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fly-pow-bye · 4 years ago

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DuckTales 2017 - The Absolute Best!

After doing the least best this series has done, it's time for a much, much harder list to put together: the absolute best episodes of DuckTales 2017. I am not going to lie: this was hard to put together. Anyone could guess that based on how I once planned to have this list alongside the worst list and that did not happen. I can also see myself forgetting about other really good episodes of this show. However, after days of pondering, I believe I have a good list here.

Same rules as the last list.

It has to be an episode of DuckTales 2017. No shorts, even if the shorts combined can make up a full episode.

With this list, I have to say something bad about each of these episodes. Not necessarily the worst part of the episode, but a bad part nonetheless. These are going to be more nitpicky, but it is only fair to prove the constant that there is no such thing as a perfect piece of media and it is a decent challenge for me.

This is my opinion and my opinion alone. There are episodes I didn't like as much that a lot of people did. The last list should be a huge hint at that.

Alright, let's begin.

10. Jaw$!

I mentioned this episode in my Least Best as the better example of the show establishing the relationship between Lena and Magica De Spell. It establishes Magica De Spell better than either of the episodes that featured her before this one. One was a tease put in the very last minute of the episode to show how Lena is going to be far more important than the "cool new goth girl", and the other was the Terra-Firmians episode that used her as a way to improve what would otherwise be a not-so-good filler episode. This one is a far better example, and it's not just because a money-shark is a lot more interesting and threatening than a bunch of cutesy rock creatures.

It also has a B-plot about Scrooge's Board of Directors scheduling an interview to improve his PR, and hilarity ensues when Scrooge has to defend his zillionaire antics when a shark made of his own fortune is causing havoc throughout the town. Glomgold also makes an appearance during this, which only makes it better. Along with some neat Jaws references along the way, this is not an episode to miss.

Bad thing: They really did not want to mention the obvious plot hole of the kids being able to go into the money bin. This was long before F.O.W.L. began their plans against Scrooge or even the 87 cent problem, but still, one would think this would be one of the most highly secure places at Killmotor Hill considering all of his enemies. Considering I didn't particularly love the Impossibin episode, as much as I love the idea of it, it might be for the best.

9. The First Adventure!

Going from an arc from season 1 to an arc from season 3, though some may argue the F.O.W.L. arc has been happening since season 1. Anyway, this is an episode that brings back the younger Donald and younger Della that was first seen in "Last Christmas!" in their first adventure with their Uncle Scrooge. It's very interesting to see the similarities between their first adventure with Scrooge and the first adventure with Huey, Dewey, and Louie.

Even though this does give good development to the arc, arguably even bigger characters in this episode are Bradford Buzzard and Black Heron, as this episode details the origins of the Fiendish Organization of World Larceny. Their antics throughout this episode are very entertaining, with the plot toying with the dynamic of the more chaotic evil Heron and the more lawful evil Buzzard. With all it all ties together, I had to put the First Adventure on this list.

Bad thing: The sense of time in this episode is odd. We get a title card showing that it's the 60's in the opening scene, and yet there is very little suggestion of any passing of time between the opening scene and the scenes that I assumed took place in the 80's.

8. Quack Pack!

It would be too easy to just put in episodes that are important to any of the various story arcs that went throughout this series, so here's an episode that could be taken out of the series without harming anything. However, it is still a very memorable episode of the show, where the cast of characters have to be in this weird sitcom. There's also a mystery element, as there is a culprit to why these characters are in this sitcom world.

I really like the whole meta element, with the characters picking apart all not only the clichés in sitcoms, but sitcom production as well. I also really appreciated the "special guest", another sitcom staple, being a character from a different Disney Afternoon show with some great references to it. Quack Pack turns out to be the antithesis of the show it was named after; it's not dated, it's really funny, and it realistically portrays how freaked out these characters would be if they saw those weird hairless apes.

Bad thing: I wish they did more with the concept of this world being made up by someone who was locked away from the world since 1990. Maybe not references to the era of Disney that gave us "Gotta Be Gettin' Goofy", but more jokes about how the 90's were different from now. They kind of ignore this, as if they only mentioned 1990 because of the DuckTales movie they were referencing.

7. Last Christmas!

Wait, a Christmas episode in a Top 10? I have my reasons for including this one. It's not just because the idea is pretty great, as it uses the very tale that inspired Scrooge's entire character in the first place. Obviously, we already had one of the best cartoon renditions of A Christmas Carol, and this episode does not try to recreate that. Instead, we get a different tale, mostly featuring Scrooge and Jiminy Cricket, er, the ghost of Christmas Past, going back to the past to experience a good Christmas party. If only we can do the same, like Dewey accidentally does in the episode.

This was also the first time we also got to see a young version of Donald, who, in this episode, is voiced by none other than the late, great Russi Taylor. It was almost like having one of the siblings from the old show interact with one of the new ones. This is also the first time we got to see and hear her outside of a painting, and it's heartbreaking and yet understandable when we get to the scene where Dewey has to say goodbye. It's a good scene, and they weren't afraid to even throw in a joke that does not ruin the moment.

Bad thing: No, episode, this is the Scrooge they were looking for. Were they trying to make it seem like Scrooge was always a hero and not a miser who would deserve getting three ghosts to visit him with that line? I don’t buy it.

6. The Ballad of Duke Baloney!

Got to pay some respect to Scrooge's arch-rival with an episode that really shows off his character, which is a bit ironic as this is an episode about him getting amnesia and getting a brand new, at least to us, persona named Duke Baloney. Amnesia episodes tend to be a dime-a-dozen, and anyone could predict this new persona is not going to last, but the way this episode develops is actually much more interesting. This is the episode for Glomgold character development, with dream sequences, flashbacks, and a great scene in the ending that takes place in a storm that he may or may not have made up in his head. I may not have given a lot of his episodes high-rated reviews, but this is easily not only one of his best appearances, but one of the best episodes of DuckTales 2017.

Bad thing: The dream sequence really subtly implies that Duke Baloney is about to become Glomgold again. How? By having him outright say "this gold, it's GLOOMING onto me!" ...okay, I'll admit, that was a stretch for a bad thing, but with a dream sequence with subtleties, that took me out of it.

5. The Last Crash of the Sunchaser!

I called this episode "the best episode of the series so far" when I reviewed it, a pretty late episode in a season with lots of good episodes, I would say that's a good sign that this one was going to be a shoo-in for at least the Top 10. What I love most about this episode is that it gives a little more humanity to the legendary Scrooge McDuck. Sure, this was shown a bit in "Woo-oo!" and "Mount Never-Rest!", but I felt this episodes was one of the best examples of that. Throughout this episode, he sees himself as this legendary figure, as everyone sees him, and he ends up failing to live up to those impossible standards by crashing in a plane in a way where they may not survive.

Much like Quack Pack, there's no traditional villain like Glomgold or Magica. Eventually, this leads to Scrooge finally bringing up his biggest failure: his loss of the Spear of Selene and a certain relative that was piloting it, and it is one of the biggest emotional moments of the series, both in and out of universe. It's one of the most important episodes in the series, and it is also one of the best.

Bad thing: The Last Crash of the Sunchaser is a neat title, but it doesn't really fit the episode. The Sunchaser will certainly crash again. At most, maybe it could be referring to Scrooge crashing down to the lowest point he gets to in the series, but that's not the Sunchaser's fault.

4. Moonvasion!

My big hot take: the season 2 finale, the best of the season finales in my opinion, is not the best episode of the series. However, it is very close. It's actually kind of funny; I had plenty of criticism against the build-up to his finale, especially the Louie Inc. plot that led to an episode that was just kind of lackluster to me, and of all the, some alien commander from the Moon who thinks the Earth revolved around his "planet" wasn't exactly as threatening as an all powerful witch or the scheming businessman who knew Scrooge's every move. Okay, when I put it like that, the alien does sound more threatening, but trust me, even Bradford had his moments.

The biggest thing about this episode is the sheer scale of it. It really did feel like every major player in the series had a part in this, from Scrooge and the nephews, to Dijon and Amunet, to the new Darkwing Duck, to Donald and Della, to even the Greek pantheon! Oh, and Glomgold, too, in what may be his finest moment in the series! It really does feel like a finale for the series, and I say this even if I felt The Last Adventure was a great one as well.

Bad thing: In hindsight, this would have been a good time for the Terries and Fermies to come back. They're in the earth! That episode wasn't bad because of them.

3. Let's Get Dangerous!

I'll tell you a secret: I did not watch Darkwing Duck as a kid. It was just DuckTales '87, and even then, I did not remember a lot of episodes of that. This show was made for people who did not grow up with DuckTales '87, because they were not even alive. Though there are parts of this episode that can be appreciated by those who were familiar with the heroes of the Disney Afternoon, I will still say this episode works very well as its own superhero movie. That is what it is, really!

This special is the true continuation of another episode, though we saw this defictionalized-within-the-fiction Darkwing Duck in the Moonvasion, and it may as well be a pilot for a Darkwing Duck reboot that spins off from this show, with its villains, its origin stories, its sidekicks, and its memorable catchphrases. It all works very well. Who knows where the new Darkwing Duck reboot will go, though I would at least imagine that they would eventually get to certain Darkwing-related plot threads that never got resolved.

Bad thing: Outside of using a few cliche moments to extend the episode that end rather predictably, in the attempt to make Darkwing Duck as cool as he wants to be, the regular cast essentially become jobbers in their own show.

2. What Ever Happened To Della Duck?!

It's the question everyone wanted to know ever since Dewey said the last line in the first episode: what ever happened to Della Duck? This is one of the more artsy episodes of the show, focusing on one duck on what she assumes is a barren moon until she finds a monster that seems to do nothing but impede on her quest to get someone to save her. It does heavily expand from there, to the point where we get to see some more new characters, one who I thought was going to be way more important than the other. I decided to call that guy "General Not Penumbra", and that name could still be fitting as an insult.

This episode would be made or broken by how good Della is, and this is a very good episode for her first voiced debut as an adult. We did get to see her in the IDW comics, but this episode is where her character is developed. Throughout the episode, she has elements of her kids and especially her brother Donald. While there are future episodes that develop her further as a mother who wants to make up for all of those years she missed, one of the biggest defining moments is right in this episode, where she sings a version of the Capcom game's famous moon theme. An amazing episode all around.

Bad thing: Do I have to? Uh, flares do not work on the Moon? No, seriously, I can't think of anything worse than that.

Honorable mentions from each season:

The Shadow War! - An excellent way to end Season 1 that would only be topped by the Moonvasion.

Nightmare on Killmotor Hill! - A dream episode that really works with the concept, especially how Lena is the one involved with it.

Double-O-Duck in You Only Crash Twice! - This is an action packed episode where Launchpad really shines.

And now, #1:

1. The Duck Knight Returns!

Yes, I decided to put the prequel episode to Let's Get Dangerous as higher than the big Darkwing Duck episode, and part of this may be a little bias on my part. While it was not the very original intention of it, Fly Pow Bye started as a project to review a reboot, so of course an episode about Darkwing Duck, a fictional show within the fiction, getting a dark and gritty reboot would be right up my alley. We have Launchpad, a Darkwing Duck superfan, reacting to how they're going to ruin Darkwing Duck. We got the conflict between what the big studio execs wanted Darkwing Duck to be and Dewey's version of it. Finally, we have the conflict between Jim Starling, an obvious reference to original Darkwing Duck voice actor Jim Cummings who is even voiced by him, and his replacement, who appears to be some guy named Drake Mallard.

