The other day, in my second-hand-tv watching (Husband is watching something, and I’m nearby, working or chatting with friends via computer) I got caught by a documentary on Octopi and how smart they are.

For the record, and so people understand… Well, I was going to type that Octopus is a delicacy in Portugal, but that’s not actually true. Portugal is — or was when I was growing up — a staple. You would get it if there was no decent fish. And mostly we ate fish — which thank you I heartily dislike — except Sundays when we might have chicken.

So– anyway, I was watching that documentary, and there was stuff about how smart they are, and we saw this little pink octopus tap out words and enjoy pets and stuff, and I was feeling pretty guilty about all of its brethren and sisteren I ate over the decades.

And then Dan segued into a documentary about octopi in the wild….

Well, look, they’re very smart, yes. And the adults will eat the new hatchlings. Even their new hatchlings.

Suddenly I was feeling much better. Sure, I’d eaten beings that might be sentient, but heck, they ate each other too.

Which brings us to: Yeah, so do humans. Which wouldn’t give me the warm fuzzies about something eating us, but still…

The point is they might be really smart, but that doesn’t make them moral creatures. Just like we’re not naturally moral creatures, no matter how smart.

In fact most of the world doesn’t share our morality. And by that I don’t mean “Don’t sleep with your sister” or “don’t enslave other human beings” or “don’t eat other human beings.” I mean, sure vast portions of the Earth still infringe the first two, openly or not, and the third still happens, though not in most floridly visible areas and not in ways Westerners see. I’m talking about more basic stuff, like don’t kill, don’t steal to the point it can’t be said you have any concept of private property. Most of the Earth doesn’t consider anyone not of their immediate group human. Not really.

Which brings to: Intelligence isn’t moral. And it isn’t admirable in and of itself.

This is important because we’ve lost track of that. When we talk of our best and brightest, we mean it in an IQ and knowledge sense, and we assume this will make them moral. When we talk of “Such and such civilization was so creative and look at everything they invented, we ignore the piles of skulls and rotting carcasses of their enemies. And their enemies often being honestly someone who pissed off their king.

When we make IQ the equivalent of all goodness, we forget the millennia that humans spent doing art installations with freshly killed young men and horses.

I don’t actually care if they had the swiftest chariots and the most wonderful palaces. We are better than they were because we are at least civilized enough not to kill people for decorative purposes.

This stuff needs to be said.

Over the last several decades we’ve been soaked in the idea of noble savage and the left’s insanity with their nostalgie de la boue. We’ve been told natural is better; untutored is better; doing what comes naturally is the only way; live as if you were a simple savage and you’ll be a saint.

All this is poppycock. Morality and the ability to learn in a civilized society require learning and teaching, and curbing your natural instincts. No matter how yummy my babies were, I never chomped on them. No matter how tired I am, we don’t actually live in our own filth. (Or the cat’s filth, for that matter. Though Havey distributes it liberally.)

Noble savages are a myth. Savages are just…. savages. And savagery — barbarism — means that the humans caught in it suffer. All of them. Barbarism shortens lives, and not just because your neighbor needed dinner and you looked tasty.

There is a lot to be said for this artificial lifestyle of ours: food relatively easily obtainable, lights at the push of a button. Showers at not much expense. Homes that are heated or cooled.

It is artificial, sure. And it requires the use of tons of artificial stuff, which is why the cultists of nature are sure it must be destroying something and killing something. Because…. it’s not natural.

And thank heavens it’s not natural. Enough of fetishizing natural.

Keep doing that long enough and you’re picking the bugs off your neighbors carcass before you roast him. And I don’t care what your IQ is, that’s no way to live.

Even if you have a shiny chariot.

I don’t suppose I’ll eat octopus again, or at least it’s not likely. I never liked it much, anyway. (I used to refer to octopus rice as spoiling rice with octopus, when mom made it.)

But if I have to I won’t feel guilty. They might be smart, but they eat each other. So I will not feel guilty for eating them.

Now when Octopus develop a language and a sense murder is wrong…. Then I’ll worry about it.

And while I don’t intend to start eating murderers, I’m also not going to brood and cry over the past civilizations and cultures that vanished. I don’t care what they invented. if they killed each other for sport, and ate each other? They were savages.

Raw intelligence means nothing. Applied intelligence that creates a society in which most individuals are relatively free and prosperous.

That means something.

And that is worth preserving.

Now go do it.

Today I’m going to post the two certificates. So, if you were due that (and anyone above $20 was, I think), well, please take it. If you weren’t, please don’t. (Yes, I know some crazy people will take them for nefarious purposes, but those crazy people probably donated to take them for nefarious purposes all so they could “nefar” and I’m not in the mood to even imagine what those purposes would be.)

And if you saw a version of this post with more stuff earlier, you’re right. It’s another fine wordpress day.

Okay, so this first certificate was designed and made by Jack Wylder. You can see why it’s amazing, right?

If you can’t download properly, or you want to get the PDF version, send to the email (SAHSWAG at outlook) and I’ll send it to you.

This one, the fish was designed by the great Caitlin Walsh and I did the rest. Yes, the lettering could be better. In fact the fish and better letters would make an amazing t-shirt. Yes, yes, will get on it, G-d willing in July, yes?

Real post in a little while. I CANNOT explain how exhausted the new glitchy WP makes me.

Boy, I’m glad I warned everyone that last year’s fundraiser would be a mess. But I never imagined it would be a mess to get the electronic swag to people.

THAT was idiotic because I had in the past tried to start a “mailing list” and got the email bricked up. Now they just don’t send things out. Which is hilarious when you consider how many spam items fill my mailbox every day. Apparently hotmail only lets spam-spam through, not well meaning people who have had an account forever trying to send stuff out.

Then there were other things: I still don’t have a list of who donated at what level. It existed for about a minute. And someone tried to send stuff out. Then …. then it defaulted to younger son’s job. And younger son got…. for a while three other jobs. And a fiance. And in the meanwhile the list… well, let’s put it this way, I know more than three of you donated at level 9.

And scrubbing the data from paypal is — tears out hair.

There was also dereliction of duty on MY part due to the fact that this year has been “fun with doctors.” (Look, we’re in the home stretch, at least for tests. If you wonder why yesterday’s post was so late. “Fun with doctors.”) As in I haven’t finished the one original story or ASSEMBLED the collection of USAian stories. They exist. I need to assemble the dang thing (This weekend. Has to be.) I also haven’t fulfilled the tuckerizations and mass deaths (And one MATH DEATH. You know who you are.)

Yes, you can send out things with stuff like mailinator. But at this point the emails are a mess.

