see you keep saying that and you'll fit right in as an educationally neglected Gileadite

probably you're less weirded out than they are about the fact that we're cool with masturbation though

I'm still pretty dang sure that I am at some point going to say the most un-Gileadite thing ever and not notice.

Well it's not really good for you but when has that stopped anybody? Don't tell me Gilead also frowns on fried food.

Oh, masturbation's fine actually. Good for you. Prevents prostate cancer.

Gileadites think ideally you should not experience sexual attraction to or romantic interest in anyone other than your spouse.

Okay, yes, so, *ideally*, but-- have Gileadites ever interacted with actual human beings. Do they spend all the time locked up in their houses and have you failed to tell me.

They think that if you try very hard you can be perfect. And all that happens is a bunch of kids who are scared that whenever they fall in love they're giving away a piece of their heart to someone and wronging their future spouse.

...I'm not saying that you can't wrong your future spouse. But. Falling in love?

Because you're only supposed to love one person in your whole life, you know. If you love two you're stealing something from your spouse they have a right to expect.

Not all of them end up doing this but-- it's there. For all of them. As what they're supposed to be doing.

I'm too Cascadian for this shit, I have a husband and a partner like a normal person.

That sounds. Suffocating

(He is just... not going to touch the husband thing. Because at this point if he's stuck in Cascadia, now is the time to be merely internally baffled.)

It really is.

My partner is from Gilead. They, uh. Spent a lot of time crying on my bed watching bad movies full of explosions.

Ah. That little speech was from experience.

Bad movies with lots of explosions really work better than they should. Everything is awful, but, oh look, pretty fire and colours!

You should try a Cascadian movie since probably you'll be less scandalized than a Gileadite about the experience.

I'm assuming an equal number of explosions but a greater number of love triangles.

Why would we have love triangles when we can simply solve them with polyamory!

Okay, so equal explosions, but at the end the hero dramatically kisses his wife *and* his lover. And someone learns a valuable lesson about teaching children to use explosives.

Yes, exactly! And sometimes someone bad is in charge of the government so you murder them about it.

... aren't you a democracy?

Well, typically in our movies the bad politicians who are in need of murdering are dictators, and then a democracy is established afterward.

...

well that's so much better.

Sorry, this is not one of the areas of values difference I'm used to being sensitive about, even Gilead is allegedly a democracy.

I'll get used to it, I'm sure.

Because 'are you sure democracy is as good as it sounds?' or 'rebellions have historically ended up with chaos and also swords to my own throat' would Not Be Helpful Replies

Anyway if you need anything I'll be around, it's the weekend and Rose and Asher will be at Folsom until Wednesday.

I'll let you know if something comes up. Thank you!

He should probably see if he can Bureaucracy his way GED-wards. That's probably the highest priority. And less like poking a bleeding mouth hole sore tooth than reading more Wikipedia.

There are GED practice tests!

The language arts section is exactly what he spent his entire childhood education doing, modulo some confusion about what the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is and why one might want to drill for cooking oil in it. The math he understands, but his education seems to be located a little to the left of what they want. The technologically advanced people helpfully gave him a detailed understanding of both English grammar and math notation. (They invented this numeral "zero" which seems very nifty.)

The science section involves phrases like "kilojoules of energy" and "a genotype of Bb with brown eye color" and "evaluate the frictional work." The social studies section has more familiar words, setting aside proper nouns, but there are a bunch of pictures he doesn't know how to interpret and questions like "how did the earliest settlers arrive in America?" and "where did the Maori people migrate to from Polynesia?", and even if he sees something he thinks he knows the right answer to like "what would happen if the government forbade anyone from importing goods?" it tells him he has the wrong answer. 

He does at least get the one about the definition of filial piety right. 

One question right! Truly he is a Master of Future Social Studies. The future needs less history. There has been enough. Oh and they should also have a normal government (or people who interact with governments in a normal way.)

He has one solution.

Hi Lev. I'm assuming Educationally Neglected Gileadites have some way of finding out who the Maori are and where they're going, and what a 'genotype' is?

Also you have too much history. You should put some back.

There are textbooks, and classes you can do online at your own pace, and online classes that meet at a certain time, and Portland is big enough that we have in-person classes. 

Which one you want depends on your learning style and how rapidly you want to cram history and science into your brain.

I am sorry about the amount of history. A year of it keeps happening every year, you see.