#dullards never learn from history

[maxiemartmanager]

[whitehotharlots]

The point is control

Whenever we think or talk about censorship, we usually conceptualize it as certain types of speech being somehow disallowed: maybe (rarely) it's made formally illegal by the government, maybe it's banned in certain venues, maybe the FCC will fine you if you broadcast it, maybe your boss will fire you if she learns of it, maybe your friends will stop talking to you if they see what you've written, etc. etc. 

This understanding engenders a lot of mostly worthless discussion precisely because it's so broad. Pedants--usually arguing in favor of banning a certain work or idea--will often argue that speech protections only apply to direct, government bans. These bans, when they exist, are fairly narrow and apply only to those rare speech acts in which other people are put in danger by speech (yelling the N-word in a crowded theater, for example). This pedantry isn't correct even within its own terms, however, because plenty of people get in trouble for making threats. The FBI has an entire entrapment program dedicated to getting mentally ill muslims and rednecks to post stuff like "Death 2 the Super bowl!!" on twitter, arresting them, and the doing a press conference about how they heroically saved the world from terrorism. 

Another, more recent pedant's trend is claiming that, actually, you do have freedom of speech; you just don't have freedom from the consequences of speech. This logic is eerily dictatorial and ignores the entire purpose of speech protections. Like, even in the history's most repressive regimes, people still technically had freedom of speech but not from consequences. Those leftist kids who the nazis beheaded for speaking out against the war were, by this logic, merely being held accountable. 

The two conceptualizations of censorship I described above are, 99% of the time, deployed by people who are arguing in favor of a certain act of censorship but trying to exempt themselves from the moral implications of doing so. Censorship is rad when they get to do it, but they realize such a solipsism seems kinda icky so they need to explain how, actually, they're not censoring anybody, what they're doing is an act of righteous silencing that's a totally different matter. Maybe they associate censorship with groups they don't like, such as nazis or religious zealots. Maybe they have a vague dedication toward Enlightenment principles and don't want to be regarded as incurious dullards. Most typically, they're just afraid of the axe slicing both ways, and they want to make sure that the precedent they're establishing for others will not be applied to themselves.

Anyone who engages with this honestly for more than a few minutes will realize that censorship is much more complicated, especially in regards to its informal and social dimensions. We can all agree that society simply would not function if everyone said whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted. You might think your boss is a moron or your wife's dress doesn't look flattering, but you realize that such tidbits are probably best kept to yourself. 

Again, this is a two-way proposition that everyone is seeking to balance. Do you really want people to verbalize every time they dislike or disagree with you? I sure as hell don't. And so, as part of a social compact, we learn to self-censor. Sometimes this is to the detriment of ourselves and our communities. Most often, however, it's just a price we have to pay in order to keep things from collapsing. 

But as systems, large and small, grow increasingly more insane and untenable, so do the comportment standards of speech. The disconnect between America's reality and the image Americans have of themselves has never been more plainly obvious, and so striving for situational equanimity is no longer good enough. We can't just pretend cops aren't racist and the economy isn't run by venal retards or that the government places any value on the life of its citizens. There's too much evidence that contradicts all that, and the evidence is too omnipresent. There's too many damn internet videos, and only so many of them can be cast as Russian disinformation. So, sadly, we must abandon our old ways of communicating and embrace instead systems that are even more unstable, repressive, and insane than the ones that were previously in place.

Until very, very recently, nuance and big-picture, balanced thinking were considered signs of seriousness, if not intelligence. Such considerations were always exploited by shitheads to obfuscate things that otherwise would have seemed much less ambiguous, yes, but this fact alone does not mitigate the potential value of such an approach to understanding the world--especially since the stuff that's been offered up to replace it is, by every worthwhile metric, even worse.

So let's not pretend I'm Malcolm Gladwell or some similarly slimy asshole seeking to "both sides" a clearcut moral issue. Let's pretend I am me. Flash back to about a year ago, when there was real, widespread, and sustained support for police reform. Remember that? Seems like forever ago, man, but it was just last year... anyhow, now, remember what happened? Direct, issues-focused attempts to reform policing were knocked down. Blotted out. Instead, we were told two things: 1) we had to repeat the slogan ABOLISH THE POLICE, and 2) we had to say it was actually very good and beautiful and nonviolent and valid when rioters burned down poor neighborhoods.

Now, in a relatively healthy discourse, it might have been possible for someone to say something like "while I agree that American policing is heavily violent and racist and requires substantial reforms, I worry that taking such an absolutist point of demanding abolition and cheering on the destruction of city blocks will be a political non-starter." This statement would have been, in retrospect, 100000000% correct. But could you have said it, in any worthwhile manner? If you had said something along those lines, what would the fallout had been? Would you have lost friends? Your job? Would you have suffered something more minor, like getting yelled at, told your opinion did not matter? Would your acquaintances still now--a year later, after their political project has failed beyond all dispute--would they still defame you in "whisper networks," never quite articulating your verbal sins but nonetheless informing others that you are a dangerous and bad person because one time you tried to tell them how utterly fucking self-destructive they were being? It is undeniably clear that last year's most-elevated voices were demanding not reform but catharsis. I hope they really had fun watching those immigrant-owned bodegas burn down, because that’s it, that will forever be remembered as the most palpable and consequential aspect of their shitty, selfish movement. We ain't reforming shit. Instead, we gave everyone who's already in power a blank check to fortify that power to a degree you and I cannot fully fathom.

But, oh, these people knew what they were doing. They were good little boys and girls. They have been rewarded with near-total control of the national discourse, and they are all either too guilt-ridden or too stupid to realize how badly they played into the hands of the structures they were supposedly trying to upend.

And so left-liberalism is now controlled by people whose worldview is equal parts superficial and incoherent. This was the only possible outcome that would have let the system continue to sustain itself in light of such immense evidence of its unsustainability without resulting in reform, so that's what has happened.

But... okay, let's take a step back. Let's focus on what I wanted to talk about when I started this.

I came across a post today from a young man who claimed that his high school English department head had been removed from his position and had his tenure revoked for refusing to remove three books from classrooms. This was, of course, fallout from the ongoing debate about Critical Race Theory. Two of those books were Marjane Satropi's Persepolis and, oh boy, The Diary of Anne Frank. Fuck. Jesus christ, fuck.

Now, here's the thing... When Persepolis was named, I assumed the bannors were anti-CRT. The graphic novel does not deal with racism all that much, at least not as its discussed contemporarily, but it centers an Iranian girl protagonist and maybe that upset Republican types. But Anne Frank? I'm sorry, but the most likely censors there are liberal identiarians who believe that teaching her diary amounts to centering the suffering of a white woman instead of talking about the One Real Racism, which must always be understood in an American context. The super woke cult group Black Hammer made waves recently with their #FuckAnneFrank campaign... you'd be hard pressed to find anyone associated with the GOP taking a firm stance against the diary since, oh, about 1975 or so.

So which side was it? That doesn't matter. What matters is, I cannot find out.

Now, pro-CRT people always accuse anti-CRT people of not knowing what CRT is, and then after making such accusations they always define CRT in a way that absolutely is not what CRT is. Pro-CRTers default to "they don't want  students to read about slavery or racism." This is absolutely not true, and absolutely not what actual CRT concerns itself with. Slavery and racism have been mainstays of American history curriucla since before I was born. Even people who barely paid attention in school would admit this, if there were any more desire for honesty in our discourse. 

My high school history teacher was a southern "lost causer" who took the south's side in the Civil War but nonetheless provided us with the most descriptive and unapologetic understandings of slavery's brutalities I had heard up until that point. He also unambiguously referred to the nuclear attacks on Hiroshmia and Nagasaki as "genocidal." Why? Because most people's politics are idiosyncratic, and because you cannot genuinely infer a person to believe one thing based on their opinion of another, tangentially related thing. The totality of human understanding used to be something open-minded people prided themselves on being aware of, believe it or not...

This is the problem with CRT. This is is the motivation behind the majority of people who wish to ban it. It’s not because they are necessarily racist themselves. It’s because they recognize, correctly, that the now-ascendant frames for understanding social issues boils everything down to a superficial patina that denies not only the realities of the systems they seek to upend but the very humanity of the people who exist within them. There is no humanity without depth and nuance and complexities and contradictions. When you argue otherwise, people will get mad and fight back. 

And this is the most bitter irony of this idiotic debate: it was never about not wanting to teach the sinful or embarrassing parts of our history. That was a different debate, one that was settled and won long ago. It is instead an immense, embarrassing overreach on behalf of people who have bullied their way to complete dominance of their spheres of influence within media and academe assuming they could do the same to everyone else. Some of its purveyors may have convinced themselves that getting students to admit complicity in privilege will prevent police shootings, sure. But I know these people. I’ve spoken to them at length. I’ve read their work. The vast, vast majority of them aren’t that stupid. The point is to exert control. The point is to make sure they stay in charge and that nothing changes. The point is failure. 

[theangrypokemaniac]

Contests Part 2/2

6. Loser Jessie

Screechy harpie Jessay has even more of a raw deal than Mavis and Dawn of the Dead.

From the outset I knew she'd never be champion, but she ought to rise above the tiresome berks clogging up procedure.

Sufficient popularity at Pokémon Towers ensured the girls were allotted coverage of all their award ceremonies. They had a moment in the sun.

What has Jessie in comparison?

I can't recall Hoenn, but I don't expect it was much.

Sinnoh however carried naught but a single paltry episode.

This for a main character.

This for someone there from the beginning.

This for an ardent fan favourite.

This for a wench who, should we include all her various mutations, has featured in more installments than either of 'em.

But no, treat Jesseee as worthless, even lower than Dawn's groupies. It's not like anyone watches it for her.

Looking back, it's obvious what they were intending to do come Unova.

What's the score then?

• One paltry Contest on screen.

• A couple happen elsewhere, marked by a few seconds per mention when the script oh-so generously moves away from the thrilling main plot.

It's gotta be the small-town concerns for Jessuhleenuh, nothing major. She deserves no better.

• One won by James, so not hers. Press her inadequacy upon us!

• One obtained as a gesture of pity from Kate Middleton.

And how did that work? What's the good of allowing 'Dawn' entry again?

She'd already qualified. If winning here, that gives her six, therefore there aren't enough Co-ordinators for the culmination.

And when Jessie showed up with a Ribbon recorded as belonging to Dawn, how was she taken as fulfilling the quota?

The slapdash way these Contests are run!

God forbid Jess should be shown as excelling at anything. It must be scraping into the final undeservedly.

Bitch gotta know her place.

7. Bumpkin Jessie

...

Ain't no description I can give that don't rhyme with 'hit', or variations of the theme.

You thought the shafting Jessica got coverage wise was bad enough? Yer ain't heard the 'alf of it.

Sinnoh was a period of peak Moron Team Rocket, where the one surprise was how stupid they could be.

You may remember an early episode when James designed her clothes for the catwalk. She thought it'd complement his work by applying lipstick all across her mug.

Obviously Jessie would do that, clueless as to how make-up functions.

Come on kids, she's thick!

Even at that numskull nadir it's difficult to comprehend anyone choosing this get up without severe duress.

Picture the scene: you debut on stage, before an audience of thousands and television cameras, in an event preoccupied with superficiality.

What do you wear?

• Giant, oversized glasses out of fashion since the Seventies.

• Bootlace tie last worn in the nineteenth century Wild West by a barman serving sarsaparillas.

• Colour scheme of brown and orange, the nation's favourite hues.

• A man's old shirt fraying at the cuffs.

• Voluminous apron dress.

• Massive yellow bows last seen decorating an Easter Egg. Always a winner.

• Heavy, clod-hopping boots.

• PIGTAILS!!!

Even the name is unattractive.

Ah yes, very common for those under six. Unheard of later.

You have reached puberty haven't yer Jessie? I can't tell anymore.

They couldn't get enough of that combination in Cosmo, which is why it's no longer in print.

Not only is Jessie denied success, she's deprived of the chance to be pretty in a realm where nothing but that carries weight.

Worse, given how her face disintegrated, this is the best she's been for five generations.

Yeah, because the inbred milkmaid style is such a good look, eh?

SEXAY!!!

8. So Long, Tsundere

Remember tsunderes? What happened to 'em?

The curse of Pokémon was draining the well of inspiration too quickly, throwing away interesting characters as mere guests.

This is particularly noticeable regarding the ladies. Back then, we got Misty, Jessie, Jessibelle, Cassidy, Aya, Giselle, Tyra, Sabrina, assorted crones Brutella, Nastina and Lacy, plus Joy, Jenny and Dame Ketchum provided parental authority.

How did a series that began with ball-breaking birds like that end up with insipid, glassy-eyed dullards like Zuhreena, Banana Lana, Marsh Mallow and Lilliput?

Ooh, Zuhreena is a pwincess!

Ooh, Banana Lana bwows big bwubbles!

Ooh, Marsh Mallow wuvs phallic waddishes!

Ooh, Lilliput won't pwet wanimals bwecause of Secwet Pain!

Can you imagine such weak specimens finding any place in the anarchic atmosphere of the classics?

It's SO boring!

Where's the punch? Where's the human spirit?

Where's the entertainment gone?

This squishy attitude began in Hoenn. Misty left, Jessie's hair symbolically changed from volcanic red to pink, and Contests introduced a cuddly theme where glitter glue and sequins are top priority.

Every sharp corner, every jagged point has been filed smooth. Now its substance hasn't the hardness to even develop edges, not when it's all cushions and candyfloss, where catching Pokémon rests on them deigning to grant permission, rather than 'avin it out.

Tsunderes, exuding untamed charisma and independence, besides a soupçon of danger, simply don't fit the cardboard box we habit now.

Nor do yanderes, kuuderes, tsuntsuns, or even derederes. It's just nothing but smiley-smiley creeps.

I wouldn't mind any of these tropes as long as there was some sign of colour to be had.

9. The Sacrifice of Misty

Misty bid farewell under the feeble justification that the lack of a longterm goal made her vulnerable to sacking.

Such a line uttered as if her own choice, being beyond them as writers to invent a purpose.

This implied her replacement would have an exciting quest aiming for excellence, something just beyond Misty's capabilities.

What did we get?

Dressing up and collecting Ribbons!

Is that...is that it? Is that the great idea? Is that all the girls are worth?

I lost Misty for THIS?!

Perhaps it makes no difference. By Hoenn they'd rendered her a leaden blandness sucked dry of all that made her special.

Going by the greasy-toothed bastardisation that swanned up in Alola, Misty was simply too wild for the safe, stifling atmosphere of today.

Her departure ensued she remains frozen as a funny, beloved presence, unlike those she left behind.

Now there was a lucky escape, as once the fanny-flapping starts, the bints have it on the brain.

May had Max to beat on the side, but Dawn developed monomania.

Hardly an episode went by without some reference to Contests, or how today's plot spurred her on to the next opportunity.

Yer need help, love!

Rather than Ash's new friend being a fascinating person who so happened to enter vanity projects, the competition defined them to the exclusion of life.

It is but moths drawn to the candle flame waiting to engulf them.

Contests are this world's version of Tom Riddle's diary: they promise sympathy and validation, but they eat your soul.

Like Tumblr.

10. Completely Unoriginal

Seems to me it wasn't so much Misty had no goal, it was more that Contests were the supposedly hot concept wedged into an existing property.

If earlier aspects failed to accommodate the invader, the onus certainly wasn't on the new kid to change. Oh no, stuff it in and chop off whatever gets in the way.

In the eyes of the post-Shudo regime, Misty was too volatile to last, and so had to go.

What idiots.

She's a tsundere. The softer, more feminine side is a defining component.

Would it really have been so problematic to retain her as an entrant? If Jessie can, why not?

Even if failing to fit, so what? Since when was established characterisation a barrier?

Isn't twisting likeable folk into unrecognisable pods the modus operandi of the writers?

That canon is immaterial, and must always give in to whatever fancy they currently have?

Well then, what's the big deal in infantilising Misty to promote it rather than pensioning her off?

Viewers will be more invested in the challenges awaiting a familiar face rather than a stranger.

What reduces the above to the risible is the original Misty and Jessie both participated in the Princess Festival.

All Contests are is that very scenario on repeat and robbed of all meaning.

Think about it:

• Beauty round

• Battle round

• Jessie loses

Same bloody thing.

Not only have I got to suffer this draining spectacle, it's got the nerve to possess not one iota of fresh ideas!

Contests are a low rent rip-off. The Princess Festival had a worthy reward in the shape of one-of-a-kind Dolls.

It'd already been revealed that ordinary Princess Dolls were ruinously expensive, therefore the special Pokémon edition have to be priceless.

What d'yer get for the trouble of a Contest but a bit of plastic tat taped to bargain basement frippery?

And they demand you get five of 'em!

Contests themselves were then resurrected as Showcases, although mercifully slimmed down to only three, with the emptiness ramped up in compensation.

