If you’re autistic and/or have ADHD like me, I recommend switching to ‘Simple English’ when reading lengthy and complex Wikipedia articles because it makes it so much easier to take in, comprehend, and understand
how to do:
On the sidebar on the left, there’s a list of languages listed in alphabetical order, so you have to scroll down a bit to find ‘Simple English’. But even if you can’t, you can just edit the URL from en.wikipedia.org to simple.wikipedia.org
Here’s an example of the difference between English wiki and Simple English wiki:
English:
Simple English:
[Image 1: A lengthy article about Japan in difficult words, with long paragraphs and no pictures.
Image 2: The article about Japan, only now the text has been compressed into a mere two paragraphs and there are pictures visible on the right (the Japanese flag), as well as a table of contents.]
Holy crap this is actually a life saver
This is important and wonderful. Knowledge should be available to everyone. Not just people with the right brainware or educational background.
So I’m a phlebotomist. And sometimes, I work at a site that is directly adjacent to an endocrinologist. Which means I see and take blood from a lot of folks that are trans, or nonbinary, or gender nonconforming.
Do you have any fucking idea how easy it is, in customer-service speak, to respect someone’s gender?
I mean, I’ve had super awkward situations where I have to say things like ‘I’m sorry, that name isn’t coming up in our system. Is there another name…“ And without fail they provide their deadname and I plug it in and I say ‘Ok, that came up, do you want me to fix that in our system?” And they say ‘Yes’ and then I ADD IT AS A SYNOMYMOUS NAME. Same as I would for someone recently married or divorced. The end.
I have never experienced a situation in which I have felt motivated to ask someone’s pronouns.
I have had situations in which I have thought to myself ‘I have no idea if this person is ‘sir’ or ‘ma’am’ and instead have gone ‘Next patient please?’ or ‘I can help who’s next’ or ‘I can help you now’ while looking directly at them.
I have had situations where I’ve gone ‘I’m like 90% certain that I’ve been given a record with this person’s deadname because this name does not match at all the gender presentation of the person I’m looking at’ And I say ‘Ok, can you spell your last name for me? Ok, spell your first name? And your date of birth?’
and then I quietly write ‘preferred name [the name they just spelled] on the top of thier record.
THIS IS NOT HARD.
And if this is not hard for me, as a person working in medicine who has to make certain that the person I’m talking to is the same person on the medical record that I’m looking up, how much easier must it be for, say, a barista who doesn’t give half a fuck who you are? I’ve BEEN a barista in the past. If a Barista is asking your pronouns, that person is an asshole.
it is pretty hard to find solid statistics on wolf attacks, but as far as i can tell, wolves in north america kill way way way less than one person a year, which means that forces more deadly to us than wolves include: dogs, ice fishing, and getting crushed by a falling flat screen tv.
…further complications to trying to write non-ridiculous angst into a werewolf story
“you don’t understand…i’ve done things under the full moon that i can never take back…one time i ate a squirrel”
“I SNIFFED MY OWN BUTT. THE INDIGNITY HAUNTS ME STILL.”
“i have pooped in the woods and now must go brood about it. don’t try to follow me.
…and seriously, be careful around your flatscreen, it is probably heavier that you think.”
European wolves (before they were hunted into extinction in most areas) attacked humans purposefully a lot; it’s in the historical record.
North American gray wolves have a natural fear of humans and attack people very rarely, really only when threatened or starving.
So like, imagine, like, a divide between people who got infected with Old World and New World lycanthropy. One makes you this dangerous beast that sees humans as a viable food source an another makes you perceive humans as a threat. Imagine people getting it wrong!
Some shady paranormal group capturing a werewolf to use as security but it just runs away when people trespass.
Some hunters go deep into the woods to murder a werewolf clan for their pelts but it turns out they’ve isolated themselves so deeply because they have the European strain and none of the hunters survive.
New werewolves are so confused because the websites give conflicting advice: get yourself to your nearest national park when you’re about to turn and just let yourself run free; if you try to cage yourself the claustrophobia and the smell of people will make you panic and you could really hurt yourself or someone else.
vs
If you’re anywhere near human civilization you must make sure you turn in a closed space that you can’t escape from in wolf form or you’ll definitely kill someone. Just try to take a nap during the full moon, OK.
And they’re like, WHAT DO I DO WHICH ONE DO I HAVE?
case in point, the global werewolf cultural divide!
on the subject of the global werewolf cultural divide, another update, per wikipedia:
Wolves from different geographic locations may howl in different fashions: the howls of European wolves are much more protracted and melodious than those of North American wolves, whose howls are louder and have a stronger emphasis on the first syllable. The two are however mutually intelligible, as North American wolves have been recorded to respond to European-style howls made by biologists (x)
I want to write a fic where Lilo goes to college and her roommate is Boo from Monsters Inc. Boo is the first person to think Stitch is adorable and cuddly, and Lilo is the first person not to act like “Mike Wazowski” was a weird name for a goldfish. They get on like a house on fire which is kind of bad for Nani’s blood pressure.
But then one night they wake up in the middle of the night because something is in their closet. And the door starts to creak open so Stitch tackles whoever (whatever) is in there. They fall back into the closet, the door slams shut… and when Lilo runs over and opens it there’s nothing but an empty closet.
Then Boo tells Lilo all about this weird thing that happened to her when she was a kid, and how no one ever believed her but she knows it was real.
And cue Lilo and Boo busting into the Monster world to rescue Stitch and wreaking mad havoc in the process.
SEE THIS IS A WORTHY SEQUEL
This needs to happen
Petition for the movie to be hand-drawn in Lilo and Stitch’s style when they’re in the human world, and computer animated once they go through the door into the monster world.
OOPS MY HAND SLIPPED – I COULDN’T HELP MYSELF
I love the artwork, this is so cute!
The fic was written and I don’t see the link attached! Anyways, it’s a fantastic fic & definitely worth a read.
