#BUT i think it's also worth keeping in mind that a lot of these activists aren't only doing the 'performative' stuff

[thelawsofdaylight]

I'm sorry if this isn't approriate, but I don't really understand why you find Les Mis a good target for a climate protest? I get that the musical has themes that align with the protesters but like... what was the good outcome? Are there really People in that audience that don't know climate change is happening? How Will this change their mind? What action is meant to be brought on by trowing soup at paintings or disrupting a performance? Does that actually help the cause of combatting climate change at all? Does it help make people more aware, does it have an effect on the mechanisms of polluters? Isn't there anything more focused that these resources (both money and the incredible bravery and drive of the People themselves) could be better focused on. These protest feels so different from like, people chaining themselves to a private jet or the schoolchildren going up to parliaments by the thousand to demand policy chances to better their future. All of the JSO actions feels so performative, I just don't see how they are actually doing anything of even the mechanism by which they are meant to accomplish anything? Which doesn't mean that the people involved aren't great people or that the reaction of the Les Mis crowd wasn't fucked up. Just... what was even the goal?

Hey! I know it's been a while since I made that post supporting the JSO protestors but I've gotten a few asks like this in the time since (and am still getting them) so I'm responding to this as the most good-faith one in my inbox and hopefully it answers others that have been asked to me in the past couple weeks as well. Disclaimer: If I'm responding to things outside the remit of this ask, it's likely that it's because someone else sent an ask about it and I've been juggling them all in my head as I've been thinking on a response.

I think in order to answer the first part of the ask we have to tackle the second. 'What has this action achieved' only works as a comprehensive criticism if we look at it in isolation to all of JSO's other actions. What I mean by this is: JSO launched by blocking oil refineries for days on end. In the two years they've been active they've done similar actions, including but not limited to disrupting fuel distribution centres, petrol stations, interrupting fossil fuel conferences, and, most recently, trying to stop the relocation of asylum seekers to prison barges. Their actions go far beyond blocking roads and disruption of public events. I think this is important to establish as I don't know how much of a working knowledge anyone not in the UK Climate movement actually has about JSO and I think it's good we're all on the same page.

But if they do all that (effective, important) direct action, then why target Les Mis? What does a West End show have to do with fossil fuel companies and climate change? And in response to these questions I'll ask one of my own: were you aware of the fact that JSO tried to stop migrants from being deported until I mentioned it just now? A lot of these actions, the ones that actually target infrastructure and confront those directly responsible, get little to no media coverage. When news of the Les Mis action first broke out, I saw so many people on Twitter with the same reactionary takes: why target Les Mis when the Conservative Party Conference literally happened the same weekend? And that's a fair and valid point- if it wasn't for the fact that JSO were at the conference. I know this because I was there too. They had a huge bloc in the march and went on to do other actions in the city after the march had ended. The whole thing, the entire 10,000+ strong protest, got maybe 30 seconds coverage on the local news and not even a mention of JSO's presence (or of climate change in general for that matter.) JSO's previous actions directed at fossil fuel companied themselves get very little, if any, coverage compared to their big flashy sports/awards show/performance interruptions.

So yeah, some of JSOs actions are 'performative'. But I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest that even performative actions have their place within the wider struggle. I understand not liking public disruption as a tactic and I understand the issues with it, but I also think it's worth reflecting on why groups like JSO use it.

Editing my draft here to report that earlier today they smashed the frame of a painting that was previously vandalised by the Suffragette movement in 1914. That's a performative action, sure, but you have to admit it makes a point. Just like the tageting of Les Mis, a play about an unjust society and the people striving to change it, makes a point about hypocrisy. It gets the media coverage. We can debate all day about the usefulness of that coverage and if chasing media headlines should be our goal in the first place... but at the end of the day, it's been proven that JSOs membership grows every time they do something like this. It gets more people to join, which means next time it comes round to blocking key infrastructure, they'll be in a stronger position to succeed.

This isn't to say don't criticise them at all! I actually think criticisms like this one are a key part of organising and, done with care, can only make our movements stronger. I have my own issues with JSO- namely, the carelessness with which arrest is actively encouraged/promoted as the only valid form of resistance- but that's a whole other conversation and one that doesn't undermine my support and solidarity for the activists who are doing those actions (and sacrificing a whole lot in the process.) I think mass direct action movements are rarely ever perfect but I also think we need to show solidarity first and foremost when people are trying to do the right thing, especially if how they're doing it is in conjunction with or as a response to other tactics.

[p1utofairy]

PICK A CARD: “when i look into your eyes, i know it's real.”

★ which romantic tropes will you and your fp embody?

DISCLAIMER: 18+ mature themes. take what resonates leave what doesn’t. this was such a cute idea – thanks for requesting this anon. 💞 i hope you all enjoy!

— PILE ONE.

tropes → star-crossed lovers, forbidden love & opposites attract.

there’s a distinct polarity in you and your fp’s personalities & backgrounds, pile 1. you’re more reserved, cautious and patient and they’re more free-spirited and spontaneous. they say whatever they want and deal with the consequences later; this isn’t in a bad way either, i’m more so picking up that they like to stand up and fight for what’s right. they could be an activist of some sort. they’re confident and brave, and you’re really going to admire that. as far as finances go, this person has MONEY, like big money! they either come from money or they are in a profession that pays extremely well and that’s where i see the forbidden love trope coming in to play.

remember how allie in ‘the notebook’ comes from a wealthy, privileged background, while noah is portrayed as more working-class? the contrast in their backgrounds and personalities added depth to their relationship and created a lot of tension and conflict, but ultimately it made their love story more compelling and dynamic – that’s what i see here with you and your fp. you’re tired of over-working yourself for low pay and working jobs that don’t fulfill you financially, mentally and emotionally. you feel stuck…wondering when things are going to change. i see someone looking out of a window in a house, there’s a strong sense of longing and their eyes look sad. they’re waiting for someone or something to arrive, but when? you’ve been telling yourself to keep going and keep pushing through, and then you will see progress and reward in the long run – very saturn/saturnian energy.

it’s interesting because you’re looking for a way out of your situation and your person is looking for an adventure. your fp is very comfortable financially, but they’re lacking in their love life. right now they’re very much single and they’re fine with that, but that fiery energy that burns inside them can’t be dimmed for long. when they cross paths with you they’re gonna be awestruck like “whoa! who is that?” lol. your fp might have some sagittarius/fire sign placements, or they just carry themselves very pompous and matter-of-fact, which might throw you off at first. that’s why i was also picking up on that opposites attract trope because princess belle & the beast from ‘beauty and the beast’ immediately came to mind. belle loved her books and independence, which was a stark contrast with the beast’s initial gruff and hot-tempered nature. you might think they’re a bit arrogant at first, but once you get to know them you’ll understand that there’s layers to them.

their family plays a big part in their life, which ties into the forbidden love trope because i’m ngl their family lowkey can be a lot to handle. as i said before, some of your fps come from money so some of their families might be a little snooty and strict like allie’s mom from ‘the notebook’ but i think with patience and time – you and your fp will learn to not give a f*ck what their family or anybody else thinks. this relationship is destined and you’re meant to show each other the different aspects/complexities of life and love. the energy is very reminiscent of mr. darcy and elizabeth from ‘pride and prejudice’ like remember how much longing and yearning it took for them to finally be together?! it was sooooooo worth it.

additional messages → wealthy, 2 years from now, ego, aries, very lowkey, the blackest day by lana del rey & cultural differences.

— PILE TWO.

tropes → second chance & age gap.

your fp is dominant af, pile 2. they possess everything within reach, and they’re admired by many. you may establish boundaries with them from the very beginning and they will respect that, they value you and wouldn’t dare do anything to hurt you. however, despite the love, passion, and devotion that will be present in this relationship, there will also be a need for compromise. it seems that this relationship will fulfill your hopes and dreams, but it will also come with its share of responsibilities. in the early stages, both you and your fp will feel a strong urge to make your relationship official and commit to each other. whatever you need or want – they will provide for you. you may not have expected to fall for them, but you couldn’t fight the obvious chemistry between you two. i picked up on the age gap trope mainly because they have provider energy. for some of you, they might already have a kid/kids? your energy feels a little bit more flighty and young. you like to be in your own personal space most of the time, and not everyone understands that, but your fp will.

actually, i think the idea of compromise i was picking up on earlier has to do with your personal space. you might be a bit of an introvert and the idea of constantly entertaining someone 24/7 and not having a moment for yourself is a bit jarring to you. now i’m not saying this person is taking your autonomy away, what i’m saying is that there has to be some sort of balance with the give and take in this connection. it’s reminding me of olivia pope and fitz from ‘scandal’ like one minute he’s showing her the house he had built for them in vermont and then the next scene she’s crying that she needs space and they can’t be together – like OLIVIA what’s it gonna be?! it’s like your heart is saying yes but your mind is saying no.

you’re gonna have to use your discernment and figure out if this is what you want – true commitment. it’s gonna take trust and dedication to make this work, pile 2. it might get to a point where y’all take a break and you choose to see someone else, and then you realize how much of a greater difference your fp makes in your life. they’re your home. that's the second chance trope coming into play. wow, pile 2. this is a very dynamic and complex relationship, but that’s what keeps you two going and loving each other through thick and thin.

additional messages → infrunami by steve lacy, you will meet through friends, extremely dedicated, workaholic, ass kisser, there’s someone in your inner circle you need to cut off, moving abroad, younger sibling & love drought by beyoncé.

— PILE THREE.

tropes → high school sweethearts & enemies to lovers.

your fp is the life of the party, pile 3…sometimes to a fault lol. they’re capable of being responsible and making good decisions, but sometimes they just say f*ck it and wild out. they can be impulsive and unpredictable at times which is quite the opposite from you. i’m picturing haley and nathan from ‘one tree hill’ and kat and patrick from ‘10 things i hate about you’ AND no by meghan trainer just randomly started playing in my head. i’m honestly so amused by this energy cause you’re like “nope! you’re not gonna fuck my life up.” being all dramatic 🤭 and they’re like “what?! me? i would never!” lol there’s gonna be a lot of witty banter between you both. your friends are gonna encourage you to just give them a chance, cause it’s obvious that you do like them — you just can’t stand how “friendly” they are.

your fp is extroverted as hell and loves a good social outing, whereas you on the other hand, rather curl up in bed with a good book or binge-watch your favorite shows/movies in the comfort of your own home. there’s this energy of “been there, done that.” the party scene just isn’t it for you anymore, and you’re content with that. this connection will really help your fp mature and get more in tune with their emotions, instead of masking them behind reckless behavior and nonchalance. that high school sweethearts trope really comes through strongly, not in the sense that y’all are actually in high school, but that nathan & haley vibe – that puppy love! once y’all are together, nobody can tell y’all shit. you and your fp will RIDE for each other.

nathan and haley definitely had their ups and downs, but they always found a way to make it work once they put their egos aside. haley brought out a side of nathan that nobody else got to experience but her. sometimes butting heads is necessary, it helps you confront things within yourself that you don’t always want to acknowledge. you’re so nurturing pile 3, you bring water to their fire. i don’t see you immediately jumping into this relationship, but that’s the beauty of it. that’s where the enemies to lovers trope kicks in, you’ll have to warm up to them first before you truly understand who they are at the core. your fp is used to fast-pace, hot n’ heavy, fleeting relationships but this is stable. this is pure. they’ll realize you can’t rush true love like this, it’s the journey and build-up that makes it so magical.

additional messages → 1st house placements, sagittarius, very soon, get out of your head, nice and slow by usher & family feud.

