#we are not the first generation to be in this position

[rincent-van-uggh]

Ahh this is so much what I have been thinking. Even if I agreed with intellectual property in principle, IP law benefits corporations far, far more than small artists (because the law only protects those who can afford to enforce it).

All the notions that AI is cheating because it makes the process of art making too easy are not at all distinct, so far as I can see, from people saying the same things about any new art making technology (digital art, electronic music, people say these things are not real art for the same reasons). I mean, people trying to pass off AI art as if they themselves hand painted it are just idiots telling lies, nothing new. If someone uses AI to generate the background for an drawing they did, and they're honest about it, thats just art. People do the same thing with backgrounds not generated by AI too.

I find a lot of AI criticism comes down to "this tool is being operated and peddaled by idiots" rather than that the tool itself is bad. "People who use AI to study for them get lower grades" well duh, having anything study for you is incoherent, you necessarily have to use your own brain for that. If what they mean by this is that people are using AI to write notes and summaries for them to read, this is also misguided as AI cannot reliably create accurate summaries, if it adds in nonsense, you may not realise and study stuff it entirely made up.

There are also adjacent issues. Like I dont take issue particularly with public data being fed to the machine apart from how empowering AI in our current system means empowering shitty corporations. But sometimes private data may be fed to the machine, corporations are getting increasingly sneaky and invasive, changing ToS to say that they can use any of your stuff, even non-public things to train AI. While AI tends to mix together loads of stuff into its outputs, it is feasible that an AI could be fed private data and spit it out wholesale, and we have no way to prevent this currently. I am glad that i have managed to move entirely off of things like google drive because I don't trust them to uphold privacy at the best of times, but especially not in this context.

My main issue with AI, honestly, is that I find it annoying. It keeps being put in places I dont want it, to solve problems I don't have. I think this is a popular position to hold here on tumblr, where we have several times pushed the website management to allow us to opt out of new trendy features we dont like, such as "best stuff first" and other algorithmic generated features, and "tumblr live". I object to having new technology replace the old stuff, not only because the old stuff is what I am familiar with, but because often times it works, in at least some important ways, better than the new stuff. I don't need AI generated art, I enjoy making art myself. I do not want AI customer service chat bot, it is less effective at addressing my needs than the humans are.

The tool is fine, but almost every time I encouter it, it is being used by idiots to uninteresting ends, and I would like to not have to encounter it if I don't want or need to.

Worst part of popular left wing AI discourse online is that there's absolutely a need for a robust leftist opposition to use of cognitive automation without social dispensation to displaced human workers. The lack of any prior measures to facilitate a transition to having fewer humans in the workplace (UBI, more public control over industrial infrastructure, etc) is a disaster we are sleepwalking into - one that could lock the majority of our society's wealth further into the hands of authoritarian oligarchs who retain control of industry through last century private ownership models, while no longer needing to rely on us to operate their property.

But now we're seemingly not going to have the opposition we so desperately need, because everyone involved in the anti-AI conversation has pretty thoroughly discredited themselves and their movement by harbouring unconstrained reactionary nonsense, blatant falsehoods and woo. Instead of talking about who owns and benefits from cognitive automation, people are:

Demanding impossibilities like uninventing a now readily accessible technology

Trying to ascribe implicit moral value to said technology instead of the who is using it and how

Siding with corporations on copyright law in the name of "defending small artists"

Repeating obvious and embarrassing technical misconceptions and erroneous pop-sci about machine learning in order to justify their preferred philosophy

Invoking neo-spiritual conservative woo about the specialness of the human soul to try to incoherently discredit a machine that can quite obviously perform certain tasks just as well if not better than they can

Misrepresent numbers about energy use and environmental cost in an absurd double standard (all modern infrastructure is reliant on data centers to a similar level of impact, including your favourite fandom social media and online video games!) to build a narrative AI is some sort of malevolent spirit that damages our reality when it is called upon

It's a level of reactionary ignorance that has completely discredited any popular opposition to industrial AI rollout because it falls apart as soon as you dig deeper than a snappy social media post, or a misguided pro-copyright screed from an insecure web artist (who decries a machine laying eyes on their freely posted work while simultaneously charging commission for fan-art of corporate IPs... I'm sure that will absolutely resolve in their favour).

It would be funny how much people are fucking themselves over with all this, except I'm being fucked over to, and as a result am really quite mad about the situation. We need UBI, we need to liberate abundance from corporate greed, what we don't need is viral posts about putting distortion filters on anime fan-art to ward off the evil mechanical eye, pointless boycotts of platforms because they are perceived to have let the evil machines taint them, or petitions to further criminalize the creation of derivative works.

[unsolicited-opinions]

how long do you give it for the Free Palestine movement, as it stands right now, to self-implode?

I'm not going to make predictions about the Western "Free Palestine" movement, but I'll try to put it in some context.

How Long Until the Western "Free Palestine" Movement Implodes?

Pattern Recognition: Comrades Eat Comrades

Western leftist movements are uniquely good at destroying themselves from within. I don't mean in a vague "movements always change" kind of way. I mean they start off energized, decentralized, idealistic…and then flame out in spectacular fashion after turning on their own organizers for being insufficiently pure.

Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) collapsed in the 1970s when it split into warring factions…some of whom literally became terrorists.

Occupy Wall Street No hierarchy, no demands, no outcomes. Just a long, slow descent into incoherence as activists argued over process, language, identity, and whose trauma deserved the most microphone time.

The problem wasn't the cause.

It was the belief that moral clarity must always mean moral absolutism. Absolutism inevitably leads to internal purges. The only real suspense is how fast it happens. Ideological rigidity eventually leads to doom.