A lot of these plots converge in very interesting ways, with plenty of twists. Drake Mallard, the guy Launchpad was trying to replace with the original, turns out to be very worthy of the role by also being a superfan! Dewey's version has dancers, just like that Batdance music video! Okay, maybe that last one isn't that great, but it does not overstay its welcome. And, of course, Jim Starling ends up causing a huge cliffhanger that, despite the show being over, we will still be hanging from. We can only wonder what was going to come next, but I do not have to wonder what the best episode of DuckTales 2017 is.

Bad thing: I can't really think of a bad thing for this episode, but I can say that it is odd that there's no real transition from "TV character" to "real hero". It does help that it's not the TV actor that ends up becoming Darkwing, but "fanboy of TV character turning into a real hero" is just as much of a leap, even with an incompetent hero like Darkwing. I would also consider the show never following up on this episode's cliffhanger a bad thing, but that's not this episode's fault.

How does the whole show stack up?

It is an excellent modern take on the Disney Ducks. Opinions may vary on how this will compare with the original, since it is very much a modern take, with a different style of humor than the one from the original or the one in the original comics. Anyone who loves shows like Gravity Falls will be right at home here. Any fan of the original comics or the original cartoon may balk at some of the creative decisions made with the characters, but I would say it pays some good respect to them.

Oh, and before anyone asks, no, I am not going to give a rating for the whole series. I've already imposed a 10 image limit on myself, and since I grade on a relative scale, the average is always, in theory, going to be in the middle. It's a good show, that's what you're going to get from me.

And that's it for DuckTales 2017. Hurrah for Disney and Clan McDuck. Bye.

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phoenixfell · 5 years ago

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Protecting Yourself & Creating a Good Experience

An unfortunate post necessitated by recent events. The unfortunate truth of reality is that we, as non-psychic human beings, are unable to determine with certainty the motives of other humans around us. If someone claims to have good intentions but are hurting you, are they simply presenting themselves poorly or are they lying entirely? This is a question you can never truly answer, but here I will guide you through some ways to protect yourself while being kind to yourself and others.

You may reblog this if you’d like.

Although this post was created specifically in response to the turmoil in the Avatar: The Last Airbender fandom, it’s not specific to this exact situation and the purpose is not to take a side. The purpose is to encourage everyone to do their part in ending hateful behavior and crafting a good community.

Contents:

0. Don’t send mean asks to people 1. Install an IP Tracker on your blog. 1.a (How to) Install an IP Blocker on your blog. 2. Curating your Experience 3. Making First Contact 4. Analyzing a Message 5. Fiction as Fiction VS Fiction as Reality 6. The Author’s Duty 7. Echo Chambers & Lateral Thinking 8. Accepting Differing Opinions 9. Good Intentions (Pave the Road to Hell) 10. Being Mean is Fun (so do it in non-harmful ways) 11. Morality (Personal, Community, and Legal)

0. Don’t send mean asks to people.

You know, I saw a post some time ago on the internet that basically said: Why do we see so many posts teaching people how to avoid being raped and virtually nothing telling people not to rape others? So, as obvious as this may sound, I’m going to give you a gentle reminder to not send mean asks to people.

Perhaps you are angry. Perhaps something else is bothering you. Perhaps you honestly feel like you are doing the right thing. These feelings are entirely valid and I understand. However, being mean to someone else on the internet is not going to solve anything. At best, it’s going to get you ignored and at worst, it’s going to actively escalate things.

If you feel down, depressed, or upset, consider this service: https://www.crisistextline.org/

US and Canada: text 741741 UK: text 85258 | Ireland: text 50808

It’s a confidential service that will help support you.

On the other hand, if you feel like you genuinely have a bone to pick with someone, take a step back. Get a cup of coffee, or tea; watch a YouTube video, and later on in this post we’ll discuss cooperative problem solving, the importance of word choice, and how to deescalate a situation.

1. Install an IP Tracker on your blog.

This is a very simple and completely legal process. The easiest way to do so is to sign up for Statcounter. This is a website for market and visitor analysis, but it does IP tracking for free, which is what we’re looking for. The site will even guide you through installing it. However--do not post it into the description. In my experiences, this does not work. Instead, click Edit HTML, search for <body>, and paste it directly underneath that.

For this to work most effectively, make sure that you have the Timestamps extension enabled within the inbox in XKit. If you do not have XKit installed, you can find directions on their Tumblr page, here: https://new-xkit-extension.tumblr.com/

1.a. (How to) Install an IP Blocker on your blog.

Although Tumblr claims to give you the ability to IP Block through the inbox by blocking anonymous asks, many people have expressed doubts that it actually works. Therefore, here’s an explanation showing you how to do it yourself. There are three steps to this, all taking place in the Edit HTML section we’ve left off in last section.

Directly below where the web analytics code above ends, paste this:

Directly below the previous command, paste this:

function ipBlock() { var ip = userip; //example: "0.0.0.0", "5.5.5.5", "3.3.3.3", var bannedips=[ "155.555.55.55" ]; var handleips=bannedips.join("|"); handleips=new RegExp(handleips, "i"); if (ip.search(handleips)!=-1){

window.location.replace("http://www.tumblr.com"); }

} </script>

You can customize this script in a few ways. First, bannedips needs to be the ip(s) you wish to block. You can add more by separating them by commas and enclosing them in quotes, as the example shows. Secondly, in the window.location.replace line, you can insert any valid address. Here are some suggestions I give people:

Tumblr homepage. Basic and effective.

A link to a Google search of something, e.g. How to not send mean asks on the internet

Your own tumblr blog, so they get stuck in a refresh loop

A similarly spelled but nonexistent blog, to give the illusion you deleted/moved

Finally, add onload=“ipBlock()” to your body tag:

That should be everything to get it working. If you want to test it, click the link in step two, copy and paste the IP address that is displayed into the bannedips, save, and visit your blog. If it’s working right, you should get thrown off.

If you don’t want your IP Block active, just remove step three and return your tag to <body>.

2. Curating Your Experience

Although Tumblr itself does not allow the functionality, there are ways to ensure that certain words do not appear on your dashboard. XKit has a blacklist feature which will hide posts containing certain words. Also of note is the wildcard feature, which is accessed by adding an asterisk after the word, ex.

nsfw -> Only blocks exactly that word and that tag nsfw* -> Will block any word or tag containing that phrase

However, I would like to gently notify you that there is significant research that actively avoiding content does more harm than good! Only you can know what is best for you, but there is a such thing as excessive avoidance.

3. Making First Contact

If there’s anything you take from this post, please let it be this one thing:

Always be kind. At first. Then tear them a new one if necessary.

The inevitable happens. As far as you can tell, you’re minding your own business on your blog. Your ask box lights up and you perk up, wondering which of your friends is reaching out to you.

Instead, the message is nasty, condemning you for your support of your favorite ship and the theme of your blog.

You’re upset, of course! And you have every right to be! You put a lot of time and effort into this blog and your ship, and to have someone so coldly butt in--you can feel the frustration mounting! Tears are glistening and your body trembles as you type up a strongly worded essay and--

Stop.

It’s okay.

Take a deep breath and step away from your emotions for a minute. Your emotions are valid-- but so are the sender’s.

Instead of starting a fight, be kind. It may hurt. You may not want to be, but I promise you it’s worth it. Here’s a template response:

Hi, anon. I’m really sorry that you feel this way about [thing] and will gladly take it into consideration in the future. Could you please tell me more about why you dislike [thing]? If you’d like to take some time to gather your thoughts, I’d be happy to discuss this issue with you.

Let me confess something. I don’t suggest this out of pure kindness. I suggest this because their response will tell you what you need to know. Remember how the intro talked about how people’s intentions are incredibly hard to figure out? This is a little trick I like to use to get them to play their cards.

There are three possible responses: They respond angrily, they respond kindly and respectfully, or they don’t respond at all.

In the first case, you may get something that resorts to expletives. They may call you names. They may tell you to delete your blog or any other amount of nasty things. It’s very likely that your very attempt at kindness will anger this person! This is a troll/bully whose sole interest is to get you upset and get themselves attention. At this point, you can safely delete and ignore the messages without any guilt.

In the second case, you have a person with a genuine grievance who just happened to address it poorly. Both of you have a duty to humanity to resolve the problem respectfully and politely. You’ve avoided escalating the conflict, you may learn something new and you may even make a new friend!

This also applies to reaching out to someone for the first time. You see someone doing something you don’t like. Oh, it just makes you blind with rage!

Again. I’m going to advise you to stop. Take a deep breath. No one responds well to name-calling and being condemned. There’s a few techniques you can use (see if you can spot them in the template message):

Listen to their opinions

Actively ask to hear their opinion

Ask for clarification

Validate the way they feel

Avoid casting blame

(These techniques work a lot in real life, too!)

Again, there are some genuinely scummy people in life! But, there are many, many more ignorant people. A gentle pointer goes much further than yelling and screaming.

4. Analyzing a Message

We’ve all been there. We’ve gotten a message and we’ve panicked--do they hate me now?! Is this a troll message or genuine criticism?!

Again. Relax. Push aside your emotions and focus on the logical words as they appear before you. Ask yourself if you are reading a tone that doesn’t exist. For example, not everyone puts active thought into choosing between “ok”, “Ok”, “okay”, “Okay”, “ok.” etc. Sometimes an ok is just that. An ok.

Break the message into parts. Find the logical structures and decipher them piece by piece. Someone who throws some very hurtful words into a message may indeed have a point, despite coming off as very crude. Accept that different parts of a message may mean different things. The world is very complicated and multifaceted. Try to avoid sticking labels to things.

5. Fiction as Fiction VS Fiction as Reality

I’ve seen a lot of arguments floating around recently that seem to think that these two ideas exist in a vacuum. It’s simply not true. The ideas are entwined intrinsically--Fiction is both fiction and reality. Fiction was created to mimic reality yet extend it far beyond what can happen in the confines of reality. What happens in reality impacts fiction and what happens in fiction impacts reality.

This is undeniable.

Both of these ideas exist, and as the author it is your duty to figure out what that means for you.

You cannot hide behind Fiction as Fiction to ignore your responsibilities as an author.

You cannot hide behind Fiction as Reality to promote censorship.

Both of these ideas are far too simple for the complicated world we live in. A complicated concept requires complicated solutions.

Every word you write has an impact on the people that reads it. This is the very definition of writing. We use writing as a tool to share emotions. Extend empathy. We use writing to make people cry, to make people laugh, to make people angry.

To deny that this impact exists is to deny what writing is.

But censorship is not an option. Censorship prevents these stories from being told, and quite frankly, no one should have the right to decide what story should and shouldn’t be told, regardless of what is in that story.

What is the solution then? There is no easy answer.

6. The Author’s Duty

When you put words before another human being, it becomes your responsibility as a moral individual to give your best effort into ensuring that those words have a positive impact on the individual.

This doesn’t mean not making them cry. Or not making them upset. It means ensuring that the morals you impart on them are sound and logical.

How one achieves this is up to you.

In general, tone makes all the difference. Writing murder in a positive light versus writing murder in a negative light can drastically alter how the audience perceives your scene.

Empathy, too, can help sway your audience. If your writing must involve racist police officers stopping a young black man, make sure you delve into how unfair this is, how terrifying it is, how this needs to change. Do not normalize it. Do not let it go by without a somber note indicating your awareness of the topic.

Sometimes, the solution is to simply avoid the issue. There are certain topics that only some individuals should write about, and that’s just how it is. This isn’t to say that you can’t write about it, but keep that writing private.

Most importantly, do your research, and ask for help and keep an open mind. It’s a grave responsibility and you may not do it right and that’s okay! Everyone is capable of learning. Everyone is capable of changing.

7. Echo Chambers & Lateral Thinking

An echo chamber is a phenomenon where an individual’s exposure to certain topics becomes self-enforcing because they don’t see, or actively avoid, differing opinions.

