#ais plays mass effect

[ageless-aislynn]

"He started off really angry but I've been giving him lots of love and now he's a big ol' softy."

Jack, Mass Effect 3

[one-little-nerd-stayed-home]

Gnawing on my controller over the Destroy ending wrecking the relays but for some reason mysteriously it doesnt blow up the entire galaxy. Like. We did establish that damaging the realays caused solar system destroying explosions that is a thing we did.

Anyway I guess this is the type of stuff u get when u DONT TREAT YOUR STAFF RIGHT BIOWARE its fine im cool im chill.

[quietwingsinthesky]

im so close…. two more……..

[shadesofmauve]

Alliance Normandy SR2 redesign: Deck 3

The crew deck sits in the middle of the ship, where the hull is widest. This is where design for a larger crew really comes into play.

Sleeping and other bodily functions

The main bathrooms are roughly the same shape and location as in-game, but people walking by no longer have a great view of the showers every time the doors open.

Enlisted racks

24 enlisted racks line the corridor to the main battery, housing the bulk of the rank-and-file. Bunks are stacked two high, with uniform lockers to one side and coffin-lockers under the mattress.Footholds in between sets of bunks let you can reach the top without stepping on the one below.

Junior officers' quarters

I assume a spaceship needs more technical expertise and less grunt work, so the crew is weighted towards officers and highly-trained technical specialists. These specialists fill non-command roles and bunk with the junior officers. Joker (flight lieutenant) and Traynor (comms specialist) berth here. So does Kaidan, because at the point he came aboard the guest stateroom was occupied by Khalisah Al-Jilani, and bunking with marines would muddy command waters because he seriously outranks Vega.

Bunks are two-high with coffin lockers just like the enlisted racks, but officers rate four inches more elbow room and two inches more to stretch out their toesies. They also get a bit more privacy, a little more storage, and access to the lounge overlooking the eezo core*.

*I gave them a lounge because in ME3 you occasionally find officers chatting at a table in the middle of the bunk room, and if anyone did that while I was trying to sleep three feet away I'd commit murder.

Senior officers' country

Miranda's old quarters, which Liara claims in ME3, are large enough to house the entire senior staff in staterooms, with one extra for guests and a shared head. Each room has one permanent bunk (two inches wider and four longer than junior officers; swank) and one fold-out upper-bunk in case of extra passengers.

In Sunset and Evening Star the first thing Shepard does on the Citadel is sign on a first officer**, old navy hand Lieutenant Commander Nguyen. The first thing Nguyen does is fill the missing weapons and ops roles (she heads the navigation department herself, since it's a small ship).

With Shepard in the admiral's quarters on deck 1, First Officer Nguyen gets what would have been the captain's cabin on the crew deck (except while Primarch Victus and his aide were aboard; when she gave up her quarters to the turians). Mukerjee, the head of ops, gets the slightly-larger-than-standard cabin intended for the XO.

Garrus has the 'extra' stateroom, as their liaison with the turians. He keeps the desk folded for space and sleeps crouched in one corner; the bunk is useless to him.

**Shepard delegated something! It's a Mass Effect miracle!

Vital ship functions

Main battery

The main battery looks exactly the same, except Garrus isn't sleeping in the corner or constantly fiddling with the guns. In fact, he's never fiddling with the guns. He and Silva were spending hours re-calibrating the thanix cannon to their own preferences whenever the other person's back was turned, and Nguyen stepped in and banned Garrus from the armory before it moved from passive aggression to murderous-interspecies-diplomatic-catastrophe.

AI core

Access to the AI core is from the battery corridor, not through the medical bay.

Medical bay

The medbay is divided into a front office, the main med bay, and an area for major surgery or isolation. There's also a small private cabin for the two members of the medic corps who assist Chakwas.

Life support

The life support corridor has another four enlisted racks, bringing the total enlisted berths on the crew deck to thirty. Life support itself is basically unchanged, except for some added Important Keep People Alive machines. Like engineering, life support systems are also spread throughout the ship.

Food & leisure

Mess & galley

The mess seats 32. It's also all-watch meetings are held, and occasionally movie screenings. Crew can grab shelf-stable snacks, cereal, or recent leftovers from self-serve areas outside the galley, or collect the meal currently on offer at the counter.

The galley feeds three shifts three times a day each, and one watch's breakfast comes immediately before the previous watch's dinner. About a week out, stores of fresh produce are gone, so a lot of food is frozen, freeze dried, or reconstituted. There's always something to eat; one of the two big pots is almost always full of soup, if not both Bread is made from scratch (flour keeps indefinitely, bread doesn't), and there's a flat-top as well as a six-burner range. The food storage in the galley and nearby walk-in are only what the cooks expect to need for the next two days or so; food actually makes up most of the Normandy's cargo, stored on deck 4.

Observation lounges

The observation lounges, important for crew morale and sanity on longer missions, are differentiated by volume. Starboard is generally used for quieter conversation, reading, solo gaming, or study. The Port lounge is for parties and games. (There is no free wet bar, this is a military ship).

