#<- evidence is circumstantial as every theory is but it does give a interesting (but twisted) writhing movement that GFreddy does in ucn

[carrotkicks]

golden child

[mardereads19]

Do you think that SJM put the truth teller as a bridge of connection between elain and azriel because it will show the truth about them in some moment on elain book. I think it would show the truth open a secret between their relationship like what they truly supposed to do together

First, hi @evavalentina19 ! Your name is gorgeous (assuming that’s your name)!!!

To answer your question; yes, I do think there is a chance. But mostly I think it is very symbolic of their relationship. Listen, I am a firm believer that Azriel and Elain are mates, because

The mate behavior is there. There are SO many moments. EVERY moment, I’d dare say. ESPECIALLY Acowar and Acosf.

There must be a reason why Azriel can smell elucien’s mating bond when no one but Amren could smell feysand’s after it clicked (And elucien’s already clicked, but there has been no acceptance, no union. Even Nessian’s mating bond didn’t come through until that one night. Before then, they just reeked of sex and each other.).

The whole “If anyone can sense if something is amiss, it’s a mate” scene in Acowar.

And the links between elucien’s bond and spells. I won’t talk about that now, but it’s here, if you’d like to read.

And if I had to add a fifth item to that list, it’d be:

5. The truth imagery going on between elriel.

You already brought up Truth-teller, and here is a post by @daisymydaisy that amazingly explores what powers it has and even supports your theory!

If Elriel turns out not to be mates, then truth-teller could still symbolize that true love. But I think that they were always meant to find each other, as the whole “three brothers with three sisters” thing and “the cauldron chose two sisters to mate with two of those brothers, but gave the third one to another” debate. The truth imagery behind everything, especially Truth-Teller (Teller of the Truth) being the only bridge between them, when the mating bond is described as a bridge between souls, is very unsubtle!!

There is also Morrighan, whose powers are truth!

Mor is part of the equation when we discuss elriel. She was, for almost his entire life, Azriel’s love interest. And, as I’ve stated here, is still a stake in the elriel book. Even if she did not make an appearance, which I highly doubt, there still remains the question: how does he feel about her now? Is he truly over her? Yes, we might know from circumstantial evidence in acosf that he is, but ex-lovers like Greyson and un-required-pinning-afters like Azriel with Mor are still part of the story. We all want to know how and when it happened. When did Elain stop thinking about Greyson exactly? When did Azriel notice Elain in a romantic way for the first time and did he even notice that Mor had become less of an interest? So, from the get-go, Mor is tied up into this.

What makes it so interesting is the fact that Mor’s power is truth, and that she has some sort of role in elriel’s love story (be it passive or active), since she knows something both the readers and the other characters don’t know!

Mor’s powers are truth! And, honestly, that’s pretty much all we know about them. But according to the way the rest is written, I figure out Mass is only giving us bits and pieces here and there, because she fully plans on showing us Mor’s powers when it’s most convenient in the next books. I’d bet that we’ll learn some more during elriel’s book if this post is right.

We all know our seer girl is observant, but Morrighan is, too. And this scene pictures her staring at the space where Azriel used to be standing before winnowing away. Seconds before, Elain was talking about her vision.

We don’t know what Mor was thinking of, but I doubt SJM wrote her looking at that spot if it weren’t because she was observing something in Azriel. It could even be as simple as noticing how Azriel listens to Elain because he understands her—like even Feyre points out later on—or something as complicated as sensing something between him and Elain. The point is, she was staring, and we got to read about it.

By Acofas, she already knows something neither the readers nor the other characters know, but she does not interfere. And, judging by her powers, whatever she knows is true, and the conviction in her voice is a giveaway of the faith she has it will come to pass.

That convo could be regarded as a strong elucien hint, if it hadn’t been for this other one that happened before:

Here, she does not respond to the comment of Elain giving back Truth-Teller, but hums (not at all telling of something wink wink).

It was her who brought to attention how Azriel won’t give-up Truth-Teller for any of Mor’s (his all-time crush, no-one-thought-he-would-ever-get-over-he-loves-her-too-much-is-obsessed-with-would-look-at-her-with-pain-in-his-eyes-but-somehow-still-get-laid-with-secret-lovers love interest) gifted blades, but that he did give it up to Elain (who we know now is driving him wild with desire and want and he would go to a store to buy her a thoughtful gift for solstice and we have heard nothing about still having those secret lovers since he began to skip family dinners and burn calories on the gym they have above the house of wind at night to ignore how he wants flower girl instead of heading to town to find one of those secret lovers even the shadows worry for him), who at the moment, was supposed by everyone to be only Az’s high lady’s sister.

Why would Mor go out of her way to remind Feyre that Azriel did something for Elain that he wouldn’t even do for Mor? Why would SJM write that convo if she hadn’t been nudging us to remember and realize how big that scene was, too? This convo alone says “hey, look at elriel!” and so when Mor says “It’ll sort itself out. It always does” and reiterates that all of them will be happy, immediately we understand that something is afoot here including Azriel, and Mor knows about it. She knows the outcome. We know too.

Now, this is a theory, but I wonder if we will see the Veritas Orb also playing a role (like you said about truth teller) in exposing the truth of Elriel (be it them as a secret couple in Acotar 5 or their mating bond).

It belonged to Mor’s family for millennia and it carries the same truth magic. So I feel like it could tie up. I haven’t read any theories or posts on this, but if there are, I’d appreciate anyone who points it out to me so I can read!

And lastly, there is also the whole True Mates thing SJM showed us in CC2.

The wording is too precise, me thinks. And it’s another wink at mate behavior. Who went ballistic-in-the-way-only-mates-can-when-the-other-is-threatened when Elain was taken by Hybern? Who went ballistic-in-the-way-only-mates-can-when-the-other-is-threatened when Cassian said Nesta had a fight with Elain? Who went ballistic-in-the-way-only-mates-can-when-the-other-is-threatened when Nesta called Elain a snoozefest and said she was finally growing claws? (He was ready to risk it all with those shadows like snakes preparing to strike.)

Conclusion

I wrote all of that to say that yes, I think there is a chance that truth-teller might be involved with revealing the truth about Elriel and, for those of us who believe they are mates, about their mating bond.

It could be by revealing it to someone alone (like Azriel finding out somehow through it) or to a group of people or to everyone, but Truth-Teller could also just be symbolic (along with the rest I discussed above). Something else could be what exposes their relationship (like the Veritas Orb, a kiss in dramatic fashion in front of everyone when one of them barely survives in a battle of some kind, or one of them screaming “BECAUSE I LOVE THEM!” during an argument with Rhysand, etc.) No matter what, the iconic blade plays some part in their relationship. A symbol at the very least. “True love lies between these two holding me,” it’s certainly saying.

The possibilities on what exposes Elriel are endless and I only hope it is as climatic as we make it out to be in our fanfics and theories and headcanons!

Anyway, that is my take on it. Sorry to keep you waiting for a couple of days, I hope my answer was worth it!

[obviouslygenuinely]

Babygate Analysis/Conclusions: A Non-Larry Perspective

(Image Credit: Hollywood Life)

I'm prefacing this post with a few disclaimers:

After some consideration, I chose to write this without factoring in Larry whatsoever. No Larry-related points, proof, or speculation in any way. This is solely analyzing babygate from an unbiased perspective. 

I don't claim to know the entire truth. It is impossible for any of us to know.  What I conclude is based on direct evidence, circumstantial evidence, research, and analysis.

I am willing to discuss opposing views. I’m happy to talk about the topic in a civil, kind, and mature matter. I will dismiss any discourse that is aggressive, immature, and so on.

I did not include every single opinion/conclusion/piece of evidence I found. I condensed my thoughts as much as possible (and this is still a novel-length post). There are so many more points I can think of. However, babygate masterposts cover all of that; I’ll link to some of those at the end.

The conclusion points aren't in a very specific order. I aimed to list related points one after another. Aside from that, it's not in order of "hardest to weakest" evidence.

Please read “Author’s Notes” for additional clarity/input. They interject thoughts/etc. that I feel are necessary to include. 

Lastly, I included links to every source I cited in this post. However, I did not tag the Tumblr users. I’m not sure if they are comfortable with having Babygate questions/comments directed to their blogs. If you are a linked source and want to be tagged, please let me know! 

My Initial Reaction To Babygate

In February of 2020, I received several messages on LateToLarry requesting that I analyze something called “babygate”. I had no idea what babygate meant at the time. 

I learned what it meant, and prior to any research I felt the theory was so absurd. I also felt uncomfortable analyzing it because I believed I’d feel bias as a single mom. The idea of discussing a random child in depth initially bothered me, too. I declined to analyze it last year.

However, I did a LOT of research over time. My opinion has changed significantly. Below, I’ve shared my main conclusions and analysis about babygate. Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy my post! 

1. No Paternity Test Was Performed Prior To The Pregnancy Announcement

Louis was/is a prominent celebrity and has a current net worth of $70 million. From legal, financial, and practical standpoints, it makes no sense for him to choose not to get a test. 

It’s unheard of in Hollywood and the entertainment industry. Any sensible team -lawyers, PR reps, managers, advisors, etc. - would not just go along with it. They are employed to protect his career and image. 

The Opposing Views

A. “Briana/Louis didn’t want to risk miscarriage with prenatal testing.”

Non-invasive testing is completely safe for fetuses and pregnant women, so there’s no medical reason for the lack of testing.

B. “Louis chose not to get the test done because he wanted to be a father and was invested in the pregnancy/parenting.”

Time has shown that this is not true. Louis does not have custody; there was a brief custody case in 2016 that led nowhere. He does not have a consistent or prominent role in the child’s life.

Conclusion

There is no logical reason for the lack of paternity testing prior to the announcement unless Louis knew he was not the father and all parties knew this to be true.

2. There Was No Confirmation Of A Paternity Test After The Birth

I’ll keep this section fairly short. A quick Google search returns dozens of conflicting reports. Many of them state that Louis demanded a paternity test shortly after birth. Other reports state that he has never pursued a paternity test. 

Here are a few examples:

“Louis Tomlinson not interested in paternity test” - Business Standard

“EXCLUSIVE: Louis Tomlinson Demanded a DNA Test “As Soon as the Baby Was Born”” - InTouch Weekly

“Louis Tomlinson: No DNA Test Needed ... Positive Freddie's His Son” -TMZ

“Louis Tomlinson & Briana Jungwirth: WhyHe Had DNA Test Done on His Newborn Son” - Hollywood Life

This Twitter thread discusses TMZ reports that - as of 2020 - no DNA test was done.

Conclusion

There is no reliable confirmation that Louis pursued a paternity test. The media cannot come to a general/factual consensus.

Again, there is no reasonable explanation for the lack of paternity testing unless Louis knows he is not the father of the child. 

3. The Conception-To-Birth Timeline Is Inconsistent/Unreliable

Pregnancy and conception as a whole can be rather confusing; timelines from conception to birth are unique to each person. Having said that, Briana’s timeline is full of glaring inconsistencies that don’t add up. 

I’ll begin with this timeline based on bulletprooflarry’s post and my own research. Dates I’ve added myself include linked sources:

May 5th, 2015 - Louis and Briana were first seen together in public.

May 6th to May 31st, 2015 - Briana and her mom followed baby-related social medial accounts.

May 12th, 2015 - Louis and Briana were pictured together in public.

July 3rd, 2015 - Louis is seen with Briana’s brother in Hollywood.

July 14th, 2015 - The first pregnancy report is published.

August 4th, 2015 - Louis confirms pregnancy on GMA.

January 21st, 2016 - The child is reportedly born.

Based on the dates above, these are the possible dates/milestones for her pregnancy:

Scenario A - If conception occurred on May 5th, Briana was 37 weeks and 2 days pregnant on January 21st, 2016. This is considered an early-term birth and about 26% of births occur at 37 weeks.

Scenario B - If conception occurred on May 12th, Briana was 36 weeks and 2 days pregnant on January 21st. This is considered a late-term or late premature birth and about 10% of births occur at 36 weeks.

These dates matter because Briana’s alleged hospital stay was not consistent with a premature or early-term birth. She was pictured in public - healthy and holding a baby carrier - within one week of giving birth. 

(Image Credit: Daily Mail)

(Image Credit: larrysbbrbb28)

If she gave birth based on the dates above, it’s extremely unlikely that she or the baby would be out in public so soon.

Below are screenshots of an additional timeline from an archived Tumblr post. It provides excellent points about more timeline inconsistencies: 

The main inconsistencies and red flags are bolded in the post. It supports the unreliable conception timeline, and it also mentions my next point - the official pregnancy announcement. 

The post above mentions that the Jungwirth family followed baby-related accounts before Briana could possibly know she was pregnant. Here’s one screenshot from skepticallarrie proving it:

I’ve also seen several posts that show inconsistencies with the size of Briana’s baby bump. Unfortunately, the most reliable post no longer exists. You can view a web archive of Briana’s pregnancy photos, but most of the image links are broke. 

The only post I have saved is a web archive of a long babygate post. The beginning of the post contains photos showing discrepancies in the size of Briana’s baby bump. 

The Opposing Views

“Pregnancy looks different on everybody, everyone recovers differently, etc.”

Yes, this is true and a valid point! As a woman who has gone through multiple pregnancies and two live births, I truly understand this argument. 