Echo chambers are also exactly what happens when a rift this massive opens in a small community.

When Orange blocks Green and starts posting about it, all of Orange’s friends decide whether they agree or not. The overwhelming majority, due to peer pressure, will agree. Many of them will then block Green and the users directly associated with them. In retaliation, Green will defend themselves. Because Orange’s group had already blocked Green, Green’s friends only seen Green’s point of view and will rise in response to the perceived slight.

What results are two heavily biased groups of users that refuse to communicate with one another and many individuals swept into the mess because they don’t wish to be isolated.

Even worse, it turns a complicated and multi-faceted issue into a binary issue. Either you agree with Orange or you agree with Green. The world is not this simple.

Instead, I would encourage everyone to practice lateral thinking of their own accord. I would encourage you to make your own decisions, rather than blindly supporting or condemning the people around you. Everyone has their own opinions about what is or isn’t okay, and that’s perfectly fine. Even your closest friends will have different opinions than you.

8. Accepting Differing Opinions

Once you’ve accepted these different opinions (good on you!) what do you do now? Simply put, the choice is on you! There’s a few options:

Quietly accept it

Respectfully debate it

Avoid it

Escalate it

The first two are pretty obvious, and the third one is where blocking people and the blacklist comes in.

The fourth one is extreme and only recommended for activities causing active, known, measurable harm to other people.

This involves actively seeking a legal entity to handle the issue.

Being mean to people on Tumblr is not a solution. Tumblr is not a place to pursue a justice agenda. There are bigger issues in the world, and I encourage you to find ways to make a difference that will actually be fruitful. Donate to charities. Extend yourself as support to victims. Contribute to research.

Changing the mind of strangers on the internet is not a good use of your time.

9. Good Intentions (Pave the Road To Hell)

This has been a phrase for a very long time.

What does it mean?

Well, I’ll offer my own interpretation.

It means that people often become absorbed with the idea that they are doing the right thing and forget to be mindful of the true consequences of their actions.

It doesn’t mean to not do good things. It means that good is relative and not everyone will find your actions good. It’s important to keep an open mind and realize that just because you think something is good, doesn’t mean everyone agrees.

10. Being Mean is Fun (so do it in non-harmful ways)

Yeah.

It’s okay. You can admit it.

Being mean is fun!

If it wasn’t fun, people wouldn’t do it! In fact, this very blog was created because I found that writing the character being mean was very enjoyable and cathartic!

So, if you find yourself tempted to be mean to people in your life, maybe find another way to get those emotions out. Hell, people on tumblr just might appreciate you taking up a nasty, villainous character that’ll tear their character up...

People love angst. You can take this bad thing and twist it into something good.

11. Morality (Personal, Community, and Legal)

Bringing this long post to a close, I would like you all to end by thinking about what morality really is. In particular, I’d like you to think about morality on three different scales: Your personal morality, the morality of the community you’re in, and morals as described by laws.

You’ll find that these morals don’t overlap.

Or, at least they shouldn’t. Please revisit section 7.

Being aware of morality in these three ways may help you determine how to proceed when going forward.

Do I personally agree with this? Does the community I’m in agree with this? Do the laws have anything to say about this?

None of these are right. Everything has different morals, and it’s up to you to find the exact opinions that fit you.

Don’t let people blindly tell you how you should and shouldn’t feel about a topic, and don’t let people bully you into changing your morals to fit into their perceived moral high ground.

But at the same time, be open. Extend yourself to new ideas. If enough people tell you that something is wrong, it just may be time to listen.

Be you.

Be unique.

Be safe.

And above all, be kind.

Have a nice night, everyone. I hope we can all work to a brighter future.

#{}.{{ OUT OF CHARACTER }}.{}#{}.{{ IMPORTANT }}.{}#ok to reblog. }}.{}

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realtatine · 5 years ago

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This is a long one folks but please help.

Ever have that life hates me moment? Well lately it seems like nothing but life hates me moments. Some of you know me irl but for those that don't I work in a deli. It's a crazy, hectic, mind numbing at times job but for the most part I love it. July is always a crazy month mainly because of the 4th. This year I decided I'm taking a week off but because of the holiday I didn't take off til the 9th. With covid any actual travel plans I would have made of course wouldn't have happened. So I planned a staycation. Go hang out with my sister who I don't get to see often even tho she lives 10 minutes away and go for a surprise visit to see my best friend. Vacation starts (friday) and I'm excited I get to see my sister the next day and hang out with her family. Due to her not feeling well (messed up back from a car accident 10+ years ago) I didn't get to see her Saturday or Sunday. Ok cool ive still got 6 days left before I return to work. Monday morning my fiancee goes to work and comes right back in. "Where's my car he says?" Me of course not being awake at all says in the driveway. Nope no car in the driveway... It's day 3 of my vacation and what am I doing? Filing a police report because our car was stolen out of the driveway. So now I get to remember exactly what all was in the car. Officer says they will try to recover the car but no guarantees. My mind is freaking out because not only is the car gone but so is our daughter's carseat. I spend the rest of the day in a funk. Trying to figure out how to not only replace the car with almost no savings but replace her carseat as well. Tuesday morning dawns and it's been a sleepless night for this mama so I trudge trough the day til about 10:30 that night. Officer calls, they found the car at a traffic stop. My spirits life and it looks like things might be going better. Because it was so late that night they had to tow the car to the impound lot. Car is in working order a little damage where they had to hotwire other than that we were told it was okay. My fiance went picked it up the next morning and had to pay $125 because they had to tow it there. I'm still trying to think happy thoughts at this point because $125 is a lot better than the 3000 plus to get a new car. We get the car back and everything is still in it!! Well almost everything her carseat is gone. Still trying to focus on happy thoughts we got the car back. My fiance drives to work he says it's acting a little funny and shaky. His mom and I go run some errands and he asks us to stop by his work. He went on lunch and when he got back he said that it was running high on temperature and wanted her to drive it around and see what she thought. She took it to it for a test drive around the block and came back saying yes it was acting funny. We decided she would take it home and bring his truck back so that he would have something to drive home that night after work. She didn't make it out of the parking lot she barely made it out of the parking spot. It started overheating and steam came out of the hood. We decided that the car was going to be unsafe to drive. So we left it there. His uncle came by after work and using a tow chain they managed to get to home. At this point I am exhausted not only from the emotional ride of the last few days but having to push it back into the spot in 90+ heat. But bright point my fiancee is off the next day and can look at it and maybe see what's wrong with the car. we ended up taking it to a mechanic because he couldn't figure out what was wrong with the car. Mechanic told us that it has a blown engine and then it would be more to fix than the car is worth. Our new car that we have had less than 4 months is now a lawn ornament. I'm trying keep the happy thoughts but it's not working. Our savings is almost gone from just tow bills alone. Now we have to get a new car and almost no money to do it. We are both essential workers so we have jobs and money coming in but with bills and everything else we live paycheck to paycheck most weeks.

Anything you can donate will help and even if you can't sharing helps too.

I know with the craziness of the world right now it may not seem like it but we are all in this together. I am a believer of if you do good, good will come to you. I've done so much good for others I'm hoping some of it will come back to me ☺️

#gofundme #help?#car thief #essential workers #do good

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argentdandelion · 6 years ago

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Child Psychology and Chara

(Sprites from the sprite resource of CrasherGale, who has since left Tumblr)

(Made with consulting from Keetah Spacecat.) (WARNING: This article covers Chara's possible motives for knowingly eating a lethal dose of poisonous flowers. It thus covers some dark material.)

Some fan works depict “Chara” (the default name of the Fallen Child that will be used in this article) as violent and demonic even before the completion of the Genocide Route. It’s possible this interpretation comes from a lack of familiarity with child psychology, or disagreeing on Chara’s age and thus age-appropriate moral awareness. Furthermore, there’s little evidence Chara acted demonic before the Genocide Route. Sometimes, kids are little sociopaths—and that’s not a sign they’re pure evil.

Basic (Canon) Information

Canon Details:

Hated humanity.

Felt very strongly about that, but never talked about why.

With Asriel, poisoned Asgore by putting buttercups in a pie rather than cups of butter

Laughed upon hearing Asgore was really sick

Apparently does creepy faces sometimes

When Asriel had absorbed their SOUL, wanted Asriel to use his “full power�� on the humans

Has a sophisticated vocabulary (“vanquished”, “absolute”, “consequences”, etc.) and formal way of speaking for a child

Climbed Mt. Ebott, a mountain it's said travellers never return from

Chara's reason for doing so "wasn't for a very happy reason".

Extrapolation:

Made the Mr. Dad Guy sweater

This is based on how Asriel just calls Asgore “Dad”, and how Chara may be reluctant to refer to Asgore as just “dad” due to being adopted when they could remember their original parents.

Chara’s age is 8-12.

This is based on Chara’s planning abilities and sophisticated vocabulary.

Chara hated humanity and was “very clear about that”: this is one of their few canon traits. However, dying a gruesome death by buttercup poisoning does seem quite a lot to do out of just hate. Most people wouldn’t go so far as to die to destroy something they hated.

While wanting to destroy humanity was surely motivated least partly by hate, the particular intentions of the plan and how well they would execute it would likely depend on age. Assuming an age range of 8-12, Chara would likely be in the Stages 2, 3, or 4 of Kohlberg’s developmental stages, with Stage 3 being the most likely.

The apparent purpose of the buttercup plan was to “free everyone”. That is what Asriel emphasizes in the VHS tapes, and also what the Angel of the Prophecy is said to do.

In Underline, Growth Spurt, Dogs of Future Past: Chara Origins, Chara’s motives were initially explained or mentioned to Asriel in ways more sympathetic than punishment, vengeance or simple hate. It’s unclear whether Chara had the mental ability to anticipate Asriel reacting badly if they said their motives were one of those three, or whether Chara just reloaded whenever they got a bad outcome.

Kohlberg’s Stage 2

Ages 5-7 or 9, or Ages 4-101

“People at Stage 2 are self-protective, dominant, exploitative, and opportunistic. The need to love and to be loved is gratified on the basis of reciprocal altruism.”- The Moral Development of the Child: An Integrated Model

Though those in Stage 2 may sometimes seem as if they lack morals, they do have some sense of right action. The stage is defined by fair exchanges and pragmatic reciprocating, with moral reasoning guided by a sense of “fair play”. Stage 2 reasoning shows a limited concern for others, but only to the point where it might further the individual’s own interests: it’s a “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours” mentality. Thus, it’s not based on loyalty or intrinsic respect.

Chara’s needs or interests might include punishing/inflicting vengeance on humans for one or more of these reasons: treating Chara specifically badly, sealing monsters underground long ago, or their wicked deeds in general. According to this source, vengeance is in fact considered a moral obligation at this stage.2

Though collectively punishing all of humanity/a minimum of six people doesn’t make sense (assuming that minimum of six people didn’t abuse Chara), it might make sense if Chara is ages 8-10. Kohlberg based his work on Jean Piaget’s own work on moral development in children, though Piaget’s had fewer stages. Those in the first of Piaget’s stages (approximately from age 5 to age 11-12) believe in collective punishment, so, if one person in a group does something bad, it would make sense to punish everyone in that group.

Due to the principle of reciprocity, Chara may also have thought they should “return the favor” to monsterkind by sacrificing themselves for monsters’ freedom. However, because this stage is characterized by pragmatic reciprocity, such an altruistic perspective does seem unlikely at this age (and death by buttercups was an awful way to die).

