Sina New puts out a poll, asking, “If you had 30 RMB, would you buy a book or some boba tea?” in honour of International Reading Day. For every 10K votes on the poll, they’ll donate 100 picture books to remote regions. So far, buying a book leads by almost twice as much as boba tea.
Down in the comments, a debate is ongoing, “Books might not end up benefiting you, but boba tea definitely will.”
“What kind of book can you even buy for 30 RMB these days? They’re all 50-60 RMB, aren’t they?”
“Probably books. I’ll be done drinking boba tea in 15 minutes, but a book will last several days.”
“Can’t you read books for free on the internet anyways?”
“My kid’s kindergarten teacher came for a home visit and wouldn’t eat or drink anything! I heard she was going to come over, and I took it very seriously. My kid was looking forward to it a lot too. She said she would be over around 6pm. I prepared lots of fruits, all pre-washed and pre-cut into a pretty fruit platter. I sat and watched the clock waiting for her to come, but she never showed up. By the time it got to 7pm, I thought she’d gotten held up somewhere and wasn’t coming over. So I put on a TV show and started binge watching.
Apparently, she sent me a text that I didn’t see. She sent me a voice mail too, but I didn’t see that either. She ended up coming up the building herself. She didn’t drink any of the water that I poured for her, or eat any of the fruit. I asked her to twice, and she refused both times. My kid handed some fruit to her, and she just put it back down. Is there some kind of rule that teachers aren’t allowed to eat or drink anything on home visits?
My kid went to a private daycare before and they did home visits too. And those teachers didn’t eat or drink anything either. But honestly, there needs to be some sense of ritual with these things. I’m doing this to show my respect for her. There’s really no need to stick to the rules to tightly. It’d be nice if she gave me some face and ate just a couple of bites.”
Comments reply, “It’s because she has to go to a dozen families every day and she’s trying to cut down on bathroom breaks.”
A childcare blogger writes, “I’ve heard before that the parents of child models don’t want their kids to grow too tall or too fast, because then they’ll be out of a job quicker. But looking around on resume websites, I saw this little child model’s info, and there’s no way this is real. She’s four years old and 91cm? That’s the height of a two-year-old, isn’t it? Are they just making this shit up?”
Comments say, “When I took my daughter to photoshoots, the photographer said that a lot of parents will give their kids drugs that keep them from growing to keep making that money. People only want child models around 90 to 95cm.”
A blogger writes a PSA, “Rabies is super rare these days and mostly happens in very rural areas. In the last couple of years, we’re only seeing like 200 cases a year. But there are a lot of people with a phobia of rabies, mostly because there’s been very little education about this, and doctors never explain it clearly to people. I think it’s partly that they’re too lazy to explain and partly that they don’t understand it themselves.
I’m not an expert or anything, but I like to read up on this kind of thing. I’ve read the latest WHO reports and can tell you that rabies has an incubation period under one year. There’s no such thing as being bitten or scratched several years ago or even several decades ago, and only getting rabies now. If you were bitten or scratched in childhood, it is entirely unnecessary now to go get the vaccine. But if you go to the hospital, just out of a cover-your-ass policy, they’ll still give you the vaccine. I think this is a pretty irresponsible and unprofessional policy.
Observing the animal for ten days works very well too. If you got bitten and you can afford to watch the animal for 10 days, and he’s still alive after ten days and not dead, that means he doesn’t have rabies, and you don’t have rabies either.
Of course, the 10 day observation period isn’t just you sitting on your ass, not doing anything except watching a dog. If it’s a dog without immunisation records, you can get your vaccine shots while observing the dog. If it’s a stray that you’ve already lost track of, then you should finish your vaccines. But if it’s your own pet dog with complete vaccines and who doesn’t go around outside on his own, then there’s no need for you to get a vaccine. It’s just as ridiculous as using your own rice and your own rice cooker to make dinner, and still insisting on poison control testing it first every day. That’s just paranoid behaviour.
I think that doctors have a responsibility to answer people’s questions and resolve their confusions. Or at least have some kind of poster up teaching people about these things and easing their anxiety. They need to stop talking about how rabies has a 100% fatality rate so you should get a shot just for peace of mine. If people choose to get a shot anyways, that’s their own business. But that shouldn’t be what we’re teaching people. It’s an entirely laughable argument. If someone is safe, why get an entirely unnecessary shot?”
Comments agree, “Demonising animals is fatal to stray animals.”
Underneath is a blogger named “Cruel Animals” posting a video of someone showing rabies symptoms after being bitten by a dog. It shows a man barking like a dog.
Comments say, “But that’s not a symptom of rabies at all? Are people really still so uneducated?”
