And a short break from endless screaming to talk about Star vs. the Forces of Evil, which has been the stress relief show of the week. I have a lot of feelings, especially about Moon and the whole Mewni mythology.
NEW YORK — Justin Bainbridge is 27 and works two jobs, but he wasn’t
allowed to start saving money for his future until a few months ago.
Bainbridge
has Down syndrome, and like other people with disabilities who receive
government benefits, he can’t have more than $2,000 in savings. If he
does, he would start to lose those much-needed benefits. But a new type
of savings vehicle is giving Bainbridge, and others, a chance to save
more cash.
Known as ABLE accounts, they let people with
disabilities and their families save up to $14,000 a year without losing
benefits. The accounts, which were made possible by a law signed two
years ago, are operated by individual states and are similar to 529
college savings plans. So far, 16 states offer the plans and about 10
more are expected to do so this year. Most of the states let
non-residents sign up. Each state has different rules or maintenance
fees, with some charging as much as $15 every three months.
Disability
advocates say the accounts are badly needed, since people with
disabilities were forced to spend extra money to avoid losing benefits.
With ABLE accounts, money saved can be used to buy anything that helps
the life of the person with a disability, such as rent payments, school
tuition or groceries.
“I’m saving for a new couch,” says Bainbridge, who shares a two-bedroom apartment in Omaha, Nebraska, with a friend.
Since
June, he has put away more than $1,800 in an Enable account, the ABLE
program run by Nebraska. He makes about $5,200 a year from his part-time
jobs, one folding towels at a gym and another collecting movie tickets
at a theater. But he still needs his monthly Supplemental Security
Income cash benefit to help pay his rent and live independently, says
his mother, Kim Bainbridge, who also stashes away money for him in the
ABLE account.
For
years, disability advocates have tried unsuccessfully to increase the
$2,000 savings limit, which hasn’t been changed in nearly three decades.
“It
kind of shackles you to a life of poverty,” says Christopher Rodriguez,
a senior public policy adviser at the National Disability Institute in
Washington.
The idea for ABLE accounts came about a decade ago
from parents of kids with disabilities who were frustrated that they
could not easily save money for their children. One of those parents,
Stephen Beck Jr., spent years advocating and lobbying for a law. Beck
unexpectedly passed away in 2014, just a few weeks before President
Barack Obama signed it into law. To honor Beck, the law was named The
Stephen Beck Jr. Achieving a Better Life Experience Act.
His
widow, Catherine Beck, is using an ABLE account to put away money for
their 17-year-old daughter Natalie, who has Down syndrome and wants to
go to cosmetology school to work at a nail salon. The Becks were able to
easily save money for their eldest daughter, who does not have a
disability. But for Natalie, they had to create a special-needs trust
that required hiring a pricey lawyer to set up.
“Her savings has not grown like her sister’s has,” says Catherine Beck, who lives in Burke, Virginia.
To
qualify for an ABLE account, the account owner must have had a
disability before their 26th birthday. Anyone can put money in it, such
as family or friends. If the account goes above $100,000, the person
with the disability will lose monthly government cash benefits until it
drops below that level again. Medicaid health benefits are never
affected, no matter how much money is saved. Money can be invested in
index funds and earnings are not taxed.
“For the first time a lot
of individuals will be able to work, save money and get some growth out
of it,” says Adam Beck, director of MassMutual Center For Special Needs
at The American College in Bryn Mawr, Pa.
When
the person with a disability dies, Medicaid can claim any leftover
money as payback for health care paid after the ABLE account was opened.
Since each state has different rules and fees, the ABLE National
Resource website has a tool that compares the programs.
Matthew
Shapiro, who lives in Richmond, Va., and works to promote the state’s
ABLE program called ABLEnow, says finally being able to have some
savings helped reduce his money worries. The 26-year-old, who has
cerebral palsy, uses a power wheelchair to get around and unexpected
repairs can be costly. He travels sometimes for his business, 6 Wheels
Consulting, which helps educate companies and organizations on
disability issues.
“Being a person with a disability is expensive,” says Shapiro. “These accounts are so much needed.”
To see this spread, to see people not caring and saying it’s just a joke.
It’s revealing your true mask that you absolutely do not care about Jews. That you only see us as a punch line. That you don’t see us as human beings.
It makes me want to cry. This is such obvious antisemitism. And to see people you respected or people you never in a million years would have thought would harbor antisemitic ideas are showing support.
This is a perfect example of how insidious antisemitism today is.
