#and i am extremely bereft about this

[reigningmax]

via victoria's instagram story

[thatgirlonstage]

Yana T so extremely deserves this hiatus and I wish her the absolute best and I want her to come back exactly when she is ready and not a day before. I just want to say this before anything else, to make it 1000% crystal clear that any crying on my part about being bereft of kuro content is not in the single slightest bit a complaint aimed at Yana. And if I see anyone saying bullshit about her being selfish to take a hiatus when she hasn’t done that one single time for eighteen years straight, I am going to bite you. And also more practically block you.

[borninwinter81]

William Blake and Good Omens - an intertextual analysis

Please note: I did another version of this and posted it, but it was quite hurried, way too short, and was incorrect in a number of ways so I deleted it. However it had already been reblogged by the time i did so. If you happen to see another version of this meta that's not the right one, this is the version I'm happy with!

After my previous post re William Blake and Good Omens did so well, and so many people showed an interest I've decided to do a more in depth piece. This is focused upon the TV version of Good Omens, not the book.

Please don't tag Neil in this - although it's mostly textual analysis I do a very small amount of S3 theorising, and I know he doesn't want to see that.

I am in no way suggesting that Neil and Terry specifically wrote Good Omens with Blake in mind, I honestly just wanted an excuse to write more about Blake because I love his work so much, and I thought it would be interesting to try and apply some intertexuality since the works will contain similar themes, both being about God, religion, humanity, and angels and demons.

I also should stress that I am not an expert on Blake, there are people far more qualified to comment on him than I. I'm just a former literature student who loves his work.

There have been many different interpretations of Blake's work over the years, so it's completely fine to disagree with someone else's ideas about it, as with any work of art or literature. And although this piece is likely to be long, I'll barely be able to scratch the surface of all the possible meanings that could be ascribed to it.

Much like the old adage that if someone claims to understand quantum physics they're lying, I'm not sure anyone can truly fathom the full meaning of Blake's philosophy (especially in his later prophetic works, fuuuuuuck those beasts....), so if you're confused by him don't be discouraged, that's perfectly normal!

That being said, I wish to discuss the parallels between Good Omens and The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, my personal favourite and probably the most accessible of his longer works.

"Without contraries is no progression. Attraction and Repulsion, Reason and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence. From these contraries spring what the religious call Good & Evil. Good is the passive that obeys Reason. Evil is the active springing from Energy. Good is Heaven. Evil is Hell."

This excerpt is from near the opening and sets out the central idea of the work - that there is an essential duality to humanity, and each person is a combination of extremes. These extremes are not at war with each other, but rather are equally necessary, hence the "marriage" of the title. "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" is a metaphor for the human experience.

Consistently throughout The Marriage... Blake refers to the two extremes as Reason and Energy. These terms could be construed in a number of different ways: thought versus emotion, mental versus physical, restraint versus desire, temperance versus excess, caution versus impulsiveness, and following the rules versus free will.

Blake's use of the word "Reason" in this context may be somewhat confusing, however he likely chose it because of his negative feelings towards science and the Age of Enlightenment. Blake saw literal visions of angels and prophets and the divinity of all creation, and hated that science reduced everything to formulas, calculations, and materialism, leaving the world bereft of wonder. "Art is the Tree of Life. Science is the Tree of Death" as he put it.

His ideas about "reason" are best expressed by his painting "Newton". Though inspired by the scientist, it is not a portrait - instead it depicts a figure deeply engrossed in scientific drawings and calculations, totally ignoring the beauty all around him - see below.

In the context of The Marriage... Reason is "passive" because it involves thought, caution, self-restraint, and doing what you are told, all states which block action. Energy is "active" because it is physical, emotional, impulsive and allows you to act based on your own choices and desires. It's quite clear that Blake feels "energy" is the preferable state - he tells us as much in the next section:

"The Voice of the Devil

All Bibles or sacred codes, have been the causes of the following Errors. 1. That Man has two real existing principles Viz: a Body & a Soul. 2. That Energy, call'd Evil, is alone from the Body, & that Reason, call'd Good, is alone from the Soul. 3. That God will torment Man in Eternity for following his Energies. But the following Contraries to these are True. 1. Man has no Body distinct from his Soul; for that call'd Body is a portion of Soul discern'd by the five Senses, the chief inlets of Soul in this age. 2. Energy is the only life and is from the Body and Reason is the bound or outward circumference of Energy. 3. Energy is Eternal Delight."

So the body is an aspect of the soul, not separate from it, Energy comes from the body, it is Reason which places limits upon Energy, but Energy is eternal delight. Physicality, desire, impulsiveness, emotion, sensual pleasure and free will are not wrong or evil, they are aspects of the human soul and it is from them that we derive our enjoyment of life.

This does not necessarily mean that Reason is always bad. After all, Blake tells us that both are necessary for human existence. Sometimes temperance, caution and thought before action are required. But Reason becomes negative when it "usurps its place and governs the unwilling", i.e. when it completely supplants Energy and becomes the sole guiding factor, forcing passivity.

The Angels of The Marriage... are governed by "systematic reasoning", therefore they are wholly creatures of Reason. They are also "all religious" meaning they believe the "errors" stated above. His Devils by contrast "hate religion" meaning they believe the "contraries", which are the true statements according to Blake. It does not necessarily follow that they are wholly governed by Energy, merely that they believe Energy is "eternal delight".

It is worth noting at this point that Blake saw God and religion as totally separate. For Blake, "God" is that connection with divine wonder which was integral to his life; he tells us plainly that "all deities reside in the human breast" and that "the voice of honest indignation is the voice of God". In other words all humans have a direct and intuitive link with God and don't require the church, Priests, or a religious framework and adherence to a set of rules in order to reach moral decisions. These rules exist only to "enslave the vulgar".

The importance of this ability to make one's own choices about a moral course of action is shown by one of the "Memorable Fancy" sections of The Marriage...

Blake relates how a Devil is able to use an Angel's "systematic reasoning" against them:

"if Jesus Christ is the greatest man, you ought to love him in the greatest degree; now hear how he has given his sanction to the law of ten commandments: did he not mock at the sabbath, and so mock the sabbaths God? Murder those who were murder'd because of him? Turn away the law from the woman taken in adultery? Steal the labor of others to support him? Bear false witness when he omitted making a defence before Pilate? Covet when he pray'd for his disciples, and when he bid them shake off the dust of their feet against such as refused to lodge them? I tell you, no virtue can exist without breaking these ten commandments; Jesus was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules."

The Angel has no way to refute the "reasoning" that Jesus was governed by Energy and "impulse", i.e. his own morality, the "voice of righteous indignation", not reasoning and the rules laid down by Heaven. And because Jesus is the Messiah he must be virtuous, therefore Energy is virtuous. The Angel immediately allows himself to be consumed by fire and is resurrected as a Devil.

How can these concepts apply to the world of Good Omens?  This was where my first draft was totally incorrect, as I tried to transfer Blake's ideas about Angels and Demons and Heaven and Hell wholesale, applying "reason" to Aziraphale and Heaven and "energy" to Crowley and Hell.  In fact the divide is slightly different in the GO-verse: Crowley and Aziraphale *both* represent Energy, and it is Heaven and Hell that act according to Reason.

At first glance Aziraphale may appear to toe the line - he needs creative application of the rules to make him comfortable with trying to avert the apocalypse, and when he doesn't like the way matters are being handled by the Archangels he seeks a higher authority and goes straight to God. He'd clearly prefer someone to be confirming the rightness of his actions for him. However this doesn't mean that he won't act on his own.

Immediately upon his introduction to the story he has given away his flaming sword, an action that he took impulsively because he felt it was right, not because someone told him to. It bothers him, but he does it anyway.

In the Job storyline, though he initially looks for some loophole within the rules that will allow him to save Job's children, in the end he directly goes against Heaven to do it, even though he believes he is going to Fall and become a Demon for having done so.

Though he resists it and exhausts all other possible avenues first, he eventually does take an active role in averting the apocalypse in S1.

He hides Jim at great personal risk to himself and against the will of both Heaven and Hell, again because he feels it is the right thing to do.

He is therefore perfectly capable of independent action from a position of "righteous indignation".

On a more basic level, he enjoys worldly pleasures, which all come from "energy" according to Blake's philosophy. Food and drink most obviously, but also books, music, dancing, theatre, art and so on.

Crowley is more easy to place as acting from Energy - in spite of the obvious aesthetic differences between them, he also loves worldly pleasures. Alcohol and coffee, snazzy clothing, driving his car with Queen blaring on the stereo, going to lunch with Aziraphale, Shakespearean comedies. All things he isn't supposed to want or need, and which baffle other Demons, in the same way that Aziraphale's desire for food baffles the Angels.

And he's absolutely willing to act according to his own moral impulses when they conflict with Hell's orders (or Heaven's), be it saving Job's children, ensuring that Elspeth doesn't die by suicide, or averting the apocalypse. Yes, he'll try to hide his "good" actions in order to avoid punishment by Hell, but he's firmly "on his own side".

Conversely, Heaven and Hell are both part of the structure of religion in this story, are strictly adherent to a set of rules, and their inhabitants appear to have no real desires of their own, other than possible advancement within the systems they uphold. They are "passive" in that their functions allow the status quo to continue and the "great plan" to unfold as they believe it is meant to, even though each side expects a different outcome.

Again, applying Blake's philosophy, I would say the reason for this is that "energy is from the body". Crowley and Aziraphale have both been given bodies in order that they can exist on earth, and *have* existed on earth for 6000 years, therefore "energy" - physical pleasures and free thinking - have become a part of who they are.

