Ardent Me

rubybass: “Will you marry me?”

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 10:23:08 -0500

rubybass:

“Will you marry me?”

But most of all, I’m sorry for giving up on us when you never...

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 10:00:56 -0500

But most of all, I’m sorry for giving up on us when you never did.

Last day of classes!

Mon, 10 Dec 2012 10:51:58 -0500

-You came.To be honest, I wasn’t completely sure you...

Mon, 10 Dec 2012 10:51:40 -0500

-You came.To be honest, I wasn’t completely sure you would.

-I’m glad to hear it. I should hate to be predictable.

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Mon, 10 Dec 2012 10:00:46 -0500

End of Semester To-Do List

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 18:30:00 -0500

~~honors thesis presentation (12/3)~~
~~floor social (12/3)~~
~~valuing assignment #12 (12/4)~~
~~community engagement program (12/7)~~
~~resident one-on-ones (12/7)~~
~~urban assignment #3 (12/10)~~
~~remote sensing final report (12/10)~~
~~honors referee report (12/10)~~
valuing final exam (12/14)
urban final exam (12/17)
~~urban final paper (12/17)~~

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Sun, 09 Dec 2012 11:55:57 -0500

Predictions

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 11:03:00 -0500

Dream: Serena and Dan’s Wedding
Flashback: High school (how we discover Gossip Girl’s identity)
Flash-forward: Chuck, Blair, and Baby Bass
Gossip Girl: Dan Humphrey

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Sun, 09 Dec 2012 11:00:26 -0500

one-angry-liberal: sonofbaldwin: The so-called “pro-life”...

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 10:57:41 -0500

one-angry-liberal:

sonofbaldwin:

The so-called “pro-life” movement’s philosophy.

One of the best political cartoons that I’ve seen.

"A woman’s worst nightmare? That’s pretty easy. Novelist Margaret Atwood writes that when she asked a..."

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 10:57:11 -0500

“A woman’s worst nightmare? That’s pretty easy. Novelist Margaret Atwood writes that when she asked a male friend why men feel threatened by women, he answered, “They are afraid women will laugh at them.” When she asked a group of women why they feel threatened by men, they said, “We’re afraid of being killed.””

- http://www.pbs.org/kued/nosafeplace/articles/nightmare.html (via alullaby)

That sums it up

[trigger warning for the commentary below]

(via erikawithac)

This reminds me of a discussion we had in school, and one girl was talking about living in fear of her safety because she is a girl, and this guy chimed in and was all “It’s hard for guys too! I’m so awkward around girls! It’s embarrassing!” Yeah, not the same thing, exactly?

(via tulletulle)

Wow.

(via kittencoaster)

This reminds me of an article about online (heterosexual) dating that I read a while ago. It listed men’s and women’s worst fears about meeting someone from online. The highest ranked fear that men had was that their date would be fat, whereas the highest ranked fear that women had was that their date would turn out to be violent and kill them.

I think that says a lot.

(via kaitg)

Its interesting also that these fears sit subconsciously until woman are asked to exams their responses to men. We women will operate with this fear in mind, the way we protect ourselves, make sure our friends know where we are when we go on a date, words that we use while interacting with men, all in hopes they will not kill us, but simultaneously love us.

I think bell hooks made a point about this in her series on love. something along the lines of how can women hope to love and receive love from men when at the foundation of our relationships there is this strong fear of men. you can’t build true trust when your foundation is crumbling under you.

the scariest part is, once you recognize this fear, and face it, how do you address it when there is evidence of “good” men abusing, hurting, and killing women everyday?

(via becomingchichi)

I was in my early 20’s when one of my homegirls broke this down for me.

I was in a broken relationship, and one of the things was that bugged me at the time was that the girlfriend at the time would freak out whenever I got angry - I never yelled, never throw or hit things, mostly, I just needed some time to cool out.

“Why does she get scared when I’m angry? I’d never hit her!”

“But she doesn’t KNOW that. She can’t assume that. Look at how many dudes are out there pulling shit.”

And that stuck with me for a hot minute. The relationship was broken on so many levels anyway, but that fact still remains, as a man, I can’t fault women for assuming the worst in order to protect themselves, especially how the world’s patriarchy and misogyny rolls.

(via bankuei)

My brain knows that my husband won’t hit me. Really, the logical part of me totally gets that. But when we’re arguing he has to stay on the other side of the room & not yell too loud because my fight or flight instincts have 25+ years of being hard wired that loud = violent & our 11 year relationship isn’t long enough to undo that.