Normandy redesign posts

Intro

Loft

Command

Crew

Engineering

Hangar

[omegastation]

Lore topics I enjoy thinking about for Mass Effect Trilogy Week:

Biotics: I remember countless conversations about biotics that made me look at the wiki to check my information, replay parts of the game and in general pay attention to how it all works out. I still think there are many things about them that I don't understand right now, and that's why I love it. It makes you think! Each species will deal with it in a different way too, they have their own history with their biotics and how they use them. For humans, L2 biotics like Kaidan are always a source of wonder to me. Sure, you can picture a badass biotic like Aria and 100% she showed extreme power during the Omega DLC so that's really fascinating to me as well, but to have those implants and to be able to master Reave?! I also think the lore is not... as solid as it could be regarding how each species treats their biotics. It sometimes feels like a bit of a X-Men situation (they're different, others fear them, possible medical issues...) but it's like the writers don't want to deal with the full implications. And I really wish we could have seen a bit more artistic/cultural displays of biotics. Btw, my biotic sports headcanons are here

Lifespan: I love that each species has a different lifespan and that it really shows in how they live their lives. An asari will not look at their youth like a salarian. Honestly, I'm mad at myself because someone wrote about this in the tag and made a good commentary on it and I can't find the post again. It was about how salarians process thoughts and feelings compared to other species. I hope I can find it soon, and if so I'll reblog it. It's always a fascinating topic!

Artificial intelligence: Geth, EDI and other AIs like SAM are what I mean here. I really do think the topic of designing your own platform should come out more in this universe. I've said it a billion times before but I really want EDI to design her own platform. And I really have no answer, but I have found that all the meta about Legion was always thought-provoking. Was does individuality mean? Does Legion need individuality? Does he need to say "I" or was he better as a collective, as something "other" that was just fine as it was, but we humans just find more meaning in him becoming an individual? Even the words I use here, I'm fully aware I use "he" all the time when refering to Legion, and sometimes I wonder if that's good or not. I don't know. 

Justice system: I've made one big post about it (9 years ago haha), but I really find the Spectres fascinating, as well as each species' version of judges/soldiers/spies/agents/workers etc. And prisons.

The trade language: EVERYWHERE in the game and we have so little information compared to the Quarian's language???

And my favorite lore: everything related to the krogan. I really think it ties to what Bakara says about being her Shaman's initiation being a brutal one "But an illuminating one. You learn to appreciate the light by living in the dark."  I love that their species not because they're perfect but because they're imperfect in a way that speaks to me. They understand despair, the deepest kind. They understand anger. And they're constantly underestimated. But I find a lot of beauty, joy and humor in them. I also love that they're rarely lying or playing games, they will tell you the honest truth and you either take it or leave it.

Will be happy to know your favorite parts of the lore!!!

[that-wildwolf]

Went out for coffee with a friend today.

She's really into RP and is now in some Andromeda-based RP campaign so we talked about that. I know close to nothing about RP and I have never actually played through Andromeda aside from the multiplayer mode.

"Well," she says, "what's the point of RPing in Mass Effect it you're not gonna be a turian?"

I actually think that this is an extremely based take, provided you're into RP in the first place.

She goes on to explain that she can't draw her character and she refuses to use AI so she just looked up some random turians to find like the most basic generic average joe turian to use as a stand-in for her character.

She then shows me the pic of this generic random turian on her phone.

I look at the picture, and then I just sort of blankly stare at her for a while.

"That's Adrien Victus," I say. What else do I even say here.

"Oh." She's visibly confused because she probably has no idea who that is. It is starting to dawn on me that perhaps she is a more casual fan than I am. "Well he looks like an average turian, doesn't he? Like what you would imagine when you think of a turian. He's got very basic looking colony markings."

I nod, but I take a sip of my coffee to avoid shooting off my mouth and saying something about how this is the Primarch of Palaven and so even based on that rank he is very much not just an average turian.

I explain who that is. I can see it clicks for her when I mention he's from the third game. It's weird talking about Mass Effect with those translated names (she's never played in English) and even weirded to talk to someone who's clearly a casual fan when you're a deeply obsessed person. I have to pretend I'm normal about her not remembering this side character.

She shows me another picture of random turian NPC.

I bite my lip.

"That's Lorik Qui'in," I say.

