potato-gay:

Every aspect of my life: *is affected by people I no longer see or talk to, some of whom hurt me*

Me: why is it so hard to get over people????

sweet-autism-things:

brighteyedbadwolf:

samayla:

coffee-alien:

“Imagine having a child that refuses to hug you or even look you in the eyes”

Imagine being shamed, as a child, for not showing affection in a way that is unnatural or even painful for you. Imagine being forced, as a child, to show affection in a way that is unnatural or even painful for you. Imagine being told, as a child, that your ways of expressing affection weren’t good enough. Imagine being taught, as a child, to associate physical affection with pain and coercion.

As a preschool special ed para, this is very important to me. All my kids have their own ways of showing affection that are just as meaningful to them as a hug or eye contact is to you or me. 

One gently squeezes my hand between both of his palms as he says “squish.” I reciprocate. When he looks like he’s feeling sad or lost, I ask if I can squish him, and he will show me where I can squish him. Sometimes it’s almost like a hug, but most of the time, it’s just a hand or an arm I press between my palms. Then he squishes my hand in return, says “squish,” and moves on. He will come ask for squishes now, when he recognizes that he needs them.

Another boy smiles and sticks his chin out at me, and if he’s really excited, he’ll lean his whole body toward me. The first time he finally won a game at circle time, he got so excited he even ran over and bumped chins with me. He now does it when he sees me outside of school too. I stick out my chin to acknowledge him, and he grins and runs over and I lean down for a chin bump.

Yet another child swings my hand really fast. At a time when another child would be seeking a hug, she stands beside me and holds my hand, and swings it back and forth, with a smile if I’m lucky. The look on her face when I initiate the hand swinging is priceless.

Another one bumps his hip against mine when he walks by in the hallway or on the playground, or when he gets up after I’m done working with him. No eye contact, no words, but he goes out of his way to “crash” into me, and I tell him that it’s good to see him. He now loves to crash into me when I’m least expecting it. He doesn’t want anything, really. Just a bump to say “Hi, I appreciate you’re here.” And when he’s upset and we have to take a break, I’ll bump him, ask if he needs to take a walk, and we just go wander for a bit and discuss whatever’s wrong, and he’s practically glued to my side. Then one more bump before we go back into the room to face the problem.

Moral of the story is, alternative affection is just as valid and vitally important as traditional affection. Reciprocating alternative affection is just as valid and vitally important as returning a hug. That is how you build connections with these children. 

This is so goddamn important.

I verbally express affection. A LOT.

My husband… doesn’t. I don’t know why. For the longest time part of me wondered if it meant he loved me less.

At some point I told him about a thing I had done as a kid. Holding hands, three squeezes means ‘I Love You’.

Suddenly he’s telling me I Love You all the time.

Holding my hand, obviously, but also randomly.

taptaptap

on my hand, my shoulder, my butt, my knee, whatever body part is closest to him, with whatever part of him is closest to me

All the time.

More often than I ever verbally said it.

It’s an ingrained signal now, I can tap three times on whatever part of him, and get three taps back in his sleep. Apparently I do the same.

It’s made a huge difference for us.

People say things differently.

This is so sweet and wonderful. There are so many valid ways to show love and affection.

orcboxer:

orcboxer:

i go to a gay bar and notice the furry convention’s in town. i see a fine lookin bear remove his fursuit, revealing that underneath, he’s also a fine lookin bear. I raise my eyebrows and say “woof” and all the cat furries immediately hiss and scatter

Cats are so funny and good, our babies hang out in whatever bedroom they are allowed in until everyone goes to sleep and then they cry a little and then sulk off to their magnificent thronelike super comfy and fun cat tree in the middle of the hallway where the doors to our bedrooms are.

Cats feel love actually and they express it in totally understandable ways

jewishdragon:

imunbreakabledude:

I’m sorry I’ve been venting in a snarky way about this but I actually want to explain nicely why I find this sentiment frustrating.

“I support the writers/actors in their strike! There’s so much TV and film to watch already anyway.” “I’ll just get through my backlog!” “There’s more than anyone could watch in a lifetime anyway!”

