#and i am forced to assume he was deliberately invoking them

[redheadedbrunette]

The political messaging in SSPX is so tone deaf in universe that's it's so hard to take at face value because it's like

CIA: *lies to everyone about the true nature of events and hides a whole lot of secrets*

Some people: hey, it seems like the CIA is lying to us about the true nature of events and is hiding a whole lot of secrets

Stuart Gibbs: those people are idiots, fyi

[lordoftermites]

Fairy Chess ‖ p. ⅰ

I won't deny I've got in my mind now all the things I would do So I'll try to talk refined for fear that you find out how I'm imaginin' you...

Ship: Roiben x Kaye

Summary: {set immediately after Ironside} Kaye provides Roiben with a little more... entertainment at his coronation revel.

Rating: M/E for me going to hell but hey at least i’ve got reading material Part Ⅱ

―――――――――――――――――――

He wanted only one night.

One night, devoid of drunken courtiers. Of the endless pouring of wine. No constant strumming of lutes and harps and laughter echoing through the cavernous hall, no attendants bidding for a moment of his attention with some new seemingly-urgent dispatch. Just a single, fleeting night of glorious, undisturbed peace.

But when you're a king of two courts, both of which would see the other fall to ruin, peace is a knife's edge; a balancing act—not a reward. And no amount of wishing is going to change that.

Still, as Roiben leans back into the twisted branches of birch that make up his blood-won throne, watching the frenzied, continuous dancing, he finds himself hopelessly wishful anyway.

Before the dais, a mass of fey move almost as one enormous wave to the music, their entranced twirling and swaying both beautiful and nauseating. They have all come to celebrate the second crowning of their brutal new lord.

Groups of sprites whirl their little forms above the throng, bathing the packed earth of the newly-rebuilt Palace of Termites in flickering yellow light. Roiben decides he likes looking at them better—their movements don't make his stomach quite nearly as unsteady.

But even then, the way they blink in and out, reminiscent of fireflies in the trees at dusk, causes him to squint himself into the headache he's been suppressing all evening. He sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose, sinking further into the throne that feels so much more like a cage; a cage he killed his way to get into.

“Acorn for your thoughts,” chimes Kaye’s voice against his ear. He smiles, eyes still closed, as he feels the familiar, comforting brush of her fingers slide over his shoulder. Roiben reaches a hand up to cover them, to ground himself in her touch. Her skin is warm— a constant contrast to the chill he can never seem to thaw from his own. “I find I have had my fill of revelry, for the next ten moons at least,” Roiben answers with another sigh. His eyes open to the overcrowded throne room once again, and that weariness washes over him anew. “Unfortunately, it would seem this one has no intentions of slowing anytime before that.” Kaye moves from her position behind him, slipping between his throne to the wooden stool beside it.

Roiben shifts his gaze to look at her, and cannot stop his breath from catching: she’s clad in a fluid, iridescent dress coming to tattered strips just above her clover green knees. Pewter ties gather slashed sleeves at her shoulders, the front of it dipping below her collarbone to pool at the beginning of her sternum. He smiles again: the sheen of fabric is the exact silver of his eyes.

Her wild hair is pulled up into two emerald knots on top of her head—space buns, she called them once, much to his confusion; they resemble neither celestial body nor baked good, but he assumes it’s simply another human reference lost on him. At the roots, she’s dusted a silver glitter that catches the light of the sprites above them. Silver hoops line the length of her earlobe, and from each dangle a single star or crescent moon, respectively. On her feet, to no surprise, are the cracked leather boots she favors above any slipper made by Skillywidden, no matter how intricately stitched or comfortable they might be.

Roiben can’t help but marvel at her: a creature of two worlds, and equally as beautiful in both. He reaches out to take her hand, brushing over the extra joint in her thumb. She smiles at him, the smile that’s just for him, the smile he would burn the world down for.

“I’ve been to some pretty wild raves,” Kaye says, turning her inky black eyes to the sea of Folk before them. “But this one definitely takes the cake.” Again, another human phrase he doesn’t quite understand, but this one makes at least more sense than astronomical hairstyles. When she looks back at him, her brow raises. “It's your coronation revel, and you’re already partied out? I thought dancing till your feet bleed was just another day in Faerie for you.”

He chuckles, eyes settling on her hand in his. He’s almost sure his stomach will betray him if he dares another glance at the swirling revel-goers. “My… previous duties kept me elsewise occupied from most of the festivities,” he replies. To his great relief, neither of them need his explanation of what those duties had been. “When the guest of honor is you, it’s not nearly as easy to slip away unnoticed.”

Kaye leans over to take a fluted glass of wine from the table between them, and Roiben can’t help his gaze shifting up to the loose fabric at her chest, which opens at her slight movement to reveal a hint of the deep green curvature there. He swallows automatically, his throat suddenly dry.

“Like the view?” Kaye asks, leaning against her own arm to further accentuate that curve as she takes a sip of the plum-colored liquor. It’s a small gesture, but it’s enough to make Roiben’s breath catch. When his eyes flick back up to meet her, she’s wearing that coquettish grin that speaks true to her pixie nature. “Though doubtless you already know my answer," he says, giving her an impish smirk of his own, "Verily, I do.”

Kaye shortens the gap between them, near enough for him to smell the clove and blackberry wine on her warm breath. Near enough to kiss him, but she doesn’t. She lingers, instead pulling her bottom lip between her teeth—a move she knows all too well sets a fire alight in his veins, and it’s all Roiben can do not to close that gap between them entirely.

Her hand reaches to the collar of his doublet, where she trails a lazy finger along the silver stitching, brushing feather-light against his neck. He inhales slowly, a deliberate drawing of breath, as though to remind himself where they are. Again, he finds himself wishing the hall was empty and cursing the reality that it isn't.

Kaye pitches her voice low, so only he can hear among the raucous around them. “I think I know how to make this party a little more… interesting. A game. Kinda.”

His brow goes up at that. “A game?” he repeats, only slightly warily. While admittedly, any diversion to keep him from spoiling his own revel would be welcome—by his attendants as well as himself—he’s almost certain, from the mischievous glint in those sable eyes of hers, it isn’t likely to be something as simple as a chess match.

Kaye shrugs. Her gaze drifts down the front of his black doublet to his lap, lingering there momentarily before fluttering back up to his face. There's a craving there in those onyx depth. A shark circling its next meal.

“Unless, of course, you’re too chicken to play.”

Indeed, this will be no game on a checkerboard.

Roiben shifts in his seat, already finding himself full awake from his previously half-present participation in the night’s celebrations. He leans in, until his mouth is against Kaye’s silver-clad ear and grins at the small, sudden breath she takes in response. “If you mean to play a game of torment,” he whispers, his lips grazing her skin, “you may find I am not at all a fair opponent—nor a patient one—when I mean to win.”

