Oc7o8er - October - Tumblr Blog

What accounts for transmisogyny?

"A disdain for feminine stereotyping. It is evident that many feminist transphobes have been traumatized by women's gender roles and stereotypes, which they did not fit physically, psychologically, or in life ambition. They had a hard time being accepted and valued as women and seem to resent the ease with which some trans women are accepted as women. Many of these women were traumatized by sexual assault, which may explain why the penis so often seems to be the real issue. But puzzlingly, they fail to identify with trans women who have also been sexually assaulted by the same instrument."

~ An exercept from "Exploring Transgender Law and Politics" by Catherine A. MacKinnon et. al

There is absolutely a point to be made about mainstream social media here.

Social media is designed to be used in a certain way. As someone who used to be on Tumblr but took a years-long break, it strikes me how this site has shifted to be more like the other social media 'frontrunners'. But that's not to say I don't think we can learn to use these platforms in a way that they weren't designed to be used. I think it's possible to cut through the popularity contest aspects and work toward real transformation and open dialogues with other people. It's hella difficult because it's basically designed to make us do the exact opposite, but at the end of the day, it's a tool like any other. And so long as we can stand even hanging out in places like these, why not utilize them to the best of our ability? I used to be very solitary on websites like these, kinda the definition of a lurker. I'm trying to break out of that bubble a little bit, and do more interacting. It's kind of awkward, and feels weird sometimes but it's also liberating to be somewhere so crowded and feel less alone than I ever have?

So let me get this straight: People are treating this site like Instagram because they associate their opinion with a post's success rather than the discussion that surrounds it, the people that add to it, and the communitarian effort towards transformation and collective discussion?

Sounds like there is a point to be made about mainstream social media here

For a very long time I suffered from an extremely deep unhappiness about The Way Things Are.

When I learned about capitalism (and everything that goes along with it), I understood that I was pretty damn justified in feeling the way that I felt. What’s more is that it helped me realize that many of the ways in which I felt personally insignificant or flawed, were actually just side-effects of participating in a society like this.

This isn’t to say I don’t (still) struggle with mental health issues. But learning about all of these things alleviated a huge burden on my mental health that I don’t think would have been possible with traditional therapeutic coping methods. 

I’m not depressed, I’m just allergic to capitalism

"Once commodity production becomes the universal economic mode, all of man’s activities come to center around it.

Its main feature—the paramount role of exchange value—reaches beyond the merely economic realm and penetrates the whole of human existence. What this does to the relationship between human beings was strikingly brought home to me by a statement I read in a daily paper some time ago:

Joseph Brayshaw, former president of the British National Council of Family Relations, commented on a recent visit to the United States. He said the “fantastic material prosperity” of the United States has fostered the assumption that things are expendable “and I had the uneasy feeling that something of this attitude of mind might have tinged the American outlook on personal relations. If they go wrong, you can always find a more up-to-date model in a new wife or husband. I wondered whether, all unconsciously, people as well as things were coming to be regarded as expendable.”

The comparison of husbands and wives with old and new models, while shocking, is not the only reason why Mr. Brayshaw’s statement is significant. Opponents of socialism often claim that in a socialist society—for reasons within its very structure—the human being will not be recognized as an end in himself but will be used as a tool, and thus will become expendable. While I cannot go into this argument here, I will say that the statement seems to be hypocritical, because—if Mr. Brayshaw is right—we are already, under capitalism, living in a society that has produced human relations which make man an object, and thus expendable.

Exchange value enters not only the relationship between man and man, destroying the possibility for genuine friendship and fellowship. I believe that exchange value, which has long ceased to be merely an economic category, invades almost all realms of our lives: our art and education, our community living, our political struggles."

~ An excerpt from Alienation in American Society by Fritz Pappenheim

[Quote in image]: “Any theory you got, practice it. And when you practice it, you make some mistakes. When you make a mistake, you correct that theory … A lot of us read and read and read, but we don’t get any practice.” -Fred Hampton

“Dialogue, as essential communication, must underlie any cooperation. In the theory of dialogical action, there is no place for conquering the people on behalf of the revolutionary cause, but only for gaining their adherence. Dialogue does not impose, does not manipulate, does not domesticate, does not “sloganize.” This does not mean, however, that the theory of dialogical action leads nowhere; nor does it mean that the dialogical human does not have a clear idea of what she wants, or of the objectives to which she is committed. ....

Thus cooperation leads dialogical Subjects to focus their attention on the reality which mediates them and which—posed as a problem—challenges them. The response to that challenge is the action of dialogical Subjects upon reality in order to transform it. Let me reemphasize that posing reality as a problem does not mean sloganizing: it means critical analysis of a problematic reality.”

— Paulo Freire

something that frustrates me is that so much of liberal communication requires ignoring the causes of things.

like if you are writing about anything for a liberal workplace, organization, news outlet, etc., you can talk about things like racism, homelessness, misogyny, trans-antagonism, ableism, etc., but you can't get into the material reasons why these things happen, because it implicates racial capitalism and settler colonialism. and that's the thing that liberals will never allow you to acknowledge.

so you get all these articles like "wow all these bad things are happening, why do Black people have worse health outcomes in so many areas like maternal mortality or covid risk? why is agricultural and domestic labor paid so low? why are certain areas of the world constantly in states of political unrest and struggling with repeated environmental disasters? why are some countries 'undeveloped'? why is there so much sexual violence and abuse?" and then they spin a wheel that only has two possible answers it can fall on and that's "bad apples" or "it's just the way it is"

Postcard from the artist collective project THINK AGAIN

"If fascism means anything, it means all-out government support for business and severe repression of antibusiness, prolabor forces."

~ Michael Parenti, Blackshirts and Reds

internationale.mid (ringtone ver.)

Eugène Pottier / Pierre De Geyter - L'Internationale

here’s a ringtone version of l'internationale played on an old nokia phone soundset at double speed. for all you socialist followers of best of midi

midi / mp3 without introduction

Red Bait