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cortisolsoup.bsky.social
violet X
@cortisolsoup.bsky.social
250 followers 320 following 230 posts
27 | mad black disabled enby system seeking solace in memes. chronic journal-er, artist, & watcher of video essays. ex-academic. healer in training. zelle: semimindfulart@gmail.com
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cortisolsoup.bsky.social
so that's pretty much that! i've been exercisin & explorin my ass off :)

here's my invite code if u wanna virtually join me: WWNFJENLZ
(using it gives us both a lil bit of premium shit + auto sends me a friend request)
back from a fun walk | image (photo): a person (myself) wearing a heavy sage green coat with the hood pulled up over white headphones and a beanie looking menacingly at the camera through tea-colored glasses. a ginger wolf-dog is sniffing my right hand. a cool guy in my squad | [screenshot from "Pikmin Bloom"] image: a blue pikmin (a little creature with wide set eyes, a triangular mouth, and a leaf sprouting from its head) wearing a pink foil wrapped chocolate heart perched on its head and a vacant expression. bottom text [his name]: "klorbo" ⭐️ a photo i took on one of my walks | image: a light blue box in the middle of a grassy field, topped with solar panel and surrounded by four pylons. someone has emblazoned the word "Luigi" and a couple of hearts across the side of it in red spray paint. the tittles in his name are also stylized as hearts. some more of my boys | image (photo with AR overlay): a ginger wolf-dog is lying on a beige tile floor licking her front paw. overlaid in between her paws is an army of different colored pikmin with white and yellow flowers sprouting from their heads in a block formation.
February 20, 2025 at 12:24 AM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
consider this my contribution to literature for today
[top text]: "INSIDE YOU THERE ARE TWO WOLVES" [image]: a black and white picture of two wolves, one white, one black, staring into each other's eyes against the backdrop of an enormous, full moon partially obscured by clouds. [bottom left text, over the black wolf]: wtf.,,... this isn't a shared experience??? [bottom right text, over the white wolf]: wtf.,,... this is a shared experience???
February 19, 2025 at 6:59 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
gr8 thread for anyone who doesn't understand why "this" is happening
Nico Robin (one piece) in a fur coat, corset bra, standing with her arms crossed and eyes obscured below a cowboy hat. Speech bubble: "confused? It's actually quite simple. Just imagine the worst case scenario."
February 4, 2025 at 4:59 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
i gave myself a diy pedicure this morning with hot water, sandpaper, and coconut oil and now i feel 3-5% better about my life so that's something
stick figure lying in bed, eyes half open, staring listlessly with purpleish red eye bags. thought bubble: partially obscured by frantic red scribbles, a person is clutching their head in both hands and sobbing profusely. blood red text: "WAKE UP / HELP / YOU CAN'T HIDE".
January 25, 2025 at 4:21 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
i stooped to consulting the houston chronicle (tryna get some info about whether or not we can expect to lose power, no real answers given; standard PR nonsense only) only to see...this...Centerpoint Energy, the for-profit company, doing "mutual aid"???? my YELLOW ASS, a CURSE be upon ye,
Highlighted: [CenterPoint secured an additional 430 vegetation management workers and 750 line workers as "mutual aid" from other utilities to help with potential power restoration.] These workers arrived in the Houston area Monday and will be onboarded and pre-positioned across the region before winter precipitation begins in the evening, according to the company's Monday statement. CenterPoint deployed four small mobile generators to warming centers in and around Houston Monday, "just in case the need arises for those warming centers," Carroll said at the press conference. "We are absolutely ready for anything," Carroll said. He urged customers to have an emergency plan in place, especially if they rely on life-sustaining equipment that may require electricity.
