. It answers the question in the room when giggling boys are carrying an unconscious young woman up the stairs at a house party, and people are not sure how to respond and are waiting for “someone” to say or do something.

Richard M. Wright, “Rehearsing Consent Culture: Revolutionary Playtime” in the anthology Ask: Building Consent Culture edited by Kitty Stryker

This is incredible. I love the...dancing sea stars?...on the boots or leggings on the person on the left-hand side of the frame. I love how intricate the flowers are around the middle person's neckline. And I love how the right-hand person used the red and blue closure tapes from the bags to add color and how they incorporated them into the neckline detail -- that's seriously so beautiful and not something I would have thought to do, I think. Jesus, what an outstanding thing.

Whale Sharks (Rhincodon typus), family Rhincodontidae, order Orectolobiformes, Cebu, Philippines

ENDANGERED.

The largest "fish" in the world, this species grows up to 72 ft. long.

Photograph by karanikolov