(Part 3) Top products from r/Blackfellas

I would advise you to read alot. Like, alot alot. If you do the wrong thing in a scene it can really screw the person up.

Coconut oil is your friend. It's a good lubricant, it makes rope less grating on the skin, you should use it if you decide to get into wax play.


https://bdsmgeekshop.com/ is a good shop for beginners. Do note that they source some of their things from China (i've found their supplier. If you know how to use taobao.)

http://www.ohjoysextoy.com/ is easy to understand reading material. (they're comics) You might find something you want to try.

Communication is key really. You should always be talking to your partner about this stuff. Even in the middle of the act. "Is this too tight? Did I hit you too hard? Are you comfortable with this? Do you remember your safe word? You can say no, if I'm pushing too hard."

BDSM is alot more about trust than it is about sex.

Be sure to read about aftercare, that's one of the most important things to do.

Read this stuff (if you want)

https://www.amazon.com/She-Comes-First-Thinking-Pleasuring/dp/0060538260/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1501800170&sr=8-1&keywords=cunninglingus

Just do alot of reading.

You can get into your local kink scene on Fetlife. Just be aware that since you're a black man, you'll 100% be fetishized with all the stereotypes. Be sure to be clear about things you want and don't want. Always tell someone where you're going(If you have an iPhone keep your location services on and tell a friend you iCloud log in information), always meet in a public place.

My main attempted ventures were foreign currency exchange. It's one of the easiest to get into and relies on a mix of statistical analysis and news analysis.

Sites:

http://www.babypips.com/

Stupid name, but takes everything step by step and has great tutorial for complete newbs.

Books:

Kathy Lien writes really good books on Forex:

http://www.amazon.com/Day-Trading-Swing-Currency-Market/dp/0470377364

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/047077035X/ref=mp_s_a_1_2?qid=1464571290&sr=1-2&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=Kathy+Lien&dpPl=1&dpID=51nNzKy09mL&ref=plSrch

My plan was to do some hardcore studying and practice using simulation sites, and once I could consistently turn a profit above 5 or 6% (less fees, etc), I would do it for real.

Good luck!

YES!!! I cannot stress Christopher Moore's books enough. Lamb is the greatest book of all time! I re-read it annually.

Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins (which probably inspired Lamb) is also great as well.

The Bogleheads Guide to Investing. Now that I can save more with a new job, I thought it was a good idea to get a start on my retirement fund.

It's basically an introduction guide to investing and a type of investing centered around low risk and steady growth over a long time. It's surprisingly not dry yet very informative. I'm hoping to use this book and others to learn how I might be able to retire early. I recommend it to anyone who needs to learn exactly what the core stuff like stocks, bonds, mutual funds, IRAs, annuities, ETFs, etc., are and what you should probably do with them.

Reading the following for at risk youths for a program my local library runs afterschool:

• Binti by Nnedi Okorafor | Highly recommend this one as it is very short and incredibly poignant, particularly for young men/women of color, but still meaningful for anyone.
  
• The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas | You cannot go wrong with a classic like this.
  
• Shadowshaper by Daniel Jose Older | This one is also meant for young men/women of color, I love it, especially for creatives.
  
• Underground Airlines by Ben Winters | I actually just finished reading this one. I'll let it's blurb speak for it: "It is the present-day, and the world is as we know it: smartphones, social networking and Happy Meals. Save for one thing: the Civil War never occurred."
  
  Currently reading for myself:
  
  
• Age of Myth by Michael J. Sullivan
  
• Sweet Silver Blues by Glen Cook
  
• The Liminal People by Ayize Jama-Everett
  
  And then I'm reading a bunch of comics/graphic novels, but these are the ones I'm really enjoying at the moment:
  
  
• God Country by Cates Shaw and Wordie Hill
  
• Chew by John Layman and Rob Guillory.
  
• The Wicked + The Divine by Gillen McKelvie and Wilson Cowles
  
• Southern Bastards by Jason Aaron and Jason Latour

Currently reading two books:

Watchmen - Reluctant to admit this is my first time getting around to reading it. Loving it so far.

and

Equal Justice Under Law - The autobiography of Constance Baker Motley. She penned the original complaint in the Brown v. Board of Education case. She was also the first Black woman to argue a case in front of the Supreme Court.

