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pseudonymous-enthusiast · 2 months ago

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I find the idea of George Sr being a trans woman very fascinating and compelling. On one hand, I'm a little sad they dropped the storyline, but on the other hand...I’m grateful they stopped where they did, cause the way they were handling it already was not good and I don’t trust them, at that point, to handle trans stories, sorry Hurwitz and Co. In season four, George Sr being a woman is signified by him being emotional and insecure about his body which is...a choice. And on top of that, George becoming a woman and Oscar becoming more manly is "prophecized" by what George believes to be a hallucination of an ancient foreboding warrior harbinger, telling him that "the strong will become the weak. The weak will become the strong," the strong being men and the weak being women so...again, wildly questionable implications there. And I think the main problem is that these assertions are never questioned. The joke is woman emotional, woman weak. The characters in Arrested Development are bigoted all the time, but when they say something ignorant, we’re laughing at them, not with them, and the George Sr trans jokes in season four are written like the latter.

But the potential of trans woman George Sr is my Roman Empire, so here's my pitch as to how they could’ve done it:

(Season 4)

So, similar to this season being Gob's breaking point in terms of the queerness he's been repressing, it's also George Sr.'s breaking point. George Sr’s manhood is propped up by his sexual exploits. Later during Cinco, a “testosterone test” is used both literally and to mean, as a man, having sex and performing well. He sees it as a way of proving manhood. But with his testosterone waning, he’s unable to have sex and thus unable reassure himself of his masculinity. No longer able to push away the thoughts and dysphoria surrounding his gender, he’s more regularly distressed, he’s very emotional, and he begins feeling insecure about his body too. He has no idea what could be causing this until…he remembers what his “hallucination” of the ancient foreboding warrior harbinger said: “The strong will become the weak. The weak will become the strong.” Naturally, the conclusion he draws from this is that the ostrich warrior cursed him and now he’s turning into a woman…because he’s misogynistic and thinks that’s what being a woman is; weak. He still tries to repress this, but eventually gives in to the feelings. He’s like, “Fine, ostrich warrior harbinger mirage thing— whatever you are! I give up!…How do you like this? Does this make you happy?” and he dresses like a woman only to find that…he likes this. This makes him happy. He doesn’t feel weak or as insecure as he had before, he actually feels…confident? He kinda likes himself, actually. Ya know, it’s not perfect but…huh. Like we see in the actual show, he starts dressing up in secret, but he hasn’t really admitted anything to himself yet. At this point, it’s a shameful secret he’s using to “cope” in the meantime. He’s thinking, ya know, maybe it’s just…a weird placebo effect thing that’ll clear up when he gets his test results for his testosterone. Then Cinco comes and his conversation about his testosterone results with Dr. Norman drag up a ton more shame. He feels relief when Dr. Norman says his results are “off the charts”, See, everything’s fine, you were just mistaken and you can go back to being a- only for Dr. Norman to correct himself: George has almost no testosterone and the estrogen of a healthy woman. He later grabs the red wig for the disguise, realizes how right it feels and runs off without a word. The on the next episode scene, instead of it being him dressing up in private(as that’s already happened), it’s something like, “On the next episode of Arrested Development…George returns to his manly ways,” but we can see the wig popping out of a bag or something, “and Lucille finds someone’s been borrowing her clothing” and we see her looking through the closet and is looking for a dress, “Where is that blue…”(cue Tobias in the background or saying something) when she notices another dress with a split seam and she’s like “Ah!…Lindsay 🙄”

I don’t have a clear thought out plan for how season five would go, but I would want him and Gob to sort of have somewhat parallel journeys. Like, how the season started out with them going on the roadtrip across Mexico to prove their manliness, that would be queer repression for them both. I also want for George Sr to be, whether he, or she at that point, realizes it or not, more confident as a woman than she was a man; still just as terrible, though. Unlike Gob, George’s life does not improve in any other facet. Like, normally, Gob takes revenge on people who wrong him, and we see when he feels betrayed by Tony in season four, he does exactly that. But once he realizes he loves Tony and what it would mean if he lost him, he is intentionally more mature about it and doesn’t push him away, even in instances where he would normally feel very betrayed and lash out. Each of their problems go deeper than their queer identity, and I believe George is too stubborn to make any meaningful change otherwise.

#his new name is Lucille 3 /j #it was done so terribly #sighs wistfully out a window #WHAT COULDVE BEEN #george bluth #gob bluth #arrested development #trans George Bluth

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fideidefenswhore · 11 months ago

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Do you think Henry VIII's childhood had a significant impact on his psychological development as an adult?

'Psychological' is not really something we can diagnose from remove; but more reasonably, yeah, I think his childhood set up his...what is a broader, less diagnostic term... emotional blueprint (perhaps even setting up his 'relationship' with God, as he would have understood it)? I think the impact of the death of his elder brother (it's generally argued he wouldn't have felt grief for this because they hadn't been raised together, the extent and intimacy of their interactions was more like cousins than what we think of as usual for siblings, but regardless of how well he 'knew' him, of course this was impactful insofar as it shaped his life by making him heir) and mother within the same year is generally underrated.

He was in the public eye at a very young age, his various ennoblements were granted to counter Warbeck's claim, one can presume that his admiration of Henry V might even have began here (Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports had been Henry V's title as Prince of Wales, Henry VIII will later, mainly, keep this specific title in his family in a pattern that denotes the violent flux of Henrician factional politics: Edward Guildford is his father's appointment, but once he dies, the title goes to his brother-in-law, George Boleyn, after Rochford's execution it's granted to his natural son, Henry Fitzroy, there's an interim exception where it goes to Thomas Cheney, but afterwards it goes to Henry's uncle, Arthur Plantagenet, until his arrest...thereafter it's in a joint office with Cheney again, and Henry's brother-in-law, Thomas Seymour, presumably as a reward for his military services); but there's this succession of threat, ennoblement, threat, sanctuary, reprisal of execution(s) for the threat(s) (and also executions for dynastic security, such as that of Edward Plantagenet, prior to the arrival of his future sister-in-law/wife), threat (in the vulnerability of the succession, once Arthur dies), followed with the death of his mother...

So all this was inevitably going to shape him to believe that there was nothing more important in the world than the Tudor succession, and specifically in his own children (in his more idealistic, optimistic beginning, sons) being the ones to inherit the throne. Why else would God have chosen his father to win Bosworth, why else would God's choice have been Henry instead of Arthur as King, if he doesn't have surviving sons by his first wife, it must have been because his choice in her as the mother of his heirs was contrary to God's will, if he doesn't have surviving sons by his second wife, it must have been because of the same reason (and by Anne, it's possibly compacted by CTE, but I think there was also an element of...by this marriage, it's about his seventh child, that has been miscarried or been stillborn, the severity of her downfall and the observation of 'you never saw prince nor man who made greater show of his horns or bore them more pleasantly' can be attributed to the comfort he might have felt in the extent of the 'depravity' suggesting that her miscarriages had been the children of other men, not his own...tied in with his allegation that Anne had been trying to poison Fitzroy and Mary, again there's ties into the protection of his succession being the general thrust behind these actions, and if it has to be protected by means of violence, well, that was in the marrow from the start...)

#anon

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biichama · 9 months ago

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Reading A Song of Ice and Fire: A Clash of Kings After Book Report

So yeah, I think I liked this one better than AGOT? Not that A Game of Thrones wasn't good--it definitely was--but I think George found a little more of his groove with this one. Also, I didn't have any adolescent reading trauma associations with it the way I did with AGOT, which helped.

Also, zero percent of this book took place in my number one least favorite location in Westeros, the Eyrie, so I have to give George props for that as well. Thank you, George. I know you're going to make me go back later because I'm spoiled from fanfiction, but the reprieve is appreciated.

Anyway, I promised another set of commentary on the POVs, so let's go.

Prologue

MAESTER CRESSEN YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS TO ME. But no, like, seriously, I think I mentioned this while I was liveblogging, but I am always impressed with how George can get you to empathize and care about characters over the course of a single chapter. And I do care about everyone on Dragonstone now--I care quite a lot about them. Mostly because Maester Cressen cared. His sad, sullen boy...

(I appreciate that Melisandre gave him the chance to back out, even if he didn't take it.)

But yeah, George did a really good job of making me care about Team Stannis, who I don't think I would have quite so much if he hadn't had Maester Cressen's POV and later Davos', so good job, George.

Arya

So first of all, I love Arya a lot and have since the very beginning. Her chapters are always very solid and she feels like a realistically drawn kid put in horrible, terrible, traumatic circumstances. And she's a really good person to view how much all the warring in the Riverlands is fucking it up for the ordinary people who live there.

I was surprised by a lot of little things in her chapters? Like I knew some of the broad strokes through fandom osmosis: Yoren dies along the way, she ends up in Harrenhall, she makes friends with Gendry, she meets Jaqen H'ghar, she develops a Kill List, Hot Pie is there? But the ways that everything happen surprised me. Weasel soup, especially, surprised me. I had no fucking clue that Arya would instrumental in getting Harrenhall back into Northern hands.

Also I was very surprised that the whole cupbearer thing only lasted a single chapter? I guess that's because I had the impression that she spent half a season as one on the show. Actually, the fact she doesn't get to Harrenhall until Arya VI surprised me too, because I'd had some vague idea that she'd be there almost the entire book.

Sansa

MY POOR TRAPPED GIRL. God, I also love her so, so much. Both Stark sisters are really good and you can't make me choose between them. She's just so clever and nobody notices it, because they haven't realized that she's not the same callow, naive kid that she was before her dad was arrested.

She's also very much still a middle school kid (as is Joffrey in the worst possible way) and it's enough to make some of Dontos' bullshit hella uncomfortable. Stop giving her slobbery cheek kisses, dude. Gross. Combined with the perennial weird vibes between her and Littlefinger and it's like she's just a magnet for older men being gross. Poor kid.

(I do not blame her for not leaving with the Hound, though, because he was drunk as a fucking skunk and like... that whole scene where she finds him in her room had such bad vibes and like normally he's the guy that I feel Sansa's most safe around, because his bark is worse than his bite with her. But not just then. I wouldn't have gone with him either.)

Tyrion

So like I've heard that ACOK is really the book where Tyrion gets his chance to shine as, like, a politician and yeah, I get it. He's very good and very competent at his job and it was delightful to see him be clever and tricksy and competent. He's a very fun perspective to be in, definitely, and I get why he's everyone's favorite character and George's special boy. Like okay I don't think he's my favorite? But that's nothing against Tyrion. I still like him a lot.

We get more Tysha context and it's so goddamn sad and even without the stuff I've been spoiled on, you could tell that she did love him, that it didn't matter how they met, because she did love them during the time they were husband and wife. Also, god, they were babies when it happened.

Speaking of Tyrion's girlfriends, I was really surprised by how, like, monogamous he was with Shae, because that is not the impression you get of this guy in fandom, but it turns out that when he commits to a woman he commits. And Shae's kind of blatantly in it for the money and security, but like you can see her getting charmed by him... but then TYRION X happens and he slaps her and you can almost see her mental gears realigning on him. Something deep inside her went fuck you at him in that moment and it's gonna have repercussions.

(Also, and I hate to say this, but while he's not in love with Cersei the way Jamie is, there's definitely some weird undercurrents in his interactions with her that make me wonder about the Lannisters more.)

Bran

MY BOY. MY DARLING BOY. I love him so much. And because I love him, I love Winterfell and all the people there. Like I've heard that people find his chapters boring and pointless and skip them on rereads and I'm like why??? Because Bran's chapters, where you get to know the people of Winterfell and the other people in the North are what make you care about them when everything goes to shit. They're what makes you want to throw Ramsay Snow down a goddamn fucking well.

So yeah, I liked his chapters. They were good. He is good. I hate Ramsay so much more now that I've met Lady Hornwood and she was a real person who was in love with Ser Rodrick and SHE ATE HER FINGERS BECAUSE OF HIM. GOD I HATE RAMSAY SNOW.

(Also the Reeds are great and I am looking forward to seeing more of them even as I am very much sad to be missing our number one feral child Rickon.)

Jon

So yeah, Jon's storyline remains a very good traditional Hero's Journey and I am enjoying it for what it is. I don't have as much commentary on his stuff not so much because I don't like it, but because it's just very much in genre? His stuff is where this is most like a normal fantasy novel, I guess.

I will say that, like, fandom osmosis fucking fooled me once again. Because I thought he'd be spending at least half the book undercover with the Wildlings and that literally does not happen until his last fucking chapter.

Catelyn

MY GIRL. Catelyn chapters always make me happy to read. (She's like Bran that way.) And starting from Catelyn II, her chapters also have Brienne, who I have been waiting eagerly for ever since I began to read these books, because Brienne of Tarth is half the reason I ended up tumbling headlong into this fandom.

(I went into it a little more in my previous book report, but basically after being somewhat traumatized by Bran II in AGOT when I was a teenager, I refused to read further for the next twenty-five years, until taking a chance on a P&P fusion fic with Jamie/Brienne endeared me to the pairing enough to read more. Eventually I gave in and actually started reading the books themselves, starting with Dunk and Egg to ease me into it.)

But yeah, Cat continues to be great and she also continues to not do shit by half, which is one of the things I like best in a character. Catelyn VII and the conversation with Jaime was a fucking highlight and I keep wondering what it would be like to read these books without being spoilered to hell and back, because the way that chapter ends. It's just good. It's so good.

Davos

There is only one problem with Davos and that it's so goddamn hard for my ex-Whovian ass not to call him Davros. Which would be completely unfair to the guy, since he's a good fucking guy and not the evil genius who created the Daleks.

