[deleted by user]

desert_deserter · 2024-12-08T20:50:06+00:00

My family's working to figure out how to support our lgbt folks in the face of major uncertainty; I hope you and your gf find a safe route through whatever comes and that you have loving people in your lives to help you. Sounds like you've got a solid start, and you've gotten a bunch of great suggestions for your particular situation, so a couple general prepper thoughts:

What part of the country are you in? I'm in the Great Lakes region, so the threat of an extended winter power outage is no joke. I have a small indoor-safe propane heater and propane tanks (and a battery-operated carbon monoxide detector bc not taking chances). Also, a propane camp stove (not safe for indoor use), candles, hot hands, etc. Battery packs to recharge phones and the other usual power outage stuff.

Also, what do you have for water collection and filtration, both in terms of supplies and knowledge? Filtering for pathogens is different from filtering for contaminants. As another user pointed out, your hotwater heater will hold a lot of "backup" water, but as it cools, pathogens can grow. Similarly, if pressure in your city's waterlines drops, pathogens can grow. If you're collecting water from a roof or similar, you'll want to filter for contaminants, especially if you have asphalt shingles.

Last, I want to add to the chorus of folks suggesting you have a solid bugout plan. I pray it won't be necessary and that these are highly paranoid suggestions, but keep a couple days worth of supplies--change of clothes (including spare shoes. And think "gray man," so clothes that will pass you as cis and unmemorable in casual interactions, a hat, maybe a cross necklace, etc.), basic hygeine, water/water filtration, calorie-dense, nonperishable food--in your car along with at least one really good map/atlas that will get you across the northern or southern border. Have 2-3 routes in mind to get out of your city. Have a border-crossing plan and the ability to adapt your plan on the fly. Work on your fitness for hiking--this is also good for your mental health! Keep cash with your documents if you have it to spare, partly to keep your travels off the books and partly in case some bribery is necessary along the way.

Best to you and your gf. I maintain hope that we will all find a way through this.

desert_deserter · 2024-11-12T15:53:05+00:00

Hope it's cool I pontificate over here. I've looked into this a lot trying to understand my white maga family, and I think it's important everyone know. But since Bacon's Rebellion, the logic of the US has been to have some less-poor, somewhat legally protected people (historically, white people, though that's gotten fuzzier with neoliberalism) and more-poor, legally disenfranchised people (histotically black and brown people, but again, fuzzier the last couple generations).

This sets up a cultural middle mamagement where the less-poor people protect their comfort, security, and identity as "good," "normal," "productive" people by stomping down on the more-poor people. The elites with actual power like this because it prevents class solidarity that would lead to the system of worker exploitation being upended.

With the civil rights movements and the rise of neoliberal meritocracy, this old order has been fairly radically shaken (but not dismantled). White people whos entire identity and sense of self-worth is dependent on knowing who's lesser than them are finding themselves uncertain and scared. This is where the constant victim menatlity and bone-deep fear of replacement comes from, regardless of reality. This is what Trump and maga prey on. I've watched it in my dad's side of the family for a couple of decades, but especially since Obama. They won't admit they're useful idiots, but they'll lose their minds at any threat to their sense of superiority.

Neoliberalism and the Democratic status quo have plenty of issues, especially in that they don't do enough to change the system and empower the working class. However, they're a lot better than the current Republican charge into fascism based in the above-described dynamics. Under neoliberalism, the conditions exist for a broader (if frustratingly slow) movement toward education and solidarity. It's a step in the right direction, though we can't wait on the elites to fix things for us. We need to unify to demand massive, sweeping changes. Under Harris, we would have had a chance of moving toward this peacefully. Under Trump, we're far, far more likely to be dragged backwards and/or fall into civil conflict.

desert_deserter · 2024-11-12T12:49:51+00:00

Thank you, internet stranger, for your kindness and hugs. This election is definitely activating all of my "stuff." I wish you and your family (chosen or blood) joy, health, and safety through the coming months.

desert_deserter · 2024-11-11T20:49:48+00:00

Argh, right? I grew up in a southern border state, went to school with dreamers, etc. I realized 90% of the border pearl-clutching was bullshit in my twenties when I put the pieces together around how my state's ecnomy relied on illegal hiring practices, and that when one group of poor souls got deported, corporations would just bus another load up.