As someone in tech, these interviews don't really test smarts, programming skills, or IQ. Just that you can grind leetcode.

Tech interviews are all really just a game with a huge amount of luck involved. Sometimes you get all problems you've heard before with lenient interviews, sometimes you get a bunch of leetcode hards with interviewers who expect you to write a proof before solving it. I definitely wouldn't consider someone smarter or dumber then me based on how they did in an interview.

It's tough after a rejection but it's good that you're going to keep applying. Time is on your side and Google will probably be knocking on your door again in 6 to 9 months anyway.

As far as impostor syndrome I'd recommend reading this book https://www.amazon.com/Mindset-Psychology-Carol-S-Dweck/dp/0345472322

It barely mentions impostor syndrome specifically but the skills taught in it are almost directly related.

Here is a very good book. It details the white racial foundation of feminism in relation to white supremacy and more. I highly recommend everyone read it.

Here is a link to the book:
https://www.amazon.com/White-Womens-Rights-Origins-Feminism/dp/0195124669

Trying to cop a new laptop but I'm stuck between 2. Idk if anyone knows anything about laptops but I'd appreciate some opinions if anyone does

Samsung Notebook 7 with 512gb - $600

Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 with 256gb - $950

Both are 13" with 8 gigs of RAM. Both have i5 chips too but Samsung is 8th gen vs 10th gen on the Surface. Honestly I kinda want the Surface I'm just trying to justify the extra $350

I'm a huge fan of corporate confidential. Retaliation is real, but if something this bad happened then the company probably won't risk it.

I'm reading Grain Brain
and
Alexander Hamilton

I literally read an entire book on the subject earlier this year.

http://www.amazon.com/Whistling-Vivaldi-Stereotypes-Affect-Issues/dp/0393339726

Groove Music: The Art and Culture of the Hip-Hop DJ by Mark Katz. You should be able to find it in your local library...

A good book to read about Southern violence after reconstruction is called The Bloody Shirt: Terror After Appomatox, where the Southern insurgency eventually succeeded in restoring the former minority, white governments (recall that in the deep South whites were a minority). This pattern has continued till today in places like Ferguson.

The fuck? Obama released a book two months before the election in 08. Hillary released a book in 2016 two moths before the election. People release books before elections. It’s a thing. You see what I mean about reaching?

Edit: here’s the links to the books. Check the release dates


https://www.amazon.com/dp/0307460452/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_t1_mnCBCbRMJ0BDC

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1501161733/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_t1_5oCBCb0V3QJDE

Sure - I meant that the questions you were asking and your overall line of reasoning sounded very much like the conversation-pattern I've heard whenever black women discuss their experiences in feminist spaces.

When they point out their lack of support by the feminist community, and the utter ignorance of how race affects issues in mainstream feminism, and the unwillingness of most white feminists to reciprocate any support given by the black community, they are absolutely correct, and they are more often than not ignored (or worse.)

Unfortunately, because I don't know the history of gender relations within the black community the way I know the history of race relations within the feminist community, I am an imperfect teacher on this subject. What I know is that black women say there's a problem, that they say they are ignored or worse when they ask for it to be addressed, and that they are credible when it comes to their own experience.

So when I notice the same patterns of rhetoric that are problematic in my community showing up in the other, it's familiar and troubling.

I think women's suffrage might have fared better than you think; many of the rural states in fact allowed women to vote in state elections starting in 1869. But it was a complicated issue, because it was more tied up in what the politicians worried the women would vote FOR than whether they thought they should be voting at all, and that gets it tied up not in the simple issue of gender roles, but each man wondering whether his constituency is safe. Imagine mobilizing a completely unknown voting bloc - terrifying to the status quo. Not as much of an issue with allowing recently emancipated slaves to vote, as they were relatively sure to vote for the union politicians that had just won the war and help provide leverage in the newly re-incorporated south. This is also partly why you have such horrific issues with allowing asian and hispanic enfranchisement or even basic citizenship; they weren't considered as predictable and therefore valuable of a constituency, so there was no reason to take on the political risk of considering their basic human rights. (I'm getting very off-topic, sorry.)