However, the sheer amount of inconsistencies are what make this a red flag. There are too many unreliable and contradicting points to brush this off. It goes beyond the point of “well, each person has a different experience”.

Conclusion

There are a few conclusions/scenarios I believe you can draw from the information above:

Briana was pregnant prior to meeting Louis.

Briana was never pregnant in the first place. 

Both are valid to consider, but I personally believe she was never pregnant. 

(Author’s note: My calculation for dates are based on the date of alleged conception. Most due date calculators, by default, use the date of a woman’s last mentrual period - LMP - to provide estimations.

I also used Date Duration Calendar for my calculations. Accessible due date calculators only allowed me to input dates from 2019/2020. Depending on the tools and dates you use, your mileage may vary.)

4. The Announcement Itself Was Highly Unusual

This point ties into the first and third points. I don’t consider it a major piece of evidence, but it’s noteworthy due to the other points. 

So, there are a few reasons why the Good Morning America announcement stands out. 

A. If Briana got pregnant on May 5th, then she was approximately 10 weeks pregnant when the first pregnancy report was published. This also means she was approximately 13 weeks pregnant at the time of the GMA announcement.

If Briana got pregnant on May 12th, she was approximately nine weeks pregnant at the time of the first report and approximately 12 weeks pregnant at the time of the GMA announcement.

B. The public announcement on Good Morning America raises a lot of questions. I’ve had multiple issues embedding the video; the bolded link takes you to the GMA announcement on YouTube. 

Anyways, these questions/thoughts - disregarding any Larry theories -  come to mind when watching the video: 

This is a segment for promoting/discussing their album/music.

The baby announcement is the sole non-album/music related topic that is mentioned during the segment.

The announcement is not organically worked into the segment as a natural talking point.

Louis’ reactions - such as bringing the microphone to his lips and not talking - is very unlike his standard interview demeanor.

The male interviewer and the band members have noticeable facial expressions and body language that suggest discomfort, stress, or awkwardness. 

A post by skepticalarrie draws similar conclusions. Her post is much more detailed than mine, and I highly recommend reading/viewing it. 

(Author’s Note: I’ve touched upon this on LateToLarry and will make a post here eventually, but body language and facial expressions are valid. They’re valid to the point that they are used in court cases.) 

Conclusion

My conclusions here are twofold. One is that: 

Announcing a pregnancy - especially a celebrity-related pregnancy - this early is extremely uncommon and unlikely.

The announcement itself seems out of place and very forced. 

This particular point, to me, is not extremely strong evidence. I still think it’s worth keeping in mind and is relevant to other points here. So, I’ve included it either way.

5. Briana Posted Stolen Pregnancy/Baby Photos On Social Media

(EDIT: I wrote this piece before the recent release of Briana’s alleged ultrasound and don’t have time to add it. It’s pretty strong proof and can easily be found in recent babygate posts.)

Babygate posts often point out that Briana and the Jungwirth family used stolen/fake pregnancy and baby photos on social media. It’s a well-known topic that’s often discussed. 

I’m condensing this section to a few examples. I encourage additional research if you’d like to see more. 

A. This Tumblr post shows stolen baby bump photos that Briana’s cousin Ashley posted on Twitter: 

B. This Tumblr post and Twitter post show a stolen baby photo that Briana posted on Instagram:

(Author’s Note: Since I was not active in the fandom at the time, I am relying on information from other blogs and social media posts. I vetted my sources pretty well, but any false information is my own mistake.)

Conclusions

The only word that sums this up is “suspicious”. Using stolen photos of a pregnant woman/baby is not necessary if you are legitimately pregnant. That’s really what it boils down to. It lends to the conclusion that Briana was never pregnant. 

6. Photos And Videos Of The Child Are Heavily Altered And Manipulated

It is indisputable that many photos and videos of the child are heavily manipulated to alter his appearance. This goes beyond filters, lighting, and angles. 

Several detailed posts show the manipulations; here are some examples:

A web archive of all Photoshop evidence from tellmethisisnotlove

An in-depth post from genuineconspiracy that includes detailed photo evidence.

A video post from freefreddiereign that shows Photoshop evidence based on photos the child. 

There is no doubt that his facial features are frequently altered. This is easy to conclude using any free software that detects Photoshop. As a photographer myself, I can easily spot the manipulations.

(Author’s Note: I know that directly discussing the child is controversial. When I first heard of babygate, my initial reaction was discomfort about analyzing a child.

I quickly learned/concluded that his family members are responsible for heavily putting him in the public eye. All content I’ve used for research is based on the family’s posts.

Still, I have personally chosen not post pictures of the child, but the links I am sharing contain photos/videos of him.

Additionally, I used FotoForensics on photos of myself prior to writing this. It was important to me to feel absolutely certain about this point. I’m fine with sharing my own FotoForensics images if anyone is curious.)

The Opposing Views

A. “Freddie looks like Louis in pictures that aren’t Photoshopped.”

Parentage cannot be based on whether or not a child looks like his mother/father. I understand the viewpoint, but it’s simply not evidence. Additionally, thinking the child looks like Louis is a matter of opinion. 

There’s also the fact that appearance means nothing overall. Science backs up this statement very well. Examples and references:

“How can children from the same parents look so different?” by HowStuffWorks

“My Baby Looks Nothing Like Me: A Genetic Explanation” by FamilyEducation

Additionally, here is a personal anecdote. I have two sons close to Freddie’s age. One of them looks exactly like his father and nothing like me. The other looks exactly like me and nothing like his father. Despite how they look, they are both of them are our biological children. 

Conclusion

There is no reasonable explanation for altering the child’s appearance - particularly to make him look more similar to Louis. 

I cannot think of a single argument as to why the Jungwirth family would do this unless they need/want the child to look a specific way. 

7. Johannah Deakin’s Official Obituary Does Not Mention The Child

When looking into babygate, I read the argument that the child is legitimately Louis’ son because he is listed as her grandchild in Internet-based obituaries and announcements. 

I also read the counter-argument that Louis’ mother’s official newspaper/print obituary does not mention the child.  I recall seeing proof, but I did not save it at the time. I did some research and this appears to be true. 

The Doncaster Free Press is a local weekly newspaper in Doncaster, and it published an article about the funeral. The article is NOT an obituary itself, but it does list her obituary details. The publication does not list the child among the surviving family members. 

If a mistake is made regarding these details, it’s typical for newspapers to post a correction addressing a misprint. Upon further research, the Doncaster Free Press did not issue a correction at any time. 

(Author’s Note: I lost my own mother and am personally familiar with how local obituaries are written. Immediate family members - i.e. spouses and adult children - provide information regarding surviving family members.) 

Conclusion

The conclusion here is straightforward. Louis and his family chose not to include the child in his mother’s official obituary. This strongly suggests that he is not legitimately related to Louis. 

My Opinion-Based Conclusions

Update: After some consideration, I am saving my opinion-based conclusions for a separate post. I originally intended to include them here; transparency is important to me.

Unfortunately, the section became rather long and took away from the main post points. So, I’ll be working on a post that’s just my opinion-based conclusions. In the meantime, feel free to message me with any questions. 

Final Thoughts

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for taking the time to read my post! I appreciate the interest expressed for it, and I hope it lives up to expectations. 

Again, I want to reiterate this is:

Not an all-inclusive post; I narrowed down my findings to seven points.

Not a masterpost on babygate.

Purposely omitting any potential Larry-related points to remove bias. 

I’ve reread this quite a few times, and it’s as error-free as possible. If you spot any mistakes/errors, I’m completely open to making corrections. Just kindly let me know. 

This list contains references/research about babygate that I consider the most reliable. It includes Larry and non-Larry related Babygate content.

Tumblr posts tagged with babygate by Tumblr use genuineconspiracy.

A web archive of babygate posts by Tumblr user tellmethisisnotlove (her account was deactivated by staff).

Tumblr posts tagged with babygate by darkrainbowlouis.

Tumblr posts tagged with babygate by skepticalarrie.

Lastly, if there’s interest in an opinion-related post or Larry-related post, I’ll consider writing them. Feel free to let me know as you all did with this post. 

Thanks!

Amy (obviouslygenuinely/latetolarry)

[bestworstcase]

a comprehensive guide to zhan tiri’s lore or, it’s not that confusing or contradictory, i promise

first things first: if you are somebody who pays attention to creator interviews and you are interested in canonical zhan tiri lore, i want you to gather up everything you’ve ever heard chris say about zhan tiri and erase it from of your brain. i know he’s made statements regarding his interpretation of her backstory but this post was made by death of the author gang and we are interested ONLY in what is stated and shown in the text itself. meaning belongs to the viewers, and creator interpretation is irrelevant. 

ready? let’s go!

who or what is zhan tiri?

zhan tiri’s first appearance in coronan history occurred thousands of years ago; in plus est en vous, rapunzel specifies two thousand, but every other mention of zhan tiri as a historical figure is “eons” or “millennia,” and the most objective source we have—the plus est flashback—is marked “thousands of years ago.”  

there is no direct evidence to suggest that she existed prior to this, but i think there is enough circumstantial support for this theory to conclude that she did: namely, the existence of idols and other religious iconography associated with her name. my reasoning here is as follows: 

the plus est en vous flashback shows demanitus banishing zhan tiri to the lost realm. this makes it—give or take a few years—the last point in time when zhan tiri would have been free and thus able to make any lasting cultural impact.

it follows that any relevant historical artifacts we see must predate the plus est flashback, as they represent a time when zhan tiri had a significant enough cultural impact to fuel their creation.

moreover, though sugracha and tromus are the only disciples of zhan tiri who directly appear in the series, it is implied that there are many more: 

Lord Demanitus was in a constant battle with Zhan Tiri and his brethren. Over the years, Demanitus captured many of the evil spirits and held them prisoner in that chamber. (S1, Painter’s Block)

much of the coronan folklore concerning the demanitus-zhan tiri relationship is... wrong, but due to sugracha’s verifiable imprisonment in the demanitus chamber, i feel it reasonable to conclude that this tidbit is correct in that there are, or at least were, other disciples held inside the demanitus chamber. and, as with the historical artifacts associated with zhan tiri, it is logical to conclude that whatever cult produced these disciples predated the plus est flashback. 

so, we’ve established the historical artifacts and iconography associated with zhan tiri came before the plus est flashback, but what exactly does that entail, and what does it tell us about zhan tiri’s true nature?

icons of zhan tiri: an overview

#1: janus point

janus point is a henge, and based on the iconography—the ram’s head symbol is plastered all over the jardinière and the henge pillars—it appears to be a site dedicated specifically to zhan tiri. the same symbol also appears on the seal in which sugracha’s spirit was trapped inside the demanitus chamber and is unique in that the muzzle appears to corkscrew.

the appearance of the henge evokes a quasi-religious flavor, and in who’s afraid of the big bad wolf, rapunzel refers to the site as a “mystical ground.” at the very least, this is a ritual site that was heavily associated with zhan tiri, and it would not be much of a stretch to conclude she was outright worshipped here.

#2: the spire idol

this artifact appears in both the keeper of the spire and race to the spire. it’s a small stone idol kept in the spire’s... gatehouse, for lack of a better term, and it depicts the basic ram-headed hulking demon zhan tiri. nothing is said about it in either episode. 

#3: the tree of zhan tiri

there is zhan tiri iconography all over this tree.

the stone ram’s head over the entrance...

...the bas-relief in the first chamber...

...more ram’s heads over all the interior archways and the scroll shelves...

...and a return of the corkscrew-snouted ram’s head from janus point on the altar for this glorious oversized flytrap.

