If you message w donation proof for any of the dono posts I reblog I will draw you something, requests accepted (art at owlbees)

America is absolutely disconnected to meat

I think I realized this when I had went to see my dad and stepmom one day and asked if I could place my hawk’s food. (A rabbit leg) in the freezer. My step mom was disgusted by the idea that a leg from an animal was in the freezer meanwhile an entire chicken was sitting in the fridge.

Your rotisserie chicken is an entire chicken.

Your pork chop is a hunk of pig.

Your rack of ribs are from a cow’s rib cage.

It’s like Americans view meat as colorful red and pink hued shapes that just exist and come into the world packaged.

You see so many people getting harassed or even having their content flagged for showing how to process or field dress meat when it’s at it’s freshest. Right after culling. For some reason this is considered “gore” by many folks when in reality it’s no more different from plucking a processed chicken after cull.

You also notice that Americans have an idea of what’s normal meat and what isn’t normal meat and there’s racist undertones that I’ve noticed in a lot of these comments left on foreign cooking videos

You have people that claim a video of a man in a different country preparing something like this is “eating a dog.” Meanwhile this is roasted goat.

You have people who’s only perception of an edible fish is in fillet or fish stick form and they call something like this nasty because “Eww there’s a head!” Yeah.. most animals have heads..

Some of ya’ll need to realize what your meat looks like prior to processing and that it’s prepared in different ways. We also need to erase the stigma behind non traditional meats.

Truly, genuinely, as an indigenous person I talk about this exact thing a LOT! Like, don't get me wrong I get a bit squicked when dressing a chicken or gutting and cleaning a fish, lord knows I had really mixed feelings the first time I saw a deers throat slit (I thought it was cruel, until my elder asked me if I would have preferred to let it suffer instead) The truth of the matter is that animals and humans are intertwined. We are food to one another, that's the way of the world and I think people forget that when we champion for humane treatment of animals and when we rail against factory farming we need to remember that removing death is not the goal, removing undue suffering it.

We haven’t had bread for days… The war on Gaza continues, the blockade is suffocating us, and bakeries have completely shut down. The situation is beyond tragic—children, families, everyone is starving. We need every voice, every bit of support, every share to make the world hear our cry. Please don’t ignore our suffering.

Please share🙏🙏

does tumblr like short vids? here’s an embroidery hoop that i finished recently after about a year of on & off work 🏡💕

[video description: a video showing the progress of someone embroidering the farmhouse from Stardew Valley onto white fabric. The audio is an upbeat pop song. End ID]

Do you know how badly you have to fuck up for this to happen

Do you know how badly you have to fuck up for this to happen

You don't have to like weed but I find people who are vehemently anti-weed but claim to be left leaning infuriating. If you go into a rage because you smelled someone smoking pot, how the fuck do you expect to form community with people addicted to meth? It's easier to say you hate smokers than to say you hate all drug users in leftist spaces because one makes you sound a bit like a square while the other is the writing on the wall. You aren't anti-weed, you're anti-drug user and anyone who uses substances is not safe around you.

I know dozens of people who use meth, coke, and fentanyl. While heroin is harder to get I do know some folks who use it when they can. Some of these drug users are my neighbors, some are my clients, and some are my friends & family. One does not cease to be human just because they use a substance you find scary.

Community doesn't mean you need to invite them to your home and look away if they smoke there. It means you don't call your property manager because you suspect your neighbor uses. It means you don't require drug tests for homeless shelters and housing services. It means the very idea of someone who smokes meth in your community doesn't make you go, "what the hell."

Genuinely kind of a wild thing to see in the replies as someone who has been professionally practicing harm reduction for years.

Considering recent events over here in the States, this seemed like a good time to bring this back. Over the next four years, expect an increase in discourse around "undesirables." This will include but not be limited to drug addicts.

Also, from someone who works at a smoke/head shop: WAY MORE PEOPLE ARE DRUG USERS THAN YOU THINK. Way more people are addicted to opiates, meth, whippets, cocaine, you name it, than you have been lead to believe, and on top of that, they are often the "normal" or "functional" people you see every day, not just the person tweaking out at the gas stations. Judges, bank tellers, grandmas, teachers, the nice lady who runs your bakery— all of them. You are ALREADY IN COMMUNITY WITH THESE PEOPLE. Start fucking acting like it.

I'm gonna keep repeating this: 'community' is not a fucking friend group.

It's not a clique. It's not you and the people YOU think are cool and funny.

Drug users are your neighbors whether you're too much of an obnoxious self-righteous asshat to be aware of that or not. You don't *get* to say drug users don't deserve to be meaningfully connected to and included in the populations they call home (which is what community actually means, btw) and the mere assertion that you can is a big part of why ppl seek connection in drugs in the first place.

It doesn't matter if ppl use or not but tbh if we really wanted to cut down on addiction all we'd need to do is have fewer stuck up motherfuckers who look down on 'undesirables' in the first place.

