kal/kali - he/she/they - 20 - please send asks and dms about anything :) - feel free to spam my notes and tag me in random stuff, it makes me feel loved :p - icon is a picrew by djarn
something i have been doing recently is asking new people i meet, work with, etc for their card, or i take personal business cards when available, get as many as possible, and then constantly offer people "my card" which is just a random card from the ones ive collected.
I just realized the fundamental disconnect for people who think they can "boycott" voting:
People who threaten to withhold their vote are thinking of the government like a business. If you don't like what a business is doing, you can refuse to shop there, and that hurts them.
But your government is not a business, no matter how much the GOP tries to pretend it is, and refusing to participate doesn't hurt it. If you refuse to vote, you still have to live under that government. I know we're all fundamentally broken by late-stage capitalism, but you get that you can't "Well, you just lost a customer" this one, right? YOU AREN'T A CUSTOMER.
Refusing to vote isn't like refusing to buy McDonald's. It's like walking into a McDonald's, handing the cashier $20 (because you still gotta pay taxes whether you vote or not), and saying "Surprise me."
(Oh and during this particular trip, one of the two McDonald's options is maybe not your favorite food, and the other is deadly poison.)
The thing that pisses me off the most is that even if covid WAS over, disabled people still fucking exist and deserve to participate in things. The brief period of time in which everyone was doing virtual and hybrid events, people could work from home, social events were actually accessible...all it did was show that we could be doing these things, and just don't fucking care.
Hybrid events should be the STANDARD. Including people who can't leave their houses should be the STANDARD. Some basic fucking consideration for the disabled should be the STANDARD.
i remember adults telling me, as a kid, to listen to doctors and get my flu vaccine and any shots i could because they remembered Before.
then they started fighting Covid precautions.
i remember adults telling me, as a kid, that the ozone was disappearing and the earth was dying and we needed to recycle and save the planet.
now my parents think climate change is a myth.
i remember adults telling me, as a kid, that racism was a plague, that we had to love and accept everyone, that we should never judge before walking a mile in their shoes.
then they told me that protesting for my Black siblings was wrong.
i remember adults telling me, as a kid, that we needed to give to the poor. working at soup kitchens. making quilts. collecting food and money and supplies. building houses. because it was the christian and just plain right thing to do.
now they look at me, on food stamps with their grandchildren, and lament the "welfare state".
i remember adults telling me, as a kid, that it was easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven and that any rich man, especially an immoral one, should never run our country.
you can guess who they voted for.
i remember adults telling me, as a kid, so very much.