#4: the shell house

tromus’s shrine gives us yet another variation on the ram’s head symbol as well as another full-body idol and also, though i didn’t get a screenshot of it because it’s hard to see with the way tumblr resizes images, a little ram’s head symbol on the clasp of his robes. 

so where did this imagery come from?

with the exception of the spire idol, there is evidence to suggest that zhan tiri herself had direct influence over the design of all this iconography. 

janus point seems to have held some importance to zhan tiri herself; when she appears to varian in cassandra’s revenge, she surrounds herself with pieces of it and superimposes her own head on top of the tree. 

further, the corkscrew-snouted ram’s head reoccurs at the great tree, which is unique among the sites associated with her in that we know zhan tiri actually resided there for what sounds like a significant amount of time; according to the legend adira shares, the great tree was zhan tiri’s “stronghold.”

this means that it’s plausible that either (a) zhan tiri herself shaped the symbols on display in the tree, or (b) they were modeled after her by her contemporaries. the interesting thing about this, there are four distinct variations on the ram’s head symbol inside the tree: 1) long, thick snout with elongated horns; 2) angular, no snout, short horns, 3) corkscrew-snouted, and 4) humanlike skull with ram horns. 

and likewise, the iconography inside the shell house was created by someone we know to have been a contemporary of zhan tiri’s; tromus was one of the students of demanitus who turned against him to join zhan tiri instead, and it is logical to assume that he did, in fact, see zhan tiri in the flesh at some point—and his ram’s head design is yet again different.

this begs the question: if all five of these designs were modeled on zhan tiri herself, why is there such variety in the basic shape? i believe this is a strong point in favor of considering zhan tiri a shapeshifter who chose and stuck with a single general form for long periods of time but casually and frequently modified the smaller details. and in fact, we do see her do this in season three, with the most notable occurrence being. this: 

so, we have concluded that: 

zhan tiri’s historical iconography predates the plus est flashback, and

accurately represented her physical appearance from that time

from this, the only reasonable conclusion is that zhan tiri is a shapeshifter, who spent a considerable amount of time in the giant, ram-headed demon form depicted in all of her pre-demanitus iconography. 

but she’s human in the plus est flashback!

in the series, human characters are designed with a wide diversity of shapes and sizes, but their color palettes stay within the range of realism, with natural skin tones and eye/hair colors. zhan tiri is... not like that.

she may be human-shaped, but her color palette sits drastically outside the norms the series has established for human characters; her skin is dead white, her hair is a dull lilac color, her eyes are bright purple with a circle of gold around the pupils. none of these are natural human colors.

there is precedent in the series for marked changes in appearance and coloration as a result of meddling with magical forces: when cassandra claims the moonstone, it turns her hair and eyes bright blue and gives her an unhealthy-looking pallor. rapunzel’s hair, likewise, turns gold due to the sundrop’s influence. thus, taking this in isolation, it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility to conclude that zhan tiri, too, has had her appearance altered by whatever magical nonsense she’s been mucking around with.

however, if we look at this design in the context of the conclusions we’ve already drawn about her historical iconography and what that tells us about her true nature, i think a much simpler and more plausible explanation is that zhan tiri, being a shapeshifter, donned this humanlike form in order to get closer to demanitus. there could be any number of reasons for doing so—considering demanitus’s fixation on seeking the drops for the right reasons, i would imagine creating some distance from the malevolent monster form in order to gain his trust would have played a role in this decision.

five final points in favor of shapeshifting

#1: zhan tiri in the lost realm

we see in plus est en vous that the lost realm causes absurd magical mutations in people who are trapped there. varian theorizes that these mutations could become irreversible if they stay in the lost realm for long enough, but given that they are all freed shortly thereafter and the changes revert, there is no concrete evidence for or against this theory.

still, this raises an interesting question: if the lost realm mutates anyone who enters it, and if these changes become irreversible after long periods of time what would happen if a shapeshifter was trapped there for thousands of years?

when zhan tiri escapes from the lost realm, she isn’t all that different in appearance from when she entered it. she’s much smaller. her hairstyle has changed a bit. she lost the bag at some point. but that’s... really it. it’s a much less drastic alteration than we see happening with the coronans, who are shown transforming into objects and animals, with their bodies distorted, or with pieces of themselves becoming detached and floating away. and these changes also serve her manipulation of cass by making her appear small, weak, and harmless, so it isn’t out of the realm of possibility for zhan tiri to have chosen this form for herself.

i think it is reasonable to assume that zhan tiri, being a shapeshifter herself, was able to, if not outright resist whatever magic in the lost realm causes these mutations, at least “fix” them as they happened. her brief appearance in painter’s block supports the idea that she retained the ability to shapeshift while inside the lost realm, since she appears there as the ram-headed demon.

#2: her shapeshifting disciples

both tromus and sugracha are able to appear human, and sugracha states that she can take “many forms” in painter’s block. though it’s never explained where they got this power, it is reasonable to conclude that they received it from zhan tiri—she is their master, and the implication very much seems to be that it was she who gave them their creepy green spirit form of immortality.

and, if zhan tiri is handing out powers of shapeshifting to her minions, it follows that she must be capable of shapeshifting herself, too. 

#3: gremlin zhan tiri’s demonic shadow

this shows up in cassandra’s revenge and plus est en vous and seems to straightforwardly suggest that zhan tiri’s true nature is closer to the ram-headed demon, with the humanlike form being more of a disguise.

#4: we see her shapeshift in plus est en vous.

she briefly loses her grip on the humanlike nature of the gremlin form when rapunzel blasts her with the sundrop, as i noted above. and later—once she has the drops in hand and the gremlin form has no further use to her—she sheds it altogether to return to yet another variation on the ram-headed demon, albeit one that looks more... monkey than ram: 

#5: and finally, zhan tiri herself says so

in race to the spire: 

I believe Cassandra promised us a proper introduction, but she failed to deliver, didn’t she? Frankly, I’m surprised you hadn’t guessed who I am—seeing as how we’ve already met, in a way. You see, over the centuries, I’ve taken the form of whatever suits my needs: a warlock, a demon... even a blizzard. 

she also portrays herself as the ram-headed demon in the vision she gives to cassandra in once a handmaiden:

now... zhan tiri is a liar, and if these were statements given in isolation of any supporting evidence, i would be skeptical. however, when all the evidence in the text points toward zhan tiri being a shapeshifting entity as the most logical explanation for everything we see of her throughout the series, i’m inclined to take her corroborating statements as a factual confirmation. 

in conclusion: zhan tiri is, and has always been, a shapeshifter. if she has a “true” form, the evidence points toward it being the large, ram-headed, tentacled demon, while the humanlike shape(s) we see in season three are forms she assumed to ingratiate herself to demanitus and, later, cassandra. 

what’s the timeline with her and  lord demanitus?

time in this series is fuzzy. this applies not only to zhan tiri and demanitus, but to every historical event discussed by the characters and the timespans covered by each season, where the only time markers are the lantern festivals that celebrate rapunzel’s nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first birthdays and a few throwaway lines about the passage of months. thus, there is no way to say with absolute certainly when any specific event in zhan tiri’s backstory occurred chronologically. we have to do our best to arrange the events we know about in an order that is logical. 

this is complicated by the fact that we know demanitus fudged some of the details to make himself look better to rapunzel and eugene: he obscured the fact that he and zhan tiri were working partners for an unknown length of time. this verifiable lie of omission casts a patina of doubt over everything else he says regarding their shared past, but it also accounts for discrepancies between what we see and what we’re told. 

as always in unreliable narrator situations, what we see has far more weight than what we’re told. with this in mind, there are three tiers of trustworthiness in the information we are given about zhan tiri’s past: most trustworthy are the flashbacks and things we see with our own eyes; in the middle are the accounts of zhan tiri’s contemporaries—demanitus and the disciples; and at the bottom are the folk legends recounted by xavier and adira. 

so what do we see?

#1: zhan tiri and demanitus searched for the drops together

just how this arrangement came to be is unclear, but i think we can glean some interesting information from the plus est flashback.

DEMANITUS: Zhan Tiri! This is your last warning! Give up this foolish quest for power.

ZHAN TIRI: This quest for the sundrop and moonstone was both of ours.

DEMANITUS: It was, until you made it about something darker. You made it all about gaining power for yourself! You turned your back on what was right!

ZHAN TIRI: And you turned your back on me. As long as I live, I will never stop until I have that power!

DEMANITUS: I know.

[He activates the portal to the Lost Realm.]

ZHAN TIRI: This is far from over! I will have that power, and when I do, I will destroy your beloved Corona! I promise you!

[The portal closes.]

DEMANITUS: I had no choice, Vigor. I had to send her to the Lost Realm.

this suggests a couple things.

first, the working relationship between demanitus and zhan tiri broke down because her selfish desire for power clashed with his idealism. demanitus didn’t want the power of the combined sundrop and moonstone for himself; he wanted to reunite them in the service of a cause he believed to be right. zhan tiri, by contrast, was interested solely in acquiring that power for herself—but given how demanitus reacted when he learned this, it seems obvious that he didn’t know that about zhan tiri until later in their relationship.

in other words, there was some level of deceit on her part involved with their partnership from the very beginning. she hid her true motives from him; she may also have hidden her true nature from him. i think there is support both for and against the latter point: in the present day, demanitus describes zhan tiri as “a warlock”—a word zhan tiri uses as an example of her duplicitous shapeshifting—but he also describes her as being “from another realm”—suggesting he knew her to be something otherworldly or inhuman. 

i tend to fall on the side of demanitus knowing her basic nature while they were contemporaries, but believing she shared his more noble motivations at first, but i think a strong argument could be made in favor of him believing her to be human from the start and only discovering her true nature later. 

second, demanitus appears to have cared for zhan tiri far more than she cared for him. in the flashback, she’s angry at his betrayal, but her focus is on her desire for the power of the sundrop and moonstone. by contrast, demanitus gives her plenty of warning and chances to turn away from her dark path, pleads with her to “give up” her selfish motivations, and expresses clear regret after her refusal forces him to banish her to the lost realm. 

this, again, supports the interpretation that zhan tiri manipulated or used  demanitus to further her own goals, just as she would later do with cassandra, rather than this being a true partnership that broke down as a result of differing goals. she doesn’t care about him any more than she cared about cass.

#2: zhan tiri’s behavior in season three

season three firmly establishes zhan tiri as a skilled manipulator who does not care about anyone or anything besides herself and her pursuit of her own power. i won’t get into the weeds with this—if you want to read a breakdown of (some) of zhan tiri’s manipulation of cass in season three, i wrote a post about once a handmaiden here—because for our purposes, we just need to understand that the basic character of zhan tiri as we see her in the present should inform our interpretation of her behavior in the past. 

in other words, i think it is safe to assume that zhan tiri applied similar techniques and principles of manipulation to demanitus as we see her do to cassandra in the present; to wit, she would have sought to make him emotionally dependent on her by exploiting whatever vulnerabilities she could find and presenting herself to him as a trustworthy friend and kindred spirit. 

#3: she is not close to her disciples

once she is freed, zhan tiri never so much as mentions tromus or sugracha again. moreover, it is unclear how much personal information they actually know about her: in painter’s block, sugracha refers to zhan tiri as “he,” which could indicate one of several things: 

zhan tiri is female, but her disciples don’t know her well enough for assumptions they made about her gender based on the appearance of the ram-headed demon form to have been corrected, or

zhan tiri doesn’t subscribe to human conceptualizations of gender, and both “she” and “he” are acceptable pronouns because the gendered connotations of both are equally irrelevant.

i, personally, prefer the second explanation, but the first is tenuously supported by how little zhan tiri cares for her disciples.

what do her contemporaries say?

lord demanitus’s telling of his conflict with zhan tiri is as follows: 

Millennia ago, a mysterious event in the heavens divided an ancient power in two. The sundrop and moonstone fell to the earth. Three of my pupils and I researched the legend of the sundrop and moonstone, two elements that longed to reunite. We searched, but alas could not find them.

Unfortunately, we were not the only ones looking. My pupils betrayed me, and summoned my old nemesis, Zhan Tiri: a warlock from another realm, bent on destruction. It took all of my powers to banish the evil from our world.

I knew the research I had written about the sundrop and moonstone was valuable. Dangerous, in evil hands. So I tore the scroll and hid the pieces...

this exposition also shows us the identities of the three pupils who turned against demanitus and joined zhan tiri instead: sugracha, tromus, and gothel.

their identities are all confirmed outside of this sequence: sugracha and tromus appear as loyal servants of zhan tiri, and in a tale of two sisters, rapunzel and cassandra discover gothel’s research on the sundrop flower, including a piece that is an obvious attempt to recreate the demanitus scroll, indicating that gothel was indeed his student at one time: 

though it appears that gothel abandoned zhan tiri as well once she found the sundrop flower, as she hoarded its power for herself rather than seeking to use it to free her former master from the lost realm. 

now... because demanitus leaves out the part of this story that would involve admitting he worked with zhan tiri before she became his “nemesis,” we can’t say with any certainty when this business with his traitorous pupils freeing her happened—or, indeed, if it actually happened that way at all. it isn’t out of the realm of possibility that the three disciples could have been pupils of both demanitus and zhan tiri, who stuck with zhan tiri after demanitus betrayed her and banished her to the lost realm. 

my personal belief is that demanitus gathered his pupils to help him continue the search for the sundrop and moonstone after the flashback in plus est, only for them to be lured away by zhan tiri (perhaps via communication in dreams or visions, as cassandra’s revenge establishes that she’s capable of entering people’s dreams whilst trapped in the lost realm) and free her by reactivating the portal—thus shifting demanitus’s focus from “find the sundrop and moonstone” to “put the demon back in her prison and clean up this mess.” 

however, this is all very up for personal interpretation, because demanitus’s version of events is verifiably deceptive and thus cannot be taken as hard fact.

and what do the folk legends say?

#1: the blizzard

Eons ago, an evil warlock, Zhan Tiri, had a deep hatred for Corona, and cast a spell which caused a blizzard to sweep across the land. The storm destroyed everything in its path. All would have been lost, had it not been for the ancient engineer and inventor, Lord Demanitus. 

Using both magic and science, Demanitus built a massive subterranean machine deep in the Coronan mountains. This mighty device had the ability to change the direction of the wind, and it pushed the flurries out to the sea. The day was saved. Zhan Tiri had indeed been defeated. But some say the curse of the storm lives on, and is simply waiting to strike again...

we know that the basic event described here really happened, because the demanitus device does exist in the location indicated by the legend and works just as described. the details may have been glossed over or elaborated on over the centuries, but we know it is accurate in the essentials.

until recently, i put the events described in this legend immediately before the plus est flashback, to account for the snow on the ground during the flashback, but over the course of writing this post i have actually changed my own mind, and i now think that zhan tiri’s blizzard occurred when the disciples freed her from the lost realm for the first time. why? well, the imagery used to illustrate xavier’s telling of the blizzard legend is directly echoed by the imagery used to illustrate zhan tiri’s release in demanitus’s account in lost and found: 

queen for a day.

and lost and found. 

the color palettes here are identical, and in both, zhan tiri is depicted as the ram-headed demon, in almost the same pose, rising out of the mountains—which fits with both the location of the demanitus device and the possibility that she created (or became) the blizzard immediately after being released from the portal in the coronan mountains. moreover, her hatred of corona is based on her hatred of demanitus and her vengeful desire to destroy everything he loves, which would logically be stronger after he successfully imprisoned her once. 

