Unf*ck Your Brain: memes and more

I don’t know if I endorse this yet but I found it a thought provoking twist on the adage.

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I love it.

I just taught DH how to use wood glue on a broken baby toy. He didn’t know that we couldn’t put the toy back on the shelf right after gluing it. I told him it has to cure overnight. So sometimes we also need help healing, or we don’t know how to do it? But there are people in our lives who are willing to set aside the time and attention and care to help. :heart:

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I know nothing about this person but found the video useful and thought provoking. About why we don’t know how to build community even if we think we want to.

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I think about this a lot in terms of class.

I grew up lower middle/working class in a rural area. There’s a lot of stuff that you can’t outsource in that context - things like cleaning services are less common and most people can’t afford them. You can’t find nannies (though there are many small home daycares). People help each other because it’s the only option. You split wood together, trade childcare, take each other to the doctor.

Upper class in a city? You can pay someone to do that. And so people do instead of asking for help from friends and family.

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I haven’t watched the video but responding to Dia’s take, what is fascinating to me is the expectation and etiquette of the situation changes/differs so much by class.

Caveat that my experience of this is also culturally tinged. My parents and grandparents were raised in a world where hiring out housework was frowned upon as elitist, and the practice didn’t really exist (although I’m sure it happened on a small, private scale). But for the most part, if someone needed extra help it was down to family and friends, and taking money for such help from someone you know was rude. It would also be rude to stay in a hotel instead of with family and friends while visiting (in most cases).

Whereas in middle/upper American society, it’s rude to expect your fam/friends to do extra work uncompensated, even if it’s just watching a cat or watering plants or dropping you at the airport or babysitting. It’s rude to impose on someone by being in their house instead of renting your own space. Or to ask someone to get you groceries when you’re sick instead of using instacart (not only are you imposing on your friend but you are depriving the local economy of jobs! How dare!)

Anthropologically speaking… neither is explicitly wrong but I do think the latter promotes more distance and less community. If you never owe anyone a favor, and they don’t owe you, there is no dependence, vulnerability, trust building.

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Hmm i wonder if some of mine & Ponders disagreements are actually class or city VS rural cultural clashes, when framed this way. (He is a slightly higher/ city class than I am and it fits the pattern described).

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Screen Shot 2024-12-21 at 6.13.14 PM

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Pure gold!

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I ran a load of laundry yesterday while a work friend was over for dinner and a movie.

Washer kept shaking like crazy, after 2 attempts to rebalance it we gave up.

After friend left, I went and ran it through the last spin cycle in halves. It ran beautifully.

Takeaway: You are no different than a washer! No amount of balance will help if you are overloaded! Remove half the towels.

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But…but…but…Ford Prefect said I should always carry a towel? Now what :dizzy_face:

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A towel. A nice portable Turkish towel. Not 4 soaking wet bathtowels.

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:crazy_face: Thanks for clearing that up :crazy_face:

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This is a very important point.

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I need to print this out and put this on my fridge. Trying not to gaslight my 5 year old but like damn kid, you get allllll up in some feels. And misrecall basic events. It’s rough to navigate that without being like “what the fuck :face_with_raised_eyebrow:” six times a day.

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If anyone needs a little eye bleach from reading too many unsettling things this week, I highly recommend visiting reddit.com/r/tippytaps . You will not be disappointed

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SQUEAL

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It and https://www.reddit.com/r/onegoldenbraincell

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Oh! That reminds me: reddit.com/r/oneorangebraincell

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