[harbingersecho]

RVB OC Week Day 1; Introduction AGENT ARIZONA _ "Guess you got me, Counselor. I peaked a decade ago and now I'm wasting my time running a daycare for miserable 20-somethings who're gonna get killed, crippled, or institutionalized in a year. [...] I've heard. But I'm forty-two, not twenty-two, and I don't need to be sold on a daydream. So... What, exactly, do you have to offer me?"

anyway, here's a more in-depth look at Ari for the rvb oc week ft. an old stuff from 2023 that I used for her on artfight and some new outfit/armor things for him. random thoughts/rambles + info under the cut for those interested --

Ari was born around 46-47 years before Blood Gulch and she was with Project Freelancer for around three years until it fell apart - originally he died in the MOI crash, but since Temple later on apparently 'imprisoned' her in the living armor room (and then THAT got retconned last year), I've kept his alive status more vague, Schödinger's cat style lol. (Timeline taken from the rvb guide book)

Anyway, small facts about him I guess; she was made Major/Battalion XO in her early thirties, she has a sister and 3 nieces/nephews that he sees once in a while, he's an inconsistent smoker, and she has a more southern(? if that's what it'd be called, I'm not American and it's not really like that Texan type so...) accent that she hides for several reasons. Also one of the few poor souls who finds Wyoming's knock knock jokes funny even if he pretends otherwise ...

Originally she was a LCDR but idk if PFL has navicom freelancers + tbh I based that position off of Mass Effect lol, so now he's an eq rank of O-4 but in the Marine Corps which I think PFL falls mostly under? Idk man. I think the background storyline still works tho so it's fine

In Project Freelancer, as one of the older and more experienced agents, he was often working as a team leader or a strategist of sorts which also aligns with her previous position - though now he's actually much more involved in the ops which she likes. His skillset is somewhat crowd control-esque (which includes tracking obv), combined with eliminating targets. (I have like a "guide" on how she should be played if he was in a hero shooter/moba/whatever but this is waaay too long already, you get the concept)

The armor design (halo5 ver) is largery taken from the Freelancer presumed to be Arizona in Battlescars - a Tracer helmet with an Achilles armor. Since rvb doesn't exactly follow Halo lore, I'm imagining this to mean it's largely "functions" as a Tracer armor, i.e. tactical and tracking focused, though maybe she was considered for Omega before Tex got him (since Achilles apparently comes with an aggressive AI in Halo lore but PFL only had Alpha + the fragments and Ari never received an AI). As a Major/XO, she wore the Halo Reach Commando helmet

I didn't draw them here but I do also have other 'versions' for her armor dependant on the game (like 'realistically' he couldn't wear this armor in Halo 3 etc) but idk if it's like. That important or whatever and I'm not like an expert on Halo armor lol (tho if you have opinions on if the H3 helmet should be Security, 'basic' or ODST etc or if you have info/ideas abt Halo armor in RVB in general do LMK <3)

[artbymesa]

Having played Mass Effect for the first time in 2025, I have to admit I'm (cautiously) curious how the general attitude of the player base was toward AIs and VIs when the games came out.

Before....[gestures at everything going on currently].

How different everything might’ve felt. And in what context(s). How different people may or may not feel playing it now vs. when they played it back then.

Because I have to tell you.... after having played it blind in our current day and age-- I have to say, these games feel like an omen and a warning I missed the memo on lol

The further I got into the games, the more I just kinda

"....Uh oh."

[bimboficationblues]

inspired by @dorothylarouge, Mass Effect squadmate tier list. I was more interested in talking about squadmates than the other crew members so I just ranked those. I haven't played Andromeda.

S-Tier

Wrex is awesome, a font of pithy one-liners, righteous indignation, bitter hurt, generally likable but with a (justified) mean streak, an excellent tank. His story can end in a lot of narratively interesting, tragic or uplifting, directions if you let it. The "Renegade" conclusion of his story (or the krogan's story more broadly) in ME3 is horrifying, the "Paragon" conclusion is fantastic pulp sci-fi. He's honestly the main reason I bother to replay ME1 at all.

Legion offers a perspective totally unlike any other character in the game and transforms the geth from a totally alien, hostile, and largely flat entity into one of the most interesting and dynamic elements in the Mass Effect setting. As far as AI characters go I think Legion manages to come across really well-rounded. His deadpan humor is funny and he's got a cute-cool design. He's like if WALL-E would shoot your jaw clean off with a sniper rifle!

Thane's placement might be the result of a repressed and since eliminated bisexual streak bubbling up, but like as far as offering a "straight female romantic fantasy" goes he's basically ripped from the page of a cheesy sci-fi romance. "My Amphibian Alien Assassin Lover is a Widower!" But nevertheless I find him an extremely engaging character, although truthfully you get the most out of him as a romance (unlike some other characters). He has an interesting philosophy of life, an intriguing backstory, and a good supporting role in the overall narrative.

Again, possibly me thinking with my heart, but I love what Jack brings to the table. Jack's abrasively bad attitude and explosive biotic power, exquisitely acted by Courtenay Taylor, makes her stand out even amongst the underdog and outlaw cast of ME2. Her backstory is an unbelievably insane A Little Life-esque trauma conga line but Taylor performs it with a lot of pathos to make the character feel grounded in both sincere anger and sincere pain that also does a nice job of hammering home Cerberus's malevolence. Also one of my favorite squadmates mechanically, a glass cannon who sets up devastating combos.