#2: the great tree

Millennia ago, this tree was once a sentient being, a force for good. But it was corrupted by the evil sorcerer [Zhan Tiri] to destroy any who approached it. It was Zhan Tiri’s stronghold. Inside it, he was invincible. But Lord Demanitus put a stop to the tree’s magic using an enchanted spear. 

as with xavier’s blizzard legend, the fact of the spear’s existence and the behavior of the great tree itself once the spear is removed proves the basic accuracy of this legend. 

the difficulty hear lies with pinpointing when all this occurred. unlike the blizzard, there are no contextual clues to suggest where this conflict at the great tree may lie in the general timeline, so any conclusions we draw must be based on speculation. the only thing we know for sure is that zhan tiri’s residence in the great tree ended during demanitus’s lifetime, which puts a hard stop in it at about two thousand years ago.

my theory is that zhan tiri corrupted and resided in the great tree long before demanitus’s time. adira calls it her stronghold, and as discussed in the first section, the great tree has the greatest variety and frequency of zhan tiri iconography of any location in the series. one of the symbols inside the great tree is even found thousands of miles away at janus point—the corkscrew-snouted ram’s head—which draws a possible line of influence from the tree to janus point. taken together, all of this suggests a long period of time during which the great tree was zhan tiri’s tree.

and as for when it entered into the conflict between demanitus and zhan tiri, i believe there are two possibilities: 

demanitus knew of zhan tiri’s use of the great tree as a fortress, and she allowed him inside while they were collaborating in their search for the drops. she likely hid the violent nature of its defenses from him for a while; then she either let her guard down and allowed him to glimpse more of the truth, or the tree as attacked and he inadvertently witnessed a brutal massacre. either way, this is what clued him in to her ulterior motives, and he crafted the spear to destroy the tree’s magic—and it is this betrayal that zhan tiri references in the plus est flashback when she says “you turned your back on me.” 

zhan tiri had been using the great tree as a home for many years without the aggressive kill-anyone-who-enters security measures, allowing it to function as a library or house of research. this may have been how she and demanitus encountered each other in the first place, and would go a long way to explaining why demanitus trusted her initially. it wasn’t until demanitus turned against her and imprisoned her in the lost realm, and her subsequent release by his pupils, that she became enraged and turned the great tree into an indiscriminate killing machine and demanitus forged his magical spear to stop her.

i think both options are equally plausible, and since there isn’t any direct evidence one way or another, this is another case for personal interpretation and preference to really come into play.

so, to sum up...

at some point around two thousand years ago, lord demanitus encountered zhan tiri, and she persuaded him to trust her and work with her to find the mythical sundrop and moonstone. she was most likely just using him the whole time, while he grew to care for her but became so uncomfortable with her violent methods and selfish motivations that he felt he had no choice to imprison her in the lost realm. 

his pupils—whom he either once shared with zhan tiri, or gathered after the breakdown of his relationship with zhan tiri—turned against him, and either took her side in the conflict, or successfully freed her from the lost realm. i think the latter explanation(s) fit better with the information we are given. 

the blizzard discussed in queen for a day most likely happened after the plus est flashback and her subsequent release by the disciples. 

the conflict at the great tree most likely occurred either right before or at some point after the plus est flashback and her subsequent release, but it is plausible to assume that by this point she had been residing in the great tree for a considerable amount of time prior to working with demanitus. 

demanitus defeated zhan tiri and her disciples, imprisoned her in the lost realm, imprisoned most if not all of her disciples in the demanitus chamber, destroyed the portal to the lost realm so she couldn’t easily be brought back, and transferred his soul into the immortal body of a monkey so he could spend the next two thousand years as a... watchman of sorts, over the drops, probably with the hope that he could step in to prevent zhan tiri’s release if necessary.

[gdelgiproducer]

Speculation about an unusual birth

(Because “‘tis the season” and all that.)

In today’s episode of “Never Ask a Knowledgeable Atheist What He Thinks Really Happened”...

If the story of the birth of Jesus Christ has any truth to it, and if he really was the result of Mary getting pregnant without Joseph’s help, then it stands to reason that somebody had to be the daddy. Being an atheist, I rule out the presence of God, so the question is obvious: is there another candidate? Funnily enough, non-Christian sources from the second century do record an alternate father for the figure we call Jesus. 

Now, granted, those sources were looking to counteract the already-popular “virgin birth” story, and they were often virulently anti-Christian, so they went for the most shameful possible alternatives in that day and age: stating that Mary was either assaulted by, or had an adulterous affair with, a soldier named Pantera, and that Jesus was the result. 

 This was so persistent that it leaked into the Talmud and medieval Jewish writings. Some sources, such as the Toledoth Yeshu, garbled this story a little, combining Pantera with Joseph and giving Mary another husband altogether who abandoned her after the baby daddy’s deception led to conception, but everybody ultimately comes down on 1) there was another father, and 2) his name was Pantera.

Christian Response

Christian apologists have had answers for this story almost since it began. Many otherwise reliable scholars argue that pantera is a pun on the Greek word parthenos (“virgin”) and not a real name; in other words, detractors were making fun of the idea of Jesus being the “son of a virgin” by called him the “son of a panther,” or a lusty animal. But it has zero historical or linguistic basis. As far back as 1906, Adolf Diessmann showed conclusively that the name “Pantera” is a real name, not unusual, and further that it was favored by Roman soldiers, who used it fairly commonly.

Other much earlier sources, Church Fathers apparently unaware of the parthenos pun hypothesis, decided that rather than ignore Pantera, whose story was evidently already very widespread, they’d hide him somewhere in Jesus’ genealogy and claim anti-Christian sources were mistaken. Epiphanius claimed that Joseph’s father’s surname was Pantera, which -- by his own admission -- would preserve the “virgin birth” he himself believed in and still make “Jesus, son of Pantera” technically accurate by that day’s standards. Someone else claimed Mary’s grandfather bore the name of “Pantera.” While either is certainly possible (the discovery of an ossuary with the name “Pentheros” in a Jewish first century tomb in Jerusalem by Clermont-Ganneau in 1891 has given us additional evidence that the name was in use in Palestine by Jews at the time), this smacks more -- at least to this reader -- of two attempts to make a square peg fit a round hole.

At the end of the day, we are left with “Jesus, son of Pantera.” This would be enough by itself, but we even have an existing candidate for exactly which soldier named “Pantera” laid the pipe. (And I say candidate only because the evidence is circumstantial at best; definitive proof does not exist.)

A Grave in Germany

In October 1859, during the construction of a railroad in Bingerbrück, Germany, tombstones for nine Roman soldiers were accidentally discovered. Among them was the memorial marker of one Tiberius Julius Abdes Pantera, a soldier of 40 years, former standard bearer for the First Cohort of Archers, who had died at the age of 62. (Presently, the marker resides at the Römerhalle museum in Bad Kreuznach, Germany.)

The Roman names speak for themselves -- both may have been given in recognition of serving in the army as he obtained Roman citizenship, with the particular significance of Tiberius being that Tiberius was the Caesar on the throne when Pantera was discharged, and so he’d have added the emperor’s name to his own when granted citizenship -- but “Abdes” is especially interesting. It seems to be the Latin form of an Aramaic name. (You know, the language Jesus and his fellow Jews spoke?) According to etymologists, Abdes comes from Ebed, which means “servant of God” in Aramaic.

I know what you’re thinking: “Why would a Roman have an Aramaic name?” Well, a lot of poor Jews and other impoverished men of Near Eastern cultures in that day, who for whatever reason could not find viable alternatives in their native place, would hire themselves out as mercenaries. Sometimes even to the hated Roman occupiers -- after all, if you hung around long enough, you got Roman citizenship and a pension in addition to your wages, which was no small reward in the days of the Empire.

Lending credence to this theory that Pantera wasn’t strictly Roman, according to his epitaph, he came from Sidon, on the coast of Phoenicia just west of Galilee (where, you’ll recall, Jesus is reported to have lived most of his life). More than that, based on the known movements of the First Cohort of Archers, they transferred from Palestine to Dalmatia in 6 AD, and to the Rhine in 9 AD. So Pantera was not only in Palestine at the right time for Jesus to be conceived, but he wasn’t Roman by birth; he enlisted locally, from an area close enough geographically that it’s even more possible he and Mary could have met.

Tiberius ruled from 14 AD to 37 AD. Pantera’s 40 years of service would therefore have started between 27 BC and 4 BC. As Pantera would probably have been about 18 when he enlisted, it means he was likely born between 45 BC and 22 BC. He could have been as young as 15 at the probable time of Jesus’ conception, which is worth noting because, from what we know of Jewish society back then, a boy would have been learning his trade by age 10, engaged at 13 (girls would typically be 12), and married by 14 (girls, 13); precocious and unconscionable by today’s standards, no doubt, but nonetheless the reality.

So... even absent definitive evidence, we have a viable candidate for the baby daddy -- right place, right time, right name, right age for things not to be icky, the kind of background where he and Mary could conceivably have met. But what about the stories of assault and illegitimacy?

Possible Explanations

Well, let’s look at what we know about Jewish culture at the time and speculate a little based on that:

This was a patriarchal culture where, as Fiddler on the Roof puts it, marriage was decided by the papas.

Sex outside of marriage was frowned upon. Shit, women were called whores just for getting divorced. (An echo of this exists even in Jesus’ own Sermon on the Mount, where divorce for any reason other than marital unfaithfulness is considered blameworthy.)

When tax collectors were being excoriated as traitorous collaborators by their fellow countrymen, imagine how much worse you’d get it if you slept with a Jew who went on to become a soldier in the Roman army. Why, the man himself, regardless of any lover or wife, might be disowned, a practice whereby parents considered their child dead and observed the traditional seven days of mourning.

Continuing on that seeming tangent from the last bullet point, if a man died without having children, Mosaic law held that his brother was responsible for marrying his widowed sister-in-law and continuing the family line in his brother’s name. So if a disowned son “died” without having children, well... maybe his brother had to pay for that choice.

Based on that, and sprinkling in a little long-standing Catholic tradition which portrays Joseph as an old widower (bearing in mind that many people in Jesus’ day didn’t live past 40, so even approaching one’s late thirties was considered “old”), I think I have an interesting idea about what went down. 

All of it is speculation. Every single bit of it. But isn’t it funny how it basically aligns with recorded tradition, even in the Bible and apocrypha, when you strip out the supernatural elements? (Okay, that’s a little strong, but, I mean, it’s not a huge stretch. It lines up.)

My Interesting Idea

Meet Miriam. a young teen by today’s standards. Like any other young teen at any time in recorded history, she’s a force of nature, with hormones and with emotions so powerful they shock even her. (Healthy teenage development can look pretty irrational. A minor annoyance can turn into an emotional earthquake that knocks everyone in the house off balance. Not much has changed.)

Meet Ebed. Maybe he and Miriam have known each other their entire lives; maybe he’s new in town and just cute enough to catch her eye. He has ambition. He feels he isn’t destined to stay in some obscure backwater, and he wants to make something of himself. More than that, he’s hungry. But odd jobs aren’t cutting it. If he puts his foot forward to betroth Miriam, her father will laugh in his face. In their time and place, marriages are arranged, and he has nothing to offer.

If anything, Miriam’s father is more interested in his older brother, Yosef, a widower. Being a tekton (often translated as “carpenter,” but more accurately a stonemason or architect) making decent money from Herod and Rome reconstructing Palestine in their image, he’d be a sound choice for her future. So she wants the brother, big deal -- what say does she have in the matter? It’s the same family. She’ll see him all the time!

One day, Ebed -- whose name I’ll remind you means “servant of God” (those Christian mystics do say the Lord works in mysterious ways, don’t they) -- visits Miriam with his usual flattering words. She knows something’s up. He tells Miriam that he’s found a way out, a way to make his mark on the world, but while it can provide for the two of them, it will expose them to shame and disgrace forever, and there’s even less chance her father will think their betrothal is a good idea. Namely, he’s joining the First Cohort of Archers. Knowing what this will mean for their relationship, even though she has known no man in the biblical sense (which makes her reluctant at first), she ultimately accepts a “proper goodbye.” Unfortunately for Miriam, in her time, place, and circumstance anyway, she was left with a reminder of his love. And the minute she knows she’s pregnant, she runs off to hang with her cousin, who just got pregnant herself under equally unusual circumstances. Running to visit a cousin in the same shape? Sounds like someone who was scared, or needed advice or time to think about what to do.

(Note that all of the above, once you strip out the supernatural angle and added frippery, is exactly what’s in the Gospel of Luke: a servant of God visits Mary with words of flattery, “tells her she’ll have a child” [I mean, he even says the Holy Spirit will “come upon her,” and don’t criticize me for my dirty mind, men considered it a divine mandate to spread their seed based on the early chapters of Genesis, whether they were consciously setting out to do that or not], she is reluctant at first but ultimately accepting of this “news,” and she immediately goes to visit her mysteriously pregnant cousin. Honestly none of this is especially different from the Bible when you remove your rose-colored glasses.)

