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"SURVIVING"

In fencing there is a biological binary* that gives one group an inherent advantage over the other. At high levels the advantaged group has been shown to perform five times better compared to the disadvantaged group, as s direct result of their biology.

Specifically, left-handed fencers perform better on average than their right-handed counterparts.

This is because righties rarely have to fence lefties, while lefties are constantly fencing righties. There's a clear discrepancy of experience. And if a lefty fences a lefty, they'll both feel that they're up against an inverted opponent, so the disadvantage cancels out.

Left-handed people make up about ten percent of the population. Left-handed fencers make up about half of all high level competitors. The inequality is clear as day.

So, should fencing tournaments be divided by dominant hand? As a right-handed fencer, I say no. Sure, it bugs me that I rarely win against a left-handed opponent, but that's just how it goes. Any reasonable person does not begin an endeavor if they can't accept each outcome. And frankly, any outcome in sports should ideally be just doing your best and having fun.

Should fencing be divided by other physical and neurological traits? There are certainly others that make a difference. I've won matches thanks solely due to my height. I've lost plenty of matches due to my slow reflexes. I've lost a handful of matches due to not being very strong.

Some of the traits relevant to fencing have more of an impact than others. Some are correlated with different aspects of biological sex, though there isn't a strict causal relationship. Ultimately no physical trait is as relevant to the outcome of a match as hand dominance is, and while we can have our own opinions on the fairness of a cross-dominant matchup, the fact of the matter is it would be ridiculous to recategorize fencing by any of these traits--including sex--without first taking into consideration the discrepancy between right- and left-handed fencers.

*I call hand dominance a binary, but this is false. Just as sex and gender cannot be conceptualized realistically in binary terms, we should acknowledge that some people are ambidextrous or do not have exactly one right and one left hand.

part of being an adult is figuring out what eveyone else's definition of "going crazy" is. to you it is not sleeping for 60 hours, writing 80k words in one sitting and expiriencing enough anxiety to kill a horse. to beth from accounting its buying a ticket to Columbus, Ohio. and to your friend its consuming so much ketamine you lose all of your posessions and wake up with five broken bones in a ditch somewhere and then proceeding to do it again the next day. to your other friend its writing a letter to their favourite actress about how much they appreciate her work. to your neighbour its laughing loudly in a grocery store whilst in pajamas. maya from uni hears the voice of her dead father making jokes with no punchlines and she considers that to be quite normal - to her going crazy would be hearing her husband instead. your downstairs neighbour will take night walks naked sometimes and claim there is nothing weird about him. there are literally no rules to life and all meaning is in the eye of the beholder.

The key to writing good fanfiction is to harbor a deeply humiliating desire, and the trick there is that even pretty basic and societally-accepted desires like “being held” and “being wanted” CAN and WILL be humiliating if they’re intense enough. Become so estranged from human connection that the idea of someone playing with your hair fills you with yearning so deep you feel like you’re going to throw up and you will write some banger fanfiction. It might have some other consequences too but idrk about that.

Brooch with hand forged fine silver lily of the valey flowers on a sterling stem. The leaf is a polished and sealed circuit board inlaid with opals.

Edit: the title for this comic is “Puzzle Rat”

this one’s a few days late due to having a lot of doctors appointments sorry
it’s  just 9 pages, and about some rats… it’s more symbolic than anything really

(it’s completely unrelated to any of my songs that have to do with “puzzleboy”)

Patreon: www.patreon.com/PengoSolvent

There's an awful trend in reading that's this CinemaSins kind of rejection of abstract concepts and suspension of disbelief, that makes people say it's bad writing when authors use descriptions that aren't immediately one to one with physical reality.

Like it's bad when a "tattoo is undulating" (as opposed to... "drawn in a wave like pattern on the skin"?), or when hair is "wet wheat from a late Summer field" (as opposed to "sort of brownish light yellow that dries lighter, but is not actual wheat stalks growing on someone's head but kind of reminiscent of the color and texture"?), or when when ice cream tastes like midnight at the fair" (as opposed to "ice cream flavour bringing back memories of undefined ice cream flavours that are individually popular but always tied to a memory of late evening at the fair ground and probably smelling vaguely like popcorn and sugar"?).

Please. We have to get back to understanding abstract descriptions that evoke feelings and memories and mental images or things we haven't experienced yet. This hyper utilitarian way of reading and judging text is killing fiction. it's robbing you of experiencing things you haven't actually personally experienced.

the real answer to almost every "does [identity A] belong in [identity B] spaces" question is actually just "these spaces are informal social groups and if you're cool you can hang, don't worry about it"

my family has had some pretty interesting encounters with psychics/mediums that seem genuine in the past, but nothing will ever be funnier to me than the last guy my mom talked to who was so definitely bullshitting, because she said "I was hoping to hear from my husband" and the guy went "he said....it's okay to Move On" and like. every single person my mom has recounted this too has been like "He Would Not Fucking Say That". as if this was an ooc fanfic about my father. it's just so fucking funny. fake psychic dude take your shitty headcanons about my ghost dad and LEAVE!!!