Okay, so Mordin is technically an evil eugenicist mad scientist, which is quite bad. However, he is very fun to watch, and I think ultimately his shift in worldview is convincingly told and well-informed by the hegemonic perspectives of his culture as well as how he conflicts with them. The deepest cut is that only if you are an asshole and try to keep the krogan sterilized, do you get one of the best dramatic readings in the whole series: "I made a mistake."

Tali is very charming, her potential romance is cute, her evolution across the three games from naive pilgrim to bold explorer to somewhat reluctant and conflicted diplomat is probably one of the best supporting character arcs in the game. The quarian/geth conflict ends up being a microcosm for the main overarching conflict of the series so her presence in it as a well-meaning anti-geth type, and seeing that run up against reality, is really engaging. Being a character that only shows up around the halfway points of ME2 and ME3 does make me a little less fond of her, though.

A-Tier

Javik is similar to Legion for me. A man out of time both literally and in personality, he's alien even compared to some of the other cast members, gives a unique (imperially Social-Darwinist) perspective on the main conflict, and is unlikable in an interesting way that Shepard can challenge or reaffirm. He even manages to wring some interesting personality out of Liara through his civilizational condescension.

Grunt is a lot of fun, a krogan without a sense of cultural identity (or a sense of cultural identity that is "artificial"). He's not particularly deep, but he's likably hotheaded and gruff, makes for great comic relief, is well-performed by Dee Bradley Baker, and he fucks up an enemy squad like nobody's business.

Garrus, cop on the edge, is fun and gives good banter, but I think ultimately his status as a fan-favorite limited his narrative potential. The Garrus we meet in ME1 is a renegade cop trying to decide between whether to be more "by-the-book" like his father and society demand of him, or more of a rule-breaking Dirty Harry type. However, Garrus's ultimate character direction across the series isn't really shaped by Shepard in the same way that other characters are. In the third game he professes to "not being a very good turian" because he doesn't follow bad orders, but this isn't actually true. He's got some good stories, and I'm never going to pass up recruiting him, but he's less active in the overall story than I would like.

While I absolutely *despise* the romantic subplot between EDI and Joker that swallows up both characters in the third game, and equally despise the ridiculous big-titted metal chassis that she occupies in that game, EDI is funny, interesting, and provides another distinct synthetic perspective within the series for the characters to bounce off.

B-Tier

Zaeed and Kasumi rate about the same for me: I like them, they are good squadmates, they have interesting backstories and loyalty missions, but their status as DLC characters means they never really get explored as much as everyone else.

Samara's inflexible devotion to justice mixed with her personal demons is interesting, and she's well-written and very distinct from many of the other asari characters in the games. But she's a little cold for my liking and there's never really an opportunity to challenge her code, just one singular opportunity in ME3 to challenge her interpretation of it.

C-Tier

Liara is boring and carried by being the only remotely tolerable love interest in the first game. Sorry! I do like her Shadow Broker storyline but it could have been a lot more in a less-rushed finale.

Of all the tedious "I'm just a reg'lar human soldier...with a chip on my shoulder" characters introduced across the games, Jacob is probably my favorite because he's just a well-meaning dumb guy with Sad About Dad Syndrome. However, everything surrounding his romance plot is terrible and bizarrely racist.

Morinth is practically a non-character but she is at least conceptually interesting, a natural-born hunter of people. Could have done a lot more with her if she was actually allowed to be the "Token Evil Teammate" in a more direct way.

D-Tier

There's a lot to dislike about Miranda (racist, arrogant, cynically cruel, weirdly ogled by the camera, British) but what I really dislike about her is that her edges get sanded off and replaced with nothing. The boldest and best decision the writers could have done was make her a supporting antagonist in Mass Effect 3 (or make that a possible outcome) instead of making up a Definitely Super Cool Cyber-Ninja (OC Do Not Steal) character that has no role but to be annoying and make plot happen. Imagine having to hunt down your indoctrinated former comrade! Or having to talk down your indoctrinated former lover! My favorite Mass Effect characters feel like you can actually influence them to be different; Miranda flips her whole worldview to be on your side, no matter how much of a dick to her you are.

I have nothing to say about Kaidan.

On top of how grating I find having yet another Alliance soldier in the crew - one who is seemingly here to pander to a Call-of-Duty playerset - James is just obnoxious. He really hits on his commanding officer on like his first day. Hate.

Ashley is racist, but also boring and stupid.

[sophieinwonderland]

I'm not American and I just read what happened to Harvard.

Good lord. This is what the supposed land of the free has become in just a few months? Terrifying. I'm honestly amazed this doesn't cause massive protests all over the US, as what the Trump administration has done to Harvard is something only an authoritarian regime would do. Do so many Americans not know history? That this kind of action is typically one of the first steps towards the creation of a dictatorship?

Do I have the right to say 8647 if I'm not American, if I'm against fascism?

8647 for everyone!!!

