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hrrtshape · 2 months ago

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hi Emma!! can you make a list of people to script out? lol

a comprehensive list of people to script out because they are objectively rancid:

(this is MY OPINION, and these people are HORRIBLE. i do not care for discourse. i am the jury, the judge, and the executioner of my own script. begone.)

johnny depp (we are not bringing 2013 tumblr back. pack it up.)

elon musk (i am scripting a reality where he does not exist and never has.)

j*ff bezos (ew)

andrew tate (i want my dr to have zero men who speak in soundbites from a joe rogan podcast.)

kanye west (no. next.)

chris brown (should’ve been wiped from public consciousness a decade ago.)

trump (not even a background character in my worldbuilding. gone.)

mark zuckerberg (if i see the metaverse in my dr, i’m burning it down.)

tucker carlson (i am scripting a dr where he never learned to read.)

any tiktok finance bro (no crypto, no ‘sigma male grindset,’ no pyramid schemes disguised as 'hustles.')

any man who starts a podcast with a brick wall background (automatic deletion.)

gal gadot (war criminal)

anyone who refers to women as ‘females’ (blocked, banned, removed from the simulation.)

any mediocre nepo baby trying to make ‘fetch’ happen (i am eliminating their acting careers at the source.)

whoever keeps giving sean penn a platform (who even asks for him anymore??)

whoever invented surge pricing on uber (i will find you.)

landlords. just, landlords.

jake paul and his ugly older brother (no.)

p*rnhub’s entire executive team (you know what you did.)

whoever decided to put ads on streaming services that already cost €15 a month (jail.)

jared leto (grown man. cult leader. dm’d underage girls like it was a hobby. gone.)

ezra miller (an international menace. every timeline is safer without them.)

armie hammer (cannibal allegations aside, why was he even famous? no.)

kevin spacey (never should have been a household name. goodbye.)

roman polanski (he's still alive? not in my dr.)

woody allen (should have been locked in a vault in 1979 and never let out.)

sean penn (why is he always involved in international conflicts? for what?)

mel gibson (we do not let blatant, recorded antisemitism slide. gone.)

chris pratt (not even the best chris. zero charisma. no.)

mark wahlberg (hate crime past. bad acting present. get out.)

miles teller (he just looks like a guy who ruins the vibe.)

vin diesel (refuses to let fast & furious die. enough.)

shia labeouf (unforgivable. no sympathy. let my girl mia out of your ugliness. gone.)

drake bell (convicted and still trying to make music? jail.)

dan schneider (he should have been removed from nickelodeon in the 90s.)

george clooney (irrelevant. flop. mocked on south park)

dream & co (i am eliminating every minecraft manchild from my dr. full reset.)

shane dawson (why did this man have a platform for 15+ years?)

again but andrew tate & his weird bald brother (expunged.)

keemstar (harbinger of all things nasty on the internet.)

jefree star (ugly. racist. something else)

p. diddy (whatever’s going on there is dark-sided. allegations on allegations. exile.)

nick cannon (he is building a small country with his offspring. make it stop.)

taylor swift’s entire ‘team’ (they keep letting her cook, and she should NOT be cooking this much.)

tyga (groomer. weirdo. we are not looking past it.)

pedro pascal (this is a test. if you reacted emotionally, you’re too far gone. no i'm joking. I'M JOKING)

christian horner (red bull f1 guy) (currently under investigation for weirdness. gone.)

cristiano ronaldo (his whole vibe is off. also, the case. you know the one.)

andrew tate (he gets listed thrice, for good measure.)

king charles (you waited how long to be king? pathetic.)

vladimir putin (the list is too long. gone.)

whoever keeps inviting logan paul back into mainstream relevance (why?)

every tech ceo who looks like they drink nutrient sludge instead of eating food (you are not evolved, you are sick.)

anyone who got famous just by reacting to tiktoks (do something else.)

guys who made a 'how to pick up girls' course (straight to hell.)

prince andrew (…do i even need to explain?)

ellen degeneres (mean, fake, expired.)

whoever keeps casting james corden in things (why do they exist?)

the entirety of the british monarchy (what are you even for?)

every influencer who scams their audience with fake ‘mentorships’ (shameful.)

james corden (listed again, because he keeps coming back.)

anyone who calls themselves a ‘high-value man’ unironically (tragic.)

whoever designed apple’s autocorrect system (i will find you.)

whoever keeps rebooting franchises instead of making original movies (enough.)

the facebook fact-checkers who flag satire posts as misinformation (get a job.)

people who still defend chris brown (you're in the trenches for a man who would leave you there.)

whoever greenlit ‘velma’ on hbo max (you have destroyed a generation.)

prince andrew (listed again for emphasis. we are not forgetting.)

if you shift and see even one of these people, run it back. that is not your dr. we do not tolerate pollution.