No. Whether an action counts as betrayal cannot depend on the sensitivity of the group, it must depend on the sensitivity of the minority. Otherwise there's no accountability. Who decides whether the outcome was worth it? The people who benefitted (the majority?) or the ones who paid the price? I'm not saying compromise can't ever happen, and I'm not saying that there's some perfect world where progress can occur without any ugliness, ever - what I'm saying is if you always focus on only the majority, and allow those in the positions of power to define not only what qualifies as success but what constitutes unacceptable harm, you're going to have a very imbalanced power structure that looks quite a bit like a panel of white, male senators grilling Anita Hill about the particulars of sexual harassment so they can install a dirtbag like Clarence Thomas on the bench to make terrible decisions for the country for the rest of his life.

In lieu of paragraphs, I shall give links:

on #solidarityisforwhitewomen follow some of those embedded links, too - there're a lot of great rabbit trails in there.

It's a problem outside the US, too

Jezebel link for the back-story, but this link-farm from Melissa Harris-Perry is the academic goldmine for black feminism

Professor L'Heureux Lewis discusses black male privilege on NPR

A very detailed collection of essays of the many ways 'misogynoir' is felt - edited to remove link; I should have read her content-use page before linking, as she explicitly states that she does not want her personal blog to be used as an education portal.

Sure, the NFL is a business known for exploitative practices and ingrained racism, sexism, and violence. Sure, they've implemented protocols after a nasty PR scandal. (Business decision - not doing so could leave them open to further lawsuits, like this one they're currently settling as ungraciously as possible ) Not sure where you got your numbers to compare NFL players to the general population, but this article breaks it down pretty well, and details why athletes have a lower reporting rate as well. It's not just that, either. The organization as a whole has a history of tolerating bullshit: multiple teams had their cheerleaders bring class-action lawsuits this year over multiple-complaint, multi-year labor disputes. Jerry Jones, owner of the Dallas Cowboys was involved in a scandal involving inappropriate behavior with a woman who is not his wife. The owners of the Vikings and Browns were both indicted on massive fraud charges just last year. The impact of building football stadiums on the local economies - with tax incentives, etc - is almost never borne by the actual organization, but off-loaded onto the communities themselves. ($12 billion according to this book ). There's the whole "it's fine to continue using a racial slur and caricature as your team identity" situation in Washington. And that's off the top of my head, from the past 18 months.

Suffice it to say, I'm not a fan of the organization as a whole, and being a business isn't an excuse to being an obvious home for corrupt individuals with a high tolerance for unethical and immoral behavior to do business with each other. (and then make major political donations!) The whole thing stinks, and they handled this entire affair in their normal, unethical manner, until they were exposed and forced into damage control.

At the risk of womansplaining, that's not mansplaining. (so you may feel relieved!) Mansplaining is that specific kind of condescension that assumes a woman couldn't possibly know what she's talking about, or that a man definitely is an authority by default. You're just asking for clarification, which makes perfect sense since our conversation has been long and rambly.

What I am looking for from society and what I am looking for from this conversation are two different things. What I want from this conversation is to describe the parallels between your privilege in your community and my privilege in mine, and point out that it's really easy to be blind to our privilege as relevant in the context of the greater good, or to act as though the concerns of "the few" aren't as relevant as the concerns of "the whole group" - but they are; you can't have the whole without the few. And as it comes up again, I would encourage you to listen without defensiveness, and rather than asking questions that can seem combative to ask for resources to read up on the basics of their particular struggle, because it will enable you to best serve the true whole group, instead of just the whole group that most resembles you - simply because that was my experience.

What I want from society is a product of watching far too much Star Trek: The Next Generation growing up. True universal health care, education, civil rights. Deemphasis on profit as the pinnacle value, more emphasis on sustainability. A shift in cultural opinion so that public service is no longer seen as degrading.

Must reads:

Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II https://www.amazon.com/dp/0385722702/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_B0KwDbBN2MT7W

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness https://www.amazon.com/dp/1595586431/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_50KwDb9M4ECGM

It's not our job to re-educate people with screwed up their views on slavery, segregation, and their lasting impacts on society. Especially in this subreddit of all places. Especially if they come out swinging in defense of slavery with the same bad faith arguments racists have been using for literally hundreds of years now. We don't have the time for those kinds of remedial lessons you could have been asking for BEFORE you drew the line in the sand. A lot of ink has already been spilled explaining it in detail for people with your mindset, and you could even search this subreddit to see why that mindset is a bad one from the start.

https://www.google.com/search?q=it%27s+not+black+people%27s+job+to+teach+you&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS853US853&oq=it%27s+not+black+people%27s+job+to+teach+you&aqs=chrome..69i57.9707j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

And I know you can put in that effort, bc you've already shown that desire in a previous comment you made in r/AITA.