So, here’s what we’re going to do: We’re going on the honor system. Because the piper has played and will be paid. Or the piper has paid and will play, whichever you choose.

Starting tomorrow, I’m going to do a post with things to download, for the various levels where the content was digital. (Yes, including finishing the short story, and giving a book funnel link to the book.)

In the mean time, I’ve established an account: SAHSWAG at outlook.com.

If you donated anything that warrants more than the MP3 of Moose and Squirrel and anything physical or involving my working at it, this is important:

1- Physical books or other things I need to mail: will be after July 4th, because we’re going to be gone from early next week till then. Sorry. In the meantime, send me an address I can mail (I think books is all, really) to. I.e. snail mail address.

2- If you donated enough for red-shirting, I’m ASSURED we have that list, and your number will come up. (Eheheheh. Math death.)

3- If you donated enough for personalized, extensive tuckerization, one person sent me the details. Two might have, but in that case I lost the second and my email is not disgorging it.

4- So, if you paid for a personalized tuckerization, I APOLOGIZE PROFUSELY but please email to SAHSWAG at outlook. And again, tuckerizations should happen through this year. Sorry it’s late. Writing has NOT happened because…. well, it’s about to get resolved, anyway. Sometimes I will hold off because the one I have is for a military gentleman who should be honored. I don’t want to insert him in the cavalcade of silly in the cozy mysteries, for example.

5- If you paid for critique/mentoring: I have two of those on deck, one of which will be “paid” at Liberty con in person (the other one should be emailed this evening. I might have questions.) But there’s more people who qualify. Again, please send to SAHSWAG at outlook, if you have not contacted me about this yet. (ALSO the person who got one through donating to Lawdog)

6- No one paid to fly us somewhere for dinner, so you’re out of luck if you claim that. :D

ANYWAY, please contact me at the email SAHSWAG at outlook for anything but the electronic content, which will be put here on the honor system before the end of the month for sure. (Again, doctors and also getting ready for 2 weeks away, including boarding the cat-tle.)

ALL of this is for the blog fundraiser almost exactly a year ago, not the rescue fundraiser Nov. 21. I can’t give anything for those, because IRS. I.e. it wasn’t a “business” thing.

And I’m sorry this has been such complete insanity. The problem was basically that I couldn’t/wouldn’t use gofundme for obvious reasons. There it’s easy to see in the back panel who donated at what level and have ALL the info. With Paypal, which is now well, not usable, it was a massive headache involving hours of work I couldn’t do, and couldn’t get anyone else to reliably do.

Which is why going forward plans are…. different.

The pledges except for kill and tuckerize (which will probably take till September) will be fulfilled by the end of the month, because, as much as I hated it, and as confusing as it was, yes, I will be doing a blog fundraiser, starting on the 4th of July.

NOTE this will NOT be a rescue fundraiser but a “I read Sarah’s blog, and think it’s worth paying for/supporting.”

Because I learned — the burned hand teaches best — next year we’re going on simplified mode and almost self-fulfilling. There will be… options.

I’m not sure if one of those will be Stripe. Haven’t started an account there. If I do, it will be fulfilled the same way as checks.

Other than that this is the plan ahead, and no you don’t have to read further, because that’s not yet. Unless you want to make suggestions, or whatever.

THE PLAN for this year.

Give Send Go – they forbid giving incentives or really anything back. (Probably because they don’t want to have to report to the IRS. It’s fair.) I’m going to put the total wished for there. (About the same as last year, maybe a little more, but not much. And last year, btw ended up fulfilling on the nose with late checks.) I don’t EXPECT IT TO FILL there, given no incentives, and some people might not want to use the service, for whatever reason. Again, if you donate there, all you get is my gratitude.

So, there will be other options.

Patreon: I am — and yes, okay, I have issues with it — going to put up a Patreon. It will not contain political stuff, but it will have personal stories, and probably videos of my cats “speaking” with buttons. We bought the system and we’re going to try it out. Should be fun, maybe. Anyway, it will have something every week of the personal reminiscence/cat event/look at this funny thing/whatever. Yes, I know the problems with Patreon, but M. C. A. Hogarth informs me that some people like to use it for their writer support. So, hey, it will probably a day of my time setting up, but it will get done. (And heaven help me, last time I tried it was super complicated.) That one will be a subscription/automatic fulfillment type of thing.

Substack serializing blog: As you guys know I have things like Witch’s Daughter, Rogue Magic and Elf Blood started and they stopped due to health/move. Well, the idea is to give you at least two novels and a bunch of short stories per year, and there will be subscription levels ranging from “gets to comment” to “gets to make suggestions, including suggesting self-insert.” (The comment thing, to be fair is a new substack thing.) It will be regular postings of chapters, and in the end you get the ebook in three formats (kindle/epub/pdf.)
I say AT LEAST two books but I’m going to try to run one fantasy one sf and one mystery, because I know you guys all have your specific preferences.
I HAVE NOT set up this substack yet. I don’t know what it will be called. I thought of calling it something like “String writing” but that is a reference to a Portuguese term and…. eh. Yes, I’ll accept suggestions. No, don’t make me carp you.

The substack I currently have is different, it’s for a newsletter (because I can’t figure out more traditional newsletter software. I’m very stupid, in highly specialized ways.) Look, yes, I’ll enable payment there too, because you guys keep trying to give me money there, but understand that’s just a newsletter announcing my stuff, and making fun (hopefully) quips about what I’m writing. And you CAN get it for free. So, I don’t know why, but yes I’ll enable that one too on payments.

Other than that, there will be the option of checks, but please — please, please — anyone donating by check — or cash, wrapped in chocolate wrapper. Really, you guys! :D — should send me an email (unless they REALLY don’t want to.) And I’ll email each person as the donation comes in, and send back something. I don’t know what yet, though I’ll figure it in the next 2 weeks. Either a collection of (mostly previously published) short stories, or a novella. I’ll let you know depending… well, on how the doctor’s report and prescriptions turn out, etc. I’ll know by the time I put it up.

Oh, and I MIGHT make a highly specialized wish list, specifically for books and things I use for work. I mean, I’ll still have to pay taxes on this stuff, but if you guys want to donate and be ABSOLUTELY anonymous that’s a way to do it. Maybe. I need to test something first.

Anyway, that’s for this year, and upcoming, (July 4 to the 16th) and you can see (right?) it will be much easier. Because 2022 really was a mess. And I hate being frustrated and stressed while trying to fulfill promises.

And no, donating is not NEEDED. The blog will continue barring disaster. And this is not a rescue fundraiser. I’m still immensely grateful for that one, but it’s not what this is. This is just “Well, the blog eats half my day and maybe I should get paid?” And going on what people get paid for editorials. (And they do like an editorial a week, not 4 or 5.)

