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Post by Emily on Mar 18, 2013 19:18:53 GMT
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Post by clemon on Mar 19, 2013 0:48:59 GMT
I just realized that Soff is kind of a sweetie for putting up with all this business in the Hatey Hatey Hate thread by being all optimistic. : ) @pure RE: migraines: That's really sucky. Hopefully they'll go away soon. I think I had one while in an airplane and it was really really painful because it felt like my forehead was splitting open. If yours are much worse, you have my ultimate sympathies.
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Post by purenightshade on Mar 19, 2013 13:10:30 GMT
My migraines have reached a point where the only thing that touches them is prescription medication. I can't even do the Tylenol 3 thing anymore. Without the meds, the migraine will last at least 3 days and I'm completely useless during that time. I had one last summer that went for four days and I wound up at the hospital after throwing up blood.
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Post by Emily on Mar 20, 2013 11:10:29 GMT
dannnnnng.... migraines are vile.
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Post by X'o'Lore on Mar 20, 2013 16:45:42 GMT
They can be. I don't doubt pure's migraines don't make her kids none too happy either. Not if it's resulted in hospital visits.
I've never had one last 4 days. Only into the second day. What really is a bummer is when you can hardly lay down because the pressure from a pillow makes it hurt a lot worse. It's hard to try sleeping sitting up.
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Post by Soff on Mar 20, 2013 18:49:38 GMT
That sounds terrible, pure :C . I hope at least the meds do work? Because it sounds like the kind of thing that can drive you pretty mad :S.
And thanks, Clemon. I'm generally pretty optimistic, I think? I try not to be unrealistic about it, but at least to focus on the good or solvable part of things. I'm glad you think it's sweet and not annoying ;P!
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Post by clemon on Mar 20, 2013 20:19:37 GMT
I think it's great that you're optimistic because apparently optimistic people experience less stress which probably results in healthier lives. So remaining optimistic is a good idea.
@ Headaches and Migraines: Wow. I get small headaches whenever I take a nap during the day, but nothing as serious as your guys's migraines. Apart from that airplane example, I don't think I've gotten more than a few unofficial migraines in my lifetime. I didn't realize I was so lucky. :I
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Post by Ally on Mar 20, 2013 20:28:11 GMT
@ Headaches and Migraines: Wow. I get small headaches whenever I take a nap during the day, but nothing as serious as your guys's migraines. Apart from that airplane example, I don't think I've gotten more than a few unofficial migraines in my lifetime. I didn't realize I was so lucky. :I Ditto. I get bad headaches every few weeks (feels like a huge amount of pressure behind one or other of my eyes, only thing that makes it go away is trying to go to sleep), but they never last longer than a few hours. Full-blown migraines sound like pure hell, I really hope the meds work for you, pure!
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Post by mareofnight on Mar 20, 2013 20:33:36 GMT
D: migraines are terrible. I don't have anything near as bad as Pure's, but I get about three a month that make me pretty much non-functional if I let them go without taking something prescription. (And the way I react to the medicine varies a bit, which is... interesting. Sometimes it gets read of the headache entirely, but sometimes it only gets rid of the pain but I'm still stupid. But I guess being stupid for an evening now and then is an interesting experience? It also seems to move the aching to my shoulders and then arms before it gets rid of it. Weird stuff.)
I've also been getting small headaches almost daily. I'm not sure why. Hopefully it's just seasonal allergies or something and will go away soon.
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Post by purenightshade on Mar 21, 2013 22:37:06 GMT
I've had...5 this month so far. I imagine I'll likely have a few more before it's over. When I have them, my meds work and they work pretty fast. I'm lucky in that I can lie down with one. Weirdly, pressure seems to help a little bit as long as I'm in a dark, quiet room.
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Post by X'o'Lore on Mar 22, 2013 1:41:15 GMT
Usually the pressure does help. I just had a case once where my whole head hurt and laying down or applying any kind of pressure to my head just made it go from terrible to more terrible. That was really frustrating. Sleeping almost always helps, but I couldn't sleep that time until I was just exhausted enough to ignore the pain. That was the worst I had.
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Post by mareofnight on Mar 23, 2013 18:42:49 GMT
I've never tried just pressure... massaging sinuses sometimes helps for me, since mine are from the combination of allergies and stress. Taking a shower or using a humidifier sometimes helps too.
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Post by clemon on Mar 26, 2013 20:43:17 GMT
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Post by Ally on Mar 27, 2013 11:59:12 GMT
*hugs for clemon*I get really upset when I read things like that too (there was a guy on a comments thread I read recently - when will I learn never to read comments threads? - ranting about the "Matriarchal Hive Mind" and how "feminism was a hate group conspiring to destroy men" and "there is no point in history where men have not been exploited by women" and "women force men to go out and fight their wars because they've designated men to be the expendable gender"...it half made me upset, and half just made me laugh because it was so ridiculous).
It's upsetting because it's so wrong-headed, and also because MRA* groups seem to be on the rise. The way I deal with it is I just keep reminding myself that a) so many MRAs rant like the guy I mentioned above, so just give them the space to publicly discredit themselves and show how laughable they actually are, and b) there are tons and tons of men out there who *do* get it, and are fantastic feminists in and of themselves.
*MRA = Men's Rights Activist. It's a bit of a misleading name, because out of context, it sounds quite reasonable - however, it's manifested as a group that looks at the ways patriarchal systems make things shitty for men, and then blames feminism for that. (At its more extreme ends, it's just about hating on women). As one of the (male) feminists I follow on Twitter pointed out, most MRA rhetoric is anti-woman rather than pro-man - for example, they'll point out the instances of men being raped in the army as part of an argument that actually, rape and rape culture isn't an issue for women (or, in some cases, argue "Most rapists are women and the law lets them get away with it! And most rape cases against men brought to court are false! No, I have no evidence, but it's TRUE!"), and then do nothing to help the men who have been raped. Essentially, MRAs are the gender equivalent of white power groups.
