you’ve got bills to pay and lives who are counting on you. you’re disabled, meaning there are so many jobs you can’t do―on top of having to hide how disabled you are to even get an interview, never mind hired.
you don’t qualify for government assistance, and even if you did, it’s nowhere near enough to pay for yourself; and you need enough money to pay for your entire household’s expenses. there are lives who are counting on you. and by the way, once you’re married, or even look like you’re married, you’re thrown off government assistance anyway.
“but if your choices are working for the military-industrial complex that murders children or starving to death, you ought to starve to death!” you say, not having to make this choice for yourself.
so someone else should die for your beliefs? wonderful. you should definitely be consulted for complex decision-making /sarcasm.
setting aside the fact that you are essentially issuing a death threat to a person who exists, it might take a month and change or several weeks for you to die of starvation. ten (10) days is just the average.
however, you could die in as little as a few days if you stop drinking. mere sips can prolong your death.
in the meantime, you’ll be lightheaded, lethargic, apathetic, irritable, unable to regulate your own body temperature, eating yourself alive, unable to concentrate, and unconscious.
We were closed in barracks, sitting on straw, waiting only to die. In the straw, it was lice… From the lice was typhus. To eat we got only bread and soup, but you had to show first your shirt… If it was any lice, you got no soup. This was impossible. Everywhere was lice! And god forbid, if someone got soup and someone spilled him a drop… Like wild animals, they would fight until there was blood. You can’t know what it is, to be hungry.
Vladek Spiegelman, Holocaust survivor. Imagine explaining this shit to him or Lady Galadriel. I’m freakin’ embarrassed just thinking about it.
“People haven’t changed… Maybe they need a newer, bigger Holocaust,” Pavel (no last name given), another Holocaust survivor featured in Maus.
frankly if you’re gonna kill children, best kill them immediately instead of leaving them alive to work sweatshops or making them suffer the adoption / foster care system or traffic them for whatever nefarious purposes you have. but that’s just my opinion of course.
what do i know? i’m just a trans person who was raised by the people crying “children!!!” to justify blocking my and other trans people’s―including trans children’s―access to healthcare and society. maybe you have enough resources to save and raise and secure citizenship all these kids you’re issuing death threats for. in that case, go do that.
life isn’t an idyllic fairyland or a videogame. sometimes, there are no good choices to make.
in undertale, you don’t have to kill anyone in order to complete the game. in skyrim, you have to kill things or else you’ll die. if you can understand that, you can understand this just fine. you might be living in undertale, but other people are living in skyrim.
good is not nice, get used to it.
all this time wasted snapping at each other… did it bring those kids back? did it get a multiply marginalized person whatever you consider an ethical job―with benefits and a living wage? what good did it do? what evil did it stop?
what exactly did we accomplish here?
we got a person off the internet for… working a job!!! in a ruggedly individualistic capitalist society with few social safety nets―a society where children are treated as glorified property, no less! even when they’re legally adults! whoo-hoo!
leftist twitter, 2022.
this was just one person out of 5,000 people that i follow. i don’t have the time, energy, or motivation to keep track of everybody’s drama. i started following this person for his awesome media analyses.
some people say he was cosplaying poverty while other people say he specifically told everyone not to donate to him if they needed that money. other people say he contributed to ruining a trans woman’s career. i don’t know who’s telling the truth and who isn’t, and i do not have the time to litigate all this junk.
now multiply this phenomenon by 5,000. absolutely not! i have enough to do, thank you.
for better or worse, i’m going with my gut which tells me that this is just a bunch of spoiled brats who have no real understanding of how real the world is for other people.
the reason i’m dragging this drama over to my website is twofold: archival purposes and to remind everyone to stop starting cat fights, we have bigger fish to fry.
so let’s fry both fish at once!
people who only fry small fish. frying all these small fish leaves us exhausted for frying bigger fish. who knew???
Another reason why I’m grateful The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings played so prominently in my early life is because it taught me that real heroes get over their damn selves and freakin’ cooperate in order to save the world. Not devolve into a “community” of bitter-biting brats.
in my personal writings, i’ve been exploring what it means to join and contribute to a community. we call ourselves the queer community, but rampaging like this demonstrates that we don’t act like one. people in a real community care about each other. they pay attention when they speak about their joys and sorrows―the latter of which includes canada’s current campaign to pressure disabled people to give them permission to kill them.