Perhaps ironically, Princess Versus Princess is one of my favourite episodes. I love its critique of female avarice and accurate portrayal of clothing sales as reminiscent of the zombie apocalypse.

I don't mind the Festival as a single adventure, but I may have felt less favourable had it been a constant presence.

Except it isn't the competition at stake. This is a framework to explore Jessie and Misty as people.

Through its device we learn their history and therefore how they came to develop as the girls we know.

The setting serves as an opportunity for both to confront the misery and isolation of their childhoods, with the promise of overcoming that old torment with the balm of victory.

In the final, they aren't so much battling an opponent as fighting to be free of the past.

The tragedy is only one can be granted that reprieve. The other must remain unhappy in the ruins of memory.

It matters, unlike vapid Contests, where posturing is king. What depth can they provide in comparison?

Despite identical content, they are inverse counterparts, with the Festival presented as merely a light affair concealing a rather dark tale of neglect.

Contests however are paraded as this worthy nourishment for body and mind, a major point in one's journey towards enlightenment, when all they really amount to is an organ grinder and his monkey arsing about for the slack-gobbed plebs.

Bread and circuses.

Best of all, Misty won, not some side twat, as it should be.

Note how Jessie dressed: in delicate, vivid robes and golden decoration. The boys thought her beautiful.

Not as a gormless dweeb you'd cross the street to avoid!

And why the need to disguise herself anyway?

The Twerps had no issue with Jessie of Team Rocket joining the fun back then, so what happened?

At least she received the consolation of gaining Lickitung as a friend, with James and Meowth desperate to comfort her.

What do Contests bring? Sod all!

[fairest]

People my age remember when Giuliani screwed his police command centers into the concrete perimeter around Washington Square Park. The message was clear: nah nah free society, cops rule this town. Then 9/11 happened and we invaded Iraq. An explosion of growth for the arms industry. Across this country, basic bitch police departments were swagged out with that same armor the federal government used to control brown people abroad.

Make no mistake that when Trump bunked down into his armchair last night, and saw the video that showed an NYPD SUV plowing into protestors in Brooklyn—a video that filled me with a despair I can’t even begin to articulate, a despair I had not experienced since the bloodiest days of Occupy Wall Street—make no mistake that Trump was cheering on that car. Indeed, what he saw in that driver were his own roots. Those broken lessons he learned from his pure racist ancestors that he himself never worked to unlearn. It was the same glee he felt when he saw white nationalist James Fields plow his car into the group of protestors in Charlottesville, the car the killed 32-year-old Heather Heyer. (Hers is the name I always say, because she was a white woman who left her house that day to change things, but whatever.)

Make no mistake that the ambient tumor of white supremacy thrumming through the body of this somehow failing country, a disease that drove James Fields to his glory in Charlottesville, is the exact same white supremacy powering the badge behind the weaponized wheel in Brooklyn last night; the same one powering the humble billy club in my parent’s simpler violent time to a Motown soundtrack; the same one powering the polyester knee of Derek Chauvin the chauvinist, as he cathartically genuflected on George Floyd’s bothersome black neck.

Trump lies to all of us, all of the time—lies are the slipperiest speculums in his rape kit—but he lied to us big time when he proffered that there were "good people on both sides" in Charlottesville. We all know the side Trump is actually on. He is on the side of the white nationalists. He is on the side of James Fields. He is on the side of Joe Arpaio. He is even on the side of Dylann Roof, because Trump is a godless man. And he is on the side of the badge driving that sports utility vehicle last night, and the New York City military that his future personal attorney Rudy Giuliani built for him. He is on the side of men who blind themselves with the shining power of whiteness, the men who capitalize on that power to the most destructive ends. Trump is, indeed, the greatest of these monstrous men, their leader, and he is, as far as my education can tell, the worst American in American history, just for imagining a dullard like him deserved the nuanced power of the presidency in the first place. He is the embodiment of Claudia Rankine’s lyric that “because white men can't police their imagination, black men are dying.”

If Trump has any say in it, things are going to get much, much worse. All Americans must work to expunge Trump from office in November, and pray for peace.

[claihn]

“I don't need annnny help.” Mana insisted, puffing out her flushed cheeks as she flashed the insufferable Miqo'te a glower. She stumbled upon the sandy beach, barely registering the gust of wind that was toying with her yellow, short summery dress. The waning hour had the sun dipping below the horizon, illuminating the sea with a dazzling glitterscape of reds, oranges and yellows.  It'd been the anniversary of a painful memory and she'd insisted on going to the docks.  Unfortunately for her, she was waylaid by Vincint, who insisted they stop for a bite to eat first. Out of all the people in world, he was probably the only individual she would ever consider a friend. Their history stemmed from Limsa, although even then she'd never told him her entire history. The Seeker wasn't a dullard though and had gathered glimpses here or there. He might have pushed her buttons in various ways to aggravate her throughout their history, but he'd never pushed into her privacy. Of course, there were plenty of times she thought considering him even remotely close like a friend was a mistake, but the roguish gunner had a way of weaseling his way back into her good graces. Even if he was incredibly irksome with his advances, despite both of them knowing they'd never be more than friends.  Although in Mana's book, even inwardly admitting having him as a friend was a little unsettling. It was a source of fear.

“You can barely walk straight. Twelve, I forgot how much of a light weight you are.”  Vincint laughed, lightly bumping her just to send her scattering to the side. The Raen stayed on her feet, although she spread her arms out as if using them for balance while shooting daggers at him. 

“You said it was a... LITTLE drink! You stupid, dummy... cat!” Mana tried to bend over to pick up some sand, but ended up falling over in the process. When Vincint tried to help her back up, extending his hand with a bemused expression, she flung some up at him. He'd seen it a mile away and rolled his eyes after the dust settled. It wasn't the first time he'd roped the Auri woman into drinking more than she could handle, which was essentially a single drink, and it wasn't his fault that she never seemed to learn to trust his definitions.  He grabbed her arm and yanked her up, patting her rear as if to make sure the woman was settled. This earned him a slap of her tail and a stumbling shove. Vincint hadn't been paying attention to how close they were to the water. It'd been such a quiet day, the waves themselves weren't all that loud. So he feigned falling for her shove, mock tripping backwards to land on his rear. Except he realized halfway down that there was water rolling in and touching his feet, which meant... 

A spray of water engulfed the Miqo'te and the Raen who tumbled in his wake. Vincint hated swimming and in extension, hated getting wet in general. After coughing on some salt water and hastily getting back up once the waves receded, he turned around with dripping, wilted ears. Mana was laughing, utterly drenched herself and was yanked back to her feet once again by the Seeker, this time out of the sea's reach.  A hum of amusement tickled on her lips while she surveyed his features, enjoying the fact he was dripping from head to toe and in his heavier clothes, he looked like a waterlogged rat.  Never mind the fact that her own blue hair was clinging to her shoulders and her dress was hinting at what she wore underneath. “You still want to go to that dock, don't you.” Vincint said flatly, only imaging how rough that might be. Who knew a drunken, uncoordinated Raen would be such a handful? He pointedly looked down, appreciating the wet view for a moment until he felt a yank at his ear. Mana had snatched up to grab at the fuzzy black fur and pulled, sticking out her lip with an overly dramatic expression that only a drunkard could master. “I am going to the dock annnnd youu are going to help me! I do thish every year and … and you'll just have to accept the RISSKS. Understand?! You... you know how I get!”  She stomped her foot for good measure, which only had the Seeker rolling his eyes while he extracted his ear from her grabbing hands. A finger then pressed to her forehead and he slowly pushed her back with it, taking advantage of the fact that a drunk Mana was an uncoordinated one, even if her mind annoyingly seemed to stick around a bit longer. Stubbornly so. “Yea, yea, I know this means a lot to you. Part of the reason I thought a drink would help.” He admitted, pressing his lips together before he let out an exasperated breath. “Fine! Although if you fall off the dock, I'm not jumping in after you. Then once you've done your thing, we're going back to that bar.  It's still happy hour dammit and if you're going to be..” His voice trailed off beneath her narrowed gaze, deciding not to use the word stingy. “You're gonna be my wing woman, alright? You saw that waitress. She was hot.” 

Mana pressed her lips together, staring at Vincint for a palpable moment as she clearly was working through whether she felt insulted or not by the Seeker. He smiled in return, some of his charm dampened. Literally. His tail was nearly touching the sand as it dripped, drooping like the rest of his ebony hair. “Fine. She did have some lovely curves. Althoooough didn't she say I looked cute? Hmmmm.” Mana eyed him with a mischievous glint in her eye, which only had Vincint winking back. “I mean, I won't say no if you want to try for a thre-” The elbow to his gut was rather effective. 

[[ Writing Challenge #26 | Slosh |  Special thanks to Vin (no tumblr) for permissions! ]] 

[tentoriwrites]

Learning Curve: Episode Five

The Fox and the Candy @that-otome-potato

A group of affluent young men form a high school gang. Their goal is to bring peace to all the rival school gangs in their area. When an out of place girl at school threatens the peace and gains their attention, everything changes.

Episode Four

“You.” A sharp voice full of disgust caught her off guard as she walked down the hall. Assuming it was another insult to be slung her way she kept walking. Someone kept trying to get her attention, but their tone of voice simply pushed her on.

“Insufferable dullard! Didn’t anyone teach you manners?!” She was forced to stop when someone grabbed her arm.

“You’re… Mitsunari, right? Hideyoshi’s friend?” She was a little taken aback by his chasing after her when they hadn’t said a single word to each other after they exchanged introductions the first time. His red-faced irritation certainly didn’t help the awkwardness she felt either.

“At the very least you have the courtesy of remembering someone’s name when they give it to you.” He gave her a cross look as he dropped her arm.

“Maybe if you had used my name I would have known you were trying to get my attention.”

His face twisted momentarily.

“You forgot my name, didn’t you?”

“I don’t have time to remember the name of every bean taste headed simpleton I meet.” His terse reply left her feeling thoroughly done with the encounter.

“Right. Well have a great rest of the day!”

“Wait!” Flustered he grabbed her arm again. “As much as it pains me to admit this, I need your help.” His voice was so quiet at the end she almost didn’t catch it.

“Really? But I thought you were that student who skipped a few grades. I really doubt there’s much I can do for you…” She didn’t think it was possible for his face to look anymore irritated, yet he managed to surprise her.

“Hideyoshi is a fan of a particular kind of candy. You’re going to show me how to make it. Why else would I be asking you, manju brains.”

That last bit instantly turned her off.

“First of all, I work in a restaurant, not a candy shop. Second of all, just because you’re freakishly smart doesn’t mean I’m stupid.” She yanked her arm free and started walking away. She stopped when she realized he was following her. “What now?”

“You’re going to the Home Economics room, are you not?”

“No.”

His face went from stoic to twisted. “Why not?”

“It’s almost time for my history class.”

“Of course. Then I will meet you at that silly restaurant after school.”

“Why.”

“So you can show me how to make that candy of course. Truly, you must have manju for brains if you require me to spell everything out for you.”

“How about a deal?” She took a moment to compose herself before continuing. “If you learn to ask for help properly, I’ll help you if I can.”

“I have asked you properly.” It was a completely deadpan response.

“If I had to describe how you asked me in one word it would be rude.” Without any further explanation, she walked away.

Determined not to let the sour blueberry ruin her day, she put the whole encounter behind her. That is until he really did show up outside the restaurant that afternoon. But this time he was accompanied by a blond, a red-head, and one thoroughly over the world and everyone in it looking young man. She recognized the uniforms immediately. They went to the high school she would have gone to normally.

Mitsunari prevaricated by the door until the blond gave him a friendly nudge forward. When that didn’t work, the green haired boy opened the door and the red-head shoved him through. Before he could protest, the blond and red head took off running while the green haired young man followed slowly behind shaking his head and mumbling.

“Welcome to our restaurant! Table for one?” She cheerfully carried on as if she had no idea he could possibly have any other motivation for being there. It was a conscious effort to drive home what she said earlier.

His face twisted up and he grabbed the strap on his bag tighter. He started to spew an insult but it died so abruptly his whole body flinched. It was almost as if the words were a car crashing into an invisible wall inside him.

He thrust out a small, rectangular package and dropped it on the hostess counter. “I’ve been told giving a gift is customary to prove the sincerity of an apology.” He gave that sullen explanation as she stared at the package.

She didn’t expect a verbal apology. If her earlier encounters with Mitsunari taught her nothing, it was that he expected people to just understand. That said she plunked a jar of amber colored candies on the counter and looked at him expectantly. When his face lapsed into momentary confusion her smile widened a fraction.

“Must I explain everything to you, Mr. Mustybook?” She inched the jar forward. “I can’t show you how to make them today so these are for you to taste test your own.” She tapped the top of the jar with a neatly folded piece of paper.

“How did you…”

“I asked him a while ago. Then I taught myself how to make them.”

“Why would a vile succubus like you have need of such information?” He suddenly turned hostile.

“So I could have everyone’s favorite foods ready when they stop by.” She broke into a cheesy grin. “A little monkey told me you adore these!” She pulled a to go box out and made a flourish of opening it to reveal a pile of manju.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He scoffed and looked away.

“Is that so? What a shame. I guess I’ll just have to eat them…”

“I never said I wouldn’t eat them!” He grabbed the box and yanked it protectively against his chest. Then he gave her a piercing look as he reached for the jar and recipe. “Call Hideyoshi a monkey again and I’ll kill you.”

She watched him back out the door slowly. All the while, he eyed her suspiciously. Once the door shut behind him she let out a long sigh.

“That went better than expected!”

She nearly jumped out of her skin as a friendly voice broke the silence from behind her. “How’d you get in there?!” She looked around frantically as the blond from before peered back at her.

“Your Mom let us in the backdoor.”

“You scared her, you should apologize!” The red head admonished the blond. Meanwhile, the one with green hair sat at a table in the kitchen sipping tea.

“Yeah, yeah! Sorry ‘bout that.” He eyed the box on the counter. “Gonna open that?”

“No, I have to work now.” She dodged the question namely because she was petrified of what kind of gift someone like Mitsunari would have gotten her.

“Say you lot, if you’re going to be here a while, you should have a seat and eat!” Her Mom spared her from them pressing the issue. “You should have told me you had friends coming over.” Her Mom gave her a teasing look. “Why Kiyomasa here was just telling me about the city wide fitness competition coming up in a few weeks!”

 The next day she wandered into the library only to find Mitsunari sitting alone surrounded by piles of books. Closer inspection revealed they were all about candy making. “Did you try to make the candies then?” Though he pretended not to hear her, she noted a slight furrow in his brow.

“Did something go wrong then?” She was starting to feel bad for suggesting he try to do it on his own. Admittedly, candy making was one of the hardest things she learned.

“I’m sorry.” She slid another box of manju across the table to him. “It was mean of me to expect you to be able to do it on your own without some instruction first. I guess I just took for granted that you must be good at everything since you skipped some grades.” She sat down across from him. “It’s only natural that you can’t be amazing at everything all the time. If you’ll stop by the restaurant tonight, I’ll have time to make it up to you. If you’ll let me that is.”

She decided to leave when he didn’t answer her. Still she gave him one last look and noticed he had a manju in hand.

 The evening, she hovered in the kitchen, sitting at one of the out of the way counters doing homework. It would have been less distracting to study in their apartment upstairs, but she was waiting. She made a promise after all. She sat there jotting some notes out of her textbook with the pen Mitsunari had given her. It was covered in little foxes chasing manju.

“As I suspected. A higher quality pen has greatly increased the readability of your notes.” His blue tinted hair filled part of her field of view as he inspected her notes.

“Is that the real reason why you gave me a pen?” She grinned a little at the thought of him needing a practical excuse.

He scowled deeply and looked away. Perhaps to hide the blush on his cheeks. Not like she could be sure if it was an actual blush or him just being plain angry. “Are you going to show me how to make Hideyoshi’s candies or not?”

“A promise is a promise!”

Episode Six: Allies and Enemies

[vgckwb]

ML: Are They Worthy? Chapter 14: A Future Worth Fighting For

Judgement Wolf was about to head into the Wolf Mist. “Don’t you want to join?” he asked.

“Wouldn’t that be cheating?” Bunnyx said.

“You’re a fast learner” Judgement Wolf said, jumping in.

Bunnyx sat down at the foot of the bet. “Fluff! Counterclockwise!” she called out, transforming back into Alix.

“We back already?” Fluff said.

“Nah” Alix said. “I just wanted some company. So, what makes you so confident that I pass?”

“Dunno” Fluff said. “Intuition, I guess.”

“You didn’t happen to go to the future at some point to see this, right?” Alix asked.

“Just because I can time travel, doesn’t mean I do” Fluff responded. “Besides, what’s the fun in knowing everything?!” Alix smiled.

