Michael Lucas¹ :flan_molotov: on Nostr: She Who Must Be Obeyed worked for twenty years in inner city Detroit, caring for the ...

She Who Must Be Obeyed worked for twenty years in inner city Detroit, caring for the indigent mentally ill. The dude who's standing on top of a burned-out car arguing with the angels and losing? Yep, that's her people.

Among other things, she ran a support group for mentally ill prostitutes. She prescribed with an eye to "how many blowjobs does she have to get paid for to afford this med?" and discussed the choices in those terms with the patients.

One day the group all came up to her, gave her a card they'd made, and thanked her. Said she got them and she was a real hood rat.

SWMBO comes home. "I'm a hood rat? Is that good?"

Me: "I guess it's good? A 'one of us' thing?"

Much later, I took a good photo of one of my rats riding in SWMBO's hood. I posted it, same as usual, with a tag line of "Halloumi being a hood rat!"

One of my Black friends told me that was a derisive term for destitute black women.

Did I have malice? No. Could I have argued with that friend that I had no malice? Sure. What's the best way to show no malice? To shut up and fix it.

I thanked him, took the pic down, and reposted with a comment about going for a ride.

A Code of Conduct just says, in various forms, "Here are examples of what we won't put up with. When you screw up, we expect you to apologize and fix it." You don't have to know everything, you only must react well when the group says "Dude, that's over the line."

It doesn't have to be a big deal, if you have a little humility.

Also: I'm proud of SWMBO for being a real hood rat.