Anyway, that’s all. Now let me go do a critique and write a short so I can assemble that collection. So I can fulfill the electronic part of the pledges.

Because I hate being in debt and unable to pay. It messes me up.

Oh, yeah, and if tests are anything bad I’ll let you know. I DON’T expect anything bad. Most of the uh weird symptoms are clearing. This is out of an abundance of caution. It just eats a ton of time. But yes, I’ll let you know.

Thank you for your patience . These posts embarrass me beyond belief. But they must be done.

Yes, the left’s technique, when trying to destroy a country is always divide and conquer. Find or CREATE a malcontent minority that you can use to tell everyone how the country/polity sucks because of how they treated this minority. Then weaponize the minority itself against the majority. Or find a minority (you know which, usually) and blame them for all the trouble fear and strife in the country and make destroying them the sacred mission of the country, while weaponizing everyone else against them. (Because, yes, Nazis were leftist they used this.)

I bring you news of great joy: Whether you are the majority or the minority you are not obligated to fall for this. You don’t have to fall for the brainwashing, the carefully picked screaming heads and the general insanity. It’s not true. it never was true. And it’s playing right into where the left wants you.

I had a friend who is frankly way smarter than this but was black-dogging fall back on “we need to expel every black person, because they’ve been weaponized against us.” Yes, I was pissed, but not awake enough — it was late at night — to tell him the logical “They’ve also weaponized women AS A MINORITY against the nation and everyone else. Do you want to expel all women too?” I suspect in his state of mind he would have told me women need to be burkaed and enslaved. And not realize the monstrosity of this, just like he didn’t realize the monstrosity of defining people by level-of-tan.

So, for those of you who might find yourselves going insane in that way: no, minorities aren’t the problem, Marxists are.

Let’s start with black Americans who are, yes, our most visible minority, in that most of them are physically distinct, kind of. Let me tell you right now, that unless these are people with a recent — i.e. immigrant. Voluntary — African ancestor, most people raised abroad can’t tell they’re black. For all the screaming and tantruming, Meghan Markle could walk the streets of Portugal and be identified as “black” less than I was while wearing an affro perm and a tan.

Most “American blacks” (No, I will not use the ridiculous African-American. Just like I won’t call myself Portuguese-American. I’m American-American, thank you so much. I worked for it.) as far as racial classification goes are what’s known as “Caucasian.” They will have, at most, a drop of black blood. To call them black is to subscribe to the South’s rule where octaroons (eh.) counted as “black” because they had one black great grandparent. The definition of this is “insanity.”

Yes most Americans can or think they can “detect” black. Whatever they look at might not have anything to do with appearance, but with culture and behavior. And those are not genetic. Trust me on this, because the behavior and culture of the black community in the US has changed completely after they became targets of indoctrination as “aggrieved minority.”

Do you know what other communities are going that way? Well, most people in the US perceive Hispanic/Latin as a race. HOW in heck they do that baffles me, but I know they do because they throw me into it. Technically Portuguese are…. mutts. Greeco Roman with bits of the rest of Europe. Neither Greeks or Romans are perceived as Latin/Hispanic, but Portuguese are.

I suspect most of this is hearing of the person’s origin. It does wonders for people’s perception. I remember the guy who having heard that I was from Portugal kept telling everyone I sounded JUST LIKE Ricky Ricardo. For the record, no I don’t. Which makes perfect sense, because our languages of origin are nothing like in sound. But having heard I was Portuguese before meeting me, he literally heard me with a (Cuban?) accent, like someone who spoke Spanish. Because, yes, most Americans think Portugal is in South America. Never mind.

The point here is that when the State department considered Latin/Hispanic separate “culture” within the US, they didn’t consider it a race. But everyone else considers it a race. And then goes looking for it.

To be fair, I’ve heard of Arabs being assumed to be Hispanic/Latin too, so the spectrum is really broad.

So, how come they/we are now an ethnicity? Well, because the state declared us a separate category, and that’s how humans work.

If you got rid of every visible minority — I’m not sure how getting rid of women works, but hey Johns Hopkins has ideas, apparently — the Marxists could create others out of clear blue sky. I mean, everyone knows gingers are discriminated against in film. How hard is it?

And once the state starts considering you a special, treated as special category, several things happen, none of them good for you.

One is that people start assuming none of your achievements or hard work are real. This applies to women as well as black people, Hispanics, etc. (Really glad for changed first name and married name. At least I escape some of that in writing. Well, not the woman. I am still, I swear, going to write mil sf under a male name and dare you to find me.) AND you are indoctrinated from day one to see every set back as the result of systemic discrimination, which in turn makes it hard — really hard — to improve and learn to be resilient.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with black people in America that being treated in a color blind way, and given the real history of world slavery (Everyone has slave ancestors. Yours might be a little closer. So what? And that’s a MIGHT since in the rest of the world there’s still a lot of slavery, sometimes under different names) wouldn’t fix.

It’s not genetic. It’s active manipulation.

And even then most blacks, most women, most Latins, etc are NOT the entitled stereotypes you see on TV and read about. No, those are the biased media amplifying them.

Most gay people are not the stereotypes you hear about. (When I went door to door for the republicans in get out the vote efforts, I hate to tell you how many gay couples I ran into, including the gentleman who was baking a cake, apron on and said “Do we need to go? It’s my partner’s birthday” (This was pre gay marriage in CO) and I said “we’re reliably told the dems have an advantage right now.” He took his apron off, and went inside yelling, “Honey, we have to go voting.” I was a door down, when I saw them pull out and drive away. Are they the majority. No. But they were sold a bill of goods about communitarian politics, which I explored in AFGM, actually.)

For heaven’s sake, most of the trans, particularly those who transitioned well before this, are not like the crazy idiot who wrote the Johns Hopkins thing talking of Men and Non-Men while saying he’s always been a woman. (For that deranged person only biological men can be women, I guess???) They’re just people who want to live their lives.

What the media sells you as versions of these groups is wrong. And if you got rid of these groups, they would weaponize other groups.

The cure is not to attack the people they tell you are the enemy, but to attack the ideology, and to point out that what you see on TV/online is not reality. (I have it on good authority most of the people you see online are dogs. Arf.)

And while the idiots exist, they are nowhere near a majority or even the numbers the media tells you they are.

It’s just gaslighting. And you’re not OBLIGATED to fall for it.

Also,could all right-side commenters stop saying “The country/republic you knew is gone” and variations thereonto? It’s stupid: the country and republic are occupied. Arguably this has been going on for oh… almost 100 years, but we just noticed now, because barn, horses, etc. (Also thanks to blessed Trump the mask-remover. If he did nothing else that would be enough to call him blessed!)