— PILE FOUR.

tropes → friends to lovers & forced proximity.

your fp has very high-energy, pile 4. i feel out of breath like i just got done doing 8 different tasks at once lol they might be very athletic or they just like to keep themselves busy. you and your fp are opposites, but the more you get to know each other, you will begin to realize that you have a lot in common – i’m hearing that you two will have a lot to talk about. sometimes you might find yourself holding back from saying things that you want to say in fear of judgement but with this person that anxiety goes out the window. they want to hear your thoughts and ideas, because they truly value your wisdom and knowledge on certain topics that they might not have been aware of. i’m hearing that they want to know your lore lol this is too cute. maybe you’re really into movies? marvel? fashion? idk there’s something very specific that you could go on and on about for hours and hours.

that’s why i picked up on that friends to lovers trope because i feel like they will show immediate interest in you and want to pursue something more, but you’ll be like WOAH hold it there…let’s build on this and see where it can go, no rush. i’m ngl pile 4 they might have a bit of a reputation or vibe of being a player…which will make you hesitant as to whether or not you want to take this seriously. i don’t even think you two normally run in the same circles – this is more like a chance meeting. yup here goes that forced proximity trope, you’ll probably meet them in some sort of unconventional way and be “forced” to spend time together.

you and your fp kind of remind me of holly and eric from ‘life as we know it’ which is a very underrated but amazing rom-com. i don’t think you’ll initially hate them per se, you’ll just be a bit cautious of them and wonder if they’re actually being genuine. however, by spending time with your fp, you will develop a deeper understanding and appreciation for them; which will then lead to you falling for them and establishing a close bond. you two might’ve gotten off on the wrong foot and then after a proper conversation with them you’ll be like: huh…you’re not so bad after all. there’s this flirty energy that comes in the form of sly/sarcastic remarks, and you’ll come to realize that it’s their own way of saying “i really like you.” it’s giving 2000s rom-com lol hot n cold by katy perry just came to mind.

the sexual tension between you two will be palpable, your friends will be like just f*ck already!!! this relationship will have it’s fair share of ups and downs, but that’s what will make it worth fighting for; nothing and no one is perfect and you will learn that in this relationship. no one could ever compare to you in your fp’s eyes – they will always have love for you even in the moments where you two don’t see eye to eye. the difference in you and your fp’s personalities will be what draws you two together even more.

additional messages → jealousy, jealousy by olivia rodrigo, lots of traveling, you manifested this, different lifestyles but we’ll make it work, your angel guides got your back & when one door closes, another one opens.

[lovebvni]

repetition (a pick-a-pile)

in honor of my friends kai ( @klxudykai )and nile (who doesn’t want to be tagged), i want to do a little pap! this will be black white and purple themed for them too (their pfp colours)

i know both of them are going through cycles of repeating their actions over and over, and it is hard for them. i know it’s frustrating — hell i hate repetition. but you find peace in it.

this pick-a-pile is just advice for your manifesting and/or shifting journey. there is no real theme, but i asked spirit to bring up something you need to repeat for each pile.

this pap is intuition and shufflemancy-based. i am not using tarot nor cards at all for this. this is also for entertainment purposes. take my words with a grain of salt AND please do not use this as legal or life advice.

now, inhale and exhale. believe in your intuition, and pick a picture.

[1 ; 2

3 ; 4]

pile 1 the spiral.

hi pile 1! here’s confirmation for your pile : cycles, crying, cynical, the letter c (in your name of in the name of your significant other. casey and clark stand out.), puns, clairaudience, crown, clowns, (a lot of words w the letter c jesus christ..), underwater, drowning, sinking, the sea, oceans, water (s), fix your face, black, sexism, activist, reality shifter, cyclones, spirals, “i feel like im not seeing any signs/progress”

well pile one, you could feel like you are stuck in a cycle. just a torpedo and you’re getting hit with the same things over and over. you’re wondering why things aren’t changing, why this won’t end, but it’s because YOU won’t change. this is the harshest i think i have ever been in a pick a card, but you really need to get over yourself. realize you aren’t the person you should be, throw that person away and reinvent yourself. you want a lot in life, and you aren’t going to get it if you don’t decide to change yourself. the universe chose you for a reason, but if you keep having your own pity party, you aren’t gonna get anywhere. stop getting mad when you’re being told the truth. it isn’t there to hurt you. it’s there to help you. the truth is a tool. and as long as you keep ignoring it, you keep hiding from the monster inside your closet, it’s never gonna leave. it’s gonna haunt you. it’s like a negative spirit. lure it out and keep it coming. it is gonna hurt, but it’s worth it.

your required repetition is “continue to listen and change yourself. transformation.”

the waiting season is one where you need to work, don’t keep sulking.

now to interpreting your song, her by poppy. you have been trying to be someone else that you are not, for someone else. the chorus

“I'm getting to know her And all of her anger You won't recognize her If you encountered I'm getting to know her And all of her anger Picked herself up Put her back together”

you need to change and you know it, and you don’t know how. start with your anger, your sadness, a strong emotion and unravel it. unwrap it like a gift. keep pulling to you get to the root of the cause — hold it.. nurture it… and get the mud off it.

see this as a new start, pile one. i love you. you need to know you’re strong, and you can do this. don’t get annoyed, because i know you’ve been told this before. fix your face.

pile 2 ghouls

hello pile 2! here’s confirmation this is your pile!!: fairies, love, purple, green, heart chakra and third eye chakra, shadows, “on a silver platter”, polite, scars, romance, sacred, girl blogger, skull and bones, doja cat, fear of success, screaming, pink, sexuality, white, sensuality, fire and ice, opposites, blood, self sabotage, royalty, alternative, goth, knight, disability, multilingual, this specific dynamic, vampire

simplicity. simplify everything. that’s all spirit is saying. don’t over complicate things. that’s like all spirit is saying u guys 😭😭

they r literally saying clear your mind, just be the person you are meant to be. listen to your intuition, be creative, have love in your heart, even when times are hard, and let emotions flow.

spirit told me your manifestations are actively coming in 😭😭 idek why you’re reading this pac! like there are no notes, nothing else you need to do. just listen to your intuition and be in tune with yourself. god i love this pile bc yall r js so sweet and light hearted — like there’s so much hidden positivity here that’s waiting to come out.

good job on how far you’ve come, and hav fun where you’re going! love you pile 2!

pile 3 — unclear memory

hi pile 3! here’s your confirmation: “even a worm will turn”, disappointment, ditsy, protector, big eyes, proposal, hobbit core, hermitcraft, minecraft, silence, under another’s control, blush, light colours (pastels), resting, new opportunities, distractions, distant, chapell roan, wlw.

you’re over possessive but you cut out your heart. or someone else cut it out. you need to get your priorities straight. there’s so much going on in your brain. they all lead to the same thing, don’t they? like how a spider web meets in the middle.

you’re sad, i can tell, but you won’t let anyone know. you think you’ve done enough, or even too much, but in reality you’ve been distracted. you’re trying to hide your main in overworking. doing too much.

your repeating advice is “get back on track and focus on your morals”.

but dont become some else. become yourself. stop holding grudges. get yourself back.

pile 4 — kisses

hi pile 4! here’s confirmation this is your pile: shadow work, brooklyn nine-nine, wolf pack, furry, july, suicidal but continuing, height difference, jumbled thoughts, flowers, blue and pink, wash off the makeup, ombré, counting crows poem.

this is my dogs favorite song 😭😭

pile four, you have been looking for outer validation when you don’t need it. you’re searching for signs, for love, for confirmation you’re on the right path when you really jay need yourself. you’re putting yourself down and other people/the universe on a pedestal. YOU ARE THE UNIVERSE!! REALIZE THAT!

what you say goes. what you want will happen. and that’s that.

your advice is as follows ; “you need to just rest.”

and i think that’s great advice. sit down and relax. listen to music, meditate, be at peace. work on yourself. try journaling too!! it will help.

thank yall for reading!! <3 i hope this helps someone. finishing this at 5:55 pm btw!!

[justalittlesolarpunk]

hi! i love your blog :D do you have any advice to implement low waste and solarpunk aspects into everyday life with a tight budget? keep doing what you do!

Hi!

Thanks for asking - I’ve had this question before and it’s definitely a real problem. Organic, plastic free food is expensive. So is handmade durable clothing, and train fares these days. It can feel like only the rich can be solarpunks, which is pretty counterintuitive given its anticapitalist ideology. But! I’m here to tell you there’s lots you can do to bring solarpunk into your life in a cost-effective way.

To start with, lots of solarpunk spaces are free or cheap. Get a library card and you can borrow as many books and DVDs and other resources as you like. Look up to see if there’s a library of things in your neighbourhood, and join a buy nothing or stuff for free group online. Download TooGoodToGo, which lets you access food from local cafes and restaurants which would otherwise go to waste. See if there’s a repair cafe that operates near you - I managed to get a pair of trousers mended at one of these for free, and I had been thinking I would need to pay a tailor (which is fine if you can afford it! Skilled labour deserves fair wages!). In some places plant-based food is cheaper, so when it is, choose it. But in others it will cost more than animal products so you have to decide on a case by case basis whether saving money or a particular diet is more important to you.

There’s lots else you can do for minimal spending or that actually saves you money. Walking to work or school avoids the expenditure in the petrol for a drive or a bus fare. If you’re within walking distance and able to do so, I’d recommend it. Joining your local chapter of Extinction Rebellion, Friends of The Earth, Greenpeace, The A22 network or any other active climate group in your area is almost always free and just involves a small weekly time commitment. This will introduce you to activists and inform you about protests and public meetings you can attend.

