#It's about the commitment

[fallen-goldfishcracker]

Part of the reason I find Wyll to be such a compelling character is that he is such a good person, but in what I think is a kinda unique way. 

I've seen a few criticisms of how quickly Wyll seems to switch sides in his initial confrontation with Karlach; how fast he goes from convinced he must kill her to letting her live. For me though, this makes perfect sense. 

The decision Wyll makes in that confrontation not actually whether or not to kill her; he has to decide whether or not Karlach is innocent, but once he's confirmed that, it's not a question.

He commits so quickly to Karlach because he doesn't have to choose whether or not to kill her in that moment; he already decided seven years ago. 

Because at seventeen years old, he decided he would sacrifice anything for the safety of others. 

At seventeen years old he decided that his own life, comfort and happiness was never worth the cost of someone else's. 

And so at twenty-four, he learns the devil he's been chasing is a person, and a victim, and an innocent, and the decision is already made up. 

Because Wyll Ravenguard at twenty-four is who he was at seventeen, and twenty, and ten. 

And to me that's one of the coolest things about him.

There's a separate post I'd like to make about how Wyll never loses his childhood wonder of the world- and I think there's a very similar principle here. Wyll grew up hearing stories of knights who slay monsters and heros in shining armor, and he took those stories and loved them and held them close to his chest. 

And then he's seventeen and a devil asked him if he wants to be a hero, and he's not an idiot; he understands the price of saviourhood so he says yes. 

And so when he meets Karlach, it's never really a question of if he'll kill her. It's just a matter of him finding the courage. 

Because he says "you don't know what you're asking of me" and he's absolutely right, we don't. But Wyll understands the cost; he's understood it for seven years. I'll bet anything that when Wyll Ravenguard made his pact with a devil to save tens of thousands of souls, he promised himself and his city and his father who wouldn't listen that he'd only ever use his pact to help and be good, and when it comes down to it, he sticks to his word. 

Because above all, Wyll Ravenguard is a man who knows who his is and what he beliefs, and who sticks to his principles no matter what, and for me that's incredibly compelling.

[crumbpigeon]

flow away

[sonykatzen]

pretty boy

[angelofdumpsterfires]

how i feel about all the changes in s3

[sirenium]

Include men in your body positivity. you are not body positive if you make fun of male pattern baldness, neckbeards, fatness, etc in men. these traits are just as worthy of acceptance regardless of if it's wrapped in pink bows or not.

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

elon musk really is a walking parody of "divorced man whose children hate him"

[iwieldthesword]

I need to talk about this because it's making me feel insane.

Last week, my white leftist goyisch friends sat me, a wholeass antizionist Jew, down for a "talk" because they "needed to check in about Palestine" and make sure "our values aligned before we hung out again". They apparently needed to "suss out" where I stood on Palestinian rights, despite having had several conversations about Palestine and them being some of my closest friends. They needed to check, to search for and uncover my true values, because I had said some "disturbing things" that had made them "suspicious".

Disturbing things included:

Supporting IfNotNow which is a "liberal zionist organization" because it normalizes Jewish heritage in the Levant

Not bringing Palestine up enough, despite them also not bringing it up (this was apparently a test)

Mentioning that the Houthi's flag talks about cursing all Jews

Saying Stalin was antisemitic because of the "all the paw-grihms"

...and apparently other things they wouldn't specify, but had been tracking for months.

To clarify, I am an antizionist Jew from three generations of antizionist Jews. I have been vocal in my support of Palestinian liberation and in my condemnation both of Israel's actions and its violent founding as a state, and of zionism in many of its forms. I am a regular donor to Palestinian and Jewish NGOs and advocate for Jewish antizionism in person, at temple, and online. I have been talking about Palestinian liberation before they could point to Gaza on a map. But they needed to make sure, they needed to "suss out", they needed to check. And it's notable that the majority of moments that made them suspicious of me were times where I talked about antisemitism: not about Palestinian liberation, not about Israeli decolonization, not about anything actually relevant to Palestine. It was talking about antisemitism that made them check to see if I was a cryptozionist.

One of the most pervasive and insidious forms of antisemitism is the idea that Jews are inherently untrustworthy and suspicious. You have to constantly be on guard, track what they say and do, "suss out" the real truth. You have to keep them in line and and watch them carefully because they're liars and sneaks, and if you're not looking closely they'll return to their real values (and drag you down with them). This is where the idea of "cryptozionist" comes from and what it's directly building off of: the inherent untrustworthiness of Jews and the need to check. Because no matter how close you become you can't actually trust them, and any upstanding gentile should make sure to avoid associating with Jews before "sussing out" their real allegiances and intentions. You have to make them turn out their pockets, just in case.

