Don’t judge her, she probably couldn’t afford adoption papers
I work at a humane society shelter, and this does happen occasionally. usually cats won’t “steal” the kittens, they’ll hear them crying and stick around and if a momma doesn’t come around they’ll take them somewhere safe and try to care for them
we recently had a very confused lady who called that her cat was trying to take care of an astounding 8 kittens and brought them in
the kittens were obviously malnourished, and we looked around her neighborhood and sadly found the dead mama, she got hit by a car
it’s a really useful thing that cats will do
sometimes the mom will just have gotten lost and will come back to try and find her kittens and so that can be frustrating, but considering how rough it is for stray kittens, it’s a lot better for them to be in a household and cared for where the parent cat can get guareenteed food and shelter
I can’t tell you how many abandoned kittens we find that can’t make it
it sucks a lot
anyway tangent done
I just 😭😭 I love cats a lot
Your cat isn’t a kidnapper she’s an ADOPTIVE MOTHER don’t be rude
A friend asked the other day what percentage of people I went to youth group with “deconstructed” and what percentage remained evangelical. As I thought about it, I realized that for the most part it was the kids who took their faith the most seriously who eventually walked away.
Those of us who tearfully promised that we would follow Jesus anywhere eventually followed him out the door. The Queer kids, more than anyone, learned exactly what it meant to work out our faith with fear and trembling.
They told us to read the Bible and take it seriously and then mocked us for becoming “social justice warriors.”
Now they’re warning us not to deconstruct to the point of meaninglessness.
But they took a chisel to God until he fit in a box. They “deconstructed” the concept of love until it allowed them to tolerate sexual abuse, celebrate white supremacy, and look away from kids in cages.
Some of us got to where we are because we took it all to heart. We took the most foundational elements of our faith to their natural conclusions. Folks who deconstruct evangelicalism aren’t drop-outs; they’re graduates.
“Your
kids are not leaving the church because you didn’t train them enough.
Your kids are leaving the church because you trained them well enough to
develop a sense for truth and justice. You let them read the words of
Jesus - and they got it. And they’ve recognized that the church doesn’t
seem to be interested in those words. They’re not leaving because they
don’t know the truth, they’re leaving because they do.“
- Rhett
McLaughlin
“But they took a chisel to God until he fit into a box” is probably the RAWEST line I’ve ever read in my life. Holy shit.
I’d love to see a version of Julius Caesar where he takes the beware the Ides of March warning seriously like “oh shit. good heads up man thanks” and he goes into it with his own knife. He calms down a bit when he see’s all his best friends like “yea, the squad is here and everyone is strapped. nice”
look Homestuck has its faults and say what you will but the “getting punched into next week. Literally.” gag where they end up literally where they would be next week, at the grocery store, is still the funniest fucking thing.
the looney tunes lady rabbit redesign discourse is distracting everyone from the fact that the movie’s plot is about lebron james and his son being sucked into the digital world of the Warner Bros server farm by an evil AI that wants to steal lebron’s instagram followers, so in order to escape they must find and reunite the looney tunes, who in this universe are merely digital fictional characters who do not exist in real life. characters from other WB-owned properties such as mad max, the matrix, dc, and fucking casablanca will also make appearances. this is not space jam 2. this is an unholy fusion of ready player one and wreck-it ralph 2.
consider: teenagers aren’t apathetic about everything they’re just used to you shitting all over whatever they show excitement about
Teen: *gets a job*
“I GOT THE JOB!”
Parents: Well, when I was your age, I already had 5 jobs and was supporting my family
Teen: *gets all A’s*
“I worked really hard!”
Parents: Well, of course you did, this is the expectation, not a celebration.
probably why so many teens take to social media where they can enthusiastically share their interests and achievements and get positive feedback that their parents never gave
A LITTLE LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK
This hit hard
I remember once, when I was in my early 20s, I was an afternoon supervisor at my job, and I worked with mostly teenagers, and the one day this one kid, who was like 15, was bored so I suggested he could clean out the fridge. He did and when he was done I said he did a good job.
After that, this kid was cleaning out the fridge at least once a week, and I was like, “why are you always cleaning the fridge?” Like, I didn’t mind, but it seemed odd. And he said, “one time I cleaned the fridge and you said I did a good job. I wanted to make you proud of me again.”
Literally, I changed the entire way I interacted with teenagers after that. I actually got a package of glitter stars and I would stick them on their nametags when they did a good job, and they loved it.
My manager had commented on how hard these kids work and I said, “they’re starved for positive feedback. They go to school all day then come to work all evening and no one appreciates it because it’s expected of them, but they’re still kids. They need positive feedback from adults in their lives.”
Like, everyone likes feeling appreciated. Everyone likes being complimented and having their efforts be noticed. Another coworker (who was a mother of teenage children), hated that I did this, and said they were too old to be rewarded with stickers, but like… it wasn’t about the stickers. The stickers were just a symbol that their effort was noticed and appreciated. I was just lucky that I learned this at a time when I was still young enough to remember what it was like to be a teenager. I was only 2 years out of highschool at that point and highschool is fucking hard. People forget this as they get older, but ask anyone and almost no one would ever want to go back and do it again, but they expect kids to suck it up because they’re young so they should be able to do school full time, plus homework, and work, and maintain a healthy social life, and sleep, and spend time with family, and do chores and help out at home, and worry about college and relationships and everything else, and then just get shit on all the time and treated like they’re lazy and entitled. And then they wonder why teenagers are apathetic.