Kaye, cheeks flushed with drink and something else, opens her mouth to speak, but is cut off. From below the dais, as if on cue, a throat clears. Roiben, gritting his teeth against a sudden rise of annoyance, draws himself back up on his throne. Bowed to nearly kissing the earthen floor is Ruddles, his chamberlain.

“Yes?” Roiben sighs, unable to hide his displeasure at being interrupted; he was, for the first time tonight, on the verge of actually enjoying his own celebration. Of course there would be something to stall that entertainment. “What is it now, a ninth round of toasting? More petitions? Perhaps a naming of yet another inanimate object?”

The old hob rises with a grunting effort, either unaware of Roiben’s clipped tone, or so used to it by now that he doesn’t let it perturb him. “My King,” Ruddles says formally, and even though the title has been invoked countless times since his first crowning, Roiben still can’t quell the sour taste that floods his mouth upon hearing it.

The chamberlain continues, again oblivious to the ticking in his master’s jaw. “Since it is nearly dawn, I thought perhaps you would wish to retire.” Ruddles turns to sweep his hand over the continuous movement of courtiers. “There are naught but a few simple matters of the court that myself and the other members of the council can handle in your stead—or save upon your return, should so desire."

Desire is the very thing being kept from him at the moment, though it isn't as if his chamberlain knows that. Still, Roiben can barely stifle an eye roll. "I was unaware that I needed permission to—"

The gentle squeeze of Kaye's hand on his arm stalls his scorn, and he forces himself to start over. "Apologies, Ruddles," he sighs. "I admit, I am overtired. I should indeed very much like to rise from this seat—before I become part of its ornamentation." Roiben stands, tired limbs groaning in protest from hours of being stationary.

Kaye stretches at his side, feigning a yawn. "I could totally kill for a bed right now," she says, and while she is also bound incapable of lying, the look in her eye when Roiben meets her gaze tells him there is nothing to do with sleep in her confession. The wink she gives solidifies her meaning.

The little hob nods, seeming to miss their unspoken exchange, and bows low once more. "As you wish, my King. I shall address the court of your retirement—"

Roiben shakes his head to forestall the chamberlain, and holds a hooked arm out for Kaye, who takes it with another squeeze. "No need. They are blissfully unaware of my presence as it is, let them continue. And, Ruddles—" He pauses at the foot of the dais next to the hob, leaning low enough to not be overheard. "It would please me greatly if you saw to it that we are undisturbed."

Ruddles gives a reverent nod and steps aside, clearing their way off the platform. Without stealing another glance back at the endless revel, the king and his consort leave the tumultuous celebration behind them.

[courtofshipsandillyrianobsession]

November without you...

Chapter 1: https://courtofshipsandillyrianobsession.tumblr.com/post/183599503989/november-without-you

Chapter 2: your gaze

AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18175124/chapters/43090061

Summary:  Lucien has something to tell to Elain. She starts to wonder if she is feeling really drawned to Lucien, or is it the mate bond?

-Good night Lucien what do you want?- Elain said as her mate approached her.

-Good night Elain, I was just wondering what were you doing...- Elain just felt awkward as she did most of the time Lucien was around. Not that she wanted to be deliberately rude but, she didn't like to feel forced to doing anything, especially to love someone. She loved her freedom, but she learned to really appreciated since she was forced to become a Fae by obligation. That day Elain lost her freedom over two things: of what to be and who to love, or at least that's how it felt like. Also, not long ago she was about to get married to Greysen. She knew he didn't love her anymore, but still she was so confused. Elain haven’t even taken off the ring her ex-fiancé have gave her.

What I least need right now is more drama, the seer thought and the fact that her mate was unsuccessfully trying to court her didn’t help.

-I was just about to go to sleep, so if you would excuse me…

-Wait- Lucien almost shouted

Elain stared at him. How dare he? She thought

-Excuse me?

-My apologies, Elain. I was just wondering what are you doing tomorrow?

-I am spending the morning Nuala and Cerridwen and then I am going to the garden with Azriel I guess.- Elain could notice Lucien frowning when he heard the shadow singer's name.

-Do you think you could have a tea with me tomorrow morning? Also, Feyre told me you liked flowers. I brought you a sunflower’s pot, they are famous in the autumn court.

Elain wanted to show a poker face, but the minute she saw the sunflower, she couldn't help but to show a little smile as she grabbed the pot. She could imagine how beautiful they would grow. Damn she thought, now she couldn’t refuse his invitation without looking like an ungrateful bitch. She wished she could have Nesta’s bitchiness right now.

-Sure, I like pennyroyal tea with a sip of milk- Elain whispered. Lucien was about to raise his hand to take off a piece of a leaf on Elain’s hair. But before he had a chance, Cerridwen appeared and covered up Elain’s body while howling at Lucien.

-Oh cauldron, how long have you been there?-Elain asked Cerridwen

-She had been here all along, I could sense some darkness indeed, tell me spy, does your master told you to follow Elain all along?- Lucien demanded to know.

-No, my master doesn’t know anything about this, not that you care but we are here to protect miss Elain, even from you -

Elain didn’t knew how but she did it again, just like when she killed Hybern. She had summoned the shadows, or at least that’s what she concluded. Thanks to the cauldron, she thought. She wasn’t ready for any physical contact, she didn’t knew how her body would react her mate’s touch. Elain decided to take advantage of the twin’s interruption to open her door and after a good night whisper, the seer and her sunflower pot disappear behind the door.

Months ago, Elain have noticed some things have changed during her sleep. During the nights, she could sense something guarding her sleep. Not like a presence, but more like an aura. She felt something, rather than someone protecting her during the nights. Back when she was human, she thought she was crazy, that she hallucinated all those feelings. But now with her Fae constitution, she was more convinced than ever. Elain have just stopped thinking about it until that night. When Elain was having a night sleep in Velaris, she heard a low shriek, but still high enough to wake her up. She cautiously woke up, looking what or who have caused that sound. The seer was looking around when all she noticed different was that the sunflower was now, she could swear the sunflower was emitting a little sparkle and she saw something near her balcony, a cat’s shadow. She assumed a cat have emitted the sound, but just as she opened her balcony to look for the cat, the shadow had disappeared.

_____________

When Elain woke up, she spended her day as usual, she helped Nuala and Cerridwen in the kitchen. Back into the human world, Elain thought she knew all types of food or ingredients that could be cooked, but in Velaris it was all different. Different herbs, different plants, different vegetation. She just wanted to try them all so everyday she would try something new just. If it ended nice, she would share it with everyone during the dinner, but if it tasted horrible, she would just throw it again. She was just taking care of the last preparations for the dinner, that Elain completely forget about the cup of tea she had agreed to share with Lucien. The seer remembered it when she saw the fae standing in the door, waiting for her. Elain just sighted and took off her apron, to leave a lovely mustard dress at sight. She excused herself while she noticed Nuala grinning al Lucien before the seer and her mate walk out the door. Elain had just taken a seat in the garden when she smelled the perfectly beverage in front of her.

