Hey Tumblr fam. I’m sharing my GoFundMe. I wish I could gather myself to write a great post but I can’t.
To keep it short, on Christmas Eve a reckless driver hit my dad while he was blowing leaves. He was cleaning up the front area of our neighborhood and a speeding driver hit him. I love my dad. I was his shadow. I also live with him.
I’m a college student who of course doesn’t make enough to bury my father, with no insurance, and to keep our house. I’m raising funds for our home and the burial.
I’m struggling right now because I was out there after it happened. I saw him die. I’m struggling. So please forgive me as I try to be an adult about this. Please help me out. Please please boost. I can’t keep writing a new post about this. It was hard enough to make the page, answer phone calls, and visitors to my house. I’m struggling. I’m hurt. I’m at a lost. I’m angry. I’m hoping to at least eliminate my financial burdens at this moment. Thank you so much for your support and shares. Please hug your parents for me.
These women should not be forced to perform for a man they don’t like….LET THE PRODUCERS KNOW
you should actually call their union because the union is responsible for not protecting their workers.
American Guild of Variety Artists
“American Guild of Variety Artists, the union that represents the Rockettes, suggesting that full-time employees will be coerced into performing, even if they object.”
AMERICAN GUILD of VARIETY ARTISTS National Office: 363 Seventh Avenue 17th Floor New York, NY 10001-3904 {212}675-1003 (212)633-0097 Fax agva@agvausa.com agvany@aol.com
West Coast Office: 11712 Moorpark Street Suite 110 Studio City, CA 91604 (818)508-9984 (818)508-3029 Fax agvawest@earthlink.net
On December 12th, over 100,000 people in East Aleppo were trapped in a 5 square kilometer range as they were being bombarded by airstrikes from Russia and the Syrian government to attempt to overtake the rebel-held area. “The Russia-backed ground offensive, which began on November 26, followed an intensive aerial bombing campaign that knocked out most of the medical facilities, targeted civil defence and municipal vehicles and blocked roads with rubble.” The world is sitting and watching a genocide happen before their eyes as civilians are being massacred. Families posted on various social media platforms to say their final goodbyes.
A huge thing we can do is spread the word as quick as possible to raise awareness! Below are a list of charities, I have researched these and listed how much of your donation gets to use. Please add to the conversation and research on your own so we can find the best charities.
Donate to:
Syria Relief: They work to provide many life-saving essentials including food, medicine and medical care, winter provisions including warm blankets and bedding, as well as an orphan support programme. 88.8% of your donation goes into relief, the remaining go into raising money, and a small portion into admin.
Save The Children: Provides food and water, helps repair water systems, supports hospitals, helps schools, and provides emotional help for children. They have helped over 500 000 children in besieged areas so far. 88% of your donation goes into relief, the remaining goes into fundraising efforts.
Islamic Relief Worldwide: They distribute food packs, clothes and medical supplies to communities under siege within Syria and displaced people along the Turkish border. They are also running or supporting camps and providing livelihood programmes, education and psychosocial support for refugees in Lebanon, Jordan, and Iraq. 90% of your donation goes into relief and development, the remaining goes into delivery of relief, campaigning, and generating future income.
Karam Foundation: An NPO that develop Innovative Education programs for Syrian refugee youth, distribute Smart Aid to Syrian families, and fund Sustainable Development projects initiated by Syrians for Syrians. They distribute clothes, food, water, flour, blankets, infant formula and other basic necessities. 100% of profit goes into building programs, providing relief, and sustaining development.
Doctors Without Borders/Medecins sans Frontieres: “Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is an international, independent, medical humanitarian organisation that delivers emergency aid to people affected by armed conflict, epidemics, natural disasters and exclusion from healthcare. MSF offers assistance to people based on need, irrespective of race, religion, gender or political affiliation. Our actions are guided by medical ethics and the principles of neutrality and impartiality.” 80% of your donation goes into relief/ supplies.
The White Helmets: Syrian Civil Defense rescue volunteers who literally go unarmed into the most dangerous situations. Since there are not very many functioning public services left, they respond to the more than 50 bombings a day in some neighborhoods, and pull out whoever they can. They’re at a huge risk because repeat bombings are common. These people are the literal last defense some Syrians have. At last count, they’ve saved 73, 350 lives. The situation is dire and desperate and this is immediate, front lines relief. Please consider donating.
As difficult as it will be, please try to keep your hands out of your pants until after you read this.