But no, seriously, I really like and appreciate Davos, who is a decent, normal dude in the middle of this goddamn clownshow. I like his dynamic with Stannis, which is so good, and if you'll allow me to be Homestuck on main for a second... they're moirails, your honor, they're so goddamn pale for each other it's ridiculous.

But yeah, Davos is good and I liked his chapters a lot and that goddamn shadow baby scene will fucking haunt me, like what the fuck.

Theon

I suspect I would have hated Theon a lot more without being spoiled for his eventual fate and the things he did and didn't do. As it is, I read his chapters with the constant urge to facepalm, over and over again, because goddamnit, Theon. Like it's very clear that the dice were loaded from the start against this man and he's in a lot of situations where there's been no good options, but still. God-fucking-damnit, Theon. You made an already precarious situation just that worse. Also you made me have to read scenes with Ramsay in them and I really hate that guy. Go away, Ramsay.

Daenerys

Honestly, these were mostly pretty solid chapters? Like Daenerys III is less interesting than some of the others, but Daenerys IV and the House of the Undying more than makes up for it. Like seriously, that was such a goddamn banger of a chapter. I think it might be tied with Catelyn VII for personal favorites from the book.

Again, I definitely wonder what it would be like to read these books unspoiled, because like while I was extremely happy to see Barristan popping up in Daenerys V as 'Arstan Whitebeard,' I bet I'd have been even more psyched to be blindsided by it whenever it actually comes up in ASOS or ADWD.

That said, I can still appreciate a good reveal even if it's for something I knew about, so I'm not too worried. And being spoilered is like my emotional shield to prevent me from sadquitting over the Red Wedding next book like I did a quarter century ago over the yeeting of Bran. Speaking of which, I'm glad to be finally starting ASOS now, since it took me a couple days to write up this post, hahaha.

#asoiaf #acok #a clash of kings #bii reads asoiaf #this book gets full points for having zero eyrie chapters #is hating the eyrie to a comical degree going to be my defining trait in this fandom? maybe!#but yeah onward to asos and most importantly jaime chapters #long post

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koko-heads · 1 year ago

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bluth family headcanons bcs why not

(these will mainly be like sexuality/gender/prns/nd stuff like that + i cherry pick what i want to be canon bc i know the show better than mitch hurwitz eg michael and lindsay are BIOLOGICAL TWINS)

the man himself,,, michael bluth [bisexual, trans, he/him, nellie is his deadname, audhd bcs i'm audhd and i'm the no.1 michael kin]

lindsay bluth fünke [bisexual male-leaning, trans, she/her, development arrested did u so dirty i'm sorry]

gob bluth [gay, he/him, i will die on the hill of him being gay and not bi]

buster bluth [token straight, he/they, anxiety duh, also audhd bcs i kin him lawl]

george-michael bluth [acespec pansexual, genderfluid, he/she/they, audhd and anxiety bc kin, no one gets her like i do she's literally my daughter i know her better than the show creators genderfluid gm is very gorgeous to me !]

maeby fünke [oh shes SO sapphic, she/her, not rlly much to say i'll be honest! love her tho]

tobias fünke [let's not kid ourselves he's pansexual, he/she, adhd king]

[i feel like george sr and lucille r both straight but george is maybe fluid? ik in either s4 or s5 he begins transitioning but that storyline is dropped so i'm gnna say guyfluid]

#needed the audience to know my objectively correct headcanons !#u can pry genderfluid gm and bi michael from my cold dead hands btw #arrested development #arrdev #michael bluth #lindsay bluth #gob bluth #buster bluth #george michael bluth #maeby funke #tobias funke #george bluth sr #lucille bluth #lgbt #lgbtq #lgbtqia #lgbtqia+

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summerspn · 2 years ago

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Arrested Development

(Series)

Very minor spoilers- no plots mentioned…

I finally finished the series!

When the show first aired I saw a couple episodes but due to my hectic life I didn’t watch more than that. I always thought it was really funny though.

All the characters amuse me but my favourites were/are Gob & Michael.

I’ve meant to watch the series when it came on Netflix for years but I apparently completely forgot about it.

Recently I came across it so I binged the whole series.

As expected I found it hilarious!

For those that aren’t aware, the series aired originally on tv (Fox station). And the network does what it always does and cancelled a great series too soon. It aired on tv from 2002-2006.

Then Netflix picked it up years later from 2018-2019.

I appreciate the commitment of the actors, cast & crew. 99% of the original cast returned & there were a ton of cameos.

I think they did a decent job overall of the second half. I liked some of the meta jokes & the show was still amusing.

However, the second half was very different:

1. There was way too much recapping. In the first hand that aired on tv there was some but it was more like a quick few seconds at the start or a randomly thrown in reminder of what happened previously. Ie) when Michael says he won’t come back the voiceover says something like ‘he did come back as he always does’ and threw in a 5 second clip.

In the continuation it’s like a full minute or so of recap at the beginning of each episode. That actually started to get on my nerves.

2. The episode length is slightly shorter. I think most episodes in the first 3 seasons were between 25-27 minutes with a couple being around 30. In the second half of the series each episode is about 21 minutes… including the recap at the beginning. I think it did influence the quality of the episodes a little.

3. I feel like the writers had no idea what to do with the second half of the series. Though, it also felt like some of the actors were coming and going a lot so maybe the writers just had a hard time working with their schedules? In any case, the writing wasn’t as good. Still entertaining though, it just felt different.

4. It may sound stupid and an overreaction but I hated what they did to one of the characters in the final episode. It made me cringe & sort of slink into my seat. I felt cheated & little uncomfortable. It was clearly done to get a reaction but at the same time, that is not the reaction they should’ve gone for… it changed the entire tone if the series.

5. The lack of character development I think was a disservice. I get it’s supposed to be ‘arrested development’ but the series could’ve ended with some development. While I wouldn’t expect a full 180 of its characters, I think the lack of growth had me bored. I think Michael, George Michael & Gob had the most growth which is one of the reasons I liked most of their storylines in the continuation. The other characters had me a little bored.

Though having a secondary character like Barry Zuckerkorn being the same old ridiculous person actually worked because he wasn’t a main character.

I was a little bummed that Liza Minnelli wasn’t in the continuation but the show did a good job of still trying to include her.

I don’t want to spoil anything for people who haven’t watched yet but I’ll just say that the storyline for Lindsey was really short & went in a weird direction.

Tobias was always weird but I had hoped for him to get a clue by the end. He didn’t.

Buster, sometimes amusing & sometimes just awkward. I don’t even know what to say.

George & Oscar, I was pretty indifferent to them in the second half.

Lucille Bluth, while she was still in character I just didn’t like that of all things to do with her, they chose that? It felt like a waste of talent. Not terrible just not good either.

Maeby - sorry but I thought her storyline was really bad. In the first part of the series I thought her character had an amusing glib attitude & sass. The continuation just had me wondering how her storylines made it past the brainstorming stage. I’m glad the actress returned but it was just…so weird.

George Michael - I’m glad we got see him in a different element & changing up the dynamic a little. But somehow it felt like things were dragging a little plot wise. I think they could’ve had the 2 seasons in 1 then a separate plot for the final season.

Michael - I also feel like they could’ve condensed things into 1 season for him then write another plot for season 5. As always he was amusing. I like that one of his major flaws is that he doesn’t listen to his son while also trying to be a great dad. So everything felt pretty in character. For the most part. But there was still more they could’ve given Jason Bateman to work with.

He’s a great actor with a lot of range so it sort of felt like waste.

Gob - though ridiculous I like most if what they did with his character except I think the finale should’ve just pushed his platonic friendship a little more. And yes because I feel bad for fictional characters I did want to see him better his relationship with a certain family member…

Now I gotta say it…what is with all the incest?

Seriously. The first season, I thought the crush was funny. But it ended quickly and just felt icky.

Then it’s brought up over and over again. Then another character flirts with a relative… actually a new character does this with a relative as well in the continuation. A few one off jokes here and there too.

And they bring in Jason Bateman’s sister Justine for an episode & characters make implications about them… she does some flirting too. Thank god (spoiler) they don’t get physical. But seriously I was already cringing in that episode.

Then, all the mother-son comments in the continuation. Maybe it’s just me but felt like a different tone compared to the first half of the series.

The writers could’ve come up with better jokes instead. The constant incestuous comments just felt lazy after awhile, not to mention they stopped being funny.

All of that said, the series is amusing & fun…if you skip the finale. Tbh that episode kind of ruined the series for me.

But again I do appreciate the actors, crew etc came back to try to finish the series properly.

It is worth a watch.

Since there’s too many actors to go in depth on their other work I’ll just mention my two favourites & you can check IMDB fir the rest:

Jason Bateman (who plays Michael) , is amazing in the series Ozark, and is amusing in Game Night (2018), Office Christmas Party (2016), Horrible Bosses 1 & 2 (2011 & 2014) etc . He’s supposed to be in the Clue reboot so I’m excited to see what he does with that.

Will Arnett (who plays Gob Bluth), honestly I haven’t seen a lot of what he’s been in yet but so far I like him in everything. He was really funny in Murderville (2022), Blades of Glory (2006), and Up All Night (2011-2012) which I thought was hilarious.

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gobbluthbutagirl · 4 years ago

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there is literally no good way to begin a post on tumblr.com involving fictional character sexuality discourse about sitcom characters so let's just jump right in. i don't think george oscar "gob" bluth ii from emmy-winning sitcom arrested development(2003-2006, 2013, 2018-2019) is bisexual. i think that he is gay. and i cannot for the life of me understand how someone can walk away from watching all five seasons of this show believing that man has ever in his life experienced even an ounce of genuine attraction to a woman. and i mean no offense to the "gob is bisexual" crowd, really and truly. i too thought to myself "ok, so gob is bi" after watching the first four seasons all the way back in march 2018. and then when 5A came out two months later i was like wait a minute. this man is gay. this man has always been gay. and no, 5B's release 9.5 months later did not change my mind in the slightest. and in this essay i will discuss why.

@quinnmorgendorffer you asked to read this. @ everyone else you did not but hopefully the readmore will deter you from unfollowing me as a result. anyway here goes:

alright so when i have historically seen people argue that gob is bisexual wrt to 5B there are two main points that get brought up. which to the casual viewer i mean yeah, i can see how you might interpret these things this way, but listen to me. i'm a scholar. i have watched this show beginning to end on no fewer than ten occasions. i know so little about so many things but when it comes to emmy-winning sitcom arrested development(2003-2006, 2013, 2018-2019) i know everything there is. show me literally any out of context screenshot from this show and i'll tell you exactly what season and exactly what episode and as close to a timestamp as i can possibly get while having absolutely no concept of time. i'm telling you, i'm insane about this sitcom. i am deranged about this sitcom. i know it backwards and forward, beginning to end, front to back, in my sleep and in my dreams and to the end of this earth. if anybody has earned the right to die on the hill of fictional character sexuality discourse about arrested development characters it's me. and to die on this hill is exactly what i intend to do here. or at least to shoot myself in the foot on it.

anyway. point #1 i see get brought up is the conversion therapy scene. and this is one that's actually so easy to dispel that it mildly bothers me that i even have to do it. tell me you did not pay attention to season 4 without telling me you did not pay attention to season 4. "he wanted to fuck mrs veal bc he popped a boner looking at her chest." are you sure about that? are you sure that's what happened in that scene? think about it for a second. what type of necklace was she wearing in that scene? and what(who) does george oscar "gob" bluth ii associate with that type of necklace? if you don't know the answers to those 2 questions you have already lost your dog in this fight. come back when you've watched this show as obsessively as i have & can make the connection instantly.

that aside, how are you getting "he wanted to fuck her" from that scene anyway? the man stood up and walked away visibly uncomfortable. remember that this is george oscar "gob" bluth ii of "i fucked [insert female character]" fame. if he had wanted to fuck her, don't you think he...perhaps would have at least made an ATTEMPT to do so? and ignoring that, this man also once popped a boner while hugging his own brother. does this mean he wanted to fuck michael as well? don't answer that. i've seen enough shit on ao3 to know how you people think.

point #2 is the line in the finale(the line spoken not even by gob but by BUSTER) that goes "i'd rather have a brother who's alive and maybe bisexual than dead and straight." a lot of you guys seem to have interpreted that line as gob being canonically bisexual but not me. i'm built different. think about it in context for a couple seconds. you know what? think all the way back to season one. gob says to michael regarding barry, "he's a man, michael. he needs a woman." this is how gob's brain works. this is a man whose entire life has been spent desperately seeking the approval of a father who will never love him and who as a direct result of that has convinced himself the best chance he has of succeeding at doing so is to emulate the man in every way. this is a man who feels so much shame on a daily basis that he roofies himself as part of his nightly routine for years and years and years. this is some next-level internalized homophobia going on here. he falls in love for the first time in his life in his mid-40s and it's with another man. and the way that he himself phrases it - something that he only allowed to happen - this man has been fighting what he's known deep down is the truth for so long and with such intensity that he can only even verbalize it as a hypothetical situation occuring to his brother - his brother who's always been the golden child, who's always been his father's favorite son.

and so i ask you - no, in fact, i IMPLORE you - on what earth would a man who has lived such a life have a clean and simple open and shut transition from "so deeply closeted he nearly manages to convince himself" to "out and proud gay man"? hopefully this is not a disclaimer that actually needs to be made but OBVIOUSLY bisexuality is its own independent sexuality. OBVIOUSLY it's not a stepping stone from straight to gay. HOWEVER for someone who is both gay and deeply closeted/in denial, either fictional(such as george oscar "gob" bluth ii from arrested development, the subject of this post) or real(such as me from real life, not the subject of this post but the first example that comes to mind for reasons that should probably be obvious), it can act as one. and i'm not saying that's objectively and/or morally right or wrong or whatever; i'm just saying it's a thing that can happen and has happened and to deny that is to deny reality. anyway my point here is that gob is clearly uncomfortable with the idea of being fully out. and why wouldn't he be? even before the whole gay mafia ordeal he's just watched the man he loves be encased in cement. he thinks tony's dead. he thinks he just watched tony die and that he killed him. and now the whole world thinks he's gay, because he IS gay, but he doesn't want the whole world to know that. he spends the vast majority of the latter half of season 5 hurt & alone & confused & straddling the border between deep denial & deep love for a man he's not sure loves him back or is even around anymore to love him back. yes i realize how unhinged i sound right now talking this way about a pathetic fictional sitcom failson but if you didn't expect tumblr user gobbluthbutagirl to be decidedly un-normal about pathetic fictional sitcom failson gob bluth then you don't know me that well.