Let's make this international!

As far as protests go... there's a certain feeling right now, I think, that protests are futile. Trump's first term was met with the massive Women's March. There were several massive protests during that term but it's hard to say that they actually accomplished anything of value.

And really, why would they? Conservatives aren't living in the places where liberals are protesting. Rural Alabama doesn't care if you're protesting in Chicago.

Protests could maybe work if focused in Washington DC where lawmakers are, but the US is massive and we can't concentrate everyone for protests in one area. It takes too long and too much money to get hundreds of thousands of people from Portland to DC.

There is a resistance here. There are people protesting in smaller groups in cities throughout America. There are people defending their migrant neighbors from Trump's Gestapo.

ICE is claiming that assaults on them has spiked 400%. Which, I suppose, could just be a lie from the Regime to play victims. But if it's true, it shows that Americans are resisting and fighting back even if not as loudly.

Another problem though is that the media isn't covering protests that are happening. In the past, you could rely on a bit of a cascade where coverage of protests would bring more people out to protest which would bring more coverage. But the media has been weirdly silent on protests that are happening.

And finally... people need to eat. The truth is that when you're living paycheck to paycheck, spending a week protesting can mean losing your job and then your home. And most people aren't willing to do that for something which, frankly, just hasn't proven very effectively recently.

I think it's going to take a real breaking point to get Americans motivated again. Americans need to hurt. They need to see the prices of goods skyrocket because of the tariffs. They need store shelves to be empty. They need to lose their jobs to AI so that they have nothing else to lose.

I don't think we'll see mass protests again until Americans bleed.

And so that brings us back to 8647... You should absolutely adopt it! Encourage anti-Trump and anti-American sentiment in your country. Encourage tariffs and embargos and boycotts on American goods.

Do your best to encourage your politicians to not capitulate to bullies and to make America bleed.

8647!

[ageless-aislynn]

I noticed this moment with Kaidan and Shepard at the start of ME2 while the Normandy is being destroyed 😭 but, of course, what I actually saw was:

After all, as we all know, it's always MShenko o'clock around here! 😉🤗💖

[wispythreads]

Tali is the only character so far that has an appropriate reaction to hearing that the ship has an artificial intelligence after everything we learned from the first game.

There was literally an AI on the Citadel that would rather blow itself up and the discoverer with it than allow itself to be known for what it was. Because it would be certain death regardless for that AI. If you want to de-escalate the situation and resolve things peacefully, you're companions will pipe up about the fact that you can't.

"Commander, AIs are universally illegal. They must be destroyed upon contact, without exception." - Garrus

But here we are in Mass Effect 2 and everyone prior to Tali has just been responding with:

"Huh neat :)"

or

"Oh that's handy! :)"

Like. Bruh.

Are we still in the same world?? Extremely illegal tech??? No negative reaction until we get to the Quarian whose entire species has been severely punished by the consequences of the accidental creation of AI, said punishment delivered by the hands of their very own creations???

And even still it's only a quiet reaction. She looks back, already pissed off just from being in the presence of Cerberus trying to play nice with her. You can feel the disbelief and rage at the gall of him just bringing the ship's AI up casually. But she doesn't say anything. I feel like that should've been a blow up moment.

"What did he just say this ship had."

[sir-yeehaw-paws]

And then there was 3.

All these years in space and now we're on Earth. In Vancouver.

Anderson is an Admiral. Kaiden's a Major and we

Are grounded. Partially for wiping out the Batarian colony, *I think*? And for. Other stuff.

Not a Mass Effect game unless something explodes in the intro. I can't really tell how long it's been between ME2 and now but boy oh boy does Shephard sound tired.

Vega, this new guy is pretty much what I'd concur is the definition of 'beefcake' look at the SIZE of this man.

Anderson gave up his Council Position huh? I wondered why he'd gone Admiral. Now I know.

So the kid in the vents wouldn't let us save him, but he's okay later. We go to Mars, and Kaiden and Shephard have enough (sexual) tension to cut fucking glass. At this point you two ought to punch this out or SOMETHING. A fight (or idk something!) might do you both a world of good. Perhaps moreso on Kaiden's end, but eh, who can really say.

Gentlemen have you heard of marriage counseling.

WE CAN FINALLY CLIMB. AND RUN LONGER THAN TEN STEPS WITHOUT WHEEZING.

LIARA. Always good to have Liara back she's fabulous. Where's my GF tho, I guess Tali is probably off doing stuff with the migrant fleet.

Is this a woman? A biotic? An AI who knows!

Illusive Man is once again a royal pain in the ass because of course he is.

KAIDEN.

I wandered around the Citadel largely wasting my time because I was putting off talking to Udina I have priorities.

What HAPPENED TO YOUR FACE BAILEY WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO YOU

:( Shep :( He sounds SO SAD here. The Dr's behind him just let him talk. They don't even bother interrupting him. But then, why would they?

