Our #introduction.
We are a US-based charitable #nonprofit organization.
Mission: Strengthen humanity through #empathy and #compassion.
Vision: A resilient, #progressive society in which everyone is an equal partner.
Check out our website (https://www.empathyforward.org/) to see what we're working on, and follow us for announcements and conversations.
Apparently someone can't say "Linux" without getting a lecture about "No, it's GNU/Linux, you stupid!"
And people wonder why Linux is only at ~5% market share on Desktop...
It's all about how welcome you feel: If you feel like you've just "invaded" someone's "holy place", then this doesn't feel so welcome, does it!?
My new drawing “Bear with Me” seems especially apt during these times. I know I’m not alone in feeling emotionally compromised. We all need to have patience and compassion for ourselves as we fight the fascist regime that’s taken hold of this country.
We can beat this. 💛
My new drawing “Bear with Me” seems especially apt during these times. I know I’m not alone in feeling emotionally compromised. We all need to have patience and compassion for ourselves as we fight the fascist regime that’s taken hold of this country.
We can beat this. 💛
Great speech about #empathy.
Possible #Spoilers S1E3 #StarFleetAcademy #StarTrek
"The war college teaches its cadets to fight battles.
I'm teaching you to end wars. To learn the patience to formulate a true strategy and the empathy to understand your opponents so you can disarm them.
That's what Star Fleet needs to be again. And leading through fear alone makes that impossible."
Captain Nahla Ake (Holly Hunter)
I tip my fedora to writers Alex Taub & Kiley Rossetter
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt34127729/fullcredits/
Great speech about #empathy.
Possible #Spoilers S1E3 #StarFleetAcademy #StarTrek
"The war college teaches its cadets to fight battles.
I'm teaching you to end wars. To learn the patience to formulate a true strategy and the empathy to understand your opponents so you can disarm them.
That's what Star Fleet needs to be again. And leading through fear alone makes that impossible."
Captain Nahla Ake (Holly Hunter)
I tip my fedora to writers Alex Taub & Kiley Rossetter
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt34127729/fullcredits/
Friends,
Here on the #Fediverse, now more than ever -- if you're willing and able -- we need you to share the things that lift you up and help you keep going.
If it sparks #joy, please, PLEASE share and continue sharing with the class in the coming weeks and months.
Is it #pretty, but you're lacking #spoons? Be sure to follow @altbot so you can still share it.
If it brings a #smile to your face, consider sharing it no matter how small.
If you chuckle at something in your daily life and tell yourself "oh that's so dumb, I better not post it", that's exactly when you SHOULD post it.
If you think of a #DadJoke that could win awards for being so corny, it is your fiduciary duty as a #Fedizen to attempt to make us all groan at your #silliness.
Some of my most popular toots were my most flippant #shitposts (in contrast to ones I've poured hours into crafting, that get a sympathy fav or two and then vanish into the ether..). It might feel awkward at first, but if you keep #shitposting it's like exercising muscles; it gets easier the more you do it. Consider exercising your big brain muscle and then barf the results here for all the world to see.
I know #hashtags aren't as big here, and a lot of people are against them but I find them invaluable. (I do wish we had a bot that auto-generated a reply to posts with socially/contemporarily relevant hashtags.) Consider adding a contribution to #3GoodThings, or tuck a silly #shitpost in a bottle and toss it into the great and fascinating sea called the Fediverse. You might be surprised who might find it interesting.
We need to flood the zone with #kindness and #happiness because I believe that's how we recharge our emotional reserves.
In doing so, it helps us fortify ourselves against the onslaught of stormy weather that is our real-life world. (Or at least that's how *I* usually do it. [I recommend augmenting with generous doses of cannabis as needed. {consult your doctor first}])
Having said all of this, it's important to remember we must strive to provide #empathy to our fellow passengers. For some of us, this is the closest we can get to #therapy. If people share their struggles and challenges, I implore all of us to remember that #kindness and understanding are radical acts of decency.
Above all, protect yourself by blocking "early and often". You aren't obligated to continue hosting a visitor on your digital "porch". You can simply close the door. You don't even need to have a reason. It's *your* fucking door and there's nothing that says you're required to buy what they're selling -- especially if it feels like negativity. I can tell you with absolute certainty that I've never blocked someone and later thought, "oh gee, I shouldn't have blocked them so fast." It's generally the opposite.
Alright, my friends. Today your assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to brainstorm the corniest damned joke you can think of, and post it. Don't mull it over, don't worry about if it makes sense -- post it. Toot it. Bop it. Shake it. Twist it.