Our “elites” are a thin and brittle mask of scum at the top.

The people? The people are all right. A lot of us are broke, a lot are unemployed, and an increasingly large bunch are trying to figure out how to survive day to day.

BUT always remember in face of the most determined psi-ops against Trump and the right in general, which included mass house arrest to keep us from talking to each other and get us to watch TV again, people hunched their shoulders and voted for Trump — or against the leftists, more like — in unprecedented numbers.

The republic isn’t gone. Stop falling for the gaslighting. More importantly, stop aiding the gaslighting.

The republic — the PEOPLE — of these United States of America are fine. We are just occupied. But we are fighting back in myriad ways, including refusing going along with the narrative.

I do realize saying it’s all doomed, or it’s the fault of x minority, or even that “the republic is gone” excuses you from having to do anything about what’s going on. You can be depressed and tranq yourself into uselessness by one mean or another.

BUT is that what you want to do? Is it really? Or do you want to stand on two and build over, build under, build around?

I know which I want to do. Be not afraid.

We’ve got this.

Book promo

*This is not an excuse for this being late. It’s a “argh” stop giving me things I didn’t ask for, directed at wordpress. No really. WordPress decided to add an experimental “AI assistant” to help me “write your posts.” So, something I don’t need, which gets invoked whenever I want to do something more than image and text, or even to format a blog. And when it comes up, it bolixes everything. Not just wordpress, which hangs up on an infinite loop, but also the browser. For something I don’t need, didn’t ask for and frankly don’t want. GRRRRRR. So this is my FOURTH attempt at this post, and …. three hours! Word press always delenda est, of course, but could it please stop trying to be smart? We can deal with its stupidity. This attempt at intelligence on the other hand is over the top stupid. – SAH*

If you wish to send us books for next week’s promo, please email to bookpimping at outlook dot com. If you feel a need to re-promo the same book do so no more than once every six months (unless you’re me or my relative. Deal.) One book per author per week. Amazon links only. Oh, yeah, by clicking through and buying (anything, actually) through one of the links below, you will at no cost to you be giving a portion of your purchase to support ATH through our associates number. A COMMISSION IS EARNED FROM EACH PURCHASE.*Note that I haven’t read most of these books (my reading is eclectic and “craving led”,) and apply the usual cautions to buying. I reserve the right not to run any submission, if cover, blurb or anything else made me decide not to, at my sole discretion.– SAH

Edited by Jamie Ibson, with a story by Dan Bridgwater: We Dare: Old Age and Treachery.

Fifteen outstanding authors. Fifteen stories about people who have been there before!
Never underestimate an old man in a business where men die young.
War is a young man’s game, and one where failure usually leads to your death. There’s a reason some people survive when others don’t—they’re faster, stronger, smarter, and usually luckier than everybody else—and you antagonize them at your own peril!
From knowing how to judge the intelligence data to understanding how to play “the long game,” or just having the experience from past operations to be able to tell when things are about to go wrong, these old men and women know what they’re doing… and woe betide the new recruits who don’t listen. Be careful, because that old timer sitting next to you—the one who doesn’t say much—may have a skill or maybe even a robot that’s going to kick your butt!
For, as the old-timers know, an ounce of experience is worth a pound of youthful exuberance!

From Karen Myers: Broken Devices: A Lost Wizard’s Tale (The Chained Adept Book 3)

Book 3 of The Chained Adept
CHAINS WITHOUT WIZARDS AND A RISING COUNT OF THE DEAD.
The largest city in the world has just discovered its missing wizards. It seems the Kigali empire has ignited a panic that threatens internal ruin and the only chained wizard it knows that’s still alive is Penrys.
The living wizards and the dead are not her people, not unless she makes them so. All they have in common is a heavy chain and a dead past — the lives that were stolen from them are beyond recall.
What remains are unanswered questions about who made them this way. And why. And what Penrys plans to do to find out.

From Holly Chism: Lizzy’s Tail

A small, plush horse learns what it means to be real when a little girl chooses her and takes her home. Through adventures and accidents, Lizzy the horse becomes real to her little girl, Carrie, even though she is still a toy.

By Robert J. Horton, Revived by D. Jason Fleming: Three Riders (Annotated): a pulp western omnibus

iktaPOP Media proudly presents three classic westerns by pulp author Robert J. Horton!
Rider o’ the Stars
When he was hired on to the Diamond H Ranch, the stranger gave his name as Dane. After seeing his skill with rope and gun folks started calling him “Lightning Dane”.
Was he a gunman? An outlaw? Why was he here? Nobody knew except Dane himself. And he wasn’t talking.
The Prairie Shrine
Annalee Bronson and her mother left everything behind when her father died, setting out to homestead in the prairielands of Montana. But being from the east, they simply don’t have the experience to cope with all the circumstances they find themselves caught up in.
Luckily, prairie poet and loafer Andy Sawtelle and mysterious gunman Silent Scott are more than willing to lend a helping hand.
The Man of the Desert
It starts with a stampede, and never lets up from there!

From Leigh Kimmel: The History of the Implementation of the Library Computer System (LCS) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Originally the author’s thesis for a master’s degree at Illinois State University, this work examines the history fo library automation at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from the earliest beginnings through the implementation of the Library Computer System (LCS) under the leadership of Hugh Atkinson to the creation of the ILLINET Online (IO) system. All of the chainges are studied in teh contest of the Illinois Board of Higher education (IBHE) mandate for library resource sharing throughout Illinois’ academic libraries to reduce expenditures while maintaining quality scholarship and education, and of the effects these changes had on library services to the user population.
The process of implementing LCS is studied to show the way in which the library administration handled the various crises as they arose and what effects these decisions had on the long-term structure of the system. Following implementation, it continues to study the subsequent developments of the online computer system to increase service to the library’s users. In addition, three doctoral dissertation are examined which used LCS as a research tool for the study of collection and use patterns in academic libraries. Finally, the author examines the results of automation at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in the context of the academic community and the state of Illinois at large, and draws conclusions from them.

From Lawdog: The Africa Files (The LawDog Files Book 2)

Africa is different.

Most people who grew up in the Western world don’t realize just how different.

In this volume, LawDog relates stories of growing up in West Africa, including run-ins with the flora and fauna, a younger brother, their engineer father and redheaded mother.

The Africa Files isn’t just a collection of childhood shenanigans, though there’s a lot of that, but also a fond recollection of a time and place that shaped a Texas lawman.

From Blake Smith: A Kingdom of Glass: A Novel of The Garia Cycle.

