nihilsupernum:

raggedjackscarlet:

did participation trophies ever actually exist?

or were they just some kind of collective nightmare conservatives had?

ive never seen a participation trophy but there are probably still, like, eighth place ribbons and shit in a box in the garage somewhere. i never valued them but it didnt seem particularly unreasonable to give ppl trinkets to commemorate their presence somewhere, like, birthday parties also did that

I did get – and still own – an honest-to-god participation trophy once, from a low-level middle school math competition in which my team placed last.  I think everyone got it in addition to whatever else they got?  It’s a dorky medal with the competition logo and the words “Mathematics is a language of connections and patterns” or something like that

Of course, it was understood by everyone that these medals were meaningless, and we were still told that we placed last, and we didn’t get to move on to the next round while some other team(s) did.  Nonetheless, ever since I got it it’s been on the wall of my room at my parents’ house, because my mom wanted to put it there.  Boomers sure are weird!  ;)

(via iwanderedon)

oligopsony:

re: the last two posts, offense is a sign of weakness while belittlement is a sign of strength, so absent going down the counter3^^^3signalling wormhole the latter is going to strictly dominate the former, regardless of whether offense may be justifiably felt or belittling people for being weak is, at least at that level of abstraction, evil

The line between belittlement and offense is not often clear-cut, though, e.g. in this case where the second poster is much more directly belittling, but ends up coming off as defensive and peeved and, yes, offended.

More generally I’d say that the “those who belittle vs. those who are offended” distinction doesn’t map closely at all onto the “edgelords vs. SJWs” distinction.  On tumblr I the usual response I see from pro-SJ people to offensive posts is belittlement – “lmao what the hell am i reading,” “tag yourself i’m [phrase],” that kind of thing.  Meanwhile, the edgelords do seem to [Maude Lebowski voice] get their “jimmies rustled” a lot, to use the parlance of our times

(via oligopsony-deactivated20160508)