GlitchTale

In the GlitchTale episode Continue, Chara tells Asriel that Frisk isn't the goody two-shoes they thought they were. Chara didn’t force Frisk to do the Genocide Route; Frisk did so themselves. When Frisk reset, all the hate (which is both a substance and a feeling here, like Determination) built up in that route went to Chara.3 Chara says it makes them sick that Frisk thinks they’re above consequences, wants to make “the little murderer” pay for their actions, and also believes that Frisk shall use all of Asriel’s friends as toys forever. This relates to the idea vengeance is considered a moral obligation in Stage 2.

Underline

In one timeline, Chara crossed the barrier with Asriel by holding hands, and some humans attacked Asriel because he was a monster. Later, during a horrific reliving of this event, Chara stabbed (who they thought was) a human. Chara believed humans thought themselves above consequences, and wanted to make them regret what they did. (Later, Chara’s motives were different. As a soul absorbed by Asriel, Chara wanted to destroy humans because they considered humans “the real monsters” who would destroy their family.)

Kohlberg’s Stage 3

Age Estimate: 7-13.

People in Stage 3 are aware of shared feelings and expectations, which are more important than individual interests. Those in Stage 3 believe people should live up to the expectations of the family and community and behave in “good” ways. To do right is to conform to social expectations, such as showing concern for others and following rules set by others to win their approval. Belief in the “golden rule” is one aspect of Stage 3. The reasons for doing the right thing is to maintain rules and authority and to be seen as a nice and good person by others.

If Chara believed they were expected to be “the future of humans and monsters” and/or “the angel of the prophecy”, that would count as an expectation of the family and community. Thus, Chara would believe they had to break the barrier by any means necessary because that’s what the angel of prophecy and/or the future of “humans and monsters” should do.

By this perspective, the buttercup plan would have seemed like a good, moral plan to get Asriel past the barrier to obtain more SOULs. Chara’s hatred for humanity might have made this plan easier to do, especially if Chara planned from the start to get more human SOULs by killing.

However, part of this stage is belief in the “Golden Rule”, and “do unto others as others would do unto you” doesn’t really apply, since Chara (as a SOUL absorbed by Asriel) wanted to kill humans but wouldn’t want humans to kill them in turn.

Dogs of Future Past (WARNING: This section is slightly darker than usual.)

In Dogs of Future Past: Chara Origins, Chara was raised in a cult. Chara tried to be “good” and obey the cult’s teachings and the claimed desires of The Player, a godlike being the cult worshipped. The cult said The Player would wipe away all those whose hearts were filthy with wickedness (that is, kill them) and would do so “soon”. Sometimes, Chara seemed to think The Player’s desires were valid, to the point they questioned why The Player hadn’t destroyed wicked people already. Yet, after the callousness and cruelty of the cult members, Chara concluded everyone in the cult was a bad as everyone outside it.

Later, Asgore calls Chara (and Asriel) “the future of humans and monsters” in front of a crowd of monsters, which causes them all to cheer. Chara interpreted this as a crushing responsibility to do the best thing for monsterkind. Later Chara concluded they were what the Player was playing as/conflating their identity with the Player's, and so executed the buttercup plan. Their original parents repeatedly told them how "selfishness corrodes the heart". Chara may thus have thus believed a sense of self-preservation was selfish, and fulfilling monsters' apparent expectations was worth more than their individual life.

Kohlberg’s Stage 4

Age Estimate: 10-15, on average.

““Right” is helping maintain social order by doing one’s duty, obeying laws simply because they are laws, and showing respect for authorities simply because they are authorities.” -Psychology Second Edition, by Hockenbury & Hockenbury

Stage 4 reflects a belief that rules maintain the social order and that the social system will break down if people do not follow rules. At this stage, doing good involves following through on what one has agreed to do, for the good of the larger social system.

If Chara believed it was their duty to free monsters, Chara may have believed any tactic that would enable them to fulfill that duty was justified. On the matter of "following through on what you have agreed to do", perhaps Chara thought Asriel ought to follow through with the buttercup plan they had agreed to do together, to the point of (potentially) manipulating him to ensure he complied.4

The Chara of Dogs of Future Past: Chara Origins is, of all the applicable Chara interpretations the author has studied, the closest to this interpretation. However, Stage 3 is better-supported in the work.

Caveat

Kohlberg's work has been criticized in various ways. In the scope of this article, there's only one major flaw: Kohlberg’s early studies were done purely on male subjects. It’s therefore possible his work doesn’t reflect the development of moral reasoning in girls. The book Psychology Second Edition (by Hockenbury & Hockenbury) points out that, in general, men and women may approach moral matters from slightly different perspectives. Many works do not describe or specify Chara as a boy or girl, or openly define Chara as neither, so which perspective to take is unclear.

Conclusion

If Frisk talks with Asriel in the playable epilogue of the Pacifist Route, Asriel will eventually come to terms with his decision to resist Chara’s control and not kill the humans attacking him. Asriel realized that if had killed them, it would have started a war with humanity.

Some suggest war with humanity was the whole point of the buttercup plan, and particularly point out the detail that Chara requested to see the golden flowers of their village before dying. It is, however, likely Chara couldn’t foresee all the consequences to monsters from their plan, including the immense emotional suffering for their family members. Thus, as far they knew, the plan was a good and moral one.

Related Reading

Flowey and PTSD (Part 1 and Part 2)

Age Estimate Source 1, Age Estimate Source 2 ↩︎

As Voltrathesparking pointed out, this does bring up some questionable motives: if Chara's goal was vengeance, how could they be sure vengeance would be executed if they died? Wouldn't they want to see the look on humans' faces as they/Asriel destroyed them? Some works presume the two Waterfall history plaques unreadable in the game (the one in the artifact room and the one defaced by Nice Cream flavors) provided the information that a monster that absorbed a human SOUL had control of its body split between the two SOULs. However, this remains speculation. ↩︎

It’s possible the hate substance itself made Chara feel hate spontaneously, and it was up to Chara to put reasons to it. (See this GlitchTale analysis) Nonetheless, this would reflect Chara’s, well, character. ↩︎

For more information, see this Nochocolate post, as well as this counter-post. ↩︎

#Undertale #Undertale Analysis #Undertale Character Analysis #The Fallen Child #Chara #Dogs of Future Past #GlitchTale #Underline

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art-of-pilo · 6 years ago

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Ethical Online Shopping! I did some research for you.

It is way too easy to buy things that seem benign, but are either made unethically or sold by unethical companies. When you buy from companies who do things you hate, you are essentially giving money to those things you hate!

This is not a perfect list when it comes to being 100% ethical. It IS a perfect list when it comes to being about 90% ethical and 100% emotionally sustainable for me to create habits around. I'll take the 10% cut for that trade-off.

1. Local small businesses in your community!

I know, this isn't online, but it should always be the first try, because keeping wealth in your community is one of the best ways you can support it, and most importantly, it helps keep businesses open so corporate giants can’t move in!

2. Thrive Market

Check them out →

Thrive is a shoppers club ($60/year) that has all sorts of groceries, including household products, non-refrigerated foods, and pretty much anything else except fresh foods that you might need!

Ethically sourced everything, full transparency on products, selective with their brands!

With every purchased membership, they give a free membership to a low-income family

Filter by values (cruelty free, ethically produced, etc) or diets (vegan, keto, etc)

Carbon-neutral shipping, 100% recyclable packaging, zero-waste warehouses

Pay $60/year and get discounts on all of their products

3. Grove Collaborative

Check them out →

Grove is a shoppers club (for $20/year) specializing in ethical and environmentally friendly home products. Some perks:

Certified B Corporation

Environmentally friendly everything, and transparency about the products they sell

They Carbon Offset all of their shipping!

Pay $20/year and get discounts on all of their products

4. Package Free Shop

Check them out →

An online store (with a Brooklyn location) that selectively carries products that replace single-use products in your life. Or in the case of sponges or shampoo, biodegradable and minimally packaged alternatives (like bar-soap style shampoo and conditioner). Some perks:

They sell everything as free of packaging as possible. When there is a little packaging, its always biodegradable or at least recyclable!

Transparency about each product from creation to end of life

No membership required

5. cleancult

Check them out →

An brand of cleaning supplies that sends you refills packaged in recyclable milk cartons! Handsoap, dishsoap, multi-purpose cleaner, dishwasher pods, and laundry pods. You buy their set of dispenser bottles the first time, or jump right into the refills if you have some already.

Cruelty free (Leaping Bunny certified!)

100% recyclable packaging

Need something else you just can't find?

Do a Google Shopping search, and see if the manufacturer sells the item.

If they don't, check out some online stores you've never heard of. Find one with an about page or a blog to learn who the heck they are!

Some things to look for are NOT having big discounts like amaz*n, and having an amature web-presence (for instance, a blog that's set up but has only one default "welcome to my blog!" post from 2014 — this is a GREAT sign)

If they look small and privately owned, purchase the thing!

Got other favorites? Let me know, I'll research them and add them to the list!

There are always going to be things that you need that you just can't find from an ethical seller, and thats ok. If you are only able to get fresh food at a corporate grocery store, that's ok! This world is set up against us. As long as you are making some kind of effort, you are doing enough.

Love, Milo

#guides #ethical #shopping

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incorrect009quotes · 8 years ago

Conversation

AMM: so, what's ur excuse?

Marzipan: For?

AMM: acting the way we do.

Marzipan: I don't like to do what people expect. Why should I live up to other people's expectations instead of my own?

AMM: so, u disappoint them from the start, and then ur covered, right?

Marzipan: Something like that.

AMM: then u screwed up!

Marzipan: How?

AMM: u never disappointed me.

#009;comic #incorrect 009; quotes #amm #marzipan #src: 10 things i hate about you #marzipamm #kinda

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dcrewatch · 5 years ago

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Detective Conan Rewatch: Episode 982

Episode 982: “Welcome to Bocchan Restaurant (Part 2)”

Before watching this episode, on a scale of 1-10, how much are you looking forward to seeing it again?

5 again!

Favorite screencap:

Genta: “I’ve got it! The culprit is someone who hates dancing!”

Conan: “...What?”

Favorite moment:

Yaaaaay the kitty was reunited with its owners and is all healthy.

Least favorite moment:

Poor kitty. D: I need to go pet mine again.

What's one thing you noticed/realized about this episode that you hadn't before?

Textured photograph usage.

On a scale of 1-10, how would you rate this episode?

5 again.

Celebrate it!

Since I don't have access to a tablet and am too lazy to scan a drawing, have a (not exactly) summary haiku.

Another victim

Looks like it’s a suicide

DB know better

Next Episode: Episode 983

Previous Episode: Episode 981

#detective conan #detective conan rewatch #episodes #名探偵コナン #anime original #Seiji Muta #Keiko Sasaki

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fly-pow-bye · 4 years ago

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DuckTales 2017 - The Least Best!

Well, here it is, the second to last article of this project, and it's one that's going to be controversial. I'm sorry, I have to do a worst list along with the best list, but I decided against actually calling it the worst list. Simply put: calling it a worst list implies these episodes were bad. Do not get me wrong, there are episodes I feel qualify for that, but not more than 10 of them. Alas, it has to be done.

I must have some rules for this list, and here they are:

It has to be an episode of DuckTales 2017. No shorts, even if the shorts combined can make up a full episode. I am also not putting in anything from This Duckburg Life, either.

I have to say something good about each of these episodes. Does not have to be the best thing about the episode, but a good thing nonetheless.

This is my opinion and my opinion alone. I am sure there are fans of these episodes, I just disagree with them.

Let's begin with #10, and I can already tell I'm going to lose some people over this, but I am not sorry.

10. Beaks In The Shell!

I did get some flack for giving this a 2 initially, and I did walk back on it simply because there are worse episodes I have given 3s or would have given 3s, but I just did not think of this one as highly as everything else in the third season. I do not hate it, as it has some clever moments here and there, like Louie's shock about GizmoDuck's identity.

