Seconded, as someone who went back to grad school in middle age. I am SO LUCKY that I actually learned to research & write in college.

i beg y'all to realize that autism has value, and makes my life different but just as good as yours (if y'all could stop being jerks about it)

Yep. And people who think that more traditionalist = more literal are making misleading analogies with very specific divides in Christianity. Orthodox Judaism is more "traditional" in the sense Catholicism is, not fundamentalist Christianity

This fall, I’m taking a course on the Convivencia. I will, as usual, be the only Jew (& the only one with Hebrew), & I feel like it’s my job to learn enough about Spanish Kabbalah to be useful 😂😂

Perhaps the Scholem quote was a hint, but: I’m entering a new Jewish mysticism hyperfixation. Hang on tight, followers!

“Judeo-Christian values” apparently demand that the US be run by Christians…but not Judeos? 🤔 Perfect example of how this term lets Christians claim the history & heritage of Judaism without sharing power with living Jews. It hides the exclusion of Jews while making obvious the exclusion of Muslims.

Sarra Copia Sullam was an Italian-Jewish woman who lived in Venice from 1558/90-1641. She was a poetess and a writer who kept up a long correspondence with a Catholic monk, and despite his constant urging to convert to Christianity, she refused & kept writing. I admire her strength & sense of self.

Frog says but I agree with some of the scorpion's positions

Come on now. They even have the chutzpah to put our name on their evangelizing! Jews don’t evangelize. It’s against “Judeo” values.

I feel I am missing out that I am cursed to only have two legs attached to my body instead of 4, 6, 8, or more. Being human shaped sux.

“Judeo-Christian values” apparently demand that the US be run by Christians…but not Judeos? 🤔 Perfect example of how this term lets Christians claim the history & heritage of Judaism without sharing power with living Jews. It hides the exclusion of Jews while making obvious the exclusion of Muslims.

Explain your @ Legend has it there was a king who suffered from severe mood swings; at times he would feel like he was on top of the world but then at others he would fall into depressive episodes that he couldn't break out of. Desperate, he made an announcement asking if anyone could help him 🧵

Explain your @ I am Rachel. I need a nap.

Let's Leave It Up To The States To Decide vs You Guys Always Say That Right Before Starting A Civil War About It

Historical critical readings sit alongside modern religious interpretations. They answer different questions. New interpretations are not “wrong,” they’re new. This approach is perfectly acceptable within Judaism: “Torah has 70 faces.” Torah is rich enough to support many meanings.

“It is the usual fate of sacred writings to become more or less divorced from the intentions of their authors. What may be called their after-life, those aspects which are discovered by later generations, frequently becomes of greater importance…” -Gershom Scholem #Religion #ReligiousStudies 🏺

They weren't paid agitators They were members of the community of all political persuasions who mobilized out of love & care for their neighbors ICE murdered two people in the streets in cold blood, kidnapped people, and put people in concentration camps where they were tortured

Most #autistic people don’t have the power to use our autism as an excuse for anything. For most of us, autism isn’t even accepted as an excuse for avoiding eye contact or using the “wrong” tone of voice! We are regularly punished for these things!

I just saw another post complaining that autism isn’t an excuse for being rude or inconsiderate, & I need to say: The standards for what’s “rude” & “inconsiderate” are largely arbitrary & often ableist, & autistic people are more likely to violate them just by existing the way we do.

Can I recommend: Being Autistic. You will neither understand why people like that one thing that's everywhere or be able to fake liking it, plus the things you will like will be random nonsense like a spy show made in 1964 that you're obsessed with for three months.

1. Attempted cancellations of prominent scholars as proxy wars on ideas one doesn't like: the case of Margaret Mead...and a mea culpa 🧪 #AcademicSky

"Belonging means more than being included. It means feeling understood, accepted, and able to participate without constantly having to explain yourself, hide parts of who you are, or push past exhaustion just to keep up." By @neuroscientist.bsky.social: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... #autism

It's always "you're autistic" and never "please, do say more about the life and times of Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin"

The answer to every riddle in “Tumbalalaika” is תלמוד תורה. What can grow without rain? Study of Torah. What can burn forever? Study of Torah. What can pray & cry without tears? Study of Torah. Think the bochur would marry me with these answers? Probably not 😂

די תּורה איז טיפֿער פֿון אַ קוואַל

I make a lighthearted joke about Ashkenazi food, and my mentions are full of people saying, “Evil Jews stole Palestinian cuisine,” totally erasing that most Israeli Jews are Mizrahi, not Ashkenazi, and have just as much claim to Middle Eastern food as any other Middle Easterner.

Coming up with great comebacks for future arguments I will never have because I'm usually so non-confrontational xD

This AI-generated image is making the rounds and normally I wouldn't even bother with something like this However, it gives us the chance to talk about a fascinating sub-group of White Nationalism that believes a race of pure Aryans called Argathans live in the center of the Earth 🧵

די תּורה איז טיפֿער פֿון אַ קוואַל

Everyone forgets us mythology autistics! It’s not even an uncommon special interest!

They built the scaffolding too high in an attempt to reach God Now God has made it impossible to communicate So they're just still going off their last orders and building more scaffolding The crowd is telling them to take the name down but tragically they don't understand anymore

Good advice. One mantra I use is "people are there to help" i.e. recognise that people exist whose everyday job it is to solve that kind of problem, or at least make the situation better.

If I see a typo immediately after posting, I will delete and repost

The whole world and the people living in it are infinitely interesting to me, and languages unlock this, but alas I am one person with limited financial resources living in a country without much of a safety net 🥲

"Knowing [X] is true about me, how can I plan for that or work around it, to achieve the results I want?" Barring specific examples to target my advice, that is probably the best single thing I can offer you.

You aren’t going to wake up tomorrow suddenly able to do something you’ve been failing at for ages. If your plan is “do better tomorrow,” the issue will never be solved. Accept this, forgive yourself, & try something different. #Autistic #ADHD

If you’ve been agonizing & trying to “fix” a particular issue for years, it probably means you can’t “fix” it yourself. Ask for help/accommodations or give up. You’ll be happier if you accept your limits & forgive yourself. Lean into your strengths instead. #Autistic #ADHD

😅

The Berlin Zoo named their baby Hippo Brötchen. :) (Bread roll 🥖)

"people drinking candy bars for coffee" yeah man that's because it's really tasty, what are you, a buckle hat plymouth rock guy?

Some folks posts would be this old meme

Okay yes the exchange Q: "how did nobody pick up you were a little professor stereotype as a child" A:"well when all the adults around you are big professors they just see you as little" Really explains so much of my life

Egyptologists did this, too. You're reading an English translation of the text on some obelisk and suddenly it's all "coivit cum ea" and you can figure it out from context but yeesh.

This convention was somehow transmitted to Japanese religion studies in the most confusing possible form: I came across an English translation of the Kojiki where the part about Izanami & Izanagi’s intercourse was in Latin. Someone translated the smutty part INTO LATIN from archaic Japanese 😂

There’s a strange convention in 19th c. translations of Classical texts: Sometimes, they leave smut untranslated. They didn’t REMOVE the smut, but if you wanted it, you had to do the work & read the original Greek or Latin.

Most niche game: Who said it, Pirkei Avot or Mr. Rogers?

well-meaning liberal christians, please get your co-adherents. (again, because someone always protests: yes, this is christianity, even if you don’t like it. christianity has never been one thing, and cutting out the parts you don’t like does nothing to help those who’ll be harmed by this gospel.)