a repository of information, tools, civil disobedience, gardening to feed your neighbors, as well as punk-aesthetics. the revolution is an unending task: joyous, broken, and sublime
211 posts
Latest Posts by solarpiracy - Page 7
Cops Lie: What would have happened if no one recorded George Floyd
Police claimed that Mario Gonzalez resisted arrest on April 19 and died during a scuffle.
Turns out Mario was entirely cooperative with the police up until they had him in custody, handcuffed him, and two officers stood on top of his back with one kneeling on his neck for five minutes until Gonzalez became responsive.
They covered his death by saying it was caused by a medical emergency.
Here is a link to the gofundme for Mario’s family.
So I am going to tag this as Black Lives Matter. You got a problem with it? I don’t care.
Few people realise that England has fragments of a globally rare habitat: temperate rainforest. […] One of their defining characteristics is the presence of epiphytes, plants that grow on other plants, often in such damp and rainy places. […]
You may have heard of England’s most famous fragment of temperate rainforest: Wistman’s Wood, in the middle of Dartmoor. With its gnarled and stunted oaks, its remote location marooned within a sheep-nibbled moorscape, and attendant tales of spectral hounds that inspired Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles, it has an outsize reputation for somewhere so tiny in size: eight acres – about four football pitches.
Temperate rainforests, however, once covered a much larger swathe of England, and even larger parts of Wales and Scotland. A map produced by the academic Christopher Ellis in 2016 identified the “bioclimatic zone” suitable for temperate rainforest in Britain – that is, the areas where it’s warm and damp enough for such a habitat to thrive. This zone covers about 1.5m acres of England – around 5% of the country.
For comparison, the entire woodland cover of England today is just 10%, and much of that is conifer plantations.
We have, in other words, lost a lot of our rainforests. […]
Many of England’s rainforests were lost long ago, to the axes of Bronze Age farmers and medieval tin miners. Others were lost more recently to […] profoundly misguided forestry policies, which led to the felling of ancient, shrunken oaks in favour of fast-growing Sitka spruce. And in many places where rainforests would naturally flourish, overgrazing by sheep – whose sharp teeth hungrily eat up every sapling – has prevented their return. […]
It wasn’t just Wistman’s Wood: rainforests cling on, too, along the whole valley of the Dart river ([…] dart is Brythonic Celtic for “oak”), the Bovey and Teign rivers, and far beyond.
Some of this is simply due to the lie of the land. At Holne Chase, a rocky outcrop on the Dart […], the scree-strewn cliffs and piles of boulders are too steep even for sheep. Oak, birch and holly flourish instead, sprouting from nooks and crevices between the rocks, carpeted in verdant mosses and that staple of temperate rainforest, the string-of-sausages lichen. […]
At Lustleigh Cleave, a steep-sided common on the river Bovey that was barren pasture on Ordnance Survey maps a century ago, several hundred acres of rainforest has miraculously regenerated. A painting of the summit of Lustleigh Cleave dated 1820 shows it to be bare rocks, a shepherd grazing his flock at its base.
Mapping what survives is only the first part of this project. The next phase is to attempt to restore our lost rainforests to something approaching their former glory. That process is already under way in Scotland and Wales, where charities and alliances have formed to protect and rejuvenate their diminished rainforest habitats. (England, as ever, seems to be lagging behind.) […] [T]he next time you go for a walk in the woods and spot ferns growing from branches, lichen sprouting like coral and tree trunks bubbling with moss, you may well be walking through one of this country’s forgotten rainforests.
——-
Headline, images, captions, and text published by: Guy Shrubsole. “Life finds a way: in search of England’s lost, forgotten rainforests.” The Guardian. 29 April 2021.
Zine: All Together: A Primer for Connecting to Place & Cultivating Ecological Citizenship
By: Emma Percy
Review:
When it comes to place, there are many aspects to study. Culture. History. Resources. This zine focuses on nature. In “Full Sun,” I included this zine under “further reading” with this description:
“Consider this zine a solarpunk textbook. It focuses on the individual’s relationship with the nature where they live. There are activities and questions for the reader to complete, with lots of blank space for reflection. I recommend this especially for people who are new to environmental activism.”
To go into further detail: this work is beautiful, with typewritten words and collage backgrounds. (The author is talented with collage, as seen in this zine and the Stravaig series.) I almost want to call it a perzine, but rather than being about the author’s personal experiences, they’re about the reader’s. This is a zine that encourages introspection and reflection.