For a german exam I had to argue against an article that was essentially „kids these days, they don’t care about anything and are constantly on their phones“ and really it was the easiest essay I‘ve ever written.
Teens don’t talk to adults bc adults only ask „so, how‘s school“ to then interrupt them two sentences in. And because they can’t engage in a conversation about buying houses and working in a bank. I would’ve loved to talk about philosophy and politics and history with family the way I did with friends and in class but because I was young no one took what I had to say seriously.
And no, teens aren’t always on their phone. They’re on their phone when they’re bored. You think I‘m on social media when I‘m with my friends? When I‘m talking about something I‘m interested in?
Maybe the reason kids are so distant and always on their phone during family parties and the like is because you‘re failing to engage and include them.
Whoop there it is
When you respect kids, they really respond and learn from you. But if you treat kids like “theyre just a kid, what do they know??” then you’ll never find out.
As a Disneyland Cast Member, I’ll add my own experience onto this –
Very frequently, when I first speak to a child while I’m at work, they’ll kind of withdraw and act uncomfortable and shy. Their parents will then rather frequently tell them to not be shy and try to coax them to talk to me – whenever that happens, I always, without fail, politely dissuade the parents from pressuring them.
“I’m a stranger,” I’ll tell the kid’s parents. “I don’t blame them for not talking to me – if they were anywhere else, they’d have the right idea, to not immediately trust me.”
I cannot tell you how many times I’ve seen that same kid – simply after hearing their initial reaction being validated, instead of reproached – immediately open up to me after that. I also cannot tell you how many times that child and I would go on to start a friggin’ marathon conversation, and I got to hear all about how great their day was or what their favorite Disney movies were or what rides they liked and didn’t like or how much they like a certain Disney character or song…all from me validating that initial feeling and showing genuine interest in what they had to say.
This isn’t just young children, either. I will always remember being positioned outside the Animation Academy one day and starting up a conversation with a young lady, perhaps 12 or 13, who joined the line with her father a full 25 minutes before the class was supposed to start. Now keep in mind, we do a drawing class every 30 minutes: there was no one else in line at that point, and no one else joined the girl and her father in line for a full fifteen minutes. So I could tell pretty quickly that this girl was very emotionally invested in getting a good spot for the drawing class: a conclusion all the more bolstered by the fact that she had a notebook under her arm. I asked her if she was an artist – she said yes, but seemed uncomfortable at the question, so I skipped even asking her if I could see her work, instead admitting that I myself wasn’t very good at art, but that I’m trying to get better and that I love the history of Disney animation. On the screens around us was video footage of different Disney concept art and animation reels, so I pointed one of them out (for Snow White) and asked if she knew the story behind the making of the movie. Upon confirming that she didn’t, I proceeded to get down on the floor so I could sit next to her and her father and dramatically tell the whole story of how “Uncle Walt” created the first full-length animated motion picture, even though everyone and their mother thought he was an idiot for even trying, and how the film ended up becoming the first Hollywood blockbuster. After the story was over, the girl’s father said that his daughter really wanted to be an animator when she grew up, and she finally felt comfortable enough to open her notebook and show me some of her artwork. It was wonderful! Every sketch had such character and you could tell how much work she put into it! And I could tell how much telling her that – and sharing that moment with her, where we got to connect over something we both really enjoyed – had meant. And after the class was over, she sought me out to show me what she and her father had drawn – and sure enough, hers was great! (Her father’s was too, really. XD)
People, kids and teens included, love sharing what they love and how they feel with others. You just have to give them the chance to show it.
A LITTLE LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK!
-~-
I feel like I am obliged to add one more thing: don’t ever think that the kids won’t feel your unspokenjudgements cause they do!
I felt always like a ‘problem’ in my family, until I was about sixteen, I got this teacher who was litterally the first to tell I was worthy. He changed my life up till this day.
Also how do grown ups imagine how ‘we’ will ever learn to engage in conversations with adults properly if you don’t teach us?
This post is
Everything
I told one of my new coworkers (who is 26) that he was doing really well and that I was proud of him and his progress. I thought he was going to start crying for how quietly he said “really?”.
Positive feedback makes the biggest difference to everything.
i’m extremely lucky that i’ve always gotten positive feedback and proper attention + engagement from my parents.
i can count on one hand the times i’ve gotten it from anyone else.
teenagers are so attached to their phones at school because it’s one of the only things we have all day that makes us feel vaguely alright
Zare why would you hide this nugget of glorious truth in the tags this is literally everything I want to say but couldn’t figure out words for it
the majority of the worlds “best” is average. Thats just how statistics work. you cant expect every single person to be above average because then the average would shft to be more difficult. we saw this in real time with the job market and education system. our generation has to learn so much more and jump through significantly more hoops to get ahead in life than the generation before us. so when the generation who could just walk into a store and get a job, a generation that had significantly less things to know about in terms of history and science, dismiss all the effort we put into our lives because “when i was your age i already did all that” its like. no. no you did not. its alienating and dismissive.
I am Silver Tongue, I am an artist. I have many characters and you can check out my art in the art tag. I occasionally practice witchcraft though I don't do anything too complicated. I am girl 2 and don't know what else to put here.
