"The millennials are the people who’ve inherited the hangover from the baby boomers’ party: a warming planet, a dysfunctional global financial system that rewards the rich and screws the poor, a polarized political class that’s moved so far to the right that a centrist like Barack Obama can be described with a straight face as “a socialist.” Millennials may be “narcissistic, materialistic and addicted to technology,” as Stein alleges early in his article; they’re also drowning in college debt, slaves to an internship “system” that demands ever-increasing work for no pay, and entrants into a job market that’s replaced employment rights with the “flexibility” of never being able to afford health insurance."

missmalena:commanderspock:firelordazula “Every Every Every Generation Has Been The Me Me Me Generation” by Elspeth Reeve for The Atlantic Wire Millennials are the “ME ME ME GENERATION,” writes Joel Stein for Time magazine’s new cover story out today — which makes him only the latest culture writer in the last century or so to declare the youth self-obsessed little monsters.  #when feature writers get lazy

missmalena:commanderspock:firelordazula

“Every Every Every Generation Has Been The Me Me Me Generation” by Elspeth Reeve for The Atlantic Wire

Millennials are the “ME ME ME GENERATION,” writes Joel Stein for Time magazine’s new cover story out today — which makes him only the latest culture writer in the last century or so to declare the youth self-obsessed little monsters.

 #when feature writers get lazy


Why I always thank the cashier, the store clerk, and the bus driver…

rubyvroom:

Primarily because my mother taught me to. Never gave it much more thought than that until I realized that a lot people don’t do this. 

Why not? Because it’s their job? Because they’re getting paid? Guys, a lot of the people who do good things for you are being paid to do it. If you were rescued by a fireman, you would thank him, right? Even though it’s actually his job to rescue people? If a doctor helped you with a physical problem, you’d probably thank him, right? Even though you’re personally paying him to do exactly that?

But most service industry jobs, we are particularly ungrateful for, even though these are things that help us get through our day more smoothly. Say you ride the bus. You didn’t have to walk to work today because a bus driver took you there. The bus didn’t go there by itself. A human being drove it. The driver put up with early-morning traffic so you didn’t have to. Isn’t that worthy of a “thanks” once in awhile?

I’ve had service jobs of various kinds in the past. I remember quite vividly how many people felt entitled to treat you like dirt. Not just failing to acknowledge a job well done, I mean actually abusing you for doing it. Especially in any sort of food service job, people get treated like the gum somebody scraped off their shoe. People who spend their own work day being unappreciated and abused will turn around and dish out the same treatment to the people who put together their value meal so they don’t have to cook that night. Don’t be that guy. People in the service industry are people and deserve to be treated with respect. 

Most of all I’m sure anybodywho busts their hump all day doing a particular job would like to feel, at the end of the day, that it was appreciated. So tell the lady who bagged your groceries thanks, okay? She did that for you. 


morganna:

sureloki:

adriofthedead:

a female character can wear a pink dress with flowers n bows and still be a strong character

a female character can wear huge, bulking armor n carry a sword and still be a feminine character

femininity is not exclusively defined by what a character wears, jesus christ

image

a female character can wear a pink dress with flowers n bows and still be a strong character

image

ugh no

i’ll be honest i haven’t seen the potter musicals because of things like this and fans like this like what are you thinking

that is a man in a dress playing a female character yes and that’s okay men can dress up as women whatever

but besides all of the problems of making a character seem ugly and hideous (because umbridge duh) by making her masculine

how can you think this is a good example of a strong feminine female character

it’s a man

in a dress

done up for laughs, not representation

ugh just fuck off

THANK YOU.