#asks

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hurt-you · 3 years ago

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i am so sorry for bringing bald chris/dean pelton into ur life im literally in tears 😭

kaenan my beloved i forgive you. you were only making a comparison to the abomination that is bald chris. the REAL problem was @spillways-mp3 for making bald chris in the first place

#zero ily but that shit was unforgivable #bald chris discourse #chriscourse????#she speaks #spillways mp3 my beloved #tumblr user rashdecision my beloved <3 #she also responds

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1eos · 3 years ago

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The most legit complaint I’ve seen on twit is ppl fearing that young black men might copy will smith and then get arrested bc they are aren’t will smith. But like. Just talk to your kid about it? Make it a teaching moment.

1) You shouldn’t run your mouth to hurt ppl anyways, but Chris Rock had it coming and you will too if you talk about someone that way. Talk shit get hit.

2) You are not Will Smith. You do not often have the privilege to do something like that and get away with it.

In an ideal world you’d be able to smack somebody a little bit for talking like that about somebody you love without getting multiple years in prison. But this isn’t an ideal world.

And whoever you would be defending in that moment needs you in their life and out of prison more than they need your momentary defense.

3) however, if some grown ass person is talking like that and you know 1) you won’t get in any serious trouble and 2) if you are defending someone, they won’t be upset about you defending them like this. Go ahead and smack that fucker a little bit.

Will Smith didn’t even smack him that hard, Chris Rock was cracking jokes about it like 5 seconds later. It prob hurt in the moment, but that didn’t look like something that would leave any injury beyond something really mild.

im sorry im not reading all this my stomach hurts so bad rn but i wanna say that 'fearing young black men will copy it' is still dumb as hell. ppl talk abt young ppl like they're fucking idiots with no home training or understanding of consequences. do you really think a kid is gonna slap their teacher after seeing a clip of will smith on twitter? seriously? not to mention black youth go to jail for literally existing while black so absolutely nothing they do can increase already staggeringly high AND UNFAIR incarceration rates 😭😭😭 all this discourse is stupid bc if taylor swift was bald from cancer and this black man made fun of her ppl on twitter would be ready for a lynching. back in the day mfs would sword fight to death over a slight. a slap is bad? well so is mocking someone with an illness on one of the biggest televised events of the year but ig black women can't be insulted 🙄

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malewifemanhunter · 3 years ago

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can you explain the slapping discourse I'm lazy and curious.

ok, sure.

Chris Rock was hosting the oscars or part of them, and he made a joke about Jada Smith being bald (she had to go almost bald because she has alopecia). Will laughed at the joke, then the cameras cut to Chris. all of a sudden Will got on stage and slapped Chris, then he went back to his seat and yelled at Chris to keep Jada's name out of his mouth. then Chris kinda went on w his comedy routine. it was awkward as shit lol

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adelmortescryche · 8 years ago

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yoimafiaweek - day 7

AN: Ack, I hope I’m not too late with my submission, @yoimafiaweek! This is what happens when you get caught between two really different ideas. Well, anyway, here’s my fill for day 7! I’m going with ‘Identity Reveal’, since it’s a free day. What a week this has been. *grins*

Premise: Have some podium family fluff/humor, and Yuri P.’s POV! This follows his journey to figure out why something about Yuuri, the Katsuki family and Hasetsu as a whole seems... Very... Strange. There’s no way in hell Katsudon’s in the yakuza. Right?

Warnings in advance for language and attitude in this one: Yurio’s got one hell of a potty mouth. Nothing too explicit, but there’s a whole load of f bombs all through his narrative.

Whatever the hell Yuri had been expected when he finally got around to joining the pig and Victor in the hot springs, it sure as fuck hadn’t been the humongous red dragon tattooed on the pig’s back.

