whilst i am always and forever just begging doctors to properly check interactions before they prescibe things (@ pharmacists: fuck everyone else i respect you i love you xoxo)
i am in fact also begging everyone to read the leaflets you get with your medication. if you have difficulty reading or understanding those leaflets thatâs fine just like⊠ask the pharmacist. never met one who wasnât happy to explain drugs.
but likeâŠ
âSSRIs make you less tolerant of heatâ should not be a shock - itâs in the leaflet. they make you sweat, give you hot flashes, and make your skin more sensitive to the sun. thatâs all in there.
âmixing alcohol and benzos is a Bad Timeâ is not a shock. itâs in the leaflet to avoid alcohol.
âmy ADHD meds made me not want to eatâ is not a shock. itâs in the leaflet that they cause appetite suppression and weight loss.
you do not have to âfind out the hard wayâ you really donât.
and bc doctors are fuckin useless at bothering to actually read and/or understand and/or explain interactions like⊠ever, apparently? there are plenty of places you can check for yourself or, again, just ask the pharmacist if thereâs anything to watch out for.
i mean asking a pharmacist about interactions is basially asking them to infodump about their hyperfixation. youâre asking someone who thinks drugs are really cool to talk about drugs they are not going to be upset about this.
oh hey my grandma was a nurse too!
the amount of people who donât read them and then later are like âWHY DIDNâT ANYONE TELL ME ABOUT THISâ
*pinches nose bridge* they did. it was in the leaflet.
And if you lose the leaflet, or canât read the print, or whatever, DRUGS.COM
Itâs got, like, every medication ever, with pictures and everything, and all the side effects, AND a really handy interactions checker.
love drugs.com for that. only site that has the full full list of side effects (go to the âfor professionalsâ section) and their interaction checker is great as well bc it does also include supplements and recreational drugs in the database.
i personally prefer the go.drugbank.com checker but only because iâm a supermassive nerd and gives you all the technical mechanisms behind the interaction. plus you can go full nerd and look at the complete pharmacology of anything. which is probably only parsable by, like, 5 people who follow me but it is really cool though
anyway if, unlike me, youâre a normal person drugs.com is absolutely your best friend outside of an actual pharmacist
Cannot stress enough how important this is. Iâm allergic to an antibiotic & was once given another medication that was not that medication but was contraindicated for ppl with that allergy. My allergy info is up to date with my pharmacy⊠but their computer missed that, or they didnât check. (My doctor DEFINITELY didnât.)
That kind of mistake can kill a person. Always check.
[Image: Tags reading, âMy grandma was a nurse and always read the pamphlets for any medicine. Even medicine weâd taken before. And now the habit is so ingrained Iâm kinda surprised not everyone does it.â End ID.]
I have seen doctors talking shit about people who read the leaflets. Even Sidnee McElroy, who I completely respect, kind of snorted about people who read the INFORMATIVE LITERATURE and then get concerned about the rare, weird side effects. I got mad on Twitter about it in comments to the direct to consumer drug advertising episode (otherwise good) because sheâs usually better than that. You canât say you want patients who are engaged and then look down on them for taking advantage of the FREE, ACCURATE INFORMATION that comes with your meds.
Educate yourself, and always double or triple check the work of any doctor who even blinks funny when you ask questions or mention reading youâve done.
Pharmacists are great. Loads of love for y'all.
I feel like the original post is shaming people for not knowing something, in a way I really donât like.
A lot of people are never taught to read the medication information, and a lot of people are actively discouraged from advocating for themselves - especially in a medical setting, and REALLY, SERIOUSLY in a mental health setting.
Particularly as an adolescent on psych meds, I was actively discouraged from reading the literature and asking about side effects because âThe only one you need to be concerned about is the increased suicidal ideation part. Definitely tell someone if that happens, otherwise donât worry about itâ. (This was 1000% Not True.)
Now, do I read it NOW? Well, yeah, but Iâm in my 30s and Iâve had more than 20 years of experience being fucked over by the medical and mental health systems. Most people HOPEFULLY donât have that.
Even then, suicidal ideation wasnât listed in the pamphlet for the blood pressure med I tried last summer - it was an unusual interaction, and I had to go online to find that, and my doctor was pretty freaked out about it. (It was fine, because I know to be vigilant about starting new medications. Sometimes bodies are weird. I also get the opposite reaction when Iâve tried ADHD meds - stimulants make me want to eat EVERYTHING IN THE HOUSE.)