On a more fundamental level, possession of a body can be equated to humanity, and humanity has been shown as the most powerful force of all in this story, its influence having led to Adam becoming "human incarnate", and thus acting according to what he feels is right, instead of fulfilling the function he was destined for.

Heaven and Hell contain no material objects, and the Angels and Demons are spiritual beings, having no bodies, so they are not open to energy, and therefore are wholly governed by Reason, and the preservation of the religious structures within which they exist. Structures which, as for Blake, may not actually have anything to do with God herself. In S1 she is a distant observer, clearly aware through her narration of all that is going on, but not interceding in any way. In S2 she is barely present save for her voice being heard briefly in Job, and overlaid with Gabriel's on two occasions.

Bearing all this in mind, what predictions can we make regarding S3 by applying Blake's philosophy?

"The ancient tradition that the world will be consumed in fire at the end of six thousand years is true, as I have heard from Hell.

For the cherub with his flaming sword is hereby commanded to leave his guard at [the] tree of life, and when he does, the whole creation will be consumed and appear infinite and holy, whereas it now appears finite and corrupt.

This will come to pass by an improvement of sensual enjoyment."

The parallels of the cherub with his flaming sword, and the passage of 6000 years should be obvious to anyone reading this - they have of course been lifted directly from the Bible as they are in GO.

I have read some metas which speculated that Aziraphale's bookshop, or perhaps Earth itself, is a metaphorical stand-in for Eden or The Tree of Life. Aziraphale has been commanded to leave his "Eden" and will now be instrumental in causing the whole of creation to become infinite and holy, but Blake tells us this will be done by an improvement of sensual enjoyment, which arises from Energy not Reason.

Sensual enjoyment is something which is intrinsic to Aziraphale's character, and this could make his placement in Heaven very important.

Putting aside all the "final fifteen" theories and taking matters at face value, Aziraphale tells us that if he's in charge he can make a difference - he needs to subvert the system from the inside out. The most subversive thing of all could be that a sensualist who acts according to "the voice of moral indignation" and "Energy" has become the supreme Archangel. We have seen in Blake how a realisation that Energy could be virtuous was enough to convert an Angel into a Devil (incidentally, does the image of an Angel being consumed by fire and emerging as a Devil seem familiar at all...)

We may have seen the beginnings of this already. Gabriel and Beelzebub became open to Energy from such little things as visiting earth, spending time in one another's company, and their mutual enjoyment of a song, which has given them wants and desires beyond those dictated by Heaven and Hell. This is enough to make them wish to leave their roles behind.

It's possible that the same may happen with Muriel. They haven't yet imbibed food or drink, but they have shown an enjoyment of books, which are an earthly pleasure, and open the reader up to new ideas and ways of thinking.

Of course, this would lead to questions regarding the Metatron's statement that he has "ingested things", and whether this means he is acting from reason or energy. Of course the simplest explanation is that it is a manipulation tactic, and he is lying about having done so, but if true that statement has some interesting implications. However, this is now super-long and I'm out of juice, so will leave others to speculate. I may return to this in the future!

There we go, hope you enjoyed. I doubt this will reach nearly as many people as my first Blake post, but if a few find it of interest then my work is done!

[lugarn]

there's a discussion going on right now in BL about found family and what is and isn't found family. a few incorrect things are being repeated, and reblogged:

found family requires estrangement

queer found family is unique from other types of found family

social groups in school can't be queer found family

in my point of view, the above ideas are extremely restrictive definitions of queer found family.

not everyone will agree with this, of course, but the ideals that i've been surrounded by my entire life are not ones of telling people what is and isn't queer but rather giving people space to explain why it's queer to them. people in the we are tag have done this beautifully and i laud them for it!

found family can easily run the spectrum from a group of people who aren't completely committed to one another and are casual friends to a group of people who think of each other in all times.

it fits all these definitions and more, just the same as blood family. that's the variety of life, baby.

every instance of found family that you want to see between characters or feel a response to while watching/reading is a reasonable example of found family. i am glad that people are able to see these concepts resonate for them. i hope everybody takes a little time to make fanworks about the show which has given them these lovely feelings of resonance and recognition.

now, to get serious for a minute...

guys, please please don't ever think that isolation or suffering is required for found family. it's not required for someone to lose everyone and be completely bereft before the relationships 'count' any more than it's required that someone be a member of queer community to be queer.

there aren't any gates being kept here that you gotta do xyz to be queer and have queer found family. honey you're still queer even if you're completely closeted and your only queer found family is the queer couple that visits the waffle house you work at once a week. it all counts! every single bit of it! it matters, and so it counts.

in asia queer found family often exists as specific counterpoint to straight blood relatives because of the difficulties of being out across most of asia. there's some lovely poignant media that's been made about this; i think my favorite so far has been twilight's kiss.

in the end i think there's room for all kinds of found family in BL. that variety of point of view what being queer is all about, right?

[wings-of-ink]

I thought of the scene from the demo where the curse decided to manifest itself in the form of a tattoo on MC's body. What if MC couldn't take a breath and the disease ended up killing them?

Can we see parents and friends POV if that happened? Pretty please🙏

Sorry for the delayed response, Anon! This was legit kinda tough for me to think about, but no worries though, I’m really okay with it. I have considered doing a short about that moment from another perspective since MC was very out of it and tensions were high. Thinking about the MC succumbing in that moment breaks my heart. I probably won’t do a direct POV type scene for their death or anything, but just give some generalizations for your ask scenario.

It would be devastating. Extremely.

Kip and Dov would not stop trying to revive the MC for a long time. There would be much screaming and crying. Both would hold the MC in their arms and rock as they mourned. Grief never ends after that.

Betony and Kavi would do what they could, but ultimately would be distraught and try to just be there for Kip and Dov. They both take the loss hard, Betony always felt like MC was family, one of her babies. Kavi feels like a failure, he hates himself for letting MC suffer (this is where Lakota gets it).

Oswin isn’t doing well either. He is filled with regrets. He never told MC the news. He never gave them his gift. He never said he was sorry. He beats himself up so damn hard and it stays with him for his entire life thereafter.

Those were the five that were around for most of that moment. Lakota was tending to Willow at the time as she was having trouble. They will be bereft when they discover what occurred.

Lakota will blame himself for not finding a way to save MC. He’ll forever think that he must have missed something or he didn’t try enough things. He cries for years, and has to avoid areas that contain memories with the MC, which is a lot of places. Though his wife wasn’t as close with MC as Lakota, she feels it too. MC is not only a friend, but a person she respects and admires, who she knows helped shape the man she loves.

That's about as far as I’m willing to go on that one. I am already tearing up. I am a marshmallow @elegantunknownphantom can attest to that, lol. You are stronger than I, Anon! Thank you for the ask and I hope the answers satisfy a bit! ^_^

[sephirthoughts]

Sorry if this is a lot but I am consumed by Cidvin at all times, so for the ask game for Cid/Vincent could you do 7, 22, 31, 32? Or any of them really! (I am obsessed with the way you talk about these two) Cheers!

7. Cid is clumsier. This is not his fault it’s just that Vincent has literal superhuman physical abilities. He makes up for it by being extremely confident though. Which makes him seem a lot cooler while he’s tumbling down two flights of stairs into a pile of garbage cans.

22. i was going to say Vincent’s would probably be physical touch but that’s more soothing/grounding. i think his actual love language would be acts of service. quietly, persistently, creating a bubble of care around his person. like making sure whenever cid absentmindedly reaches for his coffee mug it’s full and hot. the ash trays are neatly emptied no matter how much he smokes. his slippers are always near to hand. the enemies that have surrounded the place are all quickly, silently slaughtered and disposed of before they can disturb cid’s peace. that kind of thing.

Cid’s would be quality time. lest we forget, he’s a literal rocket scientist which means he goes fucking hard when it comes to work. when he specifically makes time for a person, he’s telling them “you’re more important to me than my work/lifelong obsession.” that said, he would drop absolutely everything for vincent at any time. not even in an emergency. if vincent was just like…bored and wanted to see him.

31. They spend their anniversaries just relaxing together, having a lot of sexy time, cooking a nice meal, exchanging small gifts. appreciating the time they have together while not calling too much attention to the actual number of years passing, because cid knows how difficult that is for vincent.

and late at night, after cid is asleep, vincent lays there staring at him for hours, memorising his features like snapshots in time, counting the grey hairs that he’s getting more and more of every year, as gold turns gradually to silver. quietly preparing himself for the long, cold night that will come, after this brilliant sun sets from his life, and he’s left alone and bereft, to face what it truly means to have loved and lost. to pay the bitter price that fate demands for having possessed such perfect joy. then he wraps cid up in his arms and whispers “it’s worth it” before he drifts off to sleep.

32. i answered this one before but i feel it’s incumbent upon me to emphasize how much of a sticky octopus vincent is. like he only begrudgingly lets go so cid can use the bathroom. and beware of his fangs because he claims he’s not a vampire, but if he feels ignored he will bite in and hang on until he draws blood or is sufficiently petted.

[reikiajakoiranruohoja]

Second Inquisition WOW

I don't even know how to preface this, because this is some massive tonal confusion. I guess the best way to put it is that for all I love Werewolf and Vampire, I am not blind to the horror they are for humans. Though my go-to question for anyone writing monster hunters is why they hunt, I still feel hunters are extremely important to the narrative as a counterpoint to the monsters. So when I read the introduction text for the Second Inquisition book for V5, my jaw hit the floor.

