Quidditism - 🪷💫

Stop just asking "is it normal?" and start asking "is it harming anyone?" Lots of harmful things are normalized in this society and lots of things considered weird or rare are completely harmless. Whether something is considered normal or common shouldn't be the deciding factor in whether it's okay

25 ways to be a little more punk in 2025

Cut fast fashion - buy used, learn to mend and/or make your own clothes, buy fewer clothes less often so you can save up for ethically made quality

Cancel subscriptions - relearn how to pirate media, spend $10/month buying a digital album from a small artist instead of on Spotify, stream on free services since the paid ones make you watch ads anyway

Green your community - there's lots of ways to do this, like seedbombing or joining a community garden or organizing neighborhood trash pickups

Be kind - stop to give directions, check on stopped cars, smile at kids, let people cut you in line, offer to get stuff off the high shelf, hold the door, ask people if they're okay

Intervene - learn bystander intervention techniques and be prepared to use them, even if it feels awkward

Get closer to your food - grow it yourself, can and preserve it, buy from a farmstand, learn where it's from, go fishing, make it from scratch, learn a new ingredient

Use opensource software - try LibreOffice, try Reaper, learn Linux, use a free Photoshop clone. The next time an app tries to force you to pay, look to see if there's an opensource alternative

Make less trash - start a compost, be mindful of packaging, find another use for that plastic, make it a challenge for yourself!

Get involved in local politics - show up at meetings for city council, the zoning commission, the park district, school boards; fight the NIMBYs that always show up and force them to focus on the things impacting the most vulnerable folks in your community

DIY > fashion - shake off the obsession with pristine presentation that you've been taught! Cut your own hair, use homemade cosmetics, exchange mani/pedis with friends, make your own jewelry, duct tape those broken headphones!

Ditch Google - Chromium browsers (which is almost all of them) are now bloated spyware, and Google search sucks now, so why not finally make the jump to Firefox and another search like DuckDuckGo? Or put the Wikipedia app on your phone and look things up there?

Forage - learn about local edible plants and how to safely and sustainably harvest them or go find fruit trees and such accessible to the public.

Volunteer - every week tutoring at the library or once a month at the humane society or twice a year serving food at the soup kitchen, you can find something that matches your availability

Help your neighbors - which means you have to meet them first and find out how you can help (including your unhoused neighbors), like elderly or disabled folks that might need help with yardwork or who that escape artist dog belongs to or whether the police have been hassling people sleeping rough

Fix stuff - the next time something breaks (a small appliance, an electronic, a piece of furniture, etc.), see if you can figure out what's wrong with it, if there are tutorials on fixing it, or if you can order a replacement part from the manufacturer instead of trashing the whole thing

Mix up your transit - find out what's walkable, try biking instead of driving, try public transit and complain to the city if it sucks, take a train instead of a plane, start a carpool at work

Engage in the arts - go see a local play, check out an art gallery or a small museum, buy art from the farmer's market

Go to the library - to check out a book or a movie or a CD, to use the computers or the printer, to find out if they have other weird rentals like a seed library or luggage, to use meeting space, to file your taxes, to take a class, to ask question

Listen local - see what's happening at local music venues or other events where local musicians will be performing, stop for buskers, find a favorite artist, and support them

Buy local - it's less convenient than online shopping or going to a big box store that sells everything, but try buying what you can from small local shops in your area

Become unmarketable - there are a lot of ways you can disrupt your online marketing surveillance, including buying less, using decoy emails, deleting or removing permissions from apps that spy on you, checking your privacy settings, not clicking advertising links, and...

Use cash - go to the bank and take out cash instead of using your credit card or e-payment for everything! It's better on small businesses and it's untraceable

Give what you can - as capitalism churns on, normal shmucks have less and less, so think about what you can give (time, money, skills, space, stuff) and how it will make the most impact

Talk about wages - with your coworkers, with your friends, while unionizing! Stop thinking about wages as a measure of your worth and talk about whether or not the bosses are paying fairly for the labor they receive

Think about wealthflow - there are a thousand little mechanisms that corporations and billionaires use to capture wealth from the lower class: fees for transactions, interest, vendor platforms, subscriptions, and more. Start thinking about where your money goes, how and where it's getting captured and removed from our class, and where you have the ability to cut off the flow and pass cash directly to your fellow working class people

I know my art pieces usually don’t do very well on this account. But decided to share this here. It’s a little zine about my own queerness, the thoughts I’m mulling over rn and just like balance my hopelessness with the positive voice in my head.

Some women are conditioned to be fragile and weak, and to believe that it's a sin to outperform a man. Her feminism would involve allowing women to be strong.

Some women are expected to be strong at times when they can't. Her feminism would involve reassuring her that it's okay to not be strong.

Some neurodivergent people are raised to believe that they're too stupid to ever amount to anything. Their disability activism would involve reassuring them that they're capable.

Some neurodivergent people are raised to believe that they're smart and gifted, and are expected to live up to impossible standards. Their disability activism would involve allowing them to fail, make mistakes, be stupid, etc.

