When someone disagrees with you online and demands you prove your point to their satisfaction by writing a complete and logically sound defense including citations, you can save a lot of time by not doing that.
Bro, I’ve known you for twelve seconds and enjoyed none of them, I’m not taking homework assignments from you.
This got a lot of responses from people pointing out that evidence is a key part of intellectual inquiry, discourse, and debate. That being able to support your beliefs is a key critical thinking skill. Which is 100% true.
Except that you don’t actually have to participate in intellectual discourse any time some fucko on the Internet tells you to.
There’s a vast difference between “this is an important thing to be able to do,” and “this is a thing that you must be continuously available to perform in public for any stranger who asks.”
out here trying to help the down-on-their-luck Pokemon and instead i’m getting swindled out of my money by the local furries like some kind of sucker……..
In response to overwhelming reader requests, here’s a masterpost on how to train your cat to wear a harness! This post gets you through getting your cat to willingly wear a harness and be comfortable moving around in it – a follow up piece will detail how to train your cat to actually walk with you (sort of) on a leash.
This post features @zooophagous‘ problem child lovely cat son Aster as the harness model in the photos.
black cats are wonderful because you can stare into the void and not only does the void stare back, sometimes it trots up to you happily and begs for pats
Reptiles are losing
more than just their tails to cats. In fact, new research shows that
entire reptile populations may be dropping due to the presence of
invasive felines.
I have a lot of teenage friends/mutuals who are “mature” and cool and whatever, but the bottom line is, unless you’re helping them with gender, sexual orientation, mental illness, abuse, etc. you shouldn’t be having conversations with a minor that you wouldn’t have in front of their parents.
The internet is weird. Some of my favourite artists on here are, like, sixteen. Teenagers are talented! They’re funny! They’re cool! They’re people.
But they’re also kids, and you have to respect and understand that, because ultimately, any friendship you have with a minor is also a responsibility, and if the fact that y’all both like the same cartoons is enough to make you “forget” that, or enough to make you “overlook” that, it isn’t a responsibility you’re ready for.
The only reason you should ever be in a kid’s life as an adult is because you’re prepared to be the kind of adult you needed at their age. That’s it.
If the relationship gets more intimate than “older sibling”, you’re being gross. If you’re saying anything to them that could be taken as a sexual advance or as emotional abuse “out of context”, you’re objectively being gross! If you’re relying on a kid to be your best friend in the same way a fellow adult would, your probably being, you guessed it, super gross. Full stop.
I don’t want any of my younger mutuals to see this and feel like I don’t respect you or care about you or like you, by the way. It’s the exact opposite! I think you’re great, and I want you to be healthy and happy, and part of that is establishing boundaries and understanding how we’re different, even if we have a lot in common that makes us great friends! That’s a great thing to do in any friendship.
I think it’s worth noting that beyond the obvious don’t flirt with kids online if you are an adult, it’s also important not to unload your adult problems on them. When my sister was a kid, she was friends with a 30-something year old woman online. She’d always complain to my sister about her financial problems, depression, and suicidal ideation. Since the woman was direct messaging her on AIM, my sister felt under a lot of pressure to fix things for her and help her. My parents were horrified when they found out, and almost banned the internet.
I don’t doubt that the woman talking to my sister had completely unmalicious intentions, and that she did genuinely need (and deserve!) help. I don’t think that there’s anything wrong with adult bloggers posting about their problems on their own blog. However, if they start specifically messaging a minor on this site about their problems, that’s forcing the minor into a role that they really shouldn’t be expected to perform. That kind of stuff needs to be saved for peers or professionals.
