“When I said what I said it wasn’t said in the ‘we need to talk more about this later’ kind of way. It was said in the ‘I regret what I’m saying there must be a potato in the tailpipe’ kind of way. So stop talking.”
You knew because there is the slightest, almost imperceptible difference of tincture and viscosity between the liquids. You knew because you had done it a hundred times. You gave him the correct medication. Because you are a good nurse.
ANADEARMAS as Marta Cabrera in KNIVESOUT (2019) dir. Rian Johnson
The countries that got tea via China
through the Silk Road (land) referred to it in various forms of the word
“cha”. On the other hand, the countries that traded with China via sea -
through the Min Tan port called it in different forms of “te”.
I liked this so much I became curious… and it checks out! The explanation lies, unsurprisingly, in who was interacting with whom in early modern long-distance trade.
“Authors should not be ALLOWED to write about–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative
“This book should be taken off of shelves for featuring–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative
“Schools shouldn’t teach this book in class because–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative
“Nobody actually likes or wants to read classics because they’re–” you are an anti-intellectual and an idiot
“I only read YA fantasy books because every classic novel or work of literary fiction is problematic and features–” you are an anti-intellectual and you are robbing yourself of the full richness of the human experience.
“you are functionally a conservative” is such a good and clarifying insult
Literally right after I saw this post, I saw another post in a discord chat for BOOK EDITORS in which an outspokenly liberal editor talked about how Nabokov should have never been published because he wrote about p*dophiles and described women’s bodies in ways that made her uncomfortable. She described his writing as “objectively terrible” and said she wanted to burn his books. And other editors were bringing up classics they didn’t like and talking about how they wanted to throw them in the trash. This wasn’t like a light “unpopular opinion!” conversation. This was actual book editors talking about how books should be destroyed and censored.
There is something so scary and toxic in global culture right now. The revival of fascism is influencing everyone’s mindset and approach to art, regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum.
I see far more books being censored today than when I was a kid. Librarians handed me The Catcher in the Rye, The Sexual Politics of Meat, and Animal Farm when I was literally 8-11. My mom would never have taken a book away from me. I read everything from the Tao Te Ching to the Qur'an to atheist texts under my desk at school. Teachers thought nothing of it or encouraged it. Books seemed universally acknowledged as sacrosanct to me.
Now I can’t find any adults who don’t hesitate or want to make exceptions when it comes to censorship. Even the most liberal social activist librarians I know go, “well except for book X…”
Functionally conservative. It’s so important to have the language to express that.