She has a great design, and I do like how she's the hacker girl as a counterpart to Fenton. She just seems to do a complete 180. In the last episode she was in, she was not above blinding children in order to keep her job, and now she just wants to leave F.O.W.L. just like that? I do not really buy it, and I never really found her that interesting in execution, at least in the show itself.

Good thing: Out of all the flack I've given this episode, the ending with the character's individual Gizmo suits is top notch. I like how everyone has an ability that either fits them or is a reference to a previous episode.

9. New Gods on the Block!

This is another "not really one of the good ones, but not really one of the bad ones" episode to me. My decision to put this one below "Beaks In The Shell" goes more with me thinking the Gizmo suits were a little more creative, and how I think this episode could have done better with this idea. Plenty of scenes with Storkules and Donald being a little too close, much to the chagrin of the latter.

There is also this plot where Scrooge wants to make a different team, implying that the kids are not good enough. This may have been a misinterpretation on the part of the kids, making this one of those "misunderstanding" episodes, but it is really vague here. It seemed to me that Scrooge really was trying to get a different team that did not involve his family for the most part. I am not going to say him being called out by Della when he's climbing the Titan is not a powerful scene, but I feel like it goes against the series entire arc of family being the best adventure of all. This isn't a Season 1 episode where Scrooge had to learn that, this is in Season 3!

Good thing: It was cool to see this plot expand the pantheon of Greek gods in this series. The DuckTales 2017 version of Hades, their reaction to Zeus being depowered, it’s all good.

8. The Split Sword of Swanstantine!

Unlike Gandra Dee, or any of the Olympians, the Sword of Swanstentine ended up being a major part of the finale. It is a shame that the hunt for that sword is the least best of the three shorts episodes. The first part with Dewey and Webby features the aforementioned child blinding plot that leads to a couple of cool survival scenes and a clever use of the big fight between Black Heron and Scrooge that happens throughout the episode, but is mostly just okay. The second part with Louie and Violet is a little weak, it's a one-idea premise with a character that I felt needed more development, period.

Huey and Lena's part may have been the highlight of the episode, but it only leads to an ending that is a bit predictable as soon as it comes up. Oh no, the villains have the sword! Nah, just kidding, the heroes have it because of a technicality that they certainly did not remember in the finale. I am a little glad they did not remember the sword's ability to not be used by people who have not earned it, actually, but that's not something that pertains to this episode specifically.

Good thing: As mentioned before, Huey and Lena's part is good. It's mitigated by The Duke of Making A Mess never really appearing again, but that is also not something that pertains to this episode specifically.

7. Happy Birthday, Doofus Drake!

The crew of the show have shown their disdain for the original Doofus. They could have just said that Doofus wasn't indicative of the kind of messaging they wanted to show, much like the original Burger Beagle, or the witch doctor stereotype who first summoned the Bombie, but no, their response to a character that was hated in the original was to make an even less likeable villain out of him! He was alright in "Day of the Only Child!", his debut, and I think that might be because he only had a third of the episode rather than more than half. While the ending is good, and there are some funny scenes with some of his other party guests, there's a lot of awkward scenes to work through here.

There is a plot that does not involve Doofus, but it does not do much good. The B-plot is pretty much shoe-horned in here, with no real connection besides involving characters that are not trying to crash the party. It is about Huey learning to step out of his comfort zone, and we know this because he goes into a video game world and having to learn how to step out of something that is outright called a "comfort zone". There just is not a lot to this plot other than some really cheap references. There's certainly nothing on the same level as Dewey Dew-Night, which is what "Day of the Only Child!" gave us. I guess I decided to put this episode in the Honey Bin after all.

Good thing: Glomgold's scheme involving his puppet son is a good Glomgold scene, and this is the episode that gave us Boyd, so I can't hate on it too much.

6. The Rumble for Ragnarok!

When I decided to re-rate Beaks in the Shell to a three, I was also specifically thinking of this episode as one of the worse episodes that I gave a three. This is a problem with having a series as consistently good as DuckTales 2017 is; there's a little to like in almost every episode, and this episode really knows how to handle pro wrestling as a setting while also making it fit in with the universe. I could see something like this happening in the old comics.

However, lots of neat references to pro wrestling can't hide that the way they implemented this plot is just flawed to me. The plot to me seemed to go with the moral that one should follow with what is right even if it does not lead to popularity. It does start well with Scrooge, as the villainous Millionaire Miser, telling Dewey to "embrace the boos" of the people that want the world to end. Then they decide that the crowd doesn't like Jörmungandr anymore because...he was being too harsh on a kid? They did not have a problem with Hecka beating up two kids, but when Jörmungandr ties him up with his tail, that's a heel turn? Conveniently, Dewey did not have to learn anything! I can appreciate that they didn't go with what any other cartoon would do and make a farce out of the form of entertainment, but I can not shake that off.

Good thing: Not only does this episode do a great job with wrestling jokes, it manages to throw in a reference to the original that seamlessly fits in with the wrestling jokes. It's too bad the Shield Maiden didn't get to do much, but it's still a positive.

5. The Richest Duck in the World!

I did say I wanted to only rate episodes, but if I was rating DuckTales 2017's arcs, the Louie one from Season 2 is definitely the lowest. Do not get me wrong, the Louie Inc. arc did have some good episodes, Storkules in Duckburg being a highlight, but it is definitely the least memorable arc in the series, and its finale is the worst of that arc. Sure, it was a big shocking moment in "GlomTales!" that he was able to swindle his own uncle's fortune, especially an uncle as sharp and smart as Scrooge McDuck, but the way this episode follows up on that is to make a hundred jokes about Louie being a lazy billionaire until he learns his lesson in a way that returns everything back to the status quo as soon as the real arc of the season comes back in the last minute of the episode. The finale of the entire show made this even more worthless, and I would rather not get into any more detail than I already had in that review.

I think what really gets me about this is how well Scrooge takes this plot, especially when compared to an episode that is coming up in this very list. I know a part of this is because of the villain of the episode, but there was also a feeling that Scrooge just knew that the status quo was going to come back. That just made this episode's conclusion just that much more foregone. The fact that the Tenderfeet had to show up to remind us that he exists does not make this any better. There is another plot about Della trying to call Penumbra, who is not answering her phone calls for reasons she could not have known. Revealing why she can't before kind of made the conclusion of that plot just that much more foregone. For an episode that comes before a major, major finale, it is so unmemorable to me.

Good thing: When Bradford was talking about "magical defense" in the first episode, I was thinking it was a reference to Magica, but this episode does a great job of retconning that into something less predictable. Retooling the Bombie, a villain with origins that are not necessarily acceptable by today's standards, into something more akin to a force of nature is great.

4. The Depths of Cousin Fethry!

The very first Disgusted Donald I have ever given, and, to be honest, it's because I have learned to raise my standards for this show. Don't get me wrong, this show's version of Fethry Duck had a bit of potential, especially as a sort of mentor to Huey, and the idea of the episode could have went to places, but I just found this episode boring at best. At worst, it just exaggerates Huey to an unimaginably nerdy level, up to licking trees to find out what their resin level is and kissing giant plant monsters. Outside of one particular monster near the end of the episode, that is all this episode has: grossout humor and boredom. As much as I get the joke that Launchpad's journey was just so awesome that it could not have been animated, I still stand by the running gag I made in that review.

Good thing: One good thing about the payoff is the camerawork. The viewer never sees that giant krill "monster" in full. They forgot about that in Moonvasion, though I can see the argument that the Moonvasion would make anything look small.

3. The 87 Cent Solution!

The second Disgusted Donald I have ever given, and also the last. Was I afraid to get the wrath? Well, I am certainly not afraid now, as I rate the episode where Scrooge gets "gold fever" over 87 cents getting stolen from him as the third least best episode. I mean, I get it. Scrooge did not get "gold fever" because he lost money. He lost plenty of money trying to fix his own mistakes. He got "gold fever" because someone outwitted the smartest of the smarties and the sharpest of the sharpies. However, I just couldn't find Scrooge's descent into that madness funny. It's not like the "sea monster ate my ice cream" scene from the original that the reboot decided to mock in a different episode, I just feel sorry for him in a way that just does not fit with the rest of the series.

Having the ending be Mrs. Beakley saying "oh, I would have dealt with those silly manchildren by myself" just felt bizarre compared to the rest of DuckTales 2017's endings. It felt more like an ending to that other reboot. It certainly had that "ugh, men" vibe.

Good thing: One scene that one might think I hated was the dance scene with Glomgold set to DJ Khaled's "All I Do Is Win." Not only is Glomgold the best part about this episode, that scene is among the best Glomgold scenes ever.

2. Terror of the Terra-firmians!

This was the episode I considered giving the first Disgusted Donald to, or in the new ratings terms, a 1 Scrooge, but I decided against it because it just was not as bad as the worst that I have seen before I took on this project. I was sure there was going to be an episode worse than this one, because every cartoon is going to have that one episode that does not measure up. Turns out, this was the one episode. The major plot of this episode is Huey and Webby just bickering over the existence of magical creatures who are clearly causing all of the problems of the episode. All this really leads to is the same ending one gets with the M&Ms Santa commercial, except the build up is not as funny. That's not a good sign when this episode is much longer than a commercial.

They throw in a part with Lena and Mrs. Beakley that ends up becoming a major piece of development for Lena. I'll admit: this was the part that made me not want to give it a Disgusted, but now I realize what happened. Lena's plot does not really interact with the Terra-firmian plot, with only the train crash being the only real interaction. It's like they knew this episode would not amount to much in the overall arc nor would it be particularly funny, so they put in this awesome Lena part. I will not get fooled again.

Good thing: As mentioned before, Lena saving Mrs. Beakley is better than the rest of the episode combined.

I was really hard pressed to consider putting in dishonorable mentions. It was hard enough picking 10 episodes for the actual list.

The Infernal Internship of Mark Beaks! - I just never really liked Mark Beaks as a villain. Smartphones may be around for a long time, but YOLO certainly will not.

Raiders of the Doomsday Vault! - The worst of Season 2 is already on this list, so I really stretched to find another episode that was any worse. This is just a case of Della Duck having better episodes than this.

Challenge of the Senior Junior Woodchucks! - In a series that had good season openers, this was decidedly not one of them. Other than introducing Webby 2, er, Violet, it was only good for starting the "Missing Mysteries of Finch" arc.

And now, the absolute least best episode of DuckTales 2017. It's plot important, very much so. It's an episode with Lena in it, usually a bright point of any DuckTales 2017 episode and a very beloved character. It's an episode I felt that was not good at all by DuckTales 2017 standards. That episode is...

1. The Other Bin of Scrooge McDuck!

I know this is the one with that hugely emotional scene of Lena seeing her best friend die in front of her eyes. Of course, neither Disney nor the overall arc of the series would ever allow that, as this is merely a dream sequence that shows that Lena is afraid of her aunt and what she will do to her new best friend, which clearly hasn't been shown in every one of her last appearances. Clearly, we needed this over-the-top dream sequence to really show the kids that Magica is the bad lady and Lena is the good girl. Everything good this A-plot did was done better in "Jaw$!"; they could have just tacked on this episode's ending to that episode, and it would have worked.

Oh, and the B-plot is the dreaded devil in plain sight plot. Huey, Dewey, and Louie befriend a Tenderfeet, the Tenderfeet turns out to be a jerk who tries to sabotage Louie, Louie gets blamed for it to the point where Huey, the usually sensible one, punches Louie in the arm as apparently bullying the Tenderfeet is the worst action he has ever done, and the cycle repeats. After reviewing a reboot that, despite all of its flaws, never managed to fall into it, I was shocked that DuckTales 2017, the reboot that really could, toyed with the worst plot in any cartoon ever and played it straight. I could see the argument that this is one of the better implementations of the forsaken plot, as Louie is already an untrustworthy person even among his brothers and he does manage to solve the problem in a way that fits with his scheming character, but, I am not sorry, it's still a devil in plain sight. Next. Oh wait, there is no next!