If you have the time in your week and the physical ability, which I acknowledge many people don’t, you can also join some sort of volunteer group looking after a nature reserve or tending a community garden (which might also give you access to free or discounted food). Learning to forage is also a good skill as that really is free food!

Depending on where you are, a green electricity tariff *can* also be less expensive. If this is the case and you have control over your provider, it’s worth switching to it. Buying books and clothes secondhand will also be better for the environment and your bank balance. Teaching yourself about the climate and the natural world with podcasts, YouTube, online free articles and other resources is also free and the knowledge will help you keep solarpunk at the front of your mind. Read good news stories online whenever you can, to remind you that good things are happening already.

If you’re employed, you can also try to influence green policy at your workplace or in your trade union. If you’re at school or university, joining (or setting up!) the environmental society and/or lobbying for change at the SU are both good ideas and shouldn’t necessarily cost you anything. If you can - and I know this is inaccessible for a big swathe of the population - put a very small amount of money aside whenever possible, because the more you save the more you can afford to buy better products, donate to causes, help out the needy in your community, travel in a greener way, and other more expensive choices. It’s all about that dual power.

Hope this helps get you started!

[doberbutts]

Something I was just thinking about... You know how we have both the terms homophobia and lesbophobia, acknowledging the ways in which homophobia manifests differently for lesbians? Some specific lesbophobic issues that are talked about are, for example, how the identity of lesbian is often not taken seriously (seen as a phase and/or something women do to turn on men), and how lesbians are often overlooked and erased in society at large, with the focus of more violent forms of homophobia being gay men.

(Not to say that lesbians are never violently targeted. Butch lesbians especially often are)

This reluctance to take lesbians seriously and their "invisibility" are acknowledged as problems. The fact it's a less violent (on average) type of oppression doesn't make it less worthy of being discussed, or to be named.

On the other hand, transmasc invisibility is, in a lot of circles, kind of seen as a superpower and a privilege? Of course I don't envy anyone who is a major target of violence (though, as trans people, we all are. None of us are exempt from it, despite what some people might think. Living as an out trans person is very liberating, and incredibly scary), but I do believe it's worth discussing the ways in which erasure and invisibility harms us without it being seen as controversial and... Kind of ungrateful? In the same way lesbians have been able to discuss similar issues without being shamed for it.

That being said I'm pretty sure I've seen similarly dismissive attitude towards lesbians discussing lesbophobia, but in my experience it was never this vitriolic and widely accepted/encouraged, and lesbophobia as a term was never so harshly rejected

I tend not to talk about lesbian issues because I'm not one and I think the lesbians should speak for themselves, but on the surface I would agree with this.

In my mind it's very similar to the discussion of the invisibility of black women's problems: the fact that many black women are also harmed by police violence, the sheer amount of black women dying in hospitals to medical malpractice, the erasure of black women's contributions to technology and science and history and society... these are problems discussed in the portions of the black community that I frequent, which are strongly activists anyway, but not really discussed or known at all by society as a whole and esp not the nonblack portions.

[Which is something else Crenshaw discusses which is why I keep telling folks to actually, like, read her works rather than parroting whatever incorrect definition of intersectionality they've decided they like]

Similarly, trans men are a relative unknown despite both being victims to horrific transphobic violence and also being major contributors to queer movements and even cishet society. And, similar to the above discussion, there's a lot of resistance from those outside of this conversation to accept that it's a discussion that needs to happen.

[dowhatteverer]

An honest critique of FRWBY by someone who actually watched it and was willing to give it a chance

Ok so LF and CS have proven themselves to be disingenuous liars who go out of their way to make rewrites of RWBY look poorly written and bigoted because they have diluted themselves into believing that the show doesn't carry all of the same problems that they accuse these rewrites of having. That being said, Fixing RWBY does happen to carry over a lot of problems from the original show. While I personally believe that Fixing RWBY is a better story structurally from RWBY proper, that doesn't mean that it didn't keep many of the flaws associated with the original show. This is not a defense of FRWBY, nor is it really a bashing because I will come right out and say that I do actively enjoy it and am excited to keep up with its version of volume six. I wouldn't recommend it to any of the people I interact with a lot on Tumblr simply because it's definitely not something they would like very much.

It's impressive how much passion is put into this project honestly, seeing all these fans come together to take the time out of their days without payment just to create something they care about. I definitely think the art and animations are some of the best parts of FRWBY. And I think the story does a far better job of utilizing the amount of characters that the show already had without constantly adding new ones that are completely unnecessary. It also makes a lot of changes to the characters interactions and relationships with other characters that I appreciate. I like that Weiss's time in the Brawnwen was changed from being held prisoner and threatened, to being a taste of freedom and potential new life for herself that she eventually had to ditch for the sake of her friends and the mission. And I really liked Changing Vernal to be Yang's secret half sister and having her develop a friendship with Weiss, it did a lot more to make her death feel more impactful by making her a character that the audience has to care about because these other characters care about her, and goes a long way of proving how selfish and short-sighted Raven could be where her own arrogance and desires ultimately ended up getting her own daughter killed and the tribe she chose over her own husband and first daughter to leave her. And I'm actually quite happy with Roman being Ozpin's host, I think it's handled pretty well and in a way that doesn't overshadow Ruby at all. One change that I thought was pretty cool from a story and representation perspective was having Neo use ASL and have Yang also learn it with her during her recovery period (which was actually a recovery period thank God, not just a showcase of her suffering and then just being fine without seeing her journey). And one thing that I like by default is it going out of its way to humanize Ironwood. That's always an A+ in my book as an Ironwood fan.

Now let's get into the bad stuff that is actually worth criticizing and not just sweeping under the rug just because LF and CS are lying liars who lie.

First and foremost, the Faunus plotline.

I don't like it.

There was very little effort put in to change the actual problems with the Faunus plotline in the actual show. The White Fang are still the bad guys, Blake is at the same time, still a rich princess with parents who love her, and Racism in Remnant is explicitly stated to be an individual to individual thing (though in a Livestream Celtic Phoenix said that racism in Atlas is systemic, so I'm holding out a little bit of hope that will at least be treated like a big deal) and still far more fighting against civil rights activists than fighting actual racists.

There's some interesting stuff in the beginning with Cardin starting out pretty racist, but after being forced to do some actual research on the subject and finding that his views have no historical or scientific basis quickly changing his mind about it and growing into a better person, but that's not enough to forgive the rest of it.

Effort is being put in to make Adam a more dynamic character who seems to have an explicit tragic backstory regarding the racism he faced (and not just implied with his nasty hate crime scar) but that actually makes the whole thing kind of worse. Because I kid you not, in the final episodes of the volume 5 rewrite, when the White fang is defeated, Blake tells Adam, "this isn't the world your mother grew up in anymore" and I'm just like, Adam's mom is implied to have been a Slave woman who was abused and possibly killed by her owner! Who is Blake, in her mansion on an ethnostate where she never had to face racism or cruelty or worry for a family member's safety, to tell Adam how he should react to Racism?! And I know that the reason she has to stop him in the rewrite is because the White Fang are trying to stage a cou that would lead to a war that would cost far more faunus lives than do good for them, but that doesn't change the fact that it's extremely tone deaf that it was Blake who is telling him this when her backstory hasn't been changed at all.

Either make the White Fang the good guys, or make Blake an orphan who has had to experience racism and cruelty her whole life, because you can't have both and still have a story that doesn't feel jarring and pro establishment as hell.

Next, the cultural appropriation. Taking inspiration from multiple Asian cultures for Mistral is kind of unavoidable since Mistral itself is fundamentally meant to be based on a multitude of Asian cultures. (I personally try to mitigate this problem by having different parts of Mistral be based on different Asian countries, and do the same for the other kingdoms too) but I think we all remember the thing about the Brawnwen tribe from a few months ago. Since the Ainu people are heavily discriminated against in Japan and stereotyped as being bandits and thieves, having the Brawnwen tribe be inspired by them in some aspects is definitely a bad thing. It was especially a problem when that cultural appropriation was also misinterpreted and used without fully understanding the culture of what the traditional bear was. And then the attempt to crack down and defend that was just a bad look altogether.

And to bring up the Shay D Mann and Ren and Roman bathroom scene, these are things that I think the creator just didn't realize could come across as queerphobic or a bad look for the character. The joke about Roman not realizing that Ren is a man and then having a conversation about all of tells that would have tipped him off about Ren being a guy and then having them be rebuttaled (at one point pointing out that Weiss has small boobs and that doesn't make her less of a woman, which while I think was well intentioned was just uncomfortable in general) was just in poor taste. And Shiloh (as he's called in FRWBY) didn't need to still be showcased sexually harassing Yang. He was actively physically and verbally abusing the man at register anyway in the rewrite, Yang could have just done the heroic thing and punched him to protect the civilian, instead of trying to ignore him while he comments on her figure and then saying something incredibly abelist about her prosthetic before being thrown out by Neo and her umbrella. Although It's not necessary to make all of your important characters good people. So I guess this has a lot more to do with how you feel about bad people still being important and sympathetic characters. Though I wouldn't say Shiloh is that important to Volume 5, all he really does is provide some Vernal backstory, serve as some comic relief, and is the one who ultimately decides for the tribe to leave Raven after she gets his daughter killed.

If I were to defend these choices, instead of trying to claim that Shiloh didn't sexually harass Yang (which was honestly far more present in the rewrite, no actual dialogue but he is described as complimenting her figure) and that lesbians are stupid, I would instead say that a character doesn't have to be a good perfectly squeaky clean non problematic person to be a character who isn't necessarily a villain. Or alternatively I could just acknowledge that it was unnecessary to have him actively sexually harass a girl his daughter's age because there was already something else that could have been used to show that he wasn't a good person and end up bouncing right out of the gas station anyway.

I think that's everything I want to talk about, because combing through all of it would be like rewatching an eight hour show and taking notes the whole time and I don't have much time for that.

But all in all, FRWBY isn't above criticism just because it's a rewrite of RWBY and has some aspects that deserve to be criticized, but it's also not the worst most biggoted thing in the world. I like aspects of it, but I honestly like other rewrites better. It honestly just feels like watching the original show if the original show had a more coherent story but didn't change any of the more problematic aspects.

So yeah, there's my review. I'll tell you how I felt about Volume six when it's over.

[paperstorm]

Rafael never posted or liked anything related about Palestine or even a simple post of ceasefire, yet he got the time and energy to like kim plastic dumpster kardashian's post about how terrified poor zionists feel and how they are not alone. But absolutely NOTHING about the genocide of thousands and thousands of palestinian people.

I'm disappointed by a lot of people i liked but Rafael takes the cake of the biggest disappointment in 2023. Man's all about activism and human rights but when it comes to the human rights of Palestinians and arab/muslims in general he suddenly can't see, hear and talk. Fake activism at its finest.