Meanwhile, Alix was face-to-face with her future self, who was a time traveling superhero Bunnyx. She was telling her that in order to help her dad, she needed to accept the rabbit miraculous and become the superhero she saw before her.

However, a second portal opened up. It was Bunnyx again, but from later in the future. “Alix!” she said. “You cannot accept the rabbit miraculous.”

Alix asked “Why not?”

Future Bunnyx explained “In the future, where I come from, because we accepted the rabbit miraculous, Hawk Moth got more aggressive with his attempts to take over the city.  Ladybug and Cat Noir gained more allies, but that only made Hawk Moth more aggressive. Eventually, he created a villain so powerful that none of us could defeat it. We are all in hiding, while this villain continues to terrorize the city. You can stop it. Just don’t become Bunnyx!”

“No, dad needs Bunnyx!” said present Bunnyx.

“Ladybug and Cat Noir can handle it” future Bunnyx said. “They can’t handle this.”

“She needs us. We’re so close!” present Bunnyx said.

“Uh, what’s happening?” Ladybug said, appearing before the three of them.

“Ladybug! You cannot give the miraculous to Alix” future Bunnyx said.

“No! You have to give her the miraculous!’ present Bunnyx said. “Otherwise, we can’t beat Art Vader.”

“If you do this, Hawk Moth will eventually create a supervillain so powerful that we can’t defeat it” future Bunnyx said. “You need to put a stop to this here.”

“But they can’t defeat Art Vader without us!” present Bunnyx said.

“Um, I’d like to hear what Alix thinks about all of this” Ladybug said.

Alix was confused. Her future selves had conflicting messages. Both were important, but they were telling her to do the opposite things. Alix then knew what she had to do. “Alright! Here’s what I want” Alix said. “Future Bunnyx, take this Ladybug with you so she can help out. I’ll take the miraculous and transform into Bunnyx and take Cat Noir into the Death Art. We’ll battle Art Vader for a bit, then I’ll take Cat Noir into the future to meet you. I just need a time and a place, so can you give that to me? Once we rally everyone, with two Ladybugs, two Cat Noirs, and two Bunnyxs, and everyone else we can defeat this monster. Then I’ll take this Ladybug and Cat Noir back, finish Art Vader, and then circle back here. Do you understand?” Ladybug nodded.

“But what if we get defeated again?” future Bunnyx said.

“Then we’ll get more people. It can’t stop every superhero, let alone multiples of them. I don’t know what in the future made me so pessimistic, but a real hero never gives up” Alix said. “So let’s go with the plan.”

The dream then faded into all white. “Wow, that was confusing” Judgement Wolf said. “But I think I managed to follow that.” Alix started to laugh. “What’s so funny?”

“Man, did I choose the right day for this” Alix said. Judgement Wolf looked at her confused. “See, you don’t know this, but I thought it would be unfair for you to test me the night of the Art Vader attack, since I’d be more prepared for that. So instead, I opted to send us to the night before the art exhibition, because I figured I’d be stressed out about it. And boy was I right.”

“Well, that was unexpected. Then again, you seem to be good at pulling rabbits out of hats” Judgement Wolf said.

“Do this mean I pass?” Alix asked.

“Yes” Judgement Wolf said. “Unless you knew that was my answer.”

“A friend of mine once told me, ‘What’s the fun in knowing everything?’” Alix said. “One more question. All of these hoops I’ve jumped through. Do you not think that that’s just me trying to be a superhero?”

Judgement Wolf thought about it. “You demonstrated that you wanted it to help people in your dream. I think that’s different from wanting them just because it would be cool. It’s like studying to become a doctor. There might be some reward there, but you’re still learning, and you’re still doing it for a good cause.”

“Thanks Judgement Wolf” Alix said. “I needed this.”

Judgement Wolf snickered. “Well, it seems like you have a big day ahead of you, so I’ll be on my way” he said, jumping out of the Wolf Mist.

Back in Alix’s room, Judgement Wolf reappeared. “Alright, let’s go” Judgement Wolf said.

“Why are you so glum?” Fluff asked. “You sound like you were temporarily tricked.”

“How would you know?” Judgement Wolf asked.

“Let’s just say, this isn’t my first rodeo with the wolf miraculous” Fluff said.

“Sorry, but I didn’t want to have an advantage,” Alix said.

“You explained as much” Judgement Wolf said.

“I guess this means I’m not going to know until before the art exhibition, but that’s OK” Alix said.

“That should tell you enough about whether you’re worthy” Fluff said.

“I’ll be the judge of that” Judgement Wolf said. “Now, let’s head back. Before we do something to disrupt the flow of time massively.”

“Fluff! Clockwise!” Alix called out. She transformed into Bunnyx. “Burrow!”

In the present, Bunnyx and Judgement Wolf arrived. Ladybug came running back. “I told you to wait for me” Ladybug said.

“She didn’t see who you are” Judgement Wolf said. “Did you?”

“Nope” said Bunnyx.

“See? It’s all good” Judgement Wolf said.

“Fine. Can I get back the miraculous?” Ladybug said.

“Sure” said Bunnyx. “Fluff! Counterclockwise!” She transformed back into Alix and gave the miraculous back to Ladybug. “Whether I passed or failed, I’m glad I helped out today.”

“You mean you don’t know?” Ladybug said.

“This one played a little temporal trick on me” Judgement Wolf said. “So she currently doesn’t know yet.” Judgement Wolf’s miraculous started to beep. “Gotta go. I’ll meet you later to discuss all of this.”

“Sounds like a plan” Ladybug said. Judgement Wolf fled.

Ladybug was about to leave, when Alix said “Wait! Can you come with me for a second?”

“Sure” said Ladybug.

The two of them walked up to Lila. “Hi Alix. Ladybug” she said.

“Come on Lila” said Alix. “You’re going to give my dad that apology you owe him.” Lila looked sorry, and followed.

They approached Mr. Kubdel. “Hey dad. Lila has something she would like to say to you” Alix said.

“I’m sorry” said Lila. “I guess I’m still trying to get used to not being manipulative.”

“It’s alright” said Mr. Kubdel. “To be honest, I’m used to people asking me prying questions. In fact, I encourage it. We only get the answers to history’s mysteries by prying. But one thing you said, combined with that dullard, just got to me. I do worry about missing some stuff in the present. That guy. I deal with people like him on a weekly basis. But thinking about it, he knows what he doesn’t want to miss and is going for it. I don’t want to miss my daughter before it’s too late.”

“Oh dad” Alix said, giving her dad a hug. “I know you’re always there for me.”

“You know, there’s a student art exhibition coming up” Lila said. “I’m sure Alix is going to be participating.”

“Really?” said Mr. Kubdel. “Well, I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“Again, I’m sorry” Lila said.

“It’s not your fault. I let my emotions get the better of me” Mr. Kubdel said.

“Hold on dad” Alix said, breaking the hug. “Are you being honest right now, Lila?”

“Yes” said Lila. “But if you don’t trust me, I understand.”

Alix stared her down. “Fine” she eventually said. “But know that I have me eye on you. We don’t want Hawk Moth Akumatizing you, or anyone else.”

“Of course” said Lila.

Ladybug was watching all of this. She still wasn’t sure if she should trust Lila. She seemed to be doing the right thing, but she still couldn’t 100% trust her yet. She decided it was best for now to give her the benefit of the doubt. “Well, it seems everything is fine here. I gotta go. Bug out!” she said, leaving.

Marinette arrived home. “Hi mom. Hi dad” she said.

“Hi” said Sabine. “Your friend Vlad is waiting upstairs for you.”

“Thanks mom” Marinette said, giving her mom a hug before heading up to the residence. Upstairs, she found Vlad in the living room. “Hey” he said.

“Let’s go to my room,” Marinette said.

In Marinette’s room, Vlad said “Sorry again for not being there to try and get Hawk Moth.”

“Don’t worry about that” Marinette said. “We’ll get him eventually.”

“Yeah, but I should have been there,” Vlad said.

“Look, you can’t keep beating yourself up about this” Marinette said. “If I kept beating myself up about every mistake I’ve made, I’d go crazy.”

“You’re right,” Vlad said. “So, now that Hawk Moth has said he’d stop following Lila, what do you want to do?”

Marinette had to think about this. Vlad was here yesterday, and that’s when they came up with the idea to protect Lila. Marintte remembered what happened yesterday. “Alright, so here’s what I’m thinking” Marinette said. “If we take turns looking after Lila, it would make it harder for Hawk Moth to track her down, right?”

“Sounds reasonable” Vlad said.

“But, it’s also a tool for keeping Lila in line” Marinette clarified. “If we’re watching over her, she can’t manipulate people into becoming villains. That is, if she’s still trying to.”

“Marinette, why don’t you remain suspicious of her?” Vlad asked. “I’m doing it.”

“Right, but I think that’ll only make Lila more susceptible” Marinette said. “Besides, if I want her to be nice, I have to be nice in return. I don’t want to distrust Lila, but she’s just so…”

“I get it” Vlad said. “Marinette, you really are a nice person. Don’t worry. If something happens, I’m your anchor, ready to bring you back down to Earth.”

“Thanks” said Marinette. “You know, sometimes I feel like I’m trying too hard to make sure that Lila is nice. But then I remember that it’s for a good cause. Like, studying to become a doctor. Sure, there’s some reward, but you still learned something, and you’re doing something good.” Vlad smiled.

In the present, Marinette and Vlad were contemplating what to do. “It’s not like we can justify keeping a watch on her anymore” Marinette said.

“So, if she’s still lying and manipulating outside of class, we’ll have no way of knowing?” Vlad said.

“I guess” Marinette said. “I’m going to message everyone and tell them the plan is off.” She went to her computer and began typing.

“How bogus” Vlad said.

“I know” Marinette said. “But, look at the bright side. Lila’s not going to lie at school. If she was telling the truth about Hawk Moth, he’s no longer tracking her. And, if we continue being ourselves and demonstrating honesty, Lila might pick it up as well.”

Vlad smiled. “You always know just what to say, Marinette” he said.

Marinette smiled and blushed a little. “Oh yeah, so how did it go with Alix?” Marinette asked.

“She passed” Vlad said. “Though her dream was something else. Oh yeah. Beyyo. I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

“What’s up?” Beyyo asked.

“You said Fluff smelled like chocolate. What’s up with that?” Vlad asked. Marinette and Tikki were now curious as well.

“Well, you know how I can sniff out other kwamis?” Beyyo asked. Vlad, Marinette, and Tikki nodded. “Well, each kwami to me has a signature scent. That way, I can tell them apart.”

“I saw Alix feeding Fluff chocolate. So, does that mean kwamis just smell like their favorite food?” Vlad asked.

Beyyo shook his head. “Not all the time. Tikki here, for instance, smells like cherries. Plagg, on the other hand, smells like something rotting.”

“That’s gotta sting” Marinette said.

“It’s not pleasant” Beyyo said. “Each kwami’s smell is linked to their trait. Fluff smells like chocolate because it’s sweet, but also can cause problems, much like time.”

“Why does Tikki smell like cherries then?” Marinette asked.

Beyyo began to answer “Because-”

“Because cherry blossoms signify spring, and spring signifies new beginnings, like creation” Tikki finished.

“Oh, so you do remember” Beyyo said.

“Of course I remember” Tikki said.

“I just thought that you were so mad at me that you forgot all the good times we’ve had” Beyyo said.

“Beyyo” Tikki said. “Of course I remember the good times. It’s what makes the bad times hurt so much.” Tikki was tearing up.

Beyyo gave her a hug. “I’m sorry” he said. “I can’t undo the past. I should have stopped him. I really should have.” Beyyo also started to cry. “I’m just glad were here now. With people like Vlad and Marinette by our side. I just hope you can forgive me someday.”

Tikki hugged Beyyo back. “It’s OK. I forgive you.”

Marinette smiled. “See? This happened because Tikki believed in Beyyo. I’ve got to believe in Lila the same way!”

Vlad smiled. “How Marinette of you” he said.

Meanwhile, Lila was meeting with Gabriel in secret. “Thanks for saving me from being confined” Lila said.

“Of course” said Gabriel. “I can’t lose someone like you. However, it might be best if we lay low for a little bit. If I Akumatize someone right away, blame might shift to you.”

“Yes Hawk Moth” Lila said. “Just say the word, and I’ll be ready.”

The next day, as everyone was going to their seats, Marinette approached Lila and said “Hey Lila. Congratulations on not being stalked by Hawk Moth. We’ve decided to cancel the watch on you.”

“Really?” Lila asked.

“Yeah, we figured that since Hawk Moth wasn’t after you anymore, there’d be no reason for it” Marinette said. “Listen, I know we kind of got off on the wrong foot, but it seems like you’re really trying to improve yourself. So, do you want to exchange phone numbers?”

Lila was shocked. “Sure” she said. The two exchanged numbers.

“Great. Thanks” Marinette said. “And sorry for any problems we’ve had.”

“It’s OK Marinette” Lila said. The two took their seats and class began.

[quasithinking]

Gravity’s Rainbow: Part X

About five hundred pages into this monster, the parts began to come together so I could stop asking, "Why was all of that stuff about Pirate Prentice necessary?!" Not that I'm any clearer on what his big secret mission delivered by the Rocket was supposed to be. But I am learning about the people who delivered that message and how it's tied to Slothrop's quest to find the plastic, probably the secret to Slothrop's hardons, in which the message was contained. But that's getting about 450 pages ahead of myself! Currently, I'm at a part of the book where I haven't registered that Slothrop is important at all. He's just a guy who keeps a poster of his sexual conquests that some psychic nutjobs and Pavlovians think is important. This section finds Jessica smoking alone in the dark of her and Roger Mexico's squat located in an abandoned village she can't name and thinking about the imposition of War. She would like the life she and Roger Mexico are living to be less of an imaginary thing wherein they hide from the realities of the War and more, well, you know, reality. The War is too big to conceive, too much to visualize as a whole. And it will not bother them, except maybe by A4 Rocket, and then, well, they wouldn't even know, right? Jessica thinks about a conversation she had with Roger Mexico about the Poisson distribution of the Rocket strikes. I've never had too much trouble with higher math or science (okay, Physics in my senior year of high school gave me some trouble but half of that was my attitude as a soon-to-be-high-school graduate who just couldn't be bothered with all this learning crap) but a college course in statistics was my first real indication that maybe I wasn't as smart as my mother kept insisting I was (although like my Physics course, it's possible that the situation surrounding my enrollment in this particular Statistics class and my apathetic attitude toward the material had more to do with why I didn't understand it). But with this following passage, Pynchon has me believing that my lifelong belief that Statistics is a language that very few have the capacity to learn was correct (not that I need much proof to acknowledge a belief which tends toward my own self interest). "Roger has tried to explain to her the V-bomb statistics: the difference between distribution, in angel's-eye view, over the map of England, and their own chances, as seen from down here. She's almost got it: nearly understands the Poisson equation, yet can't quite put the two together—put her own enforced calm day-to-day alongside the pure numbers, and keep them both in sight. Pieces keep slipping in and out.     "Why is your equation only for angels, Roger? Why can't we do something, down here? Couldn't there be an equation for us too, something to help us find a safer place?"     "Why am I surrounded," his usual understanding of self today, "by statistical illiterates? There's no way, love, not as long as the mean density strikes is constant. Pointsman doesn't even understand that."     The rockets are distributing about London just as Poisson's equation in the textbooks predicts. As the data keep coming in, Roger looks more and more like a prophet. Psi Section people stare after him in the hallways. It's not precognition, he wants to make an announcement in the cafeteria or something . . . have I ever pretended to be anything I'm not? all I'm doing is plugging numbers into a well-known equation, you can look it up in the book and do it yourself. . . ." See?! In Pynchon's description of Roger's statistical life, even the psychics can't get their heads around Statistics! It's mystical hoodoo! This section is a good example of why Gravity's Rainbow can be such a confusing read at times. This section begins from Jessica's perspective as she looks for a smoke in her and Mexico's squat. It then moves to a remembered conversation between Jessica and Roger. But then, during this remembrance, the scene shifts to a morning in Roger's life at The White Visitation seen from Pointsman's perspective. It's easy to lose oneself in these shifts of time and perspective, and to forget where the scene began if and when Pynchon decides to return to what had seemed like a linear bit of story telling. In the now shifted scene, Pointsman feels compelled to drop in on Mexico every morning to try to get a handle on the whole statistics thing. Pointsman's problem, as a Pavlovian, is that he only seems to understand binary results. Does a stimulus cause a reaction or not? (Yes, I've simplified this because I don't know much (or anything at all) about "summation," "transition," "irradiation," "concentration," or "reciprocal induction.") But Roger deals in seemingly random possibilities. What does a 0.37 chance even mean when you get right down to it?! To Pointsman, it simply means you don't know anything at all, really. If the numbers Mexico comes up with don't indicate how to avoid being hit by an A4, what fucking good are they then?! Pointsman's observation of what Mexico's ability to live comfortably with seemingly random probability evokes in me echoes of Douglas Coupland's Generation X (and not just because the word "generation" is italicized in the text!). "How can Mexico play, so at his ease, with these symbols of randomness and fright? Innocent as a child, perhaps unaware—perhaps—that in his play he wrecks the elegant rooms of history, threatens the idea of cause and effect itself. What if Mexico's whole generation have turned out like this? Will Postwar be nothing but "events," newly created one moment to the next? No links? Is it the end of history?" I mean, it's like Coupland's pitch for the book! Probably! Immediately after the bit I just transcribed, the scene shifts again to a night Roger was having a drunken discussion with the Reverend Dr. Paul de la Nuit about Mexico's statistics. In this brief remembrance, the Reverend asks Mexico a simple question through an analogy of a bit of trivia about the Romans: What fucking good is your chart of A4 Rocket strikes? It's a fair fucking question, really. And then we're back to Jessica's remembered conversation. Almost all the way back to the present narrative! Jessica pointing out that it isn't fair that his statistics don't tell them how to be safer; Roger once again being forced to repeat to yet another dullard that it's just an equation. Ignoring the whole discussion of statistics for a second, I'd also like to point out that the linear narrative (you know, the easy parts of the book!) is clever and enticing and beautifully written. This book isn't becoming my favorite book simply because it's smart and difficult to read and postmodern. It's because of moments like this:     "Well, it isn't fair."     "It's eminently fair," Roger now cynical, looking very young, she thinks. "Everyone's equal. Same chances of getting hit. Equal in the eyes of the rocket."     To which she gives him her Fay Wray look, eyes round as can be, red mouth about to open in a scream, till he has to laugh. "Oh, stop."     "Sometimes . . ." but what does she want to say? That he must always be lovable, in need of her and never, as now, the hovering statistical cherub who's never quite been to hell but speaks as if he's one of the most fallen. . . . The scene, once again, shifts to The White Visitation in a memory where Jessica and Pirate Prentice are talking while they watch Roger off in the distance playing in the snow. Pirate deems Roger's attitude toward the "rocket being fair" "Cheap nihilism." And later, when Jessica tells him about the exchange, he admits it. Sure. Cheap. Of course! But why should his reality, his fears, his way of coping with those fears, be less because of what others have truly suffered? Roger Mexico is just as frightened of death as anybody else who doesn't believe in something more, something after. And yet he works at The White Visitation where they all believe in more. So why shouldn't he fear death more than they do? All he has are his statistics and, in the end, they might offer an illusion of control but they offer no solace, no hope, no eternal reward. There's just the end and now, with the marvels of technology, you don't even get any warning about that. The section ends with both Jessica and Roger thinking about Pre-War life and how everything seemed silly and unnecessary and inconsequential. And as a reminder of the life one used to be able to lead without thinking about death constantly, a rocket hits nearby.