"The theme of the Second Inquisition is determination – aimed at the player coterie. Like a certain killer cyborg from the future, the Coalition can’t be reasoned with, it can’t be bargained with. It doesn't feel pity or remorse or fear and it absolutely will not stop. Ever. Individual Inquisitors or soldiers or cops or nuns can be reasoned with and bargained with. Most feel fear, some feel pity, and even a few feel remorse. All those deviations and human moments make excellent stories, ripples in the flood. But the narrative relentlessly washes over those stories, replacing every flawed or broken foe with two more – ten more — out for revenge or salvation. The Inquisition as a whole – both as a conspiracy and a movement that enflames that conspiracy – will not stop until every Kindred burns. Conveying the impersonal, implacable determination of a gigantic bureaucracy to crush the player characters should not be impossible in the 2020s – but it should be very effective."

Why this made me stare at the screen, is how the Inquisition was introduced in an older book;

"The theme of The Inquisition is the crusader. The Society of Leopold sees itself as humanity’s last stand against the encroaching hordes of the World of Darkness. Inquisitors are the new Crusaders; all the Earth is their Holy Land. But theirs is a lonely struggle, bereft of the support of those whom they would save. The general populace does not know of the struggle, and would most likely think the Inquisitors are mad. Inquisitors are holy knights, alienated from their fellow mortals by their knowledge of what awaits. Some within the Inquisition are zealots, it is true, but it is better to err on the side of caution than to let slip the defences of humanity." The difference is stark, especially as they are talking about the same sort of hunters. The reason I find the newer book's take extremely strange, is due to the fact that the player characters in VtM are undead bloodsucking parasites that manipulate humanity and have magic blood powers that make them much stronger than an average human. Yet the V5 book chooses to introduce the inquisition as horrible people who will never stop hunting poor innocent vampires. It goes even as far as the art.

(Start ID; A mixed media picture with modified photographs. A bald man in a trenchcoat is scowling with his fists clenched. He is holding the severed head of a female vampire from its hair. The expression on the head is of wide-eyed horror. End ID.)

(Start ID; A book cover with the text Inquision as the title, with a crosshair symbol reading 'Year of the Hunter' on the bottom. The cover art is a painted picture of a bearded man in a trenchcoat and torn jeans wielding in one hand a large cross and in another a lit torch. There is a shotgun and spent shells on the tiled floor. Just outside the light of the torch, a horde of vampires with glowing eyes has surrounded the man, some shirking from the light. End ID.)

One treats the hunter as a threat overpowering a vampire. The other treats the hunter as a lone figure surrounded by a mass of vampires. Let me be quite frank, humanity in WoD are the mice that the cats (vampires) hunt. Hunters are the mice that fight back. A vampire in VtM, regardless of edition, has an advantage over a hunter. Vampires use humans as prey, the polite ones pay them for it but they don't HAVE to. In V5 you are given various methods to hunt for your blood, some which are cruel. Painting the people standing up to creatures that actively harm humans as the abusers and the ones in the wrong is extremely tone deaf. Vampires are not some oppressed minority trying to eke out a living, a vampire is creature that needs to drink blood to survive and human blood is the best. In V5's own lore, it is only recently that vampires are even put on the backfoot at all. Before that, humanity were pawns in centuries long grudgematches and at best a quick bite snack at wost fleshcrafted into sacks hung from hooks. Can there be good vampires and bad hunters? Of course, WoD is all about the shades of gray. It is when the basic set up of the setting is turned around like this that I have a problem.

[sawyerquinnbrown]

My neighbor upstairs runs an Airbnb out of his apartment, which has led to many interesting and exciting situations for me. Well, I say ‘exciting’, mostly I mean ‘inconvenient’ and sometimes ‘hilarious.’

Last month I discovered that, while I on the ground floor have a one-bedroom with a tiny office, my upstairs neighbor has 4 bedrooms on two floors that he rents by himself for about a billion US dollars, so it makes perfect sense that he would run an Airbnb, to recoup some of his costs. I imagine it takes a strength of character when you live in an Airbnb, because personally, I don’t want people in my house. That’s why I moved to my own place at 36; I’d had enough. My only roommates now are two very attractive and high-quality felines, who will be introduced in more detail in a later blog post.

Anyway, the Airbnb. The first thing I noticed once this started was that I was constantly jumping whenever someone was coming through the front gate and tromping up the stairs, which was frequent. This is due to my anticipation of my many online purchases. (I purchase many things online because 1) it’s fun to receive things in the mail and 2) I don’t like to leave my house—there’s weather out there, and also bugs.) So: many comings and goings and creakings of the gate.

The second thing I noticed occurred one day when I heard some rattling outside my door. That’s odd, I thought, I’m not expecting any guests. Actually, my thought process was more like Aaaaaa, someone’s trying to break into my apartment! (My upstairs neighbor had been robbed a couple months prior, so this was a totally rational and normal and not-overreactive thing to panic about.) I am Extremely Brave™ (No.), so I went to the door and opened it to discover a hapless traveler with a large rolling suitcase attempting to open the lockbox I hung outside my door. Much relieved, I informed the traveler that the lockbox he was looking for was upstairs.

(Sidenote about the lockbox: I hung it up shortly after moving in because of the time I locked myself out. I was trying this cool thing called “Carrying stuff in my pockets like a dude” due to extreme gender dysphoria, and I left my keys inside my apartment. My landlord was kind enough to charge me $25 to unlock my door, and I ordered the lockbox as soon as I got inside. $25! ::snarling noises::)

The third point of excitement occurred late one night when a knock came at my door around 11:30pm. At the door stood an older butch woman who had run into the same problem as I had: she’d locked her keys inside the apartment, in this case the Airbnb. Unable to get in contact with my neighbor, she was trapped outside. I volunteered to text him and in exchange she offered me a beer. I feel guilty about not offering to let her kip on my air mattress, but, as previously stated, I don’t like to have people in my house.

Finally we come to the real issue of neighboring an Airbnb: too-generous guests. This sounds counterintuitive, so let me explain. As I mentioned, I like to receive packages in the mail so I can open presents I ordered for myself. However, due to Chicago being weird (in my experience as a former Bostonian), my ground floor apartment being a “1” and the upstairs apartment being a “2” is apparently unusual. Typically, I’ve been told, “1” is upstairs. So despite the very clear and large numeral “2” on my neighbor’s mailbox, everyone likes to deliver my stuff up the stairs. The too-nice Airbnb-ers see these packages and say to themselves, Aha! A package for my host! and without checking the name on the package, helpfully carry them inside and lock the door. I am left bereft, knowing my package has arrived but unable to access, for instance, a box of lightbulbs (listen, I know. Adults get excited about the weirdest things).

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[gothicprep]

i started writing this and it ended up way longer than anticipated. apologies in advance.

a movie called "you're so not invited to my bat mitzvah" has been on netflix's top 10 for the past couple of weeks now. i thought, "i wonder what this is", looked it up, saw it was review bombed, and thought to myself. great. now i have no choice to watch this.

i'll just write my review of this, and then get into what i found odd about the review bombing.

this is the latest adam sandler production for netflix. it's a coming of age story, kind of a modern take on "are you there god? it's me, margaret?" sort of thing. deals with all the difficulties of modern life – phones, tiktoks, hip rabbis, etc – and the eternal difficulties of life – puberty, getting your priorities in order, why god allows evil, hip rabbis, etc – in a way that's both familiar and specific. it's familiar in part because sandler casts people from his regular orbit, but also a very specific movie because it's about a very specific milieu. which is to say, upper middle class jewish girls and their parents, and tension between a religious event which involves a lot of intellectual preparation for an adult responsibility, and the consumerism involved with bar/bat mitzvah inflation in families that can afford to celebrate on that scale.

i found the specificity charming, especially in the depictions of the protagonist (played by sunny sandler, adam sandler's daughter) and the various difficulties she has with her father (played by her irl dad). although, i'm grading on the netflix curve here, which i'd define as "was this a movie you can watch while you're looking at your phone and still be entertained by even though you're not paying close attention to" and it's pretty much that. i'd say a little bit better than average, because the performances of the young actors really nail it. sunny sandler is great in this. she's not afraid to come off as totally ridiculous, especially in one scene where she's wearing overdone makeup and trying to take selfies. she seems genuinely bereft when her friendship with her best friend unravels. her character does some things which are genuinely cruel, even by the standards of teen movie stuff, but she has a lot of potential as a physical comedian.

it's easy for a movie like this to be a total nepotism project, but it also does not work if sunny sandler isn't good in her role, and she is. and the kids who play her friends are also good in their roles.

another thing that i also found fascinating about this wasn't just the specificity of the jewish experience that's depicted in it, but also the specificity of the current situation where teenagers aren't just presenting themselves on their phones all the time, but in which they're recording each other on their phones all the time. we've all been cautioned about what we share online, but there isn't yet conventional wisdom about documentation we have of other people outside of, idk, "you shouldn't share other people's nudes". and it does a good job of blending a specific cultural milieu with a specific generational experience.

it's not ibsen or anything but it's, like, fine.

so. the review bombs. i think this might have gotten a lot of traction on tiktok, because a lot of the 1 star reviews are prefaced with "i am [12-14] and jewish and i didn't like this". i'm not here to pick on them, but a lot of them share a common gripe about it which is... i'll just pull some quotes from them:

"As a young woman, myself, I was extremely disappointed in the oversexualization and generally offensive depictions of teenagers (especially the girls) in this film."