I imagine it is not uncommon for people to feel unconnected to the place where they live. While they may know a lot about the water cycle and how food is grown, those things can feel very distant in everyday life. Percy gives guidance and specific prompts for the reader to understand how they fit into the natural world around them.
This review was written April 22, 2021.
Hey Ship, so I've just found out that my aunt, in a huge streak of protectiveness, has apparently been... hiding the climate crisis from her children??
This came up because my uncles were discussing it around my 14-year-old cousin, who actually started to cry because it was so upsetting to her—and they suggested that she go ask me to learn more. (Because less threatening from my generation?) So, now I have a very young, very smart, very empathetic teenager suddenly encountering climate change and the danger the world is facing for the first time in her life, asking me what's going on. How the HELL do I start explaining this to her without causing trauma or severe denial?
Oh, Jesus. That’s a hard one and I’m afraid I have no advice. I’m not sure there is a way to talk about it that isn’t traumatic and existentially nauseating; I can barely talk about it on my blog because I don’t trust myself not to hurt people. Focusing on ways it can be mitigated and stuff we can work towards is more palatable but a 14 year old who doesn’t even have voting rights is bound to feel especially helpless. My experiences with climate change education have mostly been specific things like teaching people about the carbon sequestration of wetlands, but I know some of my mutuals and followers are specially trained in educating about this exact subject.
In my early 20s, I apprenticed myself to the The Queen Mothers of Kroboland in Ghana with the hope of understanding more about my cultural heritage. Early one morning, I arrived at the compound of Paramount Queen Mother Manye Nartike, who was particularly animated by a rumor she had heard about our diasporic practices in relation to land. In disbelief she admonished me, “Is it true that in the United States, a farmer will put the seed into the ground and not pour any libations, offer any prayers, sing, or dance, and expect that seed to grow?” Met with my ashamed silence, she continued, “That is why you are all sick! Because you see the Earth as a thing and not a being.”
“With 10,000 uses, hemp is one of the most versatile plants to grow—and in many ways can be a catalyst for change for Native peoples. We see a New Green Revolution in Indian Country, tied to justice, economics, restoration ecology, and a return-to-the-land movement, and it’s growing.
Just last year, the Fort Berthold Reservation, Colorado River tribes, Iowa Tribe (Kansas and Nebraska), Yurok, Sisseton and Santee Dakotas, to name a few, all got their hemp plans approved by the USDA, but more than that, tribal growers and thinkers are considering hemp as part of the future for Indian Country. And young leaders such as Muriel Young Bear, a Meskwaki woman from Iowa, and Marcus Grignon—a Menominee and project director at Hempstead Project HEART, a John Trudell initiative—represent a new wave of commitment.”
Someone asked for stuff to read about anarchism and where to get started really doing something. I don’t think they’d want their username posted publicly so here is my answer without the question attached:
For something to read about Anarchism, the book that’s always at the top of my list is Anarchy Works by Peter Gelderloos. It’s online for free here: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-anarchy-works/
As for how to get started, probably the best first step is to find people who are already doing something and ask if they need help. Maybe there’s a local Mutual Aid Group, a soup kitchen, a group organizing protests? Don’t expect to or try to quickly do high-risk high-impact stuff with strangers. That kind of thing takes trust, getting to know each other and learning some basics about how to keep yourself and others safe.
If there’s no people near you or if the people near you are not people you wanna work with, the second best thing is to find at least one other person you can get along with who also wants to actually do something. Then talk about what you could do together and put some of it into action. Again, try small low-risk things first, get to know each other, learn together, and gradually move to more ambitious plans. Check out 30 Antifa Actions for inspiration: https://antifainternational.tumblr.com/post/175437159827/30-antifa-actions
Finally: try to hang on to your privacy, even during low risk actions. If you’re helping in a soup kitchen, it’s tempting to share your full name, pose for a picture on their facebook, tell people where you live, talk about it on your real-name social media account… & if you only ever wanna work in a soup kitchen, you can do all that. But if you think there’s a chance you’ll want to move on to some higher risk actions, it’s a good idea to enter the community under a nickname, to keep your face offline and to not talk about activism on social media accounts connected to your real name. Keeping a low profile can be a great asset later on.