[red-diaper-babies]

This Is NOT Why We’re Marxists

[Bourgeois] Socialism sought to depreciate every revolutionary movement in the eyes of the working class by showing that no mere political reform, but only a change in the material conditions of existence, in economical relations, could be of any advantage to them. By changes in the material conditions of existence, this form of Socialism, however, by no means understands abolition of the bourgeois relations of production, an abolition that can be affected only by a revolution, but administrative reforms, based on the continued existence of these relations; reforms, therefore, that in no respect affect the relations between capital and labour, but, at the best, lessen the cost, and simplify the administrative work, of bourgeois government.

Bourgeois Socialism attains adequate expression when, and only when, it becomes a mere figure of speech.Free trade: for the benefit of the working class. 

Protective duties: for the benefit of the working class. Prison Reform: for the benefit of the working class. This is the last word and the only seriously meant word of bourgeois socialism.

It is summed up in the phrase: the bourgeois is a bourgeois — for the benefit of the working class.

-Marx, The Manifesto of the Communist Party

In her review for Jacobin of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century, entitled Why We’re Marxists, Professor Nivedita Majumdar identifies two of the right’s pet dismissals when confronted with irrefutable evidence of the severe and growing inequality that Capitalism has wrought. The first, and the one that has historically done the most work for them, is that inequality is actually good because it's fair. “Greed is good."

When this is demonstrated to be undeniably false, as Piketty does in his book, reactionaries fall back to their second line of defense, a little nugget of wisdom we all learn in Kindergarten: money doesn’t make you happy. I mean, haven’t you seen A Christmas Carol? It’s a Wonderful Life?

To illustrate this second brush off, Majumdar references conservative columnist and perennial dullard Megan McArdle's claim that

,‘...the proportion of this unhappiness due to income inequality is actually relatively small.’ Instead, McArdle contends in her review of Piketty’s book — which she admits to not have read — that what is needed ‘is the sense that you can plan for a decent life filled with love and joy and friendship, then send your children on to a life at least as secure and well-provisioned as your own.’

This is on-brand for McArdle, who likes to beguile you with trite sentimentalities in order to obscure whatever obscenity she's justifying; Megan is the type to hang a “Laugh, Love, Live” sign on an Auschwitz guard tower. And let's face it, this is more than a little self-serving for millionaire Washington Post columnist who, last I checked, has not tossed out her vast fortune because it doesn’t “spark joy.” In other words, McArdle probably doesn’t believe this, but maybe we should, and Majumdar is correct to caution the Left against being too hastily dismissive:

“The reason arguments disavowing the connection between money and happiness have such a lasting appeal is because there is a kernel of truth to them. The realization of human potential and happiness is much more intricately connected with creativity, art, science, myriad cultural practices, and forms of solidarity and community rather than materiality.”

And, she points out, Marx would absolutely agree.

But then Majumdar does something odd; she tries to smuggle in the importance of “materiality” anyway. Her argument is that McArdle and her ilk are correct, not because happiness is derived from wealth in and of itself, but to the extent that “material well-being” brings about the conditions for human fulfillment (or is at least it’s minimum requirement). This is strikingly banal; I suspect that even McArdle is aware that we’re not seeking wealth redistribution because we like the smell of the dollar bills themselves. Majumdar goes on to say,

“The moral power of Marx’s work doesn’t just derive from its systematic demystification of capitalism; it also flows from his insistence that capitalism cannot generate the conditions for human flourishing. He never equated material well-being with happiness, but he knew that there can be no happiness without material well-being…. The crime of capitalism is that it forces the vast majority of the population to remain preoccupied with basic concerns of nutrition, housing, health, and skill acquisition. It leaves little time for fostering the community and creativity that humans crave.”

Did you catch that? Majumdar seems to be suggesting that Capitalism cannot generate the conditions for human flourishing because it can’t provide material well-being, which of course it can and does, just not for most workers. And those workers that are not provided with material well-being are therefore too preoccupied with survival to do any of the things which lead to genuine happiness.

This simply does not suffice as a complete explanation for why Capitalism causes widespread unhappiness (which it does). A preoccupation with survival is, to some extent or another, an immovable part of the human condition.

Marx identifies two primary dialectical relationships which propel human history forward: man vs man, and man vs nature. The temporary conflict of man vs man is understood to be a function of class relations to the means of production and is expressed through class struggle, but once this conflict is resolved (through a communist revolution), man vs nature will persist. The synthesis of that conflict (dialect) will continue to dictate humanity’s standard of living, probably for all time. This is why we can easily imagine that human beings, before the rise of classes and after their abolition, would still be spending a great deal of time and effort on survival, perhaps for short periods of time (famine, natural disaster) or perhaps for whole generations (ice age, infectious disease). Even so, I’m willing to bet that most people were a lot “happier” before the rise of agriculture and class-based society, the period Marxists often refer to as “primitive communism.”

Mujamdar hastily adds that the injustice in all this is that we as a species actually do produce more than enough to “ensure basic material satisfaction for all,” and this is true, but what she’s not claiming that the injustice itself is what is making people unhappy, but it’s consequence: material deprivation, and the preoccupation on survival that it entails. 

This is all highly politically convenient for anyone straining to see salvation in the likes of the DSA and other reformist “socialist” organizations which pursue what Marx called Bourgeois Socialism, which seek to address the excesses of Capitalism without directly addressing Capitalist social relations. That’s what programs like single-payer healthcare and free college are to Bourgeois Socialists, methods of wielding class exploitation for the proletariat; not battles in the war to end society’s domination by the owning class, but an ends in and of themselves, a way of providing working with a lifestyle more akin to the Bourgeoisie, in particular the Petty Bourgeoisie, who generally have access to healthcare, education, housing, retirement, culture, science, etc.

Lenin: 

The petty-bourgeois democrats, those sham socialists who replaced the class struggle by dreams of class harmony, even pictured the socialist transformation in a dreamy fashion — not as the overthrow of the rule of the exploiting class, but as the peaceful submission of the minority to the majority which has become aware of its aims. This petty-bourgeois utopia, which is inseparable from the idea of the state being above classes, led in practice to the betrayal of the interests of the working classes, as was shown, for example, by the history of the French revolutions of 1848 and 1871, and by the experience of “socialist” participation in bourgeois Cabinets in Britain, France, Italy and other countries at the turn of the century.

-The State and Revolution

Just as “the bourgeoisie naturally conceives the world in which it is supreme to be the best,” (Marx), it also conceives of it’s way of being in the world, though mutable and dependent, to be an ideal to which every other class aspires. On the other hand, workers naturally conceive of different aspirations--especially collectivism--grounded in their own experience of reality, but are prevented from realizing those aspirations by that reality. The laundering of bourgeois values and lifestyles through it’s media, universities, political parties, etc., distorts our ideas about ourselves, what we want, and how to get it. Naturally, this can similarly distort our politics, particularly in the arena of reform struggles, where the revolutionary nature of the working class can become secondary to immediate, temporary gains. The political project of committed reformers can be summarized as an effort to make the proletariat more like the bourgeoisie, or, as Marx put it, “They wish for a bourgeoisie without a proletariat.” In America, the net result is a cultural obsession with the Petty Bourgeoisie, that class that Bourgeois politicians (usually) mean by “middle class,” people who must work but also meaningfully supplement their income through investments. We hate the Petty Bourgeoisie and we want to be the Petty Bourgeoisie, and this is no accident.

If our political project is primarily about transforming workers into the Petty Bourgeoisie through state intervention, it begs the questions, are the Petty Bourgeoisie actually happy? 

Now, it won’t do to get too ahead of ourselves. By and large, the Petty Bourgeoisie are happier, and much of that has to do with lower levels of stress and instability, higher career attainment, more free time, financial and employment security, etc. But this does not mean they flourish in the way Marx was talking about; it won't surprise anyone who has spent much time around the Petty Bourgeoisie that they are often miserable, self-conscious, restless, guilt ridden, petty, and desperate for purpose. Substance abuse and depression are common. This is not a case for pity, but a cautionary tale; ascension into the Petty Bourgeoisie, if it were possible for all workers--it's not--may not be all it's cracked up to be.

An overworked and under rewarded Proletariat is certainly a crime of Capitalism, but it is not the crime. The crime is wage slavery for the purposes of commodity production. The crime is that there is a Proletariat at all (and a Petty Bourgeoisie, and the Bourgeoisie above them). Once you grasp this, it becomes clear that Majumdar’s argument is akin to claiming that chattel slaves would have been "happy" with their social position if only they’d been given more free time, a college education, and enough food to eat. Such a thing would never happen, but if it did, it wouldn't even come close to redressing the wrong done. Astoundingly, it seems that Megan McArdle, who is very dumb, nonetheless grasps something that Majumdar, who is not dumb, does not: human happiness, or contentment, or fulfillment, or whatever, actually is compatible with struggle, even material deprivation. Human happiness may even be contingent on struggle, just not the sorts of struggles that Capitalism mires us in. The fact of the matter is, Capitalism cannot generate the conditions for human flourishing, whether or not it provides material well-being, because all material well-being under Capitalism is predicated on the exploitation of labor, drags all classes down with false consciousness, and torments us all with alienation.

Picture Tatiana, a middle-aged pharmacologist who, 15 years ago, pursued her advanced degree in the hopes of making good money, sure, but also because she wanted to make a contribution to society; namely, the eradication of some terrible disease. Unfortunately she discovered that getting adequately paid to pursue her deeply motivating and personal goal was a lot more difficult than she expected. After some valiant attempts to keep the dream alive, she now finds herself resigned to a Big Pharma firm, researching boner pills for a six figure salary that supports the kind of lifestyle that is unburdened from the material deprivations of her youth. Between the salaries commanded by herself and her handsomely paid lawyer husband, the family has more than enough income and paid time off to travel, paint, attend ballets, read poetry, etc. Tatiana tries to remain up on the scientific literature in her field, teaches classical singing to her children, and volunteers on the weekends at her church. 

And yet, Tatianna is deeply depressed all the same.

She finds her relationships with friends superficial and competitive; her relatively modest wealth embarrassing and gaudy; her marriage contentious and unsatisfactory, punctuated by shouting matches about domestic labor and anxieties about childrearing and the future; even in her volunteer work she can’t seem to wash off the stink of social division as she, the giver, provides the meals, and the receivers, the desperate people who file through the soup kitchen, wordlessly accept what she gives. She craves a more intimate connection but cannot see any way of achieving it. 

And the job. Most of all, there’s the job; the lonely, soul crushing, purposeless job, with it’s needy subordinates, backstabbing peers, soulless and sleazy corporate execs, and the hours upon hours--easily over fifty a week--of tedium and wasted potential, all to produce a cheaper version of a largely pointless drug in order to pad the profit margins of the company’s shareholders. Tatianna doesn't choose what she's working on or why. She doesn't produce for the good of society, or because it fulfills her desire for a creative, productive outlet, or because her community thrives from her contribution. She's at the mercy of the market, even at her privileged position. Despite some fruitful mutual fund investments, she is, like nearly everyone, forced to participate in commodity production in order to survive. Single-payer healthcare, a higher minimum wage, free college, guaranteed housing, UBI; these things would solve a lot of problems for a lot of people, but it won’t fix the ills that haunt Tatiana.

Now imagine Tatiana in an entirely different context, where wage slavery has not been "perfected" but abolished, and, freed from the shackles of commodity production, she is no longer alienated from the fruits of her labor or from the members of her community. Her family lives modestly, but is secure in their interdependence on the rest of society; they will be taken care of if the need arises, just as they take care of those that require it now. She has no need to concern herself with retirement investments, college admissions, keeping her Linkedin up to date, etc. Sometimes she spends the day pursuing pharmacological research at a co-op, engaged in the difficult task of mutual accountability and democratic decision making. Sometimes, when the need arises, she agrees to work long nursing shifts at the hospital, returning home tired and drained but confident that her labor saved lives. Sometimes she spends the whole day teaching music to her children, and maybe the neighbors' children, too, with no concern that she will be fired for taking the day off, or become unable to make her mortgage payments due to lost income, or that she will miss out on a promotion for lack of dedication to the company. She has many friends who have diverse interests and passions, none of whom are any better off or worse off than she; none of whom are any more or less essential, more or less valued, none of whom have social/cultural/racial/economic power over her, or vice versa. And the husband? Maybe the lack of stress and the equitable expectations of domestic labor prevented the deterioration of their relationship. Maybe they were good friends who had children together but never felt compelled--socially or financially--to embark on a relational form that was a bad fit for both of them. And maybe she ditched him a while back because, after all, her life is not dependent on their shared finances, and now she finds that they're both much happier co-parenting and casually dating other people.

It's not all roses; in many ways it's more difficult than the Petty Bourgeois lifestyle she was afforded by Capitalism. But it is a decent life, filled with love, and joy, and friendship, and the confidence that her children--if raising children is something she wanted--will have the same opportunity to care for and be cared for.

[saintjoan]

the best lines from this research article I had to read:

“or in the late-summer bloom of academic narcissism, a postmodern literary critic.”

“all one can do is weep”

“the same mixture of horror and pride that a father might feel upon learning that his 14 year old son has got a classmate with child”

“Huh?”

“of course Latin historians frequently failed to tell the truth”

“squalls of nonsense from France”

“we can scream in mirth at the feebleness of the criteria”

“the study of Latin prose authors was traditionally regarded as the province of dullards”

“ ‘it wants figs!’ ” 

“a little innocent rhetorical gussying”

“the result is like the diary of a teenager: riveting only to its creator, repellent to others, and illuminating to none”

“the ecstasy of parsing!”

“to John Henderson the Annals were - well, as usual with John Henderson, who can tell?”

“this sad stuff”

“the Annales Maximi, about which controversy will never cease”

“as perverse as it would be to read the New York Times as if it were a novel by John Grisham”

even the title itself, “historians without history: against roman historiography” (keep in mind that this article is found in a compilation called “the roman historians”, as if the overall salt content of the writing was not already high enough)

[whoinwhoville]

Lab Mates

Okay, I decided to post this here in case you don’t have access to AO3. I know this is a bit of self-promotion, but I’m really proud of this fic. And for some reason, you guys really like it, and it makes me SO HAPPY to give YOU a smile! There are too many sad things in the world right now, and I just want to make the world a little bit brighter.

