Icon from a picrew by grgikau. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
y’all better learn how to stop saying “kill yourself” to each other and “i’m gonna kill myself” to yourself and start enjoying the garden of life or i’m going to rip you apart and then i will plant you in the earth and you will become a tree. what will you do with these cruel urges then, hm? when you are a walnut tree. you’ll be making walnuts
oh. i just found out that the writer of the vincent van gogh doctor who episode wrote it as a tribute to his sister.
Richard Curtis wrote, “So – here’s the thing – the key reason I wrote this episode – was out of love for my sister Bindy. She was a gorgeous and brilliant person, 2 years older than me. She loved Vincent Van Gogh and life. She couldn’t have been more full of generosity and joy.
But half way through her life she was hit by depression and intermittently it hurt her for the rest of her life. And a few years before this show, like Vincent, she took her own life.
And in the key scene of the episode - when they bring Vincent to the future… that was me trying to show Bin how glorious she had been in our lives - and how nothing could change that.
And then also to deal with the fact that mental health issues are hard - and the capacity for joy, as I know Bindy did know how much she was loved, is intertwined with the immense difficulty of the illness sometimes…
So taking her own life wasn’t a failure by her, or a rejection of all of us. It was, as they say on Love island, what it was.”
Kalief Browder was arrested at the age of 16, on charges of robbery (for allegedly stealing a backpack) and imprisoned without conviction for three years.
Unable to post $3,000 bail, Kalief was sent to Rikers Island to await his trial.
After more than 1,000 days at Rikers awainting trial, over 800 of them in solitary confinement, Kalief was released and his case was later dismissed.
In June 2015, Kalief Browder committed suicide by hanging himself. The conditions of his detention were widely seen as having caused his mental condition and five or six prior attempts at suicide while incarcerated.
Kalief was 22 years old when he died.
Venida Browder, 63, the mother of Kalief Browder, died Friday at St. Barnabas Hospital in the Bronx.
Another First Nations chief is calling for swift action as the suicide crisis in northern Saskatchewan continues.
Black Lake Chief Coreen Sayazie says her community of just over 2,000 people has seen 30 suicide attempts in the last six weeks.
She wants to see more trained mental health workers specialized in suicide intervention in the province’s north. She claims only two mental health workers currently work in the far north and says their hours are being cut, with new limitations on overtime.
First Nations youth are suffering mental health issues in epidemic sized amounts and barely anything is being done. This is a disgrace.
The thing about Tumblr that probably makes me saddest is the underlying assumption that women past a certain age (which seems to be about 25?) stop having any sort of outside interests beyond family/career/kids. Like, y’all are always so shocked that grown women have lives and can fangirl as hard as we did as teenagers.
It makes me sad not because it makes me feel old (although it does), but because these younger women are constricting their own lives–they fully expect that this will happen to them someday. Y’all deserve better. Y’all deserve to EXPECT better.
And worse than that, the idea that there’s something WRONG with a grown woman who has other interests.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
One of the biggest things I realized growing up?
It doesn’t happen.
You expect somehow you will change when you are finally An Adult™. You’ll stop enjoying the things you enjoy now for something more “adult” or “mature.” You’ll FEEL like an adult and not like a child anymore. You’ll feel comfortable and secure and not scared and unsure and confused. You expect you will feel like you have your shit together.
But I can tell you that it doesn’t happen. You’ll still feel like the “you” you were at 15 or 17 or 19.
You just have these…things to deal with. Like rent. And insurance.
You have a job either because a) you like it or b) it keeps the lights and internet on.
You’ll look up from fangirling one day and realize “Shit. I am twenty eight years old. That’s almost 30!”Or maybe it will be that you look down at the small child clasped around your legs and realize “That is my child. I have a child. A human being child.” Or maybe it will be that you have to negotiate your budget around con tickets AND a mortgage payment.
Growing up isn’t a thing that happens.
It’s a realization that it doesn’t happen.
Holy shit, y’all. There are some AMAZING responses to this post. Yes, everything alwayshometomarvel says. All that.
Feeling like I wasn’t ‘adult’ enough fucked me up for years. I would cry at night and feel like a total piece of shit because I was married with a kid, and yet I still did ‘not adult’ things–I played MMOs, I cosplayed and went to conventions, I drew fan art and wrote fan fic. I kept waiting for the day that I would wake up and realize that what I really needed to be doing was the laundry, cleaning the house, making dinner every night, etc. Basically, be the ‘perfect’ wife and mother.
And somewhere between then and now, I somehow managed to tell myself…fuck it. I AM an adult. I go to work every day and pay the bills and help raise my son and take care of the house. I do legit adult things. AND I play MMOs, go to conventions, and participate in fandom. And THAT’S OKAY. I’m 32 years old now and finally at peace with that part of myself. (Having a supportive husband and kid doesn’t hurt either!)
All of this is such truth. Believing these things about growing up, and especially about being over 25? Really made it hard for me when I turned 30.
I was literally suicidal on my 30th birthday. I spent the whole day in tears. I felt like I had died and my life was now worthless and small and never going to be hopeful or full of promise or fun again. I felt like killing myself on my birthday because I bought into this lie that somewhere after your mid-twenties, you diminish as a woman because the only thing that made you alive and shiny was your youth.
I’m 31 now and I’m done with that shit. I’m over it. I don’t care if you think I’m too old for something. If I’m an old lady in Tumblr terms, then I’m past the legal age where I’m obligated to care what you think.
So, I’m telling you girls out there right now who are in your teens and twenties, get rid of this idea of what older women are “supposed” to look like. Get rid of this idea that “soccer moms” don’t play video games or that all women over 25 should be married and contemplating kids. Get rid of the idea that fanfic and fandom and fun things are for “kids.”