-So, tell me Elain how have you been?- the fae asked her while he took a seat as well

-Fine, I guess considering it all

-Have you enjoyed Pythrian so far?

-Yes, it’s not al all like my house but since Feyre and Nesta are here, I am okay wherever we are.- Elain declared

-You seem tired... are you completely sure you are fine Elain?- Lucien looked deeply concerned.

-Yeah, it’s just that yesterday I had a bad sleep- The seer was just looking for a quickly way out, she had never felt more awkward in her entire human and fae life. She started to drink her tea faster than usual.

-Why would you say that?- she felt interrogated, the seer was clearly starting to loose her patience.

-I don’t know, nightmares or visions I guess- she stated.

-You know I know an excellent healer in the summer court, he might just be what you need…

Elain decided it was enough. No, no more healers… I am already starting to accept my visions.

-Thanks Lucien but you see I am not sick. I am a seer and more powerful that I ever expected to be. I already accepted my disease as it but if you would excuse me I need to go back to the kitchen.Thanks for the tea.- Elain was staring to get up, ready to leave when Lucien get up and went beside her and grabbed her hand.

-Please, Elain. I can’t afford to loose you, not like I lost her...- Lucien murmured with a lump in his throat.

Elain stand still. She was ready to leave but somehow she lost her conviction. She felt a rush of electricity running through her veins. Her heart started to beat out loud. She didn’t wanted to leave, she wanted to hug the fae behind her and told him everything would be alright. She have heard about how powerful the mating bond could be, but she never expected to appear so suddenly and with such intensity. So, Elain just decided to stand there grabbing his hand too. Before, she was aware of what she was doing, she looked deep into his mates eyes and whispered:

-It’s okay, I am here. I am fine.

She could feel the fae looking back into her hazel eyes. He was approaching more every time. Elain realized he was trying to kiss her, bus she didn’t knew what to do. She was sure, her non mate part wanted to escape but the Elain that was Lucien’s mate that have taken control of her body. She was frozen and Lucien was approaching more every time. But before their lips could come together, Lucien lost equilibrium and fell on his knees. Before, she could do anything else, Elain went running back into the house. As she was climbing a few stairs to get back into the house, when her equilibrium was lost. She was ready to fall down when a pair of strong arms grabbed her. She felt relieved once he saw those familiar tattoos with blue siphons in her savior's arms and she knew she was safe.

All the feelings Elain have just went through disappeared and she felt relieved once she met those dark eyes.

-Azriel... thank you, once again.

-It is my duty to protect you Elain, no thanks are needed.- Elain felt Azriel’s tone a little bit different. Perhaps it was a little bit cold?

-Is everything alright Azriel?

-Yes, Elain it’s just that I had a weird feeling as I was coming back to the house for our lessons. I think the shadow world was disturbed somehow. I was worried you might invoke them because you were in danger. So, the minute I get here I was wondering if anything have happened to you.- Before Elain could respond to the illyrian, Lucien appeared in the front door shouting Elain’s name. The minute he saw how the illyrian was grabbing his mate, Lucien walked toward Azriel with his knuckles turning white while Azriel put Elain beside her and took a deep breath as Elain knew, he would do just before a battle.

-Wait- the woman declared as she stood between the two males.

-Lucien, I think you should go

-No, we need to talk about what just happened Elain- Elain saw how Azriel wrinkled his forehead looking curious, but he didn’t let this distracted him from the fact that Elain’s mate was trying to pick a fight.

-Lucien, please. We’ll talk later.- Elain almost begged looking deep into Lucien’s eyes.

-Do you promise?

-Yes, now please just go.- Moments later the seer let out a sigh of relief as she heard Lucien’s steps approaching the door and then he was gone. -So shall we start the lesson now?- Elain asked trying to make the tension disappear by showing a great smile.

-I even make some blueberry bread if you want some, Cassian once told me it was your favorite...- She felt relieved when a little smile appeared in the shadow singer's face.

-Yes, that would be lovely Elain- He said as the tension was leaving his body.

[redscullyrevival]

I finally saw The Last Jedi and I liked it - what I wasn’t entirely anticipating is that I also really enjoyed it! I will now commence bullet point blabbering about the film below the cut and it shall not be spoiler free. 

I now understand all the raging nerd-hate this movie has been getting - this film aimed to straight up burn this motherfucker down, huh? 

Loved it. 

Personally I was very… underwhelmed with The Force Awakens. It was a fun romp and I loved the new characters and the nostalgic twinge of the familiar but oh boy the entire thing felt far too beholden to the pedestal of A STAR WARS FILM! in slow steady blinking lights. 

The Force Awakens has that octane Abrams pacing but it is also just so damn stiff. So ridged. And obviously deeply afraid to wander off the path. 

I understand that the first re-introduction to such a beloved franchise playing it (excruciatingly) safe made sense; but I was still upset with the final product, with the final choice to deliberately aim to be nothing more than what I’ve seen and felt before.

The Last Jedi on the other hand turns out to be a long, cozy, chat about how A STAR WARS FILM! should be struck down so something new can grow. 

Hallelujah!

The visceral attack this film must feel like to a particular kind of Star Wars fan is no doubt very intense and in all honestly I do have some pity for folks who found this new film to be dismissing the legacy they feel connected to in deeply personal ways. 

*clappy hands*

But oh, I loved it so much!

Every twist and turn, every aspect of this film pushes the anticipated rhythm of A STAR WARS FILM! away; all the momentum the film gains is for the final purpose of rejecting everything easy and expected, for pushing past, well, the past. 

Hot damn, the nerds are kind of justified for once.

The Last Jedi came for them! It went so hard! The more someone had dug themselves into the belief that STAR WARS was a solid thing they knew and understood on a fundamental core level then the deeper the cut would go as the film raged on. 

The anger, the hate from certain fandom circles makes total sense. 

Because this film done changed the Star Wars. 

And it was about fuckin’ time. 

So prepared was I to sit through The Empire Strikes Back: The Remix that the intense gut fans-hate-it reaction the film got opening friggin’ day got me all kinds of delighted, how I saw it such a reaction signaled that this new film would be something actually new. 

And the fresh air of The Last Jedi comes from some pretty drastic subversion of A STAR WARS FILM! It is down right beautiful.

Ultimately, if the choice to change Star Wars was just to grim dark and edge it up then it’d be pretty terrible I agree, but The Last Jedi managed to alter and course correct massive change without breaking the frame of the how and the why and to whom these STAR WARS stories are told. 

I mean, in my opinion anyway. 

I felt the film put a lot of care and love into explaining to the audience what was right and natural about change, explaining that strength could be found in letting go of our nostalgia and expectations and opening up to new experiences in old sandboxes. I felt The Last Jedi was an oddly gentle film that knew it was going to frighten some while igniting others and did it’s best to show it’s good will towards signaling hope and legend and legacy into a shared experience. 