I'm the first and only Jew they actually were friends with; I know because they've told me (strangely proud of it in the way white Americans are proud of that kind of thing). They've asked me questions about Judaism and fawned over how beautiful and unique it was for me to be connected to my community and culture. Pre-October 7th, one of them had even mentioned being interested in coming to services at my temple. She still has my copy of our siddur. But now she needed to "check" before she could be seen with me in public. Which is what it was: it wasn't a "you're my friend and I need to give you some feedback because you're fucking up" kind of intervention (which is normal and important to have), it was a trial. It was a last chance for me to prove to them that I'm clean-enough that they could afford to risk being seen with me in public, just in case someone noticed them fraternizing with a hypothetical Enemy and their leftism was compromised. It was a test to make sure that I behave properly when required to, that I'd play along and do what I'm told and turn out my pockets if asked (because any refusal would validate the notion of having something to hide). And above all it was an opportunity for them to reaffirm their own cleanliness by putting my imagined immorality in its place.

I did what I needed to do: I smiled. I apologized. I "didn't know that". I "appreciated the feedback". I turned out my pockets because what else could I do? They'd decided who I was and what I believed, regardless of what I said or did, so there was no point in explaining that they were wrong about me. If I had told them they were being antisemitic, it would just have been proof that they were right. Caring about antisemitism is a dogwhistle in the spaces they've chosen: it's not a real form of oppression, it's a tactic for sneaky, lying Jews to weasel out of admitting their true alliances. There was nothing I could say.

Nothing's really changed for me. I'm going to continue my activism for Palestinian liberation rooted in my culture and my faith. Antizionism is still not antisemitism. But I got a reminder that many white goyisch leftists fundamentally just don't trust Jews, and that the activist spaces they're in not only exacerbate their antisemitism in an increasingly insular echo chamber, but also allow them to finally vent their internalized bigotry in a socially-acceptable way. In my former friends' eyes, what they did was activism—disavowing a Jew (and making me feel humiliated, scared, and unclean in the process) as a cathartic stand-in for doing fucking anything for actual Palestinian liberation—but for me it was a grief that I'll be feeling for a long time: not only over losing friends I loved and trusted, but also over my sense of belonging and security in leftist spaces.

[hamletthedane]

Elphaba: oh oz oh oz, I just put everyone in the classroom to sleep. what do I do? what do I do???

Fiyero, who took one look at his passed out classmates and immediately decided it was time to commit several felonies: idk what YOU’RE doing but I’M kidnapping this baby and sneaking him across the border. viva resistance.

[phantomrose96]

Thinking about Edward Elric as the Amestrian Military's specialest little unfireable boy

State alchemists can be fired for underperforming. We know this up front from the likes of Shou Tucker. And this makes a ton of sense from the homunculi's standpoint since the state alchemists are sacrifice candidates, and the homunculi would want to cull the weakest candidates and focus only on cultivating the strongest ones who stand the best chance of opening the portal.

........Then there's Edward. Who's already opened the portal.

There's no need to cultivate him. No gamble taken on whether he's good enough to open the portal. He passed the final test already. Graduated 4 semesters early.

And as such, has a free pass to do Absolute Fuck All.

And I'm imagining how funny this is from like an outside perspective.

Some newish state alchemist who'd only ever read up on the stories of Edward Elric, ready and excited to start their career of being paid handsomely with endless freedom to research and travel and do anything they want in the pursuit of science... surprised and confused to find themselves put on probation their first month for things like "ignoring orders." Which is, as best they had thought, a famous Edward Elric pastime.

Roy showing a slight bit of stress about his yearly state alchemist report, and Ed just snorting and rolling his eyes at Roy because every year HE just hastily does his on the train ride over (canon in the manga, a travesty it was left out of the anime) and it gets rubber stamped. Ed not realizing that other alchemists' reports get genuinely scrutinized and torn apart while Ed is free to turn in whatever absolute bullshit he thinks of 36 hours ahead of time. One year his report was about whether alchemy could be done via dance (conclusion: no it can't) and no one cared. Roy WANTS to tell Ed there's some kind of unknown favoritism around Ed making him literally bullet-proof but Roy has no way to phrase this that doesn't sound like he's just in denial and mad at how good Ed's train-reports are.