Mostly, get rid of this notion that the only thing really valuable about you is your youth. Youth is part of life, but it’s not the most valuable or beautiful or exciting time of your life. I like my life at 30 about 1000% than I did at 15, 18, 20, even 25.
on her deathbed, my grandmother pulled my mom close to her and said, “i don’t feel old. i don’t know how i’m supposed to feel. but inside, i still feel seventeen.” when I was a teenager, I used to think that story was sad; sad and strange somehow, like she’d been frozen in time. but now that i am a woman in my thirties, I understand. I understand her. I am a grown woman in the ways that matter. I listen to myself more, trust my experience more. but inside? I still feel the joy and rage and mess; I am still changing. we’re not frozen in time. we are just still growing.
the more we acknowledge that modern “adulthood” is largely a concept designed to sell vacuums and sedans, and not an arbitrary total overhaul of self at age 35, the more we can admit our ongoing capacity– no, our ongoing NEED for play and playfulness and exploration. those are childish things we should never have to put away.
I know a lot of suicidal transfolk have been getting a lot of publicity ever since Leelah. Now, its great that trans issues are being brought to light, but what I’m seeing literally horrifies me.
I keep seeing more of these PSAs and add-like notifications that trans people are committing suicide. The biggest message behind it all is “they have a name”. I know that transgender suicides are NOT unheard of and have been happening since before Leelah, but something occurred to me that chills me to the bone.
I don’t want this to be a trend.
Transgender kids, teens, and adults NEED to know that there are other ways to be heard. You DO have a voice. Please, for the love of my fellow transfolk, do NOT kill yourselves. Your life isn’t a trend or a statement to be said and left alone. Your voice can be just as powerful, it can be MORE powerful.
Please just whatever you do, dont let these posts about other peoples suicides let you think that it is in any way a good place to turn. This isnt what Leelah wanted or stood up for and its not what I stand for. The road to acceptation should not be paved with the bloody suicides of our brothers and sisters. Suicide is not the answer- even if you don’t feel like anyone out there loves you then please know that I love you and my heart aches for every single one of you- those who are here and those who have gone.
Im setting my suicide date as January 13 2015 (my birthday)
Since my friend doesnt have a tumblr account, she says for every like (note) and reblog this gets i have to extend it a day. Please i know nobody is going to reblog or like this.
Probably ignore it then go back to making male tears mugs and gifs
Actually this is a very common idea among feminists
It’s something feminists have been talking about for years it’s called toxic masculinity and it’s one of the common threads among the topic of ‘Patriarchy hurts men too’. If fact the first time I read about toxic masculinity was on a feminist blog.
If you actually read things feminists talk about instead of straw manning them you might know this but OH WELL
This makes me so angry. She dishonors Leelah’s identify and memory even in death, pulls attention to herself as the grieving parent, and clearly still doesn’t get that it is her actions and treatments that pushed Leelah to take that step.
RIP Leelah Alcorn.
God dammit! OK, listen up, my dear trans babies. I know that you’re hurting. Probably hurting a lot like Leelah was, but I want you to see two things here.
Leelah committed suicide because she couldn’t see any way to escape. Her voice was actively silence and her story ignored in favor of a fantasy that her parents wrote. She felt powerless, alone and afraid. That’s because her parents WANTED that for her to make her feel like the only choice available to her was to conform to their narrative. She found a different choice, but one that ultimately gave her parents the final control over her story, her life, and now, her death.
She realized she couldn’t begin transition until she was at least 18 and legally responsible for her own medical care, and someone gave her the terrible, wrongheaded and dangerous belief that that was TOO LATE to transition and “pass” and find love.
She was wrong. I know many gorgeous and happy trans men women who transitioned in their 20s, 30s, 40s and later and have found the life they always wanted. Please don’t internalize that bullshit that your chances to transition end at 18 or 21 or 25 or 30 or whatever. It’s never too late. Never.
But the real lesson I want you to take from Leelah’s death here is that she’s gone, forever, and even though she did everything she could to make sure that her story was known and heard by queueing up that post, her mother is still ignoring all of that for this fucking bullshit narrative she made up about her darling SON accidentally being hit by a truck on a morning walk, instead of facing the fact that her daughter committed suicide because she saw no other way out.
If you’re feeling like Leelah, alone, afraid, powerless and like there’s a ticking clock counting down your chance to transition, please know that there is no peace in death.
There is no guarantee that your suicide will make anyone see anything they don’t want to.
This mother is still willfully and actively ignoring, denying and mythologizing her child’s life and death. Leelah has finally lost her voice forever. The news articles will fade, the tumblr posts will vanish, and this horrid person will be telling tales about the tragic accident that took her son from her until the day she dies. Her suicide solved nothing for her. She will never see the amazing woman she’d have grown up to be. And neither will her mother.
The only chance you have to be the narrator of your own story is to stay alive, get out, get away, find your power, find your voice, find your real family - the people who know you and see you for who you are, people who hear you when you tell your story, people who will defend and protect you at all costs. We are here, waiting for you with our arms and our hearts open. Please, I know you’re in a terrible and seemingly unbearable place and environment. The only comfort I can offer is that the world doesn’t stop turning, time doesn’t stop and this moment isn’t the last moment. Please find a way to bide your time, to hold on for one more day, one more hour, one more minute, though it seems eternal, this moment is temporary.
I can’t guarantee your future happiness or that your life will be easy, but none of us, trans or cis, get any such guarantee. The only guarantee you get is that if you kill yourself, you’ll NEVER have the chance to find and build a happy life.
Every storm passes, every rain cloud moves on, and nothing in this world is permanent. This pain of your present will become the aches of your past.
Please stay alive. Please hold on until you can escape from there and come home. Our light is on and our door is open.
