abstract and modern art haters are sooo snobby like klein literally Created an entirely new pigment and then painted a canvas in a way where the brush strokes wouldn't be visible. the insinuation that people with no skill could reproduce that is so annoying because unless you are skilled at color mixing and painting you definitely couldn’t lmao
137K notes
·
View notes
Attempting to get to where we were, I got an incredibly unlikely success on the Rhetoric check. I think this scene is also really good so consider this a little bonus.
RHETORIC [Heroic: Success] - The question you mean to ask is both very complicated and incredibly simple...
"If the whole theory we're meant to believe is completely unfalsifiable..."
"If we can't even agree whether communism is about plasm or psychology or beans..."
"If we can't escape the doom that's coming..."
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - The young man waits patiently for you to finish.
"... and the rest of world conspires to invade and massacre us when we dare to stand up for our beliefs..."
"... and whenever we *do* try it just devolves into a corrupt farce..."
"... and we waste all our time arguing over who's secretly a liberal or not..."
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "Yes?"
VOLITION [Easy: Success] - Say it.
"..what's the point?"
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - The young man considers your words for a minute.
COMPOSURE [Medium: Success] - You're witnessing his ironic armour melt before you. This is his *true self* you're seeing now.
EMPATHY [Formidable: Failure] - There's something going on in there, but his innermost sanctum is still beyond your reach...
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "The theorists Puncher and Wattmann -- not infra-materialists, but theorists nonetheless -- say that communism is a secular version of Perikarnassian theology, that it replaces faith in the divine with faith in humanity's future..."
"I have to say, I've never *entirely* understood what they mean, but I think maybe the answer is in there, somewhere."
"Wait, you're saying communism is some kind of religion?"
"But what if you don't believe there *is* a future?"
"But what if humanity keeps letting us down?"
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "Only in this very specific sense. Communism doesn't dangle any promises of eternal bliss or reward. The only promise it offers is that the future can be better than the past, if we're willing to work and fight and die for it."
2. "But what if humanity keeps letting us down?"
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "Nobody said fulfilling the proletariat's historic role would be easy." A tight smile. "It demands great faith with no promise of tangible reward. But that doesn't mean we can simply give up."
"Even when they ignore us?"
"Even when they laugh at us?"
"Even when they shoot at us?"
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "Especially then."
ECHO MAKER - "And of course, we'll be shooting right back."
VOLITION [Easy: Success] - So young. So *unbearably* young...
HALF LIGHT [Medium: Success] - Why do you see the two of them with their backs against a bullet-pocked wall, all of a sudden?
INLAND EMPIRE [Easy: Success] - Their faces, blurred yet frozen as though in ambrotype. You were never *that young*, were you?
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "I guess you could say we believe it *because it's impossible*." He looks at the scattered matchboxes on the ground. "It's our way of saying we refuse to accept that the world has to remain... like this..."
"Broken."
"Unfinished."
Say nothing.
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "Yes, that's a good way to think of it, broken, but not irreparable."
"It's a nice thought."
"I don't know if I believe it, though."
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "You've got to believe in *something*. Otherwise, what are you doing?"
EMPATHY [Easy: Success] - His words aren't really directed at you. He's wrestling with himself now...
ECHO MAKER - "Steban, it's getting pretty late."
Ok, that's the end of that diatribe. Rejoin me for the canonical version of events shortly.
103 notes
·
View notes