*shrug shrug shrug* YA FEELIN’ ME?!

I know I already have a spoiler warning above the cut but now I am going to really get up in this film and push my eyeball up against it’s eyeball and hey if you wanna see all particulars feel free, but this is now specific spoiler territory, thanks and happy holidays:

I was so enthralled with Finn and Rose’s quest and I was ecstatic when it didn’t work out.

The two went on a space goose chase for a daring rescue mission and got into ruffian escapades and thought on the fly and were brave and funny and were livin’ that STAR WARS life - and they failed spectacularly.

Their mission, their rip’roarin’ escapade, was in fact a brash and ill thought out plan that almost got absolutely everyone killed. 

Precious, lovely, daring, and confident Poe Dameron was a horrible leader. 

His belief in a desperate gamble; his total confidence that he was in the right and the stuffy Vice Admiral didn’t know when to take a risk; the audience knowing his qualities as sure fire STAR WARS leadership was all for nothing and people died for it. 

I said HOT DAMN!

This film made General Organa and Vice Admiral Holdo, two older women who don’t run around with blasters in hand but who have no less twinkle in their eyes the true leaders of the resistance. The true bearers of the spark of rebellion. It was their matured tried and true mentorship that ended up saving them all - not the cocky charisma of a younger good looking man.

Also Leia is confirmed Force Sensitive™ bringing to an end decades long old guard fans bickering and moaning over if she has pretend magical powers or not and why if she did that’d be “not right”. 

(Seeing Carrie Fisher bathed in moonlight was emotional)

And then, oh man, Rey’s parents? Wonderful, soulful, bright and strong Rey? Because she is in a STAR WARS film and can use the force everyone including people who’ve never seen The Force Awakens assumed her parents were a part of the legacy, a part of the grand scheme.

NOPE.

In fact, to really drive it home just so fans can’t possibly be confused, Kylo Ren tells her “You’re nobody. You don’t belong in this story.”

He said that with his mouth words!

But there she is all the same, good old Rey. And she’ll remain. Without being so and so from extended universe’s kid or a character only in some comic book or Luke’s secret child or whatever. 

Rey is just a character made to be there and to use the force because, hey, it’s a STAR WARS MOVIE! We needed someone to be the Luke this time around so why not Rey? 

PS we shattered Luke’s lightsaber and made Rey indebted to jack squat of this franchise. She searched for her purpose and her parents and only found the strength of herself and her own choices. Peace out!

That tickled me senseless, having the cultural institution of STAR WARS being full on assaulted for two and a half hours.

That tickled my pickle. 

The Last Jedi is hyper self aware media, but it was still fun. It was still a good time but it laid down hard and fast with changing the lifeblood of STAR WARS that even I, who is nowhere near as big a fan as someone you could probably hit with a stone’s throw, admit to feeling some uncomfortable chafing at times while watching.

STAR WARS is a legit cultural institution by the way, I didn’t just say that for the fun of it - that’s absolutely 100% true. 

Star Wars as a media, as a franchise, has an ebb and flow of patterns, style, symbols, and motifs that dictate a tonal cohesiveness which designates something as recognizable as STAR WARS.  

What I’m doing when I all caps “Star Wars” is I’m trying to defer attention to the known concepts and ideas of Star Wars media as a whole cultural institution and experience rather than just invoking a cluster of films, only I’m trying to do all that just through the written word.

Star Wars is a film and STAR WARS is all that which defines the franchise as well as our shared cultural understanding of said franchise, ya fell me? That’s how I approach talking about this kinda stuff online anyways. I feel most will understand what I’m doing with the capitalization and all that but hey, now ya know ‘fo sure. 

Anyway

Shit y’all! Luke Skywalker is a funky sore spot huh? Loved that too. 

Lets get to that Kylo Ren:

Kylo Ren’s entire set up is that he ain’t Vader and fuck, ain’t that the truth. But in a good way. Duh Kylo Ren is not Vader, he is a different character. And, now, he isn’t even remotely similar to Vader as a STAR WARS character. 

Everything about Kylo Ren is opposed to Darth Vader; while he gain’s definition with this new film Kylo Ren didn’t even remotely start out as a mysterious villain like Vader originally did. 

We all knew, in that STAR WARS fashion, that Kylo Ren had to be tied to the legacy. We all knew that he had to be tied to the lifeblood of the franchise. And Ben Solo absolutely is. 

We knew this before Han ever revealed it through dialogue and that’s why it wasn’t a big reveal in The Force Awakens. Of course Ben Solo turned to the dark side and is Kylo Ren. Of course. Of course he has some weird Vader obsession, the character needed to emulate Vader so as to take up his mantel in the narrative and in the franchise. We needed a baddie in a helmet, stat!

But oh, look what has happened though, oh man:

Luke Skywalker in a moment of fear almost murdered his own nephew  -because he is in STAR WARS. 

We all know if there are Jedi then there is a light and a dark side of the force; we all know that if you are a master of and a teacher in the ways of the force you open yourself and your students up to a choice; and we all know that fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering. 

Kylo Ren being a direct response to Luke friggin’ Skywalker is as far from Vader as you can get but fits just so right within the cleansing fire that is The Last Jedi. 

The hero of the first saga ignited the villain of the next. 

That ain’t very STAR WARS and something tells me that is the biggest kick to the crotch for a lot of folks. 

I, of course, dug the hell outta that choice.

Kylo Ren is actually interesting now. Mischief managed.

The very not subtle social commentary the film was dishing out was a pretty pie to boot. Bit on the nose but hey, ain’t that STAR WARS at least? Didn’t even have to dig this time around, gems sitting right on the surface.  

… Damn, I’m tired. I still have plenty to talk about though. Hmm, well, lets close this out on a different note (and that’s a pun):

The music of STAR WARS is bonkers recognizable. Like, I keep saying Star Wars is a cultural institution that uses motifs and symbols as devices for defining itself, right? Yeah, the use of music in this film is a pitch perfect example of that. 

The Last Jedi seamlessly flows from theme to theme, with specific well known scores highlighting emotional call backs and in-story referenced characters - the use of music is the most traditionalist aspect of this new film (they even shook up the editing this time around - shock and awe). 

Smart though, if they fucked with how STAR WARS did music then even an impassive twerp like me would be pretty upset. 

For my money, the musical score is still the best thing about a good old Star War.  

[wahbegan]

It’s interesting to note Stephen King seems to take bits from folklore from around the world but there are often spelling errors or mistranslations or he gets info wrong and i’m not sure if it’s just getting bad info from writing in an age before the internet or if he slightly changes details to make it fit his world better?

