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leiascully · 3 years

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Fic: Citius, Altius, Fortius (MSR, T)

This ficlet is dedicated to the commercial about the adopted Paralympian that makes me sniffly every time. I don’t even know what they’re advertising. All credit to AAVE for the “hip” slang Mulder uses and basically all cutting-edge words in American English.

The Olympic theme was more of a suggestion than a fanfare, but Scully still leaned forward and turned the volume down a few more notches. She could feel Mulder giving her that crinkly-eyed smile. She knew the remote worked just fine over the distance between the tv and the couch, but it felt like it worked better when she leaned. It was like Jackson and his video games, a sympathetic movement.

“I don’t want to wake Gracie,” she said.

“Good plan,” Mulder said, and put his arm comfortably around her shoulders as she leaned back. Jackson snorted and looked away, but peeked back at them to check in. Scully was glad she was there for him, the Ginger from his journals, she and Mulder solid presences in his life, bracketed by the ghosts of his adoptive parents.

“I didn’t think you two would buy into all this jingoistic shit,” Jackson said.

“We are still employed by the United States federal government,” Scully pointed out.

“They’re basically our coworkers when it comes to repping the flag,” Mulder said laconically. “Gotta respect the hustle. Besides, compared to a lot of national anthems, ours kinda slaps.”

Jackson winced, predictably, at Mulder’s attempt to use slang. Scully sensed Mulder mentally adding a few tallies to his side of the imaginary scoreboard. It was all so sweetly familiar, a song she hummed in her dreams.

“Still,” Jackson said. “It’s all so fuckin’ rah-rah America. I thought you knew better. Like you said, you work for the government. You know all the shit they pull.”

“For two weeks every two years, I support the finest athletes that wealth, health, grueling training, and the opportunities inherent in living in the country possessing the world’s largest economy can produce,” Mulder said, a trace of irony audible in his voice. “And also anyone competing against Russia.”

“It’s a distraction from all the shitty things happening in the world,” Jackson said.

“It’s a damn good one,” Mulder countered. “At least they’re not supersoldiers.”

“Some of them might be,” Jackson grumbled.

“Those abs,” Mulder said, sounding a little mournful. He patted his stomach. “I should have gone for the upgrade when I had the chance.”

“When I was little,” Scully said slowly, “my mother would tell me that the prowess of Olympic athletes was proof that God loved us. She said that their bodies were miracles. I don’t think about it exactly the same way now, but there is something almost holy about that quest to go farther and faster than anyone else ever has. In a sense, we fly without wings. We climb higher than we thought we could. We run faster and farther than early humans imagined. We lift heavier burdens. We test our nerve and our resolve in feats of endurance. We subject our bodies to almost-unbearable forces and conditions. We test the laws of physics, twisting in the air or gliding over the ice. For a moment, we defy expectation, gravity, and in a sense, mortality. The athletes of the Olympics show us the potential of the human body and the human spirit in a way that our daily lives don’t, and we feel like we are there with them as we perch on the edges of our seats, our bodies echoing their movements as if we could lend them our strength. It’s possible that sometimes a distraction is a welcome respite. For a short time, the world is focused on something other than war. Many of the results may be predictable, but astonishing things happen and we learn to expect the unexpected. Athletes from nations and peoples that have been overlooked and exploited dazzle us. A runner falls and someone pulls them up. Someone may shatter their leg and because of that tragedy, someone else realizes their lifelong dream. The Olympics are a microcosm of our own attempts to strive for perfection, a supercondensed spectacle that reminds us of all our potential. In pitting us against the people of other nations, the Olympics somehow unite us in the pursuit of a singular goal, reached by various paths: a gold medal, and the accolades of an awestruck world.”

“I love it when you give a dissertation on everyday life,” Mulder murmured, kissing under her ear.

“A spectacle that displaces the people who are already the most fucked-over,” Jackson said, but there was a little less disdain in his words. “A profit machine for corporations and a propaganda outlet for governments. It’s a slippery slope from athletic superiority to eugenics. Only the strong survive.”

“George Orwell said that athletic competitions were essentially a proxy for war games,” Mulder told her. She craned her head to look at him.

“I thought you liked the Olympics.”

“I do,” he said, “but Jack has a point.”

“Hell yeah, I do,” Jackson said.

“I wasn’t saying the Olympics are perfect,” Scully argued. “Just that they could be perceived as creating a net good.”

The broadcast cut to commercial, sentimental strings music welling quietly from the speakers. Mulder looked away, rubbing at his eyes. Jackson chuckled.

“It’s that easy, huh?” he said. “All they need to get into your psyche is footage of someone winning something and some sad music, maybe a Morgan Freeman voiceover.”

“Wait until you get old,” Mulder said. “Then you’ll be welling up at every Visa commercial. These ads are designed by experts in psychological warfare. The Olympic mindgames.”

“They remind us of you,” Scully told Jackson. “You weren’t supposed to exist. You weren’t supposed to survive. And here you are, capable of things your father and I could never have dreamed of.”

“Whatever,” Jackson muttered, looking away and definitely not dabbing his face on the shoulder of his t-shirt.

Scully settled back into the couch. Grace would be waking up soon - she wasn’t an Olympic-level napper - but until then, she had a moment to enjoy the half-scripted pageantry of the Games, savoring the bittersweet combination of impossible victories and unpredictable defeats. It wasn’t unlike her own life, in a way: she’d accomplished things she’d never imagined, uncovered truths too painful to endure, run up against her own limits over and over and overcome them all to be sitting here, in her comfortable home, with her stalwart partner, dragged back from the dead, and their miraculous children. The glint in Jackson’s eyes as he argued with Mulder was more precious to her than any medal; the sound of Grace’s sleepy sighs stirred her heart more than any anthem. She stood atop the podium of her destiny.

She leaned her head on Mulder’s shoulder and watched the marathon swimmers cut through the water, one stroke after another, keeping themselves afloat for hours. She understood their exhaustion. She understood their triumph.

“I like the dressage,” Jackson said unexpectedly. “It looks like mind control if you do it right. I’m not, like, asking for a pony. I just think it’s cool.”

“I knew we could find some common ground,” Mulder said. “What’s your opinion on medals for horses?”

“Horse-sized medals,” Jackson said immediately. “Bankrupt the IOC.”

“That’s your son,” Scully told him.

“No denying it,” Mulder said in a smug voice. The broadcast changed to gymnastics and they all sat forward, watching in awed silence, as history was made.

#xfiles fic #my fic #leiascully fic #msr

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shyrose57 · 3 years

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Updated Deities Of Mizu thing:

Things:

Origin myths are how the people of Mizu, and related cities believe the gods came to be. They weren’t actually spirits or born from the sky, but over time, history distorts, and it’s not like it hurts anything.

Most of Mizu’s history is actually pretty accurate, and untwisted. The deities stepped in and set things straight, once they realized what had happened.

Most, because some of it was pretty funny and harmless, so they just didn’t say anything about it.

The city of Subbin worships a different Pantheon(unsure which it consist of yet).

Mizu’s pantheon is known to appear quite frequently to them, and become close with it’s mortals.

Despite some beliefs, they don’t actually live within Mizu, for all they visit often. They reside in a separate dimension they all created together, and can leave freely.

Gods/Deities:

Tommy:

Head of the Mizu Pantheon, and god of mischief and discord, perseverance through hardships, and companionship and bonds.

Typically depicted as a scarred teenager with red string around his arms, and stars scattered along his body. Sometimes, he also sports wings on his back, or red horns and a spade-tipped tail.

Sacred animals are cows and moths.

Origin myth: He was originally a minor spirit of discord, born from a shard of Dream’s power. They say, entranced by the stars, he hauled himself into the sky, and the stars were so awed by his determination that they immediately embraced him as a brother, turning him into a god.

Closely tied with the other three minors, as a god of the Red String, he is represented as the string itself.

Tubbo:

Tommy’s counterpart, and partner in leading the Pantheon. God of the community, kindness and reconciliation, and hard work and reward.

Typically depicted as a younger boy, though that’s about the only thing that stays the same. Sometimes, he has curly ram/deer horns, and goat feet. Other times, it’s transparent wings, or snow dusted hair.

Sacred animals are bees and deer.

Origin myth: Ties into Tommy’s. Once a forest satyr, he was close friends with the chaos spirit, and stayed in the sea beneath him, ready to catch the other if he slipped. When Tommy looked down and saw the other waiting, ever unwilling to part, he tossed down a glass of honey, with the remains of stars mixed into it, and told him to drink it. Tubbo did, and his blood was burned gold.

Closely tied with the other three minors, as a god of the Red String, he is represented as the knot tying two people together.

Ranboo:

God of sentiment, loyalty to people and memory, and mind and soul.