Bring forth the moments and shitposts you wish to see in the world, each one a candle that lights our way on this long journey we call life.
Friends,
Here on the #Fediverse, now more than ever -- if you're willing and able -- we need you to share the things that lift you up and help you keep going.
If it sparks #joy, please, PLEASE share and continue sharing with the class in the coming weeks and months.
Is it #pretty, but you're lacking #spoons? Be sure to follow @altbot so you can still share it.
If it brings a #smile to your face, consider sharing it no matter how small.
If you chuckle at something in your daily life and tell yourself "oh that's so dumb, I better not post it", that's exactly when you SHOULD post it.
If you think of a #DadJoke that could win awards for being so corny, it is your fiduciary duty as a #Fedizen to attempt to make us all groan at your #silliness.
Some of my most popular toots were my most flippant #shitposts (in contrast to ones I've poured hours into crafting, that get a sympathy fav or two and then vanish into the ether..). It might feel awkward at first, but if you keep #shitposting it's like exercising muscles; it gets easier the more you do it. Consider exercising your big brain muscle and then barf the results here for all the world to see.
I know #hashtags aren't as big here, and a lot of people are against them but I find them invaluable. (I do wish we had a bot that auto-generated a reply to posts with socially/contemporarily relevant hashtags.) Consider adding a contribution to #3GoodThings, or tuck a silly #shitpost in a bottle and toss it into the great and fascinating sea called the Fediverse. You might be surprised who might find it interesting.
We need to flood the zone with #kindness and #happiness because I believe that's how we recharge our emotional reserves.
In doing so, it helps us fortify ourselves against the onslaught of stormy weather that is our real-life world. (Or at least that's how *I* usually do it. [I recommend augmenting with generous doses of cannabis as needed. {consult your doctor first}])
Having said all of this, it's important to remember we must strive to provide #empathy to our fellow passengers. For some of us, this is the closest we can get to #therapy. If people share their struggles and challenges, I implore all of us to remember that #kindness and understanding are radical acts of decency.
Above all, protect yourself by blocking "early and often". You aren't obligated to continue hosting a visitor on your digital "porch". You can simply close the door. You don't even need to have a reason. It's *your* fucking door and there's nothing that says you're required to buy what they're selling -- especially if it feels like negativity. I can tell you with absolute certainty that I've never blocked someone and later thought, "oh gee, I shouldn't have blocked them so fast." It's generally the opposite.
Alright, my friends. Today your assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to brainstorm the corniest damned joke you can think of, and post it. Don't mull it over, don't worry about if it makes sense -- post it. Toot it. Bop it. Shake it. Twist it.
Bring forth the moments and shitposts you wish to see in the world, each one a candle that lights our way on this long journey we call life.
@raineyday I love this story!
I looked up an interview with her & found this on Facebook. Link In ALT.
Here's the video that I added subtitles to.
#Marijuana #MedicalMarijuana
#Empathy #EmpathyAvengers
It was a Tuesday in 1981 when the San Francisco police kicked in the door.
Inside the small apartment, they expected to find a hardened criminal. They expected a drug kingpin. They expected resistance.
Instead, they found a 57-year-old waitress in an apron.
The air in the apartment smelled sweet, thick with chocolate and something earthier. On the kitchen counter, cooling on wire racks, were 54 dozen brownies.
The police officers began bagging the evidence. They confiscated nearly 18 pounds of marijuana. They handcuffed the woman, whose name was Mary Jane Rathbun.
She didn't look scared. She didn't look guilty.
She looked at the officers, smoothed her apron, and reportedly said, "I thought you guys were coming."
She was booked into the county jail. The headlines wrote themselves. A grandmother running a pot bakery. It seemed like a joke to the legal system, a quirky local news story about an older woman behaving badly.
But Mary wasn't baking for fun. And she certainly wasn't baking for profit.
To understand why Mary risked her freedom, you have to understand the silence of the early 1980s.
San Francisco was gripping the edge of a cliff. A mysterious illness was sweeping through the city, specifically targeting young men. Later, the world would know it as AIDS. But in those early days, it was just a death sentence that no one wanted to talk about.
Families were disowning their sons. Landlords were evicting tenants. Even doctors and nurses, paralyzed by the fear of the unknown, would sometimes leave food trays outside hospital doors, afraid to breathe the same air as their patients.
Men in their twenties were wasting away in sterile rooms, dying alone.
Mary knew what it felt like to lose a child.
Years earlier, in 1974, her daughter Peggy had been killed in a car accident. Peggy was only 22. The loss had hollowed Mary out, leaving a space in her heart that nothing seemed to fill.