Say what you want about the political far right (and I do because they suck), but they do understand how to rally behind a single message and follow a demagogue without asking whether he centers each of their specific sub-groups and sub-interests.

We saw in the 2024 election how many leftist purists were willing to help sabotage an imperfect candidate generally aligned with their values...and help elect Trump.

Why? Because the candidate who agreed with 65%-70% of their positions was more offensive to them than someone who has openly expressed admiration for Hitler. (How's that been working out for you, leftist purists?) These parts of the far left have their heads firmly up their own pure asses. They can’t/won't see the forest for the trees.

They subvert the goals they claim to care about because they're too busy performing their purity and moral absolutism for each other and clout instead of trying to effect changes to policy.

An Aesthetic of Resistance

The Western "Free Palestine" movement, especially since October 7th, has exploded in scale and visibility.

While some people are genuinely driven by concern for Palestinian civilians, a whole lot of others are clearly in it for the aesthetic, the vibes, the social belonging, or the drama.

It's a chance to cosplay 1968 without reading anything published before 2010.

What the Western "Free Palestine" movement offers isn't a roadmap to peace, justice, or statehood. It offers an identity. It's a moral fashion statement. You wear the scarf, you learn the slogans, you change your bio, and…congratulations! You're part of something Righteous and you didn't have to sacrifice or even learn anything!

An aesthetic of resistance, however, is not a strategy. It doesn't change policy. It doesn't build power. It doesn't endure.

Worse, it doesn't tolerate any nuance. In a coalition built on branding, anyone who doesn't fit the brand becomes a threat.

It can't permit any introspection or growth, so while might grow in size, extremism, or tactics, it's intellectually sterile, and that can make it ineffective and/or brittle.

Pattern Recognition: Factions and Purges

Leftist movements which base their legitimacy on moral purity almost always eventually turn inward.

First they identify the oppressor, then then identify the collaborators, then they start purging anyone insufficiently zealous. Eventually, everyone's a collaborator.

That’s already happening.

Mainstream ceasefire activists have been smeared as traitors by more radical circles for not calling explicitly for the abolition of Israel. Members of groups like JVP or IfNotNow (who for years were considered the "edgy" left flank) are now sometimes labeled as gatekeepers, liberals, or even crypto-Zionists for refusing to call October 7 a legitimate form of resistance…and JVP and INN keep shifting with the overton window of their movement to greater degrees of extremism.

Arab and Palestinian organizers who speak about nonviolence, coexistence, or long-term political strategy are being pushed out of leadership roles and branded as traitors...by white cultural Christians who know far less about the matter than they do. If they suggest anything other than total victory for Hamas and the destruction of Israel "by any means necessary," they're branded a sellout or a Westernized Zionist. The movement increasingly rewards people who sound revolutionary...not people who organize effectively.

Jewish allies to their movement, even the extremely anti-Zionist ones, are walking on eggshells. Support is conditional. They're expected to show up, shut up, and definitely not talk about antisemitism unless they want to be accused of derailing and supporting genocide. The number of Jews who've been publicly smeared or privately frozen out by movements they supported is growing fast, and most of them aren't saying anything. They just walk away. I don't know what their numbers are, but I've spoken with a handful like this. In each case, it was the privately unrestrained antisemitism which broke the spell and helped them realize what was happening.

Internal discourse policing is relentless. Want to talk about the complexity of Hamas's role in Palestinian suffering? You're platforming Zionist narratives. Want to discuss how sexual violence on October 7 has been minimized? That's "white feminism." Want to clarify that Jewish self-determination doesn’t inherently mean colonialism? You've committed the cardinal sin of nuance and must be purged.

None of this is new. It’s the same bullshit which took down SDS, tore apart the anti-Iraq war movement, and gutted Occupy from the inside. When your movement decides internal deviation is a bigger threat than external opposition, it stops building anything and just chases ideological purity.

Social Media May Accelerate the Cannibalism

In the past, movements have sometimes eaten themselves slowly. SDS took years. The anti-globalization movement unraveled over the better part of a decade. 

That was all before social media. Now what used to take five years can happen in five weeks.

Every far left movement now has an online wing and an IRL wing. The online wing is where purity spirals metastasize because virality rewards outrage, not organization.

Calling someone a colonial apologist gets more engagement than helping to register voters.

But Engagement ≠ Change.

So what does that mean for the Free Palestine movement? It might just undergo a slow, chaotic unraveling. Callouts, splintering, people walking away in frustration or disgust because they're too tired of it to say much about it as they just…stop showing up.

"Free Palestine" means..?

One of the biggest warning signs here is that no one consistently agrees on what the endgame is. We know that to Hamas it means the end of Israel, but it's much more vague for many "Free Palestine" activists. It can mean:

End the occupation of the West Bank!

Ceasefire!

One-state solution!

Two-state solution!

Third intifada, globalized!

Dismantle the state of Israel!

Ask 10 of them, get 12 answers. In normal movements, that's no big deal, because people are allowed to disagree. In this movement, though, disagreement is treated like betrayal.

If you say you support a two-state solution, you're a filthy Zionist.

If you mention Hamas's role in civilian suffering, you're a genocide denier.

If you're Jewish and support Palestinian rights (that describes most Jews), you'd better not talk about antisemitism lest you be accused of centering yourself, weaponizing antisemitism/trauma, and supporting genocide.

And if you try to discuss actual policy? That's imperialist behavior!

This isn't just ideological incoherence, it's a refusal to tolerate difference...which can make organizing unsustainable.

So will it implode soon?

I very much doubt it.

Will it unravel soon? 

Almost certainly not. The slogans, at the very least, will stick around and the hashtags aren't going anywhere because they've become identity signifiers.

A lot of the disinformation fed to Gen Z has been sticky and I'm concerned what the US will be like when they reach the peak of their political power.