While Miriam is off with her cousin Elisheba, her father makes the choice he’d already set his mind upon anyway, especially in light of Ebed running off to join the Romans, being disowned, and permanently taking himself out of the game (as it were): she will be pledged to Yosef. Since Ebed is now “dead,” maybe he can use his word -- the final word -- to persuade Miriam that her marriage fulfills the Law, and her children with Yosef will be Ebed’s. It’s technically not true in the least, but men thank God in prayer every morning that they were not born women and a common saying is that the Law should sooner be burnt than placed in female hands, so she won’t know the difference anyway, and if she shoots her mouth off, no one will pay it any mind, as she’s a woman.

As for Yosef’s feelings on the subject, arranged betrothals are just the way things are done. He knows his brother loved Miriam, and he feels bad, but honoring him by marrying her is what tradition dictates. He’s getting older (at least by that day’s standards), he’s been around the block once; even if he never truly loves this woman, at least there will be someone to come home to.

Word arrives at Elisheba’s: “You are betrothed to Yosef. Get back here. It’s been three months.” Now, what does Miriam do in that situation? Deciding never to return wouldn’t just disgrace her; it would put Yosef in the middle of things and leave a black mark on his reputation. Whatever she feels about him, she knows he doesn’t deserve that. So naturally, with no other choice, she goes home.

Imagine Yosef’s reaction when she turns out to be with child (from, y’know, a “servant of God,” which tradition may later call the Holy Spirit to obscure things), and throws herself on his mercy. I’d say what the Gospel of Matthew (1:18-19) says happened next wouldn’t be exactly inaccurate: “His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant [...] Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace...”

Morally torn, Yosef thinks to himself, “The Law calls for her to be stoned, but I’ve already lost one wife to Sheol. If all men call me cursed, that could hurt my chances if I ever put myself on the line for betrothal again. I could break the engagement quietly, but if I didn’t marry her, people would speculate. She might bear shame and disgrace anyway. This isn’t worth the mishegas, for either of us.”

And the angel in him, if you will, won out. Maybe he’d never be what Ebed was to her; maybe he could never ask her to love him. But the child would need a father, and she would need someone to care for her, even if only to cover her shame. Who knows? It could be a blessing in disguise.

In Miriam’s shoes, I’d be grateful. Maybe even have at least four other kids with him down the line (see Mark 6:3).

It’s all just speculation, but what if...?

[ikesenhell]

Admissions

Again., Chapter 6–a collaboration by myself and @a-shout-to-the-void​ AKA Vaya. You can find all other IkeSen works of mine here, and Vaya’s  here. NOTES: HERE WE GO AGAIN. 

He hated to admit it, but Mitsunari was right. Something about this case didn't add up. They lingered in the office, pouring over the smallest details of the dossiers.

“So.” Mitsunari cleared his throat, those purple eyes wide and serious. “They still haven’t found the daughter.”

Ieyasu just grunted. No point in acknowledging it. In the timeframe of the murder, it would have been impossible to hide a child. They both knew it.

“I got some interesting records.” He flopped another file onto the table. “The child--sorry, Renée Ailes--she’s been having problems with her mother for a while.”

“Yeah?”

“Apparently. Police interviews with the girl’s friends indicate that they’d get into fights and she would come stay at their houses regularly. It’s unclear over what just yet. And then, the week before the disappearance, she made a bunch of withdrawals from her savings account.”

“Savings account?” Ieyasu echoed, huffing a laugh. “What, did she have $20 in it?”

Mitsunari blinked. “The withdrawals total somewhere around two thousand.”

“What!? How does a high schooler have that much money? I didn't even have a bank account!”

“No?” Mitsunari looked utterly confused. “I think I had--”

“Right, your family is rich. So is theirs.” Ieyasu scowled and flapped the folder shut. “Anything else?”

“Report says there’s a boyfriend. Of the daughter, I mean, not the mother. He’s twenty-two. Jacqueline Ailes claims to have no knowledge of him.”

They both paused. Ieyasu inhaled slowly. “He’s been interviewed, right?”

“Yeah. He claims to have no information. He says he hasn’t had any contact with her since the night she disappeared. And,” Mitsunari continued, brow furrowed. “No warrant was issued for his home. That’s all the information we have about him.”

Nothing about this was adding up. Ieyasu rearranged the pieces over and over again, struggling to find where they all fit. God. Maybe someone else could make sense of this, but he was just a lawyer, not a detective. The longer they looked at the evidence, the murkier it became.

“There’s something wrong here,” Mitsunari murmured. “I don’t like it.”

“I hate it when you’re right,” Ieyasu grumbled.

The other man shot him a silvery, sweet smile. Ieyasu’s heart almost beat out of his chest. How could the man make everything look handsome? “I’d try to be wrong more often, but I don’t think you’d like that, either.”

“You’re right. I wouldn’t.”

“Well then.” Mitsunari beamed; all of Ieyasu’s blood tangled and quickened at the sight. What had gotten into him? “Shall we make do with what we have in the meantime?”

“Guess we have to.”

---

For once, the pair found themselves sitting in the gallery of a courtroom the next morning. Around them, clusters of people volleyed whispers as the prosecutor settled back into his seat. Ieyasu couldn’t see his face, but the way the man tilted his chair onto its back legs and rocked felt too confident, too assured, and it irked Ieyasu. Probably some hotshot fresh into the office. Typical.

At least Williams would be offering the closing defense. That was sure to be tolerable, if nothing else. She rose from her seat with the kind of flame in her eyes that Ieyasu had never seen--a zeal that radiated off her and to the balconies like a Valkyrie.

“Oh,” Mitsunari murmured, his eyes wide. “Oh.”

“Over and over again throughout this trial, we’ve heard the prosecution present pieces of evidence that they believe condemns my client. Their language was clever, I must admit. ‘If we believe,’ ‘anyone might think,’ ‘under these circumstances.’ The prosecution has spun pretty words to distract the jury from the reality of their evidence: it’s circumstantial. There is not a single piece of evidence that definitively puts my client within a mile of the murder at the moment it happened. There is not a single piece of evidence demonstrating a clear motive.

“No, instead what we have here is what we see all too often in a courtroom: a prosecutor brought a flimsy case against a man from a disadvantaged community, assured in their belief that the jury they’d so carefully selected would be led astray by cheap theories and empty words. But that was their mistake. There is only one truly just outcome today, and it is the freedom of my client. An innocent man’s life is in the hands of the law. Use it well.”

The jury returned a verdict in less than ten minutes. “Not guilty” were the last words the head juror spoke before the entire courtroom erupted in thunderous applause.

Somehow in all the commotion, she saw them. Smiling from ear to ear, she pressed through the crowd, letting her client remain with another staffer. “Hey!”

“Hello!” Mitsunari nearly glowed. “Excellent work. You really did a phenomenal job.”

“Thank you.” She let her twists down from the tight bun, peering at Ieyasu with a teasing grin. “Find any fault with me, senpai?”

“Senpai?” Ieyasu repeated, staggering over his thoughts. “No. You--that was just fine. You did alright.”

“Ooh, high praise. Well, thank you.” And she shot him a wink. “Either way, I wanted to say thanks to you both for getting me home the other day. It really saved me. I was a bit tanked.”

“To say the least.”

Mitsunari shook his head. “It was nothing. We were happy to make sure you got back safely. Nothing happened?”

“No. Someone came on the L train to preach, but, y’know. L train.” Williams cast an eye back at the swelling crowd and offered them both a conspiratorial smile, sending shivers through Ieyasu’s body that he couldn’t entirely attribute to respect. “I have to go. Someone needs to do this press conference. I’ll see you both soon--outside of court, hopefully?”

“Hopefully.” Mitsunari shook her hand.

“Yeah,” Ieyasu muttered, and she fixed him with such a dazzling, gleaming smirk that he almost recanted all his sourness. “Probably. Probably soon.”

“Oh? I’ll hold you to that, Tokugawa. Cheers!”

She sauntered back into the crowd. Ieyasu ripped his eyes from her legs and cleared his throat. “Come on. Let’s go.”

---

They did meet again. Mitsunari hadn’t expected it to be so soon afterward. Fortunately for him, he and Ieyasu were both on a run to the local coffee shop when they saw her in the packed, cramped line. She looked resplendent in the sea of black coats, her bright yellow one sunny and warm in the New York bustle.

“Here!” She called, motioning to them. “I saved us a place!”

Ieyasu shot Mitsunari a questioning glance.

“I didn't know you’d set up a coffee visit with Williams,” Mitsunari guessed, as confused as his partner.

“I didn't,” Ieyasu answered, but pressed forward anyway, jostling his way between grouchy pedestrians. Never one to turn down a good social event, Mitsunari followed, apologizing to every pushed passerby with a smile. That seemed to smooth them over. Finally they got to her corner, and she welcomed them with open arms.

“I didn't know we were meeting!”

Williams just winked at Mitsunari. He marveled at the way she made warmth spread clear to his toes. She had that same strange, unquestionable power that Ieyasu had. No doubt everyone felt this way around her. “I didn't think you guys came here.”

“Better than Starbucks,” Ieyasu grumbled. “Though usually they aren’t this damn crowded. What gives? Did everywhere else run out of beans?”

“Dunno--oop!” Someone next to her elbowed her. She jostled forward into the two of them, who caught her at the same time. “Sorry, sorry--”

“It’s fine--”

“Don’t worry! It’s nothing--”

Amidst the scent of roasting coffee and mocha, the sweet, lingering smell of honeysuckle swirled around them. Both he and Ieyasu paused. Was that her? Mitsunari parsed through the options and immediately realized it was--the perfume was woven into every twist of her long hair.

“Are you wearing that perfume?” Ieyasu asked, as if reading Mitsunari’s mind. “Honeysuckle?”

“Yeah.” She pet her hair sheepishly. “I’m fond of it. When I was a kid growing up in the south, the summers smelled like honeysuckle, so I got attached to it. We had some in the backyard with the morning glories.”

“I recall that!” Mitsunari jumped in. “When we summered in the Cape, there was some growing out back. It’s a wonderful, mystical kind of smell.”

Ieyasu and Williams both shot him looks--one flat, the other teasing.

“Summered in the Cape?” Ieyasu stared. “Could that be a bougier sentence?”

Williams barely restrained her giggles. “Extremely bougie. ‘Summered’. He said ‘summered’.”

“Yes, it could be bougier,” Mitsunari added, playing dumb. “I could say something like: ‘We stopped over at the Cape on our private jet between horse races, where we would go and attend to our stables’.”

“That didn't happen, did it?”

“No. We don’t have that many horses.”

Williams burst into unfettered laughter and hid her face in Ieyasu’s shoulder, who looked like he might write his resignation letter within the hour. Mitsunari just smiled cheerily back until he shook his head.

“The perfume is really strong. You’re getting it all over my coat.”

“Oh?” Williams teasingly brushed off his shoulder. “Sorry about that. I’m assuming you don’t have memories of summering in the Cape to that smell.”

“No.” Ieyasu paused, then lowered his head, admitting, “My grandmother… had some. I think. I don’t know. I didn't care enough to remember that, obviously.”

Mitsunari had long grown used to Ieyasu’s way of worming out of things. He didn't miss the subtle way that Ieyasu tucked his coat in closer around him, burying his nose into the collar for a moment more than necessary in the warm confines of the coffee shop. Williams didn't pretend not to notice--she just grinned at him until he turned away, his ears unusually dark in the dim light.

“I don’t suppose I’ll get to run into you both here every day?”

“Well.”

“We come in around eleven thirty,” Mitsunari calculated. “Because typically when we enter the office at eight, Umeka prepares coffee, and by the time it wears off it’s around eleven fifteen. By then she’s usually occupied with Hideyoshi, and Ieyasu doesn’t like the way anyone else prepares it--”

“--everyone else burns it,” Ieyasu muttered, almost too subtle to be heard.

“--so we typically come in for a dip here anywhere from eleven twenty-three to eleven thirty-six.” He paused. “If you were so inclined to join us.”

If looks could kill, Ieyasu might’ve committed a crime with the one he sent Mitsunari. For her part, Williams smiled. “Well, I don’t know my schedule like that, but I’m thinking I could arrange something.”

“I’d like that.” Mitsunari paused, noticing Ieyasu still hadn’t moved that horrifying stare, and added, “We would like that.”

“Perfect.” Williams laced her arm through the crook of Ieyasu’s elbow. “It’s a date.”

[detectivemarkiprincess]

HOSTing a Cinematic Story

~EDIT~ This post will probably update a couple of times because Mod Gre missed some things and we really want to show you just how strange all of the similarities are with this stuff. We know it’s most likely wrong but we needed to get it out to cleanse our minds to make way for new theories, so if you give us crap for this I will kick the cult out of you. 

Today, kiddies, I’m going to talk about one of our little ego friends and how a lot of shit (”evidence” but really it’s only circumstantial evidence) leads to all signs of them being the true mastermind behind all of this. 