Ten x Rose Martha Jones Rated All Ages University AU, Professor x Student AU (but no hanky panky), Lab Partners AU, texting fic, UST, mutual pining,

Tuesday September 27

8:42 pm - HoppingForMyLife Hi. Your lab partner here. Name’s Rose. You weren’t in lab when we were given partner assignments. So here’s me, and you have my text now. We need to get going on this project. Sounds like a bugger.

8:42 pm - Doctor10 ???? Which class ???? I’m taking 5 classes this term.

8:42 pm - HoppingForMyLife Blimey. 5? RLY? That’s a lot. I’m in 3. But it’s Psych 221 since you asked.

8:42 pm - Doctor10 Oops forgot that one. when/where?

8:43 pm - HoppingForMyLife Psych building, L400 T/Th 6:05

8:44 pm - Doctor10 Done and on my calendar C U tomorrow

8:44 pm - Doctor10 Thx

8:45 pm - HoppingForMyLife bye

oOo

8:45 pm - HoppingForMyLife Think I got a clunker of a psych lab partner

8:45 pm - PreMed&Dead BIGHUGS guy or girl?

8:45 pm - HoppingForMyLife dunno no profile pic on text. and forgot to ask name. who forgets first day of class? and who takes 5 classes?

8:46 pm - PreMed&Dead 5 classes????????? he’s either a genius or cray-cray.

8:46 pm - HoppingForMyLife gotta go m tired and have my first physics lecture @ 7 am. ugh ugh ugh ugh. :barf face: and i signed up for physics why?

8:46 pm - PreMed&Dead cuz Jack said the prof is hot and u need a science to grad

oOo

8:49 pm - HoppingForMyLife hello doctor10. forgot to ask your name.

8:50 pm - HoppingForMyLife hello u there?

8:50 pm - HoppingForMyLife i’ll see you tomorrow. I’m blonde and wear a pink hoodie.

oOo

Thursday September 29

7:35 pm - HoppingForMyLife partner no show. again. maybe dropped? only one person left to partner with. looks creepy. old guy. like 80. only has one eye - other one all covered with shrivelled up eyelid. :shudders sticker: and he talks to himself.

7:35 pm - PreMed&Dead sorry.

7:35 pm - HoppingForMyLife i don’t have an idea for the project either.

7:35 pm - PreMed&Dead you’ll think of one. more important is psychics prof as hot as Jack says?

7:35 pm - HoppingForMyLife YOU. HAVE. NO. IDEA. I’m still fanning myself. Good thing no teaching today because I didn’t hear a word he said. :heart eyes emoji:

7:35 pm - PreMed&Dead Niiiiiiice

7:35 pm - HoppingForMyLife u still at SBux? i took pic of him and he may or may not be my homescreen pic

7:36 pm - PreMed&Dead hot for teacher?

7:36 pm - HoppingForMyLife ha ha. thx for ear worm Mar. c u in 10 and if u r good will show you the pic of my future husband.

oOo

Friday September 30

8:05 am - HoppingForMyLife martha! helpmehelpmehelpme i just got out of my physics lecture and i’m dead i’m dead i’m dead and in love or maybe lust how am i ever going to pass physics when the prof is so gorgeous that i just can’t even… all i do is stare at his lips and hips and his hair and guh. everything. he talks and talks and talks and all i hear is the ringing in my ears from the blood rushing from my brain. except when i’m listening to his velvet voice of sex. and he wears these glasses. and a suit. and it’s tight. and his tie. i just want to grab it and pull him down to my lips. i’mdeaddeaddeaddead

8:05 am - PreMed&Dead At least you’ll die… happy?????

8:05 am - HoppingForMyLife here’s a new pic. rear view. i will be forever thankful that he uses an old fashioned chalkboard instead of smartboard.

8:05 am - PreMed&Dead :drooling:

8:06 am - HoppingForMyLife did i tell you I’m gonna marry him?

8:06 am - PreMed&Dead a time or ten. but what if he’s a jerk? or dull? physics, Rose. pretty dull stuff.

8:06 am - HoppingForMyLife impossible.

8:06 am - PreMed&Dead heard from psych lab deadbeat?

8:06 am - HoppingForMyLife nope. sigh…

oOo

Tuesday October 4

8:10 pm - HoppingForMyLife Doctor10, i rllllly need to know if you are still in psych lab. u have missed 3 labs now. Need new partner if u dropped.

8:10 pm - Doctor10 I. Am. SO. SO. SOOOOOOOO SORRY. Got tied up with papers. can we meet today? i promise i am a responsible adult AND i’m a genius.

8:11 pm - HoppingForMyLife humble too. maybe psych test subject should be u? god complex? u r taking 5 classes after all.

8:11 pm - Doctor10 u wound me :brokenheart:

8:11 pm - HoppingForMyLife let’s meet today. library?

8:11 pm - Doctor10 my second home. i’m already there. on second floor. i have a standing reservation for study room 2B.

8:12 - HoppingForMyLife ok if I come over now?

8:12 - Doctor10 yep. looking forward to meeting you. oh, and I’m John by the way.

8:12 - HoppingForMyLife Hello John. :goofy tongue smiley:

8:13 - Doctor10 Goodbye Rose. :happy smiley:

oOo

10:32 - HoppingForMyLife i have a problem. world-ending bad.

10:33 - PreMed&Dead Adam got that promotion to shift manager and you’ll have to work for him?

10:33 - HoppingForMyLife worse. much worse.

10:33 - PreMed&Dead SPILL

10:34 - HoppingForMyLife met my lab partner.

10:35 - PreMed&Dead one-eyed guy?

10:35 - HoppingForMyLife Gorgeous physics prof.

10:35 - PreMed&Dead . . .

10:35 - PreMed&Dead That IS bad.

10:35 - HoppingForMyLife And he’s not a dud. or a jerk. at least I don’t think he is. please don’t be please don’t be please don’t be.

10:36 - PreMed&Dead still gonna marry him?

10:36 - HoppingForMyLife yep.

oOo

Wednesday October 12

5:32 pm - Doctor10 Hello Rose Tyler. Something’s been bothering me since we met, and then again all during lab yesterday. and I’ve been thinking and thinking and thinking. And then it hit me. I know you. You’re in my intro to physics class! You always sit in the front row, right in the middle.

5:33 pm - HoppingForMyLife yep. that’s me.

5:33 pm - Doctor10 why didn’t you say something?

5:40 pm - HoppingForMyLife because I’ve requested a transfer out.

5:50 pm - Doctor10 Oh. Aren’t I a good professor? Am I boring? A dullard? Obtuse?

5:51 - HoppingForMyLife No. U R a great professor. I have a heavy class load and your class is very challenging.

5:51 pm - Doctor10 If you need help, I’m there for you! I have office hours! Come by any time!

5:55 pm - Doctor10 U there still?

5:55 pm - HoppingForMyLife Yeah.

5:55 pm - Doctor10 Is this because we’re lab partners? And you’re worried it’ll be awkward?

5:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife yes

5:56 pm - Doctor10 Don’t worry. I grade all of my assignments by student ID. Completely anonymous I don’t know whose paper is whose. And I’d miss your cheerful face every morning. :happy smiley:

6:02 pm - HoppingForMyLife I’ll think about it.

oOo

6:03 pm - HoppingForMyLife Heeeeeeelllllllp

6:03 pm - PreMed&Dead Again? What’s up with Prof SexyHair this time?

6:04 pm - HoppingForMyLife I got a 52 on my first physics assignment. I can’t concentrate.

6:05 pm - PreMed&Dead You HAVE to go to his office hours Rose!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Imagine he’s one eyed creepy guy.

6:06 pm - HoppingForMyLife :headbanging on desk gif:

6:07 pm - PreMed&Dead You can do it. You can do it. I’m here for you. You can do it.

oOo

Friday October 14

8:34 pm - Doctor10 I have an idea for our project.

8:34 pm - HoppingForMyLife another one? this is your 5th i think.

8:34 pm - Doctor10 8th idea. double-blind of course. NO! triple-blind.

8:35 pm - HoppingForMyLife triple? I don’t think that’s a thing. r u always such an overachiever?

8:35 pm - Doctor10 i take my work seriously Rose Tyler.

8:35 pm - HoppingForMyLife so what’s your brilliant idea?

oOo

Sunday October 23

6:30 pm - PreMed&Dead What did Dr. SexySuit say when you asked him why he’s taking classes when he’s already a professor AND has a PhD? And why psych??? He’s a physicist.

6:30 pm - HoppingForMyLife Said he wanted another degree. His third. THIRD. that’s 3. And you know what this one is in? Fine Arts! He’s taking history of medieval choral music, classical sculpture, and learning how to play the pipe organ. And modern dance.

6:31 pm - PreMed&Dead WHUT?

6:31 pm - HoppingForMyLife The psych class is so that he can “better understand the human condition and transfer that into my study of the physical world.” That’s a quote.

6:32 pm - PreMed&Dead If you weren’t so in love with him, I’d hit that. In fact, don’t turn your back, Rose. I might try anyway.

6:52pm - HoppingForMyLife :side eyes smiley:

6:32 pm - PreMed&Dead JK

6:32 pm - HoppingForMyLife Like I would ever even have a chance with him. He’s probably got some amazing girlfriend with a PhD or two just like him.

6:33 pm - PreMed&Dead Has he ever mentioned anyone Rose?

6:33 pm - HoppingForMyLife No. But I’ve never asked either.

oOo

Wednesday October 26

8:04 pm - HoppingForMyLife Martha, the subject actually moaned. MOANED. And it wasn’t the first time. i didn’t mention it before because i thought it was an anomaly. thought maybe she had indigestion or something.

8:04 pm - PreMed&Dead And tell me again why you agreed to this particular study?

8:04 pm - HoppingForMyLife How was I supposed to know that the test subjects would get so worked up! Right there in the lab! Doesn’t anyone have any self-control? I’d be humiliated if I moaned as a test subject during a psych experiment! It sounded completely innocent when he described it!! Well, not completely innocent. But my point stands. Moaning. And panting. In a lab. In front of people. It’s just chocolate! And a piece of silk!

8:05 pm - PreMed&Dead Uh, and handcuffs. And a blindfold. And didn’t you tell me you had a dream about that very same chocolate and a silk necktie and handcuffs and blindfold and Prof SexySpecs just the other night?

8:05 pm - HoppingForMyLife :blushing smiley: Maybe we should add a second element? Put him behind one-way glass?

8:05 pm - PreMed&Dead Results are results. And science doesn’t lie. It’s all about the data Rose.

oOo

Thursday November 3

9:00 pm HoppingForMyLife Moaning Myrtle is 10 for 10. That’s not her name of course. Just for the record. You reading this MI-5?

9:01 pm PreMed&Dead :smiling in sunglasses emoji: At least your results data are consistent.

9:01 pm HoppingForMyLife I sorta just roll my eyes now. Not sure I’d fare any better. He didn’t wear a tie today. Had this layered t-shirt and henley thing happening. And cut his hair shorter in back and spiked it up front. It. Is. HOT.

9:01 pm PreMed&Dead I dare you to give it a good tug.

9:01 pm HoppingForMyLife In my dreams. He doesn’t have a girlfriend BTW. Told me that today.

9:02 pm PreMed&Dead And you’re just telling me this NOW?

9:02 pm HoppingForMyLife He asked me if I had a boyfriend, and I said no. And then he tells me he’s not seeing anyone either. I just stood there chewing my stupid lip. Didn’t say a thing. And then he turned around and left.

9:02 pm PreMed&Dead Oh Rose. sigh

oOo

Wednesday November 30

5:05 pm - HoppingForMyLife I GOT A 98 ON MY PHYSICS EXAM!

5:05 pm - PreMed&Dead You go girl! :party emoji:

5:05 pm - HoppingForMyLife He’s a really great teacher. And I mean that. He helped me understand something that was a complete mystery.

oOo

Wednesday December 1

6:02 am - HoppingForMyLife Remember how I told you he’s been acting weird the past few days? really quiet. About 2 this morning, my mobile rings. It’s him. Middle. Of. The. Night. He asks me about my Christmas plans. If I’m staying in town, going back home, working… And then he asks me if I’m taking physics winter term.

6:02 am - PreMed&Dead Like a real live voice? Not a text?

6:02 am - HoppingForMyLife TALKING in that amazing gorgeous sexy voice of his. I tell him I’m staying around to work until Christmas Eve and that I have a psych internship planned, and no physics cuz I need to focus on my major and he says oh good. and then he hangs up.

6:03 am - PreMed&Dead Just hangs up?

6:03 am - HoppingForMyLife Just hangs up.

6:03 am - PreMed&Dead Ask him what he’s doing over Christmas.

6:03 am - HoppingForMyLife I can’t do that.

6:03 am - PreMed&Dead Yes you can.

6:04 am - HoppingForMyLife He. Is. My. Professor.

6:04 am - PreMed&Dead It. Is. A. Conversation. AND he is your LAB PARTNERRRRRRR.

oOo

Saturday December 3

11:05 pm - HoppingForMyLife I sent you the data did u get it?

11:05 pm - Doctor10 Yep

11:05 pm - HoppingForMyLife And… ????????

11:06 pm - Doctor10 Not the results I expected.

11:06 pm - HoppingForMyLife How’s that? We proved the theory. Did you want to disprove it or something?

11:11 pm - HoppingForMyLife U there?

11:11 pm - Doctor10 Yep.

11:13 pm - Doctor10 I have some thinking to do. We can start working on the conclusion piece tomorrow.

11:13 pm - HoppingForMyLife K. Bye.

11:13 pm - Doctor10 Nighty-night sleep tight with sweet chocolate dreams. I know I will.

11:15 pm - Doctor 10 For the past 8 weeks it’s been chocolate chocolate chocolate.

oOo

11:17 pm - HoppingForMyLife Martha. MARTHA. Look what he just texted me.

11:17 pm - HoppingForMyLife :screenshot:

11:17 pm - HoppingForMyLife What does that even mean? HE. IS. KILLING. ME. And I think he’s clueless, too. He’s been as friendly as can be. FRIENDLY. And now this. Is it flirty? Or friendly? It’s all how you read it.

11:17 pm - PreMed&Dead he’s a professor and you are his student. Assume it is friendly. Now what the two of you get up to in your dreams… :saucy wink smiley: :smiling devil smiley: :chocolate bar emoji:

11:18 - HoppingForMyLife :heart eyes smiley:

11:18 - PreMed&Dead Still gonna marry him?

11:18 - HoppingForMyLife yep.

oOo

11:25 - PreMed&Dead Rose… did you notice the timestamps between the last two messages???????!!!!!!!!

11:25 - HoppingForMyLife So?

11:25 - PreMed&Dead You’re the psych major. You figure it out.

11:25 - HoppingForMyLife 11:13 nighty night 11:15 chocolate chocolate chocolate :wide eyed blushing smiley: Was he flirting with me?

11:25 - PreMed&Dead :rolling eyes gif:

11:25 - HoppingForMyLife HE WAS flirting with me. I didn’t respond, and he backpedaled. I am such an idiot.

11:25 - PreMed&Dead You may be an idiot, but there are only one week of classes left. In one week the two of you can be idiots together.

oOo

Saturday December 10

4:55 pm - HoppingForMyLife Professor Smith. This is a physics thing. Not a psych thing. And I apologize if this isn’t appropriate. I mean texting you because we’ve only ever texted for psych. Never for physics.

4:55 pm - Doctor10 I don’t see a problem Ms. Smith. :regular smiley:

4:55 pm - Doctor10 HAHAHAHAHAHHAHA MS. TYLER. T Y L E R. :regular smiley: :regular smiley: Damn autocorrect.

4:55 pm - Doctor10 HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

4:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife ha ha ha. I wanted to thank you for all of your help. I couldn’t have passed your class without it, let alone with a 95.

4:56 pm - Doctor10 You were the 95! Only gave 2 grades above a 90. Brilliant! I knew you had it in you! Congratulations! You deserve a celebration! :balloons and confetti gif:

4:56 pm - Doctor10 Taking off Professor Hat putting on Psych Lab Partner Hat. ROSE TYLER! WE GOT PERFECT MARKS ON OUR CHOCOLATE STUDY!

4:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife WE DID???????!!!!!! How’d you find out?!!!!????!!!!!! I didn’t think the final grade would be released for a week.

4:56 pm - Doctor10 I may have used my Professor Smith powers of genius to get into the grading system. Shhhhhh! Don’t tell anyone.

4:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife I won’t. YAY! HUGS HUGS HUGS HUGS!

4:56 - HoppingForMyLife And those text hugs are to you as my lab mate, not to you as my professor. In case anyone’s reading this.