I wish we could know the thought process behind the silence of people who it seems like would normally have something to say. I really don't, and that's frustrating. I think it's okay to be disappointed. An instagram post or something seems like such a miniscule amount of effort when you consider the hell so many have been living through for months, or even the work of actual activists who have been tireless and do difficult, dangerous, and utterly thankless work. It maybe is worth noting that Disney is on the BDS boycott list for a reason, and everyone who works for 911 Lone Star are employees of a Disney subsidiary (currently called 20th Television). Also worth noting that the consequences for speech have been completely one-sided, as they always are on this issue. Gigi Hadid is losing work, university presidents are the targets of clear smear campaigns, while Sarah Silverman gets to call for Israel cutting off the water to Gaza (quite literally a call for genocide) and gets to play it off as a joke and host late-night shows. I don't know what kind of potential consequences there would be for someone like Rafa, but he is a person with a very small amount of power compared to a Brad Pitt or a Taylor Swift. There very likely would be consequences. I don't know if that's what's stopping him, but it's something to keep in mind. It isn't, though, a reason to not feel disappointed. I feel it too.

(Edit: without an instagram account, I can't check for myself the context of the post he allegedly liked. The way it was characterized in this anonymous message might be misleading.)

[delileaf]

so i fr work in a research building and everytime someone looks me in the eye and tells me they’re working on tuberculosis i gotta try real hard not to fall to my knees and start screaming

#yes it is surprisingly a very active area of research #it shocks me everytime #literally posters i walk past everyday abt tuberculosis and all i can think of is him…..

hi stranger!!! this post came up while i was searching abt TB and i didnt see that you were a red dead redemption(??? that cowboy game that i wish i could play where the main character gets TB) and i was at first very confused that you were like. kind of hostile to the idea of tuberculosis treatment? i saw a post with the name arthur and i was like ohh that makes so much more sense lol

but yeah tuberculosis is still a very big problem, just not one that gets acknowledged much in wealthy or majority white nations. due to several reasons (most notably corporate greed in the pharmaceutical industry), TB treatments are very inaccessible to a lot of people — this has changed very recently, but in some parts global south, just a diagnostic test could cost an entire week’s worth of wages

if you know who john green is, he actually started going in on tuberculosis activism like last year and leveraged his fanbase against johnson & johnson and a biotech company called cepheid in order to get them to reduce the pricing of their treatment & testing equipment in low- and middle-income countries! cepheid & their parent company danaher are still dragging their feet (only the first test for TB is reduced, but if someone tests positive they’re supposed to get a second test that will check what drugs will be effective against their strain. this is a major deal and is still unaffordable to a lot of people).

i’ll restrain myself from infodumping too much about my (very unsettling) special interest, but i have some recommendations in case you’re curious:

phantom plague by vidya krishnan is an incredible resource that is very approachable for someone not familiar with TB history and so full of interesting information. krishnan covers both history and the modern day, and goes into not only some germ science but also the social, political, and financial aspects. this is a massive recommendation to anyone, it’s just really really good

tbfighters . org is a website created by TB activists that’s a great jumping off point for anyone wanting to know what’s up with TB activism right now — includes basic details about TB in the modern day, some very easy calls to action (mostly focused on pressuring cepheid out of their price gouging, with some political information for the US and UK also!), and at the end a bunch of links to learn more!

(also i mentioned john green jumping into the fray earlier, so i have to talk about how he has a bunch of really great youtube videos and tiktoks about TB — history & also the modern day fight against it)

okay sorry this was a lot. please have a good day/night!!! :) <3

wow- this is super interesting !!!! I’ve actually just started my PhD in cell biology and I get so focused on the science I sometimes forget there’s a whole like political and economic landscape to biotech and pharmaceutical companies. doing research, it’s so easy to forget you’re not working in a vacuum!!

honestly as someone from the uk TB is just not on my radar and in my stupid science brain i was like - we can treat it? therefore we solved that problem? very privileged and sheltered of me I know, so I’m so glad you sent me that info!!

it’s crazy to me that i spend so much time getting sad over a fictional cowboy while real people are still going through very real situations with TB and suffering because they can’t afford tests or treatment - something i feel like more people and especially the rdr fandom should keep in mind when making jokes abt a ‘cowboy disease’

so thanks so much for all that!!!! (also …. you should definitely play the cowboy game, it’s amazing but will break you into a million pieces)

have a lovely day!!

[self-loving-vampire]

You're my favorite preservationist blog, so once again I wanted to hear your take on this:

I may not fully understand the situation here, so take this with a grain of salt,

but wasn't it a risky move for the Internet Archive to allow 'unlimited concurrent lending' indefinitely?

Yes, the pandemic still exists; yes it would be better if greedy publishing houses couldn't threaten the existence of petabytes of preserved data over the equivalent of a few bucks,

but as one of the last bastions against the relentless onslaught of IP law, in some cases literally the only thing preventing content from falling into lost media territory,

shouldn't they have stayed a little more within the rules on this, rather than risking legal exposure they can't afford?

Isn't it their duty as an archive to play it safe and act within the law so a loss like this doesn't mean everyone loses access to everything?

Is it worth fighting a costly legal battle to maintain a more ideal state of open access if it very well could mean the end of all they've worked for and media preservation as we know it?

All the commentary I've seen so far has been rightfully angry at the publishers for pursuing this, but if the IA goes down because they fought for the right to help the most people possible and lost, the resulting harm will be irreparable, and from an archivist's perspective that seems woefully irresponsible on their part.

I think their objective should be to preserve as much content and maintain as much access as possible, yes, but this feels like an all-or-nothing gambit that could have been avoided by just going back to how they operated pre-pandemic.

I'm afraid of what will happen if fighting the good fight means dying for the cause. Some loss of access, even if it's a change as drastic as going from unlimited to limited, doesn't seem like the hill to die on if it means total loss of access.

Please correct me if my understanding of the situation is factually inaccurate, but this is the conclusion I've come to given the information I currently have.

(Also thanks for hearing me out on this. It really means a lot that I have someone I can express my thoughts to, on this and in general.)

I am honored that you see this as a preservationist blog! While I think media preservation is an extremely important thing I saw myself as just a normal person with opinions and some resources to share rather than any kind of expert or activist.

As a result, my understanding of the laws and consequences involved is probably not more advanced than yours. In the best case scenario the archive survives and only the book lending service suffers, but even that seems like a catastrophic loss. In the worst case scenario, the lawsuit could cost them so much that it could impact other parts of the site. This ruling is definitely bad either way.

That's also saying nothing of the effect this could have on other digital libraries, which could begin to limit their own services to avoid similar lawsuits.

Due to that lack of understanding of the nuances of the law, I don't know how strong their legal case was and therefore can't really comment on whether providing this particular service was unusually reckless.

However, on a moral level I am proud to have financially supported them even if just in the small ways available to a random person on the internet, and will continue to stand by them throughout the appeal process.

One thing about preservation that is always worth keeping in mind is that it's not about just keeping the texts or putting them in some restricted archive or a museum. Ideally, I want as many people as possible to be able to acquire whatever information they wish with ease and become vessels for sharing it themselves.

That not only keeps the information more "alive" by letting people actually interact with it but also makes it more resilient. If the only copies of a work are kept in a museum then said work can easily be lost if something happens to said museum. However, if the work is downloaded and shared by thousands of people around the world then it becomes much more likely to endure.

Most of all I just wish for the end of copyright law and the very concept of intellectual property...

[eduminatti]

Do you think schools in India should start teaching self defense for girls?

 Do you think schools in India should start teaching self-defense to girls? The Delhi bus rape case has led to a lot of conversations about personal security and how to do something about it.

As per research conducted by schools in Mumbai we can keep our fingers crossed all we want, but till the time women won't learn some skills to protect themselves from an attack, such things are not going to end.

Ever since the rape case in India, a lot of parents and students in India are asking school staff to teach self-defense classes for girls. I thought it would be a good idea myself as

 I grew up watching Trisha Shetty movies – where she’s a superheroine who kicks butts – but even I was surprised when my friends started telling me they are actually thinking about doing this.

 I see this question is being raised mostly by the elders who have grown up in a different time and justice wasn't always served as regards women. 

Another survey done by schools in Bangalore shows that while I agree self-defense and survival skills should be taught to all kids, it makes sense to include those skills in the principals' syllabus for girls only, specifically to help them deal with a confrontation in public spaces.

When it comes to girls' education, we've come a long way. Although it's an uphill battle, women have defied cultural norms to pursue higher education.

 For example, despite progress in providing equal opportunity for schooling and life skills education for girls, reproductive and sexual health information, access to hygiene and sanitation facilities remain major challenges for girls going to schools

Yes, I think that schools in India should start teaching self-defense to girls. I am a human rights activist and I believe that this is the right of every girl. By learning self-defense, girls will be able to protect themselves from any kind of danger and also give them the confidence to do anything.

I believe that self-defense should be taught to all girls irrespective of their age. It is not necessary to learn a new form of martial art or boxing but it could be done by just using simple physical moves like punching, kicking, etc. 

This will help them to boost their confidence level and they will be able to defend themselves and fight back with any kind of danger they face in their life.

This can also help in preventing sexual harassment as well as rape cases which are increasing day by day in our country. And if it helps even a single girl then it is worth doing this...

Yes. I think schools in India should start teaching self-defense to girls, because of the following reasons. 

1. India is a country with a very negative mindset. 

2. The mindset of people is such that they believe women are weak and thus can be taken advantage of. 

3. They do not realize that women have the same strength as men, it's just that they have been taught from a young age to be submissive and obedient to their elders, which has had an adverse effect on their confidence levels.

4. This lack of confidence leads them to not stand up against injustice even when they know it's wrong because they fear what might happen if they do so, thus perpetuating the problem further.

In these times when women are being attacked constantly, it is time to take a stand. All schools in India should start teaching self-defense to girls. While the men have been trained in martial arts and fighting, the women were told to stay away from such things. But the situation has changed.

The government should make it mandatory for all schools to teach self-defense techniques to girls. Not only does it help them in case of an emergency, but it also makes them confident in themselves.

Those against such a step say that this would corrupt the minds of girls and make them think they can do anything they want. But self-defense is not only about beating up an attacker or fighting with someone stronger than you.

 It is also about knowing what your rights are and how to stand up for yourself when you feel that something wrong is happening with you. It teaches girls that they don't have to stay silent if they are being harassed or touched inappropriately by someone.

Such classes should be made compulsory for boys as well so that they understand the importance of respecting women and helping them out instead of harming them or touching them inappropriately.