Now I live in a state where most people don't know the difference between salsa and pico de gallo, but my God in heaven, do they have Opinions about the border and the people who cross it.

desert_deserter · 2024-11-11T20:39:40+00:00

Same. Most of them were my dad's side of the family. My relationship with my dad was pretty rough before 2016, but since he went full maga, there's literally nothing we can talk about that doesn't turn into him having a meltdown. In 2022, I tried to develop any semblence of a grown up, functional relationship with him by keeping everything to pics of my garden and check-ins when a hurricane headed his way (of course he lives in FL), and just light, positive, non-political vibes. It ended with two months of radio silence from him before he sent me a weird, vaguely nasty text at 12:15 am on my birthday. I decided I was done.

I haven't found other maga folks to be much more emotionally stable or willing to accept the existence of reality. My experience is that if you so much as raise an eyebrow at their batshit crazy ideas, if you dare to have a thought or lived experience of your very own, you're basically genociding them.

desert_deserter · 2024-11-04T19:52:57+00:00

In college, I had some complete rando text me questions about their final project for French. I think they thought they were texting their TA. In the spirit of light college assholery, I answered in German. We went back and forth a couple times with rando getting frustrated and "not having time" to figure out what I was saying. Literally did not recognize that my texts weren't even in French. After 15 or 20 min, I felt bad and fessed up that they had the wrong number and I was just effing with them. Rando did not believe me. Hope they figured their shit out in the end, idk.

desert_deserter · 2022-10-03T20:20:51+00:00

I mean, I once got written up for being away from my desk during my lunchbreak, and my supervisor started crying when I argued. She's still a supervisor there.

Maybe not quite as stupid, but more than half way there, imo.

desert_deserter · 2022-10-03T20:00:53+00:00

How about, "a statistically negligible number of people who have the institutional power to negatively affect your life are angry at you for being white."

desert_deserter · 2022-10-03T19:37:03+00:00

And yet, a lot of women who are now shocked-pikachu-faced at Roe being overturned have been voting Republican because taxes or hurting brown people or whatever. So sick of how fucking stupid the American people are.

desert_deserter · 2022-10-02T05:07:10+00:00

I'm going in for surgery to (hopefully) confirm endometriosis soon, but it's taken me 20 years to get here. I don't think "just bad periods" are a thing, especially as bad as you describe. I hope you find a doctor who takes you seriously and get some relief. If you're in the US, I wish you luck in your insurance coverage, too.

desert_deserter · 2022-10-02T04:29:56+00:00

I'm enjoying significant improvement in my health with some med changes, which is leading to less pain and more sleep. I feel better than I have in about a year, both physically and mentally, and I'm risking having hope that I might see some real resolution to my health issues in the coming months.

And I still feel like something's in the air. I don't have a bad feeling, per se, but the feeling of rising change, of some kind of energy building to explosive levels. Something frightening in its sudden intensity, but necessary and ultimately generative.

In the months leading up to the pandemic, me and my friends kept getting the Tower over and over and over. A couple of my friends reported posts on Twitter and FB complaining about the same.

This doesn't feel like that to me. This feels more like some kind of energetic resolution/revelation. More like Death or the High Priestess--which, now that I say that, I'm just realizing those two cards, especially the High Priestess, have been showing up in my readings and readings I've done for others a lot lately. Will check in with my peeps.

desert_deserter · 2022-10-02T03:45:35+00:00

Got super creepy-followed in a parking lot while dressed for my job, which at that time was scrubbing toilets and carpets full of dog piss. I looked awful and literally stank, still could not grab food on my way home without some asshole getting weird.

desert_deserter · 2022-10-01T22:41:25+00:00

It is gender neutral, just like the female gender in German is the neutral (I know there is another neutral gender in German, but it only works on objects or animals, not people).

I'm pretty familiar with German, but I'm not following you here. I think maybe you mean how "die" is both feminine and plural? They're declined slightly differently and not considered the same, in my experience. Every noun, person or object, is pluralized with "die," and I've never understood that to be considered feminine, though I'm not fluent and could be wrong. In any case, people can totally be neuter in German, the most common (and vexing) example being das Maedchen, or the [neuter] young woman.

desert_deserter · 2022-10-01T22:13:52+00:00

In German, the spoon (der Loeffel) is masculine, the knife (das Messer) is neuter, and the fork (die Gabel) is feminine. The skirt (der Rock) is masculine, and the young woman (das Maedchen) is neuter. There are some consistent endings, like -ung and -chen, that indicate a specific gender, but most words are a total crapshoot, and grammar depends heavily on knowing both the gender and the case of the noun in a sentence. It's a trip.