Attention all farmers, gardeners, garden dreamers & wanna-be's:
Johnny Select Seeds has a Growers Library on their website that is filled with tons of free information about growing herbs, fruit, veggies, flowers, you name it!
Need to know your hardiness zone? They have maps!
Want to know how many seeds you need to buy to fill your growing space? They got a calculator for that!
Want to find out what it takes to build a (not kidding) gothic cathedral 14 ft growing tunnel? They have a list of parts needed and where to buy 'em!
Ever wondered what the 5 factors affecting cut flowers vase-life are? Well dadgum it if you can't find out there!
For free!
Solarpunk Action Week 2021
It’s that time again, space cadets!
Solarpunk Action Week has been ongoing twice a year since 2019, with every week looking bigger and better than the last. People all over the world are planting gardens, learning new skills, building things, reducing waste, spreading information, taking direct action, and getting their neighborhoods and workplaces organized. We, your humble hosts, have consulted the auguries and scheduled Solarpunk Action Week 2021 for:
April 25th to May 1st!
Mark your calendars, kids
What is Solarpunk?
Solarpunk is a movement in speculative fiction, art, fashion and activism that seeks to answer and embody the question “what does a sustainable civilization look like, and how can we get there?” The aesthetics of solarpunk merge the practical with the beautiful, the well-designed with the green and wild, the bright and colorful with the earthy and solid. Solarpunk can be utopian, just optimistic, or concerned with the struggles en route to a better world — but never dystopian. As our world roils with calamity, we need solutions, not warnings. Solutions to live comfortably without fossil fuels, to equitably manage scarcity and share abundance, to be kinder to each other and to the planet we share. At once a vision of the future, a thoughtful provocation, and an achievable lifestyle.”
And what is Solarpunk Action Week?
Solarpunk Action Week is a week dedicated to taking radical environmentalist and anticapitalist action to make the world a better place. Previous Action Weeks have seen people starting gardens, learning new skills, making and repairing things, reducing waste, spreading information, getting involved in community organizing
All you have to do participate is begin or continue with an environmentalist, anticapitalist project and talk about it in the #SolarpunkActionWeek tag; it’ll get a lot of signal boosts to connect with other people around the world doing the same. &and follow along on Mastodon at @SolarpunkActionWeek@ecosteader.com
- - -
The previous Solarpunk Action Weeks saw a lot of individual actions, and those were incredible to witness, but we’re at our most powerful when we come together, so your homework for the next 6 months between now and the end of April is: Get organized! If we were able to do so much as individuals back in March, just imagine what you could get done rolling into Solarpunk Action Week with a crew ready to go
If you’re new to organizing, here are some great places to get started:
The Industrial Workers of the World (which has that good good Environmental Unionist Caucus and Southern Coordinating Committee)
Food Not Bombs
Mutual Aid Disaster Relief
Transition Initiative
Buy Nothing Project
Food Not Lawns
Can’t find anything in your area? Start something yourself!
Got 1 or 2 friends? You can start an affinity group
Guide to small-town organizing
7 steps to starting a Food Not Bombs group
Wet’suwet’en supporter toolkit
And I’m sure people will link to all sorts of other great projects and resources in the rebagels, so keep an eye on the notes!
If you’re already part of a union or a tenants’ association or what have you, even better! Get them in on it.
What can I do?
So many things! You can check out the #SolarpunkActionWeek tag to see what others have done in the past for inspiration. The two dinguses organizing these events have got resource tags full of just so many things you might could do and how to get started on them, here and here respectively. And here are some other fun ideas:
Everything you need to know about solarpunk
Everything you need to know about gardening
Everything you need to know about agitprop
Everything you need to know about antifascist action
Everything you need to know about making and repairing things
Everything you need to know about organizing in your workplace and your community
Learn how to become a street medic
Learn how to repair clothes
Regrow food plants from kitchen scraps
Recycle scrap fabric into yarn
20 plants to grow indoors
Make your apartment more energy efficient
Build a beautiful and functional vertical garden out of your literal garbage
Get out there and invent the future, space cadets, because we have a world to win. I know y’all are gonna make me proud; y’all always do.