 Yes, women need to learn how to protect themselves as well because there are some truly sick people out there who want nothing more than to hurt others for their own.

[perunaselvaoscura]

Books 2022

In 2022, I read 81 books (20 of them chapbook or chapbook type things) for a total of 11,092 pages. A lot more than I thought and had read during the super depressed era of the pandemic. I kept another notebook tabulating how many total pages I read including books I did not finish, and that number is 11,205 pages. Maybe it’s not worth it to keep these two types of lists, but I was curious how many pages I read of things I did not finish, but I also wonder how many books I had read some of in 2021 or earlier that then got added erroneously to the pages read of books completed in 2022 list!

Favorite Books read in 2022:

Plastic: An Autobiography by Allison Cobb

I like how she mixed in research on plastic and the environment with stories about her relationships and her mother dying. I also found out about the huge prevalence of asthma in Houston, which is due to terrible pollution from the plants around there, and remember how I had terrible asthma that required a machine you plugged in (like an inhaler, but breathing that medicine in for 5 minutes at a time) after we moved to Houston when I was 5. 

Spacious Minds: Trauma and Resilience in Tibetan Buddhism by Sara E. Lewis

Even though it is a white anthropologist talking about Tibetans, and you wish it was a Tibetan writing it, really helpful for dealing with emotional pain, and quite the opposite of all that western therapy traditions say you should do with trauma. All is impermanent, create space between you and the problems you encounter, as they are not real. Rehashing it, digging deep into it, like in western therapy, just solidifies it more, whereas the Tibetans don’t view it as a solid thing.

For the Good of All, Do Not Destroy the Birds by Jennifer Moxley

Wonderful short essays about poetry with a recurring theme of birds in every type of context you could imagine, mixed in with stories of her life and her husband. 

Electrical Theories of Femininity by Sarah Mangold

My poetry twin. I love everything she does.

To Look at the Sea Is to Become What One Is by Etel Adnan (Vol. 1)

I thought I’d get to volume 2 this year, but I didn’t. Loved reading about her time in Marin, as that is where I work, as well as, just everything.

Boys for Pele by Amy Gentry

My first 33 1/3 book I ever read and it was amazing. In addition to descriptions of her songs and in depth analysis of the music, she brings in a lot that is theory based which I was not expecting, which really appealed to my cerebral side. 

La Movida by Tatiana Luboviski-Acosta

Romantic and activist and very The Mission.

Boat by Lisa Robertson

I always go into a trance reading her poetry.

Translation of the Lilies Back into Lists by Laynie Browne

Saw her read from this on a Zoom reading and immediately went and ordered it. Translating mundane lists we all make into poetry is totally my thing.

After Buddhism by Stephen Batchelor

Shocking in a cool way to read that the four noble truths were originally four tasks, and the "noble truth" thing was tacked on later. I really like the linguistic analysis about what was said and what we know to be the meaning being not what the text actually says. Some aspects of his critique later on became a bit uncomfortable though, and I just don’t think I ascribe to the atheism part of Buddhism in his style of American Buddhism. But really worth reading. 

Interventions for Women by Angela Hume

Feminist/Environmental activism combined with very personal poetry about her failing relationship 

An Event, Perhaps by Peter Salmon

New biography of Derrida (I had never read one). Enjoyed reading about his antidepressant, and not finishing his thesis for twenty years, and do feel like I understand some of his ideas better. Did not enjoy reading about his affair, and stealing ideas for his philosophy from a Vietnamese philosopher. 

Southern Migrant Mixtape by Vernon Keeve 

If only I knew what a great writer he was when he lived here. It’s in the more narrative style which I usually don’t like, but I loved it, very engaging.

The Empty Form Goes All the Way to Heaven by Brian Teare

Poems about struggling though an undiagnosed disability illness mixed in with poems about art.

Mine Eclogue by Jacob Kahn

I really like how he's obviously so charming, but also cerebral and definitely smart, but not in an authoritative way. I don't think you need to know very much about the eclogues besides the fact that it's about nature, because that's all I know. And I like that he got into them as his project.

Girls Against God by Jenny Hval

Goth philosophy more than a novel, but an occasional plot or character makes an appearance.

Drive By by Claudia La Rocco

A chapbook long short story that has several elements I still don’t understand.

Other books I read and loved but don’t have a little spiel about:

Regular Acid Consciousness by Paul Ebenkamp

An Essay, Ritual by Erick Saenz

Desgraciado: The Collected Letters by Angel Dominguez

Weirding by Lindsey Boldt

Facing You by Uche Nduka

Bionic Communality by Brenda Iijima

Worm Holes by Jamie Townsend

Grief Sequence by Prageeta Sharma

Memnoir by Joan Retallack

Necropolitics by Achille Mbembe

Ghost Notes by Kenning JP Garcia

The NIght Before the Day on Which by Jean Day

Eric Sneathen’s private mailings

[independentartistbuzz]

7 From the Women with Jo Alexis of Happy For No Reason

Jo Alexis is a songwriter, producer and vocalist of over 150 songs for her many projects including Alexis/Alexander, Happy For No Reason and her latest, GALEXI. Often compared to Sinead O’Connor, Sarah McLachlan & Bjork, she not only brings great hooks to enchanting melodies but her vocals leave the listener wanting more.

As a prolific songwriter,  Jo has recorded in Nashville, Los Angeles, NYC, Philadelphia and Portland with some heavy hitters like Brad Rabuchin (played with Ray Charles) and Jef Lee (played with Roberta Flack.) She’s also shared the stage with Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary and she’s had a song placed in the video game “Reactor/Master Ground 3.”

We got the chance to speak Jo Alexis about her music, career, and opinions in this edition of 7 From the Women. So, let’s dive in:

What Have You Been Working To Promote Lately?

“Canaries (Hot Summer Night)” is a raucous sing-along drinking song, like the rat pack with a female lead!  It is from my newest LP by Happy For No Reason, my jazzy folk band. We finished recording and mixing and making the music video during the pandemic which was challenged us to work remotely. However, a musician who I deeply respect told me that my lead vocals were “too aggressive” and it sounded like I was yelling. So, I bought a new microphone and redid my lead parts alone in my bedroom. I also learned how to use Logic, the DAW (digital audio work station) and spent many hours putting together the flute (Mark Pritchard) and piano solos (Matt Weiers). Those jazz cats had so many takes and it was quite a fun undertaking to put them together.  We shot the music video in Portland but our director, animator and script writer, Christian Bolorinos, was in Barcelona. So we FaceTimed with him during the shoot which actually worked out really well! So far, we've hit 135k views on FB!

Please tell us about your favorite song written, recorded, or produced by another woman and why it’s meaningful to you.

Wow! So many good ones so I’ll go with my favorite artist and my favorite song of hers- Joni Mitchell’s, “A Case of You.” I love the new version they released recently: ”Archives, Volume 2: The Reprise Years (1968-1971)”  On Disc 5, there’s an incredible version with her and James Taylor on guitar in December 1970, live at the Paris Theatre. It is so amazing to hear them together like this and her voice is truly perfect - remarkable really. My Mom used to play Joni's records and I learned a lot of her music on the piano as a kid. And of course, I tried to imitate her voice in all of the nuances. Joni was my God as a young girl and I see now that I was not alone in that worship…

What does it mean to you to be a woman making music/in the music business today and do you feel a responsibility to other women to create messages and themes in your music? 

I strongly feel the pressure to be a more upstanding, responsible member of society. I really have to call on ALL of my grit to stick with it and keep believing in my dreams. I am so clear that all I want to do is write songs and make records yet I feel burdened to prove my worth with the mighty dollar. 

I also feel a responsibility to other women and girls to be fully myself, especially as a mother of a special needs child. Many of the moms in my community devote 100% of their life energy to their child. It is tempting! However, my motto is a good mother models the possibility of pursuing and succeeding in what she was born to do. Fingers crossed.

Do you consider yourself a feminist? If so, why or why not? 

I definitely consider myself a feminist. I hear that feminism is the radical concept that women and men are equal:) My Mom is an activist and she raised me right with a community of women who taught me the importance of loving yourself and speaking your mind. I went on marches for the ERA and served cheese platters for women’s hang outs. I think people are afraid of feminism because they are afraid of female power. 

What was the most challenging thing you have had to face as a female artist? 

I think women musicians including myself are subjected to looksism in a strict way both from society and internally.  People want you to look a certain way but not if it makes them uncomfortable. I recently had a friend tell me my outfit was too sexy so I had to remind her that Beyonce isn’t holding back. And looksism is deepy connected to ageism- at a certain point, the music industry stops taking older women seriously based on her sex appeal and age. Let’s change that, yes? We are clearly just humans who make choices about our lives and hopefully in 2022, women get to do that in a strong, expressive and solid way.

If you could collaborate with any other female artists, who would you choose?

If you could form an all woman super-group who would play in it:  Chaka Khan on drums, St Vincent on guitar, Christie McVie on keys & MeShell NDeogocello on Bass, of course.  And I get to sing lead!

What do you hope to share with other women in the industry with your music?

I would love to tell other women and girls that your voice is important. Your poems and musicality is unique and needed in this world. And you are not less, worse or inferior to men- simple but true! I wish young women could know their worth. Also, don’t give up!  I love being a band leader in both of my projects(all men) and getting to work with incredible musicians all of whom treat me with the deepest respect. There are plenty of amazing men out there who greatly value women. And, it is important that I value myself.

Find Jo Alexis via:

Website / Facebook / Spotify / YouTube / Soundcloud

Subscribe to Jo Alexis’ mailing list here.