These are all well-meaning statements that are intended to support the striking workers. They’re also very unhelpful. And probably worse than actually complaining about the strike.

What I believe most people mean when they say this is “I will not blame the workers who are on strike for the consequences of the companies’ refusal to offer a fair deal.” which is a good sentiment!

But what this statement actually says is: “I’m fine with the work stoppage as long as my own entertainment is not disrupted (because so much past work is available to me anyway).”

To be clear, watching existing content during the strike is not bad, in fact, it is good! Neither SAG-AFTRA nor WGA has called for a boycott at this time, and people make things to be enjoyed for years and years.

But why is this statement bad? (Well, not evil, but like, completely missing the point?)

By saying you don’t care if new work stops coming out, you’re essentially saying the actors and writers’ (and everyone else’s) work doesn’t matter. The industry itself is MAKING NEW WORK. And actors and writers don’t want you to feel totally cool with them not working - they want you to be annoyed and make a fuss! The strike is MEANT TO DISRUPT.

You know who LOVES hearing consumers are content to watch everything that already exists and not want anything new, especially anything new that will cost them money in the form of fair labor contracts? THE AMPTP. literally, that’s their playbook - that viewers won’t even notice the effects of a strike because there’s so much already. and no matter how this strike ends, the industry is in a contraction period so they’re GONNA be making less shit for a while and try to tell you it’s actually a good thing even if it’s less of the specific thing you wanted.

You know who really WANTS to be working on new things that you can watch and love? THE WORKERS. so by saying you’re good without their work forever because you have enough already… it’s not as supportive as it sounds!

On top of that, even though all the work that already exists is amazing and varied and, I agree, honestly plenty to explore - do you really mean that you don’t care that new work isn’t being produced thru major studios/networks right now? do you truly not care about ANYTHING that is upcoming from those channels? (if so, then go ahead and say these statements, I guess, it’s true?)

But if there’s at least one upcoming TV season or upcoming movie that you care about - you know that all the past stuff in the world, however great, won’t replace THAT PARTICULAR STORY for you. Every piece of art is unique and while it’s great to have more out there for everyone, it’s not some interchangeable slop where any one Hour of Content is equal to another to an individual. Stop saying things that imply that! Because that is quite literally the future the network CEOs want! they want you forever subscribed to Interchangeable Content Slop that costs as little as possible to produce, whether it’s made by exploited workers all lumped together under one “Creators” label, or made by AI, or not made at all, just recycled!

We care about the TV and film being made now and we want to pressure the AMPTP to negotiate good contracts so that it can keep being made!

tl;dr this was a petty rant, yes, but I’ve seen this statement going around enough that I think it’s doing more harm than people realize; a way more effective way to support the strike is to spread info about what the actual negotiation points are, for one thing. (Links to read: SAG / WGA) (EDIT: more detailed link for SAG)

Strikes are supposed to be disruptive. If you pretend they aren’t, you’re helping the CEOs.

Everything you’ve said here is very true but i think people are also saying that because they are either reacting (or sort of pre-reacting) to the producers using the lack of new content for the public as a sort of threat/plea for us to side with them rather than the actors and writers. They want us to be ravenous mindless consumers but instead we are saying “lol you think that’s a threat?”

Again not discounting your feelings or your analysis. I think all of this is true. The statement is still very surface level support and dismissive of the real issue.

I rly constantly have to resist the urge to judt grab the human race by the shoulders and yell BE SMARTER!!!! JUST BE SMARTER!!!!!

joyflameball:

huffylemon:

The notes get 0 stars in reading comprehension

doozclops:

Unfriendly reminder that all you idiots being like “yeah just pirate media now, fuck corporations!” posting links and just openly telling people where to download pirated media are why it’s so hard to find safe, working sites for it anymore.

I’ve been doing this shit for over 20 years and the availability has gone down as it’s become more mainstream. The more you publicly talk about all these sites the less there are. Shut up. Tell people in private or don’t tell them at all.