So let’s all give a mildly warm (you don’t even have to applaud) welcome for someone we all know. The omniscient man who can’t even see. The Host.

Now here’s what you’re probably already saying. “Well, Mark retired all the Cyndago egos” and I would nod and say ‘you’re right’. But let’s look at this from a not close-minded point of view for a moment. 

Consider this. The infamous Author is the character who we see in Cyndago’s “Danger In Fiction” videos. The Host, never appears in any of their videos, and while it does start off saying ‘Danger in Fiction’ that doesn’t mean he appeared on Cyndago’s channel. In fact, Mod Fe searched their whole channel and found out that the little teaser clip of The Host isn’t even there. I don’t think you can even find it on Mark’s channel. So let’s take the rest of this theory to consider the possibility that The Host is not a retired ego, but The Author is the retiree.

So now that we’ve opened up your mind and expanded your horizons a little, let’s continue on down this path suggesting that The Host is in fact, behind everything. And where I want to start, is his origin video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UZ-RduHFYs

Now, this video dates back as far as 3 years ago on YouTube. 3 years ago was 2015. 👀👀👀👀 If i’m correct that’s when spoopy stuff kind of slowly started happening in the Markiplier-verse.

But let’s talk about the contents of the video. We’ll start off with the quick clip we see of The Host, placing a pair of headphones on his head. Headphones that look like Mark’s. Not to mention he has a microphone in front of him. But most importantly, he’s sitting in front of a screen. Sound familiar? It should. The man we all know and love as Markiplier does the exact same thing for every video he makes.

Sorry for the quality of the second image, I know it’s a bit dark, but it’s him putting on a pair of headphones. Also I’d like to point out a very familiar mannerism he does in this video. That mannerism being cracking his neck right before he puts the headphones on.

Perhaps he puts some of his mannerisms into the characters he writes? That’s write you heard me correctly. 

But back to The Host video for a hot second. Something else very familiar to us, that has been appearing quite a bit lately keeps appearing.

Do those static-y TVs look familiar? 

WELL

THEY

SHOULD

And I’m also going to point out that the thumbnail for Markiplier TV is ALSO 

ALSO

A static-y screen.

We see this TV appear in plenty of other videos (including multiple Cyndago videos). And I would like to point out that it’s very first appearance just so happened to be in Danger in Fiction: Chapter II.

Personally I think that the TV would serve as a means on The Host to be able to see what’s going on around him, to make sure everything is working out as planned.

But another interesting thought that Mod Fe brought up to me. The Host predicts everything that is going to happen in Markiplier TV and we see him do it, but no one else even seems to acknowledge his presence there. Weird right? Do none of the other egos know of his existence???

Anyways I wanna talk about the fact that supposedly The Host is supposed to be an upgrade of The Author. So basically he has that same ability to basically ‘write what happens’. I mean wasn’t The Author’s goal in ‘Danger In Fiction’ to write a story? So what if the entirety of the Markiplier-verse is literally just The Host’s story.

I remember a mention of trying to find a name for his character. What if The Host’s character is a self-insert. What if it’s you, Y/N. 

Not to mention the thing Mark said in the WMW ‘Explanation’ video. He said something along the lines of, “Why would Warf mention a story that everyone knows?” Which made us think of this:

Then he changed his Tumblr tag from ‘I like butts’ to...

Who else do we know that’s interested in stories/story-telling? 

Exactly. But what if his characters are starting to become self-aware, just like Warf did. Just like Warf made Abe ‘break his role’, his cliche. Which, speaking of cliches, remember how when Abe slipped into his “detective black and white tropey noir” thing?

Kinda reminds you of this doesn’t it?

Don’t forget the correlations we see between “go back to sleep...” and “Danger in Fiction.”

That being said. What if all this is just a story being written by The Host? It would be incredibly helpful if this were actually true, but then again I vaguely recall Mark saying it wasn’t the Host in some past video (though I couldn’t tell you which one).

Ugh.

Honestly, take this all with a grain of salt. We just thought this was weird and now we can get back to other theories. If nothing else, it’s good fuel for fanfics and headcanons. 

~Mod Gre (and Fe!)

[dianapocalypse]

Pearl Killed Pink Diamond: A Musical in Six Acts

I’ve seen a lot of theories floating around on who killed Pink, and specifically ones relating to Pearl, but nothing that adequately proved the argument for me all in one place, so here’s my attempt at it. Thanks to gaygemgoddess, shinebrightlikeamaryam, lestrangest, and bismuthsmywife, for giving me some inspiration/evidence and doing some of the evidence hunting used in this theory.

To begin, this theory has three main parts:

1) Pearl was owned by Pink Diamond.

2) Pearl had access to the tools to shatter a diamond.

3) Pearl shattered Pink Diamond.

We will prove that Pearl had motive to commit this crime, as well as access to Pink Diamond which allowed her to pull it off. Further, she had access to weapons which are capable of shattering a diamond, whether or not she actually managed to shatter her (which is, in my opinion, still up for debate--however, for the purposes of this analysis, we will assume that Pink Diamond was Shattered, Not Bubbled.) I’ll also go over some other popular theories and why I don’t think they hold as much water, and some supplemental speculative evidence supporting the theory.

More under the cut!

MOTIVE >> Pearl was owned by Pink Diamond.

EVIDENCE:

Pink diamond on her space suit ("Space Race")

Color Scheme ("The Answer")

Peridot explains what Pearls are and confirmation that our Pearl is "a fancy one" ("Back to the Barn")

Diamond theme plays in the background while Pearl discusses who she used to work for (”Adventures in Light Distortion”)

The first evidence we get of Pearl’s former owner comes in Space Race, when we see her space suit, which seems like it hasn’t been updated since Pink Diamond was still alive, as evidenced by the placement of the pink diamond on her chest.

Further, her color scheme in “The Answer” is much pinker than present day Pearl. She doesn’t shift towards orange hues predominantly until her most recent regeneration, and the only prominent blue hue on her early costume is on her overlay. We know gems are capable of changing colors on their outfits, so it’s possible this change was made after an early regeneration, or that Pink simply preferred a more diverse color scheme for her Pearl.

Further, on meeting Pearl, Peridot remarks she is “a fancy one” while explaining Pearls are servants in “Back to the Barn”.

While discussing the human zoo in “Adventures in Light Distortion”, in the background, the Diamond theme can be heard. (Diamond Theme vs “Adventures in Light Distortion” scene) Further, it’s very clear in this scene that Pearl is specifically avoiding stating who she worked for. We know Blue and Yellow Pearl, so that only leaves White or Pink Diamond--if she belonged to a random gem, she wouldn’t be so fancy, nor would she have motive to specifically avoid mentioning the gem she served.

Being Pink Diamond’s Pearl gives her motive to commit the crime. She obviously was not ever a fan of following orders, given how she acts towards being treated like a second-class citizen in the present; it’s likely other Pearls feel this way as well. If she is Pink Pearl, it also introduces her to Rose before the start of the rebellion. It is likely Pearl was taken by Rose’s attitude and defected to be with her. It is likely she may have worked as a double agent for Rose, even--this possibility becomes important later.

Additional motivators include shattering Pink Diamond for the sake of the Rebellion. It seems in the mythos that this event is what spurred the Rebellion from a small concern into an all-out war. Her shattering was likely a way to force Homeworld to take the Crystal Gems seriously.

COUNTER-ARGUMENTS: Pearl's gem is on her forehead, while Pink Diamond's is shown to be on her stomach ("Back to the Moon")

REBUTTAL: All Pearls we have seen other than our Pearl have had their gems placed on their chests (the Yellow Pearl and Blue Pearl, plus the Pearl component of Rhodonite). I think it is coincidence/meant to throw us off that Yellow and Blue Diamond both have gems on their chests as well. Plus, when Jasper first sees Pearl in "The Return", she refers to her as 'defective' at a glance. Since Rhodonite's pearl gem is also an oval and Jasper knows nothing else about this Pearl, it is likely she's referring to her gem placement. While it is possible she is referring to her rebellious nature in general, this would be a more specific insult to our Pearl’s appearance, similar to insulting Garnet's fusion status and Amethyst's size 'defect'.

MEANS >> Pearl had access to gem-shattering technology, and, as Pink Diamond’s Pearl, access to PD herself.

EVIDENCE:

Bismuth specifically states the Breaking Point can shatter “even a diamond” when showing it to Steven. (”Bismuth”)

Many people have been trying to claim “only a Diamond can shatter a Diamond”, but this has been shown not to be the case. Bismuth has no reason to lie about the Breaking Point’s capabilities. While she may have been wrong, we have no reason to doubt this assertion; this ends up giving the Crystal Gems the ability to shatter Diamonds. Even if the Breaking Point isn't the weapon that was used, we know that the Crystal Gems did have access to it and potentially, similar weapons. It isn't hard to imagine Pearl having a weapon capable of shattering gemstones that Rose was unaware of.

For those claiming that diamonds cannot be shattered by non-diamonds in real life, this is actually a misunderstanding. Diamonds cannot be scratched by non diamonds, but they can be destroyed by anything with sufficient force, like a hammer. Here is a video of the process--note it is similar to the Breaking Point’s spring load!

COUNTER ARGUMENT: But Pink Diamond was shattered with a sword!

REBUTTAL: We know Pearl is able to craft things herself. She is shown to be a capable engineer multiple times. It’s not hard to imagine her retrofitting a sword with a mechanism similar to the Breaking Point. We also know she and Bismuth were close, and she knows the location of the forge. Even after Bismuth was bubbled, it’s very possible and even likely that Pearl visited to craft some weapons of her own.

MEANS PT. 2 >> Assuming our Pearl is Pink Pearl, she had access to Pink Diamond.

EVIDENCE:

“Where was her Pearl?” and Zircon’s question of how Rose even got close (”The Trial”)

A Pearl would not have been suspicious or even thought capable of murdering a diamond. It’s possible our Pearl was a double agent, acting both with Rose Quartz and the Crystal gems and as Pink Pearl. Even though she’s a terrible liar, as Pink Pearl, all she needed to do was keep her mouth shut and follow orders to not be suspected. The only issue, then, is the logistics of how she got away from PD’s notice without raising suspicion; it’s possible she had programmed Holo-Pearls to assist with this aspect, since we know they are programmable and are presumably somewhat customizable.

Pearl also could have shapeshifted into Rose to perform the deed, and there are several reasons why she might have. Most likely, she did it so the Rebellion would get credit for the deed and not just a lowly Pearl. Many Homeworld gems may not have even believed a Pearl capable of destroying her owner, so this could have also been done to avoid tarnishing the reputation of other Pearls. All Rose Quartz gems had already been bubbled, so the risk to them was less than the risk there would have been to all Pearls being destroyed had it leaked that one killed a Diamond. It’s also possible Rose asked her to, knowing she was going to shatter Pink, but not willing to do it herself. This way, the blame would fall on her, not Pearl. This would explain her aversion to shapeshifting and Eyeball’s testimony of seeing a Rose Quartz. We already know from “Back to the Moon” that she can be fooled by shapeshifted gems, even when the gem placement is wrong.

CONCLUSION >> Pearl shattered Pink Diamond.

DIRECT EVIDENCE:

Rose is known to have been highly against shattering gems ("Bismuth"

Bismuth was unaware Pink Diamond was shattered at all, meaning it happened after the Breaking Point was created ("Bismuth")

Pearl's visceral reaction each time Pink Diamond's shattering is brought up ("Back to the Moon", "Steven's Dream")

All of this adds up to a Pearl with both the motive and the means to shatter Pink Diamond. The other suspects, namely Yellow Diamond, have far less evidence, and would be much less interesting narrative as the culprit. White Diamond we know nothing about and have no evidence against; Blue Diamond we have no evidence against and reason to believe she does not know who did it. I think at most, Yellow Diamond knows something about the true nature of the shattering and was involved in covering up the involvement of a mere Pearl in order to keep the Diamonds appearing “immortal” to their subjects.

So that’s about it! The links above also explain other potential theories and provide evidence not covered here. Below is a bit more speculative evidence which I didn’t have a chance to include above either because it was unnecessary or it is circumstantial at best.

SPECULATIVE EVIDENCE:

Pearl would have been trusted as Pink Diamond's Pearl, and had the opportunity to be a double agent as a result

Pearl is shown to be extremely adept with swords, but no longer uses them during battle, possibly because of guilt/trauma associated with using a sword to shatter Pink Diamond

Pearl owned a Replicator Wand, and could have used it to replicate the Breaking Point and modify it into a sword-type weapon.

While we know Pearl is capable of shapeshifting, she has an extreme aversion to it, possibly due to shapeshifting into Rose to perform the deed.

Pearl literally covers her mouth every time Pink Diamond’s shattering is brought up in front of her; this may be linked to the fact that she is a notoriously bad liar and is specifically avoiding telling Steven what she did

In “Adventures in light distortion”, Pearl mentions they haven’t been to the Zoo; “not since we--”. She may have been about to say “shattered Pink Diamond”, as they are talking about her shattering in this scene. Using “we” is an interesting word choice.

[hopefulfestivaltastemaker]

June 21, 2020

My weekly review of thoughts and goings-on. Topics include BP’s energy data, Apollo Projects, the demographic transition, and policing in Hillsboro.

New Energy Data from BP

Every June, BP releases some high level energy statistics from the prior year. This year’s data set came out a few days ago, and I’ve taken a quick glance over.