(via karnythia)

I’ve had continual discussions with Tchy about this, and I don’t expect to stop. It’s fair to say that there’s no one in the world that I trust more, and he has been extremely careful with me, but… the fact remains that he leans quite a bit towards the masculine, and this means that that fear is always there. The news of transmasculine folks abusing/raping people doesn’t help that fear any. :(

I’m learning not to apologize for it. It’s not my fault (nor, really, is it his) that I’m scared of dude-type people. But it’s always there. Which is another reason why I get so pissed off when trans men try to make transmisogyny about them.

(via kiriamaya)

men, read all of this please. including the commentary. esp if you consider yourself a Nice Guy.

(via static-nonsense)

This is an incredible thread of responses. I’ve seen this quote before, but not the dialogue that built up around it. The part about loud=violent hits home particularly hard for me. I am terrified of getting into irl arguments with men, especially when they get loud. It’s always going to sit in the pit of my stomach.

(via mizbingley)

That part resonates for me too, although from a completely different angle. Despite being more terrified of sexual violence than I am of anything other than my own brain, I do not hesitate to yell, confront, get up in the face of, threaten, even hit men twice my size and many times my strength. Faced with a threat of violence from men, I will either imply or state “I dare you to.”

I also, as previously established on this blog, have a death wish.

To me, that encapsulates everything about the violence, especially sexual violence, coded into relationships between men and women in our society: for a woman to assert herself in the face of maleness may require the woman in question (such as me) to be perpetually suicidal.

(via 14kgoldnyc)

Reblogging for commentary. I have been frightened and scared by men being loud with me, even if I don’t think they’ll be violent. Like people have said above, it’s just a latent response in your brain to fear violence from men.

I went out to dinner with someone a couple of weeks ago (LONG story, was supposed to be a group dinner but it ended up just being me & a strange man) and I told him I blogged about feminism and politics, and he went off on me. He told me feelings were bullshit and women just wanted special privileges, and then he said, “Women don’t give men enough credit for not being violent psychopaths. That’s what we are, deep down. We want to rape and pillage, and we don’t, and women don’t give us enough credit for that.” I burst into tears. That shit was terrifying.

(via stfuconservatives)

"In 2008 in San Diego, a 7-year-old boy whose parents refused vaccines contracted measles while on a..."

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 10:56:59 -0500

“In 2008 in San Diego, a 7-year-old boy whose parents refused vaccines contracted measles while on a family trip to Switzerland. Before realizing how sick he was, the boy went to school and infected four other kids at school, after having already infected his two siblings. He then infected four other children who happened to be in the waiting room at his pediatrician’s office. Three of those children were too young to have received their MMR vaccines. One of those infants was hospitalized; another traveled on an airplane while infectious. This case is a sobering example of how one family’s decision not to vaccinate their children has serious consequences for other children.

But it isn’t as sobering as the case in January in Minnesota in which an Hib meningitis outbreak severely sickened four children and killed one infant. Of those five children, one was too young to be vaccinated, one had an immune deficiency, and the other three had parents who refused the vaccine. The child who died was among those three children whose parents, out of fear or personal belief, opted out of the vaccine.”

- My son has cancer. He can’t go into day care because of unvaccinated children. - Slate Magazine (via whenrobotsreproduce)

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Sun, 09 Dec 2012 10:00:45 -0500

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Sat, 08 Dec 2012 00:01:29 -0500

I would never be happy with anyone else as long as you walked...

Fri, 07 Dec 2012 16:31:00 -0500

I would never be happy with anyone else as long as you walked the Earth, which is true. And I think you feel the same about me.

knowhomo: LGBTQ* Photos You May Have Missed Washington State’s...

Fri, 07 Dec 2012 10:53:26 -0500

knowhomo:

LGBTQ* Photos You May Have Missed

Washington State’s Newest Married Couples

As of Thursday, December 6, 2012, Washington state now issues equal gender identity and gender pairing marriage licenses.

Yay Washington!

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Fri, 07 Dec 2012 10:20:32 -0500

Sigh...

Thu, 06 Dec 2012 15:05:11 -0500

Just discovered this was a form email. My happy bubble has been burst.

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Thu, 06 Dec 2012 10:00:31 -0500

"I am evaluating your GIScience MA application and it is very impressive indeed."

Wed, 05 Dec 2012 10:40:00 -0500

“I am evaluating your GIScience MA application and it is very impressive indeed.”

- Email from fifth-year program director