“Eh? Are you okay, Yurio?”

The pig actually had the fucking gall to look confused.

Victor barely looked phased, damn him. And it only got worse when they actually headed out to the bathing area. He still remembered Yuuko and the triplets’ dumb lectures about why you weren’t supposed to stare at people in the hot springs, but it was a little hard to actually not look at anyone when at least fifty percent of the people around him were inked up in places where their clothes could cover it, just like the pig.

“I though the Japanese were supposed to be prudes about shit like tattoos,” he hissed at the old man under his breath, but Victor just gave a gay little laugh.

“Oh, but Yuuri and his family are really open-minded! I’ve been to hot springs before when I’ve come to Japan for competitions, Chris dragged me out on a free day between events, but I barely saw anyone with this much ink then.”

Yuri just had to stare up at him in silent incredulity for a moment. Because, really, wasn’t that a fucking sign that there was something fucking wrong with the picture here?

And by that point the pig was headed back their way, towel over his shoulder. Which, god, he didn’t get the Japanese at all. Katsuki was such a wimp and jumping at shadows all of the time, having a sick look flashing across his face when he noticed the barest pudge around his middle in reflective surfaces, freaking out when Victor touched his cloth covered shoulder, and he didn’t even hesitate to roam about with his dick out when they were in the baths? He couldn’t figure out if the older skater was body conscious or not, at this point.

He’d probably lose the pudge. Yuri hadn’t been around for more than a week in the Podunk little town Victor had chosen to set up in, and he could already tell Katsuki was a stamina monster of the worst kind. He had the flab to burn, but one look at his mom had told Yuri that Katsuki’s pudge was genetic, and not necessarily letting himself go since he’d fucking given up on skating.

The news about his retirement had shaken Yuri hard, because he sure as hell hadn’t been expecting it to come out. So he’d had a bad skate day. It sucked balls. Didn’t mean he couldn’t lift himself off the floor and get back to it, right?

He’d suspected Yuuri was a yellow bellied coward until he’d taken the flight to Hasetsu to see whether or not Victor had just followed his libido to fucking Japan. And while he still thought Victor might very well have followed his libido like originally assumed, he… could already tell there was something more going on, there. Well, whatever. Sure, he’d be disappointed irritated if the pig actually decided to go cold turkey and drop everything, but to be really honest, he was more interested in getting that program Victor promised him. He’d cut it out of the old man’s balding hide with his skates if he had to damnit.

Yuuri sank into the water beside them with a long sigh, the line of his frame wet and lithe as he slicked his hair back with both hands and leaned into the edge of the pool, staring up at the sky with a sharp look in his eyes. Victor made a choking sound, not able to tear his gaze away, and Yuri rolled his eyes, aiming a kick at his hip.

The wounded sound he got in response was fully worth the put upon look the pig shot them both.

It wasn’t just in the springs, though. Yuri was willing to bet anything that there was something up in Hasetsu. Or, if not the town as a whole, then definitely in Yu-topia Katsuki. Which, really, that was such a shitty play on the pig’s name. He hadn’t found it cool or anything, seriously. So lame.

But, anyway.

Something was up. He could have sworn that at least a few men the pig’s dad drank and cracked jokes with in the night were inked from head to toe. Well, every covered bit of them, anyway, when they weren’t pulling their long sleeves back because of the damp air sitting heavy in the dining area. They all looked the rough sort, but it hadn’t actually registered right after he got to Hasetsu – a combination of the facts that, not only were they really friendly with anyone staying at the inn under Yuuri Katsuki’s name, but also that they… didn’t really look rough to him. He was probably being naive about it, but how the hell was he supposed to know how gangsters looked anywhere else in the world? He barely knew what they looked like in St. Petersburg or Moscow – he just knew what sections of the cities to avoid while out on his own to avoid trouble. That had always been how it went no matter where he went – you couldn’t trust movies or books to tell you what trouble looked like, but you sure as hell could avoid trouble by not heading out to places the actual residents in a city avoided on a good day.

And, anyway, it was probably better he didn’t go to those places. Yuri knew himself, he knew how likely he was to pick a fight with someone just because they looked at him too long or funny. And he couldn’t afford to get shanked in an alley for being dumb, he had his dedushka (дедушка) to think about, damnit. And he was getting old.