ANYWAY what i am trying to say here is. gob does not read like a bi man to me at all. he reads like a deeply DEEPLY closeted gay man who spends the original three seasons in full or at least near-total denial about his sexuality and the latter two struggling with it immensely. the very first time he's shown onscreen with a woman(marta) he looks viscerally disgusted. and you watch that for the first time and you think, "wow, what an asshole!" and then you rewatch it after having seen his complete arc over the course of the show and you still think, "wow, what an asshole!" but you also think, in the wise words of tony wonder, "well, it makes sense now, doesn't it?" the man is gay. the man has always been gay. and really under a microscope any argument you could make to support gob being bisexual falls apart so fast. "he's in love with tony bc tony treats him differently-" bad & wrong take. marta was nothing but nice to that man. ann was nothing but nice to that man. every woman he's ever had in his life has given him more chances than he's ever deserved and it has still fallen through every single time. why? because he is gay. he is fundamentally incompatible with them on every level. women look at gob and think "i can fix him" and i guess in the end ann kind of did succeed at doing that. just not in the way she'd expected.

"well but what about lucille austero-" do i really have to even say this. the guy has mommy issues. not to mention the in-joke about liza minnelli's real-life history involving gay men(does the name peter allen ring a bell?). i mean come on guys. this is basic stuff here. and even if you still argue there was something real there surely you have not failed to notice how quickly he got over that relationship. whereas he spends an entire fifth of the show pining for tony so deeply and so obviously it's almost painful just to watch. "what about starla. he pursues her of his own accord-" i am once again repeating gob's own words back to you: "he's a man, michael. he needs a woman." gob is lonely. he wants companionship. he's also a misogynist and has very little interest in actually being committed to a woman. he uses his relationships with women as a way to prove to the world, to his family - and moreover, to himself, that he is in fact heterosexual. he knows deep down that he isn't, though. he has known this for most if not all of his life but he refuses to accept it.

this is a man who's been shown on screen crying after sleeping with women. this is a man who's been shown on screen crying INSTEAD of sleeping with women and lying about it after. this is a man who, in season one, when told that michael is one of very few intelligent, attractive, AND straight men, immediately points out that michael's only slept with four women. that's his knee-jerk reaction - "well i've slept with more women than he has." he assumes himself to be more intelligent(incorrect) and attractive(correct) than michael, but he can't deny that michael is straighter than he is, which is of course why he opts immediately to deny that michael is straighter than he is. in his mind it's quantity over quality. he keeps telling himself if he sleeps with as many women as he possibly can, or at least convinces everyone around him that he's slept with all these women, he'll eventually find one he's actually attracted to. and at the beginning of season four i think he's begun to realize it simply won't happen. but he's still terrified to admit that to himself, or to anyone around him. that conversation he has with tobias - "you look how i feel." "gay?" - i think if tobias had not reacted the way that he did, in that moment, gob might have come out. but that would not have made for interesting television at all, so i personally am glad it did not go down that way.

and see we know that gob has been with men before tony. we know this because not only is it implied on so many occasions but also it's explicitly stated by gob himself. but tony is the first man gob has ever "allowed"(his own words!) himself to develop feelings for. and he's spent his whole life trying and failing to develop feelings for every woman under the sun. and he's fucked with his memory so much that there's really no telling how much of it he remembers and how much of it he doesn't, but the fact of the matter is this: he remembers his night with tony, and for the entire remainder of the show afterwards he does not sleep with a woman ever again. and not for lack of trying! his 'relationship' with joni lasts for months and he does nothing with her. when kitty comes onto him at imagine he looks sick to his stomach. he loves tony. he says this out loud. he spends a whole season trying to get tony back and in the last ten minutes of the finale he finally succeeds. and his mouth says, "i guess i can go back to joni beard now" but his eyes say, "i love you, tony wonder."

and get real. that man is not about to go back to joni beard. not even a little bit. anyone who takes that statement at face value has clearly forgotten the context in which he was "with" joni beard in the first place. i mean come on. this is the least subtle thing in the history of television. the woman's surname is "beard" and her first name is "joni", a portmanteau of "gob" and "tony." TOBIAS FUNKE of all people looks at him funny when he says it! that was not a genuine relationship in the slightest. he is "going back to joni beard" in the same way that he "had sex last night(narrator: but he really didn't.)" or that starla "had all kinds of orgasms(narrator: actually, they just made out)". that is the type of statement that those in the trump administration would have referred to as "alternative facts."

and look. i could genuinely rant about this forever i'm realizing. but for those who happened to see my last post, yeah, the break between this paragraph and that last one is in fact the exact moment i decided to check the word count so far and discovered it to be well over 2,000. so i will be winding down now. but in conclusion basically what i am saying is that gob is not bisexual. he is gay. and if you want an arrested development character to headcanon as bisexual tony wonder is literally RIGHT THERE and makes infinitely more sense. ok that is it thank you for coming to my gob talk

#arrested development #gob bluth #i am playing with fire by posting this in the tags i know #but i am not doing it for those who want to argue. i am doing it for anyone who is normal and does not want to see this and blocks the tags #this is very close to 2.5k words btw. so if anybody wants to argue i expect your rebuttal to be AT LEAST this long #otherwise i will simply be disregarding it #also notice how i do not even entertain the idea that gob is straight #that's bc i think anyone who believes that does not deserve rights hope this helps <3

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etherealdjinn · 4 years ago

Text

Why Lila is Marinette’s Own Fault || Miraculous Why?

(Before I begin, note that this is my opinion over the topic and am no way am bashing anyone’s love for the ship and/or character. I respect who and what you like, therefore expect the same courtesy. However, if this is something you cannot handle, please click the back button as this will be a heavily discussed topic. No flames allowed. Other than that, enjoy.)

So usually in the story, there’s always one or two mean girls who is out to get the main character for some kind of superior reasons to justify. And there’s no reason as to why they act this way just for the sake of being mean.

Like the Ashleys from “Recess”, who tend to pick on kids just for the fun of it sometimes or cause they’re popular.

Same can go for Libby from “Sabrina The Teenage Witch” who was out to get something for what she wants or just to be superior to the other kids in school.

For Miraculous, we already have that kind of character, Chloe Bourgeois, who is the daddy’s girl of the Mayor to get what she wants. And until we had some small character development in season two (which season 3 took it away!!), we had no reason feeling sorry for her and she was just for the convenient plot in the social life for Marinette in the series.

And then… there’s Lila.

Before I get into hand in this, let me note that Lila is not a good person at all in the show. She’s a liar, a manipulator and will do whatever she can to get what she wants. She breaks into homes, steals and molests pretty models. She’s been pretty shown to be just selfish without consequences and unless we get a background story of why she acts this way, she has no excuse. Especially when she teams up with hawkdaddy to now have permission to invade and spy on Adrien whenever she wants? Fuck that.

So in Volpina, Lila is introduced as this pathological liar to get attention in season one. She obviously goes for Adrien cause he’s the famous model after all. Reasonable considering as the new person looking for attention, you seek out the most popular/famous person in the school. That would Adrien.

Though considering with her connections, it would’ve been smarter to try and impress Marinette instead if Lila did her research before she came into the scene. But of course, new person so she wouldn’t know, but whatever.

And we can see Lila easily just says things just to get Adrien’s approval and such.

And so, Marinette follows them around (stalking? really?) because Tikki points out Lila has the book Adrien took from his father’s vault and threw it in the trash.

Now the SMART thing to do would’ve been to see how Adrien would handle the situation and wait for him to leave, if to acknowledge Adrien has a mind of his own and knows when to walk away (which he does). Or at the very least, try to distract them as Marinette while Tikki retrieved the book.

But… no. You transform into Ladybug to lash out at a girl PUBLICALLY, for anyone including Adrien to hear, just to embarrass her and call her out on her lying because she… “hates liars”.

Marinette, you fucking lie ALL the time! Most of those times to Adrien! And I’m not just talking about when in regard to being Ladybug, you hypocritical- (groans)

I can list plenty of episodes: Gamer, Aninmaestro, Ikari Gozen and hell, even Reverser counts! If she hadn’t lied about Marc’s book, Nathaniel wouldn’t have torn it! (sighs)

And before you all start jumping at me saying Lila got what she deserves, I only agree partially. Ladybug, as a public figure and heroine, practically the face of Paris, acted irrationally lashing out at a bystander because of lies which were or were not believable. Lila was broadcasting a post or making the news, she was trying (poorly) to impress a boy. Ladybug gave Lila the Regina George treatment.

Yeah, so you caused an akumatized situation and Lila hates your guts. Hell, I would hate you too. That’s like a celebrity jumping at an innocent bystander when they’re whispering to their friend about a rumor that only the two of them were talking about. You can’t jump to try and stop them and should just let it dispel on its own. At that point, Lila had no real power but you just influenced her.

And… oh boy did things get worse because of this.

Look season 3 was trash (except for moments in certain episodes) and I feel talking about the infamous ‘Chameleon’ physically hurts me but… yeah gotta point out a few things. The whole episode was unrealistic, and it was an obvious ploy to be sympathetic to Marinette with Lila back… but… you’re not fooling me.

So, Lila is still on her lying game, being able to fool the students and the staff?! Okay if you believe a student has so many disabilities without any paperwork proof, you can actually get fired for that for fraud. As someone who worked with education before, that’s just pure incompetence.

So yeah, Marinette comes to school seeing the seats changes to accommodate Lila and upright begins to plot to discredit her for her lies. UM… what happened to trying to start over with Lila after failing to do so the first time?

Oh, that’s right. She gets that way (at least partly) because Lila is sitting next to Adrien. I can understand if it was because they rearranged the seating without her say so but let’s face it. Lila sitting next to Adrien was her real trigger.

So since Marinette failed to acknowledge her mistake the first time, she spends all day trying to prove Lila is lying and in return the class is angry at her. Alya even comes to point out that Marinette is jealous of Lila.

And you know what? Alya is right.

Alya knows at least what Marinette is capable of doing so when it comes to Adrien and how far she’s willing to go. Remember that Alya is the one who encouraged her to break into his locker and steal his phone. So of course, she’s worried Marinette is gonna do something to the new girl.

I don’t blame Alya for doing one of the most competent things in the show: Warning Marinette to NOT go off the handle without proof and not make herself look bad in the process.

And because Marinette failed to do so… she made Lila her enemy AGAIN. It was bad enough you had her as your enemy as Ladybug, but now you get to deal with twice the drama!

Your own fucking fault, Marinette.

Also, the advice Adrien gave? I don’t blame for him for it and neither should you. Yes, his advice is not perfect, but with the options he has on his plate, its hard to do something otherwise.

For every encounter Adrien has had with Lila, it ended up with her being akumatized or a disaster no matter how he tried to handle her. We didn’t get to see how he would resolve in Volpina because of Ladybug’s intervention, but he would try at least in Chameleon and try to get her to see she didn’t need to lie and actually tried to befriend her. At this point, Lila was already triggered by Ladybug and Marinette so she just might have to take Adrien by force instead.

At that point, Adrien just wants to stay away and which he was trying to tell Marinette don’t interact with Lila or confront her cause there’s no way to do so at this point. Maybe he was trying to tell her to wait until her rumors got discredited, but he didn’t say it clear enough for her to understand.

And keep in mind, Adrien is a sheltered child with little to zero social skills taught to him by Nathalie and Gabriel. Hell, we don’t know how his childhood was really like even with Emelie around either and Adrien seems more like the pacifist unless he needs to absolutely step in. And he did by cleaning up Marinette’s mess in ‘Ladybug’. So now he’s gotta suffer being around Lila more because of Marinette making Lila her enemy.

But once again, this is bad writing as the writers of the show obviously forgot what it’s like to live in reality. In the real world, Lila would be immediately discredited without any proof the moment she came back. Not to mention, some of the class have their own connections and have more braincells proven in the previous episodes. Google search and such. A 5-year-old wouldn’t believe these lies in these times. Hey, I believe that because I once had a kid in kindergarten during my time as an afterschool art teacher look at one of my books I illustrated before and said they liked the ‘graphics’.

Kids are fucking smarter nowadays than you think.

The only reason anyone would believe Lila’s lies is if she’s magically influenced with some kind of ‘silver tongue’ spell or something and honestly? It looks like that’s the reason.

I dunno if Thomas Astruc or Zag is trying to insult the kids/adults or insult themselves to say Paris people aren’t that smart. If it’s the latter, you should see what you are doing because I don’t want to believe that because that’s disrespectful.