Zara hasn’t seen her family in eleven years, but she doesn’t mind. They sent her to live in a neighboring kingdom when she was small, and she’s adopted her foster parents in their place. She lives the life of an aristocratic Garian girl- riding her horse, shooting her bow, exploring the castle with her friends- and she has nothing to wish for.
Until she’s summoned home, to a prospective marriage she doesn’t want, family she doesn’t remember, and a poisonous royal court that threatens everything she’s ever known. The East Morlans are nothing like Garia, and Zara struggles to find her place among the scheming Morlander aristocrats. Along the way, she makes new friends, meets enemies, and falls in love. But secrets abound in the glittering palace, and Zara must discover who she can trust as she fights for her life and freedom in a fragile, beautiful, kingdom of glass.

From Pam Uphoff: Aslanov (Fall of the Alliance.)

The Three Hundred Families control the Three Part Alliance. To the Elite, their Family is their first priority.
Twenty years before the Fall . . .
Lord Dzon Konstantin Aslanov returns Home after a five year long assignment to another World to find his Family as poor a fit as ever. He is about to find out the cost of disobedience.
If only they’d tell Konstantin why he needed to marry so soon, to the right woman. And not like his idiot brother eloping with . . . the daughter of Kon’s new boss at the Bureau of Intelligence. And why should Kon marry this particular woman when her aunt was so much more interesting . . .
As Kon investigates government contract fraud, he begins to suspect his Family is involved . . .
And the consequences . . . deadly

Vignettes by Luke, Mary Catelli and ‘Nother Mike.

So what’s a vignette? You might know them as flash fiction, or even just sketches. We will provide a prompt each Sunday that you can use directly (including it in your work) or just as an inspiration. You, in turn, will write about 50 words (yes, we are going for short shorts! Not even a Drabble 100 words, just half that!). Then post it! For an additional challenge, you can aim to make it exactly 50 words, if you like.

We recommend that if you have an original vignette, you post that as a new reply. If you are commenting on someone’s vignette, then post that as a reply to the vignette. Comments — this is writing practice, so comments should be aimed at helping someone be a better writer, not at crushing them. And since these are likely to be drafts, don’t jump up and down too hard on typos and grammar.

If you have questions, feel free to ask.

Your writing prompt this week is: TASTEFUL

I was born female in a country that was profoundly patriarchal and, back then, patriarchal without guilt. So, it was acceptable to make jokes about women being dumber than men. And it was acceptable for teachers to assume you were dumb because female.

Most of these things amused me. It was always fun in mixed classes after the first test to watch the teacher look at my test and at the boys in the class trying to figure out what parent was so cruel as to name their son a girl’s name.

I enjoyed breaking people’s minds. And once I was known in a group or place, I was not treated as inferior. The only things that truly annoyed me were the ones I thought were arbitrary restrictions, like not going out after 8 pm alone. Took flaunting them a few times to find out they weren’t arbitrary. Or rather, they were arbitrary but since culture-wide flaunting was dangerous, and I was lucky not to pay for the flaunting with life or limb.

Yes, I went through a phase of screaming that I was just as good as any man. Then realized it was true and stopped screaming it.

Then got married and had kids, and realized I was just as good but different. I could do things men couldn’t do. Parenthood is different as a woman. And none of it mattered to my worth, just like being short and having brown hair doesn’t make me inferior to tall blonds. Just different.

And even though I’m a highly atypical woman, at the beginning of my sixth decade, I find myself completely at peace with the fact I am a woman and not apologetic at all for it.

Imagine my surprise when I found out women don’t exist. There’s only man and non-man.

This nonsense, from here, has got to stop. When you get so “inclusive” you’re excluding an entire biological sex (but curiously not the other) you might want to re-evaluate your principles. Also, your sanity.

Yes, I know, saying this makes me a TERF, which is nonsense. Maybe a TERNF, since I’ve not called myself a feminist since I was 18 and realized feminism aimed for making women “win” at men’s expense. It wasn’t aiming for equality but for “equity” and since I never needed a movement to outcompete males, I decided it was spinach and to h*ll with it.

Also I’m not trans-exclusionary. If women don’t exist, what the heck are men who are trans trans TO? Non-man? Uh… what? What are drag queens imitating? Is it just non-man?

Dylan Mulvaney is a TERF, since he keeps referring to his “days of girlhood.”

Look, Portugal was sexist and patriarchal. It assumed I was less because I lacked a penis. It told me there were professions and fields of knowledge I shouldn’t try because I was born female. It told me that men would always outcompete me.

This was annoying — and they were largely wrong — but I could overcome it.

I’m not sure I can overcome this idea that I’m imaginary. Because when people get to the point of denying that women exist or are a sex of humanity, they might be too far gone to realize what they’ve become: Rank misogynists.

So, at the risk of shocking them: I exist. I’m a woman. My experience in life, and my experience in this body is bound up with being — in fact — a woman: a being born with female sexual organs and genetics, who experienced periods since the age of 11 and who could and did conceive and give birth.

I’m sorry if that’s terribly hurtful. I have nothing against adults who think they were born into the wrong body. If changing their body into a broad facsimile of a female’s brings them relief, so be it.

But what are they changing into if females don’t exist? And why must I pretend that I don’t exist so they feel better?

Sorry, but just as the rules I was born to, I don’t feel like pretending to be lesser so you feel better.

Your delusions don’t obligate me to be delusional.

I’m a woman. I’m not no-man. That’s a joke from the Odyssey. And even the ancient Greeks in their machistic glory didn’t imagine it applied to women.

WOMAN — say it. Get used to it. The female half of humanity.

I’m a WOMAN. I exist. Lots of us exist. We’re a majority of humanity. You might convince those of us who are soft headed Marxists to deny themselves. Heaven knows they have been trained to believe a million impossible things before breakfast, poor kiddies.

But most of us have had just about enough of this. This has gone too stupidly far.

Now it stops. We’re your mothers, your grandmothers, your wives, your sisters, your daughters. And we’re not going to be erased.

I was going to write something completely different today, but woke up with an uneasy feeling.

You know, like when you’re walking in a natural setting and everything goes deathly quiet. Or when you’re in a city and suddenly every non-licensed vendor starts rolling up their blankets to shove away as if they’d never been there.

No, it’s not that there are massive and very strange brawls going on in the comment section of most “right” blogs. (Right being anyone to the right of Lenin.) That’s expected when the left does something so painfully and blatantly provocative that everyone wants to open the fourth box, but half of us are sane enough to know that’s not how any of this works.