[cardentist]

the insistence that trans men face a lesser kind of oppression than trans women is no different from the insistence that bisexuality is a watered down form of gayness

all of these groups can have different relationships with their oppression thanks to how they’re presented and perceived by society (invisibility in media vs overt demonization in media for instance) but these differences being boiled down to one group being distinctly More Important or More Authentically Oppressed than the other is legitimately harmful.

on the surface both of these ideas seem to make a sort of logical sense. trans men are trans people But Men, and we all know how men are treated by society. bi people are like gay people except they also like people of a different gender, and straight people like it when you do that. add on the relative invisibility and there isn’t much in the mainstream to challenge those ideas. 

the truth of the matter is that invisibility affects more than just mainstream media. this idea that bi people or trans men have lesser experiences with oppression are gut instinct because their voices, their experiences, have a history of under-representation. people don’t Hear the experiences that the people in these groups face and then create conditions within queer (and activist) spaces that treat those people like their voices matter less because they’re privileged. this creates a cycle where these groups are devalued and talked over because these groups are Already devalued and talked over.

this all pares horribly with the atmosphere in discourse (and particularly exclusionist) spaces where identities are used as social capital that is enforced by tearing down whoever it is you think is encroaching on your space. it’s not uncommon to see posts talking about the experiences of one identity that goes out of their way to exclude whatever’s being spoken of from another identity that they see as lesser, deliberately putting another identity down and crushing their voices in the conversation to lift themselves up. (the sheer amount of times I’ve seen a post start with “trans men Never-” while describing something I experience in my daily life is exhausting)

the most insidious thing about this is the fact that when you create an environment where oppression is social capital then someone trying to assert their lived experiences with their oppression when you view them as under you is considered overtly aggressive and is often framed as bigotry within itself, because theoretically if they’re equal to you then your social capital has been lowered. you see this Constantly within ace discourse, with people doing things like calling asexuality Inherently homophobic because they didn’t want to acknowledge another marginalized group’s oppression.

this can be particularly dangerous when it leaks into broader and more serious subject matter and colors how people look at and talk about a marginalized identity’s experiences. one of the bigger arguments in these spaces was that trans men are literally incapable of experiencing misogyny and this notion was enforced by people directly discrediting trans men talking about their experiences (telling people that they’re lying about their experiences, that their experiences didn’t happen in the way or for the reason that they said they did, and sometimes intentionally misgendering the person to discredit it). I had personal experience with that which was, not great I gotta say.

this kind of target vitriol isn’t unique to any of the mentioned groups, in fact it’s something that goes both ways. there are trans men who are absolutely Horrible to trans women. but well meaning people in activist spaces are particularly skittish to stand up for trans men in this situation because they’re Aware that trans women are particularly marginalized (which they are) while also being affected by the lack of visibility for trans men. I’ve seen people who engage with Nasty discourse defending asexuality, nonbinary people, transness in general, bi/pan people, etc who outright Refused to get involved in when it was trans men on the line because it wasn’t Worth it to them. that’s definitely anecdotal evidence on my part but it’s emblematic of a bigger issue.

moreover, there’s a common trend in and around queer spaces where people identify vulnerable groups based on how established they are and go out of their way to hurt those on the outskirts because they know that it’ll be tolerated. from asexuals to nonbinary people to mogai to neogenders to pan people to intersex people to polygamous people to bi people and beyond. what you’ll see a lot of is transphobic cis women extend performative activism towards trans women while being overtly transphobic towards trans men and justifying it with the fact that trans men are Men and therefore they’re punching up.

this wasn’t really made with one solid thesis in mind and I honestly could keep rambling until the sun died out, but to cap things off I want to remind people of something that I still think about to this day.

quite a few years ago trans men were looking for a term that they could use to describe their specific experiences with the intersection of transphobia and misogyny, particularly when trans men were being pushed out of spaces talking About that intersection. obviously “transmisogyny” was taken, so someone came up with the idea of taking that word as the root and changing it to be clearly and obviously about trans men. which is how the word “transmisandry” came about.

if you’ve lived through gamergate you probably just flinched reading that if it was your first time, which is fair. the point of the term was to make its meaning as immediately identifiable as possible. if you know what transmisogyny means and you know what misandry means then it’s not too difficult to put together what transmisandry is supposed to mean if you’re seeing it for the first time. that said, it (perhaps predictably) sparked quite a bit of controversy. but the criticism it got? was that trans men didn’t Need a term to describe their own experiences. trans men aren’t oppressed for being men, “transphobia” should cover all of their experiences because they don’t Have unique experiences, trans men don’t Deserve a term to describe their own experiences. a lot of this was attributed to ignorance after people started pointing out how fucked up that reaction was, how it was kneejerk, but I don’t think that’s an excuse anymore. I don’t think it should Ever be an excuse.

nowadays people tend to use “transandrophobia,” not because the meaning is any different, not because it’s a functionally better term, but because people weren’t Willing to overlook their kneejerk reaction to Not take a term away from another marginalized group because their ability to talk about their own lived experiences in their own spaces mattered Less than momentary discomfort.

[shutupanddance]

Master Post

If you’re looking for my Master List, check out this link:

https://shutupanddance.tumblr.com/masterlist

Okay cool cats and kittens, I’m creating this master post to help you navigate my page and stay updated :) It will be pinned to my blog, and it will have my fandom list, my prompt list, my to-do list, any current events, and a few frequently asked questions. So, looking for information about requesting? Suggestions for requests? Or wondering what I’m currently working on? Don’t know if I’ve received your request? This is the place to look! Just keep on reading <3

Current Events 

None!

Fandoms

Here are the fandoms I write for!!

+ Marvel (MCU)

+ DC (DCU)

+ Sherlock

+ Star Wars (trilogies, Clone Wars, Rebels, Mandalorian)

+ Star Trek (reboots, original series)*

+ Pacific Rim

+ Knives Out

+ Night at the Museum

+ LOTR / The Hobbit

+ Jurassic Park/World

+ The West Wing*

+ NCIS*

*fandoms that you will see the most of on my blog.

Prompt List

(Does not include prompts from any current events) Here are some prompts that you can use for your request, or for your own writing! As a reminder, not all of these prompts are properly credited. Please let me know if you have the original creator’s @!

#1: “I’d agree with you, but then we’d both be wrong.”

#2: “Should I ask why you have a knife in your purse?”

”It’s a dagger, actually, and no you shouldn’t.”

#3: “Close your eyes and listen. And trust me.”

#4: Rosemary, broken glass, and an old gun.

#5: “Do you remember when I loved you?”

”No.”

”Good, because I never did.”

#6: “He saw the notice in the paper.”

”Why would you let him see the paper?”

”What was I supposed to do, eat it?”

#7: “I didn’t catch your name!”

”I didn’t throw it.”

#8: “I’m not better than you, but at least I’m not you. And right now, that’s worth a whole lot.”

#9: Romantic dinner, but something is wrong.

#10: Forehead kisses during an apocalypse

#11: “This isn’t BBC Sherlock! You can’t just run around administering justice as you see fit!

#12: Trying to get a smoke detector to shut up

#13: Falling out of a closet during Hide N Seek

#14: Revealing a dark secret, but it turns out that they already know

#15: Once upon a midnight dreary

#16: The odds were never in our favor

#17: If I should die, think only this of me

#18: Attack hugs

#19: Afraid of ladybugs

#20: The dumb*ss God couldn’t stop

#21: “There’s a rumor going around that you’re the one to ask if someone needs to acquire rare and dangerous objects.”

”There’s a rumor going around that you’re an undercover cop.”

#22: A parking lot, a coroner, and snails

#23: “You’re the only person I know who calls me that.”

#24: This is not a drill.

#25: It’s the price we pay to feel

#26: A character is cleaning/sweeping the floor when someone walks by with dirty shoes (via @writingprompts365 )

#27: “I’m back from my mission!”

““You failed it.”

““How’d you know?”

They point at the TV.

#28: A character is pushed into some bushes/plants/flowers (via @writingprompts365 )

#29: A character picks up a very shiny rock (same @)

#30: A character combs another character’s hair (same)

#31: A character is forced to have a conversation with someone they don’t like (same)

#32: Laughing hysterically at their own joke

#33: Stuck under the same umbrella

#34: ““Well, this is a nice change of scenery!”

““It’s a jail cell.”

““I was being sarcastic.”

#35: ““Let me just be perfectly clear that this was not my fault.”

#36: ““Can I buy you coffee? For old times sake?”

#37: Fake dating

#38: Huddling for warmth

#39: Being high on painkillers and confessing undying love to everyone

#40: “That’s starting to get annoying.”

#41: “I fell asleep on the bus and woke up here.”

#42: “It’s freaking cold.”

#43: “You’re not exactly known for your great ideas.”

#44: ““Can you keep a secret?”

#45: Character A lives above character B, and always drives B insane with how much stomping they do. One day, A’s foot goes right through the floor, into B’s apartment.

#45: Character A and Character B, sworn enemies, are chosen to prepare the company Christmas Party.

#46: you’re a security guard at an art gallery and you held the door for me so I left you a note in the door where we met I hope you read it

#47: Person A and Person B both trying to break into the same place on the same night by accident, only to be chased by the police upon meeting and having to hide in a closet/cupboard/safe together until they leave.

#48: the first and the last word they said to each other

#49: your kid hates my kid

#50: ‘picking them up’ hugs

#51: an incredibly loud and painful high-five

#52: "Let me fix that for you."

#53: “Can’t we listen to something else? We’ve been listening to this CD for three hours now.”

“You know, I would but the CD slot is broken so it’s either this or talk to each other.”

“I wouldn’t mind talking.”

“[turns up the music louder]”

#54: "My kiss quota for the day hasn't been filled. I need a thousand more."

#55: Person A making fun of Person B's bed head

#56: Squeeze three times for “I love you”

#57: writing a love letter but keeping it to themselves

#58: Messing around in IKEA

#59: “Hey - what’re you hiding behind your back?”

#60: going to a bookshop and selecting books for each other

#61: smiling at each other from across the room

#62: arms wrapping around your waist from behind while you’re on a phone call

#63: “ rich coming from the guy who tried to kill me three days ago. “

#64: message in a bottle

#65: becoming the parents of the friend group as soon as they start dating

#66: “I love you.”

“Ouch.”

#67: “We...we did it. We did it! Oh my God, I could kiss you.”

“Well, don’t be shy.”

My To-Do List

Here is everything that I’m currently working on! If you’ve sent a request in, and I see it, it should pop up here!

REQUEST SLOTS: FULL

+ Sherlock / Reader (not requested) undetermined topic

+ Rusty Ryan / Reader (not requested) #4

+ Sam Seaborn / Reader (requested) slow dancing

*anything with an asterisks has already been started.

Tag List

@girloncorneliastreet​ for The West Wing

@wolviesbabes​ for Gibbs / Reader

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I submit a request? When you look at my blog, there is a link titled “Asks/Requests”. Click that, and submit something!

How specific does my request have to be? More detail is always better if you’re looking for something specific, but if you’re not picky, it’s no big deal! Even if you just say “could I have some more Spock content please?” I’ll answer it!

Do you write smut? Nope! Not for me.

Are your requests open? Not at the moment! They will be soon, though.

What do I do if your requests are closed? Send it later, when they’re open again!

Do you have a master list? I do! I also have a tag called #masterlist, which all of my work is under. You can access the master list itself by navigating to the page on my blog, or just clicking the link at the top of this post!

What’s your name? You can call me C :)

Why didn’t you reblog my post about social justice? In order to avoid burnout for myself and my followers, I am doing my best to keep this blog free of anything other than fan content. This does not mean that I disagree or agree with you, it just means that I’m not commenting. I do not need to participate in internet social justice activity when I am already an activist on other platforms, including real life.

