Honestly when I read The Handmaid’s Tale I assumed the absence of POC was deliberate - that part of the vision of this fucked-up fundamentalist society was an all-white society, much like contemporary Mennonites and FLDS.

On BBC News right now there’s a mother who’s sent in a photo of her still-missing daughter, asking if anyone has seen her. Breaks your heart :(

Religious modesty rules are often quite schizophrenic. In Orthodox Jewish culture we also have very strict modesty rules that govern skirt and sleeve length, tightness of clothes, necklines, colours etc, but at the same time you’re supposed to dress like a ‘bat melech’, the daughter of a king, and there is soooo much…

Urgh just leave the poor girl alone, she’s harmed no one

I know, I can’t get outraged about this. I’d feel differently if they were selling them but this was clearly some keen junior who was only thinking about cool stuff for an event.

ouch!

That’s one of many things I hoped would magically materialise when I turned 18 and became an adult (along with a taste for alcohol, and sufficiently good proprioception to be able to drive a car). None of these things has actually happened.

In the UK, even at a shit college you have your own room. It might be the size of a closet, but it’s yours alone. We shudder with horror at the idea that we’d be expected, as grown-ass adults, to share a room.

Oh my God that face!

thanks! She is just the most smushable little thing and every time I see a full-sized cat now I’m like HOLY HELL THAT IS A BIG CAT. Then I remember that I just have a really small one.

Ooh also, here is one of Ginny in a onesie when we were trying to stop her overgrooming. She was so damn cute but she forgot how to cat while wearing it

Yay! Pet pics! Here’s my cat, Ginny. She’s 11 years old but she’s the size of a kitten because she was the runt

*wheelchair solidarity fist-bump*

Ok, but you don’t get this kind of conduct on other, non-American carriers, where equally taxing conditions exist

This.

I’ve been in customer-facing roles for years, and what you say is partly true. But I do believe there is an American cultural issue of over-reacting to any perceived challenge to their authority. In my (European) training, we were always told to de-escalate the situation. Don’t match aggression with aggression. Stay…

My heart goes out to you :( Wishing her a refuah shelaimah

I do think there is something specific about the American culture here though. I’ve flown many airlines, and even El Al is nothing like as aggressive and authoritarian as US carriers. My experience generally of (minor, e.g. cabin crew) authority figures in Europe and Asia is that they are taught to de-escalate…

Please can Jezebel report on the news about over 100 gay men being rounded up, imprisoned and tortured in Chechnya?