So yeah. Have fun telling disabled people to kill themselves when governments are already telling them to do that while also largely ignoring the very real dangers immunocompromised people still face during the dual covid and monkeypox pandemics. for the “crime” of having a coding job in a society that has no universal basic income or any other social safety nets. fools and tools.
in our eagerness to become social justice warriors, we have only become social justice jury and executioners instead. what we need is social justice scholars. people who are willing to learn about the many realities of this world and its inhabitants, not just whatever idealized utopia you live in. your experience is your own. you need to remember that.
anger is an important emotion; but like lightning bending, it can kill you if you don’t direct it properly. people don’t exist in a vacuum. even pokémon acknowledges that outrage is a powerful move, but it’ll cause confusion and prevent you from leaving the battle.
do you actually know any of the kids the military-industrial complex is killing? do you know anything about any of the cultures those kids are from? do you know why we started killing them in the first place?
there’s also a very big difference between pulling the trigger and doing paperwork. not all jobs are created equal, fuckwads!
sure, you don’t need to know these kids personally. i don’t know any of you personally, but i still give a damn about you as less wise and more dangerous to my mental health as that is. caring about others is what i was taught that good people do even when we don’t much care for them. apparently, your parents failed you so hard they couldn’t even teach you how to do something other than issue death threats for failing purity tests. what great morals you have e_e.
wow. never thought i’d see the day someone’s parents failed worse than mine.
like i said earlier, i’m a trans person who’s tired of people screaming “children!!!” as if that’s a good reason to be a shithead. especially to marginalized people.
i’m also a trans person who, in high school (idk junior or senior year), was shown a film where Chinese soldiers made a Tibetan child kill their own parents. they did it by forcing the child to pull the trigger of a gun. if anyone remembers what this movie is, please let me know in the comments section, i can’t for the life of me remember what it’s called anymore.
i’ve also seen art depicting a Holocaust victim, and in his shadow is himself as a boy with his family members who didn’t survive. as well as read Maus which is on the Banned Books List now for… “inappropriate” language and depicting a partially nude, cartoony mouse. you know. mice. creatures that don’t tend to wear clothes in real life.
also, while i don’t remember the exact details anymore, because high school was a thousand years ago for me, two reasons why we’re so (justifiably) hated in the Middle-East is cuz: 1) after WW2, we divided the region up into countries without giving a damn about the peoples actually living there and how they live in that area, including moving across what is today now separate countries with various travel restrictions; 2) we sent the CIA to assassinate a Middle-Eastern leader cuz he was Islamic and wouldn’t give us his country’s oil. And then a terrible leader took over, but he wasn’t Islamic, so that makes him okay /sarcasm. Everyone should be christians, Erudammit!!! Thank you, new guy, for giving us all your oil so we can continue building our wealth using other people’s resources!
i also learned about Aztec trepanning and Chinese foot-binding. some genius in the class then asked, “Isn’t that child abuse?”
yes, it’s child abuse, captain obvious.
the teacher had to spend roughly 5-10 minutes telling him that this was just the culture(s). it’s not like present-day america’s doing much better in regards to children’s rights.we also learned about how ancient Roman families would sell their children into slavery so they wouldn’t starve to death or become enslaved anyway.
a lot of my classmates were shocked at the idea that people would sell their children. to them, it was unimaginable that they would ever have to part with their babies on such terms.
the teacher had to explain to them, once again, that this was just the culture, and that reality is not a disneyfied beauty. real people often didn’t and often still don’t have great choices to make. to pretend otherwise only shows how puerile you are and how unequipped you are to make lasting, good changes on the world you seek to improve.
generally speaking, we don’t study history for ideas on how to raise children. we study history to learn how best to fight present-day evils, to appreciate what good we’ve got, and how we can improve going forward. there is no perfect society, but we can certainly be doing better. and that starts with figuring out who our true enemies are: cogs in a machine, or the people commissioning the machine?
“If we are to succeed against our foes, we will need to act together as a team, not as rash individuals,” Master Splinter, TMNT 2003.
“Aristocrats do not practice biting and clawing… and things like that– it’s just horrible!” Duchess, The Aristocats 1970.
Focus on self-improvement instead. How do you hope to improve society if you won’t even check yourself before you wreck yourself?