What can I send asks or messages about? Anything!! Life updates, random questions, whatever! I love to hear from you <3

That’s all, folks!

[theatresweetheart]

For the bad thing happens bingo prompts: broken wrist and analogical? could you make it g/t too, somehow?

Student Struggles

Summary: He knew it was illogical and ridiculous to make such an emotionally biased decision. Yet, Logan did it anyway.

Warnings: Broken limb (non graphic), humans treated as lesser, main character referred to as an “it” (non malicious), fear.

Pairings: Platonic Analogical 

Characters: Logan, Virgil

Word Count: 3463 words

                                        ——————————

It was a precarious predicament.

It certainly wasn’t everyday he tried to sneak out of his university’s anthropology lab harbouring an injured and terrified human in his pocket.

As one of the more respected senior’s of his class, most of the professors that were still there hardly paid Logan another look as he left the lab for the evening.

Still, that didn’t change the fact that he was nervous. Smuggling a human out of the lab without a professor’s explicit permission was an offence punishable by suspension. The suspension itself wouldn’t last much longer than a couple days, but it would leave a bad mark on his crystal clean school record. It would change the reputation he had with his professors—all of which he had so carefully tailored right from his first year in the program.

In fact, most of them greeted him warmly. Asking about his classes earlier, wishing him a good weekend and giving a teasing reminder to study for the upcoming midterms. None of these conversations lasted longer than a few minutes and normally, Logan would have been glad to speak with them. But as of that moment, the longer he was stuck there standing with them, the larger the chance was of him being found out. He knew his professors were very well trained in spotting things that seemed off—an example would be students sitting in the very back row, the furthest away from the lecturer and still getting called out for not paying enough attention.

Long story short, if Logan got caught he was risking his entire future in this field.

A part of him still questioned if this whole thing was even worth the risk. Humans got hurt all the time in his practicum; especially when other students weren’t being careful enough. It happened, so why was this one any different?

Why was the human that had looked up at him with wide frightened eyes any different than the others?

Still, whether or not it was worth the risk, Logan was too far into it now to backtrack. Retracing his steps back to the lab may be considered suspicious, so it was all or nothing whether he wanted it to be or not. Besides, he was also positive that the doors would be locked anyhow, so backpedaling would be pointless. Not that he didn’t have a key to get back in if he truly needed to.

Logan ducked around another professor expertly and he went unnoticed, as the professor in question seemed to be engaged in a particularly interesting conversation.

Or so he thought.

Just as he was about to push the door to the building open, he heard the man bidding his quick farewells for the night before easily catching up with the student.

“Logan,” his professor greeted him with a grin, pushing the other door open before Logan had the chance to escape.

“Dr. Coleman,” he replied after a moment, shouldering his book bag a little more securely.

“You seem to be in quite the rush,” Dr. Coleman said, pulling his coat closer as the cool autumn air swept in through the doors. “Mind if I join you to the parking lot?”

As if he had a choice. Logan only gave a nod.

The squirming in his pocket started up again, this time with more vigor. Slightly paranoid that the little motions would show through the soft fabric, Logan make the quick decision to fully wrap his hand around the human—keeping it still and silent. While that stopped the slight movement from the outside, he could still feel the terrified motions pushing helplessly against his fingertips. Trying fruitlessly to budge his fingers. Of course, to no avail.

While he did feel bad about physically restraining it when it was so obviously in distress, Logan really couldn’t risk being found out this far into the endeavor.

He only hoped the little thing’s heart wouldn’t stop entirely.

However, during the entire ordeal he kept his features mindfully neutral, careful to keep from alerting Dr. Coleman of his current plight.

Dr. Coleman didn’t say anything for a long moment, his eyes flickered over the student and Logan pretended not to notice. Acting off would only make the professor suspicious. Something he really did not need right now.

The professor only hummed softly before turning his attention forward, toward the cars sitting silently under the streetlights illuminating the parking lot in a warm yellow glow. Logan must have spent more time in the lab than he had meant to, if twilight was already falling.

“Busy night tonight, I assume?” Dr. Coleman finally broke the silence and Logan only shrugged nonchalantly.

“You could say that,” he relented. While it technically wasn’t untrue, it wouldn’t be school work like the professor would assume.

Dr. Coleman snickered, reaching into his pocket to draw out his car keys. He clicked the buttons and his car’s headlights flashed in response. “Getting some studying done?”

In a way.

Logan forced himself to relax a little, knowing that the professor had no idea of his little stowaway. “Certainly. Can never be too over prepared for an exam.”

“True,” Dr. Coleman stuck his hands into his pockets. Logan felt relief wash over him when the professor reached his own vehicle. This was the very type of interaction he had been trying so hard to avoid. “This is why you’re one of my favourite students, Logan.”

The praise was nice, but really not what he needed right now. “I appreciate that, Dr. Coleman. But I really do have to get going, as pleasant as this conversation has been.”

As stinted as it had been too, it seemed. Usually, talking with Dr. Coleman didn’t take that much energy. He had engaged the professor in many heated debates over his four years of study. And he would be glad to engage in those types of conversations once more! Just as soon as the human was no longer on his person and in range of being confiscated, only to be placed right back into the same area where it had gotten hurt in the first place.

Whether or not this whole thing was the correct course of action, Logan was sick of witnessing humans getting injured and then being disposed of as if their injuries made them completely useless.

If given the proper treatment and time to heal, they would have a far less percentage of humans succumbing to their injuries or illnesses.

It was unfortunate that so many of his peers thought of the small creatures as disposable. While, no, it was not difficult for professionals to retrieve more right out of their lives on earth, it didn’t make the practice any less morbid or underhanded. Anthropology students should be learning how to assist humans in healing and recovering, not tossing them the minute they were no longer “perfect” in their eyes.

“Fair enough,” Dr. Coleman said, stepping back and placing a hand on the door handle of his car. “I won’t keep you from your studies any longer. Have a good night and take care of yourself. Don’t you be pulling all-nighters, understand?”

“I understand,” Logan repeated back as if on instinct. It wouldn’t stop him from doing it, but it was…nice, he supposed, to know that the professor cared.

It wasn’t like he didn’t have friends that wouldn’t check up on him, he did, but it was different when it was someone that was higher status than you were. Held more sway over what happened in the department. Dr. Coleman was the dean of the anthropology department and he had a lot of power.

The professor nodded his head with a grin, before pulling open his car and stepping in.

Logan let out a breath and turned on his heel. Quickening his pace to his own vehicle, he fished in his bag for his keys. He found them after a moment of struggling one-handed and unlocked his car. He slid inside just as Dr. Coleman’s headlights flashed over him and the professor pulled out of the parking lot, disappearing over the hill leading down to the highway.

Letting his head rest back against the seat’s headrest, he finally released the human from the confines of his hand. Using his now freed one, he ran them through his hair before pulling his glasses off.

What was he even doing?

So what if there was a cruel practice going on at the school underneath everyone’s noses? Just because he was privy to it didn’t mean he had to do anything about it. He was just one person. Logan had friends that were very much human rights activists and into studies and politics concerning the creatures, but none of their campaigns had really gotten the traction necessary to make a true difference. It was a difficult field of study to be in when there were people opposing everything you did.

While Logan always made sure his interactions with the creatures were careful and calculated, a part of him wished he could say the same thing for his classmates.

You would think, at a senior level of study, students would be taking it more seriously. Many of them did, but many of them still used this advantage to handle the humans they dealt with rough and carelessly. To which, the creature would get injured and would then be gone by next morning.

The human currently stuck within the confines of his pocket had been one of the unlucky ones. Injured thanks to a student who had been working in the lab outside of class just a few feet away from Logan—who had conducting his own experiments—they’d dropped the human from a dangerous height on accident, causing the little one to cry out.

His classmate had panicked immediately, obviously unsure of what to do or where to go from there. They’d even gone as far as to check over at Logan to gauge if he’d seen anything and snitch. The student had then gathered the human up as if nothing had happened. They’d packed their papers, shoved it all into their backpack and then deposited the human right back into the large glass terrarium in the middle of the lab, just waiting for someone else to find the injured creature in the morning and get rid of it.

Logan didn’t even have any connection to the human currently struggling to right itself in the soft fabric. Hadn’t conducted any studies with it, observed it or anything else of the such. He’d only heard the helpless cry and decided he wasn’t going to let it suffer in its own agony all night.

The move was illogical and he knew that. Yet, he was still risking absolutely everything for this one little human. His future career was banking on the hope he never got found out.

Logan slipped his glasses back on before sliding the keys into the ignition.

“The amount of trouble you could get me in is unbelievable,” he mused after a moment, unsure if he was talking to the human or not. Either way, the only reaction he got for his efforts was more struggling. So, pulling the gear shift out of park, he made his way back home.

—

“Oh, would you stop fighting me for five seconds,” the student groused, quickly managing to corral the human between his hands again without fully touching him. “If I wanted to hurt you, don’t you think I would have done that by now? Or perhaps, better yet, just left you back in the lab’s terrarium for someone else to find?”

The human only twitched away from his hands, just as he had been doing for the past fifteen minutes. Logan really didn’t want to have to pin him down to get the fidgety creature to be still, but he was quickly running out of options and patience.

“I don’t want to restrain you,” Logan’s voice finally seemed to get the human’s flickering attention. However, now the human’s eyes were locked solely on him, with an uncanny ability to follow his every miniature movement with unwavering attention. It was, all things considered, slightly disturbing to be watched so intensely with such obvious fright and distrust. “But I will if you force my hand.”

The human’s face contorted in an expression that resembled a sneer, before he tucked his injured wrist closer to his chest.

Logan pulled his hands back to himself, watching quietly as the human flinched further into himself. It was very much obvious the little one was touch shy and Logan really wanted to refrain from handling him as much as possible– lest he frighten the human so bad his little heart stopped altogether. “You must understand that leaving your wrist like that will only do you more harm than good. I can assist you in starting your healing progress.”

The human seemed open enough to the idea and Logan carefully extended his fingertips forward, a blatant show of nonaggression and allowing the creature to come to him in its own time. Giving the human the slightest semblance of control may make this entire interaction even the tiniest bit easier on them both.

Its eyes flickered uneasily from its wrist back to Logan’s outstretched hand. It twisted to look over its shoulders, as if searching out an escape route. It hadn’t worked before and Logan knew trying to escape wouldn’t work again. His reaction time was much faster than the human’s, so it wouldn’t make it very far anyhow.