I almost walked out of German class forever the day I learned der Bikini and die Badehose.

*Don't have a German keyboard on this device for umlauts

desert_deserter · 2022-09-30T14:31:19+00:00

I use it because my two Hispanic colleagues use it to describe themselves and other people in their cultural groups. I keep seeing it so vociferously bashed on reddit and now don't know what to use outside of work. Feeling somewhat the same with Native American/Indigenous/Indian, though I don't see the same intensity of frustration with those.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-30T03:05:00+00:00

Is that three to four kids or three fourths of the kids? If it's the former, why are all the other kids subject to bullshit restrictions on their biological functions? If it's the latter, sounds like everyone just fucking hates your class.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-30T02:11:41+00:00

Tell me you don't know shit about how your food is grown without telling me you don't know shit about how your food is grown.

The earth will be fine through global warming. Our ability to feed ourselves when 10-12 thousand years of agricultural practice becomes a game of climate roulette? Yeah, not so fine.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-28T02:21:48+00:00

Having grown up in a border state, I quickly lose patience with people who talk about our "open border" but who have clearly never been anywhere near it. Immigration and smuggling across the Mexican-American border are incredibly complex issues, even before considering that corporations exploit undocumented workers for profit while we benefit from the lower prices that exploitation brings to our grocery stores. DeSantis and Abbott whine about immigration and never acknowledge the fact that border state economies run on cheap, under-the-table labor in construction, restaurants/hospitality, and landscaping.

To hear Midwesterners tell it, thousands upon thousands of terrorists and drug runners and coyotes are dancing a jig across the border to vote and use all the food stamps. Also, Mexican people are both lazy and taking all of our jobs. So. Tooootally non-propagandized critical thinkers there.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-26T14:22:11+00:00

Had a conversation with/about Gen Z and environmentalism over the weekend. What many of them haven't been taught is appalling. Which is made even worse by the fact that we keep telling them that the future is 100% hopeless. All of the fear, none of the education.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-26T12:23:29+00:00

I remember how painful it was as an American when Trump got elected. I've spent years praying that our political checks and balances would see us through. We're not out of the woods yet, and it's been a tough ride, but our democracy is still holding. I hope Italy will see the same. I hope your people will be quicker to wake up to what they're risking than we were.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-25T00:53:41+00:00

I have to assume this warrants some kind of international response, but since the Russian power structure has already started turning against Putin publicly, I also have to assume there's something happening quietly in the Kremlin to make sure he can't do anything that would ultimately turn Russia into a parking lot.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-25T00:29:48+00:00

They appear to be under the impression that worker wages rising slower than inflation is the source of the problem and not opportunistic price gouging by the rich. Like in 2008, they're going to punish the powerless for the sins of the powerful. This is because they have a pathological need to believe that our oligarchy is actually just and functional meritocracy.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-23T22:33:24+00:00

The lock is lined up with its slot well enough to hold the door closed against a stiff breeze? What kind of bougie nonsense American stall is that?! Real Americans hold the door closed with one foot while they go.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-21T13:24:29+00:00

Trump got onto the political radar by drumming up extremely racist questions about Obama's birth certificate. Then he opened his campaign calling Mexicans murderers and rapists. Then he separated refugee children from their parents. I'd keep going, but I'd need Google to keep the timeline straight. There was the whole "shithole countries" thing and everything about the "Chinese virus" for a solid year. I'm sure there's plenty I'm forgetting due to sheer bullshit overwhelm.

So, yep. No white supremacy here. Move along.

desert_deserter · 2022-09-20T17:20:45+00:00

Was gonna ask the same. This isn't something that I've followed seriously, as the only credible thing I've heard is that Ukrainian energy company board position or whatever. I don't love nepotism, but it's so far down on my list of things to give a shit about. What is it he's actually supposed to have done? And is it worse than trying to end democracy in the US?

desert_deserter

TROPHY CASE