My name is Shane. Many of you know me, some of you don’t, and a couple of you only follow me to ask daily anon questions about my sex life (super creepy btw). For those of you who don’t know me, I’m the skinny dude with wilting flower wrists munching on pizza in the picture above.
See the position that I’m in? With my right hand cocked up under my chin, using my left thumb to hold my hand in place?
This is how I have to chew food these days.
I was born with a disease called spinal muscular atrophy that makes my muscles waste away as I get older. As you can see, the deterioration affects my arms and legs, but it also means my lungs are losing their ability to breathe. My jaw is losing its ability to speak. Some days, my neck has trouble supporting the weight of my own head.
As I’ve lost ability, I’ve been forced to adapt the way I do everyday things, such as eat. You can’t tell by looking at me here, but this downward progression is a monster to live with, both mentally and physically.
My issues with chewing began in 8th grade, when my mouth suddenly stopped working during lunch in the school cafeteria one day. I was mid-bite on a massive beef burrito, so when my mouth failed to function, I had to spit everything out onto the plastic tray in front of me. It was like a volcanic explosion of sour cream and cheese and salsa and spit. My friends looked at me with total shock and confusion. In my embarrassment, I muttered something about choking and tried to laugh it off.
It didn’t go away though, and over the next few months, I found myself repeatedly unable to chew the food in my mouth.
Instead of giving up and wallowing in yet another ability lost because of my disease, I adapted. By jamming my arms up under my jaw as you see in the picture, I was able to assist my mouth with the chewing motion. At first it was embarrassing. I felt ridiculous in this position, so I often chose not to eat in public rather than use my new method. But eventually, I decided that eating and enjoying food were more important parts of life than strangers giving me quizzical glances. That was about ten years ago, and I’ve been eating like a deformed kangaroo ever since.
The fun part is that my disease is going to keep getting worse, and I’ll continue to lose the abilities I currently have. For instance, in the past year, it has started becoming harder to even get my arms into the “eating position,” so my girlfriend and I are already experimenting with new methods. We’ll figure it out, I’m sure of that, but the mental implications of constantly getting weaker make some days rougher than others. Living with muscular dystrophy means constantly finding alternative ways to thrive.
I want to ask all of you a favor tonight. As many of you know, I run a nonprofit organization that provides adaptive equipment to people living with my disease. These are items that give independence back, and help people maintain important abilities, like moving, eating, breathing, and sleeping.
This December, I’m trying to give adaptive technology to eight kids living with muscular dystrophy.
All I’m asking is that you share this post. You guys have helped me accomplish some pretty spectacular things in the past five years, and I’m hoping you know this cause is so fucking important to me that you will want to lend a hand.
If you do wish to support the campaign, you can do that here: https://igg.me/at/etSyEPjSSLE but the power of a reblog is just as helpful!
When you struggle with your mental health on a daily basis, it can be hard to take action on the things that matter most to you. The mental barriers anxiety creates often appear insurmountable. But sometimes, when you really need to, you can break those barriers down. This week, with encouragement from some great people on the internet, I pushed against my anxiety and made some calls to members of our government. Here’s a comic about how you can do that, too. (Resources and transcript below.)
Motivational resources: There are a lot! Here are a few I really like:
Sharon Wong posted a great series of tweets that helped me manage my phone anxiety and make some calls.
Kelsey is tweeting pretty much daily with advice and reminders about calling representatives. I found this tweet an especially great reminder that calls aren’t nearly as big a deal as anxiety makes them out to be.
Informational resources: There are a lot of these, as well! These three are good places to start:
If you can, apparently calling is the best way to reach your representatives. And if you can, I strongly encourage and ask you to. But, pull quote:
“’Do something that is uncomfortable but not harmful to your mental health.’ For me, calling was enough outside my comfort zone to be stressful & scary, but not so far away as to use up all my energy. That might not be the case for you, and that’s okay. Do not beat yourself up about it. There are lots of ways to take action without picking up a phone:
Write to government officials
Create art that challenges and art that inspires
Donate, if you’re financially able, to organizations that fight injustice
Listen to immigrants, people of color, women, trans and non-binary people, people of all faiths and sexual orientations, and people with disabilities. Support their work. Amplify their voices.
Descendants of West African slaves in South Carolina are fighting to prevent their land from being confiscated and auctioned. Can they save a traditional way of life that has survived for the one and half centuries since emancipation?
The first Lillian Milton knew about it was when she arrived at the local council offices to settle her tax bill. She was told her home had been sold because she had not paid a $250 levy for a sewer service. She was shocked – at that point she had not even been connected to the sewer system.