The human in question turned back to Logan, almost as if waiting for the other shoe to drop. For him to act like any other careless student that was ready to mishandle him. The human’s wrist was thin as it was, but now that it was injured (and Logan speculated, broken), it was even more vulnerable than before. Giving up a vulnerable piece of you was a frightening thing and Logan could hardly imagine looking at it from any other perspective but his own. Though, he could safely assume that he, himself, would not be very fond of this situation either if their positions had happened to be switched.

Truthfully, there would be nothing about the human’s life Logan would enjoy. Depending on whether or not he came straight from the earth’s surface and nicked directly from his own life, or if he had been born into a breeding facility.

In all reality, he understood the hesitance in letting him assist. If the human had been handled as recklessly as Logan theorized he had, coming face to face with someone that wouldn’t mishandle him purposefully would be unknown, suspicious and daunting new territory.

“I’m not going to ask you to trust me,” he said finally, the human’s eyes flickered up to meet his own. Surprise lingered in those colourful eyes. “I know you’re frightened and that’s alright. It may be hard to believe, but I really can help you. Only if you’ll allow me, of course. Though, I do think you and I both know that sleeping on that hurt wrist of yours would be uncomfortable at least.”

The human’s good hand clenched, showing Logan the inner battle the little one was facing.

Wanting to ease a little more of it’s stress, he quietly urged; “I will not hurt you, you have my word.”

A moment passed and the human hesitantly stepped forward, his wrist extended enough for Logan to start bandaging.

—

“Why’d you do it?”

The sudden voice very nearly startled Logan out of his thoughts. Virgil had been sitting so quietly next to him, that he’d almost forgotten the human was even there in the first place.

When Logan’s attention fell down to said human, Virgil wasn’t looking at him. He was instead focused intently on his wrist, carefully wrapped in bandages and hanging in a makeshift sling, the best either of them could have done. Logan had almost no experience bandaging such a small subject, so getting it done and in a place where he was satisfied with it was difficult. And Virgil had been working one-handed, so getting the sling to hold properly had been a fight all in itself.

Though, the question was what really nabbed Logan’s attention. “Do what?”

Virgil gave him a look—Logan was getting very familiar with Virgil’s looks and they all usually meant something different—which was a mix between annoyance and genuine confusion, as if Logan really didn’t understand what he meant; which was untrue “Smuggled me out of the lab,” he clarified a moment later, his fingers trailing over the white piece of fabric wrapped around his arm and shoulder again. “You didn’t have to do it, we both know that. I just want to know why you did.”

That was the true question, wasn’t it?

An inquiry that had been on Logan’s mind since that night’s ordeal.

In all honesty, Logan wasn’t entirely sure what had metaphorically possessed him in that particular moment. And while he wanted to be able to give Virgil a straight answer, he didn’t have one.

Logan sat back in his chair, hands resting idly in his lap. The silence was thoughtful, if a bit awkward. As far as they had come in their acquaintanceship (maybe even going as far as saying tentative friendship), there were still pauses that felt tense and heavy. Virgil had certainly come a long way from the first time they had met and Logan was grateful for it, since he was no longer having one-sided conversations.

There were, of course, some topics that Virgil was still too sensitive about to really learn anything, but they were getting there. Logan really hoped that he would eventually get to learn more about what it was like for the human, and be able to go off of that firsthand information to do something. However, until then building his trust was Logan’s priority.

“I don’t exactly have an answer for you,” Logan said after a moment’s pause of brief deliberation. He knew that giving Virgil solid answers was more preferable, since it would ease his anxiety. But this topic was one where Logan, regrettably, didn’t have any solid answers to give.

“Oh.” There was that dejected slump of Virgil’s shoulders, a position Logan was also very familiar with when dealing with him. Disappointment was clear in Virgil’s tone, but he made no move to push for further answers.

Logan felt as though he had let him down somehow. Which was certainly not something he would let stand. He took a long moment, carefully mulling over and debating his next words. “I suppose I did what I did because I couldn’t stand the way they were treating you anymore.” Now that seemed to have drawn Virgil’s attention right back up to him, though he had a brow quirked in question. So, Logan continued. “I know we didn’t have a working relationship prior to my thoughtless, albeit successful, actions. Though, I do feel… better, knowing that you’re safe here.”

Going from whatever kind of relationship they had established here now, Logan couldn’t bear the idea of someone else getting their hands on Virgil. Especially if they meant him any harm. While he could be mean and sharp, there was that anxious and unsure side to him, which proved that a lot of his bark was worse than his bite.

It also did give him peace of mind that Virgil was safe in his care. No more mishandling, no more purposeful injuries and no more testing with stuff that shouldn’t be anywhere near a human.

Virgil’s nose scrunched. “That makes no sense.”

“I suppose it doesn’t,” Logan relented, the ghost of a smile gracing his features. He leaned forwards once more, returning to his laptop to type again. “Though, I’m sure it’s nice for you to know your arm will heal properly.”

Virgil shrugged his good shoulder, leaning back on his hand and looking up toward the student. “Still hurts,” he mused.

Logan hummed. “I’d be surprised if it didn’t.”

The two fell back into a more comfortable quiet. It was broken periodically by soft conversation, but it was mostly filled by the sound of Logan’s keyboard click clacking.

“…thanks,” Virgil eventually said, gently enough that Logan had almost entirely missed it. He paused his typing and his eyes flickered over Virgil’s form, whom of which was tucked comfortably into his hoodie, his eyes looking anywhere other than Logan. “For doing it, I mean. Even though you didn’t have to.”

Logan didn’t force Virgil to meet his eyes, as that would only put unnecessary stress on him. “You’re welcome,” he replied, “I find that your company is quite pleasant.”

While the consequences of his actions were still a very real threat, Logan couldn’t find it in himself to regret his decision.

                                        ——————————

[astrolopop]

❤️ PICK A GROUP OR A NUMBER (1-3) ❤️

🌚 WHAT IS MY SHADOW AND LIGHT?? 🌝

💥 Group 1 💥

Your shadow message comes from the Dress of Alchemy, release your power!

You have a lot to give stored in the metephorical bank. You can take information and practices and put them together. You could practice magick litterally or this could be a kind of creative alchemy in a different sense. You may deal with anger, outrage or feeling as if all the power you hold is unable to release itself fully at this time. You hold all this knowledge and yet may be dealing with blockages which could be frustrating af. Some of you are astrologers and maybe that helps you to understand yourself more and practice self acceptance. Dealing with your roots could be difficult for you. You're like a flower that's bloomed and blooming regardless of the fertiliser or lack there of. You could be struggling to find your path and feel like you are amongst endless possibilities. You may be holding your tounge and bottling stuff up and/or don't feel you can settle down at all. There's a kind of restlessness. You are very observant and don't miss a trick.

Your light is faceless ghosts and the haunted girl, ghost people.

Know that regardless of what drains you or holds you back you will rise above, persevere and maintain your sense of identity and self. You may understand or come to understand others shadows. While you don't have to forgive them it may help you heal and keep your focus where it needs too be. For those of you overexerting this cycle may have come to a point where you don't have to fight anymore as you enter into a period of rest. You have an enormous amount of inner strength and when your ready to take the stage again, that spotlight will be all yours. Some of you may make excellent writers, actors, artists, carers, astrologers or activists. Trust the divine timing and in yourself.

💋 Group 2 💋

Your shadow message comes from the Pink Lotus Fairy, a time for spirit.

The current state of the world may have you feeling as if life has gone into slow motion. It's not fun but you can utilise this time to get mindful, heal, learn and strengthen. You may be dealing with a lot of internal mental and/or spiritual work or struggle. Maybe you are focusing on shadow work, going through ego death, a dark night of the soul or healing which is worth it but painful at times. Or maybe you are very new to spirituality and are in the beginning phases of understanding yourself as a spiritual being. You could also be taking that to the next level if you are more experinced. In any case, You could be having to adapt to new circumstances that may put you out of your confort zone. The experince will likely be quite educational, enlightening and an adventure. There could be struggle between you and a mentor figure, a concern around education or authority figure. You may also struggle with self love and acceptance and find it hard to see the beauty in yourself. If you are already very spiritual and at one with yourself. With ownership over your beauty and sexuality, maybe others have not been kind. Know that that's their problem! You are doing you and it's stunning. If it's all going well I reckon your shadow self is showing up as feminine moon energy that's just gorgeous and nothing to concern over. The internal work you've done glows radiantly. Something could have reflected back to you through someone else and now you are viewing yourself differently. Potentially dealing with soul serching or an identity crisis. Overall, this is a very positive card to get for a shadow card and affirms that you are beginning to self accept and bring all sides of sides of yourself into balance. However, If you are dealing with serious struggles and/or oppression then please reach out to safe, relevant people and professionals if you can. We send you love and our thoughts! Remember you are you, this is a great time to learn about your identity. None of us is wholly good nor bad we are just ourselves and change all the time. Yoga, meditation and learning are all ever present and encouraged for helping you deal with any shadowy times you may come across.

Your light message comes from sewer mermaid, your sensuality is beautiful.

This medmaid comes when we have been made to feel badly about ourselves or have mentally been our worst enemy. Your light side is here to tell you how georgous you are inside and out. It will help you to pour the work into reprogramming yourself so you can overcome negitive thought patterns! It's the part of yourself that will allow you to just be who you are without judgement. Flop for a while on the sofa, it's okay. After a long hard day (even just dealing with internal struggles) do something nice for you because you care for yourself. Take a bath or shower if you feel icky. Exercise to feel energised and massage yourself bc your body deserves the love. You are fierce, sexy, gentle, beautiful and most of all human. It's okay to work what you've got! You don't need anyones permission.

🧙‍♀️ Group 3 🧙‍♂️

Your shadow message comes from Voodo in Blue, back off!

So you may need time alone. Whether people respect that is another thing. You are allowed to set boundaries! Keep yourself away from people who aren't good for you. No need to be vengeful, vodoo doesn't stick her doll with pins but she will be stern and lay her boundaries to protect herself from jelousy and mistreatment. Even if none of that is happening we all need time to ourselves every now and again. It's more healthy to take time for yourself than to build up resentfulness or neglect our own needs until we get really angry or completely drained. It's not evil, it's not bad, it's natural. It's okay to be grumpy for no reason too, we all get that way. Give yourself time to ride that wave and come into a better mood. It will pass!

Your light message comes from Nautilus Princess, powerful personal growth!

You have high moral standards and can trust that you are and will continue to develop into the person you want to be. You needn't mind what others will think. You have it within you to step up into leadership positions or whatever you are aiming for! This could be a relationship as well. You're blossoming and stepping into your power with good ethics behind you. Overcoming any fear you may have!

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