Sunday Link Roundup

Soooo I haven’t done one of these for a while because I’ve been lazy. Just kidding, it’s because I’ve been busy interning for a mental health advocacy organization and suntanning and reading Anna Karenina. So there may be a lot of links here. And now that I’ve recovered from Pride weekend, here it is. Enjoy!

1. This week the European Union released a snazzy video full of pink and high heels and men staring lustfully at women, for the purpose of…encouraging women to pursue scientific careers. After the Internet exploded, the video was taken down, but here’s a great blog post over at Teen Skepchick that explains why this was so gross and inappropriate.

2. At In Our Words, a beautiful post on what depression has taught one writer. “Depression has taught me quality over quantity.  I am a very busy, sometimes self involved, flighty person.  The handful of people I consider good friends know these things about me.  What’s really crazy is that they also love me in spite of them.”

3. On the challenges of disclosing mental illness.

4. On loving your parents even though they can’t accept you for who they are. “I know this isn’t social justice orthodoxy. Social justice orthodoxy is, as Andrew Ti from Yo Is This Racist, would say, “Yo, you tell them they’re fucking racists and then you don’t talk to them. You really need someone that fucking awful in your life?” But the thing is…I kind of do.”

5. Margarita Tartakovsky, one of my favorite mental health writers, explains how not dieting is a sort of freedom.

6. How academic grades become a measure of self-worth, and all the problems inherent in that. As someone who has literally bawled on many occasions because of a random letter that was written on something I produced, I loved this.

7. More on talking about mental health. “I inevitably start to feel like I’m throwing a woe-is-me, isn’t-life-awful, tell-me-about-how-damaged-you-are-so-we-can-cry-together Pity Party. It’s embarrassing….But you know what? I think it’s time for us to have a Pity Party. We need to air our dirty mental health laundry and get a real dialogue going. Because truly, when I started actually acknowledging my depression, letting others in on how much I was struggling, and looking for a reason and a cure, a whole world of compassion opened itself to me.”

8. You don’t need to be in a relationship in order to live romantically. “I enjoy long walks on the beach as much as anyone else; I just like to do them alone.”

9. A friend of mine wrote about how we alternatively demonize and glorify technology. It sounded a lot like a post I’d written once, except better. 🙂

10. You don’t have to be thankful for your mental illness. You don’t have to see “the good” in it. Sometimes there isn’t any.

11. People are more likely to compromise with groups they disagree with if they believe those groups are capable of changing their views. Not a huge surprise, but it’s nice to see research confirm these things.

12. Some really helpful advice on how to flirt with people without making them uncomfortable, as per the recent atheist con controversy.

13. On crying in public, and the sense of shame and embarrassment many of us feel when we cry.

14. What it’s like in a mental hospital, from someone who’s been there. Read it and lay the stereotypes to rest.

15. On the myth of the “good old days.” “But my question is this: if morals have been declining in this day and age, when was it ever higher? Can we really name a time when there was less injustice, criminality, and corruption?” Nope!

16. And my favorite post ever: on self-disclosure and genuineness as a mental health professional who is also a writer. “They told me to lie to you, but I knew you could handle the truth.

Finally, the Crap Post of the Week Award goes to this article from Psychology Today, which attempts to justify cheating on your spouse because good things can apparently come of it. Such as…you’ll talk about the state of your marriage! You’ll spice up your sex life! You’ll get your needs met if your spouse is disabled and physically cannot meet them! Yes, that’s in there. And worse yet, the author calls this a “healthy affair.”

Also, a bit of news–my short-form blog, on which I write and post stuff about basically the same subjects I cover here, has recently received its 500th follower! That must mean it’s good, so go check it out.

Have a good week!

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Sunday Link Roundup
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