Wow, okay buddy, you’re BEGGING for a takedown here.
First world problems? Not a thing. People who say shit like “first world problems” are massive racist, imperialist, dismissive assholes.
If you’re ever tempted to say “first world problems,” do me a favor, and pull down a map. Tell me EXACTLY where the “third world” is. Make sure you correctly identify Switzerland as part of the third world, and Turkey as part of the First World. Don’t forget that Djibouti is a part of the first world.
Literally sit down and learn what “third world” means and why people from nonwestern nations think it’s a total bullshit term.
Second: you think people in the so-called third world don’t care about shit like makeup, and love, and technology? You think they don’t care about internet harassment? You think women over there don’t care about street harassment? You think they don’t care about fashion and clothes? You think they don’t care about music and video games?
Because THEY DO.
Right now, there is a woman in burundi teaching herself how to do a cut-crease eyeshadow look. Guaranteed.
“Third world” nations have fashion shows and fashion magazines. They care about street harassment. They care about the internet. They play video games. They know more about anime than your sorry ass every will. And the idea of “first world problems,” which makes it sound like all women in “third world” nations are dealing with starvation, rape, war, acid attacks etc.
Is bullshit.
Rank.
Bullshit.
Women in Iran spend shitloads of money on makeup. Women in the DRC don’t just care about rape. Rape – the ONE THING westerners can be expected to know about women in Congo-Kinshasa – ranks NUMBER FOUR on the list of issues women in Congo want addressed. Political participation is number 1. Economic empowerment is number 2. Women in India are passionate about information technology, and you know what they hate? Coming to the United States, where Indian women in STEM are suddenly considered LESS GOOD than their male colleagues. My friends in Senegal taught ME how to download movies off the internet. Zimbabwe has a fashion week.
As Teju Cole points out:
“I don’t like this expression “First World problems.” It is false and it is condescending. Yes, Nigerians struggle with floods or infant mortality. But these same Nigerians also deal with mundane and seemingly luxurious hassles. Connectivity issues on your BlackBerry, cost of car repair, how to sync your iPad, what brand of noodles to buy: Third World problems. All the silly stuff of life doesn’t disappear just because you’re black and live in a poorer country. People in the richer nations need a more robust sense of the lives being lived in the darker nations. Here’s a First World problem: the inability to see that others are as fully complex and as keen on technology and pleasure as you are.
One event that illustrated the gap between the Africa of conjecture and the real Africa was the BlackBerry outage of a few weeks ago. Who would have thought Research In Motion’s technical issues would cause so much annoyance and inconvenience in a place like Lagos? But of course it did, because people don’t wake up with “poor African” pasted on their foreheads. They live as citizens of the modern world. None of this is to deny the existence of social stratification and elite structures here. There are lifestyles of the rich and famous, sure. But the interesting thing about modern technology is how socially mobile it is—quite literally. Everyone in Lagos has a phone.”
95% of the people who use bullshit expressions like “First world problems” have NO IDEA what life is like for people in the so-called third world. You just like sitting there derailing.
And for the record? As a white, western feminist, DAMN RIGHT I concentrate on issues in the United States. Because when white western feminists try to “save” women outside the west? We do a SHIT job of it. We’re the ones who bowl over actual congolese women, and what THEY want, and say that the #1 issue affecting them is rape. We become arms of the imperialist patriarchal complex.
Classic example: the guy who was ruling Egypt for the British got british feminists to help him in his anti-headscarf campaign in Egypt. Why did he hate headscarves? Because he wanted to *break the spirit* of Egyptians. Not because he gave a shit about women’s rights. How do I know that? Because he was the head of the anti-women’s-suffrage group in England.
When women who live outside the west do awesome things, I will signal-boost them, and I will do whatever they think I can do to help. But I follow their lead. Because these are THEIR issues, and THEY know what matters to them. Not me.
FINALLY: My problems are not trivial. My problems are not bullshit. My problems are not to be dismissed with your racist, imperialist logic. Dress codes and makeup and music and books and video games MATTER. They matter to me. They matter to my life.
So fuck you.
And fuck your assumptions.