I know it seems I’m trying to stand up for Lila this portion, but I’m just looking things in a more realistic and logical way. Did Lila take things too far? Yes, waaaayyy too far and should be arrested for it since she works for Hawkmoth. But it could’ve been handled better and that makes Marinette at fault too.

Part of me wonders if she’s done this before because in Zombiezou, she also causes Chloe to ruin her gift for Ms. bustier. If Marinette didn’t antagonize Chloe in the locker in front of the class, maybe she wouldn’t have done anything. Again, I’m not saying Chloe was justified, but if that was the reason, yeah I can see her doing it for payback.

So to all those fics where I’m supposed to be ‘Boo-hoo’ for Marinette because of what Lila did? Fuck you guys because you need to dig deeper into the story to see both sides and not just make it a pity party where Marinette is the innocent victim.

It’s called “Cause and Effect”.

And considering she made Lila her enemy, Marinette is gonna get effected enough because that’s how karma works.

#ooc #the artist speaks #the artist opinion #miraculous ladybug #marinette salt #adrien sugar #alya sugar #lila salt #mainly facts really #but there is some parts where i'm salty #so be warned #tw: cursing #constructive critism welcome #flames will be deleted #i know the difference folks

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therealvinelle · 4 years ago

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“By contrast, I can think of characters who resemble most other Twilight characters with a relative amount of ease.”

You put this at the end of an ask and was just wondering if you would please elaborate? Have a lovely day

(Anon is referring to this post.) Do you ever look at two characters, realize they have a few things in common, then blink, take a step back, and realize that they really do have an awful lot in common? That they're more or less the same person, only in different circumstances? The same archetype, at the very least.

I'm open to the possibility that you'll say no, @thecarnivorousmuffinmeta and I are strange people who see strange things.

All the same, here are a few examples.

Also, this contains spoilers for the animes Fate/Zero, Puella Magi Madoka Magica, and Revolutionary Girl Utena, as well as the play Vildanden, the book Candide, and the show I, Claudius.

Aro: Kiritsugu Emiya from Fate/Zero.

Kiritsugu is a highly effective assassin whose defining trait, and curse, is his willingness to commit any atrocity in the name of the greater good. His ambition is to save the world. Over the course of the series he sacrifices his father, surrogate mother, best friend, wife, and daughter, and treats everybody else like chess pieces. It will all be worth it when he has saved the world.

He is the opposite of Bella, who would let anything burn for the sake of her loved ones. Kiritsugu loves fiercely, but he will sacrifice that which is most precious to him with a steady hand.

Aro has that same ruthlessness combined with idealism. He sacrifices his sister and is willing to kill his only friend as well, to say nothing of the many other things he has done. He creates child vampires and will kill anyone who stands in his way. This is what he must do to gain and maintain power.

Aro and Kiritsugu will sacrifice anything and anybody if they perceive it to be beneficial to their goal, a goal they happen to share.

Also Aro: Claudius from I, Claudius.

Cladius is the emperor of Rome not because he wishes to be, but because the moment he steps off the throne, Rome will fall to pieces.

Aro did seek out the throne, Claudius very much did not. However, both are in the precarious situation where they can never leave their respective thrones. Rome would fall to pieces without Claudius, and the world would burn without Aro.

Also Aro: Voldemort in an AU where he won.

We're deep in la la AU land now.

But, Aro had to commit atrocities to get to the throne, we only meet him millennia later when his rule is secure. A post-victory Voldemort (and I here mean years and years and years have passed) would be a figure quite similar to Aro. A harsh, uncompromising leader, yet he’s been around for long enough to shape the world into what he wants it to be, people don’t remember that it was once different, and he is regarded as the distant, yet necessary leader.

Bella: Hedda Gabler from Vildanden.

Hedda finds out she's a child born of infidelity, and that her father no longer loves her. Wanting to win back his love she kills herself. Bella, too, has that utter lack of self-love, that willingness to sacrifice herself, and it’s all too easy for her to believe Edward never loved her. Both Hedda and Bella fail to understand there are people who love and would miss them

Also Bella: Homura Akemi from Puella Magi Madoka Magica.

This is not an obvious one.

But they both have that uncompromising drive to do anything and everything for the one they love, and by love I mean the one they fixate everything they are or have ever been upon. Homura, over the course of P3M, goes from wanting to use time travel to save everybody, to being content with saving only Madoka. She will destroy herself for Madoka in a very literal sense, seeing no worth at all in her own survival.

Give Bella a time machine and a timeloop where Edward always dies at the end, and she will go down Homura’s path.

Caius: Every warrior king ever. Ooh and he and Iskandar (again from Fate/Zero) have very similar vibes, although they're far from the same character.

Iskandar believes that kingship and leadership is not about being noble or virtuous or showing a good example to your people, it's about strength, conquest, and glorious victory.

Caius, I imagine, would heartily agree with that.

Carlisle: I love Carlisle, but there are Carlisles everywhere, especially in anime. Utena Tenjou from Revolutionary Girl Utena comes to mind in particular, though.

Utena begins her story as a righteous and brave girl who wants to be a prince. She wants this without quite understanding what it truly means to be noble, nor does she know what it means to save a person.

Her desire to save Anthy is especially this. Anthy is a traditional damsel in distress at the beginning of the story, and Utena is so eager to save her that she never takes what Anthy herself into account. She judges herself harshly for this failure, but comes to understand what it truly means to save Anthy in the end.

Carlisle has that same nobility and willingness to do good, he is the moral compass of those around him, but all the same he is hoodwinked and does not always know where best to thread. His rescue of Rosalie is a good example of this, he saw a young woman who’d been raped to death, and did the only thing he could to help her, only to learn this wasn’t what she wanted.

Also Carlisle: god, so many characters.

Shirou from Now and Then, Here and There. Suffers a ridiculous amount, but never loses his goodness and insists even in the most extreme circumstances upon the inalienable worth of human life.

Duck from Princess Tutu. Never uses violence or even powers to win against her opponents. She talks to them, finds out why they're unhappy, and wins through healing them. They become friends with her after.

Akane Tsunemori from Psycho-Pass. In a world where people’s souls can be calculated mathematically, Akane Tsunemori is objectively a good person, empirically proven to be incorruptible. That’s her defining trait, no matter what she endures she never loses her upstanding morals. The kind of person who wouldn’t succumb to the lure of human blood.

Just gonna drop the fact that Carlisle’s hair and eyes are the same color, Edward with his vampire sight notes that they’re only one shade apart. The guy is a misplaced anime character.

Oh, and Candide from Voltaire’s Candide. This is just a loose association, but “beautiful blond man travels the world, meets people who are over the top cartoonishly miserable (just... multiply Meyer’s backstories with each other and add 10. Victoria’s life + Rosalie’s life + Esme’s life + their mother is pushed off a cliff by dalmatians) but he carries on with a big smile, and eventually settles down with his found family of hilariously wretched people” gives me Carlisle vibes.

Edward: He's so many people and in so many different ways, oh my god.

He's a mommy's boy who cries because I'M A MONSTER - Buster Bluth. Arrested Development.

He thinks too highly of himself - Gilderoy Lockhart from Harry Potter.

He GOBs - George Oscar "GOB" Bluth. Again Arrested Development.

He appears normal to the outside world, yet there's a complete meltdown with incoherent rants, strong opinions about music, and strong disturbing tendencies towards violence he may or may not act on - Patrick Bateman from American Psycho.

He's weird about women, mother figures, himself, and violent. Creepy yet undeniably charming - Norman Bates from Psycho.

The way he regards Bella - strong Humbert Humbert from Lolia vibes. Replace "nymphet" with "singer" and there you go.

Really, though, with Edward, he is like these yet unlike them all. He’s... he’s a lot.

Emmett: Much like how Caius is a warrior king, Emmett is Frat Bro™.

Jasper: Clint Eastwood for reasons outlined in this post.

Marcus: Arwen after Aragorn inevitably dies.

A sad sad elf who's fading away.

Rosalie: Cordelia Chase from Buffy

Speaks her mind, no matter how brutal it is or how little people want to hear it. She does not forgive those who wrong her, she is proud, and most importantly, she is misjudged. Her beautiful appearance and bitchy veneer make her easy to dismiss, but once the going gets tough she is a deeply good person. She’ll make bitchy comments about watching your back, but watch it she does.

I also do this with ships. Aro/Carlisle are a great match for Dorian Gray and Lord Henry, if Lord Henry had failed to corrupt Dorian Gray and been delighted by that fact.

I have other examples, but they go weird places so let’s not.

TL;DR: I'm Miss Marple.

#long post #twilight #twilight meta #twilight renaissance #aro #carlisle cullen #bella swan #edward cullen #caius #jasper hale #emmett cullen #rosalie hale #marcus

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uncloseted · 4 years ago

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What are your thoughts on critical race theory and how it's being taught or should be taught in schools? Everyone seems to have a different idea of what is being taught and it's hard to keep up. I've heard extreme stories about certain schools but I've also heard that those are mostly people on the right exaggerating. Thank you for answering these political questions and giving such well thought out responses!

Okay so... there's a lot to unpack within the discussion of "critical race theory". I'm going to give a primer of what it is, how it is (and isn't) being used in schools, what the controversy is, and then I'll give my opinions at the end.

What is Critical Race Theory?

"Critical Race Theory" is a previously obscure academic concept. It's an approach to studying US policies and institutions and is typically taught in higher-education institutions like law schools or schools of social work. It's been in use since the 70s, when law professors began considering how racism shapes American law. Basically, Critical Race Theory states that intentional and unintentional racial bias are baked into the way our institutions and legal system functions. CRT is a way of examining how "racism is sustained more through law, policy and practices than through individual bias and discrimination," in the words of Boston University law professor Jasmine Gonzales Rose. It's focused on shifting our attention away from individual people's bad actions (what we commonly think of as being "racism") to instead center how systems uphold racial disparities.

Where did the Controversy about Critical Race Theory Come From?

After the murder of George Floyd last year and the resulting Black Lives Matter protests, these same topics were introduced to public consciousness. Is our police system racist? Are people of color disproportionately likely to be arrested and imprisoned for crimes, even though white people commit crimes at the same rate? (The answer to these questions is yes, just so we're clear). Are there ways in which racial bias is baked into our legal system? There were a lot of people around that time who became aware that our systems are discriminatory, and, as with everything, a lot of people who pushed back against anything actually changing.

Here's where the whole thing gets a bit convoluted. The debate over "critical race theory" can be traced to just one person- Christopher Rufo, a fellow at a conservative think tank. On September 2nd of 2020, Rufo appeared on Fox News's show, "Tucker Carlson Tonight". On the show, Rufo claimed that "critical race theory" had "pervaded every institution in the federal government" and called on President Trump to ban "critical race theory" in federal workforce trainings. It's somewhat unclear why he thought this to begin with. In that same conversation, Rufo deemed "critical race theory" "divisive, un-American propaganda". From there, this idea that "critical race theory" (used as "a catchall phrase for any examination of systemic racism" or even as a catchall phrase to denote anything advocating for social change, as opposed to the principles of Critical Race Theory that are actually used in educational institutions) is infiltrating our government took off on Twitter.

By September 17th of 2020, Trump was denouncing "critical race theory" and had created the 1776 Commission to "promote patriotic education". The 1776 Commission was in direct opposition to the 1619 Project, a Pulitzer Prize winning, long-form journalism project developed for The New York Times, which aims to explore American history through African-American perspectives. The 1619 Project was being used as a tool in public school curricula to help students understand the impact of slavery on modern society. It's important to note here that at no point was Critical Race Theory being taught in schools except at the university level, and that the 1619 Project is not based in Critical Race Theory. When discussing the 1776 Commission, Trump said, "we want our sons and daughters to know the truth. America is the greatest and most exceptional nation in the history of the world. Our country wasn't built by cancel culture, speech codes, and crushing conformity. We are not a nation of timid spirits."

To recap: Rufo introduces this concept of "critical race theory" to the conservative media on September 2nd. In his context, "critical race theory" has no real definition and has been divorced from actual Critical Race Theory. 15 days later, Trump adopts "critical race theory" as a major theme in his campaign, using the 1619 project to justify his claims that "critical race theory" is being taught to "our children" in schools, and he founds the 1776 Commission to provide an alternative narrative of American history. Conservative media outlets jump onto the "critical race theory" debate, but without a clear idea of what Critical Race Theory is (which is why it seems like there's a lot of different ideas about what it is and what's being taught) in an attempt to push for limits on teaching practices relating to racism.

In 2021, Joe Biden dissolved the 1776 Commission, but bills were introduced in Florida, Idaho, Iowa, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas to "restrict teaching critical race theory in public schools". In some cases, these bills single out the 1619 Project in particular, even though it is not based in Critical Race Theory. Other bills have an even larger ban on programs that involve social justice in general.

I'm not familiar with any "extreme stories" about "critical race theory" being taught in K-12 schools, but if you want to send ones you come across my way, I'm happy to discuss the veracity of those claims.

As for my opinion, I think it's good that students are being introduced to the ways in which our country's history has impacted the way our country's systems are built, and it's good that they're being introduced to the ways in which those systems are discriminatory. 48% of Gen Z are POC. 50%(ish) of Gen Z is female. 15.9% of Gen Z is LGBT. We're becoming more diverse as a society, and so the ways in which people are discriminated against are more visible, even to kids. It's important that kids understand (in an age-appropriate way) what discrimination is, why it happens, and what they can do about it.

