WhatAnOddUsername

joined 4 years ago
[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 days ago (2 children)

I've uninstalled the addicting idle games from my phone and haven't broken in and reinstalled them since Tuesday. Hopefully I'm able to keep that up for a while.

I've made a rule for myself that, every time I sit down at my computer, I have to write at least one sentence in my masters thesis before doing anything else. It seems to be causing me to get at least a bit of work done, although nothing ever feels like it's happening fast enough.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

I just found out the rumours of JD Vance fucking a couch were made up. I can't tell you how disappointed I am. As a couchfucker myself, I was hoping to finally be able to vote for someone who represents my interests. Sadly, I will no longer be voting for Trump/Vance this election.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 4 weeks ago

If I had a nickel every time a Kennedy lost part of their brain, I'd have at least 4 nickels by now.

[–] [email protected] 71 points 1 month ago (5 children)

I was on an ostensibly leftist subreddit thread about Biden stepping down, and there were liberals talking about how Kamala is too risky because she's not a white man, or because she's otherwise too progressive to appeal to undecided voters. They're wringing their hands about how even Kamala is too progressive and they should go with a conservative white guy instead.

[–] [email protected] 58 points 1 month ago (4 children)

But, I thought Biden was the only one capable of defeating Trump and anyone who disagreed was a secret Republican who wanted Trump to win?

Well, don't worry, Biden supporters. I've taken your arguments to heart, and you can rest assured that I'll write in Biden this fall, no matter who the Democrats decide to run. It's the only way to defeat Trump.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 months ago

See, I genuinely don't know whether you're joking or not.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 months ago

This is such a weird little thing, but I write in an online journal app every day, and I had the thought last night, "What if I played with the font and text to make it pink and feminine-looking?"

This feels like a joke, and maybe it sounds like a joke, but for some reason, typing with a pink, slightly-more-girly font made me feel a bit "lighter". It is so weird. For some reason, I have this association between visually customizing the everyday things around you (e.g. using colourful pens and notebooks, putting stickers on things) as being very "girly", in a way that I used to avoid, and am, deep into my adulthood, finally starting to embrace.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

spoiler

It kinda bugs me that the transition/gender discussion is so binary, I think it's causing a lot of trouble for you.

Probably. But I also feel a bit paralyzed by the sheer variety of options available. I'm fortunate to live in what might be one of the least transphobic parts of the world, where medical transition is (at least partly) covered by public health care, and I'm failing to take advantage of it as a result of my own fear.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (4 children)

Probably just dysphoric enough to justify a spoiler tag, just in caseSo. Unlike everyone else in this thread, I'm in an annoying questioning state where I'm not about transitioning (mtf) just yet. There's still a lot about my gender identity that I'm just not sure about.

  • I feel like I'm not married to the term "man", certainly not as much as a lot of men seem to be. Yet, when I see things online attacking "men" in general in a way that I see as being a little bit unfair, it's hard not to internalize that. So, for example, a recent meme about men being more dangerous than bears. It's not that I don't understand the reasoning behind it or that I'm "offended" by it exactly. But it's hard not to be a little sad at the fact that, insofar as I am perceived as male, I am by default perceived as an unlovable and dangerous subhuman monster. I could take this as evidence that I don't want to be a man and that I should transition, but is "not wanting to be a man" enough to pull the trigger on a medical transition? It feels like I should be running TOWARDS something I want, not just AWAY from something I hate.

  • There are a lot of boxes on the "Incel" checklist that describe me, e.g. loneliness, lack of deep friendships or romantic partnerships, spending far too much time on the internet. When I read advice for guys in this kind of situation, it tends to be very similar, obvious-but-annoying-and-difficult things, e.g. taking care of your health, introspection, journaling, meditation, finding social hobbies, etc. When I read this lists, I get a bit annoyed and exhausted. And yet, it becomes a bit more bearable if I think of myself as something other than a man, e.g. "Get a hobby" feels like scolding cliche self-help advice, yet "Get a hobby, but trans" feels less bad for some weird unexplainable reason (even if I don't actually do anything different).