When the judge sentenced Mary for that first arrest, he ordered her to perform 500 hours of community service. He likely thought the manual labor would teach her a lesson.
He sent her to the Shanti Project and San Francisco General Hospital.
It was a mistake that would change American history.
Mary walked into the AIDS wards when others were walking out. She didn't wear a hazmat suit. She didn't hold her breath. She saw rows of young men who looked like ghosts—skeletal, in pain, and terrified.
She saw "her kids."
She began mopping floors and changing sheets. But soon, she noticed something the doctors were missing. The harsh medications the men were taking caused violent nausea. They couldn't eat. They were starving to death as much as they were dying of the virus.
Mary knew a secret about the brownies she had been arrested for.
She knew they settled the stomach. She knew they brought back the appetite. She knew they could help a dying man sleep for a few hours without pain.
So, she made a choice.
She went back to her kitchen. She fired up the oven. She started mixing batter, not to sell, but to save.
Every morning, Mary would bake. She lived on a fixed income, surviving on Social Security checks that barely covered her rent. Yet, she spent nearly every dime on flour, sugar, and butter.
The most expensive ingredient—the cannabis—was donated. Local growers heard what she was doing. They began dropping off pounds of product at her door, free of charge.
She packed the brownies into a basket and took the bus to the hospital.
She walked room to room. She sat by the bedsides of men who hadn't seen their own mothers in years. She held their hands. She told them jokes. And she gave them brownies.
"Here, baby," she would say. "Eat this. It'll help."
And it did.
Nurses watched in amazement as patients who hadn't eaten in days began to ask for food. The constant retching stopped. The mood on the ward shifted from despair to a quiet sort of comfort.
Mary Jane Rathbun became "Brownie Mary."
For over a decade, this was her life. She baked roughly 600 brownies a day. She went through 50 pounds of flour a week. She became the mother to a generation of lost boys.
She washed their pajamas. She attended their funerals. She held them while they took their last breaths.
She did this while the government declared a "War on Drugs."
By the early 1990s, the political climate was hostile. Politicians were competing to see who could be "tougher" on crime. Mandatory minimum sentences were locking people away for decades.
In 1992, at the age of 70, Mary was arrested again.
This time, the stakes were lethal. She was charged with felonies. The district attorney looked at her rap sheet and saw a repeat offender. He threatened to send her to prison.
One prosecutor famously whispered to a colleague that he was going to "kick this old lady's ass."
They underestimated who they were dealing with.
They thought they were prosecuting a drug dealer. In reality, they were attacking the most beloved woman in San Francisco.
When the news broke that Brownie Mary was facing prison, the city erupted.
It wasn't just the activists who were angry. It was the doctors. It was the nurses. It was the parents who had watched Mary care for their dying sons when the government did nothing.
Mary turned her trial into a pulpit.
She arrived at court not as a defendant, but as a grandmother standing her ground. The media swarmed her. Reporters asked if she was afraid of prison. They asked if she would stop baking if they let her go.
Mary looked into the cameras, her voice gravelly and firm.
"If the narcs think I'm gonna stop baking brownies for my kids with AIDS," she said, "they can go fuck themselves in Macy's window."
The quote ran in newspapers across the country.
The court didn't stand a chance.
Testimony poured in. Doctors from San Francisco General Hospital wrote letters explaining that Mary’s brownies were medically necessary. Patients testified that she was an angel of mercy.
The charges were dropped.
Mary walked out of the courthouse a free woman. But she didn't go home to rest. She realized that her personal victory wasn't enough. As long as the law was broken, her "kids" were still in danger.
She needed to change the law.
August 25 was declared "Brownie Mary Day" by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. It was a nice gesture, but Mary wanted policy, not plaques.
She teamed up with fellow activist Dennis Peron. Together, they opened the San Francisco Cannabis Buyers Club—the first public dispensary in the United States. It was a safe haven where patients could get their medicine without fear of arrest.
But Mary wanted more. She wanted the state of California to acknowledge the truth.
She campaigned for Proposition 215. She traveled the state, despite her failing health. She spoke in her simple, direct way. She didn't talk about liberties or economics. She talked about compassion. She talked about pain.
She forced voters to look at the issue through the eyes of a grandmother.
In 1996, Proposition 215 passed. California became the first state to legalize medical marijuana.
It was a domino effect. Because one woman refused to let her "kids" suffer, the public perception of cannabis shifted. The Economist later noted that Mary was single-handedly responsible for changing the national conversation.
She never got rich.