The left thinks this means they’re winning. Just like they think every time they fail to start the civil war they so desperately want it means we’re defeated. (Yes the nuttier among you think the same) when in fact we just come up with better ways to thwart them (or let them bury themselves. Whichever comes first.) AND if they continue in this vein they’ll get what they’re asking for good and hard, and they won’t like it one bit. Neither will we, because the delayed reaction will burn itself into the psyche of this great land for generations and not in a good way. (This is not incitement, note, Fed the Fred, it’s prediction. Because you know, I live in the real world not in the f*ck-f*ck world of DC where you believe something like “Patriot Front” will be believed and followed.)

This is not about Donald Trump. Yes, he has a grave injustice being committed against him, all the graver as they ignore the very real transgressions of Hilary and Hunter and yeah, the Zhoe Bai-Den.

But you know? He’s not just a big man; he is, whatever else he is, a champion, and this is his chosen battle. He’s proven in the past — all but with the covidiocy — he’s more than capable of wielding his lance. We sent him forth. He knew he’d get hit. He’s not cried craven yet. Let him fight! He does it remarkably well and loudly.

And if he falls, we’ll find someone twice as “bad” to make DC lose its mind. Oh, maybe not this cycle, where everyone else is “wise managers” (SPIT!) but the next. And meanwhile… who knows?

The republic isn’t dead or even mostly dead, but it is in a headlock. People who want it dead have seized its institutions and means of communication…. eighty years ago. The people, though by and large, are all right and in fact getting more all right by the minute. The Trump presidency would have been impossible in the eighties, when Reagan was too dangerous. And Reagan himself was too dangerous when Goldwater was terrifying. And both of those and the overton windows of their time were created by a lockstep, unopposed mass media that maintained a semblance of reasonableness both because no one knew what was going on behind the scenes AND because they tried not to outright show their hatred for America and Americans and they drooling love for every totalitarian in existence, or even dreamed up.

Now they’ve lost that mask, and boy are they opposed. I find it hilarious that both the “news” division of mass media and the “entertainment” portion still believe that firing someone is to silence them. Doesn’t work that way anymore, guys.

So, that’s the moment. It’s not as dark as you think.

It might be terrible for Trump, but guys HE KNOWS THAT and he hasn’t backed down yet. If he was wounded or scared he’d not be running again. He is sane enough and smart enough to know what can happen. (If you think he doesn’t know about the Jan 6 prisoners, or isn’t carefully staying away from them because the worst he could do TO THEM was try to intervene, you aren’t very sane.) And no, he’s not just working on reflex. The successes he managed (peace in the Middle East) weren’t done by whatever kneejerk he was being pushed go. (And if you think he wasn’t, you aren’t thinking.)

Let Trump be Trump.

I will vote for anyone who goes up against Zhou Bai Den with two exceptions — no, not those. Pence and Christie (my fingers wanted to type McCain) because voting for snakes is the Democrat schtick, and I wouldn’t culturally appropriate them, heaven forbid — not because I don’t think they’ll at least try very hard to rig this election but because hey, they might fail to. And if they don’t, they might have to create 400k votes out of thin air, and that will be … well, then you can’t unsee it.

One thing you need to realize is that we’re not up against communists. We’re up against people who grew up as communists, but communism was an international conspiracy, with its head in Russia, and it needed that element to be even vaguely competent. Well, Russia is not what it used to be, if indeed it ever was outside the fiction written by those mad lads in Foggy Bottom. What we’re not battling is the scattered pieces of the snake, wriggling around and trying to hold on so their graft and grift isn’t discovered and isn’t taken away, and so they’re not punished. …. It’s not working wonderfully for them. Without the cover of the benevolent “We want to govern you better and give everyone a pony” Soviet bullshit, all they can do is flail around in public and show how venal, perverted and crazy they are. No, seriously, 30 years ago Noisome in California would be considered and sold by the monopoly media as the upcoming boy genius. Now he just thinks he is while the rest of the country watches in horror.

Remember, DURING LOCKDOWN, with “rent a rioter” in full display, and the TV amiably trying to convince the locked in populace that we were in a full race war (most of the rent a rioters were white felons) and that everywhere was super dangerous (BTW notice they’ve tried to re-start the riots two summers now, and nothing happened. Because that kind of illusion can only work when everyone is locked in AND everyone is watching TV more than usual because of the “pandemic.” They can’t restart the pandemic — oh, they’re trying — so they can’t restart the rent a riot either. Though they will Jan through March of 2024 do their level best to REALLY get us in a world war. If they have to bomb one of our cities and blame the Russians for it in order to have the power to mess the elections again.) and with them running psi-ops against Trump back to back on every TV screen, people went out and voted for Trump in numbers never heard of for a sitting president, ever. Despite his refusing to stop the Covidiocy (which to be fair he had no power to) and even making noises of going along with it to an extent (including the vaccine.)

The people are fine. Our overtaken institutions can and will inflict misery on us, but not as much as they think they can, because they don’t control as much as they think they do. (Totalitarians never do, and these aren’t very good at totalitarying.) It’s going to be a touch few years or couple of decades, but we’ll survive, and start putting the FDR (that Admirer of Stalin) legacy to rest at last.

SO– So why am I standing here, sniffing the air, and wondering if I should at least get out of the way of whatever is about to come through?

Well…. blog comments.

No, bide a while. Listen. Yes, there’s a free for all donnybrook even in staid blog comments. Not here, but there have been a couple now in discord groups, but….

That’s normal.

You know what’s not normal? We’re missing most of our agent provocateurs. I have one I’m watching, but I’m not even sure he’s one of them. Might just be awkward (No one here is ever awkward, right?)

I mean, I blocked the ijit who runs around the net screaming about me, but that’s just the latest mask of Chlamydia. But there were a good three or four others whom I counted on to say something appalling/try to push me into a dicey position when things were fraught.

They were here, in unprecedented numbers before Jan 6, trying to push me to attend and even offering to pay the way. (I can’t claim I expected a set up. I just couldn’t see any purpose to the gathering except “one last hurrah” and I hate traveling.) They were here for everything even the stupid Maoist poster proposed demonstrations, and the fake trucker convoys.

So where are they?

And it’s not just here. The only ones I see in other blogs are the obvious ones like Chlamydia. (Who might in fact BE technically Chlamydia. Forget how he’s been identified. For one, the person mentioned wasn’t old enough to be having arguments with us 22 years ago on all the blogs, and he WAS under one of his names. I think really those names a conglomeration from a call center somewhere possibly even abroad. Which would explain the out-of-touch nonsense.)

But all the semi-plausible, a list of which I keep in the back of my head and don’t ban here are gone. And all the semi-plausible are gone everywhere else too.

And I’m worried. At a time like this? It’s not natural.

I don’t see anything, but the illegal vendors are rolling up their blankets and running.

Listen, Clarice, it’s not the silence of the lambs that worries me. Lambs can be silent because they sense the predator, yeah. But that’s lambs and right now there’s mighty few on either side.