Kids who are POC or female or obviously gender-divergent don't get the luxury of being able to ignore discrimination. Black kids are aware of "critical race theory" (the way that society systemically discriminates against them) from the get-go. Nobody is arguing that we should be telling white six year olds that they're evil for being white or that their parents are evil for being white. They're saying that a white six year old will notice that they're being treated differently than their Black best friend, and they'll know that's unfair. It's better to respond to their questions about fairness with an acknowledgement that things aren't fair, but we can work to fix them, instead of insisting that there is no problem, and that we are the "Greatest and Most Exceptional Nation In The History of The World".

Our current educational system does a lot of whitewashing when it comes to US History. Just think back to any celebration you had of Columbus Day or Thanksgiving in school, where they make it seem like the colonists and Native Americans were friends. It's important that instead of whitewashing our history, we acknowledge that many people were, and still are, hurt by that history. It's important to center non-white voices in those curricula, because without them, the story we're telling isn't true. History classes should not be a stage for American nationalist propaganda, and yet that's what they become when we insist on only teaching about the "good" things we've done.

Do I think that the 1619 Project is the way to go about that goal? Not necessarily. There are legitimate criticisms that can and have been made about that project, and I agree with some of them. Likewise, I think actual Critical Race Theory is too advanced for your average K-12 student, and it's not the best framework for teaching these topics. There are educators much smarter than I am who can (and have) come up with age-appropriate curricula to talk about these topics. But it's important that we allow for and encourage discussion of those topics, and putting a blanket ban over anything social justice related isn't going to make that happen.

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studioserra · 5 years ago

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A Brief History of Photography: The Beginning

Photography. An art form invented in 1830s, becoming publicly recognised ten years later.

Today, photography is the largest growing hobby in the world, with the hardware alone creating a multi-billion dollar industry. Not everyone knows what camera obscura or even shutter speed is, nor have many heard of Henri Cartier-Bresson or even Annie Leibovitz.

In this article, we take a step back and take a look at how this fascinating technique was created and developed.

Before Photography: Camera Obscura

Before photography was created, people had figured out the basic principles of lenses and the camera. They could project the image on the wall or piece of paper, however no printing was possible at the time: recording light turned out to be a lot harder than projecting it. The instrument that people used for processing pictures was called the Camera Obscura (which is Latin for the dark room) and it was around for a few centuries before photography came along.

It is believed that Camera Obscura was invented around 13-14th centuries, however there is a manuscript by an Arabian scholar Hassan ibn Hassan dated 10th century that describes the principles on which camera obscura works and on which analogue photography is based today.

Camera Obscura is essentially a dark, closed space in the shape of a box with a hole on one side of it. The hole has to be small enough in proportion to the box to make the camera obscura work properly. Light coming in through a tiny hole transforms and creates an image on the surface that it meets, like the wall of the box. The image is flipped and upside down, however, which is why modern analogue cameras have made use of mirrors.

In the mid 16th century, Giovanni Battista della Porta, an Italian scholar, wrote an essay on how to use camera obscura to make the drawing process easier. He projected the image of people outside the camera obscura on the canvas inside of it (camera obscura was a rather big room in this case) and then drew over the image or tried to copy it.

The process of using camera obscura looked very strange and frightening for the people at those times. Giovanni Battista had to drop the idea after he was arrested and prosecuted on a charge of sorcery.

Even though only few of the Renaissance artists admitted they used camera obscura as an aid in drawing, it is believed most of them did. The reason for not openly admitting it was the fear of being charged of association with occultism or simply not wanting to admit something many artists called cheating.

Today we can state that camera obscura was a prototype of the modern photo camera. Many people still find it amusing and use it for artistic reasons or simply for fun.

The First Photograph

Installing film and permanently capturing an image was a logical progression.

The first photo picture—as we know it—was taken in 1825 by a French inventor Joseph Nicéphore Niépce. It records a view from the window at Le Gras.

The exposure had to last for eight hours, so the sun in the picture had time to move from east to west appearing to shine on both sides of the building in the picture.

Niepce came up with the idea of using a petroleum derivative called "Bitumen of Judea" to record the camera's projection. Bitumen hardens with exposure to light, and the unhardened material could then be washed away. The metal plate, which was used by Niepce, was then polished, rendering a negative image that could be coated with ink to produce a print. One of the problems with this method was that the metal plate was heavy, expensive to produce, and took a lot of time to polish.

Photography Takes Off

In 1839, Sir John Herschel came up with a way of making the first glass negative. The same year he coined the term photography, deriving from the Greek "fos" meaning light and "grafo"—to write. Even though the process became easier and the result was better, it was still a long time until photography was publicly recognized.

At first, photography was either used as an aid in the work of an painter or followed the same principles the painters followed. The first publicly recognized portraits were usually portraits of one person, or family portraits. Finally, after decades of refinements and improvements, the mass use of cameras began in earnest with Eastman's Kodak's simple-but-relatively-reliable cameras. Kodak's camera went on to the market in 1888 with the slogan "You press the button, we do the rest".

In 1900 the Kodak Brownie was introduced, becoming the first commercial camera in the market available for middle-class buyers. The camera only took black and white shots, but still was very popular due to its efficiency and ease of use.

Color Photography

Color photography was explored throughout the 19th century, but didn't become truly commercially viable until the middle of the 20th century. Prior to this, color could not preserved for long; the images quickly degraded. Several methods of color photography were patented from 1862 by two French inventors: Louis Ducos du Hauron and Charlec Cros, working independently.

The first practical color plate reached the market in 1907. The method it used was based on a screen of filters. The screen let filtered red, green and/or blue light through and then developed to a negative, later reversed to a positive. Applying the same screen later on in the process of the print resulted in a color photo that would be preserved. The technology, even though slightly altered, is the one that is still used in the processing. Red, green and blue are the primary colors for television and computer screens, hence the RGB modes in numerous imaging applications.

The first color photo, an image of a tartan ribbon (above), was taken in 1861 by the famous Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell, who was famous for his work with electromagnetism. Despite the great influence his photograph had on the photo industry, Maxwell is rarely remembered for this as his inventions in the field of physics simply overshadowed this accomplishment.

The First Photograph With People

The first ever picture to have a human in it was Boulevard du Temple by Louis Daguerre, taken in 1838. The exposure lasted for about 10 minutes at the time, so it was barely possible for the camera to capture a person on the busy street, however it did capture a man who had his shoes polished for long enough to appear in the photo.

Notables in Photography

At one time, photography was an unusual and perhaps even controversial practice. If not for the enthusiasts who persevered and indeed, pioneered, many techniques, we might not have the photographic styles, artists, and practitioners we have today. Here are just a few of the most influential people we can thank for many of the advances in photography.

Alfred Stieglitz

Photography became a part of day-to-day life and an art movement. One of the people behind photography as art was Alfred Stieglitz, an American photographer and a promoter of modern art.

Stieglitz said that photographers are artists. He, along with F. Holland Day, led the Photo-Secession, the first photography art movement whose primary task was to show that photography was not only about the subject of the picture but also the manipulation by the photographer that led to the subject being portrayed.

Stieglitz set up various exhibitions where photos were judged by photographers. Stieglitz also promoted photography through newly established journals such "Camera Notes" and "Camera Work".

Example of Stieglitz's Work

Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (Felix Nadar)

Felix Nadar (a pseudonym of Gaspard-Félix Tournachon) was a French caricaturist, journalist and—once photography emerged—a photographer. He is most famous for pioneering the use of artificial lightning in photography. Nadar was a good friend of Jules Verne and is said to have inspired Five Weeks in a Balloon after creating a 60 metre high balloon named Le Géant (The Giant). Nadar was credited for having published the first ever photo interview in 1886.

Nadar's portraits followed the same principles of a fine art portrait. He was known for depicting many famous people including Jules Verne, Alexander Dumas, Peter Kropotkin and George Sand.

Example of Nadar's Work

Henri Cartier-Bresson

Henri Cartier-Bresson was a French photographer who is most famous for creating the "street photography" style of photojournalism, using the new compact 35mm format (which we still use today). Around the age of 23, he became very interested in photography and abandoned painting for it. "I suddenly understood that a photograph could fix eternity in an instant," he would later explain. Strangely enough, he would take his first pictures all around the world but avoided his native France. His first exhibition took place in New York's Julien Levy Gallery in 1932. Cartier-Bresson's first journalistic photos were taken at the George VI coronation in London however none of those portrayed the King himself.

The Frenchman's works have influenced generations of photo artists and journalists around the world. Despite being narrative in style, his works can also be seen as iconic artworks. Despite all the fame and impact, there are very few pictures of the man. He hated being photographed, as he was embarrassed of his fame.

Example of Cartier-Bresson's Work

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newstfionline · 4 years ago

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Thursday, April 22, 2021

Arizona third-grader holds food drives to help in pandemic (AP) Neighbors walked by during their morning stroll, passing families waved from their bikes and drivers slowed down long enough to read the hand-drawn sign—“Dylan’s Food Drive.” The poster was taped to two PVC pipes that were stuck inside construction cones for support. It was a typical scene for 8-year-old Dylan Pfeifer, who has been staging food drives from his home in metro Phoenix in response to the pandemic. Each drive is the culmination of hours of work that involves drawing posters, going door-to-door to hand out flyers and working with his mother to post information on Facebook. Dylan has hosted three drives from his home in Chandler, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) southeast of Phoenix. He said he is planning his next one in June, when summer vacation begins. Dylan says he has collected more than 1,000 cans and boxes of nonperishable food and more than $900 in donations. On its website, St. Mary’s Food Bank in Phoenix says it can convert $1 into seven meals, meaning Dylan has been able to provide more than 6,500 meals on just monetary donations. “It’s rare that you see kids at Dylan’s age who have a handle on what the problem is in their community, the people around them who are affected by it, and have the courage to do something about it,” said Jerry Brown, director of media relations at St. Mary’s Food Bank Alliance. Erin Pfeifer said the best part for her, as his mother, has been watching Dylan grow.

Verdict heard around the world: Global reactions to the George Floyd case (Washington Post) The conviction of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in the killing of George Floyd resonated globally, with foreign dignitaries and community leaders reacting to a verdict that revived calls for an international reckoning on racial inequality in justice systems around the world. Chauvin, who is White, was found guilty Tuesday of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in the death of Floyd, a Black man he pinned down outside a Minneapolis grocery store last year. Foreign media outlets ran live coverage, showing how the trial resonated far beyond its national context, and highlighting the outsized role the U.S. racial justice conversation plays internationally, as the rest of the world is forced to grapple with its own race relations. Floyd’s killing in May proved to be a moment of reckoning not only in the United States but also across the world, as protesters took to the streets calling for justice in his case and pointing to what they saw as parallels in their communities. In Japan, crowds last year gathered in Osaka holding signs that read “Black lives matter,” while in Germany, protesters took to the streets of Berlin holding placards that said “White silence is violence” and “I can’t breathe.” In Britain last year, they chanted for Mark Duggan, a 29-year-old who was shot by police during his attempted arrest in 2011. In France, they said the name Adama Traoré, a 24-year-old who died in police custody in 2016. In Australia, where Floyd’s death last year spurred a resurgence in activism over Indigenous people’s deaths in police custody, the guilty verdict led to fresh calls for authorities to scrutinize more than 400 Aboriginal deaths in custody.

Surveillance Nation (BuzzFeed News) A controversial facial recognition tool designed for policing has been quietly deployed across the country with little to no public oversight. According to reporting and data reviewed by BuzzFeed News, more than 7,000 individuals from nearly 2,000 public agencies nationwide have used Clearview AI to search through millions of Americans’ faces, looking for people, including Black Lives Matter protesters, Capitol insurrectionists, petty criminals, and their own friends and family members. BuzzFeed News has developed a searchable table of 1,803 publicly funded agencies whose employees are listed in the data as having used or tested the controversial policing tool before February 2020. These include local and state police, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Air Force, state healthcare organizations, offices of state attorneys general, and even public schools. In many cases, leaders at these agencies were unaware that employees were using the tool. Such widespread use of Clearview means that facial recognition may have been used in your hometown with very few people knowing about it. The New York City–based startup claims to have amassed one of the largest-known repositories of pictures of people’s faces—a database of more than 3 billion images scraped without permission from places such as Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. If you’ve posted images online, your social media profile picture, vacation snapshots, or family photos may well be part of a facial recognition dragnet that’s been tested or used by law enforcement agencies across the country.

Violence erupts as Mexico’s deadly gangs aim to cement power in largest ever elections (The Guardian) Violent clashes between rival Mexican criminal groups—and their alleged allies in the security forces—are escalating ahead of mid-term elections in June, triggering a string of political assassinations and the forced displacement of thousands. With more than 21,000 posts in local, state and national government up for election—including 15 state governorships—the 6 June polls are the largest in Mexico’s history, and criminal groups see the elections as an opportunity to further their interests. Much of the recent fighting has focused on the western state of Michoacán, where the Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación (Jalisco New Generation cartel) has stepped up its conflict with an alliance of local groups calling themselves the United Cartels. The violence has forced more than a thousand people to flee the area, feeding the flow of migrants heading to the US to seek asylum. “They are leaving because they get caught in the crossfire, because their homes have been destroyed, [and] because the main roads into [the area] have been carved up to stop the advance of the Jaliscos,” said Gregorio López, a Catholic priest who has sheltered refuges in the nearby city of Apatzingán. The Jalisco cartel, Mexico’s fastest-expanding criminal network, considers Michoacán, rich in international trafficking routes and extortion markets, a key building block in its bid for national criminal hegemony. But its decade-long attempt to take over the region has so far been frustrated by the local opponents’ deep political and social roots. With neither side able to impose its designs on the other or willing to back down, more than 15,500 homicides have been recorded here from January 2011 to February this year.