If you want to keep up with/support the mods between Action Weeks, here’s our info:
Pops: Mastodon, tumblr (resources tag), Patreon, ko-fi
Natalie: Mastodon, tumblr (resources tag), Patreon, cashapp $NatalieIronside, buy Natalie’s book
—
“We have always lived in slums and holes in the wall. We will know how to accommodate ourselves for a time. For, you must not forget, we can also build. It is we the workers who built these palaces and cities here in Spain and in America and everywhere. We, the workers, can build others to take their place. And better ones! We are not in the least afraid of ruins. We are going to inherit the earth; there is not the slightest doubt about that. The bourgeoisie might blast and ruin its own world before it leaves the stage of history. We carry a new world here, in our hearts. That world is growing this minute.“
–Buenaventura Durruti
Squatting resources!
Because the state prioritizes landlords’ right to leech money off of the working class during a pandemic while contributing nothing of value to society over tenants’ right to not die of exposure, we’re about to face a global eviction crisis. That means people will be thrown out on the street to fend off a deadly virus while houses that nobody can afford sit empty. At the same time, countless small businesses and community centers are shutting down because they can’t afford rent
So here are a few guides to squatting, breaking into and living in or otherwise using (e.g. as a social center) abandoned property:
Opening Doors: A Primer
The 75 River Do It Yourself Occupation Guide
It’s Vacant, Take It! by Homes Not Jails
Bonus: How to occupy and collectivize your workplace
Bonus: The Autonomous Tenants Union Network, a North American collaborative of radical tenants unions
I hope you find these interesting!
This is for those who are curious and you all out in Ferguson. I’m going to be attaching some info graphics (one may seem needless due to circumstances but I’m adding it anyway.) I have some more info I’d like to put into a better to use format ( alot of them are screen grabs and I’d like to put in clearer and slur free language.) If you want me to send anything I got or any info I have ( I’m a Criminal Justice student) don’t hesitate to ask.
I have seen a few of these but a post with them compiled may help more. I will be editing these as I get it all prepared I’ll use the Ferguson Protest Aid tag for any updates I do. Stay safe everyone.
The peryton is a mythological creature resembling a deer with the wings and overall plumage of a bird. Sometimes perytons can have bird-like hind legs, but are often depicted as being entirely deer aside from the wings. Last image created by the talented Skallan of Deviantart.
The American Hogwarts Houses
but imagine if we had tiny little dragons
the size of puppies
and they would go wherever we went sitting on our shoulders and hissing at everyone who tried to touch you because you’re their most special thing in the universe and they are so tiny it’s ridiculously cute
Sherlock, Barts and Body Parts
Why is Sherlock able to bring body parts back home and keep them in the fridge?
Why is no one remotely surprised to see him wandering about Barts Hospital using all the scientific research facilities?
We see so much of Sherlock working in Bart’s Hospital that we seldom stop to question how and why he is allowed such privileged access. Mike Stamford knew exactly where to find Sherlock, suggesting that he often comes to conduct experiments.
Many people have simply assumed that Molly gives Sherlock access to Barts but you cannot simply bring a friend into the morgue, or allow him to conduct experiments using state of the art equipment. Laboratories have strict security protocols and monitored CCTV because they often contain highly dangerous substances.
Sherlock clearly has his own connection with Bart’s Hospital and it is most likely that he has entirely legitimate access to its facilities.
I explore:
What Sherlock did before he went into crime solving
Why he is able to freely use Bart’s Hospital research facilities and morgue
How Sherlock manages to take body parts home
Keep reading
justaholmesboy did this magnificent Irish Elk fawnlock and I couldn’t resist drawing fanart for it. COOL AUs. HORNS. PRETTY MARKINGS. CENTAURS.
Thousand mile long shadows
Magnificent Trees Around the World
Commissioned by Writinginmargins for her fic Brought Out Their Burrs and Mosses. Thank you!
Don’t repost this on tumblr or other websites.
Ten Fics!
I am finally doing this! :) :) Unfortunately, I can’t find the original post but I was tagged by caitlinispiningforjohnlock and cloisteredself. Here are ten fics that I love to death and that will always stick with me:
The Second Law of Thermodynamics by entanglednow- I wasn’t going to start reading johnlock. And then I read this fic.
The Violet Hour by breathedout- Hands down, one of my favorite fics of all time. 1920s historical AU where Sherlock and John get together while solving a case in the midst of the Bloomsbury crew. The writing is absolutely exquisite and John and Sherlock are unmistakably themselves in the fascinating backdrop of post-WWI England. It’s perfect in every way.