But don't expect black people to suddenly flip a switch and take you by the hand in a comments section where you were making arguments defending slavery. That's not how this works.

edit: I'll do you this solid, though. I'll link you some videos, books, and podcasts for homework.

The fallacy of blacks selling blacks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ5zizWjSko

an easy video series about one black queen dealing with the Portuguese: https://youtu.be/EBbYxLmCO6c

Why Race Matters by Cornel West, 25th anniversary: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=cornel+west&ref=nb_sb_noss_2

Reconstruction and the Gilded Age book bonus: https://www.amazon.com/Republic-Which-Stands-Reconstruction-1865-1896/dp/0190053763/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=reconstruction+and+the+gilded+age&qid=1573323568&sr=8-1

Codeswitch podcast: https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch

a great podcast on whiteness as a political, economic, and social construct: https://www.sceneonradio.org/seeing-white/

>Excerpt:
>
> On a sunny morning in November, 2018, twelve men and two women gathered in a lavishly furnished living room in Oguta, a town in southeastern Nigeria, with the air-conditioning at full blast. They had come to discuss the caste system that persists among the Igbo people in the region. The group’s host, Ignatius Uchechukwu Okororie, a short, sixty-two-year-old retired civil servant, split open a kola nut with his fingernails and ate its flesh; he then passed a metal tray of nuts around the room, for the others to taste. “He who brings kola nut brings life,” he said. The breaking of kola nut, known as iwa oji, is an important Igbo ritual traditionally performed to welcome guests to a gathering. The group in Okororie’s living room were members of a caste called ohu: descendants of slaves who, almost a century ago, were owned by townspeople. They are typically restricted from presiding over such ceremonies. In Okororie’s house, the iwa oji was a small rebellion. Slavery existed among the Igbo long before colonization, but it accelerated in the sixteenth century, when the transatlantic trade began and demand for slaves increased. Under slavery, Igbo society was divided into three main categories: diala, ohu, and osu. The diala were the freeborn, and enjoyed full status as members of the human race. The ohu were taken as captives from distant communities or else enslaved in payment of debts or as punishment for crimes; the diala kept them as domestic servants, sold them to white merchants, and occasionally sacrificed them in religious ceremonies or buried them alive at their masters’ funerals. (A popular Igbo proverb goes, “A slave who looks on while a fellow-slave is tied up and thrown into the grave should realize that it could also be his turn someday.”) The osu were slaves owned by traditional deities. A diala who wanted a blessing, such as a male child, or who was trying to avoid tribulation, such as a poor harvest or an epidemic, could give a slave or a family member to a shrine as an offering; a criminal could also seek refuge from punishment by offering himself to a deity. This person then became osu, and lived near the shrine, tending to its grounds and rarely mingling with the larger community. “He was a person dedicated to a god, a thing set apart—a taboo forever, and his children after him,” Chinua Achebe wrote of the osu, in “Things Fall Apart.” (The ume, a fourth caste, was comprised of the slaves who were dedicated to the most vicious deities.) In the nineteenth century, the abolition of slavery in the West inadvertently led to a glut of slaves in the Igbo markets, causing the number of ohu and osu to skyrocket. “Those families which were really rich competed with one another in the number of slaves each killed for its dead or used to placate the gods,” Adiele Afigbo, an Igbo historian, wrote in “The Abolition of the Slave Trade in Southeastern Nigeria, 1885–1950.” The British formally abolished slavery in Nigeria in the early twentieth century, and finally eradicated it in the late nineteen-forties, but the descendants of slaves—who are also called ohu and osu—retained the stigma of their ancestors. They are often forbidden from speaking during community meetings and are not allowed to intermarry with the freeborn. In Oguta, they can’t take traditional titles, such as Ogbuagu, which is conferred upon the most accomplished men, and they can’t join the Oriri Nzere, an important social organization.