In Putin’s Standoff With Navalny, Many Russians Put Faith in President (WSJ) Thousands of demonstrators are expected to take to the streets in many Russian cities Wednesday in support of Alexei Navalny, the jailed opposition leader who has galvanized popular discontent with the long rule of President Vladimir Putin. But even as the opposition leader stirs dissent, Mr. Putin can count on the support of many Russians who either trust in his leadership, fear the uncertainties of political change or disapprove of Mr. Navalny and his protest movement. “If it were up to me, Putin would stay another 20 years in power,” said fashion designer Irina Larkina from her home in a drab apartment block in this Russian city on the Baltic sea. “He’s the one who has boosted our living standards and given us respect for ourselves again.” Even amid falling living standards and Western sanctions, Mr. Putin continues to enjoy enviable approval ratings. Sociologists say while few may feel deep support for Mr. Putin, the Kremlin can continue to count on approval ratings of around 60%. “There’s a point at which popularity won’t fall any further,” said Lev Gudkov, head of independent polling organization Levada Center. “The country has fallen into two camps, but the Kremlin knows there is a wealth of support it can still draw from within the population, even though it’s fallen in recent years,” he added.

Indian hospitals buckle amid virus surge (AP) Seema Gandotra, sick with the coronavirus, gasped for breath in an ambulance for 10 hours as it tried unsuccessfully to find an open bed at six hospitals in India’s sprawling capital. By the time she was admitted, it was too late, and the 51-year-old died hours later. Rajiv Tiwari, whose oxygen levels began falling after he tested positive for the virus, has the opposite problem: He identified an open bed, but the resident of Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh can’t get to it. “There is no ambulance to take me to the hospital,” he said. These tragedies are now everyday occurrences in the vast country, which is seeing its largest surge of the pandemic so far and watching its chronically underfunded health system crumble. Tests are delayed. Medical oxygen is scarce. Hospitals are understaffed and overflowing. Intensive care units are full. Nearly all ventilators are in use, and the dead are piling up at crematoriums and graveyards. India recorded over 250,000 new infections and over 1,700 deaths in the past 24 hours alone, and the U.K. announced a travel ban on most visitors from the country this week. Overall, India has reported more than 15 million cases and some 180,000 deaths—and experts say these numbers are likely undercounted. “The surge in infections has come like a storm and a big battle lies ahead,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in an address to the nation Tuesday night.

Further evidence in case against Indian activists accused of terrorism was planted, new report says (Washington Post) An unknown hacker planted more than 30 documents that investigators deemed incriminating on a laptop belonging to an Indian activist accused of terrorism, a new forensic analysis finds, indicating a more extensive use of malicious software than previously revealed. The report will heighten concerns about the controversial prosecution of a group of government critics under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Known as the Bhima Koregaon case, the prosecution is considered a bellwether for the rule of law in India. Human rights groups and legal experts view the case as an effort by the government to clamp down on critics. The space for dissent has diminished in Modi’s India, where journalists, activists and members of nongovernmental organizations have faced arrest and harassment. The activists accused in the case deny the charges against them. They include a prominent academic, a labor lawyer, a leftist poet, a Jesuit priest and two singers. All are advocates for the rights of the country’s most disadvantaged communities and vocal opponents of the ruling party. Many of them have been jailed for nearly three years as they await trial.

Community pantries offer reprieve from covid-19 hardships in the Philippines (Washington Post) They were of different ages, genders, and walks of life. Some had been there since sunrise. A number carried umbrellas and canvas bags. Hundreds stood in a line that stretched three blocks on Wednesday, all waiting for their turn to stock up on donated food. The community pantry, as it is known, bore a sign: Give what you can, take what you need. A week after the initiative began as a humble cart with free vegetables and canned goods, over 300 similar donation-driven efforts have popped up across the Philippines. The grass-roots action underlines the economic pain Filipinos are experiencing as they battle one of Southeast Asia’s worst coronavirus outbreaks and a harsh lockdown. The idea began when a small-business owner teamed up with local vegetable vendors and farmers who offered their produce to those in need. Within days, it grew into a multi-sector effort encompassing a variety of food and essential items—bread, eggs, fruit, rice, water, noodles—donated by rich and poor alike.

Iran Rattled as Israel Repeatedly Strikes Key Targets (NYT) In less than nine months, an assassin on a motorbike fatally shot an Al Qaeda commander given refuge in Tehran, Iran’s chief nuclear scientist was machine-gunned on a country road, and two separate, mysterious explosions rocked a key Iranian nuclear facility in the desert, striking the heart of the country’s efforts to enrich uranium. The steady drumbeat of attacks, which intelligence officials said were carried out by Israel, highlighted the seeming ease with which Israeli intelligence was able to reach deep inside Iran’s borders and repeatedly strike its most heavily guarded targets, often with the help of turncoat Iranians. The attacks, the latest wave in more than two decades of sabotage and assassinations, have exposed embarrassing security lapses. Most alarming for Iran, Iranian officials and analysts said, was that the attacks revealed that Israel had an effective network of collaborators inside Iran and that Iran’s intelligence services had failed to find them. “That the Israelis are effectively able to hit Iran inside in such a brazen way is hugely embarrassing and demonstrates a weakness that I think plays poorly inside Iran,” said Sanam Vakil, deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa Program at Chatham House.

With most adults now vaccinated, Israelis are busting loose (Washington Post) Israel is partying like it’s 2019. With most adults now vaccinated against the coronavirus and restrictions falling away—including the lifting this week of outdoor mask requirements—Israelis are joyously resuming routines that were disrupted more than a year ago and providing a glimpse of what the future could hold for other countries. Restaurants are booming outside and in. Concerts, bars and hotels are open to those who can flash their vaccine certificates. Classrooms are back to pre-covid capacity. The rate of new infections has plummeted—from a peak of almost 10,000 a day to about 140—and the number of serious coronavirus cases in many hospitals is down to single digits. The emergency covid-19 ward at Sheba Medical Center near Tel Aviv resumed duty as a parking garage, and waiting rooms are suddenly flooded with non-covid patients coming for long-deferred treatments.

Rebels threaten to march on capital as Chad reels from president’s battlefield death (Reuters) Rebel forces set their sights on Chad’s capital N’Djamena on Wednesday following the battlefield death of President Idriss Deby, threatening to bring more disruption to a country vital to international efforts to combat Islamist militants in Africa. Schools and some businesses were open in N’Djamena on Wednesday but many people had opted to stay home and the streets were quiet, a Reuters witness said.

#headlines #news

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indianpolsoc · 5 years ago

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Creating the Conditions for Indian Police Abolition

The following is a piece by editor Ishita Uppadhyay

‘Take it to the streets, defund the police, no justice, no peace,” is the rallying cry of thousands of protesting Americans. The recent murder of George Floyd has sparked outrage across the United States. Not only has his death bolstered the Black Lives Matter movement, but it has also emboldened many to go beyond the means of peaceful protest, resorting to rioting to voice their indignation. The protests against police brutality and systemic racism are some of the most significant in American history: Angela Davis, prominent activist and police abolitionist, stated that the country has “…never witnessed sustained demonstrations of this size that are so diverse.” The true mark of the movement’s impact, however, isn’t found on social media, but in American political discourse.

Police abolition has once more entered the mainstream American consciousness, and this time, it has transformed beyond a notion restricted to the imaginations of the left. Its implementation has seen beginnings in the massive funding cutbacks announced for the Minneapolis Police Department. The very jargon of political dialogue has changed, with statements made by the Minneapolis City Council announcing a “dismantling” of the police force. The sheer strength of the Black Lives Matter protests has even spurred President Modi to discuss the American unrest with President Trump. A sort of global stirring is taking place, and even India has been roused. This begs the question: is police abolition possible in our dear bharat, or is this a merely a distant fantasy?

The history of police brutality both in the United States and India reveal the entwined nature of law enforcement and violence against the oppressed. Much like the United States, India too faces issues regarding prejudiced policing. A 2019 report [1] published by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi shows that 35% of Dalit individuals claimed they had been arrested on false charges for petty crimes, while 27% of Adivasi individuals and 47% of Muslim individuals claimed similar discriminate arrests. Recent cases of police brutality have garnered considerable attention, with the brutal custodial torture of father-son duo Jayaraj and Fenix prompting the government to launch a CBI probe into the their deaths. The issue of police brutality has suddenly clawed its way into our dinner-table conversations. The case is inescapable, whether on social media or newspaper headlines. But Indian citizens are shocked, not surprised – Jayaraj and Fenix’s case is only one out of thousands of instances of police brutality that occur in India each year.

The corruption and inefficacy present in the Indian government and its law enforcement has instilled a disdain for appropriately administered justice in its citizens. The killing of Vikas Dubey in a police encounter is a relevant example of this belief in action. Indian responses have been divided on social media, ranging from outrage to pride regarding the Uttar Pradesh police’s actions. While criticisms of the encounter vary, it is clear that the vast majority of the country feels powerless to the actions of the police. Overwhelmed by corrupt judicial systems, citizens accept “justice” administered through extrajudicial killings. It is commonly accepted that due process cannot be ignored, no matter the crime committed. As a nation, we cannot pick and choose where legal modes of justice can be administered, and where they cannot. While this notion is welcomed by the general populace, its implementation proves difficult. In the United States, progressive socio-political ideologies like police abolition are easily brought to the forefront of discourse. This, of course, is relative to how similar realisations would occur in India, where issues of corruption disempower citizens. But within discussions of police abolition in India, one crucial element is often ignored: the unique politics of a post-colonial state.

Post-colonial countries possess a state that operates differently from those never colonized. Due to their developing nature, they are more pliable to revolution and reform. Because Indian law enforcement systems are still in the process of growth, they possess the unique ability to be more effectively shaped by the voices of their citizens. This is simply not the case in the United States. On American freedom, philosopher David Bentley Hart writes: “Chiefly, what they (Americans) have been trained not to know or even suspect is that, in many ways, they enjoy far fewer freedoms, and suffer under a more intrusive, centralized state, than do the citizens of countries with more vigorous social-democratic institutions.”

The amount of citizen dissent necessary to bring about mere conversations regarding American police abolition is proof of Hart’s statement in action. India’s position as a post-colonial country posits unique freedoms and rituals to its citizens. For instance, bribing is a common practice in India. This can be seen in a 2019 survey that illustrates that one in two Indians paid bribes in the past year, with 19% of respondents stating that they had paid bribes to the police force specifically. [2] While illegal, these acts give citizens an involuntary advantage, proving that it is possible to take immediate legal decisions without necessarily using state-sanctioned methods (such as filing a case in court, voting, contacting political representatives.) While wealth and connections are necessary in order to curry favour with the police, it is incomparable to the kind of wealth or political power necessary to impact the decisions of police officers in the United States. In India, a bribe is something even the “common man” can provide.

Further analysis of the Indian position demonstrates that our law enforcement can be considered to be more self-interested, whereas tools of law enforcement in countries like the United States solely serve those at the top of class, race, and sex-based hierarchies. The negative result of this self-interest is that it shifts more power to politicians as the sole purveyors of law enforcement. The positive result? Indian citizens are in a remarkable situation where the police force do not hold absolute power. They do not possess the same credibility or capacity to oppress, as demonstrated by police forces in the United States. This exploration of India as a post-colonial state indicates that it may not be ready for police abolition as undertaken in the United States, due to a lack of development within its police force. Having said that, this belief assumes that instability within a developed state is what creates the conditions for revolution. What if these conditions differ in India?

Marxist ideas regarding revolution believe that it occurs when the maturation of the currently existing socio-political system naturally creates instability. The implications of this definition declare that revolution occurs when the state is weak, an idea supported by historical evidence. Be that as it may, India’s rare position as a developing country with a huge population and self-interested police force enables it to subvert this idea of revolution. Instead of occurring due to maturation of the current system, revolution can occur when the state is still in the process of development. Indian citizens are currently living within the ideal conditions for revolution– all we must do is acknowledge this, and decide to utilise our collective power.

Political theorist Louis Althusser defines the relationship between the government and a police force in his seminal work, “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses.” He uses the term ‘repressive state apparatus’ or RSA to refer to bodies such as a state’s police force. Althusser believes that while RSAs are primarily a means of repression by the state, their secondary purpose is to uphold a state’s ideology. Understanding this helps us recognise that if the power of the police force is partially predicated on ideology, changing this ideology can change the police force. It is not individual police officers that create the issue of police brutality, rather, the state that legitimises upper class and upper caste safety as true safety. Contact with the police is first step of interactions within a corrupt justice system. Creating revolutionary change within this first step allows for a reduction of injustices throughout the rest of the state and its associated bodies. We need not wait for a state of extreme instability, as currently occurring in the United States, to demand change. For Indian citizens, the point of power is in the present moment.