On the one hand, yes, itâs in the leaflet that you shouldnât drink while taking benzodiazapines, and thereâs probably a sticker on the bottle too.
On the other hand, it also says that with ibuprofen and virtually every antidepressant Iâve ever been on. (The big risk with NSAIDs is that it increases the risk of a bleeding stomach ulcer, but itâs more of a âmost people will probably be okay if they donât do it frequentlyâ situation. Itâs generally not GREAT to drink when youâre dealing with mental health stuff REGARDLESS, but for some psych meds the big issue is a risk of âincreased drowsinessâ. In contrast, mixing tylenol and alcohol can seriously damage your liver. Mixing alcohol with benzodiazapines can SUPER kill you.)
Thereâs not a lot of nuance or degree there, and I think some people - younger people, especially - are used to authority figures/older adults harping on the âDonât drink and donât use illicit drugsâ thing, so they may not realize no, really, there may be an ACTUAL REASON THAT CAN KILL YOU that medication may say not to use alcohol while youâre taking them.
So yeah, if you didnât know before, now you do. Read the leaflets that come with your medication, ask your pharmacist if thereâs anything in particular to look out for, and pay attention to how youâre feeling - good and bad - when you start a new medication, and how that changes.
Hell, Iâve had doctors discourage me from reading the leaflets because âitâll only make you anxious.â
And like like I KNOW thatâs bullshit advice. Thirty years of medical negligence, abuse and weird drug interaction fuckery have primed me to be aware of how awful that advice is. But if youâre not someone who deals with chronic or long term problems that require regular advocacy, if the authority figure who youâre trusting to take care of you is telling you to dismiss the literature then yea, I can kinda see how people arenât aware of these things. Theyâre being conditioned to be âgood patientsâ by bad doctors. And in my experience, itâs depressingly common.
So yeah, read the literature that comes with your meds, either on the leaflet that comes with it or by looking it up on Drugs.com. And if youâve got questions or concerns, 100% ask the pharmacist or call your clinic; theyâll usually put you through to a nurse or physicianâs assistant to talk to. Youâre not bothering them or being bad; this is part of their job.
ive been buying more stuff on bandcamp because it supports indie artists way more than spotify
reminder to buy on bandcamp fridays!
these specific friday events (that do not happen every friday, it varies)?
artists get 100% of what you pay for their work. On bandcamp friday all proceeds go to the artist.
bandcamp fridays are usually the first friday of every month though right now there isnât one until August 6th, 2021. though this Friday 6/18 theyâre giving all the money they usually take to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund
and even if you donât buy stuff on bandcamp fridays, bandcamp still pays artists 80-85%, whereas spotify only pays artists less than half a cent per stream.
so if you like listening to someoneâs music on spotify, also support them on bandcamp if youâre able to!
I started recording every time something happened in hopes it would show how antisemitism actually manifests in witchcraft circles. It eventually got to be five parts long and instead of having people reblog incomplete versions of the post, here is the whole thing in its entirety. Give it a read. Seriously. Read the whole thing so these things can happen less.
Facebook Witch Group: post is made by a user with a profile picture of a clear nazi swastika. After being notified, admin declares the user is allowed to stay because the group is a “judgement free zone.”
Facebook Witch Group: Jewitches were assumed white by default and pitted against other groups, as if Jewish people are leveraging their identity to “play up” their own oppression and undermine others. Many openly Jewish witches are harassed out of the group.
One of the mods in that same group discovered they “might be Jewish” and became the sole authority on Jewish issues despite having zero connection to the culture or any kind of confirmed Jewish heritage. They were eventually caught lying about their entire race/ethnicity/background.
A witchy discord group implements a rule that outlaws all mention of all closed practices (including Judaism) “to protect from appropriation,” even if the person has legitimate claim to the practice. When I pointed out this basically forced me into hiding, admin says, “you can be Jewish. Just not here.”
A user identified themselves as a Kabbalist. Later in the discussion, they were surprised to learn Kabbalah was Jewish in origin, admitted they didn’t know a single Jewish person in real life, and argued that Kabbalah couldn’t be that bad because Arianna Grande also used it. (”Are you saying she’s wrong too??” yes)
Another user is called out for appropriating Kabbalah and proceeds to sling antisemitic jokes until they are banned.