Take this passage from IT

"G-G-Glamour," Bill said, and spelled it. He told them about an encyclopedia entry on the subject and, a chapter he had read in a book called Night's Truth. Glamour, he said, was the Gaelic name for the creature which was haunting Derry; other races and other cultures at other times had different words for it, but they all meant the same thing. The Plains Indians called it a manitou, which sometimes took the shape of a mountain-lion or an elk or an eagle. These same Indians believed that the spirit of a manitou could sometimes enter them, and at these times it was possible for them to shape the clouds themselves into representations of those animals for which their houses had been named. The Himalayans called it a tallus or taelus, which meant an evil magic being that could read your mind and then assume the shape of the thing you were most afraid of. In Central Europe it had been called eylak, brother of the vurderlak, or vampire. In France it was le loup-garou, or skin-changer, a concept that had been crudely translated as the werewolf, but, Bill told them, le loup-garou (which he pronounced "le loop-garoo') could be anything, anything at all: a wolf, a hawk, a sheep, even a bug.

Now. Let’s take this one at a time.

Glamour is correct. Scottish folklore, malevolent shapeshifter. Moving on to Manitou. Manitou is first of all Algonquian, not Plains. And it doesn’t...in and of itself, it basically just means spirits. There are positive ones, negative ones, and the Great Spirit that created everything, but it essentially just means the word by itself like a spiritual force. Some believed it dwelled in sweat lodges and did enter the body, driving out negative influences and all that causes pain, cannot find any solid info about whatever the hell he’s going on about the clouds or it taking the shape of animals though. I mean Manitous are supposed to go through everything including mountain-lions, elks, and eagles, but it’s not a physical being that....takes their form, i guess.

Third we have the Tallus or Taelus. The only thing i can find here is a Tulpa, or a thought-form. This isn’t something that goes into your mind, reads it, and then manifests, it’s something that manifests out of your own thoughts, it’s something you create. I can find, there’s a lot of shit that’s come out of western occultism from bastardized Tibetan spiritualism, unfortunately, but from what I can tell, the Tulpa was originally more of an astral projection kind of thing, i can find no info about a malevolent one being accidentally made. The Ritual of Chud they use to defeat it btw i assume he got from The Ritual of Chod, which is an actual Buddhist ritual, that has NOTHING to do with tulpas or malevolent entities of any kind, and especially has nothing to do with making out with them and then telling jokes with your mind. It DOES have to do with deliberately invoking a fear response in the practitioner in order to try to acclimate your mind to the concept of nothingness, which is why i assume he chose it, but yeah.

Finally we have the Eylak. Even allowing for egregious misspellings like with tulpa somehow becoming tallus, I can find no analogous creature in Slavic/Romanian folklore, which is where he got vurderlak from (more on that in a second). After extensive and frankly exhausting googling, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s entirely King’s own invention, possibly after mishearing or getting shoddy information from an informant, like how i assume he got the “lemon juice up the nose makes you hold your liquor better” bit. Okay, now the “vurderlak”. In Slavic folklore, the Varcolac (hair of the wolf) is a shape-shifting demonic entity often said to take the form of a wolf that eats the sun, causing eclipses. From this word was derived the Greek vrykolokas, sometimes spelled vorvolakas or vourdoulakas which is an undead creature from improper burial or shitty circumstances of death that shares characteristics with both werewolves and vampires (side note: as much as people love to pit them against each other the Eastern European roots of the vampire and werewolf myths are closely intertwined and the creatures were initially extremely similar. There was also a persistent myth that a werewolf’s body must be burned, or it would become a vampire. But anyway). Vurderlak is actually first used to describe Kurt Barlow in Salem’s Lot, so i guess this was him referencing himself, but it’s interesting he’d so blatantly try to reference central/eastern European myth and just slightly misspell the name. 

Finally, Loup-Garou. In spite of his assertions to the contrary, loup-garou is basically just a run-of-the-mill werewolf, and i can find no reference to it turning into other creatures.

Something similar happens in Pet Sematary when he taes a very loose translation of Wendigo and basically makes it some kind of eldritch abomination, although it’s at least cannibalistic in nature like the original creature and one gets the sense he’s more deliberately trying to take that in his own direction, but still.

So basically, why did i make this post? Well one because this part of the book has always bothered the shit out of me and two because Stephen King wrote IT in 1986. He had an excuse for mistranslations and misinformation. You all today have the internet at your fingertips. When world-building, if you’re going to try to tie in your monsters with existing folkloric or mythological traditions, please for the love of CHRIST, do your research thoroughly and double fact check because nothing pisses me off in IT more than having to suffer through this god damned fucking paragraph holy CHRIST i am petty

[clementine-lominsan]