So, yeah. He never really registered that the pig’s father’s friends looked ‘rough’. Not until this one time he saw one of the really old guys gesturing at something in the newspaper with a fucking knife, relatively longer blade and everything which, holy shit, and not one person in the room actually reacted. Well, no, that wasn’t true. A couple of the guests who’d come down from a bigger city for a weekend off or some shit went white and looked away immediately, murmuring to each other. That was actually what had made Yuri curious, really. He’d been taking his cues from Victor, but the old man had more air in his head than anything else. Unless you spoke about skating or Victorian Literature, or Romanticism or – yeah. The old man was an air head if it wasn’t literature or skating. Or Yuuri, but he just got more airheaded then, didn’t he?

Bottom line, he probably shouldn’t have been taking his cues from Victor. But even if he had been doing that, he had to admit, the people who showed up at the inn each night… weren’t bad people. Even if they were rougher than Yuri had actually registered until that point.

No, what actually had him confused was what role the pig had to play in all of it. Because asking him outright had just netted Yuri a faint smile. Asking Yuuko had earned him a giggle, and her husband had just rolled his eyes, saying Yuri was better off not thinking about it.

The triplets had just laughed at him. He actually missed when the little hellions were too busy gasping and taking pictures of him and Victor all the time – now that they’d gotten over the momentary hero worship they were downright scary irritating.

At least he got why the pig got that look on his face whenever he caught sight of them filming things on the side of the rink and giggling at each other, now.

Actually looking it up on Google had just confused him further. Because Japan and tattoos and springs just got him a whole bunch of yakuza discourse and why people in Japan were so uneasy about tattoos.

Irezumi was gorgeous, he had to admit. That said- no. Just, no way. The fucking pork cutlet bowl couldn’t be a gangster goddamnit, it made no sense.

There had to be something else going on and he was going to get to the bottom of it if it was the last thing he did.

Fuck.

“Make sure Victor doesn’t get in over his head, okay?” he growled at Yuuko, when she caught him just before he headed to the airport.

She tilted her head to the side, that same blandly amused smile he’d seen on Katsudon’s face flitting across her lips. It made him hunch his shoulders up instinctively, because thinking about Katsudon right then wasn’t very nice. The look on Victor’s face when he stared out at the rink had sent a sick wave through Yuri’s gut, but even he had to admit that the kind of meteoric rise Yuuri had made overnight meant Victor sticking around could only benefit him.

He’d get one hell of an opponent to beat out of the bargain, but that didn’t mean he had to like it. Victor was unchanging, he’d always been there. For all that he respected thought that Katsudon’s skate skills were worth something, losing Victor to the cause just pissed him off.

At least he’d be back at some point. Right? Right. And Katsudon would just follow him wherever he went, so there was that. He’d get them both. To skate against, obviously, that’s all they were worth, but he’d get them both.

“I don’t know what the fu- I don’t know what’s going on here, but Victor’s an idiot. You control the pig to some extent, right. Make sure Victor doesn’t get hurt.” Yuri demanded, point blank, and Yuuko’s face softened to something that almost looked fond.

Ugh.

“That doesn’t mean that I’m not going to win! I don’t care what weird shit Katsudon’s involved in, but it doesn’t make him a better skater than me! Tell them I’ll see them on the ice. Dasvidaniya (До свида́ния).”

His piece said, he turned around and walked away.

That sure as hell didn’t mean he stopped thinking about it, though. Lilia and Yakov put him through hell, as did learning and training his free skate. And streamlining his Agape, which Yakov had looked pleased with, when he’d gotten back to St. Petersburg and showed him what he’d learnt.

“You’ve gotten soft, Yura,” Mila teased, and he tuned her out. And tuned Georgi’s dramatics behind her.

He hadn’t gotten soft. He’d just hardened up where it counted. So there.

But, like he said, it was kind of hard to not keep thinking about the old man and the pig. Especially when he was training Agape, for some reason. Yakov had gotten a strange look on his face when he’d complained about that, but at least he’d settled in to listen when Yuri complained. After training, mind you, he’d have gotten yelled right back onto the ice if he’d tried to say anything during training.

His complaints had just gotten him a weird look, though.