There will always be a core of people pushing for Palestinian liberation (whatever that means to them), and some of them will have good intentions and/or good strategy. Some of today's antizionist zealots will eventually come around and start hearing Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib.

The count of antizionist social media accounts and posts will continue to be high - much higher than the number of actual belly buttons in the movement IRL, due to bots and agents controlled by those seeking to destabilize the West. Those probably won't go away any time soon and are likely to get much more sophisticated, effective, and difficult to screen out...because AI.

But as a mass movement? As a unifying force with real impact on politics? Something which puts people on streets in huge numbers? I'm less sure about that. From here, it looks like it's already fraying around the edges. The internal fights, the factionalism, the paranoia about bad-faith actors, the purity tests, the bizarre rituals of performance...that looks to me like the start of a collapse by attrition.

What if it just hangs out in the ideological natural reservoir of academia?

It's already been absorbed into academic discourse and nonprofit branding, right? It may just live there in a natural reservoir while continuing to do nothing material to improve Palestinian lives.

I'm not sure if/how it can be dislodged from academia. I can't support Trump's methods, but the absence of ideological diversity is both alarming and predictable.

From graduate admissions to peer-reviewed publishing, career advancement in the humanities often depends not on the originality or rigor of an argument, but on how well it aligns with prevailing orthodoxies. Scholars are trained to cite the right theorists, frame questions within accepted ideological paradigms, and signal moral allegiance to dominant narratives, particularly around identity, power, and oppression.

You pass your dissertation defense if your committee LIKES YOUR VIEWS. If your dissertation shows excellent scholarship which disputes their preferred narrative, you've wasted years and tens of thousands of dollars...and there are already more degreed scholars than faculty positions in these disciplines. So they're highly motivated to conform.

So dissent is pathologized instead of being debated. The result isn’t a community seeking truth, but a faculty enforcing consensus. Challenging the orthodoxy ends friendships and careers.

That's how you end up with an entire Middle Eastern Studies department which only knows and only teaches one narrative. It's not just a political problem, it's an intellectual ans social problem.

(On a personal level, this makes me very sad. When I was an undergrad in the 90s, I learned so much from the disagreements between professors I respected. I also admired the civility and intellectual honesty they offered each other.)

So...it seems like academia is going to be an ideological natural reservoir for the movement until that's addressed somehow without resorting to fascist tactics.

Maybe it'll splinter out into competing groups with varying flavors and intensities of dogmatism.

There are groups and individuals within the movement who think Amnesty International is a Zionist PSYOP.

There are self-styled anarchists and communists who want violence. They want chaos. When these people chant "by any means necessary," I have no problem believing they're willing to resort to domestic political violence to globalize the intifada.

Maybe some violent factions will splinter off like the Weather Underground splintered from SDS.

The revolutionary left has been recycling these dynamics for over a century.

The rhetoric tends to be more lasting than the movements which use it, because movements built on purity or aesthetics rarely build lasting institutions or effect meaningful positive change.

The Party Dynamics

Forget "Free Palestine" for a moment and look at the bigger picture.

It may be hard to believe right now because the Free Palestine people are so loud, but most Congressional Democrats continue to support Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. Party leadership has repeatedly affirmed this position, and recent bipartisan resolutions backing Israel's legitimacy passed overwhelmingly, with only a small group of "progressive" dissenters. While a vocal minority on the far left calls for conditions on aid and proposes condemnations of Israel, they don't represent today's Democratic party. Voting records, public statements, and primary outcomes all show that the Democratic caucus remains broadly pro-Israel, even as internal debates have grown louder.

But:

Since Clinton, Democrats have largely hugged the center, while polarization on the Right exploded...culminating in the MAGA takeover of the GOP.

Now the Left has its own hardliners, people whose politics are less democratic and more dogmatic. That's the very vocal minority. That's AOC/Tlaib/Omar.

...and they're driving moderates away from their party.

Trump didn’t surge in 2024 because Americans suddenly loved him. A lot of voters were running from a Democratic Party they see as increasingly dysfunctional and in which the loudest voices are often the most extreme.

The Democratic party's base keeps pulling left, but the candidates the "progressive" wing would nominate for a general election wouldn't do well.

AOC polls better than you might expect and may be beloved in Brooklyn or Berkeley, but she's still deep underwater nationally. If Kamala Harris was successfully cast as "too far left," AOC would be radioactive anywhere but the coasts. AOC may well take Schumer's senate seat in New York, but in a national election she'd likely crash and burn.

The far left isn't going to win the White House or a congressional majority any time soon because it alienates allies and energizes opponents...but a takeover of the Democratic party seems possible. Maybe not likely, but possible.

If you think that's silly, please note that nobody thought Trump would hijack the GOP and remake it in his image so quickly...until he did.

If you oppose the rising political power of the antizionist movement, get involved in Democratic party politics and help move them in more practical, policy-focused directions.

Final answer?

I'm less concerned about how/when the Free Palestine movement will end than I am about how many good people will be hurt by it before it does.

[tprings-hair]

what happened on tarsus iv?

this is my attempt at creating a definitive list of information on what kirk experienced on tarsus iv for fic writers and other fans who want to know wtf is up with kirk's backstory.

(I have a longer, more general post on tos kirk's backstory here.)