Good thing: At least I can admit that this show doesn't pull any punches. Oh no, I'm not talking about the dream sequence, I'm talking about the ending. At first, I did not really like it, as I thought it was another way for the villain to just snatch everything away at the last minute. However, once we learn more about Lena in the next episode, it makes a lot more sense.

And that's the least best! I really did not want to leave this negativity up for too long without its opposite, so the best list will be up on Wednesday rather than next week. Stay tuned!

← The Shorts (Part 2) 🦆 The Absolute Best! →

#fpb dt 2017 #ducktales 2017 #ducktales #disney #fpb reviews

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asphaltapostle · 6 years ago

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What I have long predicted is now coming to pass: Google believes it should assume control.

Out of all the technology companies that have made my knees knock and my voice hoarse and my [Tweets manic](https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&q="google" %40ficklecrux&src=typd) as a technoheretic in the past several years, Jumbo Google would easily take home the winning trophy for Dystopian of the Millennium. I have been rehearsing an especially dear pet prophecy of mine, unsolicited, to family, friends, and podcast guests since 2011 in which I end up arguing quite convincingly that Google is a dead ringer for the 16th-century Vatican: an inherently self-isolating organization with an absolute monopoly yielding gargantuan levels of essentially passive income from a service which nearly everybody transacts with, but only Google understands (and is therefore assumed to be its only possible provider,) which inevitably develops such a distance from the rest of the populace and their way of life (in tandem with total notoriety and celebrity among them all) not intentionally out of malice, but from the delusion of mythically-bestowed philanthropic duty that is borned of and compounded by this economic and cultural isolation in a perpetual accumulation of power and wealth that radicalizes the monopolizers — the majority already highly predisposed to zeal as they would’ve needed to be in order to find themselves in this singular, universally powerful position over every other class — and leaves their egocentric minds to wander exempt from all criticism save for that of fellow radicalized monopolizers, who together begin to feel more and more comfortable wondering aloud about themselves in increasingly fantastic presumptions: what if all of this was bestowed upon us because we are superior to them? What if it is our divine responsibility as superior beings to take charge and shepherd the common people as our sheep — for they cannot possibly know as well as we what is truly best for them?

You see it, right? And you can feel a very specific flavor of terror that is both awed by the scale of the circumstances created by so few human minds and sincerely amused by the absoluteness of your own inability to alter them in any way. Perhaps you even recognize this taste as one perfected by Christianity’s ancient advertising business, but Google knows so much about you that it’s rumored to’ve been selling user data to the Judeochristian God for some time now at a 10% discount, and so we extrapolate and anticipate, yes?

Of course, it’s admittedly satisfying for me to deliver you to this godfearing place in the most perverse look what I saw first that you didn’t see because you’re just not as bright but lucky for you, I’m so fucking generous with my wisdom sort of thinking around which the entire personas and livelihoods of fringe movement fanatics are built upon, but this is my one thing, okay? I’ve been waiting years for the right time to formally argue this theory in depth, and — thanks to this year’s public spotlight finally pivoting on the giants who’ve been silently swallowing their competition and relentlessly forcing their already ridiculous margins higher and higher in relative obscurity for decades, the time has come, indeed. The common people’s trust in Google had a godawful week.

Don’t Be Evil

On Monday, Gizmodo reported that twelve frustrated Google employees were quitting the company in protest of their work assisting the Department of Defense to “implement machine learning to classify images gathered by drones” for the detail fleeting Project Maven, despite some 4000 employee signatures on a letter addressed to CEO Sundar Pichai requesting (in full) that he “cancel this project immediately,” and “draft, publicize, and enforce a clear policy stating that neither Google nor its contractors will ever build warfare technology,” citing the infamous “Don’t Be Evil” motto, which Google then proceeded to remove from its code of conduct for the first time in 18 years the day after the New York Times article went to press, on April 5th.

On initial approach to the abstract of this story, from the ass to our thoughts arrives an easy narrative of a Silicon Valley mutiny comprised of twelve brave, conscientious souls who’ve been eaten up inside by their complicity in the filthy deals made by their power-obsessed CEO over scotch and cigars in a dark D.C. study — kept awake for months by the sound of his puffing cackles at satellite images of dead toddlers in a bombed-out street.

Ah ha, we say. That man is no good, and he just wouldn’t listen! They knew they didn’t have a choice… They only did what they had to do…

The reality of internal disagreements at Google, though, manages to be even more theatrical. The sheer volume of correspondence must surely be beyond anything capable of the enduser’s imagination, so let’s phone a friend: my favorite peek into the day-to-days of inter-Google existence is an old blog post by Benjamin Tilly on his first month at the company in which he was compelled almost immediately to describe in great detail how best to “deal with a lot of email in gmail” at peak efficiency using shortcuts and labels. “As you get email, you need to be aggressive about deciding what you need to see, versus what is context specific.”

Now we have a bit better idea of the aggressive emailing that was a sure constant on a normal workday at Google in 2010, so it must’ve been deafening after 8 years of Gmail development as 4000 employees no doubt vented, debated, and decided to organize last month, though without making much headway because the leadership’s response was apparently “complicated by the fact that Google claims it is only providing open-source software to Project Maven,” this new knowledge having significant effect on our mind’s image of Sundar Pichai’s activities in Washington: he is now swapping seats with a frustrated Colin Powell in order to install OpenOffice onto his desktop from a flash drive, and we recall that Google’s Googleplex headquarters resembles nowhere in modern life more than a brand new playground built in a design language borrowing heavily from Spy Kids. And though these Twelve disciples are unnamed for the moment, a few of them could immediately land book deals by going public, and every single one would always have by default not only the badge of “I landed a job at Google,” (which is really to say I have hit Life’s maximum level cap,) but “I worked at Google for a while, but ended up quitting to do something else,” which is guaranteed to make you the most interesting, intellectually superior person present in whatever crowd for the rest of your life. The ultra-cool Sarah Cooper quit Google to become a comedian and even got to talk to Kara Swisher! I won’t pretend to understand big tech’s diminutive bastardization of prestige, but “more than 90 academics” jumping to publish an open letter (adjacent to a huge DONATE: Support the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots button) in which they “write in solidarity with the 3100+ Google employees” who’s terrible boss decided to help some lackeys in the Pentagon set up their email and didn’t text back for a whole hour doesn’t sound 100% sincere. Notably, I don’t know how or why the fuck 90 people would go about collaborating on a single document, but if it really was managed, they definitely used Google Docs… At one point, it was fun to think about the history of the friendly side-scroller-playing garage ghouls and dorm dorks who gave cooky, wacko names to their dot com startups in parody and defiance of the lame-ass surname anagrams on the buildings of their established competitors, but those who’ve stuck around have only done so by becoming expert at SUCKING UP EVERYTHING around them, and it pisses me off every day how worried I am that my species will finally be done in by a company with a name like Yahoo! and be known only to a bunch of adolescent interdimensional silicon blobs 30 million years in the future as that bipedal race who remained dignified until the last 0.01% of their reign on Earth, when in way less than a single generation, they all just went FUCKING INSANE and blew themselves up because they suddenly hated all sense.

“Google” is perhaps the worst of these to have to shout in fear and/or anger in your last moments as it sounds in American English like you’ve startled your subject with a ticklish pinch followed so immediately by an esophagus-busting chokehold that the two events appear simultaneous, and in real English English, it almost always sounds like a parent speaking of a character on a pre-K children’s television programme whom they find quite foul and upsetting, but will manage to refrain from expressing so otherwise because they know that Teletubbies shit is the most quickly forgotten stage of television viewership. It’s fascinating how exclusive the word “Google” is to American English because in everything else it really is complete nonsense, but lets halt all etymological discussions right now because we’ve only now just finished with Monday.

The Soul Ledger

On Thursday, all of my Google experiences, suppositions, and soul-detaching screenshots were usurped when a thoroughly alarming internal company video called The Selfish Ledger was leaked to The Verge, which I watched once then and do not want to watch again for the sake of this piece, but I will. Though the big V has been disappointingly timid for years about editorializing — when tech journalism desperately needs some confident, informed opinion more than ever — Vlad Savov’s accompanying article should be read in its entirety, to which I can add my own terror where he perhaps could not. The production style is technically identical to that of the very popular thinkpiece-esque, motion-graphics-paired-with-obligatory-sharpie illustrated videos which you find playing at max volume on your mom’s iPad from where she’s fallen asleep on the couch at 9PM, but the repeating stock string soundtrack multiplies one’s discomfort as such that we would all end up in the fetal position without remembering the transition were it not for the appearance of trusty old Dank Jenkins, who’s face I thankfully associate heavily enough with his infamous down-and-out Tweet to be a welcome respite in attention before the very scary hypothesis for which it’s been buttering me up, as best summed by Vlad:

> The system would be able to “plug gaps in its knowledge and refine its model of human behavior” — not just your particular behavior or mine, but that of the entire human species. “By thinking of user data as multigenerational,” explains Foster, “it becomes possible for emerging users to benefit from the preceding generation’s behaviors and decisions.” Foster imagines mining the database of human behavior for patterns, “sequencing” it like the human genome, and making “increasingly accurate predictions about decisions and future behaviors.”

The next time the what if they do something scary question comes up in a casual conversation about Google, you’ll have something a lot more substantial than just speculation. Or will you? The Verge reached out for comment and got an awfully convenient response.

> This is a thought-experiment by the Design team from years ago that uses a technique known as ‘speculative design’ to explore uncomfortable ideas and concepts in order to provoke discussion and debate.

Wow! Leave it up to grand ole Googe to reveal the ultimate excuse for just about any suggestion or behavior, though it does seem almost deliberately uncomfortable, doesn’t it? No matter — whether or not this video was ever about a project or tangible product development, or simply to explore uncomfortable ideas because it is proof that the company has reached that critical Vatican stage — if you’ll remember — where they now feel comfortable exploring Very Bad, but Very easily made Real Ideas amongst themselves about what would happen if they allowed their system to nudge its users around a different, slightly less optimal route to the bar, let’s say — without their knowledge — in order for the system to collect traffic data for the sake of its own interests? Which would be, technically, in the interest of all Ledger users now and in the future, so why not?

> The ledger could be given a focus, shifting it from a system which not only tracks our behavior, but offers direction towards a desired result.”

This, my dear privacy-obsessed friends, is the real issue with data collection — its power over huge groups by way of their behavior and it is never going to be remedied in any significant way by ad-blockers or VPNs because the EndUser shall always out number you 50 to 1, even decades from now. EndUser does not understand — or, crucially, have any desire to understand anything technical about what leads to the PewDiePie videos playing on his filthy screen. Here’s a great opportunity to escape Silicon Valley’s technolibertarianism and resign your Darwinian empathy in favor of meaningful and truly-effective action: if you want to avoid a future Google Church (or Google Government, more worryingly,) you should invest your time, effort, and knowledge into electing officials more capable of understanding and regulating Big Tech.

Google Government

The internet as it stands is made possible by Google as the goto resource for online advertising. In 2016, “Google held 75.8 percent of the search ad market, bringing in $24.6 billion in revenue from search ads,” according to Recode. By 2019, “that’s expected to grow to $36.62 billion in revenue, or 80.2 percent of the market.” Google’s edge in user behavior and targeted advertising combined with their extensive resources available developers to integrate independent platforms with Google’s software services at various levels makes it very difficult for any advertising-funded individual or organization to compete online without dipping in to the Google universe. YouTube — a Google property since 2006 — has actively invested in and supported a new career path entirely within their own platform that is rapidly becoming popularly aspired-to by young children, while the reality of existence as a full-time YouTuber is far less glamorous than the immediately-visible surface would indicate, and the effort already expended by my generation in its pursuit has already made us insane.