Guy from the Internal Amestrian Affairs sector who's responsible for auditing other internal military personel for any suspicious activity hitting about 1 million red flags for Edward Elric, issuing a STRONG and URGENT recommendation to suspend the alchemist pending further investigation into things like "literal bunk-buddies with two members of the Xingese royalty (enemy nation)" and "spent $10,000,000 of his stipend on a librarian to make her re-copy (what he seemed to interpret as?) military records in some extremely transparent effort to unearth state secrets (it was a recipe book but he was literally asking her about state secrets)" and "literally has never once obeyed an order, ever, not even once in his career, and is on public record having said 'I do not care about the goals and protections of the Amestrian Military. I am in fact only pursuing my own interests several of which are diametrically opposed to the safety and well-being of the governing body of Amestris'"

The issued recommendation is intercepted before it even reaches its intended desk. President Bradley himself has taken issue with it and denies it before a single set of eyes has seen it. The President's veto stamp is a terrifying hammer, used rarely, and it is now sitting on the auditor's desk.

The auditor sleeps with one eye open from then on out.

[mangozic]

michael shelley I would die for you

[crystalizedbutterflywings]

AU where the others find out Jon is going to explore the tunnels in Season 2 and forcefully tag along (Sasha is alive and everything is fine)

I made a part 2!

[stil-lindigo]

recently, Israel sent down hellfire missiles near a hospital in Gaza, which are missiles that explode into blades that slam down and cut through anything in their way. (link)

There is a video of a man with his legs newly amputated, screaming in a pool of his own blood. I won’t share the video, because it made me vomit into a toilet, but either trust me it exists or go look for it yourselves.

There is another video of a young girl, crying silently after her legs were blown off in an explosion. She explains tonelessly to the camera man that she doesn’t want fake legs because they’ll just remind her of her real ones. She is 13. (link)

A hospital is told to evacuate and they do, all the while waving white flags in a show of surrender. The IDF shoot at them anyway. (link)

Meanwhile in Israel - they begin to enforce one of the most draconian anti-free-speech laws in history.

1.link | 2.link | 3.link

Israel also claims to be the “only democracy in the Middle East”.

Israel has bombed hospitals, fishing boats, schools, refugee camps, power sources, water tanks, evacuation routes. They have killed 80% of Palestinian journalists, they have killed 100 UN workers, they have murdered over 4,000 children in 34 days. Because of the lack of food and water, Palestinians have begun to die from starvation, cholera.

If you still support Israel after all this, I believe you’re completely lost. Utterly without any humanity. Nothing could ever excuse this.

In Australia, there is an ongoing list of protests planned, as well as a permanent camp out being set up in Naarm/Melbourne to block Israeli transport company ZIM from shipping weapons. Congressional staffers in the US are finally being gotten through to - in spite of their rampant greed and long-suffering inhumanity, even they can recognise when their phones won't stop ringing with people saying flat out they'll never vote for them again.

Find resources to help Palestine globally at Ceasefiretoday.com

[bl00dalchemist]

Local senior citizen loses his fucking shit.

[chrisrainicorn]

wHAT IF u were a gay horse and u got a new haircut so u can leave ur past behind and when the horse who saved you sees it she tells u u look pretty huh what if what then

[cantpickyourgenre]

I do think after Eddie gets back Buck has a bit of a moment where he's thinking to himself, "I do NOT want to move out, but this is weird, right?" and so he keeps making plans to get out of the house at least every other night because he wants to give Eddie and Chris space. But Eddie insists on driving him in Buck's truck to and from these events For Reasons. It starts with Eddie dropping Buck off at Madney's for dinner and Buck sends him a silly little text that says, "driver played weird music 3/5 stars" and Eddie just responds, "heaven forbid anyone try branching out past Springsteen" and Buck smiles a little. And then it just becomes Their Thing. Buck gets dropped off at the gym and he sends a little, "good snacks. 4/5 stars" and Eddie responds, "you brought the protein bar, you weirdo :)" Buck gets dropped at the bar to meet up with Ravi and sends the already typed out message, "driver can change a tire soooooooooooooo fast. 4/5 stars" and Eddie says, "I didn't even do that this time, Buck." followed up by, "damn, what does a guy have to do to get 5 stars?" and Buck just sends back ";)" and when Eddie picks him back up and brings him home, a little tipsy but NOT drunk Buck sends, "driver knew the fastest way to get to my house. 5/5 stars" and Eddie responds (even though they're two feet apart) "OUR home, Buck :)" followed up with "but thank you for the 5 stars, knew you'd come around eventually." and when Eddie drives them into a shift, after his first real fight with Chris post-Texas, its fine, they worked it out, but Eddie is still a little shaky. Buck allows his brain to not overthink and sends, "driver looks like human, beautiful, golden sunshine even when he's a little upset. 5/5 stars"