What worries me is the silence of the weasels and coyotes.

They usually get louder before attack, and much louder when they’re trying to herd us towards something inadvisable.

What would make them fall silent?

What in heaven’s name would make the weasels and coyotes disappear?

I don’t like it.

Keep your clothes and weapons where you can find them in the dark, and be ready to jump out of the way.

Something wicked this way comes.

Promo PROBABLY Wednesday (there are reasons.) You see, I sat at the wrong computer to check on something else, and then the kittens sat on me. I can’t get up. I tried, honest. It’s been…. 4 hours. Here I am. I have stuff to do….

If I die, tell people it was feline murder… They’re so cute and happy and and and WARM. I can’t. I just can’t.

Have some kitten pictures, to cheer you up.

This is Indie-Pol, cat-god of Indianapolis (Look at his name!) and he likes his tummy rubbed.

He really likes his tummy rubbed, and he doesn’t belly trap, just hugs your wrist with soft paws while you pet his tummy.

And this is Helen who now only answers to Helena (I blame Dan). She supervises the writer.

I’d take a picture of them on my legs right now, but the phone is upstairs, and as we know, that’s not reachable. Not with KITTENS on me.

I’m fuzzed and I can’t get up.

If our current “elites” were Lizard Aliens, bent on destroying us before we move off planet, what would they be doing differently?

Go on. Think about it. I’ll wait.

Bet you that you didn’t come up with anything. Or at least anything that doesn’t go “But then again.”

Oh, you might have come up with some reason they’re not lizards. The lizard is there for funsies. They seem very upset about a warming world, so perhaps they’re ice moles or something. All the same —

It is not my point to argue that our self-proclaimed better are aliens. I mean, sometimes I look at it and go “Whoa, what are the chances they wouldn’t do something beneficial to humans at least once, by accident?” But then again, you know? That’s like Biden never hires anyone who doesn’t turn out to be — literally — some form of criminal loon. Not on purpose (probably) but because of the water he swims in and what he is. So, it’s entirely possible the “elites” are just human haters without being aliens. Which is far less fun. But more likely. Though I think the time for “far fetched conspiracy theory” to become “Absolutely reality” is now three days or less.

Anyvay…. moving right along, the place where “they’re aliens and trying to exterminate us” is most obvious is the proliferation of genders.

Not only does it make it hard to reproduce (and for the people brought into physical conformance with their mind self-image often impossible) but more importantly, it betrays a complete lack of understanding of the human species and how we work.

You see, humans have two sexes. Male and female. When male and female get together, most of the time, within certain age ranges, reproduction occurs. Which means there are more little humans.

There is no such thing as “gender” except as a bizarre and twisted misnomer that conjoins sex with behavioral characteristics, some of which have absolutely nothing to do with sex; some of which are sexual, but only in the sense of “preferred style of approaching the other sex”; and some of which are outright bizarre paraphilias.

Paraphilias is any sexual interest/obsession/style which doesn’t lead to reproduction. They range from “doesn’t lead to reproduction but hasn’t been bred out of the human species so it must have some evolutionary value” — like being gay (which seems to have evolutionary value. No, I’m not going to argue it. Notice I’m not arguing the morality or rightness of it. But it seems to confer some strengths to a reproductive line) which is probably the most “Normal” in the sense of having existed everywhere at all times, including when it was against interest. — to things like “I’m a dragon kin demi-boi” which were invented yesterday and most of us would have to go consult a list to figure out, and which not only don’t lead to reproduction (or at least make it really had to find a mate) but are the result of a great deal of confusion between “Sex” in the sense of something you are and which describes your role in reproduction and “sex” in the sense of what you like — or would like, or imagine you like — to do in bed. IOW and in plain speaking, a confusion between sexual role in reproduction — male or female — and KINK, which is a preference in pleasure mode.

The “genders” multiply because they’re not genders, understood as immutable characteristics written in your DNA but social modes. And social modes are infinite and infinitely shaded. In that sense “Genders” will eventually multiply till each of us has our very own. And that, frankly is silly, particularly when enshrined into law, and mutated into compelled speech.

Let me put it another way: years ago I was a guest of honor at Penguicon, and found myself bemused by a tag that had check boxes for what you were willing to do at the con, ranging from hugging to multi-sex orgy. Not shocked. It’s SF and, well, we’ve found a bunch of work arounds for “I’m not very good at interacting with people” but bemused. I wasn’t there for that, so I left it blank, though I’m more than willing to hug friends.

The “gender” as it’s being used by activists is the equivalent of those tags. Eventually, if this goes on, everyone will have his or her very own gender and pronouns. “Hi, I’m Sarah, Sarah/Sarah, I’m a Dansexual with shades of sapiosexual and fiction-sexual.”

REALLY? What even is the point? We can introduce ourselves, right, and at long last get to whether we have any sexual interest in the other person, right?

Only we can’t. Not in a society so perverted by Freudian misconceptions (has been since the seventies, at least) where everyone who is healthy is assumed to WANT to sleep with everyone else. So, you need the definitions in your face, up front, before you even meet.

But none of this actually leads to the function of sex, which is reproduction. (Sure, and pack bonding. And stress reduction. And hierarchy establishing. NOT taking away from those, but ultimately the purpose is to make more humans.) Which is why we’re in trouble.

In fact the face-forward this-is-what-I-like-in-bed is severing bonds, rather than creating them, and interfering not only with all the not-bed forms of relationships, but also destroying our ability to form bed forms of relationships.

Dropping things like “I’m attracted to men/women” in the same pot as “I’m a woman who likes carpentry and is stronger than most women; I like women; I like wearing flannel, I MUST be a man in a woman’s body” is crazy enough. We suddenly find ourselves REQUIRED to sleep with men who are wearing women’s bodies, even if we have no interest in women, because otherwise we’re bigots. Or we find men — objectively designed by evolution (not a correct wording, but the closest I can get) to be bigger and stronger, mostly through stuff that happens before they’re even born — must be allowed to compete with women in sports because they think they’re women, and therefore it’s the same.

But if in addition you drop into it stuff like “Demi-sexual” which means you’re only attracted to people you know — aka what most of us think as normal — and “asexual” and you’re then mixing biological genre, sexual attraction, mental-only definition of sex based mostly on non-sexual preferences, AND “the very specific type of people I would consider sleeping with. And the circumstances under which I’d sleep with them.”

Then add to that a bunch of other things we’re told are genders, like “Asexual” — no that just means you don’t want any, not that you ARE a different thing — or dragon-kin — I too like to pretend I’m a dragon, but I know it’s silly and only do it online — or another of the myriad insanities, and ….