So, what would the internet look like if Google didn’t exist? We know they’ve been working with the government now on various projects, but what if some terrible exposed transgression of theirs suddenly warranted an immediate shutdown and seizure of all Google properties? Well, we know from a post on Quora by Googler Ashish Kedia that even 5 years ago, the sudden absence of Google for “2–3 mins” set the internet into a bit of a panic, reducing overall traffic by 40%. In the time since, we’ve all grown exponentially more dependent on Google properties: billions of people rely on Google Maps for directions and, thousands of companies (including the Pentagon and other government institutions) rely on Gmail and GSuites for intercommunication, file sharing, task management, etc., and more and more academic institutions rely on Chromebook devices running connection-dependent operating systems. It’s not much of a stretch to argue that Google’s sudden disappearance would constitute a Civil Emergency in the United States, which will only become a stronger and more serious incentive for regulatory bodies to look the other way.

Though the tangible results of advertising have been quantified significantly in the past 20 years, one can’t help but wonder after watching YouTube ads for the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class on toy unboxing videos if the companies who spend big bucks on Google advertising understand where their money is going, but they know that if they don’t advertise there, their competitors will. This, of course, is a fundamental practice of a monopoly, and it’s yielded Google so much fucking money that they cannot possibly spend it fast enough, as evidenced by their investments in life extension — so that, perhaps, they will have more time on Earth to figure it out.

When you build a collection of the world’s smartest people in a self-sufficient environment that discourages exploration of other lifestyles and ideas, and you sustain the society with a gargantuan, relatively low-maintenance revenue stream, you create a culture which is not only well-primed for isolationism, but is also extremely inefficient. In fact, with its vast collection of abandoned products and properties, Google must surely be one of the most inefficient companies in history. Thinking back on recent software releases along with its recent entries into the hardware space, Google is also one of the worst competing tech companies. Very little aside from Gmail, Google Photos, Google Maps, and Chrome have found their place or garnered significant usership. Google Play Music is unintuitive and impossible, Google Allo and Google+ are all but forgotten addendums to other services, and Google Search — its core, original function — has been out of control for years, and all of them are designed blandly and excruciatingly tiring to look at.

Google Shun

If this all has stirred nothing more in you than a desire to eliminate Google from your own online life as much as possible, there are alternatives in almost every one of the sphere’s they dominate. As of late, DuckDuckGo has accumulated a fair amount of buzz and coverage as a private, more relevant alternative to Google’s plain old search engine. Though it is clever enough to list us as the first result for “extratone,” I’ve found it simply insufficient as a replacement in my own life because, essentially, it rarely delivers what I’m looking for. By contrast, Dropbox Paper is such an elegant cloud notetaking and word processing software that it makes Google Docs look simply idiotic (and warrants its own review very shortly.) For getting around, know that MapQuest is not only still around — it’s now a very competitive mobile navigation app.

I, myself, have allowed Google as complete of access to my information and behavior as possible because I believe “privacy” is a completely futile endeavor if one wishes to be a part of society, though I do often use alternatives to Google services simply because I fucking hate the way they look. If you want a more complete list of services and software that allow one to shun the Google God entirely, you’ll be forced to seek out less dignified sources like Lifehacker and Reddit and decide if the additional time you’ll spend using most of them to accomplish the same tasks is really worth your digital angst.

If Google were to be more explicit with its users and staff about its aspirations to take over control of our lives, there will be little to do but accept the future they intend to create because they’ve long been too powerful to control. In the meantime, I’d suggest you continue to use whatever software works best for you and refrain from wasting your time fretting on conspiratorial suppositions of what the tech industry may be doing to “invade your privacy,” because there is no longer any such thing, nor will there be ever again. However, I would also urge to you worship your own Gods, whomever they may be, for Google will never be worthy. I, for one, shall only pray to our Mother Sun.

#social #google #future #web #privacy

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brittanyyoungblog · 7 years ago

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Declarations of Love: Quotes from Books, Movies, & More

Maybe it happens after running through an airport; while standing in the rain; at a big family dinner; or in front of the whole class, office, or press conference… Wherever or however it happens, we all know that moment in a book, movie, or TV show, because it’s the one we’ve been waiting for. It’s the moment everything has been building up to—the inevitable declaration of love.

The ‘I love you’ moment in books, movies, TV, and more come in many different shapes and sizes. Sometimes it’s funny, sometimes it’s sad, sometimes it melts your heart and other times it makes you tear up. (Admit it, just a little.) But it’s always romantic.

So for those of you who live for those swoon-worthy moments where one character puts it all on the line, here’s a collection of some of the best declarations of love. From the long speeches to the one-liners, you’ll find something to make you sigh and maybe even inspire your own declarations.

1. Harry’s New Years’ Eve Speech from “When Harry Met Sally”

I love that you get cold when it’s 71 degrees out. I love that it takes you an hour and a half to order a sandwich. I love that you get a little crinkle above your nose when you’re looking at me like I’m nuts. I love that after I spend the day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes. And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night. And it’s not because I’m lonely, and it’s not because it’s New Year’s Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.

2. Henry Miller’s Intense Confession to Anaïs Nin from his August 14, 1932 love letter

Anais, I only thought I loved you before; it was nothing like this certainty that’s in me now. Was all this so wonderful only because it was brief and stolen? Were we acting for each other, to each other? Was I less I, or more I, and you less or more you? Is it madness to believe that this could go on? When and where would the drab moments begin? I study you so much to discover the possible flaws, the weak points, the danger zones. I don’t find them—not any. That means I am in love, blind, blind. To be blind forever!

3. John Thornton’s Declaration to Margaret Hale from “North and South” by Elizabeth Gaskell

‘I choose to believe that I owe my very life to you—ay—smile, and think it an exaggeration if you will. I believe it, because it adds a value to that life to think—oh, Miss Hale!.. to think circumstance so wrought, that whenever I exult in existence henceforward, I may say to myself, ‘All this gladness in life, all honest pride in doing my work in the world, all this keen sense of being, I owe to her!’ And it doubles the gladness, it makes the pride glow, it sharpens the sense of existence till I hardly know if it is pain or pleasure, to think that I owe it to one—nay, you must, you shall hear’—said he, stepping forwards with stern determination—’to one whom I love, as I do not believe man ever loved woman before.

4. Jerry’s Living Room Speech from “Jerry Mcguire”

Hello? Hello. I’m lookin’ for my wife. Wait. Okay… okay… okay. If this is where it has to happen, then this is where it has to happen. I’m not letting you get rid of me. How about that? This used to be my specialty. You know, I was good in a living room. They’d send me in there, and I’d do it alone. And now I just… But tonight, our little project, our company had a very big night—a very, very big night. But it wasn’t complete, wasn’t nearly close to being in the same vicinity as complete, because I couldn’t share it with you. I couldn’t hear your voice or laugh about it with you. I miss my… I miss my wife. We live in a cynical world, a cynical world, and we work in a business of tough competitors. I love you. You complete me.

5. Darius’s Urgency from “Love Jones”

Let me tell you somethin’. This here, right now, at this very moment, is all that matters to me. I love you. That’s urgent like a motherfucker.

6. Gilbert’s Sweet Admission to Anne from “Anne of the Island” (Anne of Green Gables #3) by L.M. Montgomery

I have a dream… I persist in dreaming it, although it has often seemed to me that it could never come true. I dream of a home with a hearth-fire in it, a cat and dog, the footsteps of friends—and you!

7. Noah’s Outburst by the Car from “The Notebook”

It’s not gonna be easy. It’s gonna be really hard. We’re gonna have to work at this every day, but I want to do that because I want you. I want all of you, forever, you and me, every day. Will you do something for me, please? Just picture your life for me? 30 years from now, 40 years from now? What’s it look like? If it’s with him, go. Go! I lost you once, I think I can do it again. If I thought that’s what you really wanted. But don’t you take the easy way out.

7. Jack Gets Honest from “Brokeback Mountain”

Tell you what, we coulda had a good life together! Fuckin’ real good life! Had us a place of our own. But you didn’t want it, Ennis! So what we got now is Brokeback Mountain! Everything’s built on that! That’s all we got, boy, fuckin’ all. So I hope you know that, even if you don’t never know the rest! You count the damn few times we have been together in nearly twenty years and you measure the short fucking leash you keep me on—and then you ask me about Mexico and tell me you’ll kill me for needing somethin’ I don’t hardly never get. You have no idea how bad it gets! I’m not you… I can’t make it on a coupla high-altitude fucks once or twice a year! You are too much for me Ennis, you sonofawhoreson bitch! I wish I knew how to quit you.

8. Mr. Rochester’s Speech from “Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Brontë

I have for the first time found what I can truly love—I have found you. You are my sympathy—my better self—my good angel; I am bound to you with a strong attachment. I think you good, gifted, lovely: a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart; it leans to you, draws you to my center and spring of life, wraps my existence about you – and, kindling in pure, powerful flame, fuses you and me in one.

9. The Hour in the Boathouse from “A Fisherman of the Inland Sea” by Ursula Le Guin

I found out I was in love with you, winter before last… I wasn’t going to say anything about it because—well, you know. If you’d felt anything like that for me, you’d have known I did. But it wasn’t both of us. So there was no good in it. But then, when you told us you’re leaving… At first I thought, all the more reason to say nothing. But then I thought, that wouldn’t be fair. To me, partly. Love has a right to be spoken. And you have a right to know that somebody loves you. That somebody has loved you, could love you. We all need to know that. Maybe it’s what we need most. So I wanted to tell you. And because I was afraid I was afraid you thought I’d kept away from you because I didn’t love you, or care about you, you know. It might have looked like that. But it wasn’t that.

10. J.D.’s Confession from “Scrubs”

Look Elliot, every year we bounce around this thing, and I never had the courage to stand up and tell you how I feel: I’m crazy about you, and I want you to know if I had the choice of hanging out with anyone in the entire world or sitting at home with you eating pizza and watching a crappy TV show, I’ll choose you every time.

11. Captain Frederick Wentworth’s Declaration from “Persuasion” by Jane Austen

I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you.

12. Augustus’ Shout Into the Void from “The Fault in Our Stars” by John Green

I’m in love with you, and I’m not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things. I’m in love with you, and I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we’re all doomed and that there will come a day when all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we’ll ever have, and I am in love with you.

13. Mark Darcy’s Just as You Are from “Bridget Jones’ Diary” by Helen Fielding

I don’t think you’re an idiot at all. I mean, there are elements of the ridiculous about you. Your mother’s pretty interesting. And you really are an appallingly bad public speaker. And, um, you tend to let whatever’s in your head come out of your mouth without much consideration of the consequences… But the thing is, um, what I’m trying to say, very inarticulately, is that, um, in fact, perhaps despite appearances, I like you, very much. Just as you are.

14. Meredith’s Choose Me Speech from “Grey’s Anatomy”

Okay, here it is. Your choice, it’s simple, her or me. And I’m sure she’s really great. But Derek, I love you. In a really, big really big pretend to like your taste in music, let you eat the last piece of cheesecake, hold a radio over my head outside your bedroom window, unfortunate way that makes me hate you… love you. So pick me. Choose me. Love me.

15. Valmont’s Defense from “Dangerous Liaisons” by Christopher Hampton (based on his play that was based on the novel by Choderlos de Laclos)

IFTTT

#IFTTT #Meet Positives SMFeed 8

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dstprl · 7 years ago

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I am sure you have been on Social Media and seen an ad pop up for Peloton which is why I decided to write my Peloton Bike review. First and foremost let me say when my husband started eyeing this bike around January of this year I was skeptical.

