Bitch? No, it's pronounced Butch

i'm gonna be me forever and im gonna get really really good at it

sometimes people will make you feel stupid for being kind. this makes it hard to stay kind. it is important that you do anyway. if you have become unkind, it is important to remember that you can become kind again. it's a skill, not an inherent trait.

men make it absolutely impossible to practice humility

what you say: “I think this is the case”

what men hear: “I have no idea whatsoever, but here’s a totally random guess”

what you say: “I’m not an expert on this subject”

what men hear: “I don’t know anything about this subject and need its bare fundamentals explained to me”

what you say: “I could be better read in this area”

what men hear: “I have never read anything in this area”

like okay fuck it nevermind I’m actually an expert in every subject I’ve ever read or heard about. in fact I know everything.

If anyone's ever wondering why I come across as such an arrogant bitch on Tumblr it's because I used to work in science with a lot of men and never readjusted my communication style afterward.

This is one of my biggest seemingly low-stakes feminist soapboxes. Women are often encouraged to take hedging, consensus-seeking, and checking-in phrases out of their speech in order to seem "more confident". And listen, of course you do not need to say "I think" when you actually know for pretty damn sure, or double-check every little thing you say, or apologize for things that are out of your control.

But there are men in my life who I respect, who I think are generally good communicators, but who have admitted to me that if they do not know the answer to something they will just state their best guess in a confident tone of voice, with no hedging or clarification to warn the listener that what they just said was pulled from their ass.

I once asked my high school boyfriend what noise a platypus makes and he confidently told me "oh they quack" and I said "really? that seems like they'd have different noise-making structures than ducks since they're not birds" and he said "oh yeah you're probably right. I was just guessing." And had no idea why I was mad! I was like, so if I ask you a question you might just bullshit me?? What if I had believed you and gone and repeated that to other people? I could have looked like an idiot. I could have spread misinformation to a ton of people! But I have told that story to other men and had them say "oh yeah I totally do that."

This is so much worse communication than just saying "I don't know but I think..." There shouldn't be campaigns training professional women to sound "more confident," there should be campaigns training professional MEN to stop doing whatever THAT is!

[ID: Chidi Anagonye from The Good Place saying “okay, but that’s worse. You do see how that’s worse, right?” End ID.]

happy "is it tuesday or wednesday?" friday

Vincent Van Gogh - ‘In spite of everything’

they're putting me on the cover of times magazine and also putting a cup over me and there's even talk of taking me outside

i just got shot with a puppy rifle but it didnt hurt me because im not a puppy

me i just got shot by an elephant gun but im not even an elephant so im ok

i just got shot with a 9mm handgun but i'm ok because i am taller than 9mm

hi! I'm a 9mm tall puppyphant and i'm excited to be here!

Someone will say "as a queer person in the heart of empire, my life is in danger every day" and you'll find out they're a developer for Amazon and live in San Francisco or Seattle or some shit, and then you'll meet a trans girl from Alva, OK who's like "Yeah, things are pretty good. AutoZone moved me to full-time."

Always a good time to burn down yet another village!

Patreon

everybody knows you can't be "attracted" to people they made that shit up as a prank

the old "all trans people I know are mentally ill to some degree even if I don't believe being trans is itself a mental illness" line is a classic case of torturing you to insanity then torturing you for being insane

like do you have any idea how rude people are about all of this of course I'm insane

Your 20s are not about getting your life together they're about learning to escape the self imposed torture labyrinth you've built inside your own head

"retiring for the evening" is a very useful concept lol we should be free to say "i'm not gonna be chatting anymore tonight" without then having to pretend to be asleep. if we ever talk and you say goodnight don't stress it if i see you online later hahahahah

This is very important and you all need to see it right now

@vague-magnus-archives

whoa…it’s crazy, i was under the impression that the cat has been fed every day for the past 19 years. but he’s informing me right now that’s never happened? not once in his life?