Typically depicted as either a tall, faceless figure split down the middle, or a strange, reptilian creature with glowing purple eyes.

Sacred animals are enderman and cats.

Origin myth: Currently undecided.

Closely tied with the other three minors, as a god of the Red String, he is represented as the weaver of the thread itself.

Purpled:

God of value and worth, strategy, and riches.

Typically depicted as a shadowed figure in armor, with purple jewels decorating him. On some occasions though, he is shown as a purple eyed wolf instead, with a golden necklace around his neck.

Sacred animals are wolves.

Origin myth: Currently undecided.

Closely tied with the other three minors, as a god of the Red String, he is represented as the scissors that cut the thread when necessary.

Dream:

The original deity, and god of change, chaos, and order, and formerly, the End.

Typically depicted as a giant covered in a bloodied cloak and porcelain mask, with an axe upon his back, and chains on his wrists.

Sacred animal are horses and cats.

Origin myth: Came into existence when a meteor struck the Enderdragon through her chest, killing her, and from the remains of her heart, was born Dream.

George:

The second deity, and god of the Overworld, life, sentience, and rest.

Typically depicted as a sleeping man surrounded by plants, and draped in blue. His eyes are never seen, either closed, or hidden by a pair of black and white glasses.

Sacred animals are dolphins and butterflies.

Origin myth: Came into existence when a lonely Dream began to cry, and his tears spilled onto a lifeless planet, creating the Overworld, and George along with it.

Bad:

God of the Nether, chaos, marriage, and brides, it’s unclear whether he existed before Dream, or after George.

Typically depicted as a looming, demonic shadow with a crown of bone, and glowing white eyes.

Sacred animal is the wither skeleton.

Origin myth: Undecided.

Married to Skeppy.

Skeppy:

God of caverns and ores, mirth, magic, and mastery.

Typically depicted as either a figure draped in diamond jewelry and a veil, or a figure made or diamond.

Sacred animal is the bat, and the diamond golem.

Origin myth: Undecided.

Married to Bad.

Puffy:

God of the seas, motherhood, and release(of your emotions, of your past, ect).

Typically depicted as a sheep-headed woman, with an axe and a cutlass strapped over her back, and colorful ribbons in her hair.

Sacred animal is the otter.

Origin myth: Undecided.

Married to Niki.

Niki:

God of spring, battle, victory, and retribution.

Can be depicted in two very different ways. One, as a brown haired maiden, with strands of pale golden flowers framing her face. Or two, as an armored lady, with pink hair that turns to streams of blood toward the end, and baring a tattered cloak on her shoulders, a sword on her hip, and a dagger hidden on her back.

Sacred animal is the fox and the dog.

Origin myth: Undecided.

Married to Puffy.

Quackity:

God of law, order, the married, and the widowed.

Typically depicted as an one-eyed elderly man baring books of law and politics in hand, but also as a golden winged being with a lop-sided halo covering his right eye.

Sacred animal is the crane, and the canary.

Origin myth: Undecided.

Said to be formerly married to the spirit Sapnap, and the nymph Karl.

Others:

Sapnap:

Technically not a deity? A powerful spirit born to the Nether God, Bad, his domain falls over that of both humanity, and flame. Have up his life to imprison Dream.

Typically depicted as a humanoid made of flame, with ghostly white eyes, and red thread looped through his fingers.

Has no sacred animals, but is, for some reason, closely associated with cod fish, as well as blazes.

Origin myth: Undecided.

Drista:

The pseudo-sister of Dream, who played a heavy role in his imprisonment.

Typically depicted as a short figure wearing a grinning mask.

Associated with geese, for some reason.

Origin myth: Undecided.

Fundy:

A fox turned human/spirit who’s closely tied with Niki and Ranboo.

Typically depicted as a fox-like person, or fox hybrid.

Associated with foxes.

Origin myth: One day, in the remains of her battlefield, Niki came across a young fox kit that had been caught in the crossfire and killed. Feeling remorse for the death, she went to George and had him revive it into a boy, who Niki took and raised as her own.

Harbringer of fall.

Wilbur:

Some sort of fallen god or titan, perhaps? Little is known about him, besides the mentions in the Disc Saga, and a day of mourning meant in his honor.

No depictions. There’s no pictures or descriptions of this strange being.

Origin myth: Undecided/Unknown.

Ghostbur:

A sea spirit who’s widely honored as Mizu’s number one historian, and preserver of history.

Associations with blue sheep and salmon.

Typically depicted as a reclining man upon the shore, where his legs should be hidden by seafoam. His eyes are a bright sea-blue, and his lips are tinged.

Origin myth: Undecided.

#The Deities Of Mizu AU #dream smp #dream smp au #tommyinnit #tubbo #ranboo #purpled #dreamwastaken #georgenotfound #sapnap #badboyhalo #skeppy #quackity #wilbur soot #ghostbur #fundy #drista

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cienie-isengardu · 3 years

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What's with the Black Dragon in MK, they confuse me?

I know they are a branch off of the Red Dragon, who they left because they thought the Red Dragon was too moral.

And they are lead by Kano, who has no morals and as an absolute piece of shit.

Kano doesn't confuse me.

Kabal "I used to be B.D. but decided to be a good guy cop, and even Raiden wanted on his team" and Erron Black "I might be a feminist/sexist man, because I never throw the first punch with women, and also seem soft of kids, unless they pay me a lot to shot them"

Both of these guys, who are the only other B.D. members I know of, are morally gray at best, which is what the what the Black Dragon left the Red Dragon because of?! So why aren't they just Red Dragon, and why does the Black Dragon even exist (other than to pad Kanos crotch)?!

To be honest, I’m not sure myself what is the deal between Black and Red Dragons (not the fraction / era of games I’m familiar or interested in) but I suspect it is something similar to the situation of Lin Kuei and Shirai Ryu. At some point some rogue element decided to leave and created his/her/their own organisation and since then both groups hate each other’s guts. And somehow along the line Kano took over Black Dragons and extended its operation to Outworld. I’m unable to comment on the “moral code” of Red Dragons because really, what is an honor in a crime organisation anyway, but sadly, alternative timeline doesn’t focus much on this conflict so Kano has (on screen) monopoly on dealing with weapons and other black market deals.

Whatever the excuse was to split, it was most likely about power and control or revenge than any morality whatsoever.

As for the members alone, I think it is less a matter of their morality and more why they joined or worked with Black Dragons in the first place. People join criminal organizations for money, for the thrill of danger, for protection or because they lack better options. Not sure how it was before Outworld Invasion and Netherrealm War, but the game does not show us the actual state of modern (alternative timeline) Earthrealm, or at least modern USA society. I mean, in a short period of time, out of nowhere came armies of monsters twice, murdering people right and left, destroying cities. The rebuilding for sure took time but beside the lasting psychological trauma, I’m sure the survivors demanded answers as to what the hell happened and did the governments know about other realms. It is not stated how much common people know now about Mortal Kombat and Outworld or general history of conflict, but the last invasion and the Netherrealm War changed the world in an irreversible way. We don’t have an idea about the situation of average citizens nor how countries managed to stave off political, cultural or economic post-war crises. We have a clue about show business like movie making and military operating inside and outside Earthrealm and cooperation between fractions representing different countries and/or continents. Our main heroes seem to do well, money-wise at least, but they all are in this or another way related to the military thus working for the government (or United Nations / NATO / whatever political-economic union happened post-war). That however does not rule out the possibility there are people who were abandoned or forgotten by their government, who were marginalised for whatever big or small reason. With what happened it is easy for me to imagine how humanity was militarized in case of another attack, and in result, how societies were controlled more tightly by their governments. In theory all for the security means but it easily could escalate into social inequalities increasing with each passing year.

There is a lot of worldbuilding the games did not tell us about but would help greatly to understand the relationship between characters, fractions and countries. Are there arenas that are now closed off due to some magic contamination or became the lawless zones but people live there because they are too poor to move into safer places? Are there more young people with special powers due to raping or magic means, as the remnant of the war? How religions work now, when humanity saw an army of demons? Are religious wars escalated, especially if faith in Elder Gods get renewed? Did religious fanatics start cultural crusades against certain social groups (like LGBT+, atheists, anyone tied to Outworld or at least looking unnatural, like orphaned Frost?).

And the more society is tightly controlled, divided into poor, unwanted and written off against the privileged ones (military), the more people rebel against authority. Which is how Black Dragons may fit into the new times, as a niche for desperate, angry people with little to none perspective on life. Under Kano’s guard, they can be as violent and uncaring as they want. They can hurt a government (military), get good money and fun and until they are caught, there is only Black Dragon’s laws (or lack of therefor) to worry about.