“On the Trial of the King” by Maximilien Robespierre

https://espressostalinist.com/2015/07/14/maximilien-robespierre-louis-must-die-that-the-republic-can-live/ 3 December 1792 Citizens, The Assembly has been led, without realizing it, far from the real question. There is no trial to be held here. Louis is not a defendant. You are not judges. You are not, you cannot be anything but statesmen and representatives of the nation. You have no sentence to pronounce for or against a man, but a measure of public salvation to implement, an act of national providence to perform. A dethroned king, in the Republic, is good for only two uses: either to trouble the peace of the state and threaten liberty, or to affirm both of these at the same time. Now I maintain that the character of your deliberation so far runs directly counter to that goal. In fact, what is the decision that sound policy proscribes to consolidate the nascent Republic? It is to engrave contempt for royalty deeply on the people’s hearts and dumbfound all the king’s supporters. Thus, to present his crime to the universe as a problem, to treat his cause as an object of the most imposing, the most religious, the most difficult discussion that could occupy the representatives of the French people; to establish an immeasurable distance between the mere memory of what he was and the dignity of the citizen, amounts precisely to having found the secret of keeping him dangerous to liberty. Louis was king, and the Republic was founded: the famous question you are considering is settled by these words alone. Louis was dethroned by  his crimes; Louis denounced the French people as rebellions; to chastise it, he called on the arms of his fellow tyrants; victory and the people decided that he was the rebellions one: therefore Louis cannot be judged; either he is already condemned or the Republic is not acquitted. Proposing to put Louis on trial, in whatever way that could be done, would be to regress towards royal and constitutional despotism; it is a counter-revolutionary idea, for it means putting the revolution itself in contention. In fact, if Louis can still be put on trial, then he can be acquitted; he may be innocent; what am I saying! He is presumed to to be so until he has been tried. But if Louis is acquitted, if Louis can be presumed innocent, what becomes of the revolution? If Louis is innocent, then all defenders of liberty become slanderers; the rebels were the friends of truth and defenders of oppressed innocence; all the manifestos from foreign courts are just legitimate complaints against a dominant faction. Even the detention of Louis has suffered so far is an unjust vexation; the fédérés, the people of Paris, all the patriots of the French empire are guilty; and, pending nature’s tribunal, this great trial between crime and virtue, between liberty and tyranny, is decided in favour of crime and tyranny. Citizens, have a care; you are being misled here by false notions. You are confusing the rules of civil and statue law with the principles of the laws of nations; you are confusing relations between citizens with those between a nation and an enemy conspiring against it. You are also confusing the situation of a people in revolution with that of a people whose government is soundly established. You are confusing a nation that punishes a public official while conserving the form of government, with one that destroys the government itself. We refer to ideas familiar to us to understand an extraordinary case  that functions on principles we have never applied. Thus, because we are accustomed to seeing offenses we have witnessed judged according to uniform rules, we are naturally inclined to believe that under no circumstances can nations equitably punish a man who has violated their rights in any other way; and that where we do not see a jury, a bench, proceedings, we do not find justice. These very terms, when we apply them to ideas different from the ones they normally express, end by misleading us. Such is the natural dominion of habit that we regard the most arbitrary conventions, sometimes indeed the most defective institutions, as absolute measures of truth or falsehood, justice or injustice. It does not even occur to us that most are inevitably still connected with the prejudices on which despotism fed us. We have been so long stooped under its yoke that we have some difficulty in raising ourselves to the eternal principles of reason; anything that refers to all the sacred source of all law seems to us to take on an illegal character, and the very order of nature seems to us a disorder. The majestic movements of a great people, the sublime fervours of virtue often appear to our timid eyes as something like an erupting volcano or the overthrow of political society; and it is certainly not the least of the troubles bothering us, the contradiction between the weakness of our morals, the depravity of our minds, and the purity of principle and energy of character demanded by the free government to which we have dared aspire. When a nation has been forced to resort to the right of insurrection, it returns to the state of nature in relation to the tyrant. How can the tyrant invoke the social pact? He has annihilated it. The nation can still keep it, if it thinks fit, for everything concerning relations between citizens; but the effect of tyranny and insurrection is to break it entirely where the tyrant is concerned; it places them reciprocally in a state of war. Courts and legal proceedings are only for members of the same side. It is a gross contradiction to suppose that the constitution might preside over this new order of things; that would be to assume it had itself survived. What are the laws that replace it? Those of nature, the one which is the foundation of society itself: the salvation of the people. The right to punish the tyrant and the right to dethrone him are the same thing; both include the same forms. The tyrant’s trial is the insurrection; the verdict, the collapse of his power; the sentence, whatever the liberty of the people requires. People do not judge in the same way as courts of law; they do not hand down sentences, they throw thunderbolts; they do not condemn kings, they drop them back into the void; and this justice is worth just as much as that of the courts. If it is for their salvation that they take arms against their oppressors, how can they be made to adopt a way of punishing them that would pose a new danger to themselves? We have allowed ourselves to be led into error by foreign examples that have nothing in common with us. Cromwell had Charles I tried by a judicial commission he controlled; Elizabeth had Mary Queen of Scots condemned in the same way; it is natural that tyrants who sacrifice their fellows, not to the people, but to their own ambition, should seek to mislead vulgar opinion with illusory forms. There is no question there of principle or liberty, but of deceit and intrigue. But the people! What other law can it follow, than justice and reason supported by its own absolute power? In what republic was the need to punish the tyrant a legal matter? Was Tarquin called to trial? What would have been said in Rome, if Romans had dared say they were his defenders? And what are we doing? We are summoning lawyers from every side to plead the cause of Louis XVI. We are establishing as legitimate acts what any free people would have regarded as the greatest of crimes. We are ourselves inviting the citizens to baseness and corruption. We could well find ourselves one day awarding Louis’s defenders civil crowns; for if they defend his cause, they may hope to make it triumph; otherwise you would be showing the universe nothing but a ridiculous charade. And we dare to use the word Republic! We invoke forms, because we have no principle; we pride ourselves on our delicacy, because we lack energy; we flaunt a false humanity, because the feeling of true humanity is foreign to us; we revere the shadow of a king, because we do not know how to respect the people; we are tender towards oppressors, because we are heartless towards the oppressed. The trial of Louis XVI! But what is that trial, if not a call for insurrection in some tribunal or assembly? When a king has been annihilated by the people, who has the right to resuscitate him and make him a new pretext for trouble and rebellion, and whatever other efforts this scheme might produce? By opening an arena for the champions of Louis XVI, you are renewing the quarrels of despotism against liberty, you are establishing the right to blaspheme against the Republic and against the people; for the right to defend the former despite carries with it the right to say anything appropriate to his cause. You awaken all the factions; you revive and encourage dormant royalism: people can take sides freely for or against. What could be more legitimate, what more natural than to repeat everywhere the maxims that his fenders will be able to profess openly at your bar and in your parliament itself! What sort of republic is it whose founders seek out adversaries for it on all sides to attack it in its cradle! See what rapid progress this scheme has made already. Last August, all the partisans of royalty were hiding: anyone who had dared attempt an apologia for Louis XVI would have been punished as a traitor. Today they are again showing a bold front, with impunity; today the aristocracy’s most deplored scribblers are confidently taking up their poisonous pens once more. Today, the insolent writings that are precursors to all attacks are flooding the city where you reside, all the eighty-four departments and up to the very portals of this sanctuary of liberty. Today armed men, conscripts, kept inside these walls without your knowledge and against the law, made the street of this city resound with seditious cries demanding impunity for Louix XVI. Today Paris contains within it men brought together, you have been told, to snatch him from the nation’s justice. All that remains for us to do is to throw open these premises to the athletes already flocking to solicit the honour of taking up cudgels on behalf of royalty. What am I saying! Today Louis divides the people’s representatives; some speak for him, some speak against him. Two months ago, who would have suspected that there could be any question over whether he was inviolable or not? But since a member of the National Convention presented the question whether the king could be tried as an object of a serious deliberation preliminary to every other question, inviolability, with which the conspirators in the Constituent Assembly covered his first perjuries, has been invoked to protect his latest attacks. O crime! O