Just. So many more people appropriating Kabbalah and becoming hostile towards any Jewish person that expresses discomfort. (Including one person that even gave themselves a Hebrew username)
A group of users too big to argue with talking about how amaaaazing working with Lilith is. A few Jewish folks respectfully ask them to be mindful of her origins. They’re not given attention. (Or what attention they are given is only to debate her origin.)
Discord server has rooms for every major subcategory of Paganism and one room for “Abrahamic.” Christian witches completely dominate the conversation.
I mention on my blog that I am a proud Jewish person. One of the comments shortly after is “go be Jewish in Israel.”
A Nazi sympathizer joins a Discord group, reveals themselves, is banned, and proceeds to try and join over and over again through different accounts.
I check my blog activity to find a nazi witch blog had gone through my feed and liked a ton of stuff so I’d be sure to see their username (they did this to other notable tumblr blogs as well.) Looking at their bio revealed their agenda of proving Nazis “weren’t all bad,” and their dash included an open invite to a holocaust denial discord server.
A tumblr thread gets big of a bunch of witches arguing to cancel the word Sabbat because of supposed antisemitic origins. Jewish people chime in to insist that we really don’t give a shit about Wiccans using the word Sabbat, and not to speak over Jewish people and declare what we’re offended by. Tumblr arguments ensue.
I get “called out” for baking challah. That’s not antisemitism but it made me laugh really hard. (It’s okay for goyim to bake bread, obviously. Just don’t be weird about it somehow.)
“High magic” and ceremonial practitioners ignoring or brushing off their tradition’s origin in blatant appropriation.
A user shares a magical Hebrew chant to a group for everyone to use. It includes a name of Gd, even though the group is largely Pagan. They didn’t realize that was a part of it because they don’t speak or read Hebrew.
Another discord group asserts in the rules that members of closed cultures may be openly themselves and discuss their craft, but not in an educational way. Meanwhile, a mod practices exclusively Hermetic Kabbalah. I don’t have the strength to get into it.
Discord server-wide prompt ping: Tell us about your Christian upbringing! (This isn’t “pure” antisemitism, but it sure does erase those of us who weren’t raised in Christian households)
The nazi witch blog starts making rounds again, dropping asks in multiple inboxes to the effect of: “Jews are anti-pagan and anti-gentile, so why can’t we be anti-Jewish?” (Hopefully I don’t have to explain why that’s a shit take
I joined a discord server and see people discussing different religions, at some point I point out Judaism doesn’t share every major Christian belief. People start challenging this, one person even saying (essentially) “Jewish people might not believe in Hell, but Judaism does because they believe in the same God as Christianity.” (????)
That same conversation, Modmins quickly shut down discussion and some members suggest we not speak about religion to avoid making lurkers uncomfrotable/ to avoid giving people a reason to hex us. Even though religious discussion had already been going on. (I left after that.)
Another Jewish tumblr brings up the history of violence against Jewish graves, and explains how taking graveyard dirt is considered an act of desecration by traditional Jewish law. Another user argues that because their practice considers it a rite of honor, taking graveyard dirt from a Jewish grave should be okay. They explicitly said they would take it from my grandparent’s graves. They said they would take it from my grave. Multiple people have to explain why you shouldn’t eagerly desacrate people’s graves.
Another Jewitch once shared a story with us: A woman claimed she was able to contact (or had already been contacting and working with) that person’s ancestors who were killed in the Shoah.
A person discusses why Kabbalah is appropriation. One person’s counterargument boils down to: “I was told I was Egyptian in a past life, therefore I may have been Jewish, therefore I have rightful access to Kabbalah now.” (Side note, pretty sure I’ve also seen people mention “past lives” where they were killed in the Shoah.)
A discord server adds new roles, including Qlippoth and “Kabballah.” I inform them that 1) They didn’t spell it right and 2) I hoped that it would be respected as a closed practice. The mod response was essentially, “it’s not closed, are you a Rabbi?” When i asked “are you Jewish?” they would just continue to assert that my voice on the issue wasn’t valid unless I was a Rabbi. (Rabbis have no one unified belief on pretty much anything, btw.)
Another mod came in eventually to try and be more helpful, but still hesitated to make any changes. (The suggested changes were either taking off the Kabbalistic roles, or adding roles that were more inclusive to other types of Jewish magic. We’ve got more than just that.)
This could be more ignorance than “true” antisemitism, but I’d be amiss if I didn’t preserve someone asking “What about Hermetic Quaballah?”
