my favorite is the tiny area in mississippi/alabama that says “the devil’s beating his wife” when there’s a sunshower.

nope. that number isn’t “atheists” it’s “atheist, agnostic, or ‘nothing in particular’”. this includes a lot of people who believe in the supernatural or paranormal but simply don’t practice a formal institutionalized religion. probably even a number of christians who don’t identify as being religious because they don’t practice piety (going to church, etc).

it’s also interesting to note that according to the article, the atheist/agnostic segment is chiefly comprised white people, and that “nones” overall tend to be men. atheism seems to be a white guy thing, and i think it’s worth considering why.

i think a lot of this is people joining the “New Age”/“New Thought” cult and deciding it’s not “religion” because it’s not formally centralized.

“I’m not religious, I’m spiritual” they crow as they preach dogma and employ cult tactics.

religion ain’t going away folks, it’s simply changing its face.

edit to add: atheist and agnostics are a minority of “nones”. https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2024/01/24/religious-nones-in-america-who-they-are-and-what-they-believe/

that’s an american restaurant thing, not a chinese thing. indian food places do it too, they add a fuckton of sugar so it will taste good to the american palate since we’re accustomed to having ungodly amounts of sugar in everything.

no, but feel free to re-upload and re-distribute copies however you see fit

ITT a bunch of weird pedantic nerds that hate language and don’t read enough books.

i’ll go ahead and confirm for you that for you: yes, it intentionally resembles the anarchy symbol as well as several other things. the formation of hierarchical cults with “canon” practices and central authority would be antithetical to the purpose and goal of empowering the downtrodden.

funny thing is the last time i bothered thinking about utilitarianism was when i was reading about the zizians using it to justify murdering just whoever they pleased. i’m not convinced it works, it’s a school of philosophy for stupid pedants who want to feel smart and justified in whatever they already think.

utilitarianism: for when you need the worst possible take delivered in the most insufferable manner using the least amount of critical faculty to answer the questions nobody asked.

yeah people love to bang the “death of the author” drum and i think it’s because they’re just lazy and hate thinking about stuff. it’s a valid way of reading but it’s also the most low-effort and least insightful imo.

it’s tainted by the knowledge that the creator is a disgusting monster who convinced me that he was just the coolest dude, so i can’t enjoy it anymore.

popular =/= good though.

in fact awful things get popular all the time.

i was unaware of any actual incidents with her until now. i read fall of atlantis as a kid and literally cried when it was over because i loved it so much. re-read it as an adult and the pedophile apologia is so blatant that i immediately stopped reading it and stopped mentioning her name at all.

i’ll call it death of the author when they’re actually dead, until then it’s self-excused support.

even as a kid i recognized HP as slop and it feels vindicating that society is finally catching up

generation gap happening here. common core wasn’t a thing for a lot of us, it’s brand new.

i do math the “common core” way not because it was taught to me but because the old methods didn’t work and i had to figure it out on my own.

it may not be strictly “an adhd thing” but society made it so for a time.

it literally could not be easier in TYoOL 2025 for you to open a new tab and find out those details. your own willful ignorance of the facts is a poor argument.

gaiman is at least actually brilliant and well-studied. rowling is a hack and her work sucks.

but yes, fuck them both. they are monsters.

if you think the issue is that she “has an opinion” you’re not even trying. there’s a crazy amount of content available where the controversy is explained in excruciating detail by trans people and our allies. it literally could not possibly be easier for you to inform yourself on this matter without arbitrarily demanding yet another person spend time and effort to loop you into a conversation you don’t actually seem to care much about.

yeah learning about gaiman was hard, his work meant so much to me.