A key observation is that world primary energy growth in 2019 was about 1.3%, in contrast to the ~1.8% average growth from 2009 to 2019. Together with the IEA’s World Energy Investment report, we start to see some evidence of a modest global slowdown even before COVID hit.

Oil, natural gas, and coal were up 0.8%, up 2.0%, and down 0.6% respectively. Nuclear is up 3.1% but still about 4% off the peak generation set in 2004. Hydropower is up 0.9%, extending a long term trend of gradual increase. Non-hydro renewables are up 12.2%, the largest absolute year over year gain (albeit just barely) in the dataset. All in all, low carbon energy sources* accounted for 55% of total primary energy gain, and fossil fuels accounted for 45%.

There is some controversy around the primary energy metric. It is meant to allow a direct comparison between coal, gas, oil, and nuclear energy sources, whether they are used for power, transportation fuel, or heat, by comparing on the basis of heat released upon combustion or fission. But for non-thermal sources, this metric doesn’t make sense, and different institutions have different ways of estimating the primary energy content of such sources. In particular, it may be that the numbers for renewables are smaller than they should be, relative to their contribution to the economy. This may be, but it doesn’t change the basic picture.

Scenarios consistent with the Paris Agreement call for a phaseout of fossil fuel usage around midcentury. That’s 30 years from now and we haven’t even halted the growth yet. At current rates, with no increase in overall primary energy demand, it will take about 200-300 years for renewables to take over the energy system. I’ve predicted before that solar and wind might be near the inflection point of their S curves, a prediction that I now think was too pessimistic, but I also don’t the kind of exponential growth we saw in the heady days of the late 2000s and early 2010s is a realistic expectation.

This year BP also put all the raw data in a CSV file. I don’t know if they did it before, but it is much appreciated.

* Including biofuels. It is questionable whether they should be classified as low carbon.

Apollo Projects

Sam Altman and his brothers are starting up a new investment project, aimed at what they describe as moonshot projects and clearly alluding to the Apollo Project.

Their list of project examples is quite the grab bag: “Rapid response vaccines, non-carbon energy, solar geoengineering, VR/AR, biological manufacturing, new education formats, new medicines, affordable housing, and charter countries.”

This also comes not too long after the Marc Andreesson IT’S TIME TO BUILD essay and may represent at attempt to transcend the kind of small bore thinking that has (perceived to have) taken over Silicon Valley and American institutions at large.

Now, I’m for pursuing ambitious projects as much as anyone, but ambition has to be rooted in a sense of what real socio/economic needs are or else it is just a shot in the dark. What the Altmans understand those needs to be is, to me at least, rather opaque.

Understanding the Demographic Transition

I have written on-and-off over the years about the question of population and birth rates. I have more or less made the pronatalist case that I can based on my understanding of the role that population plays in economic growth. But without a better understanding of what governs reproduction decisions, my understanding of the issue is stuck at a sub-useful level. This week I made some effort to dive into the academic literature on demographic trends.

The survey of Zaida and Morgan is not a bad place to start. They introduce what is a fairly standard story: industrialization has both decreased the death rate and increase the opportunity cost of having children. This process come to be called the Demographic Transition, or the First Demographic Transition to distinguish it from what may be a distinct ongoing Second Demographic Transition. The SDT theory pushes back against the purely economic explanations of the FDT theory and proposes that value changes are at work: a shift from “king child” to “king couple” and a move up the Maslowian hierarchy to a postmaterialist value system.

The survey notes several major critiques of SDT. First, the empirical link between fertility changes and ideational changes is not well established. They cite some evidence of a “social contagion” at work in fertility changes. SDT doesn’t account well for inter- and intra-country variations. There are also inconsistent links between fertility changes and other demographic/social changes predicted by SDT. The broader philosophical critique of SDT is that, like modernization of secularization theory, it is a unilinear theory of history that holds the most postmodern European countries as the natural destination of historical evolution.

Zaida and Morgan touch on some alternate theories to SDT: that globalization and evolving gender roles are driving contemporary fertility changes, but note that those theories have problems as well.

In 2012, Oded Galor reviewed several hypothesis on drivers of falling birth rates. Galor is best known for his Unified Growth Theory model, which holds that technological change has increased the educational cost of children, and parents make a rational quality/quantity tradeoff by having fewer children and educating each one better. Naturally, Galor gives his UGT hypothesis the most credence in his review. He also gives some evidence that the declining gender gap plays a role, in that it increases the opportunity cost of a mother’s childrearing time. Galor argues against the Beckerian hypothesis--that rising wages in general depress fertility--and also argues against declining childhood mortality and old age pensions as explanations.

UGT is an interesting idea that I would like to take a better look at. It does strike me as perhaps being too much of a “theory of everything”, and it attempts to explain family decisions with an economic model without accounting for the role of social norms. I would have a hard time accepting any explanation that does not have at least some significant role for social norms. For what it’s worth, this recent survey of Madsen and Strulik provides some fresh empirical evidence for education as a driver of falling birth rates.

I must say, having read a lot of academic writing over the years, that Galor’s is exceptionally good. He has a clear and engaging style, and he is able to present the mathematics with full rigor but without burying the reader with it.

To go in the opposite direction, this 2005 study of Newson et al. attempts to explain falling birth rates as a process of cultural evolution. Industrialization generally enhances the importance of nonkin social contacts relative to kin contacts, and nonkin contacts are more likely to deliver antinatalist messages than kin contacts. The argument is an interesting one and they give a fair amount of evidence, though I would characterize their case as circumstantial rather than rigorous. The study is old enough that there should be plenty of new evidence for the hypothesis by now, and that would be something to take a look at later.

Finally, there is this review from earlier this year by Lesthaeghe, who is one of the pioneers of SDT back in the ‘80s but has walked the claims back a bit. The paper is rather jargon-heavy and not very layperson-friendly, but he offers some important insights. Armed with new data, he debunks the postponement hypothesis: that falling birth rates from the 1990s were the result of later families, not smaller families, and so should recover. He also argues against the idea that, at a certain level of development, we should expect fertility to naturally recover. This hypothesis is based on what he calls the “reading history sideways” fallacy, which is to look at all countries at a snapshot in time and assume that what wealthier countries look like today is what poorer countries will look like tomorrow. He forecasts that subreplacement fertility in wealthier countries will persist at least through the 2020s.

As a general observation, most of my understanding of academic demography has come from energy and environmental work. My brief effort this week to learn the field more directly has revealed that it is a richer field, with more diversity of thought, than I had realized, and it makes me hungry to read some more. By contrast, in the environmental world there is a caricatured, in some cases outdated, understanding of demography. I would have to suspect that since environmentalism has always carried an antinatalist orientation, it has been happy to selectively draw concepts from demography that support a triumphalist population peak-and-decline narrative (when not going down the Malthusian catastrophe rabbit hole). In reality, demography as a field shows diversity in ideology (pro- or anti-natalist), forecasts, and understanding of mechanisms behind the forecasts.

Policing in Hillsboro

This week, the Hillsboro City Council held an information session with Jim Coleman, the chief of police, and some other officers to discuss a wide range of issues around policing. Given current public concern, it was a long and intense conversation. I’m glad I listened.

With a few weeks having now elapsed since the George Floyd killing, I’ve had some time to think it over, have some conversations, and read some material from a range of viewpoints. Policing is important, but it’s never been an issue I’ve paid much attention to or been interested in and definitely not one that I understand well.

If I were to get more engaged on the topic--which, to be clear, I am not planning on--the first thing I would do is forget what I think I know and take some time to listen empathetically. The world doesn’t need another 23 point plan.

[elementary221-blog]

How to improve your method of deduction

Like all other arts, the Science of Deduction and Analysis is one which can only be acquired by long and patient study, nor is life long enough to allow any mortal to attain the highest possible perfection in it. Before turning to those moral and mental aspects of the matter which present the greatest difficulties, let the inquirer begin by mastering more elementary problems. Let him on meeting a fellow-mortal, learn at a glance to distinguish the history of the man and the trade or profession to which he belongs. Puerile as such an exercise may seem, it sharpens the faculties of observation, and teaches one where to look and what to look for. By a man’s finger-nails, by his coat-sleeve, by his boot, by his trouser-knees, by the callosities of his forefinger and thumb, by his expression, by his shirt-cuffs – by each of these things a man’s calling is plainly revealed. That all united should fail to enlighten the competent inquirer in any case is almost inconceivable.

You should consider your brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skilled workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that a little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forgot something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.

An observant man can learn by an accurate and systematic examination of all that came in his way. From a drop of water, a logician could infer the possibility of an Atlantic or a Niagara without having seen or heard of one or the other. So all life is a great chain, the nature of which is known whenever we are shown a single link of it.

Always approach a case with an absolutely blank mind, which is always an advantage. Form no theories, just simply observe and draw inferences from your observations.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the evidence. Insensibly, one begins to twist the facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts. It biases the judgment.

The temptation to form premature theories upon insufficient data is the bane of this profession.

They say that genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains. It’s a very bad definition, but it does apply to detective work.

The height of a man, in nine cases out of ten, can be told from the length of his stride.

When a man writes on a wall, his instinct leads him to write above the level of his own eyes.

To a great mind, nothing is little.

It is a mistake to confound strangeness with mystery. The most commonplace crime is often the most mysterious, because it presents no new or special features from which deductions may be drawn.

There is nothing new under the sun. It has all been done before.

Often what is out of the common is usually a guide rather than a hindrance. In solving a problem of this sort, the grand thing is to be able to reason backward. That is a very useful accomplishment, and a very easy one, but people do not practice it much. In the everyday affairs of life it is more useful to reason forward, and so the other comes to be neglected. Most people, if you describe a train of events to them, will tell you what the results would be. They can put those events together in their minds, and argue from them that something will come to pass. There are a few people, however, who, if you told them a result, would be able to evolve from their own inner consciousness what the steps were which led up to that result. This power is what I mean when I talk of reasoning backward, or analytically.

There is no branch of detective science which is so important and so much neglected as the art of tracing footsteps. Always lay great stress upon it, and practice it till it becomes second nature.

Detection is, or ought to be, an exact science and should be treated in the same cold and unemotional manner.

Never guess. It is a shocking habit – destructive to the logical faculty. Observe the small facts upon which large inferences may depend.

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

The main thing with people when you talk to them in an investigation is to never let them know that their information can be of the slightest importance to you. If you do they will instantly shut up like an oyster. If you listen to them under protest, as it were, you are very likely to get what you want.

Women are never to be entirely trusted – not the best of them.

It is good to adopt a system of docketing all paragraphs concerning men and things, so that it would be difficult to name a subject or a person on which one could not at once furnish information.

When someone thinks their house is on fire, their first instinct is at once to rush to the thing which they value most. It is a perfectly overpowering impulse.

Often the strangest and most unique things are very often connected not with the larger but with the smaller crimes, and occasionally, indeed, where there is room for doubt whether any positive crime has been committed.

As a rule, the most bizarre a thing is the less mysterious it proves to be. It is your commonplace, featureless crimes which are really puzzling, just as a commonplace face is the most difficult to identify.

Usually in unimportant matters there is a field for the observation, and for the quick analysis of cause and effect which gives the charm to the investigation. The larger crimes are apt to be the simpler, for the bigger the crime the more obvious, as a rule, is the motive.

It should be your business to know things. To train yourself to see what others overlook.

In an investigation, the little things are infinitely the most important.

Never trust to general impressions, but concentrate yourself upon details. On examining a woman’s appearance, you should realize the importance of sleeves, the suggestiveness of thumb-nails, or the great issues that may hang from a boot-lace. In a man it is perhaps better first to take the knee of the trouser.

Singularity is almost invariably a clue. The more featureless and commonplace a crime is, the more difficult it is to bring it home.

The most difficult crime to track is the one which is purposeless.

Depend on it, there is nothing so unnatural as the commonplace.

You must look for consistency. Where there is a want of it you must suspect deception.

Your eyes should be trained to examine faces and not their trimmings. It is the first quality of a criminal investigation that you should see through a disguise.

Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing. It may seem to point very straight to one thing, but if you shift your own point of view a little, you may find it pointing in an equally uncompromising manner to something entirely different.

Your method should be founded upon the observation of trifles.

The ideal reason would, when one had been shown a single fact in all its bearings, deduce from it not only all the chain of events which led up to it but also all the results which would follow from it. As Cuvier could correctly describe a whole animal by the contemplation of a single bone, so the observer who has thoroughly understood one link in a series of incidents should be able to accurately state all the other ones, both before and after. We have not yet grasped the results which the reason alone can attain to. Problems may be solved in the study which have baffled all those who have sought a solution by the aid of the senses. To carry the art, however, to its highest pitch, it is necessary that the reasoner should be able to utilize all the facts which have come to his knowledge; and this in itself implies, as you will readily see, a possession of all knowledge, which, even in these days of free education and encyclopedias, is a somewhat rare accomplishment. It is not impossible, however, that a man should possess all knowledge which is likely to be useful to him in his work. A man should keep his little brain-attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library, where he can get it if he wants it.

Often the impression of a woman may be more valuable than the conclusion of an analytical reasoner.

Read nothing but the criminal news and the agony column. The latter is always instructive.