shame! The parliament of the French people resounded to the panegyric of Louis XVI. We have heard the virtues and good deeds of the tyrant being praised! We barely managed to rescue the honour or the liberty of the best citizens from the injustice of a precipitate decision. What am I saying? We have seen the most atrocious calumnies against the people’s representatives known for their zeal for liberty greeted with scandalous joy. We have seen one part of this Assembly proscribed by the other almost immediately after being denounced by stupidity and depravity combined. The tyrant’s cause alone is so sacred that it cannot be discussed too freely or for too long: and why should that astonish us? The double phenomenon has a single cause. Those who take an interest in Louis or this like must thirst for the blood of those people’s deputies who are demanding, for the second time, that he be punished; they can pardon only those who have softened in his favour. The plan to shackle the people by killing its defenders, has it ever been abandoned for a single moment? And all the scoundrels who are proscribing them today, calling them anarchists and agitators, will they not themselves whip up the troubles their perfidious system presages for us? If we are to believe them, the trial will last several months at least; it will last until next springtime, when the despots should be making a general attack on us. And what a career to the conspirators! What a feast for intrigue and aristocracy! Thus, all the partisans of tyranny can still hope that help form their allies and foreign armies will encourage the boldness of the court meant to pronounce on Louis’s fate, while their gold is tempting its loyalty. God in heaven! All the ferocious hordes of despotism are preparing to tear at the breast of our homeland once again, in the name of Louis XVI! Louis is still fighting us from the depths of his dungeon; and people doubt whether he is guilty, whether it is permitted to treat him as an enemy! They want to know what the laws are that condemn him! The constitution is invoked in his favour. I do not intend to repeat here all the unanswerable arguments developed by those who deign to answer objections of that sort. On this matter I will say a word for the benefit of those whom they have not convinced. The constitution forbade everything you have done. Even if he could only be punished by forced abdication, you could not pronounce sentence without having brought him to trial. You have no right at all to hold him in prison. He has the right to ask you for his release and for damages and interest. The constitution condemns you: fall at  Louis XVI’s feet and ask for his clemency. Personally, I should blush to discuss these constitutional quibbles any more seriously than that; they should belong on school or palace benches, or rather in the cabinets of London, Vienna, and Berlin. I cannot argue at length when I am convinced that deliberation is a scandal. This is a great cause, we have been told, and one should be judged with wise and slow circumspection. Is it you who are making it a great cause! What am I saying? It is you who are making it a cause. What do you find in it that can be called great? Is it the difficulty? No. Is it the person? From the viewpoint of liberty, there is none more vile; from that of humanity, none more guilty. Now he can only impress those more cowardly than he is himself. Is it usefulness of the outcome? That is one more reason to hasten it. A great cause would be a popular draft law; a great cause would be that of a poor man oppressed by despotism. What is the motive for these endless delays you are urging on us? Are you afraid of hurting the people’s opinion? As if the people itself feared anything other than the weakness or ambition of its representatives; as if the people were a foul herd of slaves stupidly attached to the tyrant it has proscribed, and wishing at all costs to wallow in baseness and servitude. You talk about opinion; is it not for you to direct it, to fortify it? If it wanders, if it becomes depraved, who should get the blame, if not yourselves? Are you afraid of annoying the foreign kings in league against you? Oh yes, there is no doubt at all that the way to defeat them is to fear them! That the way to confound the criminal conspiracy of European despots is to bow to their accomplice! Do you fear foreign people? Then you still believe in the innate love of tyranny. So why do you aspire to the glory of freeing the human race? Through what contradiction do you suppose that nations which were not astonished by the proclamation of the rights of humanity will be terrified by the chastisement of one of its most cruel oppressors? Finally, we are told, you fear the gaze of posterity. Yes; posterity will be astonished, in fact, by your irresponsibility and your weakness, and our descendants will laugh at the presumption of their fathers, and at their prejudices. We have been told that genius would be needed to go deeply into this question; I maintain that only good faith is required. It is less a question of enlightenment than of avoiding voluntary blindness. Why is it that what seems clear to us at one time seems obscure at another? Why is it that something decided easily by the good sense of the people changes into an almost insoluble problem for its delegates? Have we the right to have a will contrary to the general will and a wisdom that differs from universal reason? I have heard defenders of the king’s inviolability advancing a bold principle that I should almost have hesitated to state myself. They said that anyone who, on 10 August, had sacrificed Louis XVI would have been performing a virtuous act; but the sole basis for that opinion can only have been Louis XVI’s crimes and the people’s rights. Well, has a three-month interval changed his crimes or the people’s rights? The reason why he was rescued at that time from public indignation was undoubtedly so that his punishment, formally ordered by the National Convention in the nation’s name, would become all the more imposing to enemies of humanity: but casting new doubt on the fact of his guilt or whether he can be punished amounts to betraying a promise given to the French people. There are perhaps some people who, either to prevent the Assembly from assuming a character worthy of it, or to deprive the nations of an example that would raise minds to the level of republican principles, or for even more shameful motives, would not be sorry if a private hand were to carry out the functions of national justice. Citizens, be wary of this trap: anyone daring to give that advice would only be serving the people’s enemies. Whatever happens, the punishment of Louis will now only be good if it bears the formal character of a public vengeance. What does the contemptible figure of the last of the kings matter to the people? Representatives, what matters to it, what matters to you yourselves, is that you fulfil the duties that its confidence has imposed on you. The Republic is proclaimed; but have you given it to us? We have not yet made a single law that justifies the name; we have not yet reformed a single abuse of despotism: alter the names, and we still have the tyranny in its entirety, and on top of that factions that are viler, charlatans still more immortal, along with new ferments of troubles and civil war. The Republic! And Louis still lives! And you still place the king’s person between us and liberty! By way of scruples, let us fear making ourselves criminal; let us fear that by showing too much indulgence for the culprit we may be putting ourselves in his place. Another difficulty. To what sentence shall we condemn Louis? The death penalty is too cruel. No, says another, life is crueller still: I demand that he live. Advocates for the king, is it from pity or cruelty that you want to shield him from the penalty for his crimes? I myself abhor the death penalty generously prescribed by your laws; and for Louis I feel neither love nor hate; I just hate his crimes. I asked for the death penalty to be abolished in the Assembly you still name Constituent; and it is no fault of mine that the highest principles of reason seamed to it to be moral and political heresies. But you, who never think of citing them in favour of all the unfortunates whose offenses are less theirs than the government’s, by what fluke do you now recall them to plead the cause of the greatest criminal of all? You are demanding an exception to the death penalty for the one individual who can justify it. Yes, the death penalty, in general, is a crime, and for the sole reason that, in keeping with the indestructible principles of nature, it can only be justified where it is necessary for the security of individuals or the social body. Now public security never requires it for ordinary offences, because society can always stop them by other means and make the culprit powerless to damage it. But a dethroned king in the middle of a revolution, which is nothing unless consolidated by the laws, a king whose name along calls down the scourge of war on the disturbed nation: neither prison nor exile can render his existence harmless to the public good; and this cruel exception that justice allows to ordinary laws can be imputed only to the nature of his crimes. I utter this deadly truth with regret, but Louis must die, because the homeland has to live. Among a peaceable, free people, respected at home and abroad, you might listen to the advice being given to you to be generous; but a people whose liberty is still being disputed after so many sacrifices and battles, a people in whose country the laws are still only inexorable towards the unfortunate, a people in whose country the crimes of tyranny are still subjects of dispute, such a people must want to be avenged; and the generosity for which you are being praised would resemble too much that of a society of bandits sharing our spoils. I propose that you give an immediate ruling on Louis’s fate. As for his wife, you will send her back to the courts, along with all the individuals aware of the same attacks. His son will be kept in the Temple, until such time as peace and public liberty should be established. As for Louis, I ask that the National Convention declare him from this moment a traitor to the French nation, a criminal towards humanity; I ask that a great example be given to the world, at the same place where, on 10 August, the generous martyrs to liberty lost their lives. I ask that this memorable event be commemorated with a monument to nourish in the hearts of peoples the sense of their rights and horror of tyrants; and in the minds of tyrants, salutatory terror of the people’s justice.