"With the barbie movie just coming out, I thought we were past sexualising girls. But here comes along a movie AIMED AT KIDS and teaches them that incredibly revealing outfits and quite sexual pictures are correct and even possibly supported for kids!"

"I also noticed that it sexualized teenagers after the amount of times they said “hooking up” after reminding us that they are only 13 years old"

"Second off this show “shows off” 12 year olds in a very dirty way in some parts of the show and some parts are absolutely disgusting."

"Stereotypes, sexualising of 12 and 13 year olds, and teaching people that this is how Jews are"

i'm not going to be like "these dipshits in middle school do not understand the language of film, unlike me, a 28 year old woman who is very smart". but there's nothing remotely sexual in this movie. there's the scene where sunny sandler's character is taking trying to take IG type pictures with her friends, but the audience isn't invited to ogle at it. like, one of her friends is holding a floor lamp so it functions as a ring light, and the dialogue is, like, "how do i look?" "like your goldfish just died :/". and stuff like "they kissed and i heard he touched her underboob" is no more salacious than the sort of juvenile gossip that you'd find in an actual junior high school.

that all said, it's very jarring to me to hear people in that age group using "it sexualizes teenagers" in their critical vocabulary. i don't think that would even cross my mind when i'd be that young and watching a comedy. and i could be reading too much into it, but the ongoing moral panic about sex ed and kids seems like it's driving kids nuts just as much as it is adults.

all of this is a long winded way of saying, this culture war shitstorm has gotten a lot of coverage in terms of the parents who want to ban books, but maybe it'd be prudent for someone to pitch a piece that focuses on how this whole thing is impacting young people who are no doubt absorbing some of this through osmosis and tiktok.

[roobylavender]

i love ur critiques. what are 1 or 2 things per bat character (whether irt their fans, character, or comics) that you dont like?

(or if not every bat then just those u want <33)

thank you for the compliment! i'll do fan criticisms since that's always more fun

bruce

idk if it's an outright dislike but i feel like bruce fans who get up in arms about him killing simply do not take the time to understand his moral code across the span of his narrative.. bruce should never intentionally attempt to murder unless driven to absolute extremes and the few issues in which this idea was explored by mike w. barr the ultimate outcome was meant to demonstrate why bruce should never intentionally attempt to murder (e.g., in son of the demon his murder of qayin effectively amounts to nothing and leaves him bereft of talia's companionship and the start of their family together; in batman: full circle if he went through with the murder of the reaper another child would be left orphaned and that is not a reality bruce wants to facilitate). they are character studies and should be treated as such! however alternatively i do not think bruce has as concrete feelings about unintentional murder. if he's in a chaotic situation and he has to choose between saving a civilian and saving a supervillain, he will choose the civilian, and that's okay! sometimes you have to prioritize! and dick and cass are there to feel guilty for not being able to save everyone lol

dick

i am constantly confused with dick fans' simultaneous frustration over his permanent removal to batman editorial (valid, correct, etc.) and their desire to frame him as the omnipresent big brother figure to everyone in the bat family. like.. are these not contradictory to each other lmao. i've discussed it before but it feels like many of them want to combat the idea that he's a bad big brother even though he was realistically under no obligation to do anything for bruce's other wards/adoptees like mans had already left the house! he did not have a relationship with those kids and he doesn't have to. it doesn't make me think lesser of him at all

every dick fan should be required to read up on wally and garth outside of teen titans comics before even daring to speak on either of them idgaf

jason

i'm gna skip him because i feel like 70% of my account is dedicated to discussing what i don't like about most jason fans

tim

admittedly i have less context to clarify this confusion because my reading stops abruptly in like 2002 but i'm very confused with tim fans' simultaneous positioning of him as this boy scout representation of why batman will always need a robin! and their complete indulgence in his emo boy era. i still haven't read said emo era because again [see above] but i feel like a lonely place of dying can very clearly be read as the start to a tragedy because it's insane for any thirteen year old to think he has to be the one to make sure gotham's vigilante apparatus remains functioning. reading robin (1993) is jarring in the most effective way possible because it's these moments of tim trying to lead a normal, trivial, everyday life juxtaposed against moments where he's in an outright terror zone or seconds away from beating a man to death or throwing a temper tantrum because bruce didn't respect his privacy even though it was in the interest of reassuring stephanie that tim was okay. tim unfortunately comes from a place of privilege and is not in any sense emotionally equipped to deal with what he gets into and i don't know how people think that starts with jack's death in identity crisis and not years prior with the beginning of his stint

to the above end, i truly don't care about the debate over tim's various secret identities and out of all of the bat kids i think he is the one most desperately in need of permanent retirement. let him indulge his stalker tendencies and photography talents per some other means (investigative journalism) before he goes insane

stephanie

i'm sure batgirl (2009) is a cute book or whatever (aside from its characterization of damian..) but i'm never going to read it and the idea that the spoiler identity wasn't sufficient to explore stephanie as a character is just.. eternally stupid to me. like obv most people acknowledge that the decision to make her into robin was one intended to set her up for failure but i also don't know why she ever needed to become batgirl later on. spoiler is not an identity adjacent to the red hood wherein stephanie is using it as a crutch to deter herself from achieving closure with her trauma and the only reason editorial made her ditch it is because they hate anyone not fitting into the robin-batgirl dichotomy

do steph fans like timst*ph? idk. i'm anti romantic timst*ph but i like the idea of them remaining besties provided tim works through his plethora of issues and biases

damian

in the tim vs. damian debate i am squarely on tim's side lol.. if i was a fifteen year old who witnessed my dad, best friend, and girlfriend violently die within the span of like a year and then saw the one thing to which i had clung for the past three years of my life like a psychological lifeline ripped away from me for the sake of a random kid with severe attitude issues i too would develop into the most caustic teenager known to man. obv editorial racism has its part to play in this but i'm annoyed that people constantly opt to dogpile on tim and not the writers because frankly tim's reaction to the circumstances is completely predicated

i'm not interested in dialoguing with damian fans who want to maintain any part of talia's (and by extension bruce's) abusive parenting in canon. i don't care how crucial it is to his character origins and development. that's not my concern and new 52 should have wiped him out of existence or rebooted his character entirely from scratch if they wanted me to care

alfred

does this man even have fans

barbara

i'm never going to understand dickb*bs like not even from a ship war or dick is an asshole perspective i just genuinely don't think barbara would ever have given him the time of day in that regard. he was a kid she knew once who maybe had a crush on her at one point before he moved away to another city and developed his own life there. why should she care about that. as if she doesn't have her own life! i know barbara has not been afforded many options in terms of romance and that dick has been the overarching love interest she's portrayed alongside but idk i don't think we have to make concessions merely because something is canon. canon can suck and we can reject it because it sucks even if it's omnipresent

the brub*bs versus dickb*bs situation is kind of funny to me because like yes the execution of these relationships in the timmverse is obv horrid and gag inducing but also as i recall in the comics barbara originally did have a crush on the batman or she was at least fascinated by him lol.. like i don't support it obv and her crush on him was as much fleeting and childish as was dick's crush on her and i faaaaar prefer bruce and barbara's bestieship. but it's funny to me that people would ship one and condemn the other like pot meet kettle lol

standard disclaimer that i can't do cass and duke bc idk enough about either of them 😔

[turtletaubwrites]

Hi friends!

I've got a list of the amazing fics I've been tagged in over the last couple of months to catch up on since my health stuff gave me so little spoons. I'm so excited to dive into them, but there's one I can't find!

I just scoured my notifications, and I don't know if I'm missing it or not. I can't remember who wrote it and tagged me since I hadn't started my list yet. PLEASE HALP!! I've been wanting to read this Law fic, it's been in my mind's list for a while, and now I am bereft 😭

Pretty sure it was about some lovely doctor stockholm syndrome vibes, and this lil spoonie could sure use some of that at the moment (IRL doctors can shove it 😠)

I'm sorry I'm so late to get to it all! The health stuff (+ the adhd "zero concept of time" thing) makes me slow on stuff, even if I'm really excited about it.

I would greatly appreciate assistance with finding this fic! My brain feels like it was three weeks ago-ish, but it could honestly have been posted anytime between now and 3 months ago. (I am extremely serious about the no concept of time thing 🤦🏼‍♀️)

Been missing y'all! Thank you for all the love, and for sharing all your lovely words with me! 🥰🙏🏼

~ Lynna 💜✨

[quietbluejay]

The Last Church

Bluejay once again sallies forth to deal with her nemesis! (McNeill) He somehow managed to replicate the feeling of wanting to get into an argument with people Being Wrong On The Internet

nah he's not my writer nemesis that's probably Roche or Roberts. Love to post my transformers salt one of these days...