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Post by mareofnight on Mar 27, 2013 23:56:03 GMT
I'm waaay overdue for writing up some of my thoughts about this properly... will try to get time to do so this weekend so I can share it here. (I try not to write of MRA as an idea because there are some legitimate points they could be making. This, for example. (I've seen the same elsewhere from a more reliable source, but I can't find the page again.) Most of the writing by them that I've seen has been a pretty even mix of good points, ones I'm not sure of, and stupid things. (It probably helps that I usually encounter MRA through a rationalist forum that's generally civil.) But the thing I want to write is more just my thoughts on gender roles and why they happen, in general.) Also... I think part of what makes conversations about gender, and harms caused by society in general, difficult is that there's a tendency to think one group getting hurt means that the other group is causing it? Like with gender stuff, the problems seem to be getting perpetuated by both genders. (Like, there was a boy in my class who pretty much thought any mistake I made was a sign that women are bad at computers, but then there's also the girl who explains how women are better persuaders than men because they're so unable to control their emotions and end up getting what they want by crying about it. And "slut" and "whore" and "prude" seem to get thrown around by everyone - just because the targets are women doesn't mean the perpetrators aren't.) Actually... hmm. This might even be a general cognitive bias to confuse groups with individuals...
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Post by Ally on Mar 28, 2013 12:36:14 GMT
Oh yeah, women definitely play a role in perpetuating gender problems (case in point, I was carrying some large boxes - which weren't heavy, just unwieldy - and one of my colleagues stopped me to say "What are you doing? Let one of the boys do that!"). If something is genuinely too heavy for me to carry, then I'll ask our handyman John to bring it round to the office/the stack for me, but if it's not, then I'm going to carry it - it's my job.
Maybe I'm biased here, but I would say the good points that MRAs make are actually feminist points, for example issues over fathers getting custody of children - there seem to be a lot of fathers' rights groups blaming feminism for the fact that mothers generally get custody, but the reason behind it is that looking after children is still seen as "women's work". Changing attitudes to gender roles will hopefully change things so it's not seen as unambitious or shameful for a dad to want to be very involved in childcare.
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Post by clemon on Mar 28, 2013 13:39:19 GMT
Generally I think anyone can be sexiest without meaning to, and feminism is sort of trying to find that sexism and hopefully remove it. (See Heidi vs. Harold study: when "Harold" is outgoing, successful, and has a vast professional network both male and female students want to work with him, but when "Heidi" is outgoing, successful, and has a vast professional network both male and female students rated her as selfish and "not the type of person you would want to hire/work for".)
While feminism is mainly "aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights for women" (Thanks Wikipedia) it's generally grown to include Male Liberation which I think includes identifying sexism against men too: eg. sexual abuse against men (so your rape example should be covered; at least by people who define as rape as non-consensual sex between individuals...which I thought was the case...) and welcoming men who chose to remain at home and take care children (more typically feminine roles).
Sometimes I don't agree with the methods feminists use, but I still support their goal. For example, having a female comic book day where only females are allowed in the store to look at female-made comic books sort of implies that males shouldn't read these books and females don't read other types of books, but the goal seems to be to make more female readers interested in the generally male-dominated comic industry--a goal I do support.
If the method actually succeeds the goal without any negative side-effects, then I'll more readily support it. : )
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Post by mareofnight on Mar 28, 2013 16:41:12 GMT
Meh... I 'm still not sure if I like just calling it all feminism or not. Better to keep it one movement and rename it if you're not going to call it all feminism, though. The issue is that naming can be really powerful, and feminism sounds like something that's just about women, even though it doesn't have to be. (And some of the issues are things that might not be considered femininity-related. Mainly thinking of how there's sometimes this assumption that men are strong and can't be hurt. Basically the expendable gender argument, actually.)
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Post by clemon on Mar 28, 2013 17:00:47 GMT
Yeah. Sometimes the name gets me down (especially in this typically gender-nonspecific society). But just because you're a feminist doesn't mean that you can't fight for male rights and liberation and work to reduce sexist beliefs against men and women. On the otherhand, I wouldn't drop it because of straw feminism being confused as the real thing; new names could just be associated with ultra-extreme individuals: for example, nothing sounds remotely distressing in "Men's Rights Activist", and yet, here we are.
But, I'm open to new ideas: what would you call it instead?
I think the sexist belief men are strong and can't be hurt is related in a sense to feminism, because I think there was this sexist idea that being more typically masculine meant that you were somehow a better woman (in that now you are strong and can't be hurt), while being more typically feminine meant that you were somehow a weaker woman. I think feminism these days wants you to be whatever you are (more feminine or more masculine or more whatever), regardless of who you are. I think the statement is also somewhat related because it implies that women are typically weak and can be hurt, which is something feminism wants to debunk, and that you can't really say that this is true or false without making it an attitude to be applied on an individual basis--where individuals, by definition can be male too.
Note the high amount of "I think"'s in that paragraph. I probably would make a sucky motivational speaker.
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Post by X'o'Lore on Mar 28, 2013 18:10:30 GMT
This all kind of reminds me of some comments on a tech site responding to an article sort of blasting a guy for talking about a "girlfriend mode" in a game (I think it might have been Borderlands 2?). A girl tried to respond to it and didn't really appreciate the guy calling it that and the other commenters kind of attacked her for it. It made me a bit upset. It's no wonder females are rare as hen's teeth on sites like that if THAT'S how they're going to behave.
But gender equality in games might be a whole other kettle of fish, related as it might be.
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