"When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’ To this day, especially in times of disaster, I remember my mother’s words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers — so many caring people in this world."
— Fred Rogers

We enter a little coffeehouse with a friend of mine and give our order. While we’re aproaching our table two people come in and they go to the counter: ‘Five coffees, please. Two of them for us and three suspended’ They pay for their order, take the two and leave. I ask my friend: “What are those ‘suspended’ coffees?” My friend: “Wait for it and you will see.” Some more people enter. Two girls ask for one coffee each, pay and go. The next order was for seven coffees and it was made by three lawyers - three for them and four ‘suspended’. While I still wonder what’s the deal with those ‘suspended’ coffees I enjoy the sunny weather and the beautiful view towards the square infront of the café. Suddenly a man dressed in shabby clothes who looks like a beggar comes in throught the door and kindly asks ‘Do you have a suspended coffee ?’ It’s simple - people pay in advance for a coffee meant for someone who can not afford a warm bevarage. The tradition with the suspended coffees started in Naples, but it has spread all over the world and in some places you can order not only a suspended coffee, but also a sandwitch or a whole meal. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have such cafés or even grocery stores in every town where the less fortunate will find hope and support ? If you own a business why don’t you offer it to your clients… I am sure many of them will like it. Source : [x]

We enter a little coffeehouse with a friend of mine and give our order. While we’re aproaching our table two people come in and they go to the counter:

‘Five coffees, please. Two of them for us and three suspended’ They pay for their order, take the two and leave.

I ask my friend: “What are those ‘suspended’ coffees?”
My friend: “Wait for it and you will see.”

Some more people enter. Two girls ask for one coffee each, pay and go. The next order was for seven coffees and it was made by three lawyers - three for them and four ‘suspended’. While I still wonder what’s the deal with those ‘suspended’ coffees I enjoy the sunny weather and the beautiful view towards the square infront of the café. Suddenly a man dressed in shabby clothes who looks like a beggar comes in throught the door and kindly asks
‘Do you have a suspended coffee ?’

It’s simple - people pay in advance for a coffee meant for someone who can not afford a warm bevarage. The tradition with the suspended coffees started in Naples, but it has spread all over the world and in some places you can order not only a suspended coffee, but also a sandwitch or a whole meal.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have such cafés or even grocery stores in every town where the less fortunate will find hope and support ? If you own a business why don’t you offer it to your clients… I am sure many of them will like it.

Source : [x]


"

When I criticize pop culture, any pop culture, regardless as to how it’s framed, I’m going to talk about it on aesthetic, cultural, and social grounds, because that’s the context it’s being viewed in. That means that I have no problem with noting the problems with a piece of pop culture that may be aesthetically fantastic… but that doesn’t mean it gets a pass on issues like rampant racism.

Criticizing society and culture as part of a work of pop culture is not placing an undue burden on the piece. Not every critic has to do that — though I wish more did — but those who do aren’t being unreasonable. It’s not ridiculous to look at what pop culture is doing well, and what it’s doing poorly, and, what’s more, to demand better. Requesting better depictions isn’t a demand that pop culture be educational, but a demand for basic decency, like, hey, could be not have blatant racism on TV?

Challenging critics who don’t consider social and cultural issues also isn’t unreasonable. When a critic claims that something should or shouldn’t have been done for the sake of the story, and the issue hinges around a larger social problem, I’m going to talk about that. […]

Because pop culture is larger than “what serves the plot.” That doesn’t mean it has to serve society, but it does mean that when it doesn’t, people are going to talk about it, and that’s going to become part of the larger body of work around that particular piece of pop culture…

"
posted 1 month ago with 30 notes

"We did a thorough analysis of our internal submission numbers and found that the unsolicited numbers are evenly split, while the solicited (agented, previous contributors, etc.) were 67/33 male to female. We found that women contributors and women we rejected with solicitations to resubmit were five times less likely to submit than their male counterparts. So we basically stopped asking men, because we knew they were going to submit anyway, and at the same time made a concerted effort to re-ask women to contribute."
—

Indeed. A useful reminder that throwing up your hands and saying “Women don’t pitch us; what can we do?” is ineffective and unacceptable. Changing a biased culture requires action. (via megangreenwell)

100% yes. Editors, it’s on you.