January 22, 2025 at 1:00 AM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
modding mine like this has helped quite a bit (results may vary)
January 19, 2025 at 5:49 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥 (reading now)
top text: "how it feels when I skeet in someone replies with a link to the anarchist library" A comic book panel of Batman and Spider-Man crouching in opposite directions atop a water tower in the pouring rain, presumably in the middle of the night
January 19, 2025 at 4:33 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
my behavior on this app is best explained by this excerpt from "kill the couple in your head":
Turning to face my trauma, rejecting the addictions that allow me to avoid it such as the Couple, is just a first step to healing, but it is a massive, terrifying step that most people spend their entire life fleeing. Only by engaging this trauma, which is a life-long journey, can I step through the fear that leads me to need a Couple or a child, someone to control. Of course, living in this world is a constant trauma, always compounding and reinforcing what we fight so hard to resolve and change. And so we will continue to plunge our friendships, our love, into the cage of the Couple. We will continue to project our fear onto those closest to us. The struggle to free our relations from this cage can only nourish the anarchist tension. A friend put it beautifully in their response to this talk, [highlighted] "Lately I've been thinking about intimacy like a bandit. Like a hacker or a scavenger. I know I need reciprocal forms of care to keep fighting. These days I'll take it wherever I can find it. Clutching at these fugitive intimacies even as they slip through my fingers. Cobbling together something workable, something livable, something that's enough to keep going. Learning to live in these spaces of ambivalence and imperfec-tion. I don't think you have to heal yourself to heal the world, or whatever. You just need to keep yourself going enough to keep burning things down. Who know what kinds of strange and wonderful relational forms might emerge from this mess..." [end highlight] We try to outrun our fear of disappearing, fear of irrelevance, disposability, aging, death, by encasing ourselves in institutions that are immortal - that exist to halt the cycle of death and rebirth. Old women were criminalized in the witch hunts because they were no longer productive
January 18, 2025 at 6:37 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
instant flashbacks to this scene from dinosaurs
a gif of a scene from the movie Dinosaur (2000). Aladar (an iguanodon) watches with amazement/curiosity as two meteors fall to earth in the distance against a red evening sky.
January 17, 2025 at 2:23 AM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
yeah, it blows. i have some version of this interaction with her about twice a month. [currently accepting sympathy in the form of zelle payments to semimindfulart@gmail.com] /hj
photo of a simple grey tombstone in an autumn forest. text: "WELCOME TO THE ONLY GAME IN TOWN" watermark: www.tombstonebuilder.com
January 16, 2025 at 10:48 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
hair: washed | scalp: oiled | pray for me?: please
a phone mirror selfie of a person with locs in a grey oversized t-shirt that says "fuck the army", head tilted to the side. a person with locs trying to look hot and cool. a person with locs not trying to look hot and cool.
January 15, 2025 at 11:52 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
Don't you dare turn your eyes away from history, even the awful, scary parts. If you don't watch it with your own eyes, you rely on others to tell you what you saw. We must all bear witness to what's coming.
Promotional poster for "beast games". Jimmy Donaldson squats on top of an embarrassment of riches, smiling blankly, a fuse in one hand, three bands in the other. A cheap CGI explosion frames his figure. A train, inexpensive car, and a pool full of bathers are in the background. Text: BEAST GAMES / 1000 players. $5 million dollars. One winner. / Amazon prime logo
January 15, 2025 at 11:06 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
multimedia journal entry. mint green background, olive green, amorphous, blobs around the border, pictures of mushrooms and cut outs of cartoon faces throughout. (pasted) "Why We Need" (written) "constellate (verb) to form or cause to form into a cluster or group; gather together: [no object] : the towns and valleys where people constellate | [with object] : their stories were never constellated. ORIGIN: mid 17th century: from late latin constellatus, from con- 'together' + 'stellatus' arranged like a star. 1 : to unite in a cluster 2: to set to set or adorn with or as of with constellations: cluster. • As in to collect To bring together in one body of your place The museum has constellated many of the artist, most glorious paintings into one stunning exhibition • collect gather assemble accumulate a mass corral Garner group congregate combine bulk up round up lump concentrate pack joint get together unite, organize mustard ball connect cluster arrange stack pick up pile merge, bunch, huddle flock heap batch, raise herd swarm, throng, rally systematize, compile band call regroup, hive, link, pool archive, prograde press scrape (up or together) regather
January 15, 2025 at 1:27 AM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
thought i'd permanently banished the suicidal ideations last go-round (see poem below) but it turns out that healing my self-hatred has not in fact made it easier to live through this, which seems to have increased the despair this time,,,,,,,,what do i do,,,,,,,now,,,,,
September 5, 2022 at 12:39 List of reasons to stay alive today One: we don't have enough queer elders. It would be really cool to stay here and get to be one of those One day. Probably i won't be one of the people with a full set of Queer Activism Scout patches. Probably it would be more like, i'm just lucky to be here. i imagine myself as one of the greeters for the younger folks. i'm sitting in the sunshine and my toes are out in the grass and i'm waving a little flag or holding a little sign with a goofy greeting on it. i'll stand up and put my hands on my hips and take a deep breath and say "Howdy! It's so wonderful to finally meet you, kid. I'm so glad we both made it!" and then i'll throw my head back and laugh and turn around and say "Come with me! Let Ol' Vi show you around the place. " and the new queers won't know me yet but they will pretty soon because i don't have much to be worried about anymore except wildflowers and keepin' an eye on them, so i'll have all day to listen and talk, and i'm here and i'm here and it's okay welcome home welcome in we love you here i love you here you're safe now it's okay welcome home go explore we're all safe now welcome to the future we tried to make it nice for you i hope you like it i really hope you like it.