"Kodos the Executioner, summary. Governor of Tarsus Four twenty Earth years ago. Invoked martial law. Slaughtered fifty percent of population Earth colony, that planet. Burned body found when Earth forces arrived. No positive identification. Case closed."

let's start with this quote from spock, detailing the information he found on their ship's computer.

first of all: at its core, this episode is tos's take on the nazis who escaped capture. adolf eichmann was only found in 1960, and would certainly have been in the public memory as a high profile nazi who managed to make a new life under an assumed name. he was not the only one to have escaped capture, and I don't think I need to explain which conspiracy theory the circumstances of kodos's faked death call to mind.

this episode was an exploration of what form cruelty and authoritarianism might take in star trek's universe, with a huge amount of influence from shakespeare's work. the two together make up this central dilemma: is it kodos? might kirk be condemning an innocent man? if it is kodos, does kirk have the right to act as judge, jury, and executioner? is it possible for someone who carried out terrible acts to live a new life somewhere else, and not have the violence follow?

SPOCK: According to our library banks, it started on the Earth colony of Tarsus IV, when the food supply was attacked by an exotic fungus and largely destroyed. There were over eight thousand colonists and virtually no food. And that was when Governor Kodos seized full power and declared emergency martial law.

MCCOY: I've heard of it.

SPOCK: You may not have heard it all. Kodos began to separate the colonists. Some would live, be rationed whatever food was left. The remainder would be immediately put to death. Apparently he had his own theories of eugenics.

MCCOY: Unfortunately, he wasn't the first.

SPOCK: Perhaps not. But he was certainly among the most ruthless, to decide arbitrarily who would survive and who would not, using his own personal standards, and then to implement his decision without mercy. Children watching their parents die. Whole families destroyed. Over four thousand people. They died quickly, without pain, but they died. Relief arrived, but too late to prevent the executions. And Kodos? There never was a positive identification of his body.

the thing is, this introduces a number of inconsistencies. it could easily be chalked up to confusion between multiple drafts of the script, but if you want to look deeper and see where the information comes from, you'll notice the two survivors have very different stories than the official starfleet record.

specifically, spock says that they died quickly and painlessly, and though he is sure that karidian is kodos, he does not seem to treat him as a legitimate threat to anyone's safety. we don't know if kodos ever directly killed anyone, or if he only gave the orders. but kirk and leighton seem to agree on the violence: leighton refers to his own injury as "the bloody thing (kodos) did", and kirk recalls kodos "blasting" others out of existence. it's possible kirk was saying it to confuse kodos, so kodos might say "that's not how it happened" and give himself away. it's also possible that leighton sustained his injury at a different time than the massacre. it seems likeliest to me in any case that the information on the ship's computer is not the entire truth.

which also means you can headcanon whatever you want and nobody can tell you definitively that you're wrong. be free with your tarsus iv headcanons.

exploring the tarsus iv lore (or lack of it) has led me to this sort of consensus in the fandom that kirk was looking after a group of children. I think it's a very cool way of exploring how central it is to his character that he has to be in control, protecting people, and fighting back, and I've read and enjoyed some absolutely fantastic fics with that premise. even william shatner seems to agree. in his novel collision course (which gives kirk and spock a sort of alternate first meeting as teenagers and gives some great insights into how shatner viewed kirk's backstory), kirk ().

the ship's computer specifies the number of survivors later in the episode as nine, and lists them as

Kirk, J., Leighton, T., Moulton, E., Riley, K., Eames, D.

before kirk cuts it off. once leighton dies, the last two surviving are kirk and riley.

the novelization by james blish names a couple more characters, and in order of age: Leighton, T., Molson, E., Kirk, J., Wiegand, R., Eames, S., and Daiken, R., which was what they called the role of kevin riley initially. he is specified as being five years old at the time, and kirk is not a child or teen but a midshipman.

and collision course names still more characters. edith zaglada, an eight year old girl who kirk saw killed. donny, tay, and billy are named as other survivors. this novel doesn't get into kodos's motivations or kirk's circumstances, but it gives us two new characters, griffyn and matthew, who are teenagers employed by kodos as bounty hunters for escapees of the initial massacre. starfleet arrives just as edith is shot and griffyn is trying to convince matthew to shoot kirk. we don't really know if kirk knew any of the other survivors, but he mentions edith's name specifically a few times as a death that affected him a lot. it's heartbreaking to watch city on the edge of forever with that in mind. I also can't find a source for anyone calling him JT, but collision course does call him jimmy during the flashback chapters.

crucially, the novel isn't technically canon. so you can have your gang of children led by JT, or you can have jimmy stick with a couple of people, or you could do something totally your own. none of these are wrong! do whatever your heart desires.

if you want some practical details, there's a great post here by @spirk-trek and pt 1, pt 2, and pt 3 of a great post by @pywren. I may make my own tarsus iv headcanon post if anyone is interested, and if I do I'll link it here.

[loveletterworm]

ralsei was so awesome in the new chapters i kept trying to write a post about this when they were brand new but i failed repeatedly but i still want to say this weeks later. Chapter 2 was somewhat ralsei deficient and most of what he got seemed to position him as "Generic cute thing" (to a more insistent degree than chapter 1) and/or "Vaguely suspicious" but even chapter 3 (I single it out because chapter 4 has more obvious Ralsei Moments but chapter 3 was also strong in this regard and as the very first thing it does) immediately locks in on Ralsei-ing. AND his new overworld sprites were very cuted. We can have it all...