(Looking how extremely violent the Special Forces were during the raid on Black Dragon’s hideout, how Cassie went straight for killing instead of just injuring to arrest the criminals and put them before justice, I wouldn’t be surprised if the army was not popular anymore. And yeah, Cassie wanted to save her parents but as a soldier, she is bound to respect law… that may be much different than we known from our reality)

We, as gamers (viewers) know what scumbag Kano is because we see his crimes and how he interacts with other characters. To what awful level he managed terrifying strong heroes like Sonya. But most of Black Dragon members may know him just as the charismatic leader that time after time outsmart the Special Forces and always get a good-paying job for them, whatever it is a deal in the country or a totally different realm.

And those named characters that left are those who actually experienced on their own skin what a nasty bastard Kano was. Like in Mortal Kombat X Comics Series, Erron joined forces with Black Dragons out of desperation to help Kotal which ended badly for him because Kano left him to die, thus Erron’s personal hate for Kano and his buddies. Similar thing seems to happen with Tremor, sent on a suicidal mission and then also left behind without any care or remorse. Frankly, only MK9!Kabal seems to have left Black Dragons for moral reasons and actually made proper life changing decisions like joining the police and help citizens instead of serving criminals.

Because of that, I can see why Kano, despite his true nature, is actually admired or followed by a bunch of angry, rebellious, sociopathic people and why Black Dragons are doing well despite Special Forces (and Red Dragons) hunting them for decades.

#mortal kombat #black dragons #kano #my replies #the worldbuilding i need so badly to know because outworld invastion and netherrealm war is not something that special forces or raiden #could keep a secret from the world right?#sorry not much to say about red dragons #i see their conflict as similar to lin kuei vs shirai ryu #both groups do the same crimes but think they are better than the other #kano is a scumbag but i can see why he is respected by fellow black dragons #and why so many people may be into working for him #when the mk universe is a pretty grim and dark world to live in #my analysis #my headcanons #(more like mix between those two)

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searedwood · 3 years

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30 Day Gay Journal Prompts

This is specifically designed for Pride Month and self celebration, but this can be for literally any other use. Except hate. No hate allowed.

Day 1- Write your preferred name(s), pronouns, nice nouns (nouns you like to be referred to as), and bad nouns (nouns you don't like to be referred to as).

Day 2- Record your triggers, from really bad to not as bad to getting over it. Add any specifications or notes if you feel like you need them. This is so you can identify what makes you uncomfortable or panicked, which will help you be able to identify and avoid a situation in which you may feel threatened, uncomfortable, or panicked.

Day 3- Make a list of signs that you are having a panic attack. This will help you be able to communicate to close friends or family members what may happen in an event you become panicked. This will also help you identify when you're having a panic attack, which will help you be able to calm down. Additionally, record some ways that will help stop the panic attack. For me, some ways of calming down are to go outside, my stuffie, breathing and grounding exercises, comfort music, and puns or jokes.

Day 4- Take some time and think about what makes you happy and relaxed. Write down your comfort music, comfort videos, and comfort characters. If you have a comfort game or movie, include that as well. This is to help you identify a source of calm, relaxation, and happiness that you can easily fall back on if you are uncomfortable or scared.

Day 5- Do some research on LGBTQIA+ labels, flags, and symbols. Write down your gender identity and what it means for you. Write down your sexual and romantic orientations as well, and what they mean for you. Additionally, draw little Pride Flags and symbols beside each label. I drew the genderfaunet flag on the inside cover of my journal, along with corresponding flowers that represent what I see in my identity, as well as what I hope to integrate into myself (Snowdrop - rebirth, Chrysanthemum - truth, Rose leaves - hope, Lilacs - growth/progress, Yarrow - healing, and Narcissus - self love)

Day 6- Write down the titles of your favorite LGBTQIA+ books, movies, TV shows, and games, or titles you want to see/read/play. Do a little digging and find out what titles sound interesting. Supporting LGBTQIA+ creators is a wonderful way to celebrate Pride.

Day 7- Journaling doesn't have to be just writing. Try drawing some LGBTQIA+ inspired art, whether it's just a few doodles, a flag or two, or a beautiful painting. Dedicate this entry to expressing yourself and your identity in a way without words.

Day 8- Write gay poetry. You may not think yourself talented or particularly good at writing poems, but that doesn't mean you should keep yourself from doing it, even for a day. Poetry is a wonderful way to bend language to your will and express yourself in a way that only you have to understand. Write a poem expressing your experience in the LGBTQIA+ community, or a poem detailing your first gay crush. Whatever you feel on your heart today, put it into beautifully unique words.

Day 9- Write about the moment you realized you weren't straight or binary. Alternatively, write about the moment you learned what the LGBTQIA+ community was. Describe your feelings and thoughts in the moment, and reflect over how they have changed and evolved over time.

Day 10- Take a moment and think about where you would be if LGBTQIA+ rights have existed all along, without the need for reform laws or protests. Write down who you think you would be, how you would live, and how easy it would be to do things you can't right now. At the same time, think about the disadvantages. Consider the lack of a fight for freedom and how that may influence your opinion or thoughts.

Day 11- Write a letter to your younger self. Tell your younger self about who you are and who you've become. Give them words of encouragement about the journey ahead. Remind your younger self that no matter what happens, you turn out to be a wonderful and beautiful person.

Day 12- Write a letter to your older self. Detail your present experience as a member/ally of the LGBTQIA+ community. Present your ideas about where the community will be moving forward and how much progress society as a whole will make. Ask yourself some questions, like "How do you celebrate your identity?" Later in the future, you can come back to this letter and respond.

Day 13- Learn some phrases or words of Polari. Polari is a critically endangered language invented by young gay men living in Britain. It was also used by circus men and theatre kids. Few LGBTQIA+ people now know of the language, so there's no better time to try to revive it.

Day 14- Do some research on Pride history. Record interesting or important events that marked the history of the LGBTQIA+ community. What happened at the first Pride Parade? Who was the first advocate for gay and lesbian marriage? What was the LGBTQIA+ community like before it was acceptable to be openly queer?

Day 15- Write a letter to those that are anti-LGBTQIA+. Explain why queer rights are humans rights. Tell them that love is love. Or, if you're feeling like letting loose that anger, just tell them off. This letter is for your eyes only, so don't be afraid to get mean if it makes you feel better.

Day 16- Take a moment and think about how you wish to represent yourself. Do you want to wear skirts and dresses? Do you prefer baggy pants and a puffy jacket? Do you like wearing makeup? How do you style your hair? Record how you currently dress and look and how you wish you could dress and look. Write about how your wishes reflect your identity.

Day 17- Write some ways you can improve on the way you treat yourself. Are you hard on yourself because you just can't make the right grade? Do you obsess over how you don't fit in to your family's standards of gender and sexuality? Give yourself some love and think about how you can be nicer to yourself. Remind yourself that school grades aren't more important than your own needs. Remember that if you are in an unhealthy relationship with friends or family, it isn't your fault.

Day 18- Write about what really makes you feel like yourself. You know better than anyone what your authentic self is. So what is it? What makes you feel really... you?

Day 19- If someone described you, what would they say? This can be anything from physical appearance to personality. This can help you think about how you present yourself to others. Do you want more people to know exactly what gender you identify as? Do you not want people to know what pronouns you prefer?

Day 20- Do some research on neopronouns. If you don't use any, perhaps you'll find a set or three you feel comfortable with (if not, that's fine!) If you can't do your own research, try making up your own set! I sometimes feel semi-feminine, like just a little teaspoon of femininity, but I don't really like she/her pronouns. So, I made for myself a set that sounds similar but isn't quite there. Xe/Xer/Xers/Xerself. The 'x' is pronounced like the 's' in 'measure.' A good way to make sure you know how to use a set of neopronouns in a sentence is to use this example I got from pronouny: Today I went to the park with xer. Xe brought xer frisbee. At least, I think it was xers. By the end of the day, xe was throwing the frisbee to xerself.

Day 21- Have you heard the phrase "black sheep of the herd"? It refers to someone that doesn't really fit in to their social group. In what ways are you the black sheep? Is it because of your identity or orientation? How can you help others to see you aren't different and shouldn't be alienated? How can you encourage people to welcome LGBTQIA+ people to the herd?

Day 22- Imagine you are teaching a class of young children about LGBTQIA+, gender, and sexual/romantic orientations. What would you say? How would you encourage them to be open minded and to explore their own identities?

Day 23- With great Pride comes great hardships. There are many obstacles and difficulties when it comes to finding your true self and figuring out your identity and orientation. What hardships have you overcome? What have you learned from them?

Day 24- One of your friends comes to you about having questions about gender identity. They are questioning their own identity and seek your help and support. List some ways you would help your friend feel supported and loved while also helping them discover their identity.