“Yura, you’re being paranoid,” he sighed, once Yuri was done. It made Yuri flare up dramatically in response, but Yakov just got a hand on the top of his head, and his voice cut off immediately when he noticed the look in his coach’s eyes.

It wasn’t pure disbelief, just… bemusement. And irritation, yes, but that as Yakov all the time every time. He had to keep an eye on too many skaters, and with people like Mila and Georgi around, obviously he was going to be irritated. Those two were such a fucking pain. And Victor, but thinking about Victor just made Yakov blow up most of the time.

Yuri complaining about the sheer weirdness of the Katsuki family and the guests at their inn was about the only time he didn’t blow up, actually.

Maybe he just didn’t know how to react? Who the fuck knew.

“Get back to Lilia’s home quickly, and rest. You have a long day ahead of you tomorrow,” he said, and Yuri nodded, scowl firmly in place.

He didn’t need to be believed by his rink mates or coach. Hell, Katsudon and Yuuko had all but confirmed that something was up in the way they quietly ignored all his questions. So, whatever.

He’d just ask Chulanont and that American skater about it- he’d followed observed enough of the pig’s career to know whom he spoke to off of the ice. Even if the American didn’t know about it, Chulanont definitely would, and at least one of them had to make it to the final, right? Right. If they were both pathetic enough that they didn’t get till the end he’d just message Chulanont over Instagram.

And after the pig’s disgustingly good performance during his short program, he’d definitely make it till Rostelecom, at the least. Yuri was going to find some way to murder people with the power of his mind if he didn’t.

“Yakuza?” Chulanont repeated with a grin, the night before the short program. “I don’t know whom you’ve been speaking to, little Yuri, but have you seen my boy? He wouldn’t hurt a fly!”

“That’s not what I asked and you know it,” Yuri grunted, scowl in place.

Chulanont just laughed and waved him off, turning around and walking away. Probably to go spend some time catching up with ‘his boy’. Fucking disgusting, is what it was.

Why the fuck wasn’t anyone willing to take him at his word, damnit. He already knew Yuuri wouldn’t hurt a fly. Unless he was going through a bout of self-doubt, or some shit, in which case all bets were off. But Yuri knew he wouldn’t go out of his way to hurt anyone. Not unless they deserved it, anyway.

Or, at least, that’s what he thought till he ran into Victor in the corridor the night after the short skate, red eyed and wet cheeked. He’d been hanging out with Beka, and just going back to his room after Yakov had yelled at him on the phone about curfews for a while. The sight made his brows rise, bemused. Because he had to be seeing things, right.

Well, he thought he was seeing things until Victor hurriedly wiped his eyes and gave him a wide, cheesy and disgustingly fake grin, anyway.

“Ok, what the fuck.” He snapped, making the older man laugh.

“It’s nothing, Yurio. What are you doing outside your room, though? Little kittens should be asleep by now!”

The words made him snarl and aim a punch at Victor’s stomach, but for once, the old man actually caught Yuri’s fist in his hand, the smile fracturing just a bit before he pasted it back in place.

“I’ve had a really long night,” he said, “and I think I need a drink. And you need to sleep. You should get back to your room before you worry Yakov.”

Don’t say that when you look like you’re going to start crying if I leave you and go, Yuri threw at him mentally, but no way in fuck was he going to say it out loud.

“Did the pig finally fess up about being a gangster or some shit?” he snapped instead, just putting it out there, and stopped short when Victor’s hand actually tightened around his wrist, his eyes going wide for a split second before he got them back under control.

Whoa, okay. Not what he’d fucking expected.

“You should get to bed, Yura,” Victor said, and after staring up at him for a few more moments, Yuri gave a slow nod. And backed off.

“My dad’s family’s old school yakuza, yeah,” Yuuri said with a bemused smile, the morning after the banquet. Over fucking breakfast, of all things.

Chulanont, who’d dropped in to join them for breakfast along with Giacometti and Beka, made a choking sound.

“Yuuri,” he wailed, sounding heartbroken, and Yuuri started laughing, damn him.

“I knew it!” Yuri declared, vindicated, pumping a fist in the air. And made to jump straight over the table between them when Katsudon turn that razor-like grin his way.

Beka caught him by the hem of his jacket and pulled him back down into his seat. He turned a wounded look on the older teen, and got a single shoulder shrug in response. Which, okay. Okay. He wouldn’t make a scene, damnit.