[takeariskao3]

i’ve debated on entering this ongoing fandom etiquette conversation because, generally, i don’t think i’m articulate or groundbreaking enough to say something that someone else hasn’t already said… and i may very well regret this but …

when it comes to fic comments:

do this ^^^ not that ^^^^

i received both of these over the weekend by first time commenters on my most popular (and personally beloved) wip that is currently in the throes of a year long hiatus. i won’t get into the in-depth reasons as to why its been on hold because im not asking for pity or sympathy or whatever (the ao3 curse is real) but i am posting this because one of these comments made me want to immediately pick up my drafted chapter 20 and finish it. while the other one made me want to bury my draft in my google drive and never look at it again.

this is a familiar tale, right?? lots of fic writers have exhausted the topic of super motivating and less than motivating types of comments. but i just wanted to add context to why.

first of all, because this is my first impression of both of these readers. one is fresh and exiting and positive! the other is completely disheartening, but why?? because if we infer through the subtext of the second comment that this person is supposedly a long time reader, this is the first time they’ve chosen to interact with me. at all. so my gut reaction is “wtf, i don’t know you, what makes you think you can talk to me like this or that you are entitled to that type of information if you’ve never felt the need to tell me you liked my fic before this??”

not a great feeling tbh! to immediately dislike someone upon first impression? i kinda wanted to block them so they’d never get to read the rest when i do end up finishing the story. because i WILL finish it someday.

but SECONDLY, and this is the part that made me want to put the next chapter away forever, the blunt question of “WHY ARENT YOU POSTING 🤬” literally has the direct response of me reflecting on the shitstorm of a year i’ve had and the four addresses in twelve months, and the fights with my partner that never seem to get resolved, and my daughters health issues and her two hospital stays, and my own career upheaval and how i’m still not really in a job i truly love or feel invested in, and just SHIT!! you know?? sometimes life is shit and hobbies get put on the back burner. i don’t know how else to say this but if you are wanting an update to your favorite fic, be kind!? you don’t know what’s going on in a persons internal life so why wouldn’t you choose to be nice??

no one loves the path from you more than i do, or wants me to finish it mORE THAN I DO!!! you should assume this of every fic writer! those stories mean more to them than any reader or beta. i promise you. and having to reflect on all the conscious and subconscious reasons why i haven’t been able to work on it just makes me more disappointed in myself, which makes me not want to work on it more… and the vicious cycle continues.

so, in conclusion, that second comment up there is not something i would ever expect a person to say in such words or tone if they stopped me on the street so it should never show up in my email either.

a good rule of thumb is: comment like you just ran into the fic writer in the grocery store <3

[all-pacas]

Can you go into a bit more about all the times Chase has been unnecessarily jealous?

so even though fandom/hameron shippers/etc tend to take it as a Canon Fact, chase is actually the only person to suspect that fwb-era cameron is trying to make house jealous. he brings it up repeatedly, in top secret and fetal position. chase is generally speaking perceptive and tends to be pretty spot on about cameron in particular, but cameron actually doesn't seem too concerned with house's feelings — she's a little bothered, but also very much keeps sleeping with chase after house knows, even if getting a reaction from house was the goal… well, cameron failed, and isn't too upset about it. cameron never pursues house after s1 (and from s1 we know she would have if she felt she had a chance), and yet chase alone is sure she is madly in love with him.

half wit: quick and not a big deal, but when the kids show up at house's to tell him he doesn't have cancer, foreman has a line about how house should be "making out with cameron" and chase gives him a quick, unhappy look. i wouldn't call this unncessarily jealous tbh, but it does show that he's already worried about this.

no more mr nice guy: maybe house has an std, and chase is worried cameron slept with him. i'll cut him some slack, i think it's fair that he ask her… but not in front of literally everyone they know, and not the way he did, where he takes her refusal to answer as "proof" they slept together and is in a clear snit the rest of the episode. especially because he knows they never slept together; cameron says as much, in his presence, in half wit. and even if they had, it would have been long before he and cameron got together, so … whatever. but once again, chase is going around acting like he's in a love triangle when he truly is not.

saviors: chase briefly floats the idea that cameron is in love with house when he's trying to figure out why she's ghosting him. he doesn't seem all that concerned about it, or all that convinced of the theory. i kind of give him a pass for this one -- he's trying to figure out why she's ghosting him and has a right to be upset about it -- but again: when chase is feeling insecure, he immediately jumps to cameron wants house, not me.

under my skin: chase's problem with the sperm is that he very clearly takes it as "cameron cares more about her dead husband than me." we see he spends most of the episode arguing that "she has [him] now," "she found someone [himself]", she likes "him" better. he eventually shifts this to "she doesn't really want to marry me, she isn't sure about us." i don't know if i'd say he's jealous of her dead husband, but he's absolutely insecure and, as usual, assuming he's cameron's second or third choice. luckily, this time chase gets over it pretty quickly and does the right thing (realizes she's obviously not in love with her dead husband, and just has trouble letting go).

lockdown: the big one! chase immediately moves the goalposts from i murdered a guy and my wife left me to my wife actually never loved me in the first place. this is a huge fucking retcon, but sadly it's completely in line with chase (and even he later admits, in the episode, that "if you never loved me, i never did anything wrong", that it is self-protection and he knows it is not true). but as usual, when chase is feeling insecure, he jumps straight to cameron wanted anyone but me. (in s3, foreman makes a whole point about how cameron dumping chase is out of character because when has cameron ever been apathetic?; funny how in lockdown chase falls into the same trap again.)

in a very lukewarm defense of chase: considering his parents and his own issues, i do sympathize a little with him; he is used to love needing to be earned and conditional and being taken away, i think he probably really does feel like he's second or third best for cameron and worries she, like his parents, will eventually leave him because he isn't good enough for them. that said, boy is he a jealous little baby sometimes, and it is not one of his better qualities.

[joannerowling]

But if there was never a love potion involved in what happened between Merope and Tom Sr., doesn't that conflict with the canon of why Voldemort is (and was always) fucked up? Like, he cannot love because he was conceived under the effects of a lp? Or is that also Dumbledore's conjecture and never 100% confirmed?

Ftr I am aware there are Tom Riddle truthers out there who believe he could've grown up relatively normal if he'd been treated different by Dumbledore, but I don't rly think that's how the text is meant to be read

Why aren't you asking that to the original writer of the post? 😅

First: for the record i do think in canon what happened was what Dumbledore said; not because he can't have his bias but because this is fiction and in fiction characters aren't just characters, they're devices fulfilling roles, and Dumbledore's role is to know or guess stuff right for Harry and the reader's comprehension's sake. But it doesn't mean that post's interpretation isn't interesting in its own right.