Day 25- List three things you would do if you weren't afraid. (For me, these would easily be: attending Pride Parades, advocating for queer rights, and coming out)

Day 26- Take your favorite or least favorite LGBTQIA+ ship and rewrite a scene as if they were together, or list some of your favorite queer ships.

Day 27- Discover some gender-neutral terms for things like family members, romantic partners, or honorifics (Mister, Miss, Mx.). If you can't find any you find interesting or comfortable, try creating some of your own. My pibling (parent+sibling) calls me their nibling or nibkid (NB term for sibling's child).

Day 28- Have you ever wanted to write a story? Record an idea or two, or three or four, for LGBTQIA+ stories. They can be anything from lesbian princesses to a coming-of-age trans story. Maybe you'll end up planning out your best seller!

Day 29- Think about what rights aren't granted to LGBTQIA+ people. What are they? Do they directly affect you as well? How do these lack of rights make you feel? What can you do to help advocate for these rights?

Day 30- The last day of Pride Month doesn't mean it's the last day of acceptance and love. How can you spread Pride throughout the year? How can you keep and open mind and heart and advocate for LGBTQIA+ rights? Maybe set a list of goals for yourself, things you want to keep up through the year.

#queer pride #lgbt pride #gay pride #lesbian pride #asexual pride #nonbinary pride #pride #writing prompts #journal prompts #lgbtqia #lgbt #lgbt community #love is love #gay #gay journal #queer #self love #queer representation

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linkspooky · 3 years

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Mahito = True Human

A while back I sent an anon to @kaibutsushidousha asking if there was any deeper meaning to the Kanji in Mahito’s name. It turns out that his name has a lot of significance to his character and also his role in the story. I’ll be going over the symbolic meaning of his name below. [Original post by [x], coloring by [x].]

To quote.

Mahito’s name means “true human”. Even without getting to significance of this expression to Japanese and Chinese cultures, that’s already a bold and interesting name choice, seeing that, [...] he’s implied to be not a person, but some sort of incarnated curse, working together with curse spirits interested in becoming the new form of humanity.

There’s a certain irony in Mahito’s name being read as 真人 “True Human” considering what we know of him he has an extremely low opinion of humans, and a high opinion of curses. In the latest fight against Yuji in the Shibuya arc, Mahito seems to be seeking to shed his more humanlike form like shedding his skin so he can become even more of what he considers to be a “true curse.”

Mahito’s name means true human, and he is the most humanlike of all of the intelligent curses before him and yet he seems to want nothing to do with humanity, preferring to see himself as a curse instead. He even quite literally, as I mentioned above, sheds off his own skin in order to try and take what he assumes is his true form.

Mahito’s name means true human and yet he doesn’t want to become humans. He always encourages the curses around him to act more like curses, acting illogical and on impulse.

Mahito wants to become a “true curse” the most curselike of the curses. Rather than becoming human literally, they wanted to replace the humans entirely. Mahito is a human curse, created by the hatred spewed between humans and yet not only wants to destroy humans but is also the one most eager to destroy his reflection Itadori Yuji even though he claimed they were “the same person.” There’s a certain irony in naming Mahito “True Human” when he’s constantly trying to prove that he’s anything but human.

But anyways, let’s get to what Asian traditions define as “true human”.

Starting off with Japanese history/Shintoism. In the year 684, Emperor Tenmu defined that the largest families in Japan needed to have rank attached to their family names as a way of easily expressing their social status. The eight social ranks defined by Emperor Tenmu, from the noblest to the most plebian were:

1 - Mahito (True humans) 2 - Ason (Courtiers) 3 - Sukune (Lords) 4 - Imiki (People from overseas, especially from China and Korea, who settled in early Japan and introduced Continental culture to the Japanese) 5 - Michinoshi (Artist and priest families) 6 - Omi (Retainers) 7 - Muraji (Families big and influential enough to earn a rank but not falling into any other category) 8 - Inagi (Families of regional officials responsible for rice storage)

The title of Mahito was granted only to families descended from Emperors themselves or imperial princes. Basically, only those of royal blood could be called “true humans”.

The connection to Asian traditions is clear in Mahito’s naming. Mahito is the closest thing possible to curse royalty among the curse family. He was the one set up to take leadership of the rest of the curses even after Jogo, Hanami and Dagon passed.

Mahito is also, a curse that’s been paralleled to Sukuna the so called “king of curses” several times. Mahito even presumes that they’re something like rivals. It’s probably no coincidence that lords were known as “Sukune”.

The irony of naming Mahito true human also repeats again. Mahito wants to prove he’s the most “Pureblooded” of the curses by constantly exaggerating his own curse nature, hating, and spiting others for no reason. However, he’s the most humanlike instead. Mahito is said to serve out the purpose as a mirror to humanity. “Death is a mirror for humans”, he said that in the sense that people become more self-reflective when facing death, and also the idea of mortality for humans tends to make people more eager to define who they are.

We see are lives in sharp relief and are constantly trying to define ourselves, because we have to face death. Mahito is much like that. He’s made up of human fears. Human insecurities. Human hate. The fear of other people. However, that makes him a mirror because he shows humans their own flaws. In other words Mahito regards himself as a pure blooded curse and nothing more, but Mahito more than any of the curses reflects humanity. It’s even what he does to Yuji. When Mahito and Yuji fight he tries to force the others into self reflection.

All of Mahito’s negative qualities, those are human qualities too. Mahito hates humans, but humans also despise each other. Mahito acts like a coward, but there are plenty of people who are cowards. Mahito is reflecting the worst traits of humanity and bringing them face to face, and thus acting like a mirror. We even see Mahito acting like a mirror. When he kills Nanami, in the few moments before Nanami dies, he doesn’t see Mahito standing right in front of him.

He sees Haibara. When looking at Mahito, he saw his old dead friend. Mahito was serving as a mirror for what Nanami’s thoughts at the time. No matter what Mahito strives to become as a true curse, he’ll always be a reflection of humanity because he was created by human feelings, and human projections.

Which is probably why Mahito strives to transform himself and find his true form in the first place, because he is as of right now, just a monster stitched together of other human beings with no true form, and no true purpose.

Next up, let’s talk about Taoism. The main gist of Taoism is that some people are randomly born with sacral bones in their skeletons. Sacral bones can sometimes run in the family, but can also occur in random people with no taoist heritage, regardless of class. Peole with sacral bones can seclude themselves taoist communities in isolated mountains or islands, becoming Taoists, the students of Xian arts. Xian is a title granted to a Taoist who completed their studies, turning immortal in the process.

In Taoism, Yuanshi Tianzun is the greatest being in all universe, with the Xians who serve Yuanshi Tianzun being considered good, and the Xians who oppose him being considered evil. Zhenren (”true human” in Chinese) is the name granted to the greatest Xian wizards serving under Yuanshi Tianzun. The Xians chosen as Zhenrens are people who transcended the everyday world, and reached the peak of the Tao arts.

One Taoist named Zhuang Zi made immense contribution to making the Taoist knowledge widespread by writing a book also named Zhuang Zi. In his self-title book, Zhuang Zi defines a “true human” as person who mastered the Tao’s ideals, or more specifically, “a person who meekly obeys the heaven’s decree, accepts everything as natural, lets go of all prejudice and confrontationism, and lives under the taoist mindset that all things are of equal value”.

The process of Sacral bones resembles Jujutsu Sorcerery technique heritage a lot, but besides that there’s a lot of resemblance between Tao’s ideals and Mahito’s own ideals. Specifically about the equality of life.

Mahito seeslife as something without necessary meaning or value. Life simply circles. The life of a butterfly or an ant is just as important as the life of a human being. In a world where everything is just trying to survive and live to the next today, it might just be human folly to assume we’re somehow outside of the food chain of the planet we share with all other life. You could take “All life is equal” to mean two things, all life is equally precious, or all life is equally worthless. Guess which one Mahito takes.

A taoist accepts everything as natural, and Mahito seems to submit himself to natural law. He calls the three curse spirits which are basically just nature spirits to be his closest friends. Jogo, Hanami, Dagon, they’re all just representative of the naural world around them.

Mahito also describes life as just one more facet of nature.

All life is equal. All life is the same. All life is equally worthless. A wolf killing a rabbit isn’t cruel. If the wolf doesn’t kill the rabbit they’ll starve. If the rabbit escapes they’ll live to the next day. If it doesn’t the wolf does. Everything in this world is just trying to live - which is why Mahito doesn’t see the battle between curses and humans as a battle between good and evil. Curses are trying to replace humans, so they can live freely in the world the same way humans do.

It’s a battle for survival. There’s no good or evil between the wolf and the rabbit, both of them are just fighting each other in order to survive. However, if Mahito really wants to follow natural laws that means he’s also a part of the same nature.