Him using Hitler, Jews, and the Holocaust as punchlines is blatant antisemitism.
But defending these actions as simple jokes? Would you be as appalled if your precious YouTube personality wore black face? What about making a Muslim terrorist joke?
If you support these men and their actions, you are antisemitic. Full stop.
Before you have a knee jerk reaction and deny it, please think and consider why that is.
Antisemitism is insidious and creeps into anywhere. You may consider yourself someone who stands so strongly for social justice. But if you defend this as just a joke, you’re an antisemite.
Please, I’m begging you all to put aside your rabid love of this man and try to see it from our perspective. Listen to us when we explain why it’s dangerous, why it’s a gateway, why it is horrible and hurtful.
That’s all we ask. Is to listen and try to understand.
If you believe in social justice, you must try and understand.
I would get on my hands and knees and beg you to think about this. To consider that we are human beings who have been persecuted for years. We have always sought safety but have never found true safety. Please consider that we fight for our lives every day. We fight the creeping insidious worm of antisemitism. In jokes, in media. To hear friends or coworkers make jokes. Too see graffiti.
We are never safe. And all we ask is to just understand our feelings.
I’m begging every single one of you that supports PewDiePie to just listen and to just try to understand. Consider our perspective. You can go on thinking it’s funny if you wish, it is difficult to change opinions on the Internet. But just try and understand. Try and empathize or at least sympathize.
Nonviolent resistance does not happen overnight or automatically. It
requires an informed and prepared public, keen to the strategy and
dynamics of its political power. Although nonviolent campaigns often
begin with a committed and experienced core, successful ones enlarge the
diversity of participants, maintain nonviolent discipline and expand
the types of nonviolent actions they use.
They constantly increase their base of supporters, build coalitions,
leverage social networks, and generate connections with those in the
opponent’s network who may be ambivalent about cooperating with
oppressive policies.
Crucially, nonviolent resistance works not by melting the heart of
the opponent but by constraining their options. A leader and his inner
circle cannot pass and implement policies alone. They require
cooperation and obedience from many people to carry out plans and
policies.
Commitment to non-violent resistance is not about being “nice” or “polite.”
It is not about protecting the feelings of oppressors.
329 Cannon House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 Phone: 202-225-2931 FAX: 202-225-2944
Woodstock District Office
9898 Highway 92, Suite 100 Woodstock, GA 30188 Phone: 770-429-1776 FAX: 770 -517-7427
Cartersville District Office
135 West Cherokee Avenue, Suite 122 Cartersville, GA 30120 Phone: 770-429-1776
Galleria District Office
600 Galleria Pkwy, Suite 120 Atlanta, GA 30339 Phone: 770-429-1776 Fax: 678-556-5184
it would be best if constituents from these districts called! ask some questions and let them know we are not ok with this!
Please please please call these reps and the reps in your own state. We NEED to maintain protection for these species, as it is the only way to preserve the ecosystems that we DIRECTLY DEPEND ON for carbon sequestering, clean water, and clean air!!
ok unpopular opinion but when we praise rick riordan’s current use of diverse characters, especially with regards to race, i don’t think we give enough of a shoutout to the kane chronicles
i get it, the kane chronicles is like neglected step-sibling of the percy jackson and heroes of olympus fandom, magnus chase is not nearly as successful as PJO/HoO and its still more popular than the kane chronicles but can we recognize how important of an experimental time period it was for rick as an author re: characterization
if you’re one of the slew of people who have read riordan’s other works but not kane chronicles, the two protagonists, Carter and Sadie Kane are siblings of mixed race. Carter has dark skin, dark curly hair, and Egyptian features like their black father, but Sadie has light skin, blonde hair, and traditionally European features like their white mother. Riordan uses this dynamic throughout the series to bring attention to racial microaggressions and blatant anti-black sentiments that we harbor intentionally or not in the modern world.
For example, in the books, there are several times when people assume by looking that them, that Carter and Sadie aren’t related, and both siblings expression their aggravation, because Sadie has every right to her Egyptian heritage as Carter does, just as Carter has the same right to feel connected to his mother and her side of the family as Sadie does, but because they look like polar opposites, they aren’t given the same treatment.