But it was so damn tempting. He wanted to bash the pig’s face in.

“Yuuri said that the Katsuki clan takes care of Hasetsu,” Victor explained, curled up right against Yuuri’s other side. They traded a pair of disgustingly sappy looks before looking back at him and Yuri just had to bare his teeth in response.

��That doesn’t tell me anything. Don’t scrimp out on the fucking details, Katsudon – I’ve been going crazy for almost a whole damned year!” he snarled, making Yuuri grin.

“Well. It’s not like we really talk about it. What was I supposed to say?”

“Hi, I’m Katsuki Yuuri, Japan’s Ace, and oh, I’m also in the yakuza,” Chulanont suggested sulkily, making Katsudon elbow him. Victor coughed on his other side, hiding a grin of his own, and Yuri groaned, covering his face.

“I was starting to think I wouldn’t find out until I ran into Katsudon fighting delinquents in an alley or some shit. What the fuck. What the fuck,” he mumbled, making nearly everyone at the table muffle their laughter into their fists or shirt sleeves. Except for Victor, who fucking sighed, sounding like a lovestruck American movie actress or something. Why were they so-

“Disgusting,” he groaned into his hands again, and Beka patted him comfortingly on the back.

See? This is why he liked Beka. He wasn’t disgusting. Not like the pig and the old man, or even like fucking Giacometti, who was smirking on Beka’s other side.

“Is that actually what happened? Is that how you found out?”

Yuri stiffened immediately, hands still covering his face, but Victor didn’t even hesitate when he laughed and cracked a joke about always being ready to be rescued by ‘his Yuuri’. When Yuri peered over the tips of his fingers, Katsudon was staring straight back at him, eyes sharp as a naked blade.

Yuri stared back. Because he wasn’t fucking afraid. Not of Katsudon. And es-fucking-specially not when he’d been the one to make Victor cry.

Yuuri eyed him for a moment longer before cracking a wry smile, turning his attention back to what Chulanont was saying beside him. And Yuri didn’t think anyone else had noticed their silent exchange, not until Beka’s fingers tightened on Yuri’s back.

When he looked around, surprised, it was to find that Otabek had gone still, gaze fastened right on Yuuri’s face where he was laughing and flushing at whatever it was Victor was whispering into his ear. And when he looked down at Yuri, his eyes had gone just that slightest bit wide.

Yeah. Yeah. This? This was why he liked Otabek. He wasn’t blind, unlike nearly every other damned person that Yuri could name.

“Yuuri didn’t lie when he said that the Katsuki clan protects Hasetsu,” Yuuko said with a smile, when he video-called her to complain about her friend.

“That doesn’t tell me anything. Also, what the hell, do they teach people in Hasetsu to be unassuming or something?”

“Toshiya-san’s family probably owns most of the land in town, now,” she went on, not responding to what Yuri said.

Yuri didn’t even feel miffed about that. What she’d offered up was so much more interesting.

“Wait, what?” he breathed, and she burst into giggles.

“Yes,” she said, “oh, that’s how Takeshi reacted when we were children, when he first moved to Hasetsu with his dad. Yuuri’s family’s loaded. That’s why they were so willing to send him off to study skating abroad without any hesitation. Toshiya-san supported Yuuri all the way through the juniors until Sponsors started approaching him – and that didn’t happen until right before he got into the Senior League.”

Yuri stared at her.

“That- but- The inn! It’s a dump!”

“It’s homey,” she corrected with a grin. “And, anyway, the Katsuki clan was never big on impressing anyone. There’s absolutely no crime in Hasetsu or any of the surrounding towns- they police their territory better than the actual officers do, and even after the smaller onsens lost business, they never took it out on the people who rented their property.”

Yuri choked, because didn’t that mean the Katsuki clan owned-

“They’re good people, Yurio. If a little scary when you piss them off. Yuuri’s like that too, you know,” she concluded, smiling softly at him.

The expression on her face made him want to throw his phone straight at the fucking wall.

But, okay. Okay.

“Tell me more,” he said, and that was that.

If you make him cry again-

I won’t.

You better not, Katsudon. Or fuck your badass yakuza rep-

I don’t know what you’re talking about, Yurio.

Yuraaaaaa~ You had best not be talking about me when I’m not there to hear you!