There’s a flaw in Mahito’s thinking. He decries humans for being self important, and reasoning that they’re somehow more worthy of life than other animals or even curses. Mahito believes that if he’s stronger than Yuji, he should have the right to kill him in order so that he can live. However, Mahito doesn’t handle it very well when he’s on the other side. Might makes right, is a logic that means whenever you’re stronger, what you think is the right thing. However, what most don’t consider is that if you’re weak it also means you have to submit to somebody else.

Mahito never even considered the idea that he might be the prey. His logic is all might makes right, the stronger person has to live, but he also assumed he’d be the stronger one. When it turns out he’s weaker, and he’s the one whose about to die, he ends up running for his life. Despite basically justifying himself and doing whatever he wanted when he was on top, he can’t handle being at the bottom of the food chain, he can’t submit to being weak. Which is why we see his sudden panic when he realizes he’s the prey this time. This is also, something that contradicts what Jogo says.

Curses do not fear death. However, Mahito does. Which means in this moment as he’s running away, Mahito is acting more like a human than a curse. He assumed his life was more important in the grand scheme of things, just like humans have a tendency to do, and doesn’t want to be eaten like a rabbit so Yuji can survive to the next day.

Last but not least, Buddhism defines “true human” as a person who opened their eyes to the Truth and perfected their personhood. Both Buddhas and Arhats qualify as “true humans” by that definition. Gojou is another character with heavy Buddhist motifs on his name...

This could be a connection with two ideas in Mahito’s character. Number one, he’s always trying to perfect himself and lift himself up to the highest level possible. His Domain is even called “Self Embodiment of Perfection.” You get the sense that in tinkering with others, distorting the shape and form of others he’s trying to find the true perfect shape of himself.

The second is his connection to Gojo. This is also just a theory as we don’t know exactly what the six-eyes do, but it’s heavily suggested that both Mahito and Gojo are able to see both the “soul” something that is impossible for all other curses and jujutsu sorcerers to do.

Mahito’s able to see the soul most likely just because of what he is, a reflection of humans, and how his cursed technique resolves around warping the shape of the soul in order to change the body. Gojo is at least able to see Geto’s cursed energy with his six eyes, when he’s replaced by Getwo. The two of them have special insight to the soul that no other characters have thus they are “true seeing” in a budhist sense. They are also both characters trying to perfect their personhood, Gojo is the ideal jujutsu sorcerer and Mahito longs to be the ideal curse.

So, there’s a lot of connections to asian traditions present in naming Mahito “True Human”, but there’s also a lot of ironies too. Mahito as always is a walking contradiction, and that quality of his is what makes him all the more human.

#jjk meta #jujutsu kaisen meta #mahito #jogo #sukuna #itadori yuji #curses #king of curses #jujutsu kaisen theory #jujutsu kaisen analysis #jujutsu kaisen curse #long post

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mostlysignssomeportents · 3 years

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The future is symmetrical

When Mitch Kapor articulated the principle that “architecture is politics” at the founding of EFF, he was charging technologists with the moral duty to contemplate the kinds of social interactions their technological decisions would facilitate — and prohibit.

At question was nothing less than the character of the networked society. Would the vast, pluripotent, general purpose, interconnected network serve as a glorified video-on-demand service, the world’s greatest pornography distribution system, a giant high-tech mall?

Or could it be a public square, and if so, who would have the loudest voices in that square, who would be excluded from it, who will set its rules, and how will they be enforced?

As with its technical architecture, the political architecture of the net is a stack, encompassing everything from antitrust enforcement to spectrum allocation, protocol design to search-and-seizure laws, standards to top-level domain governance.

Among those many considerations is the absolutely vital question of service delivery itself. What kinds of wires or radio waves will carry your packets, who will own them, and how will they be configured?

For decades, a quiet war has been fought on this front, with two sides: the side that sees internet users as “mouse potatoes,” destined to passively absorb information feeds compiled by their betters; and the “netizen” side that envisions a truly participatory network design.

This deep division has been with us since the internet’s prehistory, at least since the fight over Usenet’s alt.* hierarchy, flaring up again during the P2P wars, with ISPs insisting that users were violating their “agreements” by running “servers.”

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/11/altinteroperabilityadversarial

Above all, this fight was waged in the deployment of home internet service. The decision turn the already-monopolistic cable and phone operators into ISPs cast a long shadow. Both of these industries think of their customers as passive information consumers, not participants.

As an entertainment exec in William Gibson’s 1992 novel Idoru describes her audience: “Best visualized as a vicious, lazy, profoundly ignorant, perpetually hungry organism craving the warm god-flesh of the anointed. Personally I like to imagine something the size of a baby hippo, the color of a week-old boiled potato, that lives by itself, in the dark, in a double-wide on the outskirts of Topeka. It’s covered with eyes and it sweats constantly. The sweat runs into those eyes and makes them sting. It has no mouth…no genitals, and can only express its mute extremes of murderous rage and infantile desire by changing the channels on a universal remote. Or by voting in presidential elections.”

Contrast this with the other cyberpunk archetype, the console cowboy who doesn’t merely surf the digital, but steers it — the active participant in the technological/media environment who is more than a recipient of others’ crafted messages.

For a long time, Big Tech and Big Telco tried to have it both ways. AT&T promoted teleconferencing and remote family life conducted by videophones in its 1993 “You Will” marketing campaign. Youtube exhorted you to “broadcast yourself.”

But AT&T also set data-caps, kicked users off for running servers, and engaged in every legal, semi-legal and outright illegal tactic imaginable to block high-speed fiber networks.

Youtube, meanwhile, blocked interoperability, leveraged vertical integration with Google search to exclude and starve competitors, and conspired with Big Content to create a “content moderation” system that’s two parts Kafka, one part Keystone Kops.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/12/fairy-use-tale/#content-id

While the questions raised by broad participation in networked society are thorny and complex, one question actually has a very simple and factual answer: “How should we connect our homes to the internet?” The answer: “Fiber.”

There is no wireless that can substitute for fiber. Wireless — 5G, Starlink, whatever — shares the same spectrum. We can make spectrum use more efficient (by tightly transmitting the wireless signals so they don’t interfere), but physics sets hard limits on wireless speeds.

Each strand of wire in a wired network, by contrast, is its own pocket universe, insulated from the next wire, with its own smaller, but exclusive, electromagnetic spectrum to use without interfering with any other wire on the other side of its insulation.

But copper wire also has hard limits that are set by physics. The fastest theoretical copper data throughput is an infinitesimal fraction of the fastest fiber speeds. Fiber is millions-to-hundreds-of-millions times faster than copper.

https://www.eff.org/wp/case-fiber-home-today-why-fiber-superior-medium-21st-century-broadband

We should never run copper under another city street or along another pole. Any savings from maintaining 20th century network infrastructure will be eradicated by the cost of having to do twice the work to replace it with 21st century fiber in the foreseeable future.

Trying to wring performance gains out of copper in the age of fiber is like trying to improve the design of whale-oil lamps to stave off the expense of electrification. Sure, you don’t want anyone sitting in the dark but even the very best whale-oil lamp is already obsolete.

But besides future-proofing, there’s another reason to demand fiber over copper or wireless: symmetry. Our copper and (especially) wireless infrastructure is optimized for sending data to end-points, not getting data back. It’s mouse-potato broadband.

(this is especially true of any satellite broadband, which typically relies upon copper lines for its “return path,” and even when it doesn’t, has much slower uplinks that downlinks)

By contrast, fiber tends to be symmetrical — providing the same download and upload speeds. It is participatory broadband, suited for a world of distance ed, remote work, telemedicine, and cultural and political participation for all.

Fiber is so obviously better than copper or wireless that America paltry fiber rollouts needed to be engineered — they never would have happened on their own. The most critical piece of anti-fiber engineering is US regulators’ definition of broadband itself.

Since the dawn FCC interest in universal broadband, it adopted a technical definition of broadband that is asymmetrical, with far lower upload than download speeds. Despite lockdown and broadband-only connections to the outside world, Congress is set to continue this.

The latest iteration of the Democrats’ broadband bill defines “broadband” as any connection that is 100mb down and 20mb up (“100/20”). Both of these speeds paltry to the point of uselessness, but the upload speed is genuinely terrible.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/07/future-symmetrical-high-speed-internet-speeds

US broadband usage has grown 21%/year since the 1980s. 100/20 broadband is inadequate for today’s applications — let alone tomorrow’s (by contrast, fiber is fast enough to last through the entire 21st century’s projected broadband demand and beyond, well into the 2100s).