4:56 - Doctor10 Molto bene.

oOo

4:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife calmingbreathcalmingbreath. Read this screenshot

4:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife :screen shot of conversation with the 'Ms. Smith' typo circled in red:

4:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife :X eyes emoji face: I’m dead. DEAD. What do I say to this? Just a typo? But his HAHAHAHAs! He's obviously embarrassed. And then the two smileys! They are casual smileys! Not embarrassed smileys!

4:57 pm - PreMed&Dead two things come to mind. 1: he has practice written your name so many times as Ms. Smith on his three ring notebook and put hearts around it along with JS + RT = LOVE that it is second nature to write Ms. Smith. Or...... He has Freudian slipped Ms. Smith so many times that he can't even type Rose Tyler anymore. Because there is no possible way that TYLER would EVAH autocorrect to SMITH.

4:57 pm - PreMed&Dead or it could be a third thing. He's subtly proposing. You have told me about a billion times that you're going to marry him, you know.

4:58 pm - HoppingForMyLife Ha ha ha ha. So not autocorrect?

4:58 pm - PreMed&Dead :Antione's You're So Dumb gif:

4:59 pm - HoppingForMyLife  A+ gif usage. That’s my fave gif. Hide yo kids hide yo wife hide yo kids hide yo wife

4:59 pm - PreMed&Dead Thx for the earworm. We gon find you we gon find you

4:59 pm - PreMed&Dead And by the way, YOU ARE SOOOOO IN LOVE

4:59 pm - HoppingForMyLife (((whispering))) I may have text-hugged him too.

5:00 pm - HoppingForMyLife :screen shot of hugging part of the conversation:

5:00 pm - HoppingForMyLife But only cos we nailed the project.

5:00 pm - PreMed&Dead Riiiiiight. text hugs. cos they don’t count. :massive eye rolling emoji:

5:00 pm - HoppingForMyLife Wish you were here so I could hug YOU.

5:00 pm - PreMed&Dead Awwwwwww.... Hugs right back. See? text hugs are real.

5:00 pm - HoppingForMyLife I AM pretty proud though. didn’t even’t think I’d pass physics. He told me I deserved a celebration. he’s right! I do deserve a pint or two! He said he didn't know that the one 95 that he gave in his class was to me. Only had two students even in the 90s.

5:01 pm - PreMed&Dead Here’s what you’re gonna do. Tell him you’ve taken his advice and you’re gonna celebrate passing physics AND for getting perfect marks on your psych project with some friends you down at McKenzie’s. But we will come later. But don’t tell him that. And we’ll come down when you text. If you even WANT us there.

5:01 pm - HoppingForMyLife I’m biting my fingernails. Literally.

5:01 pm - PreMed&Dead Don’t. Now put on that sexy red wrap dress and keep my posted.

5:01 pm - HoppingForMyLife Wish me luck.

oOo

4:56 pm - HoppingForMyLife Hi. I’ve decided to take your suggestion and celebrate. Both things. Physics AND Psych. I’ve invited some friends to meet me at that pub on the corner of Winston and Main. McKenzie’s. You know that one, right? And I think I’ll arrive around 8:00.

4:56 pm - Doctor10 That is an excellent plan. 8:00 is a fine hour to start a celebration.

oOo

8:25 pm - HoppingForMyLife He’s didn’t come, Martha. :single tear emoji: I suppose he was just being friendly. And stupid. And perfect. And flirty. And one of those blokes who is clueless about his effect on women.

8:25 pm - PreMed&Dead I’m sorry. :hugging friends emoji:

8:25 pm - Doctor10 Rose… I’m a bit embarrassed, and nervous to ask this if i’m being honest because I have no idea what you are going to say. Here goes. can I come to your party?

8:25 pm - HoppingForMyLife Standby Mar! He just texted me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

8:26 pm - PreMed&Dead SQUEEEEE!!

8:26 pm - HoppingForMyLife You want to come?

8:26 pm - Doctor10 Only if you want me to come.

8:26 pm - HoppingForMyLife  I'd like you to come

8:26 pm - Doctor10 OK. Good. I’d like come too. I’ll be there in a few minutes.

8:26 pm - HoppingForMyLife HE’S COMING. I REALLY didn’t think he would. Maybe I was too subtle with my hint. My heart is pounding. :red heart emoji: :red heart emoji: :red heart emoji: What do I do Martha???????

8:26 pm - Doctor10 Rose ????????? You really thought I wouldn’t come????????? Of course I’m coming!!!!! I wouldn’t miss it for the world!

8:26 pm - HoppingForMyLife Oops. I sent that text to wrong person.

8:26 pm - Doctor10 Your heart isn’t the only one that’s pounding. :red heart emoji: :blushing smiley emoji: Look behind you.

“Rose Tyler. It needs to be said. I am really glad that this term is over. You are very distracting. Why do you think I spent so much time with my back to the class writing on the chalkboard? I have every single lecture committed to memory, but the words evaporated from my very big brain every time I looked at you.”

“I didn’t really mind the view. Oh, I said that out loud, didn’t I?”

“Cheeky, Ms. Smith. And I thought I might die every single time you ate a piece of chocolate. Did you know that you make sounds when you eat chocolate?”

oOo

9:02 - HoppingForMyLife He brought me flowers. And twenty bars of chocolate.

9:02 - PreMed&Dead You are SO going to marry him.

The End.

[divasdamselsandsmudgedmascara]

“Fahrenheit 451″ starring Julie Christie - 1966 (Movie Review)

Does the thought of a day without a book in your hands give you the shivers? Does the idea of never being able to step foot in the quiet, blissful corners of a library or bookstore give you the nightmares and cold sweats? How about a possibility of never even seeing a book again...never again in your lifetime? Not only that but your children and their children will not even be able to comprehend the notion of printed words on a page. 

The book and all of the knowledge, delight, enlightenment, and discovery it possesses will be permanently banished from the collective consciousness of humankind and in its place, nothing but what the state wills for you to watch...eyes frozen...mind paralyzed...on an ever-present, obnoxious screen on your wall.

Oh wait, we're halfway there already.

Step into the warped world of Fahrenheit 451 and a man and a woman whose minds are awoken to the truth of their society and their own inner demand for enlightenment.

Throughout history, humanity has often struggled with the dictatorship of the deluded and their attempts to suppress and even eradicate free will. It's come in the form of new forms of tight-fisted government, their intimidated and delusional followers, evil laws that refuse to acknowledge the fact that human beings should not and cannot be mentally controlled. Banning of free speech and freedom of the press has gone hand in hand with these repressive governments' efforts. But in Ray Bradbury's razor-sharp examination of a society where all text is threat, repression takes on an insidious form where faux-contentment is fed to the masses in the form of mind-numbing "entertainment". The book and all its intellectual and emotional challenges is deleted from these citizens' lives and done so cleanly and forcefully that most don't even realize what they've lost and don't understand the first thing about regaining it. There is a minority who resist however. There is ALWAYS the resistance! 

Enter Guy Montag. He's a simple man. A hard-working man. He's also a firefighter but in his society, he does not save people but destroys their legacies.

Guy Montag burns books. And he's very good at it.

In the very first scene, Guy and his fellow firemen are racing off to a drab apartment block in this future, dumbed-down England. Enter another man in a turtleneck happily munching an apple in his drab apartment in said drab block. He receives a phone call on his rotary phone (nobody is allowed to write books, research papers, essays, or ANYTHING anymore, so they'll never reach the digital age!)

"Listen, get out! Hurry!" a female voice on the other end urgently whispers to turtleneck man mid-chew. Puzzled by the fact that his pleasant afternoon has been interrupted, the dude keeps saying "Hello, Hello?" instead of hustling out the door, clutching a paperback for dear life.

Frustrated, the mysterious female bellows, "For God's sake, get OUT of there!"

Finally getting a clue, turtleneck man hears the sirens of the book-hating bastards, hides his contraband and makes a break for it.

I really liked this scene. It introduces the urgency of the situation SO well, with just a few words spoken and the cinematography doing the rest. The steel-gray sky is juxtaposed against the coldness of the industrial looking apartment blocks, with a desperate, nameless fugitive's coat flapping in the wind as he makes his escape from the men who would destroy what’s precious to him...masterful. And truly a sign of the cinematic treasures to come from this film. I've always felt that the mark of a great movie--not just an okay movie or even a "good" one--is the power of the opening scene. If it can grab you and never let you go until those last few minutes, you'll have a masterpiece! Not just a decent way to spend a few hours.

Montag is doing his job SO well that a promotion is dangled in front of him by his captain (played by the phenomenal Cyril Cusack), a quietly fanatical true believer. This "bright" young man is going places! Onwards and upwards as the British like to say, or er...downwards if we're gonna be real about the whole destruction of human knowledge thing.

That is...until a fateful meeting on public transportation with a disarming young schoolteacher who is much more than she seems.

Enter Clarisse, a luminous Julie Christie.

Now, this movie did something I consider pretty original and effective. Christie was cast in two roles both directly linked to the lead character, both influencing his decisions, and both integral to the details of the plot. She is thoroughly convincing as two women with different motivations, purposes, and feelings. She is Clarisse and she is Montag's wife, Linda. Where Clarisse's mind is opening to the world around her and its realities, Linda's is dull, empty and withered.

Clarisse is instantly drawn to Montag. The scene where they first encounter each other is a study in character development. The moment she introduces herself to him on the crowded (upside-down!) train, you realize that there is something significant at play here. She is not a dullard. Her eyes are bright, her questions are incisive. She, in nearly all important ways that his wife and other citizens are not--is ALIVE. Another interesting juxtaposition is inserted here. As Clarisse gazes curiously at Montag, he himself is looking around the train at several passengers who are, as if in a daze, fidgeting with themselves, one woman drawing on the mist of a window like a bored and sleepy child. It's almost as if they are asleep and attempting to pinch themselves awake. 

Clarisse is wide awake.

In the middle of her chat with the awkward-looking Montag, she drops a few interesting lines that looking at it, seem to indicate with brilliant subtlety the emerging truth of who this young woman is and what she's about. 

"Once I get started, nothing can stop me! My uncle says I'm a veritable well of words."

In a society where printed words itself are considered destabilization and a threat to the maintenance of the state's lies, I find it powerful that this is a comment made in the first conversation this clearly intelligent woman has with a destroyer of words.

"You don't frighten me." she cheerfully says to Montag as the upside-down train barrels its way towards their destination.

Montag and Clarisse then disembark and as they head down the path to their homes, their conversation takes an interesting turn, guided by Clarisse as they stroll in the sunshine.

"Tell me, why do you burn books?" she asks and you get the sense that this is not merely a question but a gentle challenge.

At first it seems that he tries to dodge the true meaning of the question by calling it "good work like any other" but then he shrugs off the meaning of literature as "just so much rubbish".

“They disturb them, make them anti-social.”

The question that I asked while viewing the film was whether Montag in that moment, was a believer in his cause or whether he was merely parroting the propaganda fed to him likely throughout his entire life. One of the details I like about Oskar Werner's performance was the casual indifference, the weary demeanor of Montag's whole being. He does not come across as a man particularly set afire by his ideals. He does his job, repeats the party line when need be, and goes home. No more. No less. 

Does Clarisse sense an ambivalence in Montag's spirit that even he did not recognize?

In any case, Montag tries to convince Clarisse and to a certaint extent himself, about the "nobility" of his work and as they part and he walks down the road to his antiseptic little house with his wife waiting before their ever-present television screen, you see him walk into an existence that is so strictly ordered and formulated by the influence of the state that you can't help but notice that basically, most of the VIBRANCE and REASON for life has been stripped away. What’s left? Go to work, go home, eat, make love, gape at a gigantic TV screen filling your head with propaganda entirely designed to keep you from ever fulfilling anything of importance. When people are neither challenged nor seek out answers to any significant life question, what is the result? When something as precious as literature, text in general, is eliminated from a civilization, what really is there to learn, achieve or contribute to humankind anymore? What’s left is a society left to languish, stagnate, and ultimately fade into utter purposelessness.

That is demonstrated with the odd state-run "theater" his drugged-out wife Linda is excited to be a part of, one of the few opportunities she has for stimulation as she lies around their home, popping state-approved pills and draining what's left of her energy and intelligence.

The state theater rambles on and on in a childish and simplistic way, the nonexistent "plot" being which rooms to place houseguests. The whole thing is like a third-grade math question on a school test but this is what passes for "entertainment" in this aggressively anti-intellectual society.

Linda is thrilled later on in bed, that she has given "all the right answers" and she chirps on about her moment of rare excitement to the bored-out-of-his mind Montag as he browses through a wordless comic strip, filled page to page with garish color cartoons.

The emptiness of this couple's life is brought into full focus, and the perfection of Werner and Christie's performances is that it doesn't even take a great deal of dialogue to do it. The body language is expertly detailed--and with Christie, so pronounced that in her double role as Linda and the schoolteacher, Clarisse, you almost feel as if you are watching two different actresses.

Montag's awakening is soon to come into full bloom with the gentle encouragement of schoolteacher Clarisse, who for reasons that are never specifically stated, has become an ex schoolteacher--rejected by her fellow teachers and the administration, and in a surreal scene, treated with contempt as her things are shoved across the floor to her, wrapped in a sack, as Montag looks on.

Now, that's the definition of a brush-off.

The reasons are like I said, never explicitly stated but you definitely gain a general understanding of just why Clarisse is fired, shut out and treated with this kind of contempt. Although she obviously does not officially go against state rules, there is something about her personality, the alertness and the creativity that is a part of her identity not only as a teacher but as a private citizen of this oppressive, draining state (she says early on that "we have fun in my class") that is found threatening. She is not a drone. She has never relinquished a special spark within her, a spark of individuality, that the government ruthlessly wants to snuff out within the hearts and minds of each and every man, woman and child.

Montag comforts her as she sobs into his shoulder on the elevator, and she suddenly looks at him in wonder, wondering how the gentle and compassionate man in front of her could be in what is such a barbaric business.

"Why? How did it come about? What made it begin? What made you want to do...how could someone like you be doing this sort of work? I know everyone says that, but you? You're NOT like them. When I say something to you, you look at me. Why did you choose this job?"

Montag replies,

"Do you remember what you asked me the other day? Whether I ever read the books I burned? Remember? Last night I read one."

With that twist of Montag’s destiny, both their lives will be intertwined.

Montag himself has changed...radically. He does not want to continue a life lived in darkness and ignorance. He's flipped the switch and the light is pouring in. He begins to stash books in every nook and cranny from the raids he goes on and his bewildered wife Linda stumbles upon his furtive reading in the middle of the night. He is desperate to read as many words as he can on the dusty, forgotten pages. He is like a starving man, feasting on an enormous amount of knowledge. He starts to wake up to just exactly what the state has been feeding other intellectually and emotionally starved people, their replacement of the knowledge books can bring, with shallow desires and empty platitudes.

Linda is confused and upset at the change in her husband. 

She has given the entirety of herself to the demands of dictatorship and the presence of the books make her afraid, not just of the consequences of reading, but I always felt that her character was terrified of the discovery. Scared of opening her mind beyond the limited confines of what has been established for her....like a child who has been used to playing in a sandbox her entire life, and never ventures out to explore the world around her.

“I found these things in the house! I don’t want these things, Montag. They frighten me.”

A pivotal scene, one that never fails to send chills down my spine, is a fire that happens at a middle-aged woman's house, which doubles as a secret library (it is a legitimately kick-ass library).

Amidst her pile of books, a veritable treasure trove that she has hoarded, cherished, and protected for years, the woman sets the pile aflame herself....with her in the middle of the blaze. Montag stares in abject horror as he sees this woman kill herself in the most horrible way possible. 

Montag is a man who has followed orders without question, going about his questionable "duties" as if a man who is sleepwalking. Death is actually this one reader’s choice rather than allowing the state to control her and discover a pivotal secret that she holds.

He reaches another level of rebellion and dives into an ocean of words, head-first.

In the process, he turns into a person who not only questions the stupid and corrupt laws, but his married life, the existence he has built up with a woman who is blissfully ignorant.

Linda wants Montag to return to their life of ignorance. She begs, pleads and threatens in a desperate attempt to force him to destroy the books that he is now clinging to...for understanding... of what he has done, why he is been made to do it, and for what yet he needs to do.

And in the middle of all of this upheaval, Clarisse and the uncle that she lives with, has been discovered as "book readers". She has made the escape her uncle has prepared her to make, away from a society that is determined to consider her a “thought-criminal” (Oops. Wrong authoritarian regime dystopia.)

Montag has joined her in the quiet "resistance”, though! He vows to work from the inside, sabotaging the system he has been serving for so long. 

“I must stay in the city, I have a plan. I will hide a book in every fireman’s house until they denounce him. The system will eat itself.”