This is far from the worst prose I've seen from McNeill. It actually feels strangely bereft of purple.

so Uriah in his misspent youth stole a clock that's apparently counting down to doomsday seems kind of not appropriate to stick something you stole in your church after you found religion, but what do i know and at two minutes to midnight, a visitor arrives

girl help they are not sending their best there's a lot to complain about here but i don't even know if i should bother

I'm getting a headache

He really is a reddit atheist

liar GIRL HELP THEY ARE NOT SENDING THEIR BEST okay you know that feeling when you really want to get into an argument with someone online but you have to be so brave about it and walk away from the computer that's how i'm feeling rn tldr priest tells the story of the miracle of the lightning stone, emperor goes "it was probably paradoleia (sp?) and also sometimes lightning can cure people of blindness" emp continues mocking him the people who described it as "the emperor bullies an old man and then burns down his church" are 100% correct

[press x to doubt]

only religious people emperor ever talked to are protestants, got it

im wheezing here lmaoooo this is your example

IM CACKLING i think the emperor is. very stupid. hey neoth hey answer me what did you call your initiative to conquer the galaxy to unite all of humanity again? and how did you operate it? and with the goal of purging it of…what, again? like even ignoring historical inaccuracies as much as it pains my soul to let these things pass by EVEN IGNORING THAT those shamans were dead dog drunk when they made the emperor

this is a comedy

but also it's very annoying that the priest is not able to refute him on basic stuff and also. it makes the emperor look. very stupid. either that or you assume the emperor is just making stuff up to bully an 80 year old man

I WANT TO THROW HANDS AND IM BEING SO BRAVE ABOUT IT

hey so like what are you about to do to someone who disagrees with your view on cosmology?

is it crack? is it crack that you smoke?

but yeah this is so frustrating i am begging you give the poor priest ONE GOOD REFUTATIONNNNNN i don't care if the emperor brushes it aside that's not the point here anyways Uriah finally is Done and begins the Mass only to get interrupted by the Emperor going "there's no one here" bluh

I'm laughing so hard here I needed that ahhahahahahahahaha i feel like i should pull up the excerpt of the iterators from Horus Rising oh yeah so the Emperor reveals that "you thought it was God who saved you, but it was I, DIO!" uriah goes noooo ok fine u win my life is a lie but then

then the emperor destroys the church and talks about his grand ambitions to conquer the galaxy

as opposed to everyone else, who thought they were wrong im sorry i was weak i gave in to the bait

so, that was The Last Church i needed that laugh

In summary: -anti-religion that's basically just Anti-Catholicism as seen by someone whose only exposure to religion was American Protestantism which is pretty much most reddit atheists so a point to McNeill for accuracy there

HE DIDN'T EVEN TOUCH ON THE PROBLEM OF EVIL, SOMETHING EXTREMELY RELEVANT IN 40K!

like okay. I Will Be Fair this guy (the priest) got very little theological education and who knows how much actual history given the length of time BUT ALSO AS A HUMAN I JUST REALLY WANT SOMEONE TO TELL THE EMPEROR OFF

what if i i write my own version….but no, i shouldn't…haha…but…what if…. Emperor has the arguments of a 19 year old redditor and the debate skills of one too If you are a 19 year old redditor reading this post, this doesn't apply to you unless you are specifically the kind of atheist redditor who goes to religion subs and picks fights.

[autumnalwalker]

Word Find Tag

Thank you for the tag, @winterandwords.

My words to find were gear, hear, wear, & tear.

Passing the (optional) tag to @ahordeofwasps, @kaiusvnoir, @kahvilahuhut, @stesierra, and the usual open tag for anyone else looking for an excuse to share.

Your words shall be even, perhaps, body, & shatter.

Here are some pieces of dreams that I've had (with links to the full thing, as always)...

Gear: A Dream About Trust And Fear

Even with the spotlight I lose track of her more than once, and I can only go so far before I have to stop. 

She swims back to me once she realizes I’m no longer keeping up and asks me what’s wrong. 

I tell her that I’m scared.  It’s so dark out here and I can’t see where I’m going like she can. 

She’s saddened by this but says she understands and we return to the shallows. 

What I said was true, but there’s more to it.  Although rationally I trust her and don’t believe she would ever harm me (at least not intentionally) I can’t get the image out of my head of her grabbing me by the wrist and dragging me under, and I hate myself for that. 

In the shallows we take the rest of the night easy, talking.  I promise to acquire some sort of equipment so that I can follow her properly in the future.  SCUBA gear perhaps, or even a potion that will allow me to breathe underwater for a few hours (although those are expensive enough that it’s not a sustainable option in the long term).  Either way I’ll need to get myself a waterproof watch so I can set an alarm to return to the surface with a safe amount of time to spare. 

Hear: A Dream About Digital Resurrection

Perhaps the most notable of my regulars are the half dozen or so men that almost always arrive in a group.  They are all parenting the same child - whom I never meet but hear much of - and all consider themselves to be the boy’s fathers.  With this era’s technology, that may well be the case genetically and not just socially.  There is never mention of a mother.  At any rate, it is clear that they are all devoted to one another and care deeply for their son.  Sometimes they all fuse into a multi-headed flying dragon.  Or they arrive in that form and split apart to place their orders.

Wear: A Dream About A Change In Plans

My body is taken apart and put back together with new limbs and interface ports for weapons and armor that I will only be allowed to wear when deployed.  My mind is retrofitted with proprietary software suites for targeting solutions, evasive maneuvers, tactical libraries, killing instincts, and a sense of naked vulnerability whenever I am not fully kitted out for destruction. Little in-between is allowed for the extremes of intoxicating raw power and pliant helplessness. 

Tear: A Dream About A Doll And A Dog

I was shattered, discarded, and bereft of self.  Useless and forgotten until my witch found what was left of me.  She made me new.  She made me durable enough that nothing ever could hurt me again.  She made me weak enough that I could never hurt anyone else again.  She made me whole.  She allowed me to just be without needing to be useful.

If she could put me back together, then surely she must be able to put everything else back together.

It took time for me to appreciate what she did to me.  Now that I am thinking about it again, those memories come back in flashes.  I would flail, and scratch, and bite, but my hands could not tear cloth and my teeth could not break skin.  Once I rent apart steel and ceramic and flesh and bone and circuitry and cables and graphene and glass and helmets and skulls and armor and weapons and ships and cannons and pipelines and spines and clouds and earth and cities and hearts and -

And now I stop and take deep breaths I don’t need until those memories I need even less fade again.

[mceajc]

I watched a TERF interview

I didn't want to, but I felt I had to. The video is

I left a comment on the video. It turned out about 3k words. Here it is

I'm going to write comments as I listen, so apologies in advance for poor formatting or any other issues.

@2:35 Helen Joyce - whose background is in mathematics, and not the study of gender expression - went to speak to an expert on queer and trans experience, and threw away what was written and wrote it herself because she disagreed with it. How interesting that she imposed her own viewpoint on her readers bereft of expert opinion. Gender presentation doesn't have anything to do with sex and reproduction. That's the whole point about having a different word to describe it. @3:00 "I see continua everywhere I look ... all these things is a smooth continuum - the one thing that isn't is sex". I find it very strange for a scientist - a biologist no less - to say that sex is binary given the vast number of ways that biological organisms reproduce. Perhaps this exception only exists in your mind, and not reality, perhaps?

This statement is also provably false, because of the existence of intersex people - never mind the other organisms who have stranger lifecycles.

@3:35 "Language is used as something to express your thoughts clearly" Language is malleable and ever changing - and words for people who refuse to conform to this invisible binary have existed for centuries in cultures all across the world. If you want to be clearly understood, be careful how terms are used. So far, the terms "male", "man", "woman" and "female" have yet to be defined clearly. I hope they are, because I fail to see the rationality of the statements made so far with the definitons as I understand them.

@6:00 "My hands are female" What an odd turn of phrase. I would have used the word "feminine". Anyway, this sort of phraseology is a bit disingenuous. It makes it sound like there is no overlap whatsoever between the bodies of a male and female. If I said "anyone under 1.6 metres tall is female, because the average height of a male is 1.7 metres", people would - quite rightly - look at me like a complete imbecile. Helen gets to say essentially the same thing in a slightly oblique way and ... gets away with it?

@7:00 I would agree that some people do take things to the extreme and say things like "heteronormative is a bad thing". This does not make it less bad to have heteronormativity the assumed default, or to view "nontraditional" family units as inherently less valuable - or in some cases as actively bad. Assuming things like that does make someone a prejudiced bigot, whose views are unsupported by evidence.

@9:00 I see a strange dissonance between complaining about sex and gender stereotypes while also mocking the queer groups who go against these stereotypes. To then immediately follow this with the incoherent sentence "it's worse than ... if he doesn't like rugby he's a poofter and let's bully him, it's now saying he's actually a girl." I don't think anyone is saying you should treat a child who doesn't like rugby as a girl. This is a very strange assertion to make. Are there any examples of a child being treated as a girl because they didn't like rugby? What on earth is the point being made here? You seem to be the ones trying to enforce the "pink box blue box" binary, and I am glad you see the harm in this - hardly an argument against allowing a wider variety of gender expression.

@9:44 If people learn gender identity/expression from the stereotypes, then what is your explanation for the existence of gender nonconforming (nonbinary) folk - both trans and cis? Helen then goes on to assert that sissy boys are being encouraged to identify as girls? Where is the evidence for this?

@10:15 I do wonder whether people might be even happier if they got to explore different gender expressions and roles. It would likely affirm a great many peoples' feelings that they are secure in their own gender, as well as experience what life is like for others.

@11:00 I absolutely agree that there should not be pressure to be one thing or another.

@12:19 "your sex is the best guess that a doctor had when you were born" This is factually accurate, and mistakes are made. There are many documented cases where intersex people were operated upon as a baby when a determination fell between the "accepted range" for some physical characteristic. It's not as though doctors do genetic, endocrine and hormone testing on every baby and put that into a spreadsheet which then spits out "male" or "female" - mainly because even that would be unreliable.

@12:37 "a tiny number of people". I suppose if you think a "tiny number of people" is bigger than 160 million, and that's using the very lower end of the prevalence of intersex characteristics of 0.02% of 8 billion people. There could be many hundreds of thousands in the UK alone, and we will never know unless we perform invasive genome, hormone and other tests in order to find out.