(via annfriedman)


"At my age, when you’re by yourself and a man comes up to you, that’s scary stuff. Just because he’s a pap doesn’t make it okay, goddammit."
— Perrie Edwards x

"

This unholy marriage of rape culture with the cult of forgiveness means that some people forget that actions should, and do, have consequences for very good reason. Certainly, there are issues with the American criminal justice system (alternatively, the prison-industrial complex). No doubt, forgiveness on the part of victims of horrendous crimes is sometimes helpful to them in their healing process. None of that erases the need to hold people accountable for their actions, and in the case of Steubenville, there is no dearth of documentation proving that a great wrong did not simply occur, but was actively committed by people sure that their actions would never be taken to task. How else to explain the lack of shame, the creation and sharing of evidence proving the crime, the sheer arrogance expressed in said evidence?

Though punishment is not always a deterrent at all, let alone the best deterrent, allowing for the forgiveness narrative to allow people who commit staggeringly heinous crimes to walk away does not exactly send the right message to those who believe themselves to be above the law, or even basic respect for others’ humanity, agency, and bodily autonomy. Most people behave with common decency because they are commonly decent, but they’re not the ones about whom we have to worry.

"

If you’re a “nice guy” to a girl up until you realize she doesn’t want to date you, then go on about how she’s a cold shrew that friendzoned you and how no girls date nice guys, like, nah mate, girls do date nice guys. You just aren’t a nice guy. You’re a passive aggressive beta with internalized misogyny and a serious victim complex.


"When obese people are at the size genetically normal for them, their energy balance and requirements per unit of lean body mass are indistinguishable from you or me or any other ‘normal’ weight individual, said Dr. Rudolph L. Leibel, M.D., now at Columbia University, whose laboratory at Rockefeller University, New York, has conducted some of the most detailed, complex metabolic research on energy balance and the biochemistry of fat. “An obese person is metabolically just like a lean person, except they’re bigger,” he said."
— Sandy Szwarc - How We’ve Come to Believe Overeating Causes Obesity

"In an unprecedented move, parents in California are suing their local school district over sex education. But these parents aren’t revolting for the reasons we’ve come to expect: They’re suing because they want their kids to be fully informed — imagine that. The sex ed textbook used by the Clovis Unified School District in Fresno, Calif., “does not mention condoms at all, even in chapters about HIV/AIDS and on preventing STDs and unintended pregnancy,” according to a press release from the American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing the parents, along with local doctors, in the suit. Instead, the textbook recommends preventing STDs through self-respect, group hangouts, abstinence and, um, “plenty of rest.” Who wrote this thing, Todd Akin? Charmingly, the curriculum compares “a woman who is not a virgin to a dirty shoe” and explains that “men are unable to stop themselves once they become sexually aroused,” says the ACLU. This isn’t just an assault on reason, it also breaks the law, the suit argues. In 2003, we wild ‘n’ crazy California liberals passed a law requiring sex education in public schools to be comprehensive and, you know, scientifically accurate. Last year, researchers at the University of California San Francisco found that things had improved throughout the state since the law’s passage, but spottily. More than a quarter of school districts did not teach HIV prevention — in fact, schools were more likely to discuss abstinence than mandated information about HIV — and only 58 percent covered contraception."

coxons:

5 examples of how the languages we speak can affect the way we think.

divineirony:

To say, “This is my uncle,” in Chinese, you have no choice but to encode more information about said uncle. The language requires that you denote the side the uncle is on, whether he’s related by marriage or birth and, if it’s your father’s brother, whether he’s older or younger.

“All of this information is obligatory. Chinese doesn’t let me ignore it,” says Chen. “In fact, if I want to speak correctly, Chinese forces me to constantly think about it.”

This got Chen wondering: Is there a connection between language and how we think and behave? In particular, Chen wanted to know: does our language affect our economic decisions?