The most practical thing that you ever can do in your life would be to shut yourself up for three months and read twelve hours a day at the annals of crime. Everything comes in circles. The old wheel turns, and the same spoke comes up. It’s all been done before, and will be again. Then when you have heard some slight indication of the course of events in an investigation, you should be able to guide yourself by the thousands of other similar cases which should occur to your memory.

An investigator should look at everything with reference to his own special subject. One, for example, can see some scattered houses along a countryside, and become impressed by their beauty. But to the investigator, the only thought sometimes should be a feeling of their isolation and the impunity with which crime may be committed there.

Crime is common. Logic is rare. Therefore it is upon logic rather than upon crime that you should dwell.

Pipes are occasionally of extraordinary interest. Nothing has more individuality, save perhaps watches and bootlaces.

Always in an investigation you should put yourself in the man’s place, and, having first gauged his intelligence, try to imagine how you would proceed under the same circumstances.

Results are come by always putting yourself in the other fellow’s place, and thinking what you would do yourself. It takes some imagination, but it pays.

It is of the highest importance in the art of detection to be able to recognize, out of a number of facts, which are incidental and which vital. Otherwise your energy and attention must be dissipated instead of being concentrated.

Make it a point of never having any prejudices, and of following docilely wherever a fact may lead you.

In an investigation, it is only the colourless, uneventful cases which are hopeless.

In an investigation, always look for a possible alternative, and provide against it. It is the first rule of criminal investigations.

The features given to man are means by which he shall express his emotions, and you can read a man’s train of thought from his features, especially his eyes.

Some people without possessing genius have a remarkable power of stimulating it.

As long as the criminal remains upon two legs so must there be some indentation, some abrasion, some trifling displacement which can be detected by the scientific searcher.

The Press is a most valuable institution, if you only know how to use it.

One characteristic that the detective should have in the Science of Deduction and Analysis is the ability to throw the brain out of action and to switch all thoughts on to lighter things wherever you think things could no longer work to advantage.

Education never ends. It is a series of lessons with the greatest for the last.

First real insight into the character of parents is gained by studying their children.

Your thoughts about dogs should be analogous. A dog always reflects the family life. Whoever saw a frisky dog in a gloomy family, or a sad dog in a happy one? Snarling people have snarling dogs, dangerous people have dangerous ones. And their passing moods may reflect the passing moods of others.

When a doctor does go wrong he is the first of criminals. He has the nerve and he has the knowledge.

When you follow two separate chains of thought, you will find some point of intersection which should approximate to the truth.

Do not agree with those who rank modesty among the virtues. To the logician all things should be seen exactly as they are, and to underestimate one’s self is as much a departure from the truth as to exaggerate one’s own powers.

It is always good to have someone with you on whom you can thoroughly rely. Local aid is always either worthless or else biased.

It is my belief, founded upon experience, that the lowest and vilest alleys do not present a more dreadful record of sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside.

The average petty thief has a more extensive knowledge of the value of objects, than the average collector.

The best place to hide anything, is where everyone can see it.

It’s often a mistake to accept something as true, merely because it’s obvious. The truth is only arrived at by the painstaking process of eliminating the untrue.

One of the first principles in solving crime, is never to disregard anything, no matter how trivial.

People generally forget in assuming a disguise, that the shape of the ear is an almost infallible means of recognition and identification to the trained eye.

Facts are always convincing. It’s the conclusions drawn from facts, that are frequently in error.

To the trained ear, footsteps have a characteristic rhythm as identifiable as fingerprints.

When murders are committed, there usually is something that unfortunate victims have in common, that might indicate the motive. If, on the other hand, they appear incidental, then they are sometimes a part of something more sinister.

The science of detection is very much like stringing a handful of beads. In an investigation, the suspects are the beads, where you then must try to string them together with some thread to make a connection, in order to solve the mystery.

Houses, like people, have definite personalities.

Surgical instruments that save life, are hardly more pleasant to look at, than those that take it.

Murder like matrimony, generally has a motive.

In this profession, one has to take chances.

Egomaniacs are always so much more chatty when they feel they have the upper hand.

Suicides, invariably leave notes behind them. Murders do not, and when you drive a person to suicide, that’s murder.

Often a good disguise to assume, is that of a postman. No one ever looks twice at a postman.

When women are involved in crime, their method, whatever it is, is apt to be peculiarly subtle and cruel. Feline not canine.

Poison is a woman’s weapon.

Whenever setting a trap, in order to catch someone, it’s best to bait it with the food they like.

In an attempt to solve a crime, it’s best to duplicate the conditions under which the crime occurred.

Never trust plans already made by other people, they have a habit of becoming to widely known.

Sometimes to leave one unguarded, can be a skillful trap for one’s opponent.

The imagination is where crimes conceived, and where they’re solved.

Even when facts clearly indicate one thing, it is not always the case. That’s why so many murders remain unsolved. People will stick to facts, even though they prove nothing. Now, if you go beyond facts, use the imagination as the criminal does, imagine what might have happened, and act upon it, you will usually find yourself justified.

An investigator always needs something more than legends and rumors. Proof, you must have proof.

When examining footprints, it’s good to know that, clubfooted people invariably bring their full weight down on the toe. If other peculiarities arise, such as, the footprint being balanced from toe to heel, then the footprint must have some other compensating deformity to explain it, such as, the footprint being made by a person not really clubfooted, but wearing a clubfooted shoe.

The obvious always appears simple.

No matter what situation arises, one must adapt oneself to the tools at hand.

Every crime, always exhibits a pattern and a purpose in it.

Purpose and motive are the last things a sane man would imply, if he were posing as a madman. Unless there is method in his madness.

The temptation of the sudden wealth, could possibly turn a once seemingly harmless person, into a ruthless killer.

Murder is an insidious thing. Once a person has dipped their fingers in blood, sooner or later they’ll feel the urge to kill again.

The terrifying part about blackmail is, that the victim is afraid to fight the accusation, no matter how false. Once the accusation is made, their name becomes smeared and sometimes their life is ruined.

Anything is possible, until proven otherwise.

Never trust the obvious.

The deductive mind never rests. It’s not unlike a finely tuned musical instrument, which demands attention and practice. Problems of logic, mathematical equations and riddles are some ways of fine-tuning the mind.

A great detective relies on perception, intelligence, and imagination.

Come, Watson, come! The game is afoot.”

[victoryzen]

History Channel vs. the Daily Beast: Amelia Earhart's Final Days

Sacramento Journalist Cary Rodda (SN&R), a facebook friend whose music articles I've enjoyed for years, brought a Clive Irving (Daily Beast) article to my attention after I posted a link to an excellent documentary I’d just seen on the History Channel: Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence

http://www.history.com/specials/amelia-earhart-the-lost-evidence

Since Mr. Rodda’s comment, this additional article by Michael Greshko has been published (7/11/17): http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/07/amelia-earhart-lost-photograph-discredited-spd/

The History Channel has stated that they will examine the evidences and be transparent in their findings.

Meanwhile, I’ve written a long response to Irving’s Daily Beast article that I wish to share here.

If the photograph is proven to have been published in a Japanese travelogue two years prior to Earhart’s crisis and disappearance, then indeed I’ve been proven wrong on a point I felt quite certain of. Nonetheless, I’ve yet to examine the contrary evidence for myself, and the Nat Geo article does support a competing theorist (King, co-funded by Nat Geo). Given what we know about what money can buy, I’m going to spend some time on this. I’d like to see an original copy of the 1935 travelogue for one thing. It’s too easy to photoshop these days and digital editors work cheap.

See another link/s to current articles on the subject below, along w/ some of my questions.

My essay in response to Clive Irving’s July 9, 2017 article in the Daily Beast:

This is an interesting article, and worth considering. However, I disagree w/ Aoki’s interpretation of Japanese-American-Chinese relations, and there are several unclear points (eg, which nation “allowed” the US ship to travel up the Yangtze R. to rescue people from the US Embassy? China, or Japan? Sounds like China; if so, that point doesn’t support Aoki’s claim that relations between the US & Japan were great, just great, everything is fine; obviously Roosevelt can only downplay so many events that may incite a war before s/he’s just got to face the facts.

Also, Pearl Harbor DID happen, and FOIA docs show (I believe) that US intel knew about the attack at least 2 hours prior- the US (or some factions of US- not like we can ever agree on anything) was eager to get into WWII (I think Ken Burns’ docs cover this) and sacrificed PH in order to have a strong position to enter the war against the Axis of Evil (can any reasonable person deny that nomenclature based on even what we could then observe of the Third Reich’s actions?)

Aoki has also interviewed a telegraphist, Lt. Kouzu, on the Koshu Maru, for her 1982 japanese-language book, who claimed no Americans were picked up, and the ships logs mention nothing of it. I do not speak or read Japanese, but in 1982, it’s likely that WWII participants were still living, and unlikely therefore that veterans or servicemen would speak openly about events that would have most likely been sensitive to Japanese national security- a reasonable person cannot deny that such an event would be headline news world-wide, and a triumph to the US/British (closely allied then, even more so then now, largely because of family- my own grandfather’s grandparents were English immigrants).

Psychologically, it was an unhappy ending to Earhart’s adventures for her & Noonan to “disappear”. For all we know, their return may have been a bargaining chip at some point for the Japanese. The Japanese were up against the USSR and needed every edge they could get in terms of international clout long before & regardless of WWII. They are a geographically small island nation, culturally isolated until what, 60 years before WWII? That’s not a long history of international relations, as things go. Their disadvantages far, far outweighed their advantages, strategically speaking.

Another point: Irving’s article states that

Even though the technology used in the Electra may not have been particularly advanced, any foreign govt knows it’s a good idea to check it out anyway; it may have carried messages or similar sensitive intel; it may not have been the tech they were mainly interested in, but it would’ve been neglectful for them to simply ignore or leave the plane (& crew) be after it “crash landed” in their territory.

The four meteorologists who were taken to Greenwich Island via the Koshu Maru were delivered there on July 3, 1937. Pretty sure the documentary’s theory and evidence shows they landed but were not immediately picked up by the Koshu Maru. I believe locals interacted with them initially until the Japanese were alerted & only then did the Koshu Maru arrive. I could be incorrect, but to the KM, that distance would be reasonable to travel in the time allotted.

The Clive Irving article addresses theories of Earhart’s disaster plans that are NOT based on the expertise of pilots who understand that as part of their training and trip planning, disaster plans are decided upon that follow certain protocols that may or may not actually be used in the event of an actual disaster, such as the captain who landed the passenger jet in the Hudson in January 2009. Earhart, if indeed she was “not an intuitive pilot like Lindbergh”, would’ve stuck to her pre-planned strategy, not necessarily the most logical action in the eyes of non-pilot laypersons with hindsight on their side.

Lindbergh was celebrated in Tokyo in 1931 (6 yrs prior) after being rescued by a presumably non-military Japanese boat. Who’s to say the same would not have been true for Earhart and Noonan? Could the outcome have been different if she’d had to emergency-land six years prior and if she was male? Her feisty American spirit doubtless drew criticism from a “traditionalist” type of male in the US because she didn’t follow cultural expectations of female dress & behavior; the US hadn’t entered WWII so Rosie the Riveter (aka my Grandma Corkey Bowns who soldered windshield wipers on Eisenhower’s Air Force One) had yet to be called to serve in traditional male roles. Earhart would certainly have been considered a threat to cultural stability in pre-WWII Japan.

Irving first addresses the photographic evidences of the documentary- mainly a photo from Jaluit Atoll in the Marshall Islands, that the documentary has examined by experts including a facial-recognition expert. At first, when viewing the docu, I expected (frankly) shoddy and inexact visual comparisons. I was surprised to see several photos comparing both Earhart and Noonan that I would consider strong visual evidence. As an art & family historian with some training in photography, film, digital imaging, and aged photo repair, I am no expert, but few would deny that I have a good eye for such detail. What struck me most was Earhart’s distinctive posture. The docu didn’t make mention of it, opting for a proportional comparison instead, but I found the body language and posture of the figures in the photo most convincing. If I had to make the call, I would say there’s a 90+% probability that the figure in the photo is Earhart. Add that to the circumstantial evidence and Noonan’s figure, it’s 99% (unless proven wrong, this is accurate).

So, all due respect to Aoki’s book’s theories and claims, I do not find the Daily Beast article to hold convincing data that disproves anything in the documentary. In fact, it may even lend credence to the conclusions presented in Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence. Our greatest interest should be finding the truth, of course, and it is good to explore and compare ideas. However, we know that governments cover up facts in order to protect their own interests; the Japanese and US governments are no exception. The amount of info the US Navy has redacted from records (presumably released by FOIA- the Freedom of Information Act) relating to Earhart alone should give us pause.

Articles of additional interest: http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/search-still-amelia-earhart-80-years-after-she-disappeared-n778291 Questions: Where did her 4th cousin W. Earhart get his info from, suppositions? Family legend? His own conclusions? Who is the Japanese military blogger Koto Yamano? Could s/he be former military/intelligence? Is this scan & data accurate and true? Have the US National Archives indeed been "purged" of references to Earhart? Have FOIA requests been made? Does the US Navy or CIA have documents relevant to Earhart's life and possible death, or did they, that can be accessed legally? Or does the US Treasury have any info relating to her?