Second: I'm pretty sure @harrypotterheretic didn't say that no love potion was involved, only later on than Dumbledore thought, and for less longer. Also, i haven't read the books in 5 years so i'm a bit fuzzy on the details: does Dumbledore actually say that Voldemort is like he is because he was born out of a loveless union, or is that something that came out later in interviews and was meant to be understood as allegorical rather than literal?

Third: As i've said before, i don't think Voldemort is incapable of love just because of how Merope tricked Riddle, but because of the Gaunts' generational inbreeding. It's a metaphor for him not being right in the head, and incest (which is strongly implied, even if not to Merope directly) having fucked up consequences on people. As anyone who has discovered hidden incest in their family's past will tell you, even when you don't know about it, it has a way of poisoning your life. Voldemort's ideology is essentially that wizards should not mix with Muggles less they become less pure, but as we see taken to the extreme that position only leads to decay (the Gaunts are poor in everything, wealth, status, health, even magic).

And fourth: people who say that Voldemort became a bad person because of Dumbledore's treatment are straight up living in their own fanon version of events and not in an interesting way. They're annoying to me, much like Snape stans. Tom Jr is a psychopath, full stop. I swear the way some people misrepresent Dumbledore as the root of all evil really echoes the people treat JKR these days sometimes, it's extraordinarily poor reading comprehension.

[hollow-lime-green]

hello oh great fanfiction community !

i saw a stsg big bang event acc today and before that event gets rolling, i would like to say some words about fan events and specifically big bangs in general - without targeting any specific event, and maybe as some food for thought for the community/prospective event runners.

under the cut: the argument for a reverse bang (not femdom)

this is a bit of a ramble but i'm writing this as i have my coffee so you'll have to deal with it being a bit of a braindump.

so let me first just say that i love fan events and i extra love big bangs. the concept of teaming up with someone is awesome. you get to make friends, and specifically you are making friends with someone with a different but related hobby! (art vs writing)

that being said, in all fandom spaces i have ever been in - zines, events, general interaction - there is a pretty heavy favoritism towards artists. you can see this when you look at the number of artists slots in zines, relative levels of engagement in fanart vs fic posts, and, of course, in big bangs (artists select prompts, rather than writers).

now, i am not blaming artists for this (not fully - although sometimes this becomes entrenched in the space's culture, esp with zines and zine groups). there are actual reasons for this:

Zines - art takes up less space than fic - of course you can fit more of them in a zine. also, artists can do merch (imagine writing merch... fortune cookie slips?)

Likes - art is extremely quick to see and ingest, and then smash the like button. writing requires a bit more time investment and usually clicking to a second tab. it is very logical for art posts to get more engagement. (and i think the kind of engagement fics get is often more rewarding - i would not trade my comments for any number of likes. however this, and follower count which correlates, is a good general measure of 'popularity')

Big Bang/Prompt Selection - artists go "omgggg no i can't write the pitch i suck at writing!!"... and i'm going to be so real, i think they're right lmfao. i mean the answer is 'well git gud' but in my experience this is actually true, they struggle to write out pitches.

so yeah, there are real factors that drive artist power/popularity ahead of writers in these spaces. that can also influence the culture of how they are often given priority in fandom events. while i don't blame artists for that, it kinda sucks as a writer. often, as a writer, it can really feel like you're begging for scraps - limited zine spaces, engagement on posts, etc.

which is why big bangs are so great! as a writer, you get a buddy! we love buddies! (not that firefighter ship, i don't know her.) collaboration is great. as a writer, you get to pitch your ideas, and then some artist is gonna see your idea and be like "omg i love that idea" and then they claim you and you get to be buddies, right?

right?

well, this is where the equity problem can come back - because writers are the ones pitching first, they are still in the vulnerable position here. i've been in a few big bangs, and by the nature of this system (writer pitch, artist pick), you often will end up with writers who don't get a pitch claimed, or a situation where artists are pinch hitting and doubling up to make sure everyone is matched up.

which just doesn't feel great.

now, like i said, there are valid reasons for why writers pitch first - fic is more describable (there are events, it's not just a still), writers are better at words (tough to hear but true), and it also takes an ass ton of time and motivation to write (i have even seen some events where there's a big lead time on fic creation, then artists get paired later in the process).

but, consider, it is simply less fun this way. all of these events sort of function on the assumption that an artist will get inspired by fic/prompt - without giving writers the chance to do the same. for writers, there's no spontaneity in this process. we have to be in the driver's seat.

sometimes, a writer deserves to kick back with a pina colada and say "yeah bro what's the vision" as the artist says "ummm... idk i wanna do like.. pastels? kinda like, fluffy springtime? oh and here's a new rendering technique i want to try- [pulls out tablet]"

because the thing is, i can work with that, actually. i think a lot of writers can. all i need is a handful of tags - AU and some general mood indicators - and we can find something compelling to write. you wanna put the character in some ridiculous pinterest strappy outfit? i'll write the choreography of getting into/out of the ridiculous pintrest strappy outfit. you wanna do dark colors? oh the mood of this scene is about to be so dark colors. comic? bro i'll write the dialogue. that's part of why i've been so excited to write for tropefest! it's fun!!

so, a reverse bang, for the uninitiated, is exactly this: a big bang where artists pitch, and then writers select from those prompts.

they are cool and we should do them. thank you for listening to my ted talk. (who am i kidding this is definitely tedx)

[fairy-spring]

The new fandom discourse has certainly been, uh… interesting.