She had always joked that if legalization ever happened, she would sell her recipe to Betty Crocker and buy a Victorian house for her patients to live in.
She never sold the recipe. She never bought the house.
Mary Jane Rathbun died in 1999, at the age of 77. She passed away in a nursing home, poor in money but rich in legacy.
Today, over 30 states have legalized medical marijuana. Millions of people use it to manage pain, seizures, and nausea.
Most of them have never heard of Mary.
They don't know that their legal prescription exists because a waitress in San Francisco decided that the law was wrong and her heart was right.
They don't know about the 600 brownies a day.
They don't know about the thousands of hospital visits.
Mary didn't set out to be a hero. She told the Chicago Tribune years before she died, "I didn't go into this thinking I would be a hero."
She was just a mother who had lost her daughter, trying to help boys who had lost their way.
She proved that authority doesn't always equal morality.
She proved that sometimes, the most patriotic thing a citizen can do is break a bad law.
Every August, a few people in San Francisco still celebrate Brownie Mary Day. But her true memorial isn't a date on a calendar.
It is found in every oncology ward where a patient finds relief. It is found in every dispensary door that opens without fear.
It is found in the simple, quiet courage of anyone who sees suffering and refuses to look away.
Mary taught us that you don't need a law degree to change the world. You don't need millions of dollars. You don't need political office.
Sometimes, all you need is a mixing bowl, an oven, and enough love to tell the world to get out of your way.
Sources: New York Times Obituary (1999), "Brownie Mary" Rathbun. San Francisco Chronicle Archives (1992, 1996). History.com, "The History of Medical Marijuana."
@raineyday I love this story!
I looked up an interview with her & found this on Facebook. Link In ALT.
Here's the video that I added subtitles to.
#Marijuana #MedicalMarijuana
#Empathy #EmpathyAvengers
Apparently someone can't say "Linux" without getting a lecture about "No, it's GNU/Linux, you stupid!"
And people wonder why Linux is only at ~5% market share on Desktop...
It's all about how welcome you feel: If you feel like you've just "invaded" someone's "holy place", then this doesn't feel so welcome, does it!?
Our #introduction.
We are a US-based charitable #nonprofit organization.
Mission: Strengthen humanity through #empathy and #compassion.
Vision: A resilient, #progressive society in which everyone is an equal partner.
Check out our website (https://www.empathyforward.org/) to see what we're working on, and follow us for announcements and conversations.
I've just seen an absolutely disgusting article. I said "seen", not "read", because I'm blind and I could not read it.
for your reference, here's the first beautiful sentence of this article:
"ffGE ARrj XRejm XAj bZgui cB R EXZgl, Rmi mjji jrjg-DmygjREDmI XgRDmDmI iRXR XZ DlkgZrj."
I don't know the technology behind this BS, but screen readers see it as scrambled text, kind of encrypted or something like this. I guess it's some font juggling (ChatGPT supposed it's gliph scrambling, where random Unicode values are mapped to random letters — I'll trust her in this because I really don't care about the tech behind it), but if you have a tiny little grain of empathy, never ever ever do this, for goodness sake.
https://tilschuenemann.de/projects/sacrificing-accessibility-for-not-getting-web-scraped
#Accessibility #Blindness #Empathy #BadPractices #Web #Text
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I talked to my co-worker about @timnitGebru and we decided to talk about it in our blog as well, due to the fact I use @letsenvision 's AI companion, Envision Ally.
Reflect and be aware of tools we have in hand, is the only way for us to take control on tech, rather than being controlled by it.
https://plusbrothers.net/ai-companion-dark-side-michael-story/
#ai #empathy #human #social #tech https://plusbrothers.net/ai-companion-dark-side-michael-story/
I've just seen an absolutely disgusting article. I said "seen", not "read", because I'm blind and I could not read it.
for your reference, here's the first beautiful sentence of this article:
"ffGE ARrj XRejm XAj bZgui cB R EXZgl, Rmi mjji jrjg-DmygjREDmI XgRDmDmI iRXR XZ DlkgZrj."
I don't know the technology behind this BS, but screen readers see it as scrambled text, kind of encrypted or something like this. I guess it's some font juggling (ChatGPT supposed it's gliph scrambling, where random Unicode values are mapped to random letters — I'll trust her in this because I really don't care about the tech behind it), but if you have a tiny little grain of empathy, never ever ever do this, for goodness sake.
https://tilschuenemann.de/projects/sacrificing-accessibility-for-not-getting-web-scraped
#Accessibility #Blindness #Empathy #BadPractices #Web #Text
