Take it to the alter

I need to remember to put my thought here. Direct the energy instead of letting it leak out of me.

so today I went along on my kid’s field trip out into the woods and learning about birds and snakes. Great stuff, lots out outdoor education.

but there was this puppet show and they were explaining.. I dunno  frogs? To the kids

I dunno. I felt a distinct ICK with the presentation, which I realized was made appropriate to a very young audience and hadn’t been altered since probably the late nineties

But it was essentially that they were… gendering frogs? And he would refer to animals as ‘girl’ and ‘boy’ frogs. Like oh, I was croaking cause I’m trying to find a girlfriend. All the boy frogs do this, and the girl frogs listen, etc

And like.. this dude is like 60 and working for a conservation park in the middle of nowhere. Cut him a break, he’s used this speech for decades. 

And the other is like… I dunno, maybe we should fix this? Cause that’s not how frogs, or any animals, really work? Like, frogs don’t.. date?

I dunno. It’s reinforcing this idea of a binary to the kids and then later somebody says ‘well this is how it is in NATURE – and it’s not??’ Like you can’t say ‘he just like me for real for real’ and then be like WE are actually just like them’.

Does this even make sense??? It’s like lions. Those alpha type dudes will ALWAYS point to lions and be like ‘yeah, one dude and lots of ladies! He’s totally the king and in charge and these are his bitches’ and it’s NOT. like, science has proven this isn’t true, that he is their himbo and if he doesn’t put out they will REPLACE him.

but like – those dudes were TAUGHT this about lions. The lion king is DEEPLY rooted in this false narrative. And I dunno, maybe we should correct it? If at the very least so we don’t get more fanfiction about alphas and betas which is ALSO disproven.

But on a more positive note, the day at her school starts with a land acknowledgement. And I fucking love that. They even explain, briefly, WHY it’s important. That by benefiting from it NOW- the absolute least we can do is acknowledge that what happened was deeply wrong.

and it’s like ‘well what does it change now? We can’t do anything about it! It’s a waste of time’

nah. Because this IS the thing you can do about it. You have to spend two minutes thinking about it every day. Feeling discomfort is good for your soul. Not shame or guilt but acknowledgement that a thing happened and that we have to do better and this is why. We need to be reminded of the necessity of empathy.

anywho. Gay frogs and land acknowledgements. Nothing about alters at all! Hah.