And maybe consider that YOUR first world problem? Is that you can’t “see that others are as fully complex and as keen on technology and pleasure as you are.”
honestly if you want to take proper care of your goths you shouldn’t take them outside in hot weather at all, just winter and MAYBE late autumn/early spring if you live in a cool climate
people really should do this kind of research before getting goths at all but as long as they’re willing to learn and adapt i guess
there are breeds of goth suitable for warmer climes but you have to be very careful when looking for one and you cannot assume that your goth is one of them if you don’t know for sure what they are
even the warm-climate breeds still usually do better in their native locale’s winter temperatures though, and shouldn’t be left outside in the summer unattended or, at the bare minimum, they should be given plentiful shade, cold water, and appropriate music to keep them calm
Honestly, if you want something less fragile than a goth, you should be considering something like a punk anyway. There’s no need to expose goths to the heat, IMHO. Admittedly there’s differences you need to do research on, but punks are very rewarding. And for God’s sake, if anyone tells you ANY emo can handle the heat, run. They don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about.
goths aren’t fragile though? they’re not heat-tolerant but they’re extremely hardy in dark and stormy weather, metal concerts, and dramatic emotional episodes. just because they aren’t well-suited to one weather pattern doesn’t mean they can’t be extremely hardy and rewarding to keep under conditions they’re better suited to.
Forget the climate thing, there’s a more important husbandry issue here:
WHO THE FUCK PUT THEM OUT IN THE DAYTIME?
Direct sunlight is extremely harmful to goths! THey should never be outdoors before twilight!
Do your damn research, people.
you’re missing a key point though
goths need the opportunity to complain about sunlight, it’s vital to their wellbeing; as long as their time in it is carefully controlled and they’re given sufficient sunscreen and shade, it can be amazing and 100% necessary enrichment
Look at that picture. Look at it. Please tell me where the shade is, because I don’t see any. I see two goths wilting in direct sunlight. Just look at how flat their hair is! This is not even remotely acceptable care.
i never said the picture was a good example of goth husbandry, i think it’s sort of taken as a given that it’s not – nobody in this threat is endorsing it, op included
i’m just saying that it isn’t a black and white issue
Fair enough. I’ll concede that a properly-shaded porch or sunroom-type area can help them get the outdoor enrichment and complaining opportunities they need, without putting them at risk of direct sunlight or actually touching anything outdoors. But be careful not to overexpose them.
Aren’t there some varieties of goth that are built for sunlight, or is that me mistaking a similar species for goths?
You’re thinking of either New Romantics – unfortunately presumed extinct, you could tell them apart by their lack of Victorian plumage and occasional colouration – or Emos, which are the product of a crossbreeding with Shoegazers.
As mentioned above, emos don’t handle heat well, although they do better with moderate amounts of sun than purebred goths.
If it’s the ornate Victorian aesthetic you like but you want something that can keep up with a more active, diurnal lifestyle, you might consider a steampunk or steampunk cross? I know they’re somewhat out of fashion these days, but they can be just as endearingly dramatic as other goth breeds, and they thrive on daylight outings.
There IS a rarely seen breed of goth which IS suitable for diurnal needs though. The highly unusual breed of the Sunshine Goth is completely content in daytime or nighttime environments and is very hearty and adaptable. Unfortunately it does not display the distinctly dramatic coat patterns of a traditional Goth and it’s relations (which may be why the breed is so rare, it always seems like people favor form over function). The breed’s behavior, interests, and tastes are all still easily defined as Goth, and they offer the same rewards. You have to watch for unscrupulous breeders trying to pass an overpriced part-Raver off as a rare Sunshine Goth though, their needs are completely different, and the Raver will generally be much more brightly colored and energetic.
No guys, I need to stop and talk about something in this movie and how fucking revolutionary it was; something that I haven’t seen in a movie before or since.
This is a movie about a kid who leaves her birth family.
Not a kid who find that they have a secret lineage or something that allows them to find their ‘true family’ – this is a movie about a kid whose true birth family is made up of bad people. So she gets out. And that is played as the right thing to do. She isn’t punished for it or made to feel bad about ‘abandoning her family’. There isn’t an underlying ‘but they’re your family and you have to love them’ or ‘they’re your family and they love you even if they don’t show it well or do hurtful things’ message of the kind that I see OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER in media. Matilda gets out and lives happily ever after because of it.