[benrleeusa]

[John K. Ross] Short Circuit: A Roundup of Recent Federal Court Decisions

Zestimates, Big Girl Panties, and Scabby the Rat

Please enjoy the latest edition of Short Circuit, a weekly feature from the Institute for Justice.

Suppose a La Plata, Md. public school teacher compelled a Christian student to write part of the Shahada: "There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah." First Amendment violation, right? Fourth Circuit: It was homework for a world history class. About what Muslims believe. Judgment for the school.

Allegation: Rumor spreads at Sterling, Va. warehouse that an employee was promoted only because of her sexual relationship with a higher-ranking manager. The highest-ranking manager at the facility helped to spread the rumor, barred her (but not her paramour) from attending a mandatory all-staff meeting where the rumor was discussed, and told her he'd no longer recommend her for promotions. She's later fired. Fourth Circuit: Because "traditional negative stereotypes regarding the relationship between the advancement of women in the workplace and their sexual behavior stubbornly persist in our society," she might very well have suffered harassment because she is a woman. The case shouldn't have been dismissed.

Using Sherlock Holmesian powers of deduction (unbalanced tire, worn lug nuts, nervous driver), police officer suspects drug trafficking is afoot. He touches the suspicious tire, which feels (and is) suspiciously full of meth. Fifth Circuit: And under the revived property rights theory of the Fourth Amendment, touching the tire was a search (but the driver is still going to jail).

Female nursing assistant at Pascagoula, Miss. assisted living facility is daily subjected to lewd and sexually violent behavior by a dementia patient. When she voices concerns to facility higher-ups, they invite her to "put [her] big girl panties on and go back to work." After she's fired, she brings Title VII suit against the facility. And her hostile work environment claim can go to trial, says Fifth Circuit.

Vacant-property owners in Saginaw, Mich. must register their properties with the city; the registration form states that an owner must allow the city to enter her property if it becomes dangerous. Does this system unconstitutionally require an owner to waive her Fourth Amendment rights? Sixth Circuit: Nope. The Fourth Amendment allows warrantless searches of dangerous buildings provided there's a pre-search hearing to determine whether the building is dangerous.

Upon returning to his Detroit, Mich. basement apartment, man finds it ransacked. Storming upstairs, shouting expletives, he encounters a stranger who shoots him three times. Yikes! Turns out it was a federally deputized member of the Detroit Fugitive Apprehension Team task force, on the hunt for a fugitive. Man sues task force members for excessive force and other alleged misdeeds. Officers: Actually, we shot him only after he pulled his own gun on us. Which, says Sixth Circuit, is precisely the kind of factual dispute that must be resolved at trial. No qualified immunity.

In 2013, a chaplain with the Michigan Department of Corrections tells Muslim inmate that he can't attend Eid al-Fitr, a religious feast marking the end of Ramadan. Chaplain tells inmate he's the wrong kind of Muslim and can attend the feast only if he changes his religion. Access to the feast is allegedly denied again in 2014. Inmate sues, asserting First and 14th Amendment violations. Qualified immunity? No, says Sixth Circuit—not least because a court in a different case "had already issued a binding order enjoining these defendants from preventing Muslim inmates to participate in Eid." And "reasonable officials follow court orders."

Pro-life sidewalk counselors are prohibited from approaching within eight feet of any person in the vicinity of Chicago abortion clinics if their purpose is to counsel, provide literature, or protest. Seventh Circuit: Well, the law is nearly identical to a Colorado law upheld by the Supreme Court in 2000, and even though that case is hard to reconcile with more recent Supreme Court cases, it has not been overturned. The law stands.

"Scabby the Rat has returned." Scabby—a giant balloon rodent evoking a Nutcracker nightmare—often pops up at union protests, including one in Grand Chute, Wis. in 2014. That is, until the town ordered deflation under the local sign code. Seventh Circuit: Which was OK. The sign code was content neutral and enforced fairly. (Real hypo from trial: Would Scabby count as a holiday decoration if he had a Santa hat?)

Drug defendant is shackled during pretrial hearings because that's what Central District of Illinois court security thinks is safest—as a blanket rule, for every detained defendant. Which means chained wrists, chained ankles, and a chain between them. The defendant, on interlocutory appeal: The judge can't do this without deciding that I, specifically, am dangerous. Seventh Circuit: Meh. Come back after you're convicted. Dissent: This indignity diminishes the courts. And how is he going to get effective review later?

Website Zillow uses an algorithm to generate "Zestimates" of home values based on the home's location, the selling price of nearby parcels, and other factors. Given the 100 million properties for which Zillow creates Zestimates, the company does not inspect whether houses have special features that might make them more (or less) valuable than the estimate. Plaintiffs, dissatisfied with the Zestimates on their homes, sue Zillow, claiming that the Zestimates have made it more difficult for them to sell the homes at their real value. Seventh Circuit: Zout of luck. Zestimates "are opinions, which canonically are not actionable" under the deceptive trade practices law the plaintiffs invoked.

Rarely do an opinion's opening sentences double as a Short Circuit entry. The Seventh Circuit shows everyone how it's done: "Is it reasonable for officers to assume that a woman who answers the door in a bathrobe has authority to consent to a search of a male suspect's residence? We hold that the answer is no."

DHS Secretary suspends various laws to permit replacement of segments of border fencing (or, y'know, whatever you prefer to call such physical barriers). Ninth Circuit: Which was entirely within the Secretary's statutory authority.

Golden Beach, Fla. police officers submit sketchy timesheets: They might be getting paid twice for the same hours. They're arrested for fraud, but eventually the charges are dropped. They sue. Was the application for the warrant to arrest them deliberately missing exculpatory info? Eleventh Circuit: Doesn't matter. The info wasn't that exculpatory.

Two African-American couples were murdered in Walton County, Ga. in 1946, as a large crowd of people looked on in what is considered to be the last mass lynching in American history. A grand jury was convened, but no one was ever charged even after 16 days of witness testimony. Seven decades later, can the transcripts be released to a historian? Eleventh Circuit: Yes; though grand jury records are usually kept under seal forever, these can be released as a matter of exceptional historical significance. Dissent: The rules clearly prohibit the disclosure of these materials. Imagine the harm that might come to descendants of the suspects, witnesses, and grand jury members when all is revealed.

And in en banc news, the Ninth Circuit will reconsider a ruling that the Second Amendment prevents Hawaii County, Hawaii from banning the open carry of handguns.

Last month, the Food and Drug Administration closed a public comment period over whether it should continue to allow plant-based products to use words like "milk" and "cheese" in their labeling. But such a crackdown would "confuse consumers, harm small businesses across the country, and raise serious First Amendment concerns," IJ argued in a submitted comment.