It’s all insane because you’re not comparing apples to oranges. You’re comparing apples to Ford Fieros and then throwing in some skyscrapers for funsies.

Let’s talk. There are two sexes, male and female. This is defined by the role the individuals play in reproduction and is largely unchangeable.

Now is the time for you to stop screaming. What I’ve said is only controversial if your head is full of idiocy.

Biologically, humans come in two functional sexes. Male and female. Both are needed for reproduction. Yes, there have been reports (beyond that one) of spontaneous cloning, and they might — or not — be true, but actually, ultimately, they’re one-offs and non reproducible at will. For most of humanity if you want to reproduce grab a member of the other sex and GO. You might not succeed, depending on age and health and compatibility, but you have a good chance of doing it, if those align.

Yes, there are birth defects and “indistinct genitalia” at birth are not that unusual. HOWEVER by adulthood the birth defects are a tiny percentage. And most of them are either sterile or, regardless of genitalia, function only as male or female. The fully functional ones are an even tinier percentage. Holding out for that to make humans non binary is like saying humans aren’t bipedal because some people can’t walk. Pfui. If you’re not a toddler this doesn’t pass the sniff test.

At any rate, those are the base biological sexes. You were, unless you’re one of the almost vanishing minority, one or the other at birth. Not ASSIGNED at birth. You just were.

We can’t actually change that where it counts. Not in terms of reproduction. We can change your appearance so you pass as the other sex. (Though I’m told the up-close in the pants stuff is not as exact and capable of passing as we’d like to think. I don’t know. And I’m not going to look at pictures.) That’s about it.

Even that is fairly difficult, as most people never quite pass and get stuck in this uncanny valley area where they trigger everyone’s subconscious alarms, which sucks.

I’m not saying that for some people with severe gender dysphoria NOT acquired last week in a mass event in an internet forum that is not a relief. I mean, being able to sort of pass. I can visualize that all too easily, okay? Let’s just say that.

HOWEVER that’s all. If you feel you’re the opposite sex to the point that cosmetic surgery helps, and you’re an adult, go for it. You can live as the other sex. It’s none of my actual business. You can’t actually change your reproductive sex, though. And the things done to pass as the opposite sex — hormones, etc — are likely to render you sterile. Sorry.

Also I wish to make it clear we are not capable of making you reproduce as the opposite sex nor are we even close to it. Look, if being able to reproduce as the opposite sex were the moon landing, we’d still be in the phase of looking up at the birds and making noises that indicate flying is cool. But we can’t say it better because we haven’t invented words again. I must say this, because there’s been a lot of fast stepping and lying from advocates and even “scientific publications.”

If you’re a kid — early twenties or under — contemplating sex transition, that’s fine, but make your decision with the understanding you’re giving up reproduction. Because you are. No, not even in fifty or a hundred years. It’s not even as close as “immortality” which is always fifty years away.

I must say this, knowing some people will be very upset and reflexively be mad at me for saying, and not at the liars promising otherwise, because people promising otherwise are LYING and people are making decisions based on things that can’t happen.

Anyway — so at base — there’s two sexes, male and female. Those matter for reproduction. They have bloody nothing to do with how you dress, what you like to do for fun, or even what you like to do in bed.

After that, and in a completely different sphere, there’s sexual attraction: there have always been men and women who are attracted to each other. They’re the vast majority of humanity, the reason that vive la difference, and what makes the world go round, or at least keep going. That’s fine. Then there’s men who are attracted to men and women who are attracted to women. That’s been normal throughout history (whether it’s exclusive, or they’re attracted to the opposite sex too.) and therefore is normal under “humans present this way.” Note I’m making absolutely no claims to morality much less religion. I know what my religion prescribes and I try to follow it, but in civil society I favor not discriminating against a normal variant of the human race. Or discriminating for, for that matter. It is what it is, and it should be neither reviled nor favored. Just human, okay.

The same goes for being naturally uninterested in sex. It’s happened throughout history too. Sure, in some cases it’s probably a mental or hormonal issue. But probably not in most cases. It’s normal. And we should stop treating celibates like there’s something wrong with them too, okay? They’re just part of normal human panoply.

And then…. and then we get to other things. Oh, you’re a man who likes to dress as a woman to sleep with either women or other men? Sure, whatever. But since I’m not interested in sex with you, why do I need to know that? Why does society at large need to know that?

You’re someone who wishes to have extreme mutilation body modification because that’s what your kink calls for? Whatever. You’re an adult and you’re paying for it yourself? Don’t do it on the street, and don’t scare the horses. And if your post op mutilations — I’m think the non-human ones — scare the horses, stay the heck out of the street. Because it will scare children too.

As for people who like to sleep with a lot of people of one or both genders at once… again… what does this have to do with me, since I am not now, nor am I likely to be interested in you? I don’t actually care.

We don’t need new pronouns. They’re all used in the third, not the second person, and you can’t control how people talk about you behind your back. (Mostly as “that crazy sob/b” honestly.) If you change sexual appearance, and you pass, the pronouns used for you are already the other sex. Beyond that, this game of gotcha and “I’m more special than thou” serves no purpose but create a mess and make it more difficult to establish any relationship from professional to social to, yes, sexual.

Leave the pronouns alone. If you really hate male and female there’s something seriously off in your head and you’re confusing old divisions based on reproduction with advertising to the world precisely in which way you wish to be laid.

And while we’re at it, let’s get at the source of this nonsense: Humans are not bonobos, no matter how much Freud wanted them to be. We are largely a monogamous (sometimes serially monogamous) mates-for-life species. Largely heterosexual, with the normal, understood, low percentage variations. Our hormones conspire in this, by making us bond to the people we bed. What this means in practicality is that making us sleep with everything that moves breaks us, doesn’t mend us. Our mind shatters at being forced into A LOT of meaningless sex. Yes, there are people who are not monogamous, and it seems to be inborn. BUT I’m talking the majority of people.

So, no one should be looked down on for not having a lot of sex. Or not having a lot of sex with strangers. Or not having sex at all. All of those are normal. Freud was crazy. Certifiable.

Second: given that we’re not bonobos, we need to establish sexual etiquette. Starting with “it’s always all right to say no.” And “knowing each other for a while is better” and such.

And then we need to establish ways for people to approach/get to know each other, without sex being immediately expected. (That should be as is the statistical exception. It exists. And it should have its own spaces. But its spaces are not the boardroom or the classroom, for instance.)

We need to do this. And start working on it now.

Because the opposition, the complete semantic confusion of “genders” ends up with each of us with his or her own gender, our hand against everyone else, and convinced they hate us.

It’s time to stop the crazy. Get your head clear. Then help the people next to you.