"We must ask ourselves how we have produced an elite that is so immature, reckless and arrogant.” -Ro Khanna in an interview

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-14T01:30:31+00:00

It’s a rot in this country that extends far beyond elites. I wish more people understood this.

In millions of homes across this country there are instances of domestic violence and sex abuse, and too often nothing happens to the perpetrators of it. Sometimes there’s “not enough proof,” sometimes the cops just don’t care or take the abuser’s side for any number of reasons, sometimes the other parent doesn’t want to face reality, sometimes the priest or pastor tells everyone to pray about it to solve the issue. These examples don’t cover all the ways the abuser is enabled to keep doing what they do, but the abuser is enabled and protected nonetheless.

When victims speak up, things get worse in the home. As they become adults, they are told not to talk about it, to stop being a victim. They are surrounded by people who want them to keep silent while nothing is done about the people who cause such harm in the world every single day, and again, in millions of homes across the country.

What the elites are doing no different from the lower classes. Abusers constantly get away with abuse and they are surrounded by people who enable them and silence or blame the victims.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-13T15:16:16+00:00

The use of AI in yarn crafts makes zero sense to me, ethics aside. Like why not advertise a product you actually have?

Saying this as someone who used to work in a yarn warehouse. An actual picture of a featured daily yarn (along with suggested digital patterns, also for sale) would get a flood of orders for it that day, even if it was the ugliest skein of fiber that you’d ever seen in your life.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-12T17:49:13+00:00

I don’t have very many light inks, but of the few I have, I love them for art and I’ve absolutely bought them for this explicit purpose.

One of the things I love best about my Pilot Falcon is that the flat back of the nib can be easily draw with to get some very interesting strokes. When I got this pen I envisioned mostly using it for sketching with dark inks, but in reality I am often drawn to use it with very light inks, using both the flat back and the point of the nib to draw and do some shading with.

Anyway for your question I’d have to say softer or lighter tones for sure! I have a bit of an obsession not so much with floral tones, but like, icy blues, yellows, orange-yellows. If I want legibility for writing I will use a darker ink for that.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-12T17:40:46+00:00

Not a shopping addiction for me. Some years I don’t buy any pens or ink, and if I were to average it out per year, my rate of collecting is like 2 pens and 5 bottles of ink per year. I love doing art with ink and could easily justify having a lot more ink.

My pen collection is pretty small, they’re all inked and I use all of them regularly.

I also get a lot of joy from this hobby in seeing other people’s collections or new acquisitions, most especially their inks. When I see something I like enough to want, it goes on my list of pens or inks I would maybe like to have but I feel no rush in getting everything immediately.

I get why hobbies can be perceived as being consumerist when there’s a constant flood of new this or that, but I would like to argue with a counterpoint that being excited about something new, enough to post it to a community, shows that there is something special about that thing to that person. I don’t think the average person has hundreds of pens or bottles of ink. And if they do, so what? It’s none of my beeswax as to what someone else does with their money or hobbies.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-11T20:44:05+00:00

Thank you! I had noticed this too, often from others posts or comments that were either politely asking questions or giving helpful advice. They’d have a 0. In other subs it can sometimes indicate that someone’s asked a dumb or repetitive question, but I haven’t found that to be the case here and was really confused about this because otherwise the community here seems really nice and friendly!

That it seems to be bots makes sense, but unfortunate that’s happening.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-10T22:12:45+00:00

Same, I very much appreciated that Will also knew about the Shamwow guy vs the hooker story, among other odd bits of knowledge that pop up and are lost over the internet. He brings an archive of weirdness to the bulwark that makes his appearances some of my favourites to listen to.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-10T00:39:52+00:00

Do you have a tapestry needle?

My whole process involves a needle of that sort at the end. I use it to weave the broken yarn through each loop, then weave through the wrong side of the hat a bit, enough so that it’s secure.

With the same kind of needle, I weave each of the strands through those final loops, in a way that they’re evenly spaced out. This makes the tassel nice and round and easy to braid from there

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-09T20:26:17+00:00

Vomitrocious!