January 15, 2025 at 12:25 AM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
part (2/2)
The point: prioritizing survivors who are able to produce evidence as listed above in order to be credible invalidates any cases where such evidence does not exist, which I would argue is a significant proportion of cases, if not the majority of cases. among those who are "theoretically" capable of recounting their experiences: - The process of recounting the abuse/trauma can be prohibitively painful and energy-intensive. even in the best case scenario it can leave us incapacitated and unable to return to "normal life" for hours, days, weeks, or months. there is usually no compensation offered to offset that-so excepting the rare cases where someone has a robust preexisting support system this isn't a responsible risk to take. - relinquishing narrative control of our stories in any way, including to journalists, is a huge risk. it requires placing a lot of trust in people and established institutions with different incentives that may or may not prioritize vour best interests through the process and/or in the final product. it doesn't always go well. In fact, it usually goes very poorly. - in the absence of hard evidence, trust is going to come into play at some point. prioritizing survivors who are willing to jump through these hoops and subject themselves to the voyeurism of the masses, holding them up as more credible because they were able to subject themselves to this often incredibly extractive and draining process, implicitly decreases the support and reduces the credibility of those who can't or won't. - The shit icing on this shit cake of a situation is that including the gory details will absolutely not save them from being disbelieved, picked apart, harassed, questioned further, etc., etc. unfortunately, it is my experience that people pretty much come into these situations having already "picked a team" and will be reading the narrative through that lens. More specific apologia will be deployed to fit the new details. - all of this happens in front of survivors everywhere, it's incredibly triggering and upsetting and toxic, nobody learns their lesson, see ya again next week.
January 14, 2025 at 8:02 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
i really hope this makes anything resembling sense (part 1/2)
January 14, 2025 at 13:50 what counts as "Evidence"? (in roughly descending order of supposed irrefutability) - direct admission of guilt/ culpability from the perpetrator (this one almost never happens. Even perpetrators of the most horrific violence imaginable tend to see themselves as victims. Those of them with more self-awareness know better than to admit anything in public.) - Video footage/ photos of the abuse (unlikely to be created in the first place) - police reports (going to the police with anything with the expectation of being taken seriously is a bad idea for 6 million reasons that are out of the scope of my capacity to write this list) - recordings/transcripts of conversations where the perpetrator admits fault, directly or indirectly - Recordings/transcripts of conversations where the survivor describes the abuse to somebody else - legal action from a group survivors harmed in similar ways - verbal allegations from a group of survivors harmed in similar ways - verbal allegations from a single survivor [AUTHOR'S NOTE: My original plan was to have a parenthetical next to each of the evidence types listed above, explaining the various ways that they are inaccessible to many survivors. I ran out of energy after the first few, so I leave this as an exercise for the reader.]