  • A lot of discussions I can find about trans identity talk, explicitly or implicitly, about how a person feels "inside", e.g. what gender do they feel like they are? I don't know if I feel like anything in particular. When I'm filling out forms and it has the option, I usually answer "nonbinary" or something similar. I was playing an online game where you can customize your appearance, and the default avatar was a featureless, not particularly gendered, cute looking cartoon person. I tried making it look like how I actually look, but then I realized, "Wait, I kind of prefer the featureless androgynous humanoid cartoon -- that's closer to what I actually feel like". If you asked me how I imagine myself inside, the honest and silly answer is that I feel like a "Scrimblo Bimblo"-type genderless cartoon/video game character. I'm not 100% sure if "woman" is the right label for me, but I'm not totally against it either -- it just feels odd. I will say, when I see happy women, either alone or in relationships, I feel a tinge of envy, and that strikes me as a sign that I prefer the idea of being a woman more than the idea of being a man. I keep thinking to myself "I can't transition because I'd be an ugly woman", which I am well aware is a classic thing for trans women to tell themselves before transitioning. The prospect of medically transitioning and still identifying as nonbinary is... frightening, but fear seems like a bad reason not to do it.

At this point, I've been ruminating on this so long that it feels like I'm being annoying and indecisive, like I want you to make the decision for me. I realize that's a silly thing to want (but, like, could you? Because that would be GREAT!) so perhaps the best I can hope for is that writing this is a useful exercise for me.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

So I would try and ask, and solve, the question of "What do I want to do instead of looking at screens all day,"

So, that's kind of the conclusion I came to, which is why I wrote all those words up there -- to give context for why I'm asking the question I'm asking. From my original post:

Whenever I give up one addiction, I end up picking up another. This suggests to me that there is a deeper need here that is going unaddressed. It suggests that simple techniques to get rid of a habit (e.g. "Try deleting the game from your phone!") aren't sufficient in the long term. But I'm not sure what to do about that.

What I am looking for, if it exists and if anyone can attest that they've found it useful, is a structured workbook or similar resource that would help me to work through the nontrivial question of what deeper need I have to address.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 months ago

Somewhere down at the 10th level: The parts in Sonic the Hedgehog where Sonic is about to drown underwater and the music gets really fast and dramatic.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

By the way, I'm aware of the irony of looking for an interactive media resource to cure my addiction to interactive media, so don't bother pointing that out.

7
submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

Something I've found about myself is that I'm always addicted to some kind of screen-based media.

So, for example, I used to be really into mobile idle games. Then when I forced myself to give that up, I found myself scrolling through social media for hours at a time. When I force myself to give that up, I find myself playing mindless puzzle games on my computer for hours at a time.

Whenever I give up one addiction, I end up picking up another. This suggests to me that there is a deeper need here that is going unaddressed. It suggests that simple techniques to get rid of a habit (e.g. "Try deleting the game from your phone!") aren't sufficient in the long term. But I'm not sure what to do about that.

Ideally, I would like to be able to talk to a therapist about this. But since I'm back on a waitlist to see a therapist, I don't think that's going to happen for quite a while. I've been attempting to do other things for my mental health (meditation, journaling, exercise) but I find that the problem of my screen addiction continues to persists.

Every so often, in discussions about mental health, I see people recommending workbooks as an alternative for people unable to access therapy. I've been skeptical about this, but on reflection, it seems like that might be the right amount of structure for me. Meditation and journaling and exercise aren't really directed towards a specific problem the way a converation with a therapist can be, and if there are workbooks or similar resources that would help me work through this problem, I think it's worth a shot.

My ideal situation would be an interactive online or physical workbook that give me prompts for writing and reflection within a structure, e.g. I don't just want a book or series of YouTube videos I can passively read or watch (I can easily find those -- HealthyGamerGG is a well known resource on YouTube) but I also don't want to be told to just generically journal about my life (I'm already doing that).

If anyone knows about such a resource, please let me know.

15
submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

Hello there. For the first time, I actually have some concrete questions about activism/doing my part in a union.

I'm in a teaching assistant union that's currently on strike. Since I'm sick for a few days, I've requested to be part of the "remote work" group, and the task I've been assigned is to find contact information for people who've donated to the university.

It occurred to me that "tracking down a person's contact information" is probably a fairly useful skill to have in the context of organizing, so I thought I should ask whether there is any advice I should follow here?

The university lists the names of donors alongside the scholarships, grants, etc. So far, I've mostly just been Googling "(person's name) (name of university)" until I narrow down the right person, and usually find either a LinkedIn page or a page related to that person's business. (Or, a few times, an obituary). The only slightly more sophisticated thing I've done is "whois" lookups for websites. Is there anything else I should consider?

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