Some children are constantly reminded "you're the child, I'm the adult" in order to deny their autonomy. Their youth rights activism would involve treating them like an adult at times when they feel ready for it.

Some children are treated like adults in order to justify increased expectations or to downplay abuse against them. Their youth rights activism would involve allowing them to be a child.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution to oppression. Each individual person's experience is different. Whatever trauma is caused by their oppression, the activism should focus on undoing it.

We on the left have to realize that someone saying that their god is real and divine but that your god/gods aren't real or aren't gods should be seen in the same light as someone saying their gender is real and valid but that your gender isn't real or is a disorder of some sort. It's hate speech and shouldn't be socially acceptable.

The flag situation

It's been brought to our attention that the original versions of the quidditism flags hel a lot of resemblance to the flag from a queer facsist group rising to "fame" lately.

At first, we elected to ignore it, but alas, nobody wants to be conflated with these people.

The flag has therefore been changed.

The old designs will stay up on this post and can of course still be used, but the main flag is now the one on the pinned/coining post.

Old flag designs:

New flag design:

if you feel like you're always getting talked over, or if you feel like you're always accidentally interrupting people, you should consider looking into some of the linguistics research about conversation style and turn-taking. lingthusiasm podcast has a great episode called "how to rebalance a lopsided conversation" that goes over some of this research in a really accessible way; Deborah Tannen's book You just don't understand is an early book¹ that's aimed at general audiences on the same topic.

the thing is, when there's conflict in how a conversation flows, often what's going on is a mismatch in norms or expectations -- not that one person is necessarily acting "wrong" and the other person is "right." the mismatches in norms/expectations can and do align with existing power structures in society, but being more aware of them can really help you as an individual trying to navigate them.

you can train your brain for more linguistic awareness! start listening for pauses, intakes of breath, or back-channeling that's meant to support, not interrupt. try it out!

¹ I am linking to the wikipedia page for the book rather than a link to buy the book because it's kind of outdated and the criticism section on the wiki page is pretty reasonable. If you do read this book, be prepared for uhhhh period-typical gender essentialism that, to my knowledge, Tannen has not particularly updated her views on in the intervening time. But it is an influential and important book, just read it skeptically imo

Information on consent

📖 What is consent? 📖

Consent, as described by the Oxford Dictionary, is permission for something to happen or agreement to do something.

Consent applies to many stuff, not just sexual advances. From letting someone borrow your pen, to drinking tea, to hugs. I will be using the tea comparison for this.

Consent does not simply mean "both parties love each other". One can love someone but not consent to certain stuff, or may consent to stuff with those they don't particularly care for on an emotional level. If you ask someone if they want tea, and they say "Hell yeah, I love tea!" then great, that is active consent. They do indeed want tea. If they respond with "I'm not sure, maybe?" then you can still make that cup of tea if you want to, but don't be mad if they don't drink it when you offer it to them. And if they don't drink it, don't make them drink it. Just because you made it doesn't mean you are entitled to have them drink it.

If they respond "No, I don't want tea." then don't make them tea at all. Don't be mad at them for not wanting tea, don't annoy them until they give you until they tell you "Fine I want tea". That is coercion and it doesn't change their actual mind about whether they want tea or not. It is not consent.

If they say "yes, sure! thank you." but when the tea arrives they don't actually want the tea, don't make them drink it. They may have changed their mind. Sure it can be annoying because you went through all that effort to make them tea, but they still have no obligation to drink the tea just because of that. They did want tea, now they don't. It's okay for people to change their minds, don't make them feel guilty of that.

If they decide while drinking that they actually don't want tea, then don't make them drink the rest of it. Again, it's okay for people to change their minds, do not make them feel guilty of that. And if they're unconscious, then don't make them tea at all. Unconscious people can't answer the question "Do you want tea?". You may have asked them when they were conscious and they may have agreed, but now they're unconscious. make sure they're safe, and, this is important, don't make them drink the tea. They may have agreed then, sure, but unconscious people don't want tea.* If they were conscious when they started drinking it but then passed out, don't make them drink the rest of the tea.*

If they're not in the right mind, say, mentally unwell, then don't offer them tea at all, even if they say they want it or deserve it. They need safety, and comfort, not tea. You can offer later when they feel better. If they said yes to tea once, don't expect tea time always forever whenever you want. Don't come up to them unexpectedly and make them drink tea saying "But you wanted tea once!". Just because they wanted tea one day doesn't mean they want it anytime forever.

📖 What falls under consent and what does not? 📖

For both parties involved:

Are they actively saying "yes, I want it"?

Do they know to the fullest extent what they're in for? What they're agreeing to?

Are they allowed to change their mind at any given time and have it be respected by the other party?

Is there safety precautions? (such as safe words)

Are they on an equal level with no power imbalance that could put either party in jeopardy should they change their minds or say no

If the answer to all of these is yes, great! That falls under consent. If the answer to any of these is "no" or "maybe" then that is not consensual.

*Some points in the first part are more nuanced, like in the case of a contract for example. In such a case, if everything in the contract fits in the checklist above, awesome!

Quidditism discord emoji combo + flag colored version.