“All LU fans are the worst and can’t read! I hate how they dominate the fandom!”

“I hate Zelda fans who say we HAVE to play the games to enjoy fandom! They’re elitist gatekeepers who probably don’t even think BotW’s a real Zelda game!”

There are things about these blorbos that can really only be gleamed from an authentic playthrough, or at the very least watching someone else play it. Screenshots and headcanon and hearsay can only go so far, and it’s a very big reason why a chunk of the fandom (myself included) recommends doing a bit of research.

It’s not elitism, and it’s not gatekeeping. I literally just want y’all to enhance your experience with the fandom by having a greater understanding of the source material.

Engaging with the Zelda fandom solely through LU is, in my eyes, like engaging with Star Trek solely through the newer movies that came out.

Are you able to understand it by itself?

Sure.

Is there a lot of context that’s missing because they’re trying to call back these things that happened in the original series and you don’t understand why everyone cares so much about Khan and these dialogue parallels but something something it happened in the old one so???????

Yeah, it’s gonna be like that, too.

Honestly I can’t even say too much about LU fans not knowing stuff about the games, because I can’t even trust the Zelda fandom IN GENERAL to actually read anything that’s happening in them either.

A good chunk of the fandom honestly takes what “elder authorities” say on it at face value. I don’t think I need to repeat the whole incident I went through last year involving a certain someone and her thesis essay on Twilight Princess full of things that flat-out did not fucking happen.

Yet, hundreds, if not thousands of guests on tumblr have seen that essay, and they take it as the big “holy shit tp was so dark” essay instead of sitting down and actually thinking about the words that were written.

But I digress.

Yeah, LU has dominated most of the fandom. Arguably the reason why we have so many linksmeetau’s is because of how much Linked Universe exploded.

Do I like it?

No.

Do I understand all the LU x Reader stuff I see everywhere or all the fanon that was made just for this AU?

Not even a little.

Does that mean I should dunk on people who do?

Absolutely not!

I of all people am in no position to talk when it comes to weird fandom things. I ship Link with an OC. My literal favorite one is FIRST HERO. Who ain’t even CANON. Everything I have for him is SHIT I MADE UP!!

But ya know what?

I still know how to fucking READ!!!!!

You know what? Fuck it, I’m taking everything back.

I AM gatekeeping!

NOBODY’S allowed to touch the Zelda fandom until they learn some god damn READING COMPREHENSION!!

I’m kidding, of course.

But seriously like. Learn your fandom.

Linked Universe isn’t the source of every headcanon ever, and Linked Universe didn’t kill your grandma, okay?

You don’t have to be freaks like me and my husband, who pore over every in-game and meta detail for the sake of an AU. But I strongly encourage everyone to watch a playthrough of other Zelda games. And if you can play them, that’s even better!

Also like.

The headcanon of ALttP Link and Zelda being siblings doesn’t belong to Linked Universe. That’s a general fandom headcanon.

Just thought I’d clear that up.

[slfcare]

the most difficult thing about growing as a person socially, as in getting out of your shell and noticing that you are, is that there will still be times when it doesn’t feel like you’ve grown at all! times when you can’t really connect with anyone around you, times when you fail to enter into an existing conversation, times when you say the wrong thing (or nothing at all when in hindsight you probably should’ve). but that’s also kind of the best thing, because that’s the thing that helps you realize that sometimes, it’s not you or your lack of skills or any shortcoming. sometimes certain environments just aren’t for you and certain people aren’t your people, and that’s okay. that’s human. it’s okay to not feel the progress you have made all the time.

[fjordfolk]

every time someone in a discussion about breeding for BOAS reduction in pugs says to 'look up this program called Retromops' i slip a little arsenic into the produce section at the grocery store

[littencloud9]

why am i seeing fanfic discourse on my tl in 2025. hello

“i have the freedom of speech and i can comment whatever i want especially when the thing is published publicly” and “fic authors are posting out of a labour of love and you giving UNWARRANTED criticism is, in fact, rude as fuck” are statements that can coexist idk what to tell you. yes you can say whatever you want but you ARE going to be regarded as a little cowardly asshole. because you are

[vaguely-concerned]

there's a self-help/mental health adjacent post that's going around and it seems to be really helpful for a lot of people which is very good. I also personally hate it with all my fucking heart

[dark-falz]

ALRIGHT so now that its been two years, I still stand by the Hermetic approach, since Hermeticism applies different religions to their Theurgy, as well as Alchemy and Astrology (but I still don't have much explanation to the Zodiac signs on the Falz seal)

Here's an updated take on the seal with the elements in their proper positioning, as well as all the translated info on the MOTHER-project (mags) from the Book of Hunters. Sorry its a bit sloppy it was quite the pain in the ass to get all the text together

Since I didn't have much on it before, alchemy is given to us in many forms. From Montague's end the main use of it went into making Mags. To summarize the image text; Mags are artificial intelligence armor units made (mainly) by Dr. Montague from D-Cells, that summon the Great Light. D-Cells come from Falz, a divine (evil) entity. "Light makes darkness, a pair exists, but it doesn’t always exist.-" - Rico Tyrell

"That which is above is like to that which is below, and that which is below is like to that which is above" - The Emerald Tablet

Modern saying; As above so below

Examples: Light/Dark, Yin/Yang, pure/evil, magnets. Concept of duality. Dark can make light as they're both "divine" elements, two sides of the same coin. The emotional AI was likely created as a way to transmute the element of dark to light, following belief of mankind being inherently "good". The mirages Mags give us are based on ancient creatures from Coral, which were not affected by D-Factor until the asteroid came to Coral and the abnormal photons were discovered, which ultimately lead them to Ragol in the first place. I believe Photon Mirages are what a D-Cell contaminated version of those ancient creatures would look like.

