Daily OpusEverything I write is freely rebloggable. Just keep the source and tell people about my books :D [Until I decide otherwise, my pronouns are Ze/Hir/Hirself. As in "Ze went to the shops to get hir medication hirself". Thank you for the respect.]
Just remember. There is no such thing as a fake geek girl. There are only fake geek boys. Science fiction was invented by a woman.
Specifically a teenage girl. You know, someone who would be a part of the demographic that some of these boys are violently rejecting.
Isaac Asimov.
yo mary shelley wrote frankenstein in 1818 and isaac asimov was born in 1920 so you kinda get my point
If you want to push it back even further Margaret Cavendish, the duchess of Newcastle (1623-1673) wrote The Blazing World in 1666, about a young woman who discovers a Utopian world that can only be accessed via the North Pole - oft credited as one of the first scifi novels
Women have always been at the forefront of literature, the first novel (what we would consider a novel in modern terms)was written by a woman (Lady Muraskai’s the Tale of Genji in the early 1000s) take your snide “Isaac Asimov” reblogs and stick it
even in terms of male scifi authors, asimov was predated by Jules Verne, HG Wells, George Orwell, you could have even cited Poe or Jonathan Swift has a case but Asimov?
PbbBFFTTBBBTBTTBBTBTTT so desperate to discredit the idea of Mary Shelly as the mother of modern science fiction you didn’t even do a frickin google search For Shame
And if you want to go back even further, the first named, identified author in history was Enheduanna of Akkad, a Sumerian high priestess.
Kinda funny, considering this Isaac Asimov quote on the subject:
Mary Shelley was the first to make use of a new finding of science which she advanced further to a logical extreme, and it is that which makes Frankenstein the first true science fiction story.
Even Isaac Asimov ain’t having none of your shit, not even posthumously.
You know what else was invented by women? Masked vigilantes, the precursor to the modern superhero. Baroness Emma Orczy wrote The Scarlet Pimpernel in 1905.
The character would later inspire better known masked vigilantes such as Zorro and Batman.
Stick that in your international pipe and smoke it
I have literally been telling people this for over a year.
the first extended prose piece - ie a novel, was not, as many male scholars will shout, Don Quixote (1605) but The Tale of Genji (1008) written by a woman
The first autobiography ever written in English is also attributed to a woman, The Book of Margery Kempe (1430s).
The day may come when I find this post and do not reblog it, but it is not this day.
i just think the world would be a better place if we would all take a bit of time to examine how we personally interact with stories
I, for one, am a complex network of interconnected stories stored on a meat based drive.
that is quite possibly the most terrifying way of describing a human but honestly same
That’s not scary. What’s scary is that you’re a ghost and a skeleton working together to Pilot fleshy power armor made by your mother
You know, I expected to regret making this post for entirely different reasons than I actually regret making this post.
The Discourse Derailed, 2018.
collaborative art performed by collective
Asshole Ghosts Direct Mother-Manufactured Meat Suits to Disturb Other Ghosts at a Distance Using Agitated Electrons to Modify Stories on Domesticated Sand
1. The Best Defense is a Good Offense: Be proactive with children’s behavior.
Don’t wait until a child is in the middle of a meltdown in the toiletries aisle of Target. Try to be aware of how different situations and stimuli might affect kids of different ages. A few tips:
Kids, especially toddler age kids, struggle with transitions. Give them a clear time table and stick to it. Give them updates as deadlines approach. “We are leaving the library in 5 minutes.” “We need to go see Grandma in 10 minutes.” “Target will only take 20 minutes.”
Getting toted around by adults can be exhausting and frustrating. Give kids tasks to do. Put them in charge of something. It can be something actually helpful (you get to hold the calculator and keep track of how much money we are spending in the store) or something fun to keep their mind busy (count all the blue things in this aisle.) Talk to your kids. Help them feel involved, instead of just a tote bag.
Model self care and emotional awareness. Kids are often dealing with SUPER new emotions, and may not know how to recognize them, contextualize them, or act on them. Talk through your own emotions, or emotions you think they may be having, and show them how to deal with them. “Yeah, I know, mommy is really sad that we can’t go to the park because of the rain. It makes me feel really bad inside. I think if we color with crayons for a while, I’ll feel better.”
Give kids choices. Obviously, age plays a big part here, but a reasonable, curated set of appropriate choices gives kids a growing feeling of agency and teaches making good choices. “Would you like peas or green beans?” “Penguin Shirt or Turtle Shirt?” “Water or apple juice?” This requires YOU to also speak with and listen to the kids. Always important.
Be aware of how the children in YOUR care react to things, and find ways to mitigate “bad” behavior before it happens.
2. “Punishment” is not the goal. Discipline means teaching.
Your goal, as a parent, as a teacher, as a baby sitter, is not to punish kids. Your goal is to help teach kids how to become thoughtful, responsible, and kind people. The entire idea of kids “deserving” bad things because they’ve “been bad” is flawed. If a kid does something “bad”, then we should aim to help them not make that bad choice again.
How?
Identify any immediate stimuli or situation causing the bad behavior and remove/alter it so the behavior stops. This might mean leaving an errand unfinished, a time out, taking away a toy, etc, in order to STOP the behavior that is happening RIGHT NOW.
Talk to the child about why their behavior was “bad.” What bad affects could it have? How does it affect others? What caused it? Kids, even very young kids, can understand complicated things if explained in terms on their level.
Come up with a plan for what to do next time the original stimuli or situation happens. If Timmy tries to take your truck again, what can we do differently? The next time we are in line at the bank, what can we do to make it more fun?
If the child is older, and the offense is more severe, you may feel the need for a tangible consequence. Remember that these should be age appropriate, reasonable, and negotiable. Give kids the ability to reduce their consequence with good behavior, and be willing to modify the consequence if they have a compelling and reasonable request. Listening to kids and being empathetic is not a weakness. It is a sign of respect.
3. Don’t forget that kids are people. Kids are also kids.
Kids will not be perfect angels. You will not be a perfect adult. Sometimes they will be cranky, angry, tired, hungry, selfish, or mean. You can be these things to. One bad day doesn’t mean you are a failure, and it doesn’t mean the kids are a failure. You have to let kids have bad days sometimes. You have to love them anyway and be willing to give it a fresh go tomorrow.
Working with kids is not easy. No one said it would be. But part of working with kids is the obligation to always be thoughtful about our interactions with them- we teach them with everything we do. So we should treat them with all the respect, kindness, thoughtfulness, and patience we want them to learn.
Trying to communicate with my future morning self is like setting an elaborate trap for an unsuspecting zombie like
if I put my phone alarm on full volume and vibrate and move the charger so I can put it on this out-of-reach metal surface, I can startle her awake. Probably. Then if I securely duct tape this caffeinated chocolate bar to it, it will provide a challenging situation and make her mushy little brain work extra hard to figure out how to turn the alarm off. Then she might go for the chocolate while she’s turning off the loud noises. With luck, she’ll consume the whole thing. 20 minutes of bliss then boom, physiology kicks in and the caffeine reaches her brain. Gentlemen, this just might work.