For example, going forward, I plan on cutting back on my time with the public side of the internet so that my emotions don’t boil over. Some people are productive in their anger. I’m just destructive. Besides, I have better things to do: literally anything else.
do you understand why people have to work for such places? poverty’s no joke. starving’s no joke. you’d understand this if any actual evils befell you on the daily.
it is a privilege to not notice your privilege. and it is a privilege that you have the time, energy, and connections to apparently just ditch whatever job you’ve got in favor of a “purer” one.
one reason why corporations and the military-industrial complex have such a strong hold over everyone is because they are often people’s only access to healthcare and a college education. how are you going to get your worker bees and soldier bees without fulfilling their survival and surthrival needs and also meet your shareholders‘ expectations of unending, ever-climbing profits?
if you want people out of these places, you need to offer them a solution other than death.
as i look around my room, i wonder how many workers were exploited to make the stuffed animals, movies, and games i own. the american lifestyle is built on taking advantage of others. we even refuse to teach how slavery and genocide fuel this country. yes, not all evils are created equal, but we all have blood on our hands. as Ten says, “Who d’you think made your clothes?”
They were a boy and girl. Yellow, meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish; but prostrate, too, in their humility. Where graceful youth should have filled their features out, and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shrivelled hand, like that of age, had pinched, and twisted them, and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade, through all the mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and dread.
Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shown to him in this way, he tried to say they were fine children, but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.
“Spirit! are they yours?” Scrooge could say no more.
“They are Man’s,” said the Spirit, looking down upon them. “And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!” cried the Spirit, stretching out its hand towards the city. “Slander those who tell it ye! Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And bide the end!”
“Have they no refuge or resource?” cried Scrooge.
“Are there no prisons?” said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. “Are there no workhouses?”
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.
don’t be so quick to judge other people’s evils when you haven’t examined your own.
and yes there is no ethical consumption under capitalism. but acknowledging that some people have fewer choices and opportunities than others is literally one of the first parts of understanding the many compounding systems of oppression that are operating gleefully and unopposed.
if you’re not living that life in that body, raised by that family in that location, you don’t know what you’d do.
where do you think the technology to peruse the internet comes from, you ahistorical assholes? even the internet itself was a military pet project.
save your judgy energy for the people who are in charge of making decisions that keep these systems going. besides, as a dive into my parenting category can attest to, there are much worse things you can do to a child than killing them. if they’re dead, their suffering’s over. if they stay alive, they become husks: alive but without hope. nobody is coming to save them, and they know it.
you can also spend your time judging characters instead. i judge characters all the time! it feels great, and the worst it does is piss off nerds, not doxx a person. fuck nerds. we’re garbage.
- doxxing: reveal intimate details of where someone lives and works. and in some cases, gets the police to murder them and their dog. what you do on the internet has consequences in the real world. bullying’s no joke whether it’s online or in person.
if you wanna bully someone, bully Faenor instead! that son of a bitch―Finwe, not Miriel―got his sons killed (murdered by his own hands in one potential instance) all because he wanted some shiny balls all to himself instead of giving them back to Yavanna as he should have.
Father Faenaro had seven sons.
Seven sons had Father Faenaro.
I’m not one of them.
Nor are you.
So let’s all praise HFE!
Glory to me in the highest
and in Reality, peace and good will to everyone.
Especially the compassionate weepers.
There’s a lot to weep about in Reality,
never mind any stories you’re reading
or games you’re playing.
maybe the reason why only Elves are allowed in Aman is cuz the Elves, like all eldest siblings, are exhausted from dealing with their younger ones.
“HFE, thank you for creating and sharing so much art and writing for free. How can we help turn your passion and skills into a full-time gig?”
I’m glad you asked!
If you can give me a one-time tip, head over to ko-fi. I’ve also got emotes and icons you can buy.
If you can commit to a monthly tip, you can set that up via twitch or patreon. Twitch also lets you set up alternate payment schedules: every three months and every six months. Ko-fi lets you set up monthly payments now, too!
You can also buy some characters and critters I’ve designed on toyhouse.
And if you have no money to spare (understandable), one way you can help me out is by commenting and using as many share buttons as possible. Commenting gives me feedback on what works y’all are passionate about. Sharing helps expose my works to new people. The bigger my audience grows, the more audience members with money will encounter my works.
Thank you for taking time to read this. I hope you enjoy what you’ve found here.
- Homework (links in this piece).
- HFE productions:
- Twitter.
- jobs disabled people can get at home depot.
- parroting murderous nonsense from evangelical pastors.
- how much worse you can make a child suffer than to just kill them.
- “purity”.
- carrots the military dangles over low-income kids.
- they never have to find themselves in the villains; hence why they think they can do no wrong.
- i would love to work with trans people too!
- what better job?