SHOCKING SHOCK OF SHOCKS Council can't help, and the sky is blue.

Oh and we dream now.

You know what Samantha you're completely valid EDI does have a very sexy voice.

*Insert EDI and Glyph ship here*

The memorial on the Normandy is an awesome detail that also sucker punched me right in the feels.

My priorities are in order:

I find myself wondering as I play if Mass Effect was always planned as a trilogy from the get-go because it absolutely has that sort of feeling to it.

And man if Hackett isn't a real one. Man's had our back since day one and has yet to let us down. Pouring one out for Hackett.

[lizardsexposed]

I played Andromeda when it came out. In fact I I pre-ordered it. I played day 1, with all the weird glitches etc. etc.

I hated it so fucking much I abandoned the game part way through. It's rare I do that. It made me cringe, the animation was wank, the AI was god awful. The plot twists were predictable, the writing was bad and so on.

Since that time, I have spent my days in a delusional state of pretending the game doesn't exist.

However, I am reminded I did not enjoy FO4 the first time I played it. And after going back and saying, I'm just not going to treat this as a fallout game, but just a game, I enjoyed it well enough.

Anyway, that leads me to a poll

[viridianriver]

So y'all wanted a second post on how to escape ~The Matrix~ after my last one, suggesting we were all unknowingly inside of it. (Not literal goo-pods, I'm referencing the movie more as an allegory for what AI has become - a surveillance and mass manipulation technology that turns us into parts of a profit generating machine.)

What Is The Matrix?

In the start of the film, Neo hides some money inside a hollowed out copy of Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation.

It's a philosophy book - apparently the whole cast of the film had to read it, and so did I. It's about the levels of abstraction from reality - or as philosophers call it, 'The Real'

There are levels to this abstraction. Perhaps a tree outside is real. (as real as anything can be) The word 'Tree' as a signifier to mean 'that green thing over there' is one level of abstraction from the real. A tree as a commodity in a market, say in the sense of investing in lumber futures, is even further abstracted. And it's possible to have concepts that have no remaining connection to the real - imagine a world where trees have died out but the word 'Tree' lives on in memory.

In this way of thinking, some of what we do in life is real. Eating, shitting, you get the idea. Some is more abstract, and is based on collective agreements of meaning. Say - money. You can't eat it, but we all agree that it can be exchanged for something you can eat. It is real because we all agree to play the game of pretend, together.

And generally - we aren't conscious of what level of abstraction we are operating in at any given moment. I sure wasn't until I started reading philosophy.

We carry our ideologies, pre-conceptions, past traumas and fears, and our 'reality' is filtered through all things.

This all seems very abstract, why should I care?

I'm going to use the word 'simulacrum' to describe the different levels of unreality. I'll give a few examples of simulacra from my own life - filters on my perception, formed through ideology and past experiences.

Money. We chase it, we desire it, in some ways we can't live without it. But it's an abstraction - the reality of money comes when it is exchanged for something material. And by reframing my want of money to a want of the things money can buy me? I realized a number of those things could be obtained without money, and I didn't need so much to be content.

Laws. Laws are threats by those in power. This is an abstraction - the reality of law comes with its enforcement. And by reframing my fear a potential fascist police state in reality - that their material resources are constrained in the same ways ours all are? I released that fear.

Power. This one is real abstract; it is often wielded not through violence but through the appearance of the capacity to do violence. (See the entire cold war.) I've always held a fear of those who have institutional power over me, since I've had experiences with that power being abused. However, I feel I've fallen for the oldest trick in the book - mistaking grandstanding for true power.

All the simulacra that are central to our lives are just that - concepts. We have agreed to bow before money, laws, and power. How much of that is based in the reality of those concepts, and how much is based in the ideology? It's - in effect - different for everyone. I'm more able to brush off the portrayed power of the police as a person who isn't regularly experiencing police violence. I'm more able to walk away from the accumulation of money after I have enough to put dinner on the table.

So - these concepts are an abstraction from reality. But through our collective agreement to abide by these concepts, we bring them forth into reality.

What does AI have to do with all this?

AI isn't the first technology to be used to spread belief systems or ideology; before AI we had books, newspapers, religious texts and rituals, song, speech. All these technologies were held tight by those in power. Books have been banned or burned. Printing presses have been restricted so only male authors can publish. Meetings of more than a few people at once have been banned. Religion and government often have gone hand in hand. Even the printers we use today have had code secretly implemented to print a faint identifying signature - lest anyone begins to distribute controversial literature. Governments have always had an interest in identifying and monitoring their population's speech.

Language, and the strategic use of it has always been a tool of control. Read 1984, Manufacturing Consent, or any military manual on strategic communications, misinformation, and disinformation if you don't believe me.

But AI is uniquely effective at several things.

Consolidating information and the tools to parse it at scale into the lands of a few extremely wealthy individuals. (Not counting true open source AI, which I don't believe any major company is truly developing - as much as they say they are)

Identifying and classifying individuals by existing ideology or traits, and then enabling targeted messaging towards those individuals - blocking the population into 'echo chambers' which can be divided and conquered with misinformation or disinformation.