1. https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/opinion/columns/policing-in-india-fails-the-diversity-test/article29385224.ece

2. https://edition.cnn.com/2019/11/27/asia/india-corruption-bribe-intl-hnk-scli/index.html

#politics #articles

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blackistory · 5 years ago

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History

Club Harlem was founded in 1935 by Leroy "Pop" Williams on the site of a dance hall called Fitzgerald's Auditorium.[a] Williams was a medical student at University of Pennsylvania when he managed to acquire enough money to buy Fitzgerald's; he left college after becoming the owner of the nightclub.[2] Williams gave the new nightclub the name of the Manhattan neighborhood because "a lot of black people live there".[3][4] The district, known as "Kentucky Avenue and the Curb", had become the home for African Americans in the racially segregated city since the end of World War I.[5] The new nightspot joined other popular black entertainment venues in the district such as Grace's Little Belmont, the Wintergarten, and the Paradise Club.[5] Along with Harlem's Cotton Club, it was a place for the moneyed set to enjoy an evening of African-American entertainment.[6] When the club opened in 1935, there were slot machines along with a basketball court on the top floor of the building.[7] In the 1940s the club became known as Clifton's Club Harlem.[8]

Club Harlem in 1940

In July 1940, Club Harlem, Little Belmont, the Paradise Club, and the Wonder Bar were targeted in a midnight raid by police officers, accompanied by the newly elected mayor, Tom Taggart, seeking proof of illegal gambling activities.[b] The police confiscated "three truckloads of gambling paraphernalia" and arrested 32 club owners and employees, then shut down the four clubs.[10] The next day the clubs were open for business as usual.[11][12][c]

In 1947, showman Larry Steele introduced an all-black revue called Smart Affairs to Club Harlem. The elaborate show, featuring 40 to 50 acts including comedians, singers, showgirls, chorus lines, and dance numbers, was headquartered at the club through 1970, and also toured throughout the United States and abroad between the 1940s and 1960s, including venues in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Adelaide, Australia, and Toronto, Canada.[14][15] The budget for the "Smart Affairs" shows ran as high as US$35,000 per week. The shows were on a par with Broadway productions.[16] Smart Affairs productions grossed between $400,000 and $500,000 annually by the early 1960s.[14] Steele also founded the Sepia Revue and Beige Beauties chorus lines at the club.[14] Entertainer Lola Falana was discovered by Sammy Davis, Jr. while working in Club Harlem's chorus line.[17]

In 1951 Williams and his brother, Clifton Williams, brought in other partners, including Ben Alten of the Paradise Club.[4][d] By 1954, Williams and Alten owned the Club Harlem and the Paradise Club, operating both under joint ownership.[18][e] The club employed 200 people in 1964. Its busiest time was during the tourist season from mid June to Labor Day.[19] Alten described the club's most profitable time as being between 1959 and 1977. On the weekends, between 20 and 25 buses from areas in the Northeastern United States arrived, bringing guests who wanted to see the club's shows.[2]

By 1968, Williams began having difficulty booking some African-American entertainers into the venue. He wrote an open letter to baseball star Jackie Robinson, who had a regular column in the Pittsburgh Courier newspaper. The entertainers in question did not want to work at venues catering to African Americans.[20] After the death of Pop Williams in 1976, Alten's new business partner was businessman Calvin Brock.[2] Alten and Brock refurbished the club, but business was never as good as it was in the past.[2]

Description

Club Harlem was outfitted with two lounges and a main showroom seating over 900.[4] A cocktail lounge had room for 400 guests with continuous entertainment available. The club was equipped with seven bars;[2][16] the front bar alone accommodated nearly 100 people.[21] Guitarist Pat Martino recalled in his biography: "In the front room at Club Harlem you had two stages for two different groups. Willis Jackson would do forty minutes, and then Chris Columbo's band would do forty minutes. They'd split sets all night long. And in the large back room you had singers like Sammy Davis with an orchestra. That was an incredible place".[22] Weekends at Club Harlem started on Friday night with the two bands alternating sets; the music kept going until Monday morning.[2]

Shows

For more than 50 years, the Harlem was the place in Atlantic City to see the best shows, hear the best musicians and have the best time.

The Philadelphia Inquirer, July 28, 1987[3]

The club scheduled matinees, nighttime shows, late-night shows, and a 6 a.m. "breakfast show" during the summer tourist season.[3][23][24] The music played from 10 p.m. Saturday night to 6 a.m. Monday morning.[3] "Celebrities, politicians, and tourists" often arrived in the early morning hours after the clubs on the white side of town had closed, and white performers such as Frank Sinatra, Milton Berle, and Lenny Bruce would go up on stage.[3][25][26]

Top-name black musicians also dropped by "to jam and develop their skills".[24] Musician Kelly Swaggerty, who was with Tadd Dameron's band at the time, remembered a jam session with Clifford Brown, Art Farmer and Joe Gordon that began at the Paradise Club and was continued at Club Harlem as the musicians wanted to continue playing.[27][f] Long time Atlantic City disc jockey Pinky Kravitz recalled that by 3 a.m., there were up to 1,000 people in line, waiting for the breakfast show to begin. In addition to the show itself, any celebrities sitting in the audience were called up to the stage and would perform.[17][29]

Drummer Chris Columbo, who conducted the club's orchestra for 34 years,[24][30] remembered that the early morning shows were the most vibrant because the other clubs in town were closed and many of those who were appearing at them were now at Club Harlem jamming with the club's musicians.[3][25] Johnny Lynch was in charge of the house band of 14 musicians, which was integrated. The band was well regarded among musicians. It was said that if you were in the Club Harlem band for the summer, you were a fine musician. Young men who wanted to become professionals often quit their regular jobs in summer to play with the Lynch band.[2]

The leading black entertainers of the day appeared at Club Harlem, including comedians Dick Gregory, George Kirby, Moms Mabley, and Slappy White; singers Cab Calloway, Billy Daniels, Billy Eckstine, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Lena Horne, Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington, and Ethel Waters; and jazz musicians Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Nat King Cole, Wild Bill Davis, and Duke Ellington.[24][31] Daniels first performed his signature song "That Old Black Magic" at Club Harlem in 1942.[3] Guitarist Pat Martino has stated that as a younger man he would play at Smalls Paradise in New York City for six months and then perform in the summer at the Club Harlem.[32] Racism, however, prohibited many of these performers from appearing at clubs on the south side of town, where white families lived. However, in the 1950s Frank Sinatra came from the 500 Club to Club Harlem to perform with Sammy Davis, Jr., and sang with Davis, a member of the Rat Pack, back at the 500 Club.[31] Lonnie Smith recorded a live album, Move Your Hand, at Club Harlem in 1969.[33] Even in its waning years in the 1970s, Club Harlem continued to attract contemporary black stars such as Harry Belafonte, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Redd Foxx, Marvin Gaye, Leslie Uggams, and Dionne Warwick.[34]

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bighound-littlebird · 6 years ago

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The Alarm that Never Sounded: GOT's treatment of the SanSan Romance

by Miodrag Zarkovic

Originally posted here.

When adapting female characters from ASOIAF into the TV show "Game of thrones", David Benioff and Dan Weiss aren't unlike Robert Baratheon: if they can't disrobe it, they're bored with it. Their rendition of Melisandre, for example, isn't an intimidating and imposing practitioner of dark and supernatural powers, but rather a seductress who's able to make people obey her only if she rewards them with sex (Stannis, Gendry) or gold (Brotherhood without Banners). One more example would be their rendition of Margaery Tyrell, who was turned from a teenage girl with a perfect facade and somewhat mysterious foundation, into a promiscuous lady willing to do anything – even have sex with both her brother and her husband simultaneously, as she proposes to the latter in Season 2 – in order to achieve her personal political ambitions that are literally limitless.

With that in mind, Sansa Stark never had a chance to be properly adapted in the show created by D&D. Now, the word 'properly' has a rather wide range of possible meanings, and this essay will attempt to examine at least some of them, but, for now, let's say that the most obvious aspect in which TV Sansa was shorthanded is her screen time. In "A Clash of Kings", the book that was the basis for the Season 2 of GoT, Sansa's POV chapters, along with Tyrion's, are the only ones that depict what's happening in King's Landing, the capital of The Seven Kingdoms and the center of political power in the story. This goes for the first two thirds of "A Storm of Swords" as well, e.g. until the moment Sansa escapes from King's Landing. In short, her chapters couldn't help but be of paramount importance in the narrative sense. In the show, however, Sansa's significance is greatly decreased, and not only because the show doesn't follow the "POV structure" of the novels, but because she's reduced to nothing but a prized captive for the Lannisters.

Yes, TV Sansa is a minor, and she's played by a minor, named Sophie Turner. Her age, due to the laws that forbid the usage of underage children in explicit sex scenes, prevented D&D from using Sansa in a way they adore. And her age couldn't be drastically changed without drastic consequences on her overall arc which is, in ACOK at least, built around her first period. That's why, for example, D&D couldn't cast Natalie Dormer – one of their favorite ASOIAF characters, by the way, because they did alter Margaery to suit the actress, instead of the other way around – in the role of Sansa, because Dormer, while certainly looking younger than she is, could never pass as a minor.

And that would probably be the only thing that makes Sansa off-limits for Natalie Dormer, or some other actress D&D adore, to play her in D&D's adaptation. Everything else would've been doable. Had George R. R. Martin not put her first period in the books, Sansa's age, promiscuity, vocabulary, even wardrobe, would've been changed accordingly to suit D&D's vision of a progressive Westerosi woman, which means the first three would've been amplified, while the fourth one – wardrobe – would definitely be reduced and freed from all the unnecessary parts. She'd probably even hook up with some rogue brute at some point; when she'd find the time for him, that is; after she's done with Joff, Tyrion, Lancel, and god knows who else, she'd certainly figure out cynical killers can occupy her bed just as good as other available men can.

Speaking of cynical killers – enter Sandor Clegane. One more character that, alas, couldn't be played by Natalie Dormer, and therefore not of particular interest to D&D. Sandor in the novels is a truly memorable fellow, who slowly but steadily grows in readers' eyes as the story progresses. At the beginning, he's nothing more than a merciless brute used only for killing people Lannisters want dead. Very soon, however, a reader finds out there might be some traces of soul under that rough surface. More and more we find out about Sandor, more and more intriguing and understandable he gets. Even – more likable.

Now, what makes him likable? The stories Littlefinger tells to Sansa?! Of course not. The stories Sandor himself keeps telling to Sansa are what fleshes him to the extent that was probably impossible to predict at the beginning of the series. Through his conversations with Sansa, we find out every important thing there is to know about him. Later on, when he hangs up with Arya, Sandor is already a fully developed character, whom we aren't discovering any more, but rather following. And he became like that precisely through his exchanges with Sansa.

The show went the other way, and a pretty odd way, at that. D&D decided it was better for Littlefinger to deliver the story of how Sandor's face got burned, and that decision carries some very serious consequences in regards to characterization. For example, Littlefinger appears as someone who does know the secrets of King's Landing, but, at the same time, as someone who doesn't hesitate to share those secrets with persons he doesn't have any control over. Yes, he warns Sansa not to tell anyone about the story; but, he warns her because, and here comes the funny part – Sandor is going to kill her.

Now, why isn't Littlefinger afraid Sandor's going to kill him? After all, isn't that the logical question because it's Littlefinger who offers Sandor's secrets to others? It seems there are only two possible answers: 1) Sandor is not that scary and dangerous as Littlefinger claims, or 2) Sandor is a dangerous fellow, but Littlefinger is the bravest individual alive, because he goes around telling the secrets of people that physically can literally eat him for breakfast; and he isn't shy even, because he doesn't fail to warn Sansa how dangerous is the situation he himself dares so boldly.

Whatever conclusion a viewer draws from there, something is going to be radically changed from the source material. Quite possibly, in fact, a lot of things are going to be altered. After the said scene, both Littlefinger and Sandor are drastically different than their book origins. And the characters we ended up with in the show, are not nearly as complex and intriguing as their book counterparts. This is especially true for Sandor, who's nothing if not scary and dangerous. He is supposed to frighten the living hell out of everyone who isn't his older brother. If you take that away from Sandor, you're only left with his tender side.

But, even his tender side was almost entirely removed from the show. This time, not only by Littlefinger, but also by Tyrion: in the throne room, when Joff orders Kingsguards to undress Sansa, Sandor stands there silently. His face expression suggests he isn't pleased with what he sees, but that's it. He doesn't stand up to his king with firm "That's enough" as in the book. It is therefore on Tyrion exclusively to deny Joffrey the pleasure of torturing the girl whose only crime was that she saw him in a moment of unflattering weakness. As in the books, TV Tyrion enters the room with his sellsword and he defends Sansa from Joff, but the important difference is that in the show it looks like Tyrion is the only one both willing to oppose Joffrey and capable of doing it. In the novel, we can sense that Sandor is ready to do the same thing, only, in his case, it comes with a much bigger risk, which is not without importance.

So, in this particular case, Sandor was sacrificed for the sake of TV Tyrion. TV Littlefinger, however, wasn't forgotten in that regard, because, once again, he's fed with lines that originally belong to Sandor. In the finale of the second season, it is Littlefinger who tells Sansa to look around and see how much better than her all those liars are. Just as the last time around, this change serves neither Littlefinger nor Sandor: the former's creepy-mentoring side is exposed much earlier than it would be logical, while the latter is robbed of yet another moment in which he shows how much he cares for Sansa and how protective he is toward her.

Sansa is a case on its own, as far as wrong adaptations are concerned. She's in the league with her mother Catelyn Stark, as two Stark women that were literally butchered in the show. The thing two of them have in common is the nature of their complexity: opposite to other female characters in ASOIAF, like Dany or Arya or Asha or Brienne or Cersei, Cat and Sansa aren't interested in hurting their enemies with their own hands, or, in the case of Dany, with her own dragons (this goes for Cersei, too, even though she's the one ordering the suffering of others, not committing it: her aggression is always personal, as we can sense in the first three novels). And, what's more, Sansa isn't interested in hurting anyone, actually. Cat does have an aggressive side in her; it's female aggression all the way, but aggression it is. Sansa, on the other hand, almost never desires other people to suffer in any way. There's only one noticeable exception: Joffrey. She does think on one or two occasions how nice it would be if Robb put a sword in Joff, and, by extension, she wishes Lannisters are defeated in the war against her family. However, we have to consider the situation she finds herself in at those moments – imprisoned by the Lannisters and at Joff's 'mercy' all the time; small miracle she wishes them ill. I've never been a girl arrested by the grave enemies of my family, but if I was, I'd definitely pray for their most horrible deaths every single night. And, we have to remember that, after Joff's death, she fails to feel happy over it, even though she tries to a little.