In a discussion about Lilith, one person asserts to my face that Jewish people cannot be witches without forsaking and publicly denouncing their entire religion and culture. Therefore any Jewish anything was up for grabs for witchcraft purposes, and all Jewish witches present were mistaken in some way.
Another person in that same discussion describes an (incorrect) origin story for Lilith, which involved Judaism’s malicious plan to take local mythical figures and portray them as demons to oppress the other local religions and further their “rabid monotheism.”
Through the comments of the old thread, I learned about Wiccans trying to make their own mezuzot, which is hilariously off base.
A semi-prominent witchblr user has an epiphany, and begins posting about how “most conspiracy theories hold a large amount of truth.” While they say they don’t want to delegitimize Jewish pain, also believe that Jewish people control all the banks, and the Holocaust was a “strategic move” to create a narrative of Jewish oppression and delegitimize any conspiracy theories
At least one other tumblr witch sees this blog and comments with enthusiastic support. (along the lines of “Yes, the truth is coming out! Preach!”) Their account looks really normal otherwise, so they were just quietly interacting with the community while harboring these beliefs.
Joy of Satan, a well-known neo nazi propaganda site disguised as a Satanism resource, comments on one of my posts with a link to their homepage.
Somebody in a Discord chat goes to the #closed-practices room and asks a genuine question about Lilith. Several goyim respond with incorrect information and challenge any Jewish voice trying to speak in dissent. One person even says they have spoken with Lilith directly in the past, and anybody who believes she is restricted just doesn’t understand Lilith/the Divine as well as they do.
A popular Facebook group focused on calling out cultural appropriation begins making rounds. Jewish people (and lots of POC) are shamed if they do not find something as offensive as the collective group, even if the other group members are not actually members of that culture.
A narrative forms that tarot is a closed practice, ignoring Jewish mysticism’s influence on it and insinuating that Jewish people have no right to reclaim it while other people profit off of our appropriation.
A person (not even on anon!) Comes into my inbox saying that “Abrahamic religions” are anti-Pagan, anti-satanic, and anti-women, so they should be allowed to be “anti-Abrahamic.” They also conflated Lilith with a Hindu deity with no actual backing for it. Turns out they’re a Joy of Satan promo blog.
Someone digs up an old post on Lilith share her personal story (and try to receive validation that they’re the exception and should be allowed to appropriate her.) When she doesn’t get what she wants, she asserts I “need to do shadow work” for responding in my (terse, but not malicious) tone, and asserts she knows more about Lilith than us and that Jewish people are disrespecting Lilith. She then digs up OTHER posts I had personally made about Lilith to comment on what “bullshit” they are.
Someone asserts that Jews are only co-opting the term “appropriation” from other minorities (and don’t have our own legitimate claim to it) and that Judaism is only closed because we “think we’re the chosen ones” and therefore better than everyone else. (This is a deeply GROSS misunderstanding of the chosen people thing, btw.)
A popular occultist account on Tiktok responds to Judaism being a closed practice by “joking” that he’s going to beat our heads in.
A group gets recommended in a chat I’m in. When I warn them about the antisemitism I experienced in that group, I am met with doubt and asked to provide (what would have been months-old) screenshots of the offense and people insinuate that I am actually working to silence other minorities (because the group was social justice focused) in some way for levying these “allegations.”
A group signs me on to be a moderator for no other reason than the fact that I am Jewish. They didn’t really know anything else about me, but they knew they needed representation in that area. Benevolent, but still notable.
Later on, a mod tries to insinuate that I have never truly experienced oppression or felt unsafe because of my background, and refused to recognize that Jewish oppression existed at all without adding a “but…” or saying I was playing a victim card and somehow undermining her own struggle. Just for saying antisemitism exists, not that it’s more or even equally important as other types of oppression. Just that it exists. I leave the group.
Somebody makes the distinction in a group that not all Pagans are witches and not all witches are Pagan. A moderator of the group says they “disagree” and believe all witches are Pagan. I (and others) reassert that our respective religions don’t fall under any definition of the word and we do not identify as Pagans. Their reply: “in your opinion.”
I gently point out (in what was a friendly conversation up to this point) that something they were doing could be seen as appropriative or offensive if they didn’t go through the proper channels. The tone switches abruptly and suddenly they’re accusing me of “believing in cultural superiority” and gatekeeping knowledge. Another person joins the conversation solely to back them up, and says I am “pouring out negative energy” by talking about this.