What the hell was he supposed to do with these two. Really.

#yoimafiaweek #day seven #prompt: free day #pairing: viktuuri #victuuri #identity reveal #podium family #protective!Yurio #katsuki yuuri #victor nikiforov #yuri plisetsky #nishigori yuuko #otabek altin #yoi ensemble #my writing #confident katsuki yuuri #bamf katsuki yuuri

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yourreddancer · 8 years ago

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Andrew Sullivan

I guess I should start by saying this is not a blog. Nor is it what one might call a column. It’s an experiment of sorts to see if there’s something in between those two. Most Fridays, from now on, I’ll be writing in this space about, among other things, the end of Western civilization, the collapse of the republic, and, yes, my beagles. If you’re a veteran reader of my former site, the Dish, you may find yourselves at times in an uncanny valley. So may I. The model I’m trying to follow is more like the British magazine tradition of a weekly diary — on the news, but a little distant from it, personal as well as political, conversational more than formal.

I want to start with Trump’s lies. It’s now a commonplace that Trump and his underlings tell whoppers. Fact-checkers have never had it so good. But all politicians lie. Bill Clinton could barely go a day without some shading or parsing of the truth. Richard Nixon was famously tricky. But all the traditional political fibbers nonetheless paid some deference to the truth — even as they were dodging it. They acknowledged a shared reality and bowed to it. They acknowledged the need for a common set of facts in order for a liberal democracy to function at all. Trump’s lies are different. They are direct refutations of reality — and their propagation and repetition is about enforcing his power rather than wriggling out of a political conundrum. They are attacks on the very possibility of a reasoned discourse, the kind of bald-faced lies that authoritarians issue as a way to test loyalty and force their subjects into submission. That first press conference when Sean Spicer was sent out to lie and fulminate to the press about the inauguration crowd reminded me of some Soviet apparatchik having his loyalty tested to see if he could repeat in public what he knew to be false. It was comical, but also faintly chilling.

What do I mean by denial of empirical reality? Take one of the most recent. On Wednesday, Senator Richard Blumenthal related the news that Judge Neil Gorsuch, Trump’s nominee for the long-vacant Supreme Court seat, had told him that the president’s unprecedented, personal attacks on federal judges were “disheartening” and “demoralizing.” Within half an hour, this was confirmed by Gorsuch’s White House–appointed spokesman, who was present for the conversation. CNN also reported that Senator Ben Sasse had heard Gorsuch say exactly the same thing, with feeling, as did former senator Kelly Ayotte.

The president nonetheless insisted twice yesterday that Blumenthal had misrepresented his conversation with Gorsuch — first in an early morning tweet and then, once again, yesterday afternoon, in front of the television cameras. To add to the insanity, he also tweeted that in a morning interview, Chris Cuomo had never challenged Blumenthal on his lies about his service in Vietnam — when the tape clearly shows it was the first thing Cuomo brought up.

What are we supposed to do with this? How are we to respond to a president who in the same week declared that the “murder rate in our country is the highest it’s been in 45 to 47 years,” when, of course, despite some recent, troubling spikes in cities, it’s nationally near a low not seen since the late 1960s, and half what it was in 1980. What are we supposed to do when a president says that two people were shot dead in Chicago during President Obama’s farewell address — when this is directly contradicted by the Chicago police? None of this, moreover, is ever corrected. No error is ever admitted. Any lie is usually doubled down by another lie — along with an ad hominem attack.

Here is what we are supposed to do: rebut every single lie. Insist moreover that each lie is retracted — and journalists in press conferences should back up their colleagues with repeated follow-ups if Spicer tries to duck the plain truth. Do not allow them to move on to another question. Interviews with the president himself should not leave a lie alone; the interviewer should press and press and press until the lie is conceded. The press must not be afraid of even calling the president a liar to his face if he persists. This requires no particular courage. I think, in contrast, of those dissidents whose critical insistence on simple truth in plain language kept reality alive in the Kafkaesque world of totalitarianism. As the Polish dissident Adam Michnik once said: “In the life of every honorable man comes a difficult moment … when the simple statement that this is black and that is white requires paying a high price.” The price Michnik paid was years in prison. American journalists cannot risk a little access or a nasty tweet for the same essential civic duty?