January 14, 2025 at 7:58 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
@moonblossomaaa.bsky.social hello :)))))
January 13, 2025 at 9:04 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
your last saved meme is your moral philosophy
lower panel: five presumably unrelated cartoon people on public transit riding in silence, each with thought bubble trails leading up to the same thought bubble (below) thought bubble/upper panel: generic outline of a person's head. text in head: "does my language shape my thoughts?" a speech bubble from their mouth indicates how the person's private sentiment might be expressed in speech. text in speech bubble: "Can I ever really share a thought? / Communicate it with no ambiguity?" watermark: tiktok @psuchros
January 13, 2025 at 7:19 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
@skunk985.bsky.social look we love similar cats thanks for liking my posts
tuxedo cat, eyes closed, sitting on a pile of junk
January 11, 2025 at 11:17 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
🤠
January 11, 2025 at 11:13 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
I LOVE TAKING NOTES I LOVE JOURNALING
January 11, 2025 at 11:05 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
what sins might i have committed that my yt algo keeps offering me up this monstrosity... A-Train?? not just *in* the mix, but as the THUMBNAIL?? RICK ASTLEY??? Pete & Bas?? (oh, patricia taxxon! that's correct 😌) 💀💀💀💀 but the rest of it...please!!!!! 😵‍💫
A-Train (from The Boys) poses suavely for the thumbnail art of his presumably in-universe music video. TEXT: Mix - Pop music Pete & Bas, Patricia Taxxon, Rick Astley, and more
January 9, 2025 at 6:42 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
on today's episode of men being weird in the dms:
stranger: "Hi Violet 😉" me: "do we know each other?" stranger: "I don't believe we do" dave: "I'm Dave, l'm a business owner in [redacted] area. You look cool, so I reached out." (selfie of an older white man) me: (grim skeleton looking incredulous against a red background) dave: "Lol, ok" me: "what's your purpose here" "what are your aims" dave: "At the moment, it was just to say hi and get to know you. Didn't have a plan beyond that. Lol" me: "well sir you are incredibly suspicious" dave: "Why is that?" me: "do you message strangers often?" dave: "Sometimes, if it's someone I think is interesting." "There was a time when speaking to people was how you got to know them." me: "......" dave: "It was the norm, and was expected and appreciated. Not sure what happened to that" me: "so i'm supposed to expect and appreciate this is what you're saying" "well, i do not 😌" You've blocked Blacktie You can't message or call them in this chat, and you won't receive their messages or calls.
December 18, 2024 at 7:04 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
currently reading filterworld (kyle chayka) which has been on my reading list for a while
Algorithmic anxiety happens because there is a dramatically asymmetrical relationship between user and algorithm. For the individual user, trying to predict or dictate the outcome of the algorithm is like trying to control the tide. To continue the metaphor, all users can do is surf the wave that's already formed. There is little incentive for companies to assuage this anxiety because a user's confusion can be beneficial to business. When a company's product is ineffective or a user encounters difficulty, it can be blamed on the opaque entity of "the algorithm," which is perceived as external to both the users and the company itself, since they are likened to opaque "black boxes." Exploitation is disguised as an accidental glitch instead of an intentional corporate policy. In reality, a company like Facebook is wholly in control of their algorithmic systems, able to change them at will—or turn them off. Algorithmic anxiety places the burden of action on the individual, not the business—the user must change their behavior or risk disappearing. Users sometimes complain of being "shadowbanned" when their posts or content on a platform suddenly lack the same level of engagement as before. Users often fear that their account specifically has been blocked without warning or recourse by some decision-maker; but the algorithmic priorities may simply have silently changed, and traffic is no longer flowing in their direction. The effect goes back to the Mechanical Turk; we can't always tell the difference between technology working and the illusion of technology working, but the perception may be just as impactful, in the end, as the reality. Taste can also feel more like a cause for concern than a source of personal fulfillment. A selection made based on your own personal taste might be embarrassing if it unwittingly clashes with the norms of the situation at hand, like wearing athleisure to the office or bright colors to a somber funeral. I find myself mortified when I pick out a previously unexplored bar or restaurant for a group of friends, a choice I think will be a crowd-pleaser, and it turns out to have entirely the wrong vibe. (One such bar in D.C. turned out to have too many taxidermy animal heads on the walls for comfort.) In that situation, an automated recommendation from Yelp or Google Maps may have suited me better: the proof of democratic, average approval takes the pressure off making a choice that may prove too quirky. Yet at the same time, I wouldn't want those lowest-common-denominator rules to determine which books I read or television shows I watch. Culture isn't a toaster that you can rate out of five stars—though the website Goodreads, now owned by Amazon, tries to apply those ratings to books. There are plenty of experiences I love—a plotless novel like Rachel Cusk's Outline, for example—that others would doubtless give a bad grade. But those are the rules that Filterworld enforces for everything. As taste requires surprise, it also thrives on challenge and risk, treading too far in a particular direction. Safety may avoid embarrassment, but it's also boring. Over the twentieth century, taste became less a philosophical concept concerning the quality of art than a parallel to industrial-era consumerism, a way to judge what to buy and judge others for what they buy in turn. This phenomenon-conforming too much with popular taste and thus insulating yourself from having a more inspiring personal encounter with culture—