Additionally, Carter and Sadie’s mother dies before the start of the series, and afterwards, the two are split up, as sadie is taken from her father by her maternal grandparents (so white theyre sour cream) who err on hatred for carter, their father, and their paternal uncle (black) in a very dursley-ish sort of way and its hinted to be at least partially racially based, while Carter is allowed to remain with his father. By the time Carter reunites with Sadie at the beginning of the series, he and his father have been forced to stay away from her for so long that they basically have to relearn each other all over again. Meanwhile, their grandparents lash out at Carter for no reason other than the fact that he exists. (also its been 2 years i think since i read the first book so this might be wrong, but sadie also has some misconceptions about her father’s relationship to her because she seems to feel that he left her with her grandparents on purpose because he didn’t care about her the way he cared about carter some of which i think we hear straight from the grandparents mouth. but the reader sees this from another perspective because we know it physically pained their father to be away from sadie, and any implication otherwise plays into the “absent black father narrative”)
Idk i personally think developing the constant reoccurring mention to carter and sadie being different physically is like part of what helped him get out of the box of chronically not mentioning character races that nearly all white authors get stuck in, that and there was also probably a generous push from the “grover cant be black” outcry after the first movie and you can think im crazy for saying it but the fact of the matter is that the first kane chronicles book and The Lightning Thief movie both came out in 2010
so anyway if you have read the kane chronicles pls make an effort to celebrate its diversity the way you would celebrate other books of rick riordan, like including sadie kane in your gifsets about badass WOC or drawing attention to Zia and Anubis/Walt when you talk about love interests of main protagonists (re: annabeth, piper, and alex)
I think the natural world is intrinsically precious and obviously wildlife means an awful lot to me but I wish all the environmental propaganda I heard growing up had actually touched on all that actual human suffering.
I heard so much about all those poor cute little rainforest animals who need our help because they are so defenseless and innocent yet I was never taught about the indigenous human beings who live in the same fucking rainforest and are afforded no more rights than those same apes and birds getting plastered on posters around my elementary school.
Yes it’s sad that climate change threatens the polar bears but why have I heard so much more about the polar bears than the fact that over 20,000 people have had to flee the Marshall islands due to rising sea levels? Oh, hey, most of them fled to the United States, too, so who knows how many now risk deportation while their original homes are UNDER THE FUCKIN OCEAN.
Why did even environmental groups tell me more about what pesticides do to fish than what they do to human embryonic development? What about people starving to death because poaching and overfishing and banana crops and shit have destroyed their resources?
I hear a little more about these things NOW, I guess, but all I heard growing up was just “SAVE THE PRETTY BIRDS AND DOLPHINS” and it’s just no fucking wonder people as a whole stopped caring about the ecosystem. Captain Planet and Fern Gully and all those endless ad campaigns and grade-school programs somehow expected human beings to get on board with preserving nature while simultaneously treating human beings as exclusively monsters and outsiders to nature.
Born in Guangzhou, China, Bow-sim Mark started seriously training in Wushu during high school, specializing in Tai Chi and Northern Shaolin. At the time, women who studied martial arts were almost unheard of. However, her talents caught the attention of the Great Grandmaster Fu Wing Way, one of the most decorated martial artists in China and founder of Fu Style Tai Chi. He ended up taking her in as his private student.
In 1984, Mark won a gold medal at the first International Tournament of T’ai chi ch’uan in Wuhan City. In 1995, she was named Black Belt magazine’s Kung-Fu artist of the year. Before Mark immigrated to the U.S., she was already famous all over China not just because she was a talented female martial artist, but because she was also better than most men in her craft.
“Everything is harder for a woman,” Mark told NextShark with some help in translating from her daughter Chris Yen. “If a man has to work at 100% to excel, a woman must work at 150%! Not just in martial arts but in any field in order to be taken seriously.”
Mark with Donnie Yen and his sister, Chris Yen.
After teaching at her master’s school for 10 years, she emigrated to Boston, Massachusetts in 1975 where she became one of the first people to introduce Wushu to the West.
“There were only a few Chinese kung-fu schools in Chinatown and mostly karate schools around the suburbs,” Mark said. “My school was the first Chinese ‘Wushu’ school and at the time, Wushu was not known yet in the West.”
As a successful martial arts master who’s had students open up schools themselves, Sifu Mark broke down what makes a good teacher. She notes that while there are many styles of Tai Chi, all tai chi can be judged by six characteristics and six requirements:
“The characteristics are that the movement should be circular, relaxed, calm, continuous, and done with intent and energy. The requirements are that the spine is naturally straight, the shoulders and elbows are sunk, the chest is empty, the movement originates in the waist, the pelvis is at a natural angle, and yin and yang are clear.”
A Middleground 