The considerations

For one, he already had a bike which he wasn’t using and when I looked at the price tag of the Peloton I was shocked to say the least. Then he informed me there is a monthly $39 subscription you want to have because without it, the bike really won’t be used at full capacity.

After thinking about it and hearing my husband talk about it I agreed to getting one. It arrived in March 2018 and I suspect, to get me to buy in even more, my husband bought me cycle shoes that clip into the Peloton pedals.

We did not purchase everything Peloton such as the water bottles, dumbbells, foam roller, earphones or shoes but we do have a few hoodies and t-shirts because they are cute.

[Tweet “Read all about my #Peloton bike experience and whether you should get one. #pelotonride #femmefitalefitclub”]

Price

I started off balking at the price of a Peloton bike which is around $2,300. That is not easy for many to swallow but they do have payment plans which is a plus. That price is only for the bike. In order to enjoy the online Live and On-Demand classes you need the monthly subscription which is an additional $39.

As you can see it can add up. Again, if you can move past the sticker shock they do have payment plans which can ease the cost burden on some.

Classes

There are hundreds upon hundreds of classes available with the subscription such as cycling (of course), running, and yoga to name a few. I am extremely impressed with the amount of classes offered beyond just cycling.

Class durations vary from 5 minutes to 60 minutes and you can filter on them or also by:

class type,

instructor,

music genre or

category (hard, new, most popular, etc.)

Please note, all of the classes are not children friendly. In certain classes the instructor may use profanity or the lyrics to the songs played aren’t the clean version.

If that isn’t your cup of tea, no problem, they have classes with all genres of music from Country to 80’s Pop to R&B. Choose what you like, there’s a lot of variety so you are bound to find something you enjoy.

Community

One thing I like a lot about Peloton is the sense of community they provide on Social Media. They have a private Peloton Page group for Peloton users and each instructor runs their own private group.

People share their personal records with each other, post tons of photos and are very helpful and encouraging when questions are asked by newbies such as myself.

The Peloton app

The app is where you access all the classes unless you have the Peloton Tread. It allows you to build a profile and share the classes you completed to Social Media. You can also follow friends there.

While I like and reciprocate a follow for a follow on the Peloton app there isn’t much else there when it comes to socializing. BTW follow me at Diatta. You can’t message each other but you can see how many rides or activities they completed and the amount of rewards they’ve collected.

The Peloton ride

The Peloton rides are HIGH ENERGY even the ones for beginners or low impact. If you’re riding a live or on-demand class, you can virtually high five others who are participating in the class with you. There’s a bunch of Live and On-Demand cycle classes to choose from as far back as 6 months so pick a class and enjoy yourself.

During the rides there are a lot of features as well such as viewing your heart rate, if you wear a monitor, viewing the artist and song title playing and the leadeboard.

The leaderboard is where you can see all those who ever took the ride, where you rank and who may be riding with you at the same time you are. You can also see how their output compares to yours which, if you are competitive, can help you push beyond your comfort zone and hit a new PR.

Instructors

I can’t say enough about the Peloton instructors. I have not even come CLOSE to taking them all because there are a handful which play the music I like so I tend to take their classes over and over but from Robin Arzon to Ally Love to Alex Toussaint you really can’t go wrong.

Some of the instructors also teach multiple disciplines such as cycle, boot camp and running. I like the versatility of its instructor team. Each instructor as their own unique style but I’ve found they all keep me interested and motivated during the workout.

All positive attitudes, all smiles and very attractive people, can’t go wrong there. Many even shout you out on Social Media.

I’ll leave the Instagram names of the ones I follow below. All you have to do is click on the photo and follow them.

💥 READY 💥 My everyday is just like yours…underneath it all lies all the hard work and effort to be ready when the time comes. I’m #RipReady with the #ZNE fit… how do you stay ready?👇🏽 #adidasathletics #createdwithadidas @adidas

A post shared by A l l y L o v e (@allymisslove) on Aug 30, 2018 at 7:54pm PDT

Ally Love @AllyMissLove

I’m out! 💃🏽 See you on Sept. 7 @onepeloton, Fam. Off to Burning Man. ✈️

A post shared by Robin Arzon (@robinnyc) on Aug 22, 2018 at 4:39pm PDT

Robin Arzon @RobinNYC

My superpower is inner fire. I ignite the 🔥 of transformation in myself & others, every 👏🏼damn 👏🏼 day!👏🏼 As the superheroes of our own narrative we must play out our purpose with the same conviction Superman has to justice & truth and Batman to protect Gotham. Your role here is that important! 🌟 SUPERHERO CHECKLIST: ✅ Define your life’s purpose & align EVERYTHING with it! ✅Refuse to listen to any inner or outer voice that says you can’t. ✅Gather a team & collaborate. ✅ Plan to always be uncomfortable. ✅ Be brave AF & lead with love, simultaneously. 💥 If u were a superhero, what would your power be? Why?

A post shared by Jessica King (@jesskingnyc) on Sep 3, 2018 at 10:57am PDT

Jess King @JessKingNYC

Feel Good. Look Good….Do Better!! #Vibecheck #Justdoit #NYC

A post shared by Alex T (@alextoussaint25) on Aug 18, 2018 at 3:48pm PDT

Alex Toussaint @AlexToussaint25

running into the holiday weekend ….. 💨💨💨 we work so hard to enjoy life! celebrate the extra day fam and treat yo’self 🌭🍔 @asics @iamwellandgood @wilhelminamodels #iamwellandgood

A post shared by Olivia Amato (@oamato) on Aug 31, 2018 at 5:48am PDT

Olivia Amato @OAmato

Quick question… What is your actual motivating factor? 💫 What I mean is, what is the root of your motivation? What is feeding your desire? Is it Soul or is it Ego? We say yes to so many things yet possibly never ask ourselves often, if ever, why? Why are we doing things that don’t always feel right or are what we need or want, or can afford just to keep up with the joneses. We say yes to dinners, coffees, meetings, trips, clothing, buying trendy items, moving, relationships, and of course exercise. If I took a poll asking you if they actually enjoy working out, would you say yes? If not, why do you workout? So, you lace up to run. 🏃🏼‍♀️ Why? Do you run to look better or because you actually love the feeling of running? That runners high, that accomplishment of completing a task, a claimed moment of your day that’s device-free 📲 and simply yours, a necessary mental break and “you time”, a treat for your body, a method to focus your competitive spirit, a way to spend time with friends? Is your choice to move initiated by positivity or by a feeling of negativity? When we choose to move because we hate our bodies we run the risk of disappointment in achieving a goal that is never good enough in our heads, never mind the fact that the entire time you spend getting to said point you’ve carried along a negative motivating factor with you into a positive space! How will you create love ❤️ where you bring hate? Both are green, just depends which grass gets watered. Let today be the day we change our approach to the things we do. Approach work, friendships, partnerships, and your personal relationship with yourself with love and see how fast you mind and world starts to change. When we do things that feed our soul instead of our ego the end is no longer in sight. The sacred relationship with yourself will begin to improve, fast…. be sweet to yourself, and don’t be afraid to find your truth. Dig deep and look for the reason you actually are doing the things you do. ______________________ #createthelove #truth #rksolid #motivation #tuesday #train #trainpeloton #traintuesday #transformationtuesday #transformation #abs #run #running #workout #ego #soul

A post shared by Rebecca Kennedy: RKsolid (@rksolidnyc) on Aug 28, 2018 at 5:47pm PDT

Rebecca Kennedy @RKSolidNYC

I feel that I’ve become more empathetic/understanding in my years spent in NYC. The truth is… the struggle is real… I don’t know anybody who hasn’t fallen flat on their face at least once here. I’m speaking from experience: when you fall flat on your face here, you don’t just fall, you get trampled over 10 times, kicked in the ribs, and then splashed with 20 buckets of icewater. “WAKE UP” she tells you! It takes a resilient, strong human being to peel themselves back up off the ground after, and find that hustle again. It takes a champion… My city is full of champions. BLESS you NEW YORK CITY. #newyork #hustle #champions

A post shared by Selena Samuela (@selenasamuela) on Aug 28, 2018 at 6:00am PDT

Selena Samuela @SelenaSamuela

When I started

When I first started on the Peloton bike I had trouble clipping in. I struggled. Hubby tried to coach me and I was trying my best but could not clip those shoes in to save my life.

He sort of had to half wear my shoe and clip them in for me and then I put them on while clipped in to the pedal. I know I know but I’m much better now.

I also struggled clipping out. A few times I just left the shoes clipped in and went on with my day because my legs were too tired to try and/or I was catching cramps. OUCH!

After the first 4 rides, 4 days in a row my butt stayed sore even though my husband had a cushion on the seat. It’s just the nature of the beast. It gets better as I no longer get sore since I’m riding my regularly now and I’m 24 rides in (woohoo) but my butt can get numb if I sit too long.

I remedy the problem by standing when that happens.

What kept me interested – FRIENDS

Once I found some of my friends actually owned Peloton, and we started following each other, we would schedule when we would take the same classes either live (which start early in the morning East Coast time) or on-demand (which are available all day long).

That made it very fun for me because we could see each other’s results and it felt like we were together even though we were states away.

They do have a neat feature where you can click on the person’s profile during the ride and click Live Video and actually see the other person riding LIVE. I did that once with a friend who lives in North Carolina and it was very cool.

It was during a live class. I thought that was very cool.

The other classes I’ve taken

Besides cycling, I’ve also taken the strength training and tread classes which are very good. The strength training tends to last about 10 minutes (at least those are the ones I chose) but they have longer classes. I just never had time to do more or go longer.

The tread classes

The tread classes are excellent and what got me back interested in Peloton to begin with. I typically run on my own treadmill and mirror the class from my iPhone 7 to my Apple TV flat screen so I have the big screen and speaker experience.

Feels like I’m actually in the studio with them.

We do hills, sprint drills, combinations and all sorts of things which really keeps the heart rate up and the fat burning which is what I like. They even have walking classes for those who need a recovery day or can’t handle all of the pounding from running.

I’ve tried a few of those and believe it or not, those are very challenging too. As you can imagine they crank up the incline.

So far there hasn’t been 1 instructor or 1 class I didn’t enjoy. I’ve gotten up and worked out completely tired and not feeling it but once I hear that peppy voice and motivating quotes and words…it’s on. I fix my attitude and get into it.

What could be better

I honestly can say there aren’t any suggestions or recommendations I have for Peloton at this time to improve upon. Granted I was having issue connecting my heart rate monitor but found out it was my error not theirs.

It’s a very innovative company and I look forward to some new products and services they come out with.

My rating

As if you could not tell, I give Peloton 10 out of 10 stars. There are programs for every fitness level which I love, there are various types of programs by music genre and duration which offers up options for people who have the time or have limited time.

They’ve thought of everything. The instructors are positive, attractive and motivating. They also shout out people riding in the studio or at home during the live rides which I find extremely thoughtful.

I can’t thank my husband enough for having the vision and thought to purchase this awesome package of equipment and classes which has taken our at-home workout game to the next level.

I enjoy it very much, plan to ride more days on than off and highly recommend you research and consider getting one for yourself.

Perhaps we can ride virtually together in a live or on-demand class and push each other further. To quote several of the instructors “You ain’t hustlin’ if you ain’t strugglin’”. Let’s GO!

Are you interested in purchasing a Peloton?

Leave any questions you have that I haven’t answered in comments below.

My Peloton Bike Experience and Review I am sure you have been on Social Media and seen an ad pop up for Peloton which is why I decided to write my Peloton Bike review.

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