'community' is not a fucking friend group.'community' is not a fucking friend group.'community' is not a fucking friend group.'community' is not a fucking friend group.'community' is not a fucking friend group.'community' is not a fucking friend group.

In this argument tho, there seems to be a huge bloody leap from "being annoyed by drug use" to "literally can't stand anybody who could possibly have ever used any drug"

I'm by no means a puritan, but not wanting to be exposed to fumes against your will is a pretty fucking normal thing.

it is, however, telling that anarchists once again seem to only have any sympathy for the most run-down strata of the lumpenproletariat, leftovers of a bygone mode of production and various rejects of the system. yes, we should sympathise with them, but it is seriously not irrational to exclude them from some things. drug addicts make terrible revolutionaries.

I don't usually reblog shitty responses to go 'whoa look at this shithead', but I'm gonna go for this one because it's an educational example and if you reblog this stuff directly from me and then write this, you're gonna piss me off. So here goes:

Look at the first two paragraphs, the way the post tries to start with a reasonable sounding take, of just 'being annoyed' and 'not wanting to be exposed to fumes'. It's a weak take because nobody said you can't be annoyed by people or that you can't have any non-smoking spaces. Everything was just about accepting addicts as members of your community and not subjecting them to isolation.

But, you see, the first two paragraphs are not meant to be a coherent response to the above, they're meant to set the tone 'I am the voice of reason', to soften the taste of what comes next.

And what comes next, the third paragraph, is just a bunch of slurs about addicts and very poor people. For those unfamiliar with marxist lingo:

And this is ended by rejecting the call of accepting addicts as members of your community because they supposedly 'make terrible revolutionaries'.

Note the huge shift here from 'annoyed by smoke' to judging the character and abilities of the entire group labelled 'addicts'. The original post said 'it's easier to say you hate smokers than to say you hate all drug users' and this poster just did exactly that: lead with 'not wanting to be exposed to fumes' to then whip out the open bigotry in the third act.

The idea that drug addicts can't be revolutionaries is bullshit of course. But this reveals the value system of the 'revolutionary' tumblr user writing this, They see nothing of value in including the most oppressed in their communities and their solidarity, simply for the sake of not leaving anyone behind. Their only standard for who matters is whether they can be productive enough to contribute significantly to the revolution.

With that kind of take, it's understandable why they want you to think it's just about 'being annoyed by drug use'. Because what comes next is just 'fuck the poor' wrapped in marxist language.

responses like this also hijack the conversation away from practical movement-building and towards someones feelings. the post is discussing forming solidarity with ur neighbors to actually solve the problems underlying drug use and addiction and this mf comes in to say "im allowed to be annoyed and want to exclude these ppl from my community"

ok, exclude them how? where will they go? r u just gonna throw em in jail like the state as it exists now does and hope it somehow goes differently? leave them in the wilderness to die from withdrawal? or just ostracize them from all community to make 100% sure that they have no possible escape other than drugs?

but the conversation isnt about questions like that anymore, now its just someone self-soothing bc they got told they believe something harmful and cant accept that idea w/o feeling like an asshole. its straight out of the conservative playbook just dressed in progressive language

i so deeply understand the reasoning of every comment

"Deny comfort to the oppressor.

Defend the poor and sick.

Depose the capitalist oligarchy"

Sticker spotted in Snohomish county, Washington

blooming apple tea: source

every single article, post or mention of a Muslim or Latino person on a Visa or Green Card getting dragged off the street by masked men in broad daylight has the same exact comments: "wow, they're gonna start doing this to citizens soon." some of these people have lived here since they were 8 months old and have lived here for over 30 years. it's very telling that Americans are still are managing to separate them in their head from a "citizen" and that their outrage will be far greater when it's someone who "actually lives here" as if 3 decades in the same country shouldn't qualify you for the same rights as everyone else.

its okay to be fat! unless you are on purpose. unless you've never tried dieting before. unless you're disabled. unless you're not actively trying to be the healthiest person in the room. unless you sit down. unless you drink soda. unless you aren't fashionable. unless you aren't white. unless you get off on it. unless you exist.

there rlly is smth very telling ab how the thing that made ppl livid ab this post was "unless you are on purpose/get off on it" like some of yall ripped the body positive veil down to show that u dont give a shit ab fat ppl or body autonomy at all bc of that

It's just such a big task, wanting to teach people the ways of the plants, articulating a way we can rely on one another and our ecosystems instead of capitalism, and beginning the work...learning to utilize the weeds that are our friends, cooking with the edible plants, being sociable with neighbors to form a community, destroying the wasteful tracts of unused Lawn to be replaced with wild flowers and grasses and trees...

"By learning how to craft from the materials of nature" I think to myself, "there would be no need for buying plastic objects and knickknacks which doubtless were shipped from overseas and are responsible for much pollution...and the ecosystem rejoices when its gifts are accepted."

