strix alba

via http://ift.tt/2gswrc7:This advice on how to deal with "racist mouthy twats" has gone viral because it's good advice:
whoweargoldintheirhair:

smarsupial:

bethanyactually:

amemait:

twodefenestrate:

Good advice on what to do when you find yourself near a racist mouthy twat who is spouting out their crap at some unfortunate person.

NEVER engage the perpetrator. He (and it is usually he) is looking for confrontation. Instead speak to the person he is abusing. Say hello. Introduce yourself. Shake his or her hand. And just stand with them. Keep talking. About anything. Weather. Bus schedules. Football. This kind of bullying never works against a group of people having a conversation. Usually a single person travelling or a mom with a kid or maximum, two women are targeted.

Form a group of people with and around them if you can. Don’t tell them they are not alone. Just don’t let them be alone. I speak from experience. Once, I encountered a young girl wearing a hijab being abused as a terrorist by a drunk man on a train. I just went and sat beside her and started a conversation with her. After a while, the dude lost interest. I had a lovely chat with a young student from Qatar. She wanted to study literature while her dad was only prepared to pay for engineering or commerce as he wanted her to join the family business. It helped her feel safe and it expanded my horizons.

This is known in behavioral psychology as “non-complimentary behavior”; by not fueling the aggression of another person and you can flip the whole script of all their expectations, and without any footholds for their aggression (like direct provocation and confrontation/conflict) to launch into further tirades against, the aggressor can’t continue their angry scene-building. The more people who participate in script-flipping, the more successful it gets, as in this post you see with the advice to form a protective group between the bigot and their target for that very purpose.

There’s an NPR podcast called Invisibilia which goes into detail about how it works and what sort of people rely on it everyday professionally and for survival alike, in their Flipping the Script episode.

Ooohhhh

In light of the many posts I’ve already seen about people being attacked with racial and xenophobic slurs in our (ugh) president-elect’s name, it seems like a good time to reblog this post. 

If you see someone being abused or attacked, and you feel you can SAFELY do so, ignore the perpetrator and speak to the person they’re abusing. Just go stand by them, say hello, tell them you like their shirt, ask what they have planned for the day, anything to let them know they’re not alone. Even better if you can get other people to do this with you. 

Remember: talk to the person being abused; do NOT engage the bully. And stay safe, everyone.

Very good advice.

Hey, what a coincidence seeing this post again… because I just had the opportunity to put this advice into practice. It works. Middle-aged white dude screaming at a little old hispanic grandpa on the subway in NYC. I was pretty frightened and I just got home and I’m still shaking a little, but I made myself do it because clearly no one else around me would.

Again: it’s scary, but it works. IT WORKS. PROTECT YOUR NEIGHBORS.

via http://ift.tt/2es4CKu:
andreii-tarkovsky:

13th (2016)

Dir. Ava DuVernay

via http://ift.tt/2dYoaM5:
do-as-youre-told:

stimmyabby:

Sometimes people use “respect” to mean “treating someone like a person” and sometimes they use “respect” to mean “treating someone like an authority”

and sometimes people who are used to being treated like an authority say “if you won’t respect me I won’t respect you” and they mean “if you won’t treat me like an authority I won’t treat you like a person”

and they think they’re being fair but they aren’t, and it’s not okay.

This is so well put I am stunned