Kyn-elwynn - Second Home

and it's not even about keeping people “dumb” as it is about keeping people functionally illiterate. if they can barely read, they won't read those naughty books that might make them question the reality handed down to them. they won't have any historical context for the situation they are in or any knowledge of the struggles and victories that followed.

they won't read those books that cause the reader to feel empathy for somebody living a different walk of life from them. they won't read the policies of their chosen political parties or the statistical results of those policies or even the religious scripture in which they believe they're basing their decisions.

and if they can barely write, they will find it harder to transmit their own thoughts and ideas—even orally.

less literacy means people watch and listen to short sound bites and slogans and video clips over anything with depth or anything that brings context or nuance into the discussion. less literacy means creating a society of easy marks ready to be fooled, ready to be misled. less literacy means less ability to understand the scientific knowledge humanity has amassed and less ability to realize when they are being abused. less literacy means less imagination, lower attention spans, and lacking awareness.

Business Insider

America's biggest businesses are bowing out of Pride parades

Corporate America is backing away from Pride amid the DEI backlash and the White House's war on diversity.

Trumps anti-DEI crusade is causing businesses to drop progressive agendas for fear of government retaliation.

By the by, you know what's a fun and easy thing to do as you're scrolling through your social media feed and checking your messages?

If you see an ad for a fascist, one of their orgs, or any of their pet projects, report it as a malicious ad.

If you see an account rattling off fascist bullshit in the comments on whatever platform you're browsing, block it and report it as spam / bot / hate speech / misinformation as appropriate.

If you get a text or an email from one of those organizations, block the address but also flag it as phishing. Not just spam. PHISHING.

This accomplishes three things.

One, it cleans up your feed, your messaging, and your inbox.

Two, it weeds out bots and psyops accounts and General Assholes.

And three, if enough malicious ad reports and phishing flags are submitted, the companies posting the ads may have trouble posting material in the future, since their accounts may be suspended, their emails will be marked as phishing, and their ability to reach people will be reduced.

Sure, it's a small impact. Sure, it's not a guaranteed success.

But EVERY SINGLE WRENCH we can throw into the machine of fascism breaks some small part, causes some small delay, prevents things from rolling forward smooth and easy.

And the more of us that do it, the harder it will be for that machine to keep rolling.

Think of it as the online version of tearing down posters and disrupting communications.

Make them take time to create new accounts. Make the algorithms work against them. Make them have to adjust and pivot again and again. Make them spend that time and money and effort to get their propaganda through.

Nobody needs to do everything. But everyone should do something.

Keep Going.

y'all ever reach the end of google

op made the post unrebloggable, can you repost what you wrote about the christan anti sex work group?

Sure thing! I don't blame them for turning off reblogs. I had to block some antisemitic creep who reblogged it from me with a rant about how actually it was feminism's fault, so clearly it had broken containment into the gross side of tumblr. Here it is with OP's handle and icon removed so they don't have to be connected to it anymore.

It's not just the advertisers- that's definitely also part of it, but this is also the direct, targeted action of a specific christian fundamentalist group, the "National Center on Sexual Exploitation," previously "Morality in Media" and "Operation Yorkville," a political lobbying organization that campaigns against pornography, who claim "Pornographers are committing the biggest crimes of the century!"

It was*this group specifically* (accompanied by another Christian anti-porn org, Exodus Cry) that put pressure on mastercard and visa to stop facilitating electronic payment for sites that hosted nsfw material. Faced with the risk of losing their ability to process payments, the sites partnered with visa and mastercard had no choice but to agree to porn bans.

They were behind Onlyfans flirting with banning sex workers last year, and they were one of the principle supporters of FOSTA/SESTA. I can not understate just how much influence this one well connected, well funded group has.

From their about page:

NCOSE convinced mastercard and visa to cut ties with porn not for the sake of advertisers, but because they convinced them that they could be potentially liable for facilitating illegal activity- the exchange of CSAM, prostitution and human trafficking- happening on the porn sites they were partnered with, which in NCOSE's opinion is all porn sites, and all porn period, since they believe all porn is human trafficking.

NCOSE has been around since the 60's, but hasn't seen much success until the last decade. Their previous campaigns, focused on pushing for the enforcement of obscenity laws from the 1800's and fabricating blatantly nonfactual research about porn as a mental health crisis, were not as widely received. But they've had much more success since they've started weaponizing concern for victims of abuse and trafficking, appropriating progressive language and trading in on the white moral panic about child sex trafficking that grew directly from the "Stranger Danger" and "Satanic Ritual Abuse" moral panics of the 80's and 90's- both themselves the result of a right wing reactionary movement using concern trolling about the safety of children to rail against drugs, loud music, and tabletop rpgs.

Blaming the sanitization of the internet solely on the vague specter of "advertisers" ignores the real, nameable groups and their extremely straightforward christofacist goals. It promotes apathy, pointing at an ambiguous target that feels as impossible to combat as the machine of capitalism itself. When it's literally just these specific guys, and like two or three similar, equally identifiable organizations!

I'm not saying sites like facebook don't have a vested interest in looking squeaky clean and family friendly, but tumblr, pornhub, onlyfans, patreon and gumroad did not move to ban porn because of advertising. Tumblr has never attracted the kind of advertisers who care, and pornhub, onlyfans, patreon and gumroad don't make the bulk of their money from ads, but from user transactions, which MUST be facilitated by an electronic banking platform in order to be safe and reliable.

Tumblr's porn ban was due to FOSTA/SESTA meaning the could not continue operating unless they either dumped nsfw content or went adults only and implemented costly and draconian age verification protocols that, frankly, no one was going to put up with for a mediocre blogging platform. The others folded under pressure from the electronic banking platforms, which threatened to drop them as partners due to the pressure *they* were under from NCOSE weaponizing public opinion to create a flurry of anger and condemnation towards these companies "facilitating human trafficking."

The enemy is not hiding, we know their names! They come not in the name of capitalism (who merely rides their coattails when convenient) but in the name of puritanical Christian Fascism.

So no, it's not the puriteens. It's their parents and grandparents, on an open crusade to enforce Christian anti-sex beliefs on as much of the world as they can manage.

when your art program’s closing message hits you straight in the heart and makes you stop and contemplate the state of it all

how to draw horses(for the discerning horse girl)

i spent two years working in barns to give you this information. use it wisely

view all 16 parts under the cut!

hopefully this guide will inspire you to draw the cowboys you've always dreamed of

“We need to strive to be more accepting of POC” you guys can’t even handle religion.