This same person also calls me a false witch, asserts that my power/magic is meaningless, etc. There was no reason for them to believe this other than my religious affiliation.
A person asks me to sic Lilith on somebody on her behalf. I tell her I’m not comfortable doing that on command, especially with strangers. It felt like she just wanted to use my traditions “through” me and get free magical labor. (This same person later called me a r#tard and a sh#male when she got banned from a group I helped run.)
I make a post venting about antisemitism. In less than ten minutes, somebody has reblogged it connecting my vent to Israeli politics. The original post never mentioned Israel.
I share a post that covers a rough history of antisemitism over the past 1000+ years. Though the post only mentions Israel in brief passing (and was much more about the historic geographical area than the modern country,) somebody concludes that I am “anti-Palestine.” For…. reblogging someone mentioning Israel in an academic context. I guess. Anon is sure to send me all of their opinions about it.
I reach out to a mod of a group with concerns about appropriation and offer to help educate the mod team if they have any questions about stuff. I get banned.
My dad was a veterinarian in the meat animal industry so here is an explanation of why medium rare is a thing with steaks, but not chicken:
In beef, what you worry about is e. coli.  In healthy live cattle (and they must be healthy to be butchered for consumption) e. coli is only in the digestive tract but it can escape and contaminate the outside of the beef during slaughter and butchering.  The bacteria does not migrate to the interior of the meat as there is no circulation to take it there.  So you can eat beef where the inside is less cooked as long as the outside is well seared to kill any bacteria that may be on it.  Hamburger should always be thoroughly cooked because it is all âoutsideâ.
With chicken, the concern is salmonella, which is found through out the body of the chicken.  Chickens can tolerate it, it doesnât make them noticeably sick, but humans can not, so the entire meat must be cooked enough to kill any bacteria present in the meat.  As a note, it used to be believed that salmonella was not passed on to the eggs and in fact in the 1950âČs, when my dad was in Vet school, studies showed it was not present in the eggs even if it was present in the hen.  Thatâs why there used to be a lot of recipes that used raw eggs, it was safe then.  However due to some change in the bacteria, or changes in egg-farming practices, it is now found in eggs as well.  The amounts are small, and if you are eating eggs within a couple days of being laid itâs probably not a problem, but store eggs are old enough for bacteria to have reproduced to dangerous levels and the liquid interior allows it to spread all through the egg.
As a side note, with pigs the concern is trichinosis, a parasite that used to be common in pigs and spread to humans through under-cooked pork.  However, it has been essentially eliminated in commercially produced pork these days.  It should be safe now to eat âmedium rareâ pork, but trichinosis was so horrible and the fear of it so ingrained that it is rare to see pork that is not well done.
^ Good addition!
I also wanted to mention that apart from the salmonella risk (which is a freakinâ big âapart fromâ), you also have the risk of Campylobacter infections. Not only can these lead to really really horrible gastro-intestinal problems, a small number of infections also cause an auto-immune response that leads to the body destroying its own myelin (the stuff around your nerves that makes them good at carrying electrical signals). Basically, your nerves stop working and even if you survive, youâll be hooked up to an iron lung for⊠a long time. I donât know how long it takes to regrow myelin, Iâm not a neurologist.Â
Donât eat raw poultry, guys
RB for awesome info, ty! I knew the info but not the reasons and as a âI need reasons to remember thingsâ person this is really helpful!
its incredible how many people are vocal about how fiction affects reality but can’t/won’t admit that shows depicting cops in a positive light are cop propaganda
love your shows and enjoy them all you want but stop using that to excuse them from how they contribute to irl mindsets around cops as individuals and as an institution
Do you think the Penguins going by the big tanks ever go: “Why did we walk here? I suck at walking. You could have just thrown me in there if you wanted me to see it. I could swim around and see so much more. This makes absolutely no goddam-”
*sees Shark*
“-Oh Ok I understand. You got it Boss, no more stealing fish outta the bucket, no pooping on the glass. I’ll be a good Penguin, ya don’t gotta threaten me like this…”
“A philosopher once asked, “Are we human because we gaze at the stars, or do we gaze at them because we are human?” Pointless, really… “Do the stars gaze back?” Now that’s a question.“
I forgot to post this here! Wanted to draw this scene cus Taliesinâs frame moving to the top row was hilarious but this mental image seared itself into my jiggy brain and refused to leave đ» so welp!
Do NOT Repost without credit! Reblogs are appreciated!