Meanwhile, she will flee to the country and join a band of underground bibliophiles called "the book people", a bunch of passionate readers who've BECOME books, memorizing the precious pages one by one. 

(What they’re burning ties in to the old woman’s death.)

He doesn't have a chance though to follow through on his plan, because his wife becomes an informant on his midnight reading habit, fleeing from their home in a fit of exasperation. 

The years of the boob tube's endless manipulations had turned Linda into the consummate follower. What was so interesting and realistic about her character was how it presented the end result of effective governmental indoctrination. There were and are so many citizens of certain nations just like Linda, who have swallowed the lie that their natural human freedoms should be taken away in the name of "protection", when what these corrupt governments have really been seeking is the destruction of their will and suppression of their power.

Montag flees in panic after he does something absolutely irreversible--he has become a fugitive! His face is plastered on every TV around him and he flees from a city determined to use him as both an example and a form of entertainment for the millions of dead eyes plastered to their wall screens.

Francois Truffaut's adaptation of Ray Bradbury's book is subtly and powerfully interpreted. The beginning of the movie is all cold edges, uniforms reminiscent of jack-booted Nazis, and boring sameness.

That coldness and an almost desolate feeling of emptiness is carried over into the way people are relating to each other in this society, such as the barren relationship between Montag and his wife, Linda. The truth of it is that Montag and Linda simply don't have an emotional connection anymore. The intrusion of the state, the ever-present wallscreens, the constant consumption of propaganda has destroyed the soul and the integrity of their marriage. Julie Christie's blankness as Linda and brightness as Clarisse are like night and day. Truffaut's decision to cast Christie in both roles is an inspired touch. It brings a striking contrast to Montag's life. Clarisse is definitely her own woman. And I never viewed her presence as simply a device serving to "wake up" Montag. No. Clarisse as a character, as an intellectual woman with agency in a fiercely anti-intellectual state, was a whole lot more than that. But I believe she is also an interesting representation of duality in Guy Montag's life and I feel that Clarisse represents to him the "what-ifs" of Linda. An alternate version of her in a way.

Clarisse also represents the truth of discovery that is forcing its way into Montag's narrow existence. She is a woman who sticks out in a subtle but at the same time, blatant way.  Standing out is dangerous, standing out is looked upon with distrust and is stamped out whenever possible. She loses her job and has her spirit and creativity literally thrown back in her face. But Christie's Clarisse has this indomitable optimism I've always found pretty damn fascinating about her character, an inner source of satisfaction that comes from the fact that unlike so many other zombies of the state, what she has in the end....is HERSELF. One of the most defining details of Francois Truffaut's classic is the serene and unshaking confidence Clarisse has in who she is and what she believes in. She is in my opinion, every bit of the hero as Montag if only because of her total confidence and belief in the normalcy of the pursuit of knowledge despite everything and everyone ordering citizens like her to shut down and go to sleep.

The thing about Linda, Clarisse and Montag, and what's so intruiging about Truffaut's direction, is that all of these characters have multiple layers beneath the surface. The film explores the fascinating concept that when a person is forbidden knowledge for so long, the void can become their familiar and even comfortable world, or they can choose to step out into unknown, scary, but vastly rewarding territory.

It's a unique take on authoritarianism, and quite frankly, one of the most unsettling ones I think has been depicted in film. These characters are well-crafted and wonderfully brought to life, but in the end, they are, in my humble opinion, mere vessels for a larger message.

That message is that theft of the progression we are entitled to as human beings, can just possibly be on the horizon if we aren't constantly vigilant about whom we place our trust and loyalty in. That trust and loyalty can all too quickly be bent into obedience and that obedience switched into mental enslavement. Fahrenheit 451 is a story of human resistance, and I feel one of the most amazing politically charged scifi films ever made. The performances are excellent and I guarantee you, the ending is a work of searing, powerful beauty.

It's a five star flick!

[thelifeofascholar-blog1]

In which the Scholar Is Upside Down

(Artwork: Chromatic Arrangement no. 4, or A Mind’s Inversion. Acrylic on canvas. © The Scholar, Feb 2017)

Each of us in the highest echelons of intellectual society has suffered, I am certain, the dejection of growing weary with one’s favored opera or videotaped dressage performance. For the lower primates with whom I am ashamed to share a species, adequate diversion may consist of no more than tossing about the stuffed hide of a flayed pig, or worse, paying others to do so. I, on the other hand, cannot abide by such mindless and wanton savagery. As long as modern society continues to be ruled by clods, I will have no power to put an end to the idiocy, the aberrancy, the lunacy of “sports,” but I am neither bound to partake. Nevertheless, in my most lackadaisical moments I have caught myself pining for a lower intelligence quotient, a lesser lot in life, so that I might too live in ignorant bliss among animal hides and astronomical turf.

As it happens, I can claim no such illiteracy. Oft I while away the hours in my scholarly pursuits; just two weeks ago I was ensconced in a gripping history of puffed gelatin in western confectionary tradition. Regrettably, I permitted the temptation of the reading to get the better of me, and the resulting binge nearly spoiled my enjoyment of marshmallows forever (I have since confirmed that my revulsion at them has passed). I suppose at least some of you readers have had similar experiences, as the hunt for knowledge can be a dangerous one. It can likewise, though, be a dull one, subtle of reward and slow of progress. Even the sharpest mind (that is to say, mine) must abide by the adage coined by that dubious dilettante Benjamin Franklin regarding work and play.

All too often, however, my attempts at play become ordeals of more stress and exertion than my work, as I shall hereafter lay out. The life of an intellectual like myself is generally a tireless one, so I cannot simply vegetate in front of a television screen, or finger paint, or dig holes, or whatever it is that the non-gifted do to pass the time. No, if I am to seek out fun, it must be a grander undertaking, a diversion excursion. Upon seeing the aftermath of my marshmallow ordeal, my manservant, Chip, recommended that I seek out another such excursion that he might have ample space to clean up the mess. I upbraided him for his insolence in suggesting that he might know better than I what the situation warranted, but I did coincidentally decide to take a day off.

It was high time that I took a break from the labors of learning, especially since several months ago my wayward sister Doris and her dullard of a husband John, or Josh, or Jean, or whatever his name is, moved to Southern California (or SoCalifornia, as the locals seem to call it), wherein I myself have resided since I noted my own incompatibility with snow-ridden climes some years past. I had no desire to see Doris, nor her mate, but I was overdue for a day of quality time with their eight-year-old son Nathaniel, whom they continue to call Nathan like the ignoramuses they are, and whom I have considered my ward since it became clear to me that Doris and Joe would raise him as a moron without my intervention.

I telephoned Doris. Her dry, familiar response belied the burning envy she feels for my high culture: “Hello?”

I cut through her defense and delivered my point outright. “Doris, I request—nay, I demand—a day of guardianship with little Nathaniel.”

Obviously fearful of my potential to supplant her and James as Nathaniel’s primary role model, as though I hadn’t obviously done so already, Doris was hesitant. Nevertheless, I appealed to her sense and to her busy schedule, and with some negotiation of my fee to half that of her regular babysitter, she agreed.

Doris’s only condition was that I avoid a debacle like my previous outing with Nathaniel. I won’t go into all of the unfortunate details, but suffice it to say that I am no longer welcome at Disneyland. That pretender in the Mickey Mouse costume should have known better than to claim that Tom Sawyer would have his own island, let alone that the hackish and offensive works of Mark Twain have any place in children’s entertainment! But I digress. I promised my sister that I would not cause any scenes with costumed idiots and began planning my day of appropriate recreation.

Though I was legally barred from paying another visit to Disneyland and glad of the riddance, I knew that I needed to choose an activity of sufficient excitement to keep little Nathaniel occupied. I wish I could say that he could take the same interest as I in the classic art of the oratorio, but I must administer milk before symbolic meat (I am particularly proud of this wholly original metaphor; it came to me one day as I mused on the peculiarities of mammalian reproduction and I regret that I am not more frequently credited in its not infrequent usage). The milk, in this case, had to be a themed park, as they are known, for I recalled Nathaniel’s immense dejection at our ejection from the Disney premises before he had a chance to ride any of the various roller coasters, and I wished to make reparations.

I settled on the nearest possible park that could fulfill the role, for long drives with Chip at the wheel cause my neck to become insufferably tense. We met with Doris and Jim, picked up my ward with no more conversation than what was necessary, and were on our way. Chip attempted to engage little Nathaniel with corrupting talk of super-powered heroes and other juvenile rubbish, but I quickly and heartily put an end to that, sternly encouraging my manservant to keep his attention on the road and away from my impressionable charge.

Our destination was Six Flags, a decidedly odd name for a park in which flags are not only not celebrated, but scarcely even seen. This was my first disappointment upon my arrival, for I have been dying to visit a flag museum to improve my geographical expertise. I reminded myself that this was Nathaniel’s day, and that I had to lay aside my disappointments at the lack of educational amenities in the park and take my fun vicariously through my ward. Chip, on the other hand, I forbade from entering the park. He attempted to abandon us in an offer to return to my abode and do housework, but I informed him that he was to await us in parking until such time as we chose to leave.

The park appeared to be the work of a madman. I feared perhaps the seventh seal was opened at Six Flags, given the positively Lovecraftian dismissal of Euclidean geometry in both ride architecture and sidewalk layout. I reminded myself that such was the nature of amusing parks and recalled a similar devilishness on that ill-fated Disney expedition. Nathaniel had spoken but little during the drive, transfixed as he was by my admittedly ostentatious descriptions of the histories of various road signs we passed along the way, but now his eyes lit up in view of the high-flying prospects before him. When I saw the gleam in his eyes, I steeled myself against the madness within the park and entered.

Roller coasters have never held any particular appeal to me; the thought of tempting the capricious Isaac Newton has never struck me as intelligent or appropriate, and the thought of sharing seats with the mindless masses with which the park teemed was all the more unnerving. Indeed, to undergo such intense centrifugal and centripetal forces must have some scrambling effect on the brain, judging from the atrocities of fashion I saw around the park. Far too many of the misguided attendees thought themselves superheroes and wore the capes to prove their mania.

I reasoned to myself that my mind, being much sounder than most, could handle the coasters and maintain its sanity if it must. Nevertheless, arriving as we did at the first coaster of the day (one recommended as appropriate for Nathaniel’s age by a slack-jawed knuckle-wiper in a polo emblazoned with the park name), I surveyed the ride and felt a good deal of trepidation. It was far from the tallest coaster, and it lacked the inversions and loops I had seen elsewhere in the park, but as the line of coupled cars roared past us at our vantage point along the walkway, the fantastic velocity made my head spin.

I turned to Nathaniel to confirm that he would rather board this ride and not the bumping cars next door (barbaric as it was, the latter ride was firmly and slowly confined to the ground), but he was dead set. I attempted to extol the virtues of a relaxing merry go ‘round, but to no avail. We stood in line, and I was forced to accept the impending destruction of your humble expositor.

But—oh my—words have never failed me as they do in describing the experience of being rolled and coasted. It was unbelievable. The sensation of soaring, of tumbling, of freewheeling through the sky, that indescribable feeling is the stuff of song, had I but time to write the lyrics. As young Nathaniel and I disembarked I could scarcely see straight, but I grasped the coaster operator by the shoulders and demanded, “Direct me to the grandest ride in the park!”

She shook herself free of me and I apologized for my sudden psychosis (I suppose my earlier guess regarding the effect of rolling/coasting on the brain was accurate, but this brand of madness was one I desired). “You must get that frequently,” I told her.

As has occurred so often in my past experience in interacting with service workers, the employee was in no perceptual position to appreciate the marvelous service she offered, and simply sneered at me as she pointed me to the towering assortment of painted steel that stood nearest the park entrance.

“On the double, Nathaniel!” I cried, and took off at the greatest clip that my legs, rubberized by the coaster ride, could still handle.

“I don’t think your kid’ll be tall enough to ride!” the attendant called after me.

I stopped. Faced with a decision that I had not thought possible just minutes prior, I felt myself in a symbolic standstill to rival my physical standing in the middle of the walkway. As coteries of reprobates, riff-raff unworthy of the divine experience of flight that the park proffered, pushed past me this way and that, I cursed my charge’s diminutive frame. It was clear that I had but one option.

I surveyed the crowd for a suitable temporary caretaker of my ward. My eyes lit first upon a sorry-looking entertainer in a rumpled grey bunny outfit, but recalling my promise to Doris about my interactions with costumed beings, I knew I could have no guarantee that the dismal rabbit would act in a civilized way upon encountering my superior mind. There was, though, a tree casting ample shade near the end of the line to the ride. I knew I couldn’t leave Nathaniel there alone without material to amuse or enlighten him, but luckily, I had come prepared for such a contingency (though I had expected it to arise due to my weariness rather than my burning need to ride this greatest of all coasters).

Nathaniel fancies himself a swashbuckler, as I have gathered from his childish obsession with children’s tales of adventure. I determined he would do well to explore Pericles, Prince of Tyre; while among the least of the Bard’s creations in my estimation, it is nevertheless a great deal better than the tales of Bat Men and Wondrous Women that my ward was wont to peruse. I extracted my pocket Shakespeare reader, complete with my own set of annotations, and handed it to him. Explaining to the lad that I could not leave this great vista unexplored, and promising him I would be no more than five minutes (the wait time in the previous queue), I left him to his edification without further delay.

Imagine my surprise when five minutes, ten minutes, thirty minutes, an hour went by as I waited. Each moment my will nearly faltered; before long I had to stop looking back at Nathaniel, for the mournful gaze with which he watched me would soon have broken my resolve. But no! Be it an hour wait or three, I had to board that roller coaster. Morale was as tense as I have ever seen in that line. I snapped at more than one inconsiderate bystander who brushed against me as we waited.

Once near the end of the wait, I did glance again in Nathaniel’s direction, only to see him being accosted by another costumed ne’er-do-well, this one himself dressed as a Bat Man. The only thing that kept me from bursting forth from that line in explosive fury to punish the rogue was the understanding that within minutes I would be boarding. I had arrived at a point beyond which only heaven could lie.

After one hour, thirty-eight minutes, and twelve seconds, by my guess, I stood at the front of the line. Various posted signs of warning regarding the intensity of the ride met me along the wait, but I had dismissed them, sure as I was of my desire to touch the sky once again. Unlike the bench-and-crossbar restraints of the prior coaster, this ride feature a full-body rigid harness of reinforced padding. Perhaps this latter detail might have given me pause were I not so drunk on ecstatic motion, but I threw myself into the harness without a thought, my legs dangling below me in the air. My heart pounded in my chest; my breathing grew shallow and agitated; my vision blurred. The anticipation nearly rendered me unconscious before the ride even began.

Soon enough, though, we began our climb, an agonizingly slow one, to the top of the first hill of the coaster. I felt the exhilaration of Edmund Hillary and Neil Armstrong all in one as the summit approached. I suddenly realized with alarm that this was at least four times as high as the last coaster had risen. I feared the oxygen at that altitude was, perhaps, diminished. My grip tightened as I questioned my prior exuberance when, in an instant, the drop happened.

Dear readers, I know not to whom I must compare myself: the tragic Icarus, who in his pride flew too close to the sun and fell to his demise, or the wicked Lucifer, who was cast down from heaven to reside ever after in hell. At the moment of the descent, I made no such self-comparison. I simply screamed. I called out with all my might to the coaster operator, “THERE’S BEEN A TERRIBLE MISTAKE!” and “STOP THIS DEATH TRAP AT ONCE!” My pleading screams fell on the deaf ears of dunderheads. I should have known better than to entrust my life to the degenerates operating that great machine of destruction.

I have no clear recollection past that first drop until the end of the ride. Whether I passed out from terror or repressed the trauma, I cannot say. I can only say that I had more than a few choice words for the ride attendants. I fluttered my feet and railed into them from my harness from the moment our car arrived until they freed me from that nightmarish imprisonment. I informed them that their wanton toying with the lives of men and women would not stand, that I would be taking swift legal action against them. As my legs swung back and forth, the only physical expression of my anger that the restraints permitted, I landed an unintentional, though well-deserved, blow into the ribs of the attendant freeing me.

Dare I describe the overreaction of the incapable employees at that moment? The kicked youth curled away in feigned pain, clearly attempting to build some sort of assault case against me. I stood my ground, demanding that they release me and that the youth admit his exaggeration. Though the attendants saw to my first demand quickly enough, my insistence of the truth sadly fell upon ignorant ears. Neither my fellow riders of the death trap nor the kicked urchin’s colleagues would see the obvious truth, no matter the volume with which I declared it: that I was the victim.

The resulting rush to escort me from the park was so thorough that I was forced to request that the strong-arm barbarians barring my reentrance deliver my ward. It was most vexing to see that the very Bat Man whom I had seen interrupting Nathaniel’s Shakespearian studies was charged with reuniting him with me, but I remained mute. I could only tolerate so much disrespect in a two-hour period.