@13:00 Echo chambers are not good, on that we agree. I would urge anyone to actually speak to trans folk and get to know them, rather than dismiss their lived experience out of hand.

@15:36 From a 2021 published study across some 30 OECD countries that legalised gam marriage, the suicide rate dropped between 10 and 20%. Other studies indicate that the rate of suicide for LGBT kids can be as high as eight times higher if the child is someone "who experience high levels of rejection from their families during adolescence".

@16:05 This is disingenuous - in all likelihood a lie. Yes, being on cross-sex hormones can produce sterility. No responsible doctor has ever given cross-sex hormones to a child. Puberty blockers, on the other hand, do exactly what they say and delay the onset of puberty. This allows time for everyone involved in the process to come to a decision. Often, the option is there to have sperm or eggs stored before any potentially irreversible effects happen. NOBODY is sterilising children. If anyone has evidence of this, absolutely those doctors should be reported. I have seen no evidence of this.

I'm a little surprised that so many people are shocked and appalled by the idea of sterility. Infertility affects up to 7% of men, and many millions of women. Many men and women choose sterility. Fertility is hardly a good measure of whether someone's life is worthwhile or not.

@16:35 I am very glad that there has not been an increase in children committing suicide. People commit suicide when they are out of options and that's the last positive action they can take to end suffering. People commit suicide because they don't get the support they desperately need. So perhaps you are right, and it is a "playground fad" to act trans, or pretend to be trans, or explore different gender roles - who eventually grow up to be either secure in their assigned gender, or who transition in a loving, supporting home. I rather suspect that this will be the case when the scientific studies come in.

@17:06 "I think much more probable" - well, at least you are honest that there is no evidence supporting your assertions either.

@17:39 "no evidence that not transitioning the child would decrease that risk". Well good luck getting ethical approval for denying treatment for gender dysphoria for a control group for that scientific study! What an asinine statement being played up as a reasonable argument.

@17:54 Indeed, it is very brave to hold these viewpoints. I am reminded of Posie Parker going to New Zealand to hold an anti-trans rally, and actual Nazi's showed up to support the rally - fascist salutes and everything!

@18:44 "I was so far in I couldn't get back". Disturbing echoes of - an echo chamber? It's almost as though surrounding yourself with people who agree with you only alienates yourself from the general public further.

@2104 Again, I am baffled by arguments set forth here. All homosexual couples are infertile, but somehow this does not cause any difficulty for Helen. I also don't see the relevance of who someone is attracted to being relevant to anything, but in this I admit I probably just don't understand what's trying to be said.

@22:36 I would love to see links to these studies and any critiques. I could not find them when I went looking.

@23:32 I think many trans folk, especially in the UK, will not recognise the process from this description. There are people who wait years just for a first appointment. The waiting list. As of 2023-12-01 there is a 60 MONTH waiting list for a first appointment at the London Gender Identity Clinic. https://www.genderkit.org.uk/resources/wait-times/

@24:25 I thank Dr. Dawkins for his common decency. I have a couple of questions. 1) Could you please define what you mean by "woman", and 2) in what way would you not accept someone saying "I am a woman"? Are you so very confident that every cis woman you meet will meet the standards of your definition of "woman", and would you ask them to prove their sex to you? I am minded of a US government official having a cis girl tormented because they thought "she looked trans".

@26:22 I would also like to thank Dr. Dawkins for highlighting a very important point that often gets lost in these discussions is the sincerity. Too many gender-critical groups will make the same, tired, nonsensical posit of "what if I identify as an attack helicopter". These people are being insincere, and if not, are obviously mentally disturbed because attack helicopters are made of metal and not flesh. Sincerity matters very much, and it gets ignored by a lot of the "what if" arguments.

@26:38 "I don't think that being a woman or a man is the sort of thing you pay a price to be". Well, hooray for free healthcare! I would like to point out that to many gender critical people, being able to have children is one of the defining traits of the sexes - does Helen feel that women who pay for fertility treatments to be "not real women or mothers"? Are a couple who pay to adopt a child "not real parents"? I find this argument offensive. As a logical parallel, perhaps I could say that people who have to pay to see don't deserve the same treatment as those who were born with perfect eyesight. But that would be a crass, cruel stance to take - wouldn't it, Helen?

@27:46 What goes on in "women only spaces" that a person's genitals become relevant? I've had GPs and doctors of both sexes, and I've never seen their genitals. It's not relevant to the care they have given me. I do of course have sympathy for people who have been raped and do not want to be in the presence of someone who reminds them of the terrible actions of the past, in the same way that I don't expect someone who was mauled by a dog to put up with an over-friendly dog when they visit a friends' house - if they make the request, obviously it is common decency to make accommodations - but that is hardly the default.

@28:00 I have mentioned sincerity before, and it is relevant here too, but it doesn't need repeating. Sport. Ah, yes, where everyone should be exactly the same in order to compete. I do not know the best way to divide sport up, but we never divide things into just male and female. There are age groups, weight classes, divisions, handicaps - a thousand different ways that allow people to compete with others of a similar level. Biological sex, to me, is one of the dumbest ways to split groups up by ability and I'm sure the feminists would agree.

@29:31 This is an interesting point, but not in the way I think Helen meant it.

@30:30 I feel unutterably sad when a woman says that women wouldn't win anything in an open event. Jasmine Paris won (at least one) in elite open competition. A friend I worked with won outright a long distance running event. I am certain Simone Biles would have wiped the floor against any man. I am certain that women, given the same desire, advantages and encouragement as men, would close the gap with men significantly. I would be horrified if someone suggested that Kenyan men should be excluded from the marathon because "otherwise, non-Kenyan's would never win any marathons."

@30:50 I see Helen addresses the gymnastics issue - to an extent.

@32:28 Here is where we see ample evidence against the prohibitions Helen seems to be seeking from America.

I would ask all the parents out there: would you feel safe sending your child - who is of a sex different to yours - alone into a public toilet? Which would you rather do instead: take the child into the other toilet, or go themselves into the other toilet? The answer is easy at the moment if you are a father with a baby, since the women's toilet is more likely to have a baby changing station - but for older children? What would you do?

I am reminded of James O'Brien's point of "who checks"? If you elimiate someone from a space becasue of what their genitals are - who checks? Or will you legally require all trans folk to wear a pink triangle? Will you require people to out themselves as trans whenever they use a toilet away from home? Would you subject a whole group of people to the same "urinary leash" that women suffered under in the past? Will you make it an offence to be in certain public areas simply because of who they are, and not becaseu of what they do? These are dystopian questions to be asked. I know they are not the same, but there are echoes of apartheid, segregation - things that I would like to think are in the past and should stay there.

Many of the points made for women having separate facilities that Helen raised are applicable to all women.

Further, there are women who have been assaulted by women. Do we make separate accommodations for them? Or would you recommend they use the men's facilities?

I have all the sympathy in the world for rape victims who have traumatic flashbacks, and who feel unsafe. I wonder if Helen is aware of the number of trans people who don't go swimming because of fear? Fear of ridicule, fear of assault? Trans folk who have been assaulted? All assaults are terrible things, and we should do what we can to prevent them - but removing personal liberties from an entire group, the vast, vast majority of whom are blameless? This does not sit well with me, though how to go about dealing with the problem in a better way is a tricky question I do not have the answer to.

I've made all the points I want to about sport, but with Lia Thomas - what exactly is the argument here? Did the other swimmers feel unsafe?

@37:55 I suspect there are many trans folk - and all the other queer folk - out there who would object to the statement that the bullying all goes one way. It very much does not all go one way, and it is the focussing on trans people by mostly right wing reactionaries and media which has caused a great proportion of the ruckus. People who live and work with trans folk have a generally normal reaction to the fact they are trans - it's the people to whom a trans person is an abstract that manage to "other" them so much as to make them figures of fear and disgust. That's my view of the situation, in any case.

Trans people have existed for a long time. There are newpaper articles over a hundred years old about trans folk - and are written in a much more sympathetic way than would be the case now. Even sex-change surgery is older than knee transplants. Something has indeed changed, but I doubt it is the human beings themselves - it is some manufactured reaction that has gained traction. At least partly. There are actual issues and problems to solve, and I fully believe that solving them in a sensible way will be helpful to men, women and everyone in between.

@40:16 No argument here about the IOC being corrupt. Not a great reason to demonise sincere trans folk.

@41:55 Funny in a not funny way how Helen points out the oppressive behaviours of society toward people with non-conforming sexual attraction, and these are the same behaviours many people are displaying towards trans folk. It's LGBTQIAAP+ because it is groups of people who have been judged by society at large to be in some way "less" and so have been treated badly - thrown out the military, disowned by parents, fired from jobs, subjected to conversion practices - or otherwise fallen foul of falling outside of what is seen as "acceptable". I don't think a human being's worth should be down to what society deems "acceptable". Everyone who falls outside of "acceptable" felt the need to band together. Being gender critical feels like groups trying to pull the ladder up after themselves - it feels like we are going backwards, socially, towards some puritan thinking.

@42:54 Do tell, Helen, how gay culture works. I am all ears.

Oh, I see you leave it to the listeners imagination. I'd love to hear a survey to see what the reality is.

@43:05 I am, and always will be, a staunch supporter of "The L comes first". They are the ones who stepped up in teh AIDS crisis and donated the blood that was so desperately needed to help keep those suffering alive.