We need a million more movies like this to counter the metric shit ton of movies that directly counter this message.
au where the trojan war is a party menelaus throws to win back his girlfriend who left him for some douchebag and he ropes all his friends into helping him and wacky shenanigans happen and a running gag is that odysseus doesn’t even want to be there he’s got shit to do and at the end he gets stuck in traffic on the way home
“listen, man,” homer says, “i dunno what you want me to tell you. like, i wasn’t even there.”
the cop who smells like bear claw donuts and watering hose plastic slaps his hands flat on the table, toying with the corner of something papery; maybe a folder, or a photo. the cop whose uniform swishes like lycra when he walks–and, though this is just a guess, is probably wearing knock-off ray ban pilot sunglasses that he hasn’t taken off once in his life–leans against the two-way mirror so hard that the buttons on the shoulder of his uniform click against the glass.
“kid, i admire your desire to keep your friends out of trouble,” Donut Mouth says. “but a real house really burned down. people could have died.”
“look at it from our point of view,” Ray Ban suggests. “because from our point of view, it looks like a prank war got out of control and ended in arson. you don’t want arson on your record.”
homer, who has been in this police station since three-thirty in the goddamn morning and is more hungover than he has ever been in his entire fucking life, leans back in his chair and folds his arms over his chest.
“oh, you want me to look at it from your point of view,” he drawls. “nice. real fucking nice.”
the embarrassed pause is enough for homer to gather his wits a little: if he pushes past the pounding in his head he can kind of remember how he got here. he knows that the cops were right; there was definitely a fire, and it was almost definitely the greek alpha sig’s fault, although if you really go all the way back it’s not like they were unprovoked.
he sips at the coffee they’d given him a little while ago. it’s almost cold, but it helps quiet the pounding in his brain. pancakes would have helped more, but he doesn’t think the police station have those on the menu, and even if they do, it isn’t like they’re going to be any good if the quality of their coffee is any indication.
he tries to figure out how long he’s been here, in realtime not drunk time. probably an hour at least. so–that’s one down, and they can only keep him for twenty-four, right?
yeah. he’s pretty sure. so all he has to do is make it twenty-four hours without telling them who actually started the fire but also without being, like, a hostile witness, or whatever. he doesn’t actually know that much about the law, but he remembers that one brooklyn nine nine episode where jake arrested someone too early and they had to find something to charge him with in one day
homer is fairly confident that he can’t get charged with anything he’s done lately, but he does definitely smell like weed, so.
love, justice, and homer all are blind, but none of them are stupid, so he rubs at his eyes and says, “okay. fine. i’ll tell you what i know, but like, most of this is just what i heard. it’s not gonna hold up in court. i mean, i didn’t see anything.”
“obviously,” says Ray Ban.
“what do you mean, ‘obviously’? that’s fucking ableist, man.”
“that’s not what i–”
“roy,” Donut Mouth interrupts, tone a warning. “go on, son.”
“okay,” homer says. he takes a deep breath. “so like–okay, what you have to understand is we’re deep in this war, right? i mean, this has been going on since like, the first toga party of the year, when this transfer kid, paris, hooked up with helen during rush.”
“helen …”
“spartowski.”
“and she is?”
“manny atreus’ girlfriend. or–ex-girlfriend, i guess. she’s alpha delta chi.”
“so manny atreus burned down the trojan house because … his girlfriend cheated on him in paris?”
“what? no. i never said he burned it down, i said the prank war started because his girlfriend cheated on him, and not in paris, with paris.”
“someone’s parents named them paris?”
“i don’t fucking know, man, i didn’t name him. that’s just what he’s called. maybe it’s a family name.”
“sure.”
“my dude, i’m called homer. you think i’m judging people on the weird shit their parents named them?”
Donut Mouth coughs into his hand. “fair point.”
“okay. so: manny said we had to go to war, for like, honor or something, and honestly at first it sounded kind of fun, so we just kind of went with it. but …”
he trails off. august seems like such a long time ago. a whole lifetime. maybe more than one.
“but what?”
homer’s head hurts. he’s so hungover he thinks he can smell beer in his sweat. he can definitely smell weed. it’s going to be a long, long, long day.
“i dunno,” he admits. “i guess things just got–a little out of hand.”
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