- HFEpro:
- Toyhouse Literature: Everybody’s Grandpapa Wolf.
- Patreon Exclusive: i hate babysitting.
- Youtube Playlist: not everyone gets to choose their own adventure.
- Twitter.
- Enough is Enough: youth cyberbullying statistics.
- Death with Dignity: starving to death.
- Purplemath: mean, median, mode, and range.
- NPR: starving to death.
- Littleloud: Sweatshop.
- The Amber Ruffin Show: America’s History of Stealing Vulnerable Children of Color.
- VICE: Children for Sale: The Trafficking Ring Selling Babies from the Slums to Rich Couples.
- ACLU: Laws Restricting Teenagers’ Access to Abortion.
- Audre Lorde: The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle The Master’s House.
- Falconer: Fairyland Fanfare.
- hbomberguy: Pathologic is Genius, and Here’s Why.
- Man on the Internet: Undertale the Musical.
- seanzoz: Senile Scribbles: Skyrim Parody (The Collection).
- TV Tropes: Good is not Nice.
- James Stephanie Sterling.
- When Inane Creeps Attack Actors For Something A Fictional Character Did.
- The Stunning Cruelty Of Raven Software’s Layoffs.
- Videogame Executives Are Pointless Parasites.
- Telltale Hit With Class Action Lawsuit Following Layoffs.
- Activision Begins Mass Layoffs Following Record Financial Success.
- Demolishing The Excuses Made For ‘AAA’ Publishers’ Exploitative Greed.
- The Good Boys Of YouTube.
- The Sinister Reasons For Adding Microtransactions After Launch.
- Ashleigh Jessica Taylor: The Social Contract With Black America is Broken! (systemic racism simplified) by Kimberly Jones.
- Avatar The Last Airbender: Iroh Teaches Zuko To Redirect Lightning.
- Last Week Tonight.
- Yad Vashem: The Official Poster for Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day 2012.
- The Daily Show:
- Wikipedia.
- Jason Schreier, Kotaku: The Horrible World Of Video Game Crunch.
- Humanium: The detrimental effects of fast-fashion on children’s rights.
- Patrick Sisson, Curbed: Famous U.S. Buildings and Landmarks Built With Slave Labor.
- National Geographic: The Indian Removal Act and the Trail of Tears.
- u/northshore12 r/doctorwho Reddit: Planet of the Ood: Anyone else cringe at Donna’s sweatshop clothes reaction?
- Yvette Hymann, Good On You: Child Labour In The Fashion Industry.
- Equal Justice Initiative: Children in Adult Prison.
- Jessica Brain, Historic UK: The Victorian Workhouse.
- Project Gutenberg free ebook: A Christmas Carol by written Charles Dickens, illustrated by John Leech.
- Britannica:
- Kiara Lewis, Sunstroke: What Does “There’s No Ethical Consumption Under Capitalism” Truly Mean?
- Jane Coaston, Vox: The intersectionality wars.
- DA Games: Break My Mind.
- Berkeley University of California, Office of Ethics: Protect yourself from “Doxxing”.
- Cloudflare: What is swatting?
- Cyberbullying Research Center: What is Cyberbullying?
- History on the Net: The Maya Concept of Beauty.
- Amanda Foreman, Smithsonian Magazine: Why Footbinding Persisted in China for a Millennium.
- Unchained at Last: Child Marriage Progress.
- Gus Alexiou, Forbes: Canada’s New Euthanasia Laws Carry Upsetting Nazi-Era Echoes, Warns Expert.
- Tim Stainton, UBC School of Social Work: Social Justice’s Poor Cousin: Disability, MAiD and Social Work.
- Meagan Gillmore, TVO: ‘Catastrophic Pandora’s box’: Disabled Ontarians speak out against proposed MAID law.
- University of Texas at Austin ― How Much Do Coders Make? Coding Salary Guide for 6 Types of Coders.
- @OKJAHRA: i do not support all women. some of you bitches are very dumb!!!
- Goodreads: Maus I-II by Art Spiegelman.
- Ordinary Things ― The Evil Business of Nestlé.
- Oliver Balch, The Guardian ― Mars, Nestlé and Hershey to face child slavery lawsuit in US.
- N.S. Gill, Thought Co ― Roman Exposure of Infants.
- Labour Law Advisor ― The MOST EVIL Company in the World.
- White People Won’t Save You: Blood Diamond.
- HFE productions:
HFEproductions 
2 thoughts on “not everyone gets to choose their own adventure”