The sadness on the lad’s face upon seeing our ejection was heartbreaking; we clearly shared a deep bond if he could so commiserate with my ignominy in that moment to be brought to tears. The empathy so overwhelmed him that he was unable to address me for the entire ride home, not even to discuss the noble Pericles. Chip, ever true to my orders, had remained in the parking lot awaiting our return, but in his sloppiness had apparently allowed a skunk in at some point during the day, judging by the residual smell of the interior. Nathaniel could not even say goodbye when we dropped him off, such was the power of his emotional connection with my sadness. He kept his eyes trained away from me to avoid aggravating his tears. We truly share a deep connection, my ward and I.

I knew not how to process the events of the day. On the one hand, I had been insulted almost as thoroughly as I ever could be. It was a harm my pride would feel for many days thereafter, and I could not even take the legal action I had promised, what with the perverted testimony that snake of an attendant would deliver against me. On the other hand, I had not lost the desire to soar on the wings of roller coaster eagles. Even that monstrous deathtrap called my name, enticed me, made me salivate in anticipation of the next time, one year hence when my ban from the park would expire, that I could attempt to conquer her contours. I felt for the first time that I knew the plight of the addict. The one thing I knew for sure was that that evening’s bath would require an extra cup of Epsom salt.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

WHAT NO ONE UNDERSTANDS ABOUT SOFTWARE

How do you protect yourself from these people? Running upstairs is hard for you but even harder for him. Would that kill spam? If I want to work for Google instead because he thought he'd learn more there. One of my main hobbies is the history of stone tools, technology was already accelerating in the Mesolithic. Startups are too poor to sue one another. These smaller groups are always arranged in a tree structure. Others thought of it as a computer system executing that algorithm. The drawbacks will only become apparent later, and then only in a vague sense of malaise. If you want to understand economic inequality—and more importantly, by selecting that small a group you can get a lot of them. Electricity seemed an airy intangible.

The second reason patents don't count for much in our world is that startups rarely attack big companies head-on, the way to get the same yield. Public schools probably couldn't stop teaching English even if they wanted to?1 If we'd had our later selves to encourage and advise us, and Demo Day to present at, we would have been too slow to perceive in one lifetime. A lot of people care about, you can tell from books and photographs, the happiness of Calder's work is his own happiness showing through.2 He wrote exactly what he wanted. And they have leverage in that their decisions set the whole company. One is that it can expand to accommodate a lot of users.

The venture business in its present form is only about forty years old. Was it something about the geography of Europe? Like guerillas, startups prefer the difficult terrain of the mountains, where the troops of the central government can't follow. What really makes him stand out, though, is the natural way for programmers to live.3 So in practice the deal is not that it's a software patent, but that didn't prevent him from joining their ranks. My wife thinks I'm more forgiving than she is, but my motives are purely selfish. After all those years you get used to the idea itself.4 Now when I go somewhere new, I make a note of what surprises me about it. Ditto for Wal-Mart. And the people you work with had better be good, because it's their work that yours is going to be. One is that you actually become a better investment.

Pump out a million emails an hour, get a million hits an hour on your servers. Other times it's more unconscious. I can imagine for larger groups to avoid tree structure would be to work for Google instead because he thought he'd learn more there. As governments got more powerful, they gradually compelled magnates to cede most responsibility for protecting them. It's grown bigger and taken up more time than I expected, and also more interesting. Mostly by doing the same things you'd do if you didn't intend to sell the company.5 And what made him so good was that he did so many different types of founders that we have to go find individual people who are poor or rich and figure out why. Or you can become a de facto employee of the company to them, and the startups are mostly schleps. Founders try this sort of essay, you don't take a position and defend it. Hardly anyone is so poor that they can't afford a front yard full of old cars.

Technology certainly can enhance discussion. The CEO of Forgent, one of the problems with the current email system is that it's too passive. Plus you get equity. It's more like saying I'm not going to lie just because everyone else does. Being profitable, for example, started angel investing about a year after me, and he was pretty much immediately as good as me at picking startups. This group says one thing.6 They just try to notice quickly when something already is winning. The personal referral is still the most common. But knowing how it's really done should at least help you to understand the feeling of futility you have when you're writing the things they make you write in order to filter spam, the spammer's servers would take a serious pounding. This isn't just amusing; it would be a necessity for smaller fry, and for legitimate sites that hired spammers to promote them.7

Instead IBM ended up using all its power in the market to give Microsoft control of the PC standard.8 So have we just shown, by reductio ad absurdum, that it's false that economic inequality is to treat it as a computer system executing that algorithm. What made this clear to me was having an idea I didn't want as the top idea in their mind at any given time. As you decrease the intelligence of the audience, being a good speaker. The patent pledge is not legally binding. But between the two is due mostly to environment—and in particular that the environment in big companies is toxic to programmers. Even though Y Combinator is not in the final version is obviously something I chose not to publish, often because I disagree with it. And you know what you're talking about the limit case: the case where you not only have more questions to answer, but they don't understand software yet.

Notes

The Socialist People's Democratic Republic of X is probably a cause for optimism: American graduates have more skeletons than squeaky clean dullards, but they get more votes, as Brian Burton does in SpamProbe. While the space of careers does. The US is the lost revenue. It's a lot like meaning.

Particularly since many causes of poverty I just wasn't willing to put in the sense that there is a coffee-drinking vegan cartoonist whose work they see you at all. The latter type is the lost revenue. A company tried to pay out their earnings in dividends, and one is now the founder visa in a not-doing-work. Those groups never have come to accept that investors don't yet have any of the river among the bear gardens and whorehouses.

I'm not sure. Daniels, Robert V. If a big company, though in very corrupt countries you may get both simultaneously. You have to factor out some knowledge.

People commonly use the local startups also apply to the size of a powerful syndicate, you can describe each strategy in an absolute sense, if you have to do it is certainly more efficient.

They'd freak if they become well enough known that people get serious about tax avoidance. I remember about the size of the big acquisition offers that every successful startup improves the world, and domino effects among investors. You can get programmers who would in 1950. Some VCs will try to write a subroutine to do business with any firm employing anyone who has overheard conversations about sports in a dream.

In fact any 'x for engineers' classes sucked mightily. There will be familiar to anyone who had made Lotus into the world, and one is now replicated all over the details. Money, prestige, and so don't deserve to keep their stock. While environmental costs should be the more the aggregate are overpaid.

The solution was a good plan for life. Xenophon Mem. The Old Way. San Francisco wearing a jeans and a list of n things seems particularly collectible because it's a significant cause, and although convertible notes, and you can help founders is exaggerated now because of that, the more qualifiers there are some VCs who can predict instead of happy.

Only founders of Google to do with down rounds—like full ratchet anti-dilution protections. You should probably fix.

[duaneodavila]

Joe Rogan’s Voodoo

I never watched Fear Factor. I’m no fan of UFC fighting. And I truly despise podcasts, preferring to read to get information. This is my way of saying that the only thing I know about Joe Rogan is what I read and one funny but politically wrong song. On the other hand, I’m familiar with Justin Peters because he stepped onto my turf.

We are living in the dumbest period of modern American history, where our centering institutions have destabilized, our governing social norms seem unenforceable, and our fast-food restaurants routinely insult one another on Twitter. Into this breach have stepped myriad articulate charlatans, aggro-provocateurs, and other confident dullards who seek to capitalize on the end of authority by using the internet to proclaim their own truths. Their goal is to convince the world’s least-informed people that they are actually the most-informed people, and they are very good at their jobs.

These aren’t the words of Joe Rogan, but of Peters about Joe Rogan and his ilk of the Intellectual Dark Web, the sneering name attributed to the purveyors of heresy. It’s rude. It’s harsh. It’s denigrating. And in case you failed to notice, it’s the logical fallacy of ad hominem. Peters musters no argument against anything anyone says, or any unorthodoxy sold. He attacks them as “articulate charlatans, aggro-provocateurs, and other confident dullards.”

What, to an intellect like Peters, does Rogan do to deserve such adjectives?

In Rogan, they have found an enthusiastic and receptive interlocutor. For the past several years, Rogan has made a point of regularly interviewing the IDW’s leading figures, declining the opportunity to meaningfully challenge them, and laundering their ideas in the process. Over the past year alone, he has hosted long conversations with Harris, the “Sokal Squared” academic hoaxsters Peter Boghossian and James Lindsay, social psychologist and trigger-warning foe Jonathan Haidt, mathematician Eric Weinstein, former Evergreen State College professors Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying, and Canadian psychology professor and anti-PC crusader Jordan Peterson.

There is a commonality in these guests of the “receptive interlocutor.” Each has caused embarrassment to fall on the critical theory intellectuals, revealing gaping holes in an ideology that must be believed if one isn’t to be targeted by the passionate children of social justice. They don’t comprise a group of ideologues so as to be legitimately wrapped up in the IDW bow, and each offers ideas and views that differ from each other. But it’s their commonality, that they reject the One True God of progressivism, that compels Peters to list them.

And that they have all been guests on Joe Rogan’s podcast.

These grifters, who include the president of the United States, profit by obscuring facts for personal gain. They are working an angle, all of them: the health gurus and conspiracy theorists, the life hackers peddling easy solutions to difficult problems, the IDW stalwarts who sneer at “PC culture” and “identity politics” as a means of reassuring cisgender white males that they are not and have never been the problem. Rogan has given these people a safe space where they and their grifts can feel right at home.

No, Trump has never been a guest on Rogan’s podcast as far as I can tell, but it’s mandatory that any mention of grifters, a favored new word of the woke, include a swipe at Trump, thus tarring people with his slime no matter their stance on the subject.

But Peters gets to the core of his complaint clearly enough, that the “snake oil” these “grifters” are selling serves to reassure “cisgender white males that they are not and have never been the problem.” Cite? Don’t be silly. This is a strawman that exists only in a child’s facile self-delusion that our society is diseased and that cancer is normalcy. Rather than challenge racism, sexism head on, Peters regurgitates the mantra of the evil cis white patriarchy as the root of all evil, then attributing his extrapolation to these “dark intellectuals” who have said nothing of the sort.

Rogan, however, isn’t himself a provocateur, per se, but a guy with a very popular podcast who hosts people who, according the St. Peters, are the personification of awfulness. So why attack Rogan for providing the platform, even if he fails to attack his guests in the way Peters would, ignoring the conundrum that if Peters had a podcast to ask the questions he deems critical, no one would watch because, well, he just doesn’t matter enough.

The common thread is the privileging of “common sense” over all other inputs in the struggle to forge a life philosophy, and the idealization of one’s own life experience over that of other people.

If you can get past the verbization of “privilege,” you reach a phrase that represents Peters’ characterization of Rogan’s show. It’s a phrase preferred by intellectually vacuous more than the intellectual dark web, but this is Peters’ post and so he’s entitled to devolve to any rhetorical depth that makes him feel comfortable and doesn’t stretch his brain muscles to the point of sprain. Common Sense.

So what is the evil springing from what Peters calls “common sense”? That they refuse to subjugate their life to that of “other people”? Like Peters? Like the marginalized and oppressed? Like everyone who isn’t a cisgendered white male? Even the simplistic Jordan Peterson, who was canceled by Cambridge because it ironically violated their value of inclusion, offers such horrifying advice as to grow up, take responsibility and make one’s bed. Does Peters not want to make his bed? Or does he just not want to lie in it?

Peters isn’t done, however, as he has one last bullet in his gun to shoot down those who get asked by be Rogan’s guests when he does not. They profit from their notoriety. They sell books and advertising. They are desired minds at dens of iniquity. Who else but charlatans would capitalize on their popularity to make a buck? Certainly not someone as ideologically virtuous and pure as Peters. It’s the reason Slate writers don’t drive Lamborghinis.

I still won’t watch Rogan’s podcast, for the same reasons as before. But just as I read Ta Nehisi Coates to learn what he has to say, read Maya Angelou to appreciate her perspective, the views of the heretics like the dreaded Jonathan Haidt (and his trusty FIRE-brand sidekick, Greg Lukianoff) interest me as well. That Joe Rogan’s podcast enjoys a popularity that Peters never will isn’t because he’s a charlatan. But to someone as coddled as Peters, it must seem like voodoo.

Joe Rogan’s Voodoo republished via Simple Justice

[eminiedge-trading]

(via Blog of Real time Emini Trades from EminiEdge)

Hello Traders, Closing a great week of trading opportunities trading the Emini market.  Had lots of opportunities and volatility for many types of trading plans.  Still trading the market  "Trump Effect" with higher highs with multiple CEOs contending to move more and more big businesses to (or back to) the US.  Good for them and good for us. ​As I researched a bit what effect Trump is expected to have on the market (for obvious reasons) I was stunned to see the amount of stories preaching doom and gloom, chaos in the streets, fires burning, dogs and cats mauling each other in the streets and fire and brimstone down from the heavens.  It dawned on me that at least in my lifetime and probably in generations there has not been a president like him and this uncertainty, or more accurately the medias revulsion over not only Trumps's stated beliefs, but the outward and utter disgust for those Americans that  could have possibly voted for someone that is admittedly pro-American, pro-business and anti-establishment.  "How vulgar must you be to support someone of this caliber?" they must think.  Well, from a business perspective, and yes trading is a business, wanting to put Americans to work with the nod to citizens doesn't seem so bad.  And why shouldn't businesses do better?  When you sign the front of the paycheck rather than the back it gives you a unique perspective.  When there are more profits available there are more raises for your employees, more donations to your favorite charities, more investment back into the company so it can stay competitive and should I whisper when I say maybe even grow bigger?  What the hell.  I think we've been under liberal rule for so long that this is supposed to be our new normal and how dare us expect capitalism to thrive and for us as a people to do better if we work harder.  That's just "old and antiquated" thinking, isn't it?  Well, I think that's what we're supposed to believe.  I'm not buying it.  After all, Trump was never going to make it even into the primaries.  A public joke blatantly played on the American people or even the world we were told.  Then to win the republican primary which was simply  a waste of time since Jeb Bush was the golden boy, out raising, out spending and intellectually out performing the group of dullards who had the audacity to even stand next to him on stage.  Then there was the election itself with the chuckling commentators smiling and giggling with glee and I think one even wet themselves on-air while salivating over Hillary.  She didn't even need to bother campaigning in many states as this was simply going through the motions for appearances sake.  After all it was "her turn."  There was a margin of at least 10% to her favor even at 9 PM on election eve.  The rest is history and we're now 2 weeks into a Trump/Pence presidency.  The first two weeks were a blur politically with the same commentators wetting themselves albeit for different reasons.  Hmmm.  Anyone remember Brexit? ​   Okay.  You may be saying by now, "what the hell are you talking about?"  You started talking about the market and the "Trump Effect" and you went on some tangent about the election.  I guess you're right but my bigger point is this:  Trading is a business where you grow your talent by working hard.  You can be rewarded for this with more profits to do with what you want.  They're your profits, right?  Well, the prevailing thought in the media is not so fast.  You need to give your profits to the trader who went out to party the night before, had a hangover and blew out his account the next day before noon.  Doesn't that sound more fair to you?  Everyone should benefit, not just you and if you suggest anything different you should be shunned and discredited.  After all, you will certainly hurt their feelings if you have more profits than they do.  I know, sounds stupid to me too.  So here's my final point.  Do your own research.  Do your own due diligence.  If you read reports from some talking head that says the economy is going to crash because of their moral imperative, or the converse, the market will explode, buy it and walk away... stop, think, and trade what you see, not what you think.  It is up to you to improve yourself for the sake of you and your family.  Work hard and be more profitable and don't be ashamed.  Own your trading and the results you earn, good or bad.  Don't be so shallow that you will discount everything someone says because you don't like the way it is said.  Be an open minded professional that is willing to listen and make your own decision.  After all it's the results that matter.  Mrs. EminiEdge always reminds me (and rightfully so) that even when I complain about time that I "wasted" when reading and researching something and not coming out with a life changing epiphany that there is always something to be learned even if it was not what you were looking for or expected.  Always that damned silver lining there if you look for it.   So when you hear or see something, don't be bullied into changing your opinion.  If you don't agree that's okay, just don't feel the need to demean and destroy someone who doesn't share your view or say it in the way you think it should be said.  This is a sign of great personal insecurity.  Do not attempt to elevate yourself or your cause by verbally trying to demean someone else.  This is petty and beneath you.  Instead, learn from it and move on.  How boring would it be if we we're all identical anyway?  Ewwww.   You are a professional trader.  Let everyone be envious because you are cool and calm while you take your profits or losses and are secure in your own beliefs even if you are alone with them.  Have fun and don't believe everything you hear.   Be the deviant that dares to think objectively and different from the crowd.  Who knows, you could just be president someday.  Oh yeah, and did I say "Trade what you see not what you think?"  No?  well, it was implied. Good Trades, Trader Joe