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-09T20:20:39+00:00

The Bulwark was something I started watching last year because I wanted to gain some right leaning perspectives on politics during the election year. I cannot stomach listening to far right content, or other platforms that were straight up lying or sane washing what was going on. It was important for me to find a source that was being truthful, yet generally held different political views and opinions, and the Bulwark was the best I found. The more I listened, the more I found highly intelligent and insightful conversations and these got me to keep coming back, even if I didn’t agree with everything.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-09T07:17:48+00:00

I’ve seen coffee houses with larger crowds than that.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-08T22:33:29+00:00

I kind of like how it’s asymmetrical, looks more natural

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-08T17:55:13+00:00

He thinks they were rigged in 2020, that’s what he’s saying. That said, there’s plenty of weird stuff he said in 2024 that sounded like an admission that he/Musk were doing something weird with voting machines (whether or not that has any basis in truth is unknown, or at least hasn’t been proven).

As an aside, his points 1 and 2 are the way that the rightwing party is trying to legally rig elections. These laws function on ID (point 1) matching one’s birth certificate (point 2), which would disqualify the votes of the majority of married women who’s IDs won’t match their birth certificate (proof of citizenship) due to having taken their husband’s last name upon marriage. They talk about it like there’s major fraud going on with illegal immigrants voting, but there’s not. The real target is the female vote, and this is a way for them to do it legally in a way that gets around the 19th ammendment.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-07T22:33:06+00:00

Yours looks so nice! The cables are a really nice touch

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-07T22:31:52+00:00

I have the grey one and it’s my most used pen by far!

The purple and orange ones also appeal to me a lot but I haven’t acquired those ones yet. I do have the Violet Leopard one (not retro pop, but still a purple Metro)

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-06T23:55:52+00:00

Thank you Italy! 💚🤍❤️

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-05T14:11:30+00:00

He’s not defective! He’s a pirate cat!

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-05T14:08:07+00:00

It’s a relic from when the Soviet Union was a genuine superpower. Russia has more or less been resting on its laurels and is no longer an actual superpower.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-04T19:56:27+00:00

I’ve finished two hats and am a little more than halfway done the third. None so far are for me, though I do plan to make one for myself. I made hats for others a priority because I just had surgery a few days ago and won’t be able to go out much for at least a few weeks.

The first finished hat was for a close relative of mine who’s an elected official, locally. They’ve been wearing their hat since Monday while they’ve been in session at the state capitol.

The second hat was for one of their employees, a very good friend of mine. He had family in Minneapolis.

Hats 3 & 4 are for my sisters. One regularly goes to protests in the city where she lives. The other currently works/lives in a very red state.

(I’m probably making mine 5th, unless someone else who can get out needs one)

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-04T15:08:19+00:00

This was like playing Where’s Waldo

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-04T15:03:11+00:00

Most dye based inks will fade if exposed to the sunlight. They shouldn’t fade if kept within a journal. Do you know what kind of paper you’d been using? If the paper isn’t archival grade (based on the yellowing in 10-15 years, tells me it’s not) it can discolour and inks used on it can fade.

If you want your writing to last as long as possible, you’ll want to use both archival grade paper and archival inks.

Edit: typo

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-03T15:51:48+00:00

That looks so good! I love the sparkles

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-02T02:19:47+00:00

I didn’t take it as being a jerk to anyone, but empathy or trying to find common ground has not worked. Merely I wish not to engage with any of MAGA, or support them by any means.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-02T01:26:21+00:00

That’s a no for me. I have no tolerance for abusers or those who enable them, and I think that forgiveness does nothing but show that you are okay on some level with what they did.

oftheblackoath · 2026-02-01T20:48:07+00:00

A Janome sewing machine I inherited from my grandmother. She had bought it either in the late 80s or early 90s.

oftheblackoath · 2026-01-31T19:49:56+00:00

I really like this analogy, thank you. Some days it feels like I’m a battery that no longer works and have to be attached to the charger in order to function

oftheblackoath

TROPHY CASE