@45:30 (paraphrasing) "The people in this movement [what Helen calls the "Sex Realists"] have been through some sort fo crucible - and these can be good bad or indifferent". Helen then goes on to list some of the least reality-based groups I could think of. The only one she missed out is "Flat Earthers".

I do find it interesting that Helen and - Maya, is it? - are both economists. I wonder how many sex and reproductive biologists are in this group? Curious to see a break-down.

I am a fan of the acronym FART - Feminism Appropriating Radical Transphobe.

The dichotomy of "Intersex and trans people are a tiny minority, we shouldn't pander to their needs" and "trans and intersex folk are too numerous - they will destroy the data we use!"

It is saddening that some people see this as a battle, while trans folk just want to live their lives without fear or discrimination. If sex and gender were such natural things, we wouldn't need people like Helen to police it.

[ladyswillmart]

Hivallion Pellithorn

Born: March 09, Y.T. 1388 (8122 years old)

Birthplace: Near Eglarest, the Falas

Height: Roughly 6'5"

Hair: Tawny silver; formerly very long and typically worn in a single plait that reached all the way down to his hips, but recently he had it cut quite short

Eyes: Pale bottle green; occasionally wears spectacles for reading

Appearance: A bit unusual for an elf, but nothing too terribly outlandish and perhaps owing to his Falathrim heritage. His face is constantly chapped about the cheeks, as if he spends a lot of time outside in windy conditions. Observed by one Arlen Askew (student) thusly:

“He doesn’t appear aged, not in the face, not quite. Not quite young either, but there is a sort of overall worn quality to him that I find comforting. Not worn out, just worn, like a fisherman’s jumper that’s gone all fuzzy and grey from years of being battered about by waves and spume and salted breezes. Despite that, he has such a kindly countenance! In fact he simply radiates this lovely sort of warmth through and through, like a freshly baked apple and cheese pie. Though I am not sure an elf would find the comparison as flattering as a hobbit like myself...”

Trades: Ecologist, scholar, natural historian; following his injury, he has been regaining his strength while working as a tutor in the Shire, far from any meaningful strife (for now)

Background:

Born near the coastal elf-haven of Eglarest, Hivallion’s early years were uneventful, however formative. Although shy and quiet around other elves, he harbored a deep appreciation for the wildlife of his home, especially its birds and insects. He fast became a respected scholar of Falathrin ecology, particularly for his detailed field work and exquisite illustrations. When Morgoth’s forces sacked the Falas in F.A. 473, Hivallion (along with his mother and his twin brother) escaped with Círdan to the Isle of Balar. He narrowly escaped death in the Third Kinslaying (F.A. 538), and later still he participated in The War of Wrath as a scout—such skills would have been tightly honed for all his work as a clandestine observer of animals!

Forty or so years of warring—however victorious—left most of Beleriand totally annihilated, forever lost in the depths of the Belegaer. Now bereft of a home like countless others, Hivallion once again followed Círdan, this time to the Grey Havens where he spent most of the Second Age in relative peace and stability. Alas, this changed in S.A. 3430 when he several of his colleagues (perhaps most notably his fellow lore-master Elrond) convinced him to join the Last Alliance of Elves and Men, though he did so reluctantly. His fears were well-founded as he fell at the Battle of Dagorlad in 3434, following an extreme breach of personal space courtesy of an Edged Weapon of Morgul-steel wielded by the Witch-king of Angmar. Hivallion ultimately Survived the ordeal, largely due to the intervention of Elrond and his suggestion to bear the injured elf to the Last Homely House so he could receive a more thorough treatment for the wound. However, his recovery would not be easy or swift; he spent the next 3025 years in a dreamless coma in Tham Send.

While Hivallion himself has yet to fully comprehend the extent of this, the story of "the irrefrangible Falathrim" touched the hearts of all who heard it and elevated the humble seaside scholar to something of a minor folk legend, especially in Lindon and thereabouts. It is rumored (but only rumored) that Elrond had to clear out an entire storage closet in his home just to hold all of the letters, flowers, and other lucky trinkets sent by well-wishers to the slumbering elf in hopes that he would one day overcome his injuries.

Hivallion did regain consciousness in the summer of T.A. 3018, though he would yet need several more weeks of rest to recover his bearings. After deciding he was well enough to travel, he first sought out the company of one Gildor Inglorion, an old friend whom he learned was leading a Wandering Company around Eriador. This in mind, he decided to head west from Rivendell towards the Shire, hoping they would perhaps meet somewhere in the middle...

[sixpossumsinatrenchcoat]

Four More Years (ch 4/5)

Just posted the very emotional culmination of my sweet & silly lil Omori timeskip and now I am unraveled, incapacitated, generally bereft. If you enjoy dopamine please consider swinging by. Text preview below, story link below that!

At 10:34 PM, there’s a friendly patter on the door. Sunny wrenches it open with relief.

Kel looks tired, his smile a little faded. But he still brightens when he sees Sunny. “Hey, buddy! What’s going on? You miss me?”

“Yes. A lot.” 

Kel looks surprised, and then pleased. “Pfft, well. Hey. Back at you.” He peers over Sunny’s shoulder. “...Where is everyone?”

“Gone. Having a nice night.”

“Aw,” Kel laughs, not unsympathetic. “And they left you all alone?”

Sunny nods grimly.

“Aw, Sunny!!! I woulda come sooner if I knew you were all on your lonesome!”

“It’s okay,” sighs Sunny, who’s being extremely brave. “I’m glad you’re here.” 

When Kel grins, the fatigue washes off him a little. He smells a little like a sports bar and a lot like the YMCA, sweat and bleach and rubber. His hair is tied in a scruffy half-ponytail but a few locks have pulled loose, curling around his chin. He makes the whole room feel warmer. 

But he also looks tired. Or… not tired exactly. He feels muted, his natural glow slightly dimmed. More than you’d expect from just getting worn out on the court. His smile isn’t lying, but it’s only about 80% honest. Maybe he’s taking the loss harder than usual? 

Sunny grabs Kel by the wrist, yanks him toward one of the kitchen stools. “Are you okay?”

“Huh? Yeah, for sure! Why wouldn’t I be?”

Sunny shrugs. You tell me.

“It is all good, dude! I’m just, uh…” Kel’s left hand finds the back of his neck. “...I dunno. Probably a little tired. Sorry! I didn’t mean to kill the mood.”

Sunny has been having a neutral-to-poor night. If any mood could be flushed out of the brush, it deserved to be shot. “Don’t worry about it.” 

Kel grins sheepishly, still rubbing the back of his neck. 

Sunny’s frown deepens. Kel isn’t as obvious as Basil, but he’s nowhere near as sly as Hero. He’s obviously feeling down about something. But of course he’ll never bring it up. 

That’s fine. Talking isn’t what either of them does best. Sunny gives Kel’s wrist a last squeeze and pads over to the French press. 

“Sunny?? It’s—” Kel glances at the clock on the wall, a cracked wheel of oxidized copper that shouts a different birdcall every hour. “—10:40 at night???” 

“It’s okay,” Sunny tells him. “It’s decaf.” 

Kel watches, looking increasingly delighted, as Sunny brews a half a pot of decaf and then pulls out a carton of orange juice. He pours half of one and half of the other into his thermos, a tall black mug with a screw-on lid. But he doesn’t hand it over. He takes one sip and grimaces, mostly to make Kel laugh. Then he slips it into Basil’s backup backpack. 

“Are we going on an adventure?” Kel really must be tired. He sounds almost as wary as he does excited. 

“Just a small one.”

Sunny’s been saving this caper for a rainy day. Ideally, he would have scoped out the roof of his complex months ago. But Basil’s anxiety can be very occasionally inconvenient when exposed to even mildly life-threatening peril. The route Sunny scouted isn’t an escalator with a guardrail, but it’s not a particularly tricky climb. Basil just isn’t in the demographic.

Taking a page from Basil’s book, Sunny dumps a few more treats into the backpack, more or less at random. Then he hooks his keys onto his belt loop and looks at Kel. 

“Are your motor skills impaired?” he asks seriously. 

“Haha, whaaat! No way! Or, I mean… not… a lot? No more than if you didn’t get enough sleep.”

Sunny never gets enough sleep. “Cool.”

To get onto the roof, all you have to do is slip out the window onto the fire escape and climb a few ladders, till you hit the one that’s gated shut. Then just swing over the railing, scramble up the outside of the scaffolding, and hoist yourself over the gutter. 

Sunny leads the way. He makes Kel hang back while he tests his weight, making sure he’s not leading them into a meat grinder. But the rusted metal holds. The only hitch comes in the form of a flurry of pigeons that explodes out from under the gutter, pelting Sunny with feathers and dust. 

“Sunny!!!” Kel gasps. 

But it’s fine. These days, when Sunny is overwhelmed, he doesn’t lash out or flinch away. If you don’t move, you can’t hurt anyone. He closes his eyes and tightens his hold and then the birds are gone. 

He looks down at Kel. “Should be safe now,” he says calmly.

Kel’s eyes widen and he grins—a real one this time, wide and wild. “Right behind you!!”

The roof is everything Sunny hoped for. It's dusty and empty and high-up enough that when you look to the north, you can see a little sliver of the sea peeking between the high rises. There’s a big white trapezoid right in the middle, presumably the service entrance to the roof. The door is welded shut and the backside is a sloping plane of rough tile, but the sides are all empty white. 

Sunny’s eye widens. A whole empty wall… A great white canvas pressed up against the sky, off anyone’s radar, and high above the cop cars wailing on the streets below. The possibilities are almost paralyzing. 

