fact or fiction
Is it a fact or is it merely fiction? Fact or Fiction explores relationship myths and truths to get your head out of the clouds and back into romantic reality.
My Call Is Important
You don't see it until you hit it. That's the thing about modern systems. They look like open doors. They look like pathways. The website is clean, the buttons are bright, the language is welcoming. Apply Now. Get Started. Join Us. It feels like invitation.
By Edward Smith4 days ago in Humans
Please Stay on the Line
The phone rang on a Tuesday. I knew who it was before I looked at the screen. The bank. It had been ringing for three days. Same time. Same number. I let it go to voicemail the first two times. On the third day, I answered.
By Edward Smith4 days ago in Humans
The Octopus: A Parable
There once was an octopus that lived in a beautiful reef on the edge of the sea. He had eight perfect tentacles he could use to swim, and catch his food, and hold onto the rocks when the tide was strong so he wouldn’t be swept out into the dark, dangerous, deep waters.
By Ophelia Keane Braeden4 days ago in Humans
The Tomb Called Justice
The courthouse looms at the town’s center like a tomb that refuses to stay closed, a monument of cold marble and older secrets. Its columns do not merely support a roof; they form the ribcage of an idea—that human suffering can be bled out, measured, and bottled in the name of peace. Above the bench, the scales hang like the iron skeleton of a trapped bird, eternally suspended in a room that smells of dust and the metallic tang of old fear.
By Ginny Brown4 days ago in Humans
The Immune System’s "Civil War": When the body forgets its own identity and begins to dismantle the nervous system.
The smell of scorched copper and old, damp wool hit me first, rising from the patient's bedside like a foul incense. It was 3:14 AM. The woman in the cot didn't move her legs. She couldn't. She looked at them with a visceral detachment, as if they were two heavy logs left behind by a stranger. Her own T-cells, the very soldiers meant to protect her from the rot of the world, were currently stripping the insulation from her nerves. It was a microscopic demolition. It was a silent, internal arson. I watched her hand tremble as she reached for a glass of water—a jagged, stuttering motion that spoke of a command signal lost in a fraying wire.
By The Chaos Cabinet4 days ago in Humans
Falling Between Every System
Modern social systems are often described as safety nets. Employment law protects workers. Healthcare programs provide treatment. Disability benefits replace lost income. Unemployment insurance bridges job loss. Each system is presented as a safeguard designed to catch people when life disrupts their ability to function normally. Yet for many people living with disability, chronic illness, or injury, the lived experience is the opposite. Rather than forming a net, these systems stack vertically, each with its own eligibility rules, thresholds, and assumptions. Instead of catching the fall, they create gaps. People do not slip through because they failed to try. They fall because the systems were never designed to align.
By Peter Thwing - Host of the FST Podcast5 days ago in Humans