Any wireless applications will also depend on fiber — your 5G devices have to be connected to something, and if that something is copper, your wireless speeds will never exceed copper’s maximum speeds. Innovation in spectrum management requires fiber — it doesn’t obviate it.

Today, the highest growth in broadband demand is in uploads, not downloads. People need fast uploads speeds to videoconference, to stream their games, to do remote work. The only way a 100/20 copper network’s upload speeds can be improved is by connecting it with fiber.

Every dollar spent on copper rollout is a dollar we’ll forfeit in a few years. It’s true that cable monopolists will wring a few billions out of us if we keep making do with their old copper, but upgrading copper just makes the inevitable fiber transition costlier.

China is nearing its goal of connecting 1 billion people to fiber. In America, millions are stuck with copper infrastructure literally consisting of century-old wires wrapped in newspaper, dipped in tar, and draped over tree-banches.

https://mn.gov/commerce-stat/pdfs/frontier-service-quality-report-final.pdf

Indeed, when it comes to America, monopoly carriers are slowing upload speeds — take Altice, the US’s fourth-largest ISP, which slashed its upload speeds by 89% “in line with competitors’ offerings.”

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/27/immortan-altice/#broadband-is-a-human-right

America desperately needs a high-fiber diet:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/30/fight-for-44/#slowpokes

But it has a major blockage: the American right, who have conducted history’s greatest self-own by carrying water for telecoms monopolists, blocking municipal fiber:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/01/17/turner-diaries-fanfic/#1a-fiber

It’s darkly funny to see the people who demanded that “government stay out of my internet” now rail against monopoly social media’s censorship, given that a government ISP would be bound by the First Amendment, unlike Facebook or Twitter.

Luckily, Congress isn’t the only place where this debate is taking place. In California, Governor Newsom has unveiled an ambitious plan to connect every city and town to blazing-fast fiber, then help cities and counties get it to every home.

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/15/how-to-rob-a-bank/#fiber-now

In tech circles, we use the term “read-only” to refer to blowhards who won’t let you get a word-in edgewise (this being one of the more prominent and unfortunate technical archetypes).

The “consumer” envisioned by asymmetrical broadband futures is write*-only — someone designed to have other peoples’ ideas crammed into their eyeballs, for their passive absorption. A consumer, not a citizen.

As Gibson put it, it’s a person who “can only express its mute extremes of murderous rage and infantile desire by changing the channels on a universal remote.”

Cyberpunk is a warning, not a suggestion.

#pluralistic

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hannawatchesesc · 4 years

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Kinda a (long) rant about this movie situation.

I have seen a lot of posts (mainly from States) saying that Europeans are way too sensitive about this Fire Saga what ever situation, that the movie should be taken with a sense of humour, and that people from States doesn't even care about our stupid competition (when joked that they made this movie because of jealousy.)

Please note that this isn't the end of the world, or the most pressing issue to be solved, and Eurovision fandom surely knows it. Still, it doesn't change the fact, that this movie wasn't the Eurovision representation we hoped for.

TL;DR in the end

So here me out.

I'm not even ashamed to say, that this Eurovision movie didn't spark a joy in me, and that I'm tired of people who don't understand Europe, and the worth of Eurovision for this continent.

Eurovision is one (1) single thing, that honestly unites Europe. The European Union consists 27 countries, and the whole continent 51. There are about 750 million people living here, and about 450 million in the Union. So obviously the cultural differences here are huge.

These 51 countries includes: one of the most powerful countries in the world, a dictatorship, few countries with worrying state of democracy. Poor countries, rich countries, welfare states, countries which have faced a devastating humanitarian crises and wars no longer than 30 years ago, old countries, and countries not older than 10 years.

Creating unified European identity is really hard, even within the Union. And we are always compared to other parts of the world as the European Union. Sure, it's a great comparison since the Union and the States are approximately same size in population, but this erases the fact that there are 27 independent nation states in the Union with their own norms, laws and leaders. Not to mention, that Europe ≠ European Union.

We don't have sports, politics, religions or even cultures, which could unify whole continet. So to be able to unite it once a year is a miracle, that shouldn't be belittled or say that it is useless.

Eurovision has a long, succesful history of doing this. First contest was held in 1956, to unify war torn continent. Lets not forget, Europe was devided ideologically and politically. Old enemies were suddenly friends, and old friends were now enemies. Many countries were in ruins both literally and figuratively. It's not a small thing if a song contest is able to do this barely a decade after a world war tore through whole Europe, and keeps doing so six decades later.

ESC might be silly and over the top, but it's our silly and over the top. It's one thing Europeans can discuss with each other and everyone can understand the concept. It's a safe platform for marginalized groups to show their art and communities in a very large and public place, and in countries that tries to deny those communities. It isn't only about the music, it's about the possibility to share our cultures as well as be as freely who we are, when not everyone has right to do so in their every day life. Eurovision isn't without a flaws, but it has shown it's commitment to human rights more than once in recent years.

Eurovision is also a few of those things, that is truly ours (and Australians, but you know.) We live in a world full of news about US. Past four years I don't remember a single day reading/watching our national news and not seeing news from across the pond.

Sure US politics have been kinda crazy lately, but I have a hunch, that most of people there cannot tell as much about a European country's (not UK) politics, as Europeans can about US politics. We read, write and post about problematic politics in the States constantly, and worry how their foreign policy desicions will affect our countries.

And it is not just about politics. We watch American movies, tv shows, read American books, eat American foods and follow American celebrities. We use US based platforms; US based companies collect and sell our data. To be able to understand (internet) culture we need to speak English and understand how the States works as a society.

We live in very US centric world right now, that is unavoidable, but I wish Americans would regonise that. There are many issues in US that are not relatable in European countries (example gun violence, or electoral colleges). We have own problems in our countries, and yet we still need to hear about and understand yours all the time, whether we wanted it or not.

Eurovision is one piece of culture that is just European. There is a reason why we don't want Americans to be involved. We don't really care if you don't care, we are going to make these jokes anyways, because we have to care so much about your problems and culture. This is our moment to atleast pretend that US doesn't matter. Once a year we can be in our own bubble without worrying if there is going to be nuclear war next week.

So sure, we are going to be salty and sensitive about this, but it is going to be a big of a deal for like 6 days max. We are going to return to post about BLM, and gun laws and Donald Trump. But I think we have a right to be salty. Some Americans (who don't even care about our stupid competition) made a movie about our thing, made some beginner level mistakes and used the most tired European/Eurovision stereotypes.

Will Farrell maybe great guy and Eurovision fan, but it isn't the same. I know they probably tried their best to make this fun and light, but it wasn't probably the best way to tell about Eurovision for wider audience.

Maybe, just maybe this could have been our movie to make, and our story to tell? There isn't that many European movies about Superbowl, is there?

TL;DR

Living in the US Centric world is really tiring sometimes as we need to learn and understand at least our own countries and US politics and cultures, and stress about said politics' effects on our countries and continent. Beside that, we have our neigbouring countries and European Union to worry about.

Eurovision is one thing that unifies Europe and its vastly different countries. It's okay not to understand it, but being disrespectful about it is just super rude. Europe is full of problematic shit and we know it, but Eurovision isn't one of them, so just leave it alone.

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eddie-redmayne-italian-blog · 4 years

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Eddie's interview from Style Magazine

By Valentina Ravizza

Photo: Boo George

Styling by Fabio Immediato.

Translate by me from Italian to English

HE WOULD HAVE had to spend the holiday in Italy,” I have a real obsession for your country “,Eddie Redmayne responds from a gray London,” more suited to my pale complexion”, and tells for the first time (and I try to collect my own thoughts) of his next character, the American activist Tom Hayden, protagonist of the protests against the Vietnam war in 1968 and 77e trial of the Chicago 7, the new film by Aaron Sorkin, arriving on Netflix from October 16. "Democracy is something extraordinarily beautiful and complex, nothing comes easily, we must defend our freedoms if we don't want them to be taken away from us."

It can be risky for an actor to take a public position, Aren't you afraid to undermine your popularity?

“The truth is, I'm not afraid to take sides, we all should. I feel a social responsibility as a human being: today more than ever we should ask politicians certain questions. I'm not one who particularly likes to take risks unless it's for something I deeply believe in.”

For exemple?

To play Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything I met several people affected by ALS and doctors who helped me to learn more about the disease, and now I am among the supporters of the Motor Neurone Disease Association. During the lockdown in Britain was made a list of vulnerable people and I found it shocking that patients with motor neuron disease were not part of it, so I spoke to several politicians and went to help them. As an actor my voice has more chances to be heard and I can bring more light on this topics, I have to do it.

Also politicians as in the case of The Trial of Chicago 7?

This film tells how we got rights by changing wrong laws and remember that progress could have gone in one direction rather than another.