Kel studies his face and then shakes his head, grinning crookedly. “Man, you are like, the coolest, you know that?”

Sunny gives him a baffled look. He hasn’t even done anything.

“I’m serious!! You’re just… It's like there's so much in your head that it all comes spilling out. Like you take all the bullshit, all this horrible pointless suffering and make it so everyone can see it, and so everyone who sees it can feel it. It’s—” Kel’s smile wilts at the edges. “I can’t even imagine, seeing like you.” 

“I’m supposed to be cheering you up,” Sunny points out.

“Huh? Who says I need cheering up?”

Sunny’s frown deepens. No one said. Kel is just… muted. Like the light inside him needs a change of batteries. But he’s not sure that he knows how to say it. 

“You’re just. Not as… bright? Still very bright,” he reassures him, when Kel’s eyes widen. “But, it’s—” He grimaces. “I don’t want you to lie.”

“Wh— I would never!!!”

“Not with words,” Sunny says, frustrated. “With—” He gestures at Kel’s stance, his easy smile. “Just. It’s okay if you’re not happy.” 

He stops. Kel is looking at him with that ache in his eyes, even worse than when he first arrived. He looks lonely. But that doesn’t make any sense. Sunny is right here. 

Sunny huffs impatiently. He’s not sure why he even tried doing this with words. That’s never been how he and Kel talked. He turns on his heel and wanders toward the northern edge of the roof, where you can see the fog rolling up the hill. Then he plunks himself down on the edge and flaps a hand at Kel. 

“Come drink your horrible drink.” No one else is going to.

Kel chuckles and goes where Sunny wants him. “...I guess I maybe am a little off tonight, huh.”

Sunny gives him a look. Do you want to talk about it doesn’t work on Kel, because Kel never wants to talk about anything that might bum anyone out. “Talk about it.”

Kel snickers. “Aw, it’s nothing really. Or, I guess it’s a lot of little things?”

“Like what.”

“Man, you’re persistent tonight, huh?” 

Sunny reaches into his borrowed backpack, silent, and hands Kel a slice of dried mango. 

“...Are those just loose in there?”

Sunny nods. 

Kel sputters a laugh and takes it. “Aw, I dunno, Sunny. It’s really pretty stupid.”

“Okay.” Feelings usually are. 

Kel snickers, gnawing on the edge of his mango. If it were daytime, he could see clear to the ocean. But at night it’s lost to fog. 

“I guess it’s just… It kinda feels like… everyone’s growing up? Like, figuring out what you want, and how you wanna live and stuff. And I’m the only one who’s just... not.”

“Aubrey is legally homeless,” Sunny points out.

“Yeah, cause she wants to, like… fuck the establishment, and blow up the IRS and shit!! Every day she looks more like herself! And Basil, hah, he’s—” Again, there’s that strange flash of hurt. “You know. Getting… everything he ever wanted, probably. And you!!!” He turns to Sunny with stars in his eyes. “God, you’re, like… taking all the cool shit in your head and pushing it out into the world and it is so exciting to watch, Sunny! Really!! It’s—I can’t believe how exciting it is, just watching you go around and look at things and make them important, just by seeing them.” 

Kel drums his heels against the side of the building, his sparkle dimming a little. 

“...You’re all so fun to watch, and I’m just kinda the same dumb kid as always. Like everyone’s running ahead, and I’m stuck trying to catch up.”

“But you’re the one who ran ahead.”

Kel blinks. “Huh?”

“When we were all—” Sunny gestures toward dissociative fugues, waking nightmares, drownings and stabbings and eyes gouged out. “You’re the only one who figured out how to live with yourself. On your own, without anyone’s help. And then you pulled us out after. It’s just that we’re finally catching up.”

“Yeah, but— No. Come on. That’s different. And anyway, it’s not like I was—” Kel hesitates. “Hey. When you were still… inside. Did you ever… Could you even hear me?”

Sunny’s head tilts. He heard Kel all night long, in Headspace. But that’s probably not what he means.

Kel looks out over the sleeping city. In the Glittering Harbor, you can only ever see the stars at twilight, after the sun’s slipped behind the world but before the fog has dragged its way onto the shore. But at night, you can see the city lights reflected in the clouds. 

“...I used to talk to your door all the time, Sunny. All the time. For years, like maybe one day you were just gonna answer. It’s like— Even if I know something’s never gonna happen, I still can’t get over it.”

“But it did happen,” Sunny says, confused. “You brought me back.” 

Kel laughs, but it's not a happy sound. It makes Sunny feel all upside-down and sideways. “Yeah. Yeah, maybe. Or—I don’t know. Maybe it just would’ve been some other—”

“No,” Sunny tells him firmly. “No one else could have done it. I would have died instead.” He doesn’t want to upset anyone, but it’s true. He was dying in that house. He was dying so slowly all the time, all the time he was awake. Every day he was a little less alive. He would have drowned in the bath, or got so confused and afraid that he would slide a knife between his ribs to make the nightmare stop. Or you’d fall down the stairs, Omori chimes in. You’d break your neck so you couldn’t move or call for help and then you’d starve down there, on the floor where it happened, and it would be weeks before anyone knew. “And—I didn’t hear you, at the door. Sorry. I was… not very awake. But I heard you in my dreams all the time. Sometimes even when I couldn’t find anyone else. So maybe some of it did get through. I don’t know. I don’t think about it very much.” 

Kel is looking at him with surprise. Sunny feels a little surprised, too. It’s probably the most he’s said all at once in… He’s not sure how long. 

“You saved me,” Sunny reminds him. “And brought us all back. And you’re doing fine, anyway.”

Kel sputters a laugh. “Aw, geez, Sunny. You always know just what to say.”

Sunny famously does not, but whatever. He studies Kel’s face and frowns. That laugh was honest, but Kel’s smile is lying again. “Are you sure there isn’t something else?” 

“H-Huh?? I—” Kel looks away, toward the horizon. “Aw, I dunno. I mean. I guess I… don’t really wanna talk about it.”

Sunny can understand that. There are lots of things he doesn’t want to talk about. “Okay. Then… tell me what to paint up here.”

“Woah!!!” Kel yelps. “For real?”

He nods.

“Sunny??? That’s too much responsibility!! I don’t know the first thing about art!!”

Sunny rolls his eye. “Everyone knows about art." Art is just whatever makes you feel things. "Anyway, I’m the one who’ll paint it.” 

“You’ve got me there,” Kel concedes. “Hmm… You could paint… a t-rex… that’s also a cyborg. A whole ranger squad of cyborg dinos!!” 

“Were they recreated by science?” Sunny asks seriously. “Or did they survive the extinction event, and now they’re the dominant species?” 

“Definitely the second one. Oh, oh, or you could paint Hector! Hector would be a great muse!”

“Hector has always been my muse.”

“Mine too!!” Kel is starting to sound more like himself. “What about a big ole garden? I bet Basil would like that.”

“Basil is never going to see it.” When Kel looks taken aback, Sunny clarifies, “He doesn’t like… danger.”

“It’s just a mural though?”

Sunny snickers. “He wouldn’t want me climbing up here.” 

Kel looks surprised, and then guilty. “Oh! Ohhh. Okay, yeah, I can totally see that. But then—is it okay that we’re up here?”

“He can’t tell me what to do,” Sunny sniffs. Anyway, Basil wouldn’t actually try to stop him. He would just clamp his jaw shut and swallow his misgivings and proceed to spend the night vibrating in terror. “It’s just nicer to come up here when he doesn’t have to know.”

“Hey, whatever works.” Kel darts another glance at him. “Okay, I have a real idea, but it’s stupid.”

“Those weren’t real ideas?”

“I have another real idea, but it’s stupid. And super not original. But if I really get to pick, then… I think you should paint us.”

“All of us, or the two of us?”

Kel shrugs vaguely. “I guess it wouldn’t be very smart, though, huh. I mean. It’d be pretty obvious who did it.”

“Not necessarily.” There are lots of ways to paint something without painting it. Abstraction has always felt more real than realism, anyway. The eye isn’t a camera. Every image is passed through a hundred different filters, how you’re feeling and what’s on your mind and whether you’ve had anything to eat. Overly literal representation is just a shadow on the wall of the cave. To say something true, you need to tell a few lies. 

It's like with Basil's photos. No matter how much you paid for your equipment, a photo of a sunset will always pale in comparison to the genuine article. You have to spend a while fucking around with the contrast and the color to make an image that feels even close to true. 

Sometimes the real world feels like Headspace. All of these layers stacked on top of each other, all of them accurate, no one of them true. Sunny could paint a perfect replica of Kel Rodriguez—messy curls, easy smile—and it would be accurate, but not honest. Or he could paint a blurred, warped animation smear, and it would be honest, but not true. Or he could paint a living sun, lurid orange and yellow and brilliant blue-white, and it would be true, but definitely not accurate. But all of them would be real. 

“Can you already see it?” 

Sunny startles. Kel is watching him fondly. “Sorry.” 

“Don’t be!! I told you, I love seeing you think.” Kel stops short, his fingers tapping an anxious beat against the gutter.. “...It’s late, huh? I should probably get going.”

Sunny sags. He’d been hoping to talk to Kel about everything they’ve been talking around: Kel acting weird, and Sunny feeling weird about it; Basil’s advice, and what Aubrey thinks that Kel might think. But he can’t unload that whole complicated tangle of feelings when Kel already looks so low. Paying attention to what other people want is tiresome, but important. Sunny wants to be good to the people he loves. 

“Okay,” he sighs. “Just stay behind me. I have to check for pigeons.”