We watch as Ult, who's AI was not complete, is taken over by D-Factor. Similar to Vol Opt attacking the hunters, and Calus leading Elly to likely be used as a host. However, Elenor is not affected, like our mags, because Eleanor is literally the Mother Mag.

Elenor possesses a super-powered emotional AI, unlike that of her prototype/big sister Ult, and has more emotion than both Shino and Kireek. Kireek himself becomes corrupted by D-Cells. (I'll need to properly navigate the story missions for examples)

in the 2000s a manga that was released called "Chobits" follows a similar concept. For example, Persocoms are humanized "personal computers", but "Chobits" have true emotion and will. In this sense, typical CASTs such as Shino and Kireek are Persocoms, Elenor is a Chobit.

On Osto's end, it went more into making bio-weapons and his own AIs: Calus, Vol Opt (of which were likely unintentional) and Olga. After Heathcliff Flowen was injured by Falz and contaminated with D-Factor, Osto merged Flowen with his AI, Olga, to create Olga Flow. Flowen/Olga Flow possesses the Parasitic Gene "Flow" after mutation. The Parasitic Gene "Flow" plus the "Parasitic Cell type D" is what overloaded Falz and caused the explosion we're all familiar with. (Similar to how mags overload and need to generate the Photon Blast) Could this also have something to do with Olga's AI's purpose being communication? Maybs. Flowen could communicate with us through the Olga terminals throughout the seabed, it could be likely Olga could communicate with Falz as well, being that the D-Cells want to constantly evolve, if they mixed with the Parasitic Gene "Flow". Olga Flow also has Mags, Gael and Giel, and attempts to speak to you, unlike Falz. It is believed he says; "I am Olga Flow, the ultimate of evolution" at the start of the fight before he drops down. This makes sense given what the D-Factor is known for, its will to evolve.

Tumblr won't let me add the mp3 audio so here is the speech from my Google Drive

(fuck you Tumblr)

"Ultimate" is the clearest sounding word to me

These are hunters who have been injured by D-Cell contaminated enemies in the Ruins. This is likely why Zoke demanded Shino to not leave Pioneer 2.

In fact the consistency for the abnormal photons is so strong the closer you get to Falz, I assume it causes the hunter to hallucinate these occurrences.

And if the hunter gets injured by a D-Cell type enemy, its over for them.

I mean we SEE D-Cells floating around in the Ruins 3

Here they are freely floating around the room just before the Falz pipe (if you're not playing a mission)

We also have Virus Armor: Lafuteria, which is made with a combination of items, including "Parasitic Cell Type D"

Obviously we have them harnessing Photon Energy, but they've been doing that for a long time now. I'd say its definitely more of an established science than alchemy, which is "fuck around and find out" with humans, AI, and the Divine alike.

Or, maybe the people who came up with this shit had no idea it was all gonna make sense from an occult standpoint.

I realized I wasn’t paying attention to spell check and “seperatre” is suppose to be “separate” but it’s too late for me to fix ok ok so the Algolian Seal is based of a Hexagram seal right ok we’re here. …..drawing this up was easy but explaining it will not be…I apologize for sloppiness in advance.

The rotating bits I think. So the entire seal itself rotates in use, but the highlighted parts rotate differently. In a seal, this would mean these are the roots for power/energy/magic to be created. The phrase “I wish it at an alliance from several years ago” can be considered an “invocation chant”. The planets are the natural (you could even say natal HEH) source of power this magic would take from, which is why they are also rotating.

Also note the planets with the rule of 3 in the seal. Yes there’s the 3 planets but looking across the seal those planets are in line with 2 more circles. This signifies the structure and how I came to the conclusion the Algolian seal is based off a Hexagram seal, as shown in the Lesser Key of Solomon. And now we know this is based of Abrahamic religions. However, when it comes to the general magic premise of Phantasy Star, I believe they took a more Hermetic approach to it based on the use of Zodiac symbols on Falz’s arena, the use of planets as power, mention of reincarnation in seals, and how they mention “Crowley” in PSP2I. (but we aren’t in that universe yet. Go ahead and google “Crowley” tho you’ll find him.) Hermetics also largely deal with Theurgy, which is what magic circles would be used in. (Theurgy is working with Divine through ritual, invocation or envocation, and can even get into possession. The ultimate goal in Theurgy is to unite with the Divine)  But, alchemy is huge in Hermeticism, and I do feel there is a lack of alchemy references. Unless I’m missing them but I’ve been really going out of my way. It could be on a science level beyond my understanding, and relevant to Photon energy. Dr. Montague using corrupt Photon energy from monsters to make weapons is something I’ve considered, but I’d also like to know more about Dr. Osto and his experiments. There’s also, you know, the whole turning things into things using things which is a totally valid point but maybe I wanna know the how’s and why’s to that too ok.

Keep reading

[guttersvoice]

thinking about this today.

[wonder-worker]

"[Elizabeth Woodville] was the only member of [Crown Prince Edward of Westminster's] original 1471 council not already on the king’s council and her name headed the list of those appointed as administrators in Wales during Edward’s minority. [She remained on the council after it was expanded in 1473 and granted new governing and judicial powers]."

"In 1478 Prince Richard married the Mowbray heiress. Like his elder brother he had a chancellor, seal, household and council to manage his estates. His council, like that of Prince Edward, comprised the queen [Elizabeth Woodville] and a group of magnates and bishops, few of whom were Woodville supporters. [...] It was Elizabeth who mattered, for Richard resided with her and Rivers treated his affairs as their own."

— J.L. Laynesmith, The Last Medieval Queens: English Queenship 1445-1503 / Michael Hicks, Richard III and his Rivals: Magnates and their Motives in the Wars of the Roses