#and I'm bad at articulating

[jedi-enthusiasm-blog]

Many people have taken one look at this and inmediately leaped to the conclusion that Jedi forbid emotions. Which is, huh… interesting.

What people don't realize is that the Jedi Order are a religious organization, and as such they have their own sacred texts, such as this meditation mantra (because yeah, that's the only time it's ever mentioned, during meditation).

And the trick about this kind of texts is that they're not meant to be taken literally. You're not supposed to take it at face value, you're supposed to think about it, reflect about it, and then interpretate it. I'm sure the average "fan" hasn't actually thought about it beyond "code bad Jedi evil", nevermind that it's not actually the Jedi Code mentioned in the films.

Since it's a meditation mantra, one used to focus to make connecting with the Force easier, it makes perfect sense that this is how you should feel when using the Force.

You shouldn't be overwhelmed with emotions or passions, you shouldn't act if you don't have knowledge. This is obvious: if you can command the essence of life, then maybe you should actually be in the state of mind to do it.

However, the other lines of "no chaos but harmony" and "no death but the Force" don't fit into this. So, what do they mean?

Here is the other version of the Code. It was seen for the first time in the Kanan comics, and is arguably more canon than the previous one.

(People have called it the Gray Jedi Code, which is hilarious in and on itself and another point in favor of the argument that the so called Gray Jedi are just canon Jedi.)

I'm sure everyone can agree that this one is good.

Feel, but find peace in your emotions. Know nothing, but figure it out. Suffer, but look past it to find serenity. Just like there is chaos, there is harmony. And just like there is death, there is the Force.

But what if I told you that both Codes are saying the same thing?

I know, I know. You probably think I'm crazy, but… what if they're saying the same things, in different ways?

To expand on the interpretation that the first one is how you should be when using the Force (and I admit with my whole chest that this is my interpretation), we can say that the Force isn't naturally things like emotion and chaos. They are only what we bring with us.

That doesn't make them any less real. They are, and they are important, but they are subjective experiences. Everyone will have different emotions, different passions, different things they are ignorant of. Even death, even as it will come for everyone, is something private and personal. I don't know what X person felt or thought when they died.

However, things like peace, harmony and the Force are universal.

Chaos (noun): "complete disorder and confusion." "the property of a complex system whose behaviour is so unpredictable as to appear random"

Dictionary definition, bear with me. "Whose behavior is so unpredictable as to appear random". It isn't random, it has patterns and reasons to happen just like everything else. We simply don't know those patterns. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Just because we don't know something doesn't mean we can't learn it. There is no ignorance, there is knowledge. Therefore there is no such thing as chaos, not really, just a pattern, an order, a harmony, we don't know yet. First definition is about human reaction, not anything about the object itself. There is no chaos, there is harmony.

Emotion, ignorance, passion, chaos, even death. They are all feelings, subjective experiences, things that, ultimately, can change as you find new understanding (well, death only happens once and is permanent but you get the point). But inner peace, knowledge (about situations, about people's reactions), serenity and harmony are all universal. They exist, and will exist long after we die, we just have to find them.

And, long as we remember people, as we understand that all lives have left a mark, big or small, we will keep those who have passed alive within our hearts.

Death, yet the Force. There is no death, there is the Force. Or, perhaps…

"(The Force)'s an energy field created by all living things" Obi-Wan Kenobi, ANH

"Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter" Yoda, ESB

"No one's ever really gone" Luke Skywalker, TLJ

Death, yet the essence of living beings. There is no death, there is life.

[egophiliac]

I don’t think we’ve ever seen you draw knight of dawn before 🤔 what are your thoughts about him? Or take?

I've drawn him a couple of times, just really little/in the background. but I should draw him more, I love this guy a lot! I have many, many thoughts about him and the way he parallels Silver...and also I think it is extremely funny that his ghost is stuck in a ring. especially considering where that ring has been for the last 16-ish years.

[koisher]

i hate how fandom spaces act like it's woke and progressive to care about male characters over female characters. it's obviously part of the greater issue of misogyny in fandom but this in particular annoys me a lot. no i don't care about your favourite boy just because you've dressed up your post in uwu cutesy talk. go away

[rookamell]

There's a Varric/Blackwall banter in Inquisition that is probably my favourite quote to come out of the dragon age series and also says so much about Varric and also about Hawke but reframed in the context of Veilguard also says so much about Rook and why those people complaining about Rook 'not being a main character' or Rook 'not having any right to be the leader' are so completely missing the point of Rook.

Blackwall: You can't really think Reeve Asa is a better knight than Honorine Chastain. Her record's flawless. Four hundred jousts, never unseated. No one's ever come close to it.

Varric: Oh, she's easily the most skilled, that's a fact. It's just that 'scrappy' is better than 'flawless'. I like heroes who try their damndest, even if they fail a lot. It's easy to be valiant when you always win and everything goes your way. There's nothing great in that.

In Inquisition, obviously Varric is talking about Hawke. Hawke, the tragically doomed hero who tried and failed to save Kirkwall, but who tried. Now explain to me why Varric would pick anyone other than Rook to be his second? To look after the team while he talks to Solas? Varric is, first and foremost, however much he tries to be something else or pretend he isn't, an idealist. An author. He lives and thinks in terms of stories, it helps him deal with and make sense of the world. So why would he go and try and recruit the type of hero he doesn't like? Yeah, Rook is a nobody. They're probbaly not the best at what they do and the only reason Varric notices them is because they get cast out of their organisation for going against orders to save people. They might not be the most skilled, but goddamn if they don't try. Rook is the definition of scrappy, the prologue and first couple of cutscenes basically hit you over the head with it multiple times. They're exactly the stuff heroes are made of, according to Varric. And sure, they need some help, but what good would a story be if the hero was perfect all the time?