“They had sold everything, the property, the house and all and when I offered to pay them with a cheque, they told me I couldn’t. I had to get cash money – 880 some dollars that I had to pay them to get my place back. It’s like they were saying if I didn’t get on the system I wouldn’t have no place to stay.”
Milton suspects the heart attack she suffered in January was brought on by the stress of trying to get her home back.In the end, she says, “my boss lady gave me the money,” and she was able to pay the court fees to redeem her property.
Many of her friends and neighbours in Jackson Village, one of three black communities in Plantersville, South Carolina, face losing their homes in a similar way if they don’t pay the tax for a sewer they say they didn’t want and don’t need.
Last week 20 homes were put up for auction.
Most residents are the direct descendants of West African slaves, who bought land on the former rice plantation, or were deeded it by the government, after emancipation in 1865. Property ownership had special meaning for these former slaves, known as Gullah Geechee, and the land has been proudly passed down through the generations, as a safe haven to raise families and farm.
But America’s seemingly insatiable appetite for coastal living and the money that can be made from buying up cheap former plantation land is a potential threat. The only people we see are the developers,“ says the Rev Ben Grate, gazing at the empty road that snakes through Jackson Village.
“We call them ‘strangers’ and we are afraid of them. Because they come to take your land. They are millionaires, in big cars, driving slow, staking out property, dreaming on what it would be like to have a motel on the river right here.”
With its neat brick-built bungalows, set back from the road in their own plots of land, and protected from the roar of Highway 701 by a dense forest, Jackson Village feels secure and cushioned against change.
But few residents here have deeds to their homes. The freed slaves who originally bought the land were mistrustful of the legal system, or excluded from it, and did not leave written wills.
The land is held in common. The families are entitled to live on it under “heir’s property rights” – but so are all of the descendants of the original owners. Ben Grate estimates that more than a million people, spread out across America, have a share of land in Plantersville, whether they know it or not.
If one of them decides to sell their share of their parents’ or grandparents’ home, a court can order the entire property to be sold at auction.
So although they are living on prime real estate, much sought after for holiday homes, golf courses or country clubs, they cannot simply sell up for a fat profit.
The residents can also have their home seized and sold off if they don’t pay their taxes.
Lillian Milton’s property, which was valued at $46,700 by the Georgetown county assessor, was sold at a delinquent tax sale to a real estate developer for $1,236, according to documents seen by the Georgetown Times. Residents who have their homes taken in this way have a year to redeem them, as Milton did.
Army Engineers said no to a permit. Doesn’t mean that DAPL can’t keep drilling and just pay the fines. 50K a day in fines is nothing for a company like them to brush off.
They could literally just wait, and lose money of course, until Trump gets into office and streamlines the project. He could just use the Federal government’s powers over interstate commerce to get it put through.
This is part of a colonial frontier war against the original peoples and the land
Celebrate a victory but don’t fall for the State’s trick. This is far from over.
“Yet even as men and women began drumming and dancing around the fire, many Native Americans were unconvinced that Sunday’s news was the end.
“It’s not over. It’s never over,” said a Standing Rock member who gave his name as Ghost. “They say one thing and do another.”
DAPL and Energy Transfer Partners are planning to continue construction, permits or no. They released a statement to that effect.
Donald Trump’s objection to a hand recount of nearly 4.8 million votes in Michigan, which the Trump campaign submitted yesterday, is the latest in a series of efforts to block three states from verifying the accuracy and integrity of their elections. His campaign team is aggressively working to obstruct and weaken recounts demanded by voters in:
Pennsylvania, where late Thursday evening, just hours after his vote lead fell from more than 70,000 to 46,435, Trump moved to block the vote recount, claiming that it “puts Pennsylvania at grave risk”;
Wisconsin, where Trump allies in the State Republican Party logged a complaint with the FEC, arguing for the full recount to be thrown out; and Trump’s Super PAC and others filed a federal lawsuit against the Wisconsin Election Commission to enjoin the recount;
Michigan, where Trump lawyers filed an objection with the Board of State Canvassers to block Michigan’s recount, and the state’s Attorney General similarly moved Friday to halt the recount.
“We won’t stand down as Donald Trump and his allies seek to frivolously obstruct the legal processes set up to ensure the accuracy, security and fairness of our elections. – Jill Stein
If you would like to donate to the recount efforts, which are being publicly funded and are still in need of around $2m to go through, you can do so here. You do have to be an American to donate, unfortunately, but please pass this on to your American followers if nothing else.
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