A lady shares screenshots of texts with her boyfriend, explaining, “My boyfriend has a really close female friend. I ate out with her once and I could tell right away that she’s into my boyfriend, but he insists that I’m just overthinking it. He even got mad at me because of her, said I was making something out of nothing. He thinks he has high EQ and would be able to tell. I chose to believe him.
Once, I was looking at his phone. And he’d told me he only talks to her about work, but I saw that they share their life with each other too. The girl will tell him about movies she’s watched, and he’d respond enthusiastically. On New Years, he sent me Happy New Years messages, but he sent her Happy New Years messages too. The things he shares with me, he also shares with her. It just made me feel super bad.
That girl is super enthusiastic about him, and he doesn’t know how to turn her down. He’s just continuing to maintain social contact with her. And she knows I’m his girlfriend and everything, but she still talks to him all the time. My boyfriend too—I used to trust in him, but after I checked him phone, I don’t know whether I should or not.
Now he says he’s wiling to change for me?”
The boyfriend’s texts read, “I thought that an adult’s world isn’t black and white. I wanted you to understand that my best friend happens to be female. If you really think there’s more to it than that, and I have to cut off connections with her, then I’m willing to change. Because I don’t want to lose you.”
A health blogger posts a bunch of anti-vaccine infographics persuading parents to not let their children pay for their ignorance. I won’t bother translating all of it—I’m sure you’ve seen similar things on western internet.
Comments ask, “What did I look at to make the algorithm think I want to read this shit.”
Someone posts about having entered a company of nepotists. “There are five people in this company. The owner is the husband, the head of finance is his wife. Marketing and Operations are both the husband’s cousins. And then there’s the peasant—me. Everyone’s lackey.”
Comments make fun of her, “They don’t even need to make a work group chat—they can just pull you into their family one.”
“Company outings is just eating over at the boss’s house?”
“My previous company was like this too. The boss, his wife, and his mistress all worked in it.”
An askreddit, “Why are more and more people getting c-sections? Why are people unwilling to do vaginal delivery?”
The top reply says, “Because we don’t educate people enough about the downsides of C-sections, and the existing education aren’t hitting the correct points.
The whole time I was pregnant, I was sure I wanted a C-section. My reasons are that one, I’m scared of pain; two, I’m worried that even if I go with vaginal delivery, I’ll end up having to suffer a C-section anyways and get the worst of both worlds; three, I’m worried about pelvic floor muscle damage.
All of my female friends and family tried to talk me into a vaginal delivery, all saying that it was better. Since I’ve got a rather scientific mind, I asked all of them why. And they couldn’t give me a good reason. All they can say is that it takes longer to recover from a C-section. With a vaginal delivery, you can start walking around the very next day. After having their head squeezed by the birthing canal makes kids smarter.
And I just figured to myself, it’s not like I’m going back to work the next day. The kid’s got a nanny to take care of him. Why do I care if I can walk around the second day or not? So what if it takes longer to recovery? So long as I’m not in any pain, I’m good.”
Then, something happened that pissed me off even more.
At my 28 week checkup, I told my doctor, who worked at the best hospital in all of Guangzhou, that I wanted a C-section. The doctor said that a C-section was unnecessary with my stats, I have to go with a vaginal delivery first. He tried to convince me that a vaginal delivery was much better too.
“How?” I asked.
The doctor said, “First, with a vaginal delivery, you can have a second kid right away. With a C-section, you have to wait three years for your uterus to heal first. Second, if you go with vaginal delivery and accidentally get pregnant faster than you wanted, you have the choice of abortion. With a C-section, with your uterus not yet healed, an abortion could cost you your life. Three, after a vaginal delivery, you can get an IUD afterwards right away. With a C-section, there can be risks with inserting an IUD.”
That infuriated me. I told him, “First, I’m not having a second child. Second, there’s no such thing as an accidental pregnancy. Accidental pregnancies only happen because people don’t take their own body seriously. Thirdly, my husband and I use condoms for birth control. I would never get a fucking garbage IUD.”
I see some people down in the comments saying that the doctor is just telling it to be straight and I need to stop being a snowflake and demanding that he use prettier words. This isn’t about telling it straight or not. I just think he’s not getting the point. As a professional ob/gyn, he should be telling me about the actual risks of a C-section. I don’t care about his attitude or his tone of voice. Even if he told me, “Motherfucker, do you not understand that C-sections increase the risk of amniotic fluid embolisms, you fucking retard?” I wouldn’t be nearly as pissed off, because at least he cares about my health and safety.
It’s like if someone went to the hospital with a benign tumour and wanted it removed. Should the doctor tell him about the actual risks of surgery, or should the doctor just tell him, “Nah, don’t, if you cut if off, you won’t be able to go to work tomorrow and make money.”?