I made a little basket. I'm getting much better at it! It's made of Eastern Redcedar bark, collected from standing deadwood.

So much space devoted to mown grass, that could be taking care of us in many ways.

Just think how much consumption could be reduced if everybody who was into crafts had the knowledge and access to natural materials found in the world around them!

Kudzu, Willow, Wild Grapevines are also good for this kind of thing...

Not everyone can be into crafts, but everyone can use the crafts! So they can be a gift!

I wonder what natural material makes good pot-holders and oven mitts...surely that's a very old invention

Not everyone will be into every craft but that's the point of community.

At our allotments (like a community garden only the plots of British allotments tend to be a bit bigger than your average American community garden plot) there's a lot of swapping of skills, supplies, seeds, and actual food.

One of our neighbours is too old to get up a ladder and prune his plum tree, so we do it for him and have permission to pick some of the plums in return.

If one person ends up with too many seedlings of one type of plant then they'll give some of them to others and often get something else in return. If one person ends up with more beans or courgettes or kale or whatever than they can use then they offer the excess to friends.

I make a lot of jam and have several 'jam deals' with people where I have permission to pick their berries etc and return some in the form of jams or jellies. A different neighbour has a crab apple tree that he can't be bothered to do anything with but also won't cut down because it shelters his bee hives. I pick the entire crop of crab apples and give him crab apple jelly and butter in return. We also keep an eye on his bees when he's away and then we get some of the honey.

The same applies to skills and communities. You don't need to have everyone knowing how to make baskets from barks and grasses. You only need a few that can do that, while others are good at canning or sewing or growing pretty flowers or raising chickens or identifying tasty and non-lethal mushrooms. Then you swap skills and end products and so everyone has supplies and everyone gets fed.

That's how communities are supposed to work. You're not supposed to know how to do every possible task all alone. You're supposed to know how to do/enjoy doing a few things and then when you need something you don't know how to do yourself you turn to someone else who does.

@meganemaryam Luckily, there are a ton of wild plants that work great for spinning thread and yarn. I don't know where you live, but some of the best ones are Apocyonum cannabinum (dogbane; it has a lovely copper-to-peach color and is incredibly strong and tough, doesn't require retting you just beat it and scrape it a bunch) any of the types of nettle, Kudzu (Pueraria spp, haven't personally tried it yet but it was literally one of the fundamental textile fibers of ancient China and farmed for use as textile), Milkweed (Asclepias spp, you can use the bast fibers or the seed fluffs, the latter are very delicate and best to blend with something stronger, but I made a fantastic yarn out of 50/50 Dogbane bast fiber and Milkweed floss) and the new/green less-than-a-year-old sprouts off of grapevine (Vitis spp).

With the exception of the milkweed floss, all of these fibers are bast fibers, meaning they come from the inner bark, you have to peel the bark off the woody inner part and then beat, soak, crush, and/or ferment the bark in some combination to extract the fine threads. It is surprisingly easy to get cool results this way

Pictured, Dogbane/Milkweed blend yarn, processed Dogbane fibers, a bunch of Dogbane/Milkweed yarn (don't mind the spool made from a macaroni and cheese container) Grapevine thread, Dogbane cord. I made it!

A THEFT

when i move out i want to start a garden but the soil where i live is really bad, it's all clay and it's really difficult it grow things like vegetables. Does anyone have advice on where and how i should start?

All the guides your going to find will mention adding organic matter (leaves, woodchips, compost). Would maybe recomend mixing in things like sand or maybe rockdust (which can be good for adding phosphorus).

Other thing that might be useful is just doing annual wildflowers first and then when they die mix them in with the soil which can gradually increase the soil health.

Send me a zone and local climate type and I'll try to give some recomendations. But I've personally had great luck with high clay soils with. Apples, stonefruit(cherries peaches plums ect), cane berries (blackberries raspberries and boysenberries), gojiberries, horseradish and honeyberries .

Ask around and see what people around you grow as well. Odds are they've dealt with the same problem and have better advice than I could ever give.

Cover crops are also a great starter plant to help build soil and break up clay. Daikon radishes (left in the soil to rot and compost), wild mustards, thing with a tap root that dig down. Fast growing plants like sorghum and sudan-grass are excellent for multiple “chop and drop” in-place-composing in a single season. They seriously can grow a foot a week in some areas and you just keep cutting them down to knee height or so to create a lot of organic matter in a short amount of time. Just remember to cover them in tarp/cardboard at the end of the season to kill ten off or they’ll come back next year like any other grass.

And you don’t have to dedicate your entire garden to this. If you’re interested in composing, a single area dedicated to fast growing sacrificial plants can quickly build up a reasonable sized compost pile to be used on other garden beds.

Hey, oomfies! This Eid, let’s spread some more love to Gaza. Grassroots orgs there are doing incredible work despite the many limitations...getting food, meds, and shelter to families who’ve lost everything. Even a few bucks can make a real difference. Donate the cost of a coffee!