Is there any similarity between the protests of the 1960s and those of movements such as Black Lives Matter ?

There are moments in history when people ask for society to really represent them and that's exactly what happened then and what many people are doing in these months. The demonstrations mentioned in the movie were against the Vietnam war, but also supported the claims of the civil rights and feminist movements, the one against which they are protesting today has it’s roots in systemic racism, so the similarities are many.And there are also several other parallels between the two political situations: at the 1968 Democratic convention there was a former vice president, Hubert H. Humphrey, right-hand man of Lyndon Johnson, who ran for the White House, as today former Vice President Joe Biden is in running, and there was a Republican candidate for president who was betting for “law and order” , then it was Richard Nixon, now the same campaign is being carried out by Donald Trump.

Today there is social media, what would have happened if Tom Hayden and the others from Chicago had it?

Hard to say, myself I don't use them . While they represent a great tool of democracy that gives everyone a voice from the shore to power, they also contribute to exacerbate and amplify the falsehoods and prejudices of those who listen only to what they want to hear, in a sort of echo chamber, and they can be used to manipulate things in a very pervasive way.

Is it more difficult to play a figure you esteem like Hayden or one you despise?

I try not to judge, to dissociate my sense of reality to recreate hers. I do as much research as possible, accumulating a lot of information and then throwing everything away and play only what's in the script, hoping that all the prep work has been absorbed somehow into my body, And knowing that that movie will never be. a documentary: I am creating a painting, not a photograph. For this I must accept that I will never be able to be exactly that person, that in something I will necessarily fail.

And when the character is a pure author’s Fantasy product?

It’s like when you were told at school to make a free written essay: I hated it, I said “please, give me a lead!”, In these cases I try first of all to understand what the boundaries are, to find some elements of truth: for example, in the saga of the Fantastic Beasts to become the "Magizoologist" Newt Scamander I started by observing the work of zoologists.

How is it divided between entertainment and committed movies?

In my choices I have always let myself be guided by instinct: I read a script that my body reacts, I get excited, I laugh, I am touched to the point of seeing myself in the role of that and than understand that I really have to do it.

Did the same happen with Tom Hayden?

They first told me about it three years ago while I was on vacation in Morocco, when told me it was Sorkin who wanted me it was like a dream come true. I read the script and it not only ran , but it had a kind of syncopated rhythm I immediately loved it. Then when I got better informed about the project, I found out that it had been written years ago and I couldn't believe he hadn't seen the light yet.

In fact, the first draft is from 2007.

We wondered if this movie had an audience, if it was current enough.Instead with what’s going it has become more and more pressing

So much so that in order to release it this year, given the health emergency Paramount Pictures has decided to sell the film to Netflix (56 millions of dollars) to be distributed directly via streaming.

There could be no better way than Netflix to reach as many people as possible. And I say this as a passionate cinemas’ lover . Unfortunately in the last 20 years I have witnessed a general loss of attention span: there is always a new story to know, we are constantly being pulled in different directions, and instead find ourselves in a cinema hall being forced to sit there for two hours and half even when our attention tries to escape, it’s a kind of pleasant claustrophobia.

And theater, is it still part of your life?

I know that more years go by without me returning to the stage more what I’ll say l’ll sound insincere, but yes, my career started from there, I spent 5 o 6 years working in London theaters. I knew almost nothing about cinema until that world began to open its doors to me, I had to learn a lot on the set. I’ve been looking for a theatrical project, but so far what has been proposed to me are works by the greatest authors, and instead I’d like do something new, fresh. Maybe I found it, but I still can't say anything.

Have you ever thought of letting yourself be taken one day by another passion besides acting?

My other great love is art, but if I ever have to work on it, I imagine myself more as a curator than as a co-worker. But I honestly think that being an actor is extraordinary: whatever part you encounter on your path continues to grow:although sure it’s a wild life and it's a drug.

Are you a workaholic?

In the beginning I was because I had no alternative: I was constantly auditioning and once I got a part immediately got to work, Until in this unfair world of acting there came a moment when I was suddenly successful and overnight I finally had the opportunity to choose. Many people are looking forward to retirement, I hope I’m offered roles even when I’m 80 years old.

At that age maybe you will also be behind the camera?

I'm a bit of a control freak,so yes, I could potentially one day go directing, even just out of curiosity But only if I had to find the right project, something in which I feel safe,

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meloncubedradpops · 4 years

Text

Repo! the Corona Opera: Part Two Fascist Boogaloo

Greetings fellow Repo! fans,

Here is my second installment of a series of three essays where I compare our contemporary times with the movie Repo! the Genetic Opera. My first piece detailed the similarities between the two worlds, and turns out, I have an awful lot to talk about still. I ended my last article by posing the question, "What went wrong in this dystopia to normalize the concept of death due to nonpayment?" No doubt, this movie is incredibly outrageous on many fronts, particularly within the dynamics of the Largo family. As mentioned in the previous piece, I highlighted the pervasiveness of GeneCo's power and influence towards the citizens in the city (is it called city of GeneCo? GeneCo-land? GenCity? An actual city in Italy??).

People who write stories often bend the rules to make their story compelling. Be it exaggerating social interactions, creating scientifically impossible scenarios, or even allowing the characters to use technology that does not exist yet. I admit the creators of Repo! applied all those tactics and more, which makes the parallels I draw that much more surreal. I want to acknowledge this before I dive deeper because yes, I truly think it would be impossible to have a company who can offer cheap and dirty surgeries with an absence of debilitating class action lawsuits resulting from botched procedures, infection, or their body rejecting the organ transplant. And while I admit Zydrate does not exist, yet, but we do have a long history with opioid abuse. If you asked me when I first watched the movie if I think the Largo family could be a mirror of an ultra wealthy family from real life, I would have politely disagreed with you. But times right now are freaking weird. A single day does not go by where something completely outlandish is blasted all over the news, particularly in the United States.

In my last essay I pointed out examples where the citizens in GenCity live a life after experiencing a mass extinction event. Besides the technological anachronisms, society and GeneCo have an uncomfortably close relationship with each other. GeneCo is not merely a corporation that offers healthcare and surgeries, it has an unyielding power politically too. I argue that GenCity is ran by a fascist government that is controlled and operated by GeneCo.

If you're not a person who is super familiar with fascism, basically it's an extremist right wing government philosophy. I find it interesting that in the song "21st Century Cure", Graverobber says: Industrialization has crippled the globe. Although plagues, war, and other hardships existed before industrialization, that paradigm of change accelerated the imbalances between man and nature. Fascism did not exist until after World War I, after all. Between the world war itself and the Spanish Flu of 1918, there was a lot of pain and suffering felt all over the world. Fascists took advantage of vulnerable populations and asserted that their political party is the only correct party, and those who oppose are considered an enemy. Historically fascist governments have blurred the lines between the spheres of what's considered "public" and "private", and often danced harmoniously with business allies in pursuit of profit. As an effect, fascist governments have required citizens to foot the bill of a private company's losses. With enough propaganda, fascist governments will have you believing that this is ultimately for the betterment of everyone. And if you give them enough time, they will normalize terrible acts against humanity that barely make a peep, if the truth even comes to light.

For the rest of this essay, I will be highlighting examples in the Repo! movie that correspond with characteristics of fascism, using political scientist Dr. Lawrence Britt's The 14 Characteristics Of Fascism, which was published in the spring 2003 issue of Free Inquiry magazine.

The 14 characteristics are:

1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism: Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.

The world surrounding GeneCo occupies itself with the concept that this incorporated area derives a sense of nationalism, in the absence of much dissent. If you see below, there is an advertisement on the top right corner that says, "Your Birthplace for a new Heredity". GeneCo is not just a company that sells organs and surgeries. It is its own incorporated city. This ad, combined with GeneCo's relentless messaging that not only did this company save humanity, you must conform to the idea that only GeneCo can provide you the experience of feeling clean, safe, and perfect.

2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.

Being able to legally repossess someone's organs because they didn't make their organ payments is about as disdainful as you can get. Nathan has a whole song called "Legal Assassin", and there doesn't appear to be many laws that would at least have the pretense that these repossessions are remotely humane. There are multiple instances in the movie where Nathan approaches a client who is already restrained, panicked, and powerless. From what I can gather from the media in Gencity, GeneCo proliferates the idea that the company would be dysfunctional if people could get financed surgeries and let those payments go to collections. When you're a mega corporation, they let you do it.

3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause: The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.