December 16, 2024 at 3:27 PM
cortisolsoup.bsky.social
some journal pages i wrote in '22 in the wake of the overturning of Roe V. Wade- my reaction to the (White Feminist) disbelief/horror surprise flooding my feeds. substitute Roe for [any recent Deeply Concerning phenomenon X] and it's evergreen baybee
I just find it funny that everyone on the TL is flipping the fuck out about Roe V. Wade, now that it's officially donezo/ outta there. I find it funny that folks are legitimately finding out fresh for the first time today that the state is working on votes and gay marriage net. And now niggas is panicking. what's even funnier is watching YT "activists" plead, and cry, and rail against the system- then end the video with some shit like "go vote!" or "we need Supreme Court reform!" "*different* elected officials!" I wonder how big the overlap is? [venn diagram: A) people loudly lamenting about Roe V. Wade today. B) •"the revolution is theoretically cool but it's not realistic… or a job" folks •(formerly) apathetic fake woke white women in their "fleabag era" who admin meme IGs - turned civil rights activists now that their favorite SH method (fucking dangerous cis guys from tinder) is like...too dangerous for dissociation now A+B) %? that's the funny thing about fascism. Y'all never even rung bells for the undesirables, but for sure they'll bring out the big brass for you, babe. This is your moment, hun! the BELL shall soon TOLL FOR THEE. The writing ain't on the wall, it was carved into the fuckin' bedrock of this godforsaken country, the moral of the story has been in plain sight from the beginning, you are disposable, you are interchangeable, this machine's continued operation requires your sacrifice, your life, whatever the state asks for you shall give, you everything you *think* you have is at their fingertips, you are in their hands, The Lord Giveth; The Lord Taketh Away, and today's your day to PAY UP. It's about as dear as a summer's day that the corporations don't give the slightest shit about us- but baby, dis you think the american government is for the people? You don't have to know that much history - even the twisted processed pile of scraps that passes for a curriculum in this country has enough clues to reveal the truth. Hell, LOOK AROUND! NIGGAS IS DYING IN THE STREET! IN FULL VIEW of the "benevolent" "reformable" institutions! Look at all the black folks in this country! We just got dropped the fuck off here! Look at all the WHITE FOLKS! WHOSE FUCKING LAND IS THIS? WHO ALWAYS PAYS? Fascism is capitalism's immune system. when the flow of resources to the top slows down, or threatens to - no matter how much the owning class has accumulated- no matter how evil + depraved the process must be- fascism will be invoked. it is a dual process of consolidating power at the "top" and culling undesirables at the bottom, identifying "degenerates" and "useless eaters", starting with the most marginalized- the furthest from "whiteness", like the most fucked up version of musical chairs imaginable, and white women: did you not see it coming until you found yourself unseated? The music can be pretty catchy, I guess. I find it hard to believe that you didn't understand the rules of the game though, ladies - you simply believed that you were fast and clever enough to end up safe and seated when the music stops. Tough luck this time. The game was never about skill. it was always rigged. To those of us who were dragged away first, or never invited to participate in the farce in the first place (because some people are too alien, dangerous, or "useless" to even make pawns out of) the nature of the game has been obvious from the beginning. some of us tried warning you, back then. it becomes very clear very quickly to anyone trying to recruit or "talk sense" or "radicalize" white folks – and I count myself as a former (permanently retired, present day) Whitey Whisperer- that you lot are a lost cause in the early game. you never even start listening until the 11th hour, much less taking advice from trannies and darkies and cripples. As terrible as fascists are, a skill they have honed with terrifying competence, the ability that holds their organizations together, is enveloping their paragons and regiments in reverence, worship, and fetishization. Every fool has a rank and a badge and a God-given sense of divine place; belonging, and "respect". of course, this ecstatic state/position is frighteningly precarious, highly conditional, and– so far– always temporary. I have no doubt that this priority only serves to increase its power to addict and enslave those {fortunate? unfortunate?} enough to experience it. i've tasted the feeling myself. "healthy" "real" love just doesn't pack the same punch. and you don't even have to *do* anything, *build* anything- you just fall into it. better if the eyes stay closed. Better not to venture out of Eden. An abusers love always has a vice grip. Even if you "win", even if you wake up and see the truth, there is no "letting go". The vise that was so comforting would crush you to death before it would allow you to escape. So why struggle? why add your body to the pile? As furious as I am, i can't say that i don't understand. we are more alike than we are different, after all. none of their promises are real. your privileges were always temporary. your cell was padded with stolen things, held together with stolen lives. wealthy white women had a few decades with a generous length of rope. now, you are being reeled in again.
December 13, 2024 at 4:36 PM