The reason I was so furious is because all three of the reasons he gave me only concerned my capabilities as a birthing machine. He didn’t spare any thought about my thoughts and feelings. Like he thinks the reason I’m going through maximum 10 out of 10 pain just to have a second kid as soon as possible, just to make it more convenient to get abortions or IUDs.
Are mothers nothing more than a birthing machine?
So, I went off to find a friend of mine who worked at the same hospital and asked her what kind of connections I need to pull to get a C-section.
She asked me, “Even WHO is paying a lot of attention to vaginal delivery rates. Do you think they’re doing that because they’re concerned about world-wide birth rates? C-sections are easier and more profitable for the hospital to do—why wouldn’t the hospital want to make more money in less time?”
That made me think.
Next she explained to me that compared to other illnesses, for example, vaginal delivery is like a conservative plan of treatment. C-sections are like going for surgery. And a key to hospital’s plans of treatment is to avoid all unnecessary surgeries, because surgeries necessarily come with risk. For example, what about infection risk? What about pelvic adhesions? What if a doctor screwed up and damaged your organs? All of these risks are much more serious than the pelvic floor muscle damage or haemorrhoids that might happen in the course of a vaginal delivery. The reason people don’t hear about this is because they’re relatively rare, and they’re as immediately obvious afterwards as pelvic floor damage.
The reason the WHO cares so much about promoting vaginal delivery is to avoid the unnecessary damage that a C-section causes to a woman’s body. The reason the government puts a quota on C-section rates is to prevent hospitals from pushing C-sections on people that it’s not suited for.
All the other reasons like having a second kid, getting an IUD, they’re all reasons for vaginal delivery, but they’re not the main reason that vaginal delivery is promoted.
After I heard her out, I finally calmed down. And at that point, I realised why most women are so against vaginal delivery. Because there are so few sources educating people on this. And all the existing educational resources are all coming at this from the point of view of more throughly exploiting women as birthing machines.
Even my own doctor, a renowned expert in the best hospital in one of the largest cities in China, didn’t tell me anything about the additional risks of a C-section. All he cared about is how vaginal delivery aids in further child birth.
All my friends repeat that C-sections take longer to recovery from, with the unspoken words of, “So you can take care of your kid sooner”. Otherwise, what does it matter if I’m laid in bed for three months?
And even the false claim that vaginal delivery makes kids smarter, still assumes that it’s the mother’s job to sacrifice herself for her kid.
But when it comes to education people about the downsides of vaginal delivery, it’s all coming from the mother’s point of view—you’ll be in a lot of pain, you’ll leak pee, you’ll tear, you’ll get haemorrhoids…
People who support C-sections treat women like human beings. People who support vaginal delivery treat women like tools. Is it any wonder which one women prefer?
If you told women who support C-sections all the associated risks, and teach them recovery methods for vaginal delivery, plenty of them change their minds.
Finally, let’s talk about my attitude towards C-sections.
C-sections appeared as a way to solve difficult births. It is meant to be an emergency procedure when vaginal delivery is not possible. It’s meant to save lives, but it was not meant as a normal, routine way of giving birth.
I still believe that it’s women’s right to choose how they want to give birth. But this is only with the pretext that she’s making an informed choice after learning about all the pros and cons of delivery methods.
Hospitals don’t have the right to decide on behalf of women. They have no right to require that you have to meet certain qualifications before you can get a C-section. They have no right to require that you must get a C-section.
All hospitals should do is teach people the pros and cons and respect their decisions.
But this causes another problem—women’s decisions are going to depend on the information they get from their doctors. If the government doesn’t intervene, then some hospitals are bound to exaggerate dangers to trick women into asking for C-sections.
But if the government mandates certain C-section rates, then that takes away from women’s choice.
So this is a very difficult problem.”
A famous Chinese director is mad as hell because he bought jade beads on the internet to make into a bracelet, only to find it’s fake jade. He showed screenshots of his conversations with the jade seller, where he bought the jade beads for 3800 RMB each, after confirming they’re high-quality ice-type jade. He attached photos of what he was promised and what he received.
Comments make fun of him, “He’s off by at least two orders of magnitude on the price, what was he expecting?”
“Who the hell buys jade on the internet?”
A compilation of absolutely goddamn adorable little babies and their life as full-time kiddos.
The conversation in the last clip goes, “Mommy hopes that you’ll grow up just as happy as you are now.”
Kiddo replies, “Nah, that’s impossible. When I grow up, I’m going to have to go to work every day like you.”
The section on C-sections is really fascinating. Another example of just how *detailed* sexism is; it has so many varied consequences within every social institution.
Really fascinating mix today! The story about forcibly preventing child models' growth is so horrific if true