Therefore, it maybe isn't a stretch to say Sansa is probably the one character that is most unlike the author himself. Other major characters, especially POV ones, do resemble Martin at least partially. For males, it's obvious: even though GRRM never fought in a war, nor had any military training whatsoever, men are men; even in our day and age, no male is a complete stranger to war; while depicting all those dramatic battles and duels was quite an achievement (which no personal experience would make any easier, truth be told, because in ASOIAF the combat as a phenomenon is illustrated from any number of angles, each among them presented with an abundance of details), ultimately it was in himself where Martin could find a lot of answers about his male characters, whose position in a society is never independent from their combat prowess or lack of it. Female characters, on the other hand, had to be trickier, just like they always are for male authors – let's admit it, they are not that good in creating great females, just like women writers usually don't produce male characters that are a match to their female characters nor to the male heroes created by male authors. In our day and age, these "gender rules" are rarely spoken of, but they continue to exist, due to gender predispositions that are nowhere as strong as in the mind of an individual. There are exceptions, as in good male characters created by women and vice versa, but they are in a clear minority compared to underdeveloped or unrealistic characters whose only "fault" was that they didn't share the sex with an author. And in that regard, ASOIAF could very well be unparalleled: it is perhaps impossible to find any other story that features nearly as many memorable male and female characters both, as ASOIAF does (truth be told, that fact alone should be enough to inspire analysts and scholars to look at ASOIAF at a different, more demanding light, and not as a genre piece).

Martin's girls, however, aren't completely unlike the man who came up with them. Most of them are willingly participating in "men games", e.g. power-plays and/or wars, which makes for a precious connection to a male mindset of the author. They are thinking and behaving as women (or, in the case of Arya, and Dany to an extent, as girls), but all of them are interacting with something that, in all its glory and misery, can roughly be called "a man's world". Some of the most beautifully written chapters in the series are delivered from female POVs – The Red Wedding and Cersei's "Walk of Shame" come to mind right away; but, in a thematic sense, those and other female chapters don't differ too much from male POVs.

Except for Sansa's chapters, which unmistakably belong to something we can roughly call "a woman's world". Chapters of both male and female POVs in ASOIAF are often rich with testosterone, but Sansa’s ones are almost entirely driven by estrogen: look no further than her captivity in King's Landing, that actually is, as already said, focused around her first period – that decision solely should bring a lot of respect for Martin, because he had to know going that road is never easy for a male writer.

And the funniest thing is, it all fits. Sansa's storyline is distinctive in tone, but not odd. It is a legitimate part of the general plot of ASOIAF. In fact, as her story progresses, Sansa becomes more and more important for The Game, even though she showed no clear inclination to participate in it so far, but at the same time, Martin keeps Sansa away from all those "male" aspects he decorated other female characters of his saga.

And on top of everything, we're presented with her love story, a romance with no other than the man who, prior to discovering some delicate feelings for Sansa, could pose for an ideal brute of Westeros. At the beginning of the story, Sandor Clegane could be perceived as the exact opposite of Sansa. As someone who has no business whatsoever in her world, just like she has none in his. But, with some craft wording and master subtlety, Martin succeeds in illustrating the flood of emotions that go both ways in their relationship. Those emotions are never easy, nor appropriate, let alone allowed – even by Sansa and Sandor themselves! – but they're hard to be denied.

The complexity of their multilayered characters, of their respective positions in a society and in an ongoing war, and of their relationship that resists all known clichés, represent some of the strongest evidence that ASOIAF is much more than a genre piece. There's a lot in these novels that escapes genre boundaries, but nothing more evidently than SanSan. Stuff like that is not your usual fantasy element, no matter how flattering fantasy can be as a label (Homer, Shakespeare, Tolkien – to name just a few all-time greats that created unforgettable stories with supernatural aspects in them). Any author who comes up with that kind of love story involving those kind of characters – and with a legion of other characters, and with no less than four different religions, and with themes of honor, redemption, identity, bravery, equality, ancestry, legacy, freedom, revolution... – deserves to be analyzed not as a genre writer.

Now, one can only imagine what kind of enigma Sansa and Sandor were for Benioff and Weiss. And it pretty much remained unsolved, because, when faced with all the complexity of these two characters, Benioff and Weiss decided to remove it almost entirely, along with their relationship that is reduced to occasional and odd mentioning of 'little bird'. TV Sandor was simplified to a one-note brute that goes around TV Westeros and lectures people about the pleasures of killing, a one-note brute he never was in the novels, not even in the beginning of the saga. TV Sansa, on the other hand, was denied her book complexity by shutting down all her layers, one by one. For example, Benioff and Weiss completely removed her decision to go behind her father's back and inform Cersei of his plan. They simply refused to go down that road. They did something similar to Catelyn, whose infamous line to Jon they didn't remove entirely, but did replace it with a much softer one. It is pretty safe to assume that Cat's and Sansa's complexity did bother Benioff and Weiss from the get-go.

What's also removed from the show is Sansa's agency, primarily represented in the novels by her secret meetings with Dontos, a disgraced knight she herself saved from Joffrey. In the show, we got only the saving scene; it was filmed and executed clumsily, but it was there at least. However, until recently, nobody could be sure Sansa did save Dontos, because the man disappeared afterwards (he was briefly seen as joggling balls in "Blackwater" episode, in the scene in Cersei's chambers, but he was unrecognizable for the vast majority of audience). It is reported, though, that Dontos will be returning in Season 4, so yes, Sansa did save his life after all. But, even when he returns, Sansa's attempts at escaping will be two seasons younger than they should've been at that point, and it's hard to see a way D&D can remedy that neglect.

Show-lovers often defend D&D in regards to Sansa, by saying her personality is a difficult and tricky one for portraying on screen, because even in the books she's introverted. Now, maybe she isn't the most extroverted character ever, but she's pretty far from reclusive, as she does communicate with the outside world a lot at the beginning of the series, before she's imprisoned. And even while in captivity, she can't help but communicate with Sandor and Dontos. What's more, around two of them she is her true self, which provides a wide array of possibilities for a good and informative dialogue that, in an adaptation, could compensate for the lack of inner thoughts. With Dontos, she's open not only because she saved him, but also because he explicitly offers his help (and, truth be told, it is he who enabled her to leave King's Landing eventually, so, even though he wasn't exactly honest with her concerning his motivations, her trust wasn't as misplaced as it may seem at first). And with Sandor, she's open for no particular reason – other than those subtle, emotional forces, that both of them can't help but follow and eventually become the closest and most intimate beings to each other.

The way Martin incepted and developed the barely visible, but undeniable romance, between Sansa and Sandor, is nothing short of literary brilliance. With so few words and interactions, he managed so much. The vast majority of readers are aware of restrained attraction they mutually feel, even though they didn't share a single physical aspect of the romantic relationship.

Martin is indeed a master of subtlety, as evidenced by what looks like the endless amount of carefully hidden clues that point to any number of narrative puzzles, realization of which do make an entire story much richer than if taken at face value. And he's never more subtle than with two romances: Rhaegar/Lyanna and Sandor/Sansa. Now, the respective nature of subtlety of those two romances is rather different. With Rhaegar and Lyanna, a reader is – through Robert's retelling – offered a version that is actually the very opposite of what probably happened, and only later a reader can pick up clues here and there, and finally figure out the story of a fatal attraction between the two. But, the clues are presented throughout the text, so much that, even if you don't decipher everything after the first read, at the end of "A Game of Thrones" – the first book of the series – you'll probably sense that Robert's view on events wasn't exactly accurate.

The story of Sansa and Sandor is a very different one. Their relationship is never as much as addressed, even by themselves. Sandor isn't a POV character, and he's not exactly open to people, so his silence on the matter isn't unexpected. But, Martin didn't address their romance even in Sansa's chapters, which are typically packed with inner thoughts of the POV character. It looks like Martin decided to do it the harder way and make their romance somewhat a mystery even for Sansa, which, in hindsight, does seem to be the most logical way: what teenage girl would be fully aware of a romance that "inappropriate", and experienced in those dire circumstances?! As a result of that decision, the readers got a completely fascinating depiction of a romance, that can be described as a train you hear from miles away: at first, you can't even tell is it a train or some similar sound, but slowly, with every second, you're more and more certain that your ears didn't trick you, and very soon the train is so loud that it is the only thing you can hear at all. In the novels, a reader may find something strange at first, when Sandor shares the secret of his burned face with Sansa. Some alarm may be turned on deep inside. And it becomes more apparent each time two of them share a page, with a culmination during the Battle of the Blackwater Bay, when Sandor, after he decides to desert the Lannisters, visits Sansa in her room and offers to take her home to Winterfell.

It might be the only instance in the entire series where Sandor did ask anyone's approval, which does speak volumes about his feelings for Sansa. Considering the manner in which Martin described this romance, Sandor's actions on that day was as good as a confession of his deep attraction to her. Sansa, on the other hand, doesn't have a single moment which could be pointed at as a prime evidence of her undeniable love for The Hound, but this doesn't mean her feelings toward Sandor aren't palpable. It's one more mastery of the writer: through her frequent (and skewed, but in a telling way) memories on the last time she saw Sandor, he was able to show her feelings resonating more and more inside her.

In the show, Martin was denied a chance to do the same thing, even though he wrote the "Blackwater" episode in Season 2. Thanks to the already destroyed storyline, and to god knows how many changes, and to D&D's decision to remove from the final cut some scenes Martin referred to with his scenes, the one between Sansa and Sandor near the end of that episode, served more as a greeting to book-fans who like SanSan in the source material, than as a goodbye between two not unlike souls who shared much, and could have shared a lot more, and maybe are going to if they meet again. In that scene, Rory McCann was visibly better than usual as Sandor, and Sophie Turner was as good as usual, but, just like with anything ASOIAF, the scene doesn't have nearly the same impact and importance if taken out of context.

The exact context of their SanSan is yet to be fully revealed in the books, too. Because of the already mentioned subtlety – a quality that seems to intimidate showrunners Benioff and Weiss, who, in their turn, do retaliate with their on-screen war on subtlety (just recall what they turned other romances into; for example, the romance between TV Jon "Not The Brightest Kid In The Block" Snow and TV "I Know Everything And Therefore I Can't Stop Talking" Ygritte) – Sansa's and Sandor's love story is by no means an open book. Their romance has its own share of mystery, one of which may be: what inspired those two persons to feel so strongly for each other? Personally, I always thought their mutual attraction isn't only based on a "beauty and the beast" model. There is that, but in their case it goes deeper. If that was the engine behind his emotions, Sandor had more than enough opportunities to find a beauty for his beast long before Sansa entered his life. With Sansa, I'd say their mutual attraction is rooted in their personalities. For example, if you take away Sandor's aggression, he also isn't interested in hurting others. He's naturally talented for violence, and he lives in a society that respects that kind of talent, and that is why he's violent for a living, but at the end of the day, the suffering of others isn't any kind of reward for him. Possibly, because he isn't interested in other people that much. Though, when he is interested in someone, the interest is as strong as they come.

(We don't know at this point, but it's not a stretch to imagine that his reaction to the news that his hated brother was killed wasn't unlike Sansa's reaction to Joff's death. "Am I glad he's dead? Well, not exactly, even though I wanted him killed.")

Sansa may very well be like that, too. That would be one of the possible explanations of her AGOT actions. Like the rest of the Starks, Sansa is a complex character that has some issues of her own, without which neither she nor the other Starks would be such memorable characters as they obviously are; it is the fact that they are both willing and strong enough to fight those issues, that Starks stand out for. Without going into details (as if I could!), I expect that in the remaining novels Sansa is going to face the reasons that made her go to Cersei that damned night and with the consequences of that action. And whatever comes out of that soul-searching will be inevitably combined with her claim to Winterfell that Littlefinger brought up in AFFC. And that combination is going to elevate Sansa's arc to even bigger and more important levels than so far, even though so far she was the one Stark that was most engaged – unwittingly, but still – in the bloody dynastic war for the Iron Throne.

And she'll have to cross paths with Sandor Clegane, one way or another. Their relationship was so meticulously built up, it simply has to get some sort of a closure. What that closure is going to be is impossible to predict, because we are talking of one George R. R. Martin, a writer who managed to shock us as he pleased more than a few times.

What is also impossible, is to take anything that did or didn't happen in the show as any indication at what the closer may or may not be. There isn't a storyline in GoT that wasn't drastically changed, and weakened in the process, but Sansa's arc, along with her relationship with Sandor, is among the biggest victims of D&D's inability to adapt.

Whether you happen to like what Benioff and Weiss put in the show, or don't, you'd be advised not to recognize any significance in their decisions for further developments in ASOIAF. Just like show-lovers tend to remind everyone else, GoT and ASOIAF are two entirely separate beasts. And book Sansa and book Sandor, along with everything Martin has in his store for them, can be really glad about it.

#sansa stark #sandor clegane #game of thrones #asoiaf #asoiaf meta #meta #books vs show #long post

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