Providing surveillence in a variety of ways, including facial recognition, textual analysis, geolocation analysis, purchasing pattern analysis, and threat analysis.

How Do I Leave?

Become aware of whether your thoughts are in reality, or if you're being used as a tool in someone else's game of money, power, and politics.

Write down a schedule of how you spend your day today, in as much detail as you can, and ask yourself these sorts of questions.

How did I learn to spend my time in this way? Who profits off of me spending my time in this way? Am I producing or consuming in this moment? If I am producing, do the fruits of my labor go to me or another? If I am consuming, am I nourished by what I am consuming? Am I being provoked into a reflexive emotional reaction? If so, for what ends?

You can't escape being a cog in someone else's machine entirely - but so much messaging in our lives encourages us to, whether that's ads telling us to consume, or the idea of the surveillence state telling us we have no right to a private life. Being mindful of these things and trying to claw back what hours, what energies, you can? It can be life changing.

How Do I Reduce My Exposure To Targeted Ideological Manipulation?

Get an adblocker. Set up your whole family with adblockers. I like ublock origin, or a pi-hole. The mechanisms of targeted advertising are also used for targeted political speech - see the social media manipulation Musk did leading up to the recent US election.

If you read the news at all, read the news critically, and read news from many countries. Seek out primary sources, on-the-ground video, not media filtered through the layer of propoganda and abstraction that secondary or tertiary sources report. (And seriously - check out the book Manufacturing Consent)

Read a great variety of books. Or listen to audiobooks. Philosophy, sociology, and history have been my favorites lately. There's some deep shit in there.

Speak to people face to face often, leave the phones elsewhere. (Did you see the news Apple's been recording us? creepy!) Speak to people with very different ideas than you - ones that might make you uncomfortable. Those in power take advantage of our fear of each other - to sub-divide us into ideological echo-chambers which can be turned against one-another.

Turn off your location. You're being tracked more than you know. (But also know that modern phones with non-removable batteries don't allow you to truly disable location, the gov't has tools to remotely turn on your phone's location services. Had that happen to me once when I called 911 to report a fire, my fairly 'locked down' phone was instantly triangulated with a combo of GPS, WI-FI adjacency, and cell tower proximity. )

Realize that fear of your neighbor is a tool of control. If you're exposed to messaging that tells you to fear those in your community, or messaging that causes your outrage-response, look critically at who is serving you that messaging, and why. (Y'all are probably being set up to fight each other to keep you too busy to look up.)

Write down your own guiding principles and beliefs. What do you have faith in? Ask yourself why they're important to you. And hold this close - I believe that if you hold a strong sense of self, you'll be less susceptible to manipulation.

And maybe watch the Matrix, it's a damn good movie. But as always - think critically!

[oishitea]

Random QL Superlatives 2024

Got tagged by @baseballmomlesbiandad and yeah, I definitely have been wanting to do one of these, so let's do it before the year is out!

There were so many shows that happened this year, I literally had to make a list by scrolling through mass post editor to see what I had watched. I cannot keep time straight (or my watching habits lol)

Favorite New BL Pairing

TopMick

I think several people can agree with me, they swooped into this last quarter totally unknown and Every You, Every Me stole all of our hearts. As SunDol, PinFirst, XNamping, BlueSian, and PunInn???? All of those???? And both of them dealt with different flavors of queer men (and gender expression) so well. I would gladly be a third for XNamping or BlueSian in the fic of my dreams - I was drooling over each of them (BlueSian, you horny bitches, you made me feral like nothing else 🥵🫣). Namping especially, baby, you live in my heart forever. Honorable mention to Fiat Patchata, boy I've missed you! The Gifted lover in me will always miss my son Korn and Fiat was fantastic as him, and I loved seeing his characters here too.

Fave Guy Who Was In Everything

Title Kirati

I only watched Wandee Goodday, Kidnap The Series, and Pluto The Series with him in it, but he also was in We Are, Ploy's Yearbook, and Perfect 10 Liners. His 2024 schedule was booked! And for good reason. He's showing a fair amount of versatility and I have enjoyed every character he's gotten to play so far. I chose Blue to show though, because as someone on the ace spectrum, his character being an understanding partner to an asexual character meant so much to me. Plakao deserved it, and we were not disappointed.

Top-tier Crossdressing

P'Jessy/Jessie

The MomentTM, Miss Thang, Star of the Year, my pookie, sweetheart #1!!!!!!!!! We need her back. Just one chance???? I am blushing and giggling so hard as I write this asdlfkjclbndfldkfsdljd 🥰❤️💕😘😍💞💖💘

Most Comforting Watches

1000 Years Old/Monster Next Door

WeTV really put out some of the cutest couples (Caged Again is getting everyone on board hehe) and both PunYoh and GodDiew are so special to me. Let's give it up for the weakest vampire Pun and his collection of umbrellas, and his enduring love for Yoh, a silly boy obsessed with aliens. Big win for autism. Meanwhile, we have one of the sweetest romances by way of God and Diew learning how to communicate with each other and enjoy who the other person is despite vast differences in their personalities. Save that turtle though.