Chen designed a study — which he describes in detail in this blog post — to look at how language might affect individual’s ability to save for the future. According to his results, it does — big time.

While “futured languages,” like English, distinguish between the past, present and future, “futureless languages,” like Chinese, use the same phrasing to describe the events of yesterday, today and tomorrow. Using vast inventories of data and meticulous analysis, Chen found that huge economic differences accompany this linguistic discrepancy. Futureless language speakers are 30 percent more likely to report having saved in any given year than futured language speakers. (This amounts to 25 percent more savings by retirement, if income is held constant.) Chen’s explanation: When we speak about the future as more distinct from the present, it feels more distant — and we’re less motivated to save money now in favor of monetary comfort years down the line.

But that’s only the beginning. There’s a wide field of research on the link between language and both psychology and behavior. Here, a few fascinating examples:

Navigation and Pormpuraawans
In Pormpuraaw, an Australian Aboriginal community, you wouldn’t refer to an object as on your “left” or “right,” but rather as “northeast” or “southwest,” writes Stanford psychology professor Lera Boroditsky (and an expert in linguistic-cultural connections) in the Wall Street Journal. About a third of the world’s languages discuss space in these kinds of absolute terms rather than the relative ones we use in English, according to Boroditsky. “As a result of this constant linguistic training,” she writes, “speakers of such languages are remarkably good at staying oriented and keeping track of where they are, even in unfamiliar landscapes.” On a research trip to Australia, Boroditsky and her colleague found that Pormpuraawans, who speak Kuuk Thaayorre, not only knew instinctively in which direction they were facing, but also always arranged pictures in a temporal progression from east to west.

Blame and English Speakers
In the same article, Boroditsky notes that in English, we’ll often say that someone broke a vase even if it was an accident, but Spanish and Japanese speakers tend to say that the vase broke itself. Boroditsky describes a study by her student Caitlin Fausey in which English speakers were much more likely to remember who accidentally popped balloons, broke eggs, or spilled drinks in a video than Spanish or Japanese speakers. (Guilt alert!) Not only that, but there’s a correlation between a focus on agents in English and our criminal-justice bent toward punishing transgressors rather than restituting victims, Boroditsky argues.

Color among Zuñi and Russian Speakers
Our ability to distinguish between colors follows the terms in which we describe them, as Chen notes in the academic paper in which he presents his research (forthcoming in the American Economic Review; PDF here). A 1954 study found that Zuñi speakers, who don’t differentiate between orange and yellow, have trouble telling them apart. Russian speakers, on the other hand, have separate words for light blue (goluboy) and dark blue (siniy). According to a 2007 study, they’re better than English speakers at picking out blues close to the goluboy/siniy threshold.

Gender in Finnish and Hebrew
In Hebrew, gender markers are all over the place, whereas Finnish doesn’t mark gender at all, Boroditsky writes in Scientific American (PDF). A study done in the 1980s found that, yup, thought follows suit: kids who spoke Hebrew knew their own genders a year earlier than those who grew up speaking Finnish. (Speakers of English, in which gender referents fall in the middle, were in between on that timeline, too.)


"Guys on Reddit are very typically coming from STEM fields - a lot of engineers, a lot of programmers. I really think the complete lack of basic understanding of social justice on Reddit, the lack of understanding of how past oppression continues to exert force on the present, is reflective of a larger failure of a good humanities education. It’s reflective of the increasing early specialization we require of college and even high school kids. Their STEM curriculums don’t require much of a humanities or social science foundation, so they grow up completely unarmed with the tools required to think critically about society, and totally unaware of how social structures shape everyone’s lives - and it’s especially invisible to them as mostly white, middle-class, straight males."
— “Why is Reddit so Anti-Women?” Fascinating (and highly sensical) approach here, underscoring what gets lost when education (policy) is viewed as strictly the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields (the globally profitable/innovation-driven ones) at the expense of social/cultural education.  (via glycerineclown)