Ein Zimmer Mit Bad by breathedout- I think this fic actually contains my favorite sex scene in all of literature. John and Sherlock have angry, possessive, jealousy-induced sex in a giant copper bathtub in Berlin. Oh my god, it is everything.
What to do When Your Flatmate is Homicidal by hyacinthsky_747- This fic is so funny, and so touching and poetic, and just a delight from beginning to end.
Cooperative Principle by bendingsignpost- This fic ripped my heart out and threw it on the floor and trampled all over it with hob-nailed boots. And I loved every minute of it.
Yet by aderyn- Post-Reichenbach fic full of folklore, poetry, and loveliness. Every word is perfect.
Art and Nature by PoppyAlexander- Gorgeous, gorgeous historical AU where Sherlock is the butler and John is the gardener in a manor house in the 1920s. Sherlock is cold and remote and impeccable until John Watson comes to the house and slowly draws him out. When they are alone together, the way Sherlock comes apart just for John… Oh, it is to die for.
Landscape With The Fall of Icarus by CaitlinFairchild- This is the first story by caitlinispiningforjohnlock that I ever read and it seriously changed my life. This fic fucking knocked me off my feet and left me panting for breath. It was so good I didn’t even know what to do with myself when I finished it. It was a fic I didn’t even know how badly I needed until I read it. It helped me recover from season three. It is devastating in the most eloquent way.
Kings Among Runaways by allonsys_girl- This story is my life. I am obsessed with it. The brilliant anigrrrl2 is busy working on a myriad of other brilliant fics at the moment, but this one really gets me. Like reaches into my chest and does things with my heart gets me. It is vivid and searing and tender and gorgeous and so full of feeling I ache when I read it. And she’s only written four chapters so far.
All the Best and Brightest Creatures by wordstrings- I will continue to rec this fic until I die. It is on another level of fic-ness. Sometimes, I have to put off reading the updates for months and months because they are too good and I feel them too deeply and coming back to real life is sad and painful. That is how good this fic is. You live in it when you read it.
We all seem to agree that Tattooed!Sirius would have Canis Major somewhere on his body but I am also of the opinion that on the side of his chest, usually covered by his arm, he’d have Leo as well. When people asked, he’d say it was because Leo is the lion, for Gryffindor, but closest to his heart, the Regulus star stuck out, because for all his talk, he hadn’t quite given up on his little brother yet.
I am travelling for a long time and I want to download some ffs on my Kindle, can you rec me something good and longer? Just please, I need happy endings. I of course have already put all yours on, to re-re-re-read. Because you are brilliant. Obviously. ALSO PARKS AND REC.
Hahahaha! Yay for all the Parks & Rec love!
Okay, guys, the call is for good, longer fic. I assume you’ve got “Performance” already, right? Here are some other recs:
Jupiter_Ash’s Tennisverse: http://archiveofourown.org/series/16847
Mise en Place by azriona: http://archiveofourown.org/works/896418
1electricpirate’s Applications and Practices of Basic Arithmetic series: http://archiveofourown.org/works/896418
The Heart in the Whole by verityburns: http://archiveofourown.org/works/301718
Left by lifeonmars: http://archiveofourown.org/works/639976
prettyvk’s Ink Your Name ‘verse: http://archiveofourown.org/series/100784
History, Repeating Itself by gyzym: http://archiveofourown.org/works/179622
flawedamythyst’s Skeletonsverse: http://archiveofourown.org/series/35165
You said longer fics, so I left out some of my absolute favorites because I figured you wanted the really meaty stuff!
If you’re willing to go outside Sherlock and Sherlock-related fandoms, here are my Inception recs:
toomuchplor’s Steinway!verse: http://archiveofourown.org/series/6054
Patience, a Steady Hand by Helenish: http://archiveofourown.org/works/170021
gyzym’s DomesticVerse: http://archiveofourown.org/series/5589
Okay, guys, what would you add??
Ao3 Classics.
Series inspired by Penguin Classics. (x)
(for single covers follow the link x)
Links to works under the cut |
Read More
it’s omega!fawnlock in heat. NSFW.
if you want to see it click the picture or link below it
le link
The Radioactive Fox
Radioactive by Imagine Dragons vs. The Fox by Ylvis.
Based on the above post.
Download here.
This is officially my favorite piece of art in the whole book. Titled: Behold the Dragon Warrior
yo, ho all hands hoist the colours high heave ho,thieves and beggars never shall we die