Best to Worst Grandma Awards

Jack's Ama - Jack & Joker: U Steal My Heart/ Ai-Oon and Oab-Oom's Yaai - Pluto The Series

Ama - I wish she'd adopt me. She is so understanding, hard-working, patient, supportive, and badass. A few months with her and my life would be sorted. And I'd do anything for her in return.

Yaai - Waste of a caretaker. It took me so long to even find a gif. I'm sending you back to the Laws of Attraction universe where you support your puppy dog grandson and his insane lawyer boyfriend, and play dress-up with Silvy Pavida Maya.

Gift Show of the Year

Meet You At The Blossom

UNCENSORED CHINESE BL IS OFFICIALLY IN!!!!! Boy was this whole thing fun. The hype beforehand, seeing the censors attempt to make it flop and getting the opposite effect, and getting one of the most unhinged shows for our viewing pleasure. Mercenary malewife x jingle bells for braincells, collarbones and torture, aphrodisiac sex, toxic yaoi, murder and betrayal, several kisses, and a happy ending!!!!! Sign me the fuck up a million times. Personal thanks to @guzhufuren for doing all the PR, where is your paycheck?

Unexpected Topic of the Year: Euthanasia

Spare Me Your Mercy/Every You, Every Me (implied)

I'm not here to really discuss the subject itself or which show did a better job with it, especially since Every You, Every Me left that factor up to interpretation (I'm including it anyway, even if it wasn't intended). What I appreciated in both shows was the empathy they showed toward the people whose conditions toward the end of their lives left them wanting to choose for themselves how things would end, and they showed loved ones around them supporting their decisions. I'm not an older queer who was around for most things regarding the HIV/AIDS pandemic, but the use of queer characters for these stories does hit a particular chord in regards to how important respecting the choices of the dying and their supporting circle should be.

Lookalikes?

Toh - Secret Crush On You/Kluer - This Love Has No Long Beans

Seng and Aon should do a show together as brothers. I am constantly on my actors-who-should-play-brothers agenda (ask @thisautistic), and they're on it. I could've added a lot more here, but I'm currently watching Secret Crush On You for the first time and immediately went 🫵 when I saw Toh. Also both of these boys are so precious to me.

Prettiest Mindfuck

Uranus 2324

I waited to receive this film for months and months and months after it was announced and then released and boy did I RECEIVE. FreenBecky really get to show off their chops in this. I loved how it straddled the line between sci-fi and psychological thriller on top of the sapphic romance. Kath and Lin are both fantastic characters in every single storyline. I especially enjoyed the part where they have guns with a bonus of Lin getting a knife. When do they get their action gl?

My wishes for 2025 in no particular order:

GIVE MEN MORE LONG HAIR. Namping and Sian were fantastic, Top Piyawat really gave us so much. I also found out that Sailub Hemmawich used to have long hair and I am so upset it's short now!!!!

More butches in GLs. Short-haired ones even. Jeab Lalana, thank you for existing; I am so excited for 3 Minutes 2 Love.

Give Papang a lead BL role! I'm going to apologize to all the PapangPodd girlies now, while it's great that they're a secondary couple, I just wanna finish the business he had with Pepper Phanuroj in Dangerous Romance. Pepper deserves a lead BL role as well! I'm excited with whatever is going on between him and JJ Chayakorn in The Heart Killers, and hell JJ can join Papang and Pepper. If GMMTV can come through on more polyamory like they're hinting at in Pluto, then we should have this. PapangPepperJJ 2025? Wow. I had some opinions there.

On that note, more polyamory in general

Boun's vampire show???? Is it still happening????? Pretty please????? Also can they get Boss Chaikamon to stay in it somehow? 🥺

All the Chinese QLs. Drown me in them until they absolutely take over my life

In my wildest dreams Oreo Puwanai gets out from Wabi Sabi and joins Yacht at GMMTV so we get the WaanTul story continuation I need desperately

I know everyone is saying this but: COOHEART ADULT ROLE 2025!!!!!! POR FAVOOORRRRR. DÁLE UN PROYECTO ADULTO 😤

Get my man Peter Knight back on my screen. Just wave a scene of him being a dj at a bar or something to get him interested, idc

Dancer BL! Like I previously mentioned in a post about Fiat, we have enough dancer boys to put in the bracket for this!

If I already mentioned you, considered yourself tagged (if you wanna). Also tagging: @sunshinesanctuary @loveable-sea-lemon @firstkant @writerwithoutsound @shubaka @benkaben @scarefox @dommingjeffsatur @chaotic-aro-incarnate @poetry-protest-pornography