God I love Rook. And I love Varric and the way he thinks. And you know what? You know what the game says?

He's fucking right.

[aintnopartylikeaprideparty]

as someone who has experienced abuse from someone with a personality disorder, it's actually incredibly easy to not dehumanize everyone with a personality disorder. i've seen people do borderline eugenic rhetoric surrounding people who have npd, aspd, bpd or other personality disorders, and then be like "I'M allowed to say these things because i'm a survivor, and if you disagree you are hurting abuse victims."

and frankly? i'm tired of it. as an abuse survivor i'm here to say that you're NOT allowed to turn into a fucking eugenicist the moment you're hurt by someone with a personality disorder.

does hurting and belittling other people who happen to have the same disorder as your abuser, people that are already suffering and that are already looked down on by society, bring you any healing? does it bring you peace?

Being hurt by someone isn't an excuse to hurt others that you feel justified in lashing out on. you're literally in control of your own actions,

you may claim to be making a safe space for abuse survivors, but i will never feel any solidarity with you, and i ESPECIALLY don't feel safe with you considering i might have a personality disorder.

you are excluding a large amount of abuse survivors in the name of "advocacy". a lot of people with personality disorders developed one or multiple due to heavy abuse. in the aim of creating a safe space, you are excluding the ones who need a safe space the most.

[hey-hey-j]

(sort of a companion piece to this)

older brother instinct

(★ my Kofi)

[sha-brytols]

it doesnt even bother meeee when warrior ladies are still traditionally feminine but bioware just like. i cant put it into words but its like they're sooo insecure about warrior women specifically that they have to put extra effort into reassuring us that she's still girly and has girly interests and it's just WEEEIRD

[not-an-idiot]

Idk how to explain it, but I feel like the moving city is something like a (more or less) good component to the silver line. You can't leave both places, but for the moving city it's because it'd be too dangerous and to keep the scary/evil outside and for the silver line it's because Locomotion won't let you go

[fluo-skeletons]

it's been 9 years i think we can all collectively agree now that Flowey has never been a master of psychological manipulation.

No shame to him, he's a kid who's been recently awakened from death and probably became very socially detached thanks to the nature of resets,

but you can't tell me that Papyrus didn't/wouldn't have caught on if he had been planning to take the souls at the end of true pacifist. Flowey is not a good liar. In any case, this does lead to monsters being freed, so was Papyrus really wrong to play along?

And who's to say this all wasn't Papyrus simply playing into whatever would set Flowey on the path he takes in true pacifist, trusting that the human and him would work it out? Flowey can have his power display and then realise what really matters. sometimes you gotta work through your problems the hard way

local kid with zero issues of abandonment/isolation whatsoever

[aeb-art]

note: the following is three (almost four) years post-game

okay fine i'll just draw comics for my au since writing is so dang hard smh

anyways welcome to two coins! where loop shows up again but siffrin only got the one hat ending

edit: part two

[camellcat]

first xander brought her back with human breath and determination... then willow with supernatural power and love.... smth smth two halves to keep their third in balance from drifting too far into either side and losing herself.....

[deplcythebattery]

why are functional disorders not seen as real? why is the functional part what makes people think it's not real? i'm autistic and struggling to grasp why the word functional means not real to a lot of people. like. it's a functional disorder. it affects functioning. why is that not a big deal? why does that make it not real like other disorders that aren't labeled functional disorders?

also why does it not count as a real disability if it's functional?

edit: there's a really good reply in the reblogs from @ciderjacks if others are wondering this too!

[itz-pandora]

Thank you guys for dealing with me

[brw]

Goodbye Krakoa. Stay dead bitch. No more mutant islands.

Can we stop making ethnostates now like can we stop doing that in comics. Can we not keep saying "minorities are safe nowhere but in their own country that doesn't let certain people and also they might not even be safe because Evil People might get jealous and kill them". Ultimately this era has done nothing to explore why ethnostates are bad in any real way. It has done nothing to actually explore how being complicit in the creation of an ethnostate is a Bad Thing. We had some events but we didn't explore anything because we were too scared of making some of our faves look bad. I just actually hate the statements this era has ended up saying and I hate the fact that heroic characters are mourning over the loss of an ethnostate founded by eugenicists. These politics are ugly. And worse yet I see people mourning the loss of the fictional ethnostate like have we all lost our minds.

[canisalbus]

"The concept of love is of course prominent in Christianity, so even as a kid being raised in a religious environment . . . Machete wasn't completely alienated from it. But it has always been a nebulous, unperceivable and unattainable thing for him."

I love that you could replace "love" with "God" or "divinity" here and it would still work. And in that way it matches the way I've been perceiving their relationship as Vasco granting Machete a kind of holiness he didn't think living people could have

.

[shakeskp]

Wasn't expecting to explain to an old neurosurgeon who teaches MBA students with ChatGPT how bad it can be for younger students who haven't developed their critical thinking

Wasn't expecting him to say "You're right, actually, you're right"