Then there is the obvious question of the president’s mental and psychological health. I know we’re not supposed to bring this up — but it is staring us brutally in the face. I keep asking myself this simple question: If you came across someone in your everyday life who repeatedly said fantastically and demonstrably untrue things, what would you think of him? If you showed up at a neighbor’s, say, and your host showed you his newly painted living room, which was a deep blue, and then insisted repeatedly — manically — that it was a lovely shade of scarlet, what would your reaction be? If he then dragged out a member of his family and insisted she repeat this obvious untruth in front of you, how would you respond? If the next time you dropped by, he was still raving about his gorgeous new red walls, what would you think? Here’s what I’d think: This man is off his rocker. He’s deranged; he’s bizarrely living in an alternative universe; he’s delusional. If he kept this up, at some point you’d excuse yourself and edge slowly out of the room and the house and never return. You’d warn your other neighbors. You’d keep your distance. If you saw him, you’d be polite but keep your distance.

I think this is a fundamental reason why so many of us have been so unsettled, anxious, and near panic these past few months. It is not so much this president’s agenda. That always changes from administration to administration. It is that when the linchpin of an entire country is literally delusional, clinically deceptive, and responds to any attempt to correct the record with rage and vengeance, everyone is always on edge.

There is no anchor any more. At the core of the administration of the most powerful country on earth, there is, instead, madness.

With someone like this barging into your consciousness every hour of every day, you begin to get a glimpse of what it must be like to live in an autocracy of some kind. Every day in countries unfortunate enough to be ruled by a lone dictator, people are constantly subjected to the Supreme Leader’s presence, in their homes, in their workplaces, as they walk down the street. Big Brother never leaves you alone. His face bears down on you on every flickering screen. He begins to permeate your psyche and soul; he dominates every news cycle and issues pronouncements — each one shocking and destabilizing — round the clock. He delights in constantly provoking and surprising you, so that his monstrous ego can be perennially fed. And because he is also mentally unstable, forever lashing out in manic spasms of pain and anger, you live each day with some measure of trepidation. What will he come out with next? Somehow, he is never in control of himself and yet he is always in control of you.

One of the great achievements of free society in a stable democracy is that many people, for much of the time, need not think about politics at all. The president of a free country may dominate the news cycle many days — but he is not omnipresent — and because we live under the rule of law, we can afford to turn the news off at times. A free society means being free of those who rule over you — to do the things you care about, your passions, your pastimes, your loves — to exult in that blessed space where politics doesn’t intervene. In that sense, it seems to me, we already live in a country with markedly less freedom than we did a month ago. It’s less like living in a democracy than being a child trapped in a house where there is an abusive and unpredictable father, who will brook no reason, respect no counter-argument, admit no error, and always, always up the ante until catastrophe inevitably strikes. This is what I mean by the idea that we are living through an emergency.

I’ve managed to see Scorsese’s Silence twice in the last couple of weeks. It literally silenced me. It’s a surpassingly beautiful movie — but its genius lies in the complexity of its understanding of what faith really is. For some secular liberals, faith is some kind of easy, simple abdication of reason — a liberation from reality. For Scorsese, it’s a riddle wrapped in a mystery, and often inseparable from crippling, perpetual doubt. You see this in the main protagonist’s evolution: from a certain, absolutist arrogance to a long sacrifice of pride toward a deeper spiritual truth. Faith is a result, in the end, of living, of seeing your previous certainties crumble and be rebuilt, shakily, on new grounds. God is almost always silent, hidden, and sometimes most painfully so in the face of hideous injustice or suffering. A life of faith is therefore not real unless it is riddled with despair.

There are moments — surpassingly rare but often indelible — when you do hear the voice of God and see the face of Jesus. You never forget them — and I count those few moments in my life when I have heard the voice and seen the face as mere intimations of what is to come. But the rest is indeed silence. And the conscience is something that cannot sometimes hear itself. I’ve rarely seen the depth of this truth more beautifully unpacked. Which is why, perhaps, the movie has had such a tiny audience so far. Those without faith have no patience for a long meditation on it; those with faith in our time are filled too often with a passionate certainty to appreciate it. And this movie’s mysterious imagery can confound anyone. But its very complexity and subtlety gave me hope in this vulgar, extremist time. We cannot avoid this surreality all around us. But it may be possible occasionally to transcend it.

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