"When Seligman studied learned helplessness in dogs, he found that traumatized dogs refused to escape even when the threat was no longer present. The dogs had learned that attempting escape or action increased their pain, so they stopped trying. In order to get them to leave their perceived prisons researchers had to drag the dogs out, resulting in an uncomfortable yet necessary visceral experience of escape. When an individual is taught that action is dangerous, they will not act. If I learn movement is dangerous, I won’t move. If I learn setting boundaries is dangerous, I won’t set boundaries. If I must comply to stay safe, I will continue to comply even when I have other choices."

excerpt from ‘A Trans Body’s Path in Eight Folds’ from Pass with Care: Memoirs by Cooper Lee Bombardier (2020)

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celeste mountjoy

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from Solmaz Sharif’s “Near Transitive Properties of the Political and Poetical: Erasure”

kai cheng thom, from a place called no homeland

Dante Émile, tender spots