While the career of a Graverobber is certainly creepy and macabre, the idea that they could be executed without a jury of their peers is especially strange. After I created my last essay, my friend Veronica pointed out, that per "A Needle Into A Bug", one of the deleted scenes from the movie, that street zydrate is not actually derived from the brains of dead people. He extracts zydrate from bugs that nest inside the craniums of dead people, which in my opinion is a huge distinction. So who is he really stealing from? Is it morally okay to dig up a corpse to get drug goo to sell to junkies? Absolutely not, and the idea is incredibly disrespectful for the dead. And while I am sure there are graverobbers in this world that likely steal things like jewelry from corpses, I still wouldn't justify being executed extrajudicially.

Further, Graverobber's relationship with the Largo family has me believing even more that GeneCo needs them more than their media campaign can justify. Rotti has access to incredible surveillance of the city, so you would think he would eliminate anyone who enabled Amber Sweet's addiction. My theory is GeneCo knows that street zydrate may result in more surgery sales. However they want to continue making money selling the lab-grown stuff. So the end justifies the means, if we can associate graverobbers and those who use street zydrate as criminals, we can continue believing that "they" are the enemies setting everyone else back.

4. Supremacy of the Military: Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized. AND 12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment: Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.

GeneCo employs a private police force to carry out law enforcement. They patrol around a graveyard, a quasi-public space carved out for those who mourn. And because there is pervasive video surveillance, Rotti can demand that they do his bidding at any time. An example is his order to murder the repo man. We aren't aware of any sort of involvement beyond the borders of GenCity, but even the concept of a graveyard being a warzone is a special kind of hell.

5. Rampant Sexism- The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy.

Genterns! On the surface, it’s pretty cool that there is a large volume of female medical professionals who are skilled enough to carry out surgeries. However behind the sexy veneer is the reality that Genterns are not set up for success. They are not provided adequate PPE and work under non-sterile conditions. In the "Mark it Up" scene, one is killed by Luigi. Imagine going to medical school for years and years, only to be tasked with the job of organ warehouse worker. Then on one of your shifts you are stabbed to death because the CEO's son bumped into you while you were working. Not only that, but you are also expected to dress proactively for the purpose of selling the GeneCo product and experience.

6. Controlled Mass Media: Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common. GeneCo has a monopoly on the media of the city. Politics, entertainment, healthcare, you name it, they have a direct stake in, and control over, the media. We do see from time-to-time tabloid clippings of the Largo family. But generally speaking, GeneCo puts a lot of effort in upholding their image. The best evidence is Blind Mag's story. She is a singer who acquired the ability to see after a GeneCo cornea surgery. And while she clocked into work day in and day out, singing and advertising for GeneCo for 17+ years, her departure resulted in Rotti murdering her. But why? Was he afraid of the things she would say? Rotti knew he was terminally ill when she declared her resignation, and yet killing her on stage is somehow less of a scandal?

7. Obsession with National Security: Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses. Fascist countries use fear as a tactic to keep the masses scared and compliant. The universe of Repo! is one filled with tragedy. Millions of people have died. I would imagine that the series of events that would lead to the creation and success of GeneCo was contingent upon people being scared for their lives. While dealing with the coronavirus, I find myself constantly checking my temperature, keeping my distance from people, and wearing a mask out in public. The human spirit is resilient, which is how we have survived so long. However sociopaths smell our fear and use it against us. The city of GeneCo is surrounded by plots upon plots of graveyards, signifying the carnage left after their public health crisis. I have a strong feeling that GeneCo was able to harness the threat of whatever caused the massive organ failure epidemic and as an effect created a power vacuum.

8. Religion and Government are Intertwined: Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.

This one is going to be a reach, particularly because there is an absence of religion in this story. I don't think religion would be on the creator's of Repo!'s purview, and honestly I don't blame them. If you look at the imagery of the story, however, it is very gothic. We have no idea if religion survives, and if it does, to what extent. I would imagine that people still have spiritual needs, and I argue that the GeneCo Opera is an example of how they get that fulfilled.

"If you want it, baby, GeneCo's got it"

The GeneCo opera is not your typical opera experience. GeneCo specifically tells their customers to "testify". People are singing in unison, praising GeneCo. Clearly GeneCo has taken several human rituals and blended them together to create an over-the-top entertainment experience that seeks to advertise their company behind the testimonials of its patrons. The benefits of the opera for GeneCo, as a fascist entity, are two-fold: have people associate their most nirvana moments with an experience only GeneCo can offer (zydrate and surgery), and distract them with religious-like concerts so they won't question their neighbors being murdered on the streets by that very same company.

9. Corporate Power is Protected: The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite. AND 13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption: Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.

Throughout the entire movie, the Largo family is front and center. We know Rotti is terminally ill, and he utilizes his final moments to tie up loose ends in his life. His children feel entitled to his estate and the company of GeneCo. At no point do we see Rotti consult with a board of directors at GeneCo, a private fiduciary firm, or with any government entity. I would describe the company of GeneCo to be a weird combination of an aristocracy, government body, and corporation. His children commit crimes with no recourse or justice. Rotti kills the doctor who tells him he's dying. Luigi kills multiple people throughout the movie. In one of the opening scenes, we see a photograph showing Pavi is cutting off a woman's face. In the credits we see Amber's body guards lying dead on the floor during her press statement. What sort of corruption took place to make these occurrences so prevalent and normalized?

10. Labor Power is Suppressed: Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.

We aren't super privy to the machinations that make this city functional. But there is a clear stratification that has sustained itself long enough that healthcare is not a right in this city, and those who can't pay for necessary healthcare can finance it. In a just society, if we have the means to save humanity, we can figure out a way to pay for it. Be it taxes on the most wealthy or other cost-saving measures, if there is a will, there is a way. However if you give a company enough power and money, it will do everything it can to stay on top. The best examples I can think of would be Nathan and Blind Mag's tenuous career at GeneCo. Neither really wanted the job they were given, but they were forced into those positions by Rotti. Had Bling Mag belonged to a entertainment union, would she have had more protections? Would a proper investigation into the murder of Marni result in justice being served, and the opportunity for Nathan to live a better adjusted life? Rotti masterfully manipulates situations that create powerless outcomes for his employees.

11. Disdain for Intellectuals: Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts We don't see any particular evidence that GeneCo is currently hostile to higher education or academia. What we do know is the technologies of this world are akin to something we'd see out of the 20th century. However GeneCo is advanced enough to synthesize usable organs. In my last essay, I drew parallels to today by highlighting that there may have been a "brain drain" of intellectualism as a result of academics dying from their public health crisis. Outside of the opera house, we don't see many examples of art in this world. Maybe this is what happens when a government stops funding programs it deems frivolous or challenges the status quo?

14. Fraudulent Elections: Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.

Based off context clues in the movie, we know that there is a group of voting citizens who help determine whether or not a company can repossess financed organs that are passed due on their payments. We don't know who makes these votes, the election process, or anything like that. So it is hard to say if GeneCo goes beyond their media campaign convincing voters to keep repossessions legal. Despite this lack of knowledge, I would argue that GeneCo wields incredible power regarding the course of elections for laws that apply to them. Okay, you want to pass a law to make organ repossession illegal? Fine, we don't have to offer products on a payment plan. The very threat of being able to take away healthcare is something right wing governments loveeee doing.

Speaking of elections, the United States 2020 general election is approaching. Now that I argued the ways that GeneCo is fascist, I will tie together ideas from both of these essays into a final piece that I hope you will like. If you enjoyed this article, please send it to all your Repo! friends.

#repo! the genetic opera #repo #Fascism #halloween #election #geneco #politics #horror #2020 #coronavirus #zydrate #musicals

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mountphoenixrp · 3 years

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We have a new citizen in Mount Phoenix:

Rafaela Lee Garcia, who is known by no other name, a 26 year old daughter of Huracan. She is an investor and the director of Mount Phoenix Bank.

FC NAME/GROUP: Kang Seulgi / Red Velvet CHARACTER NAME: Rafaela Lee García AGE/DATE OF BIRTH: November 8th, 1994 PLACE OF BIRTH: Tampa, Florida, the USA OCCUPATION: business investor, Director of Mount Phoenix Bank (MPB) HEIGHT: 162cm DEFINING FEATURES:

a well-proportioned figure, broad shoulder; hooded, upturned eyes that tend to completely close when she smiles; full cheeks; round chin

a faint scar on the inner side of her left wrist

PERSONALITY: Rafaela will never be satisfied with being inferior. Authoritative, charismatic, shrewd, calculating, and somewhat manipulative, she’s living to follow her own dreams and ambitions. Her hard-earned grit and self-esteem turn her into a disciplined and dignified individual. Being prudent with strong leadership, she takes herself and her doings very seriously. She’s more than willing to work hard and give everything she’s got for the sake of success, yet at the same time showing respect to people, the law, and work ethic.

While looking stern and composed most of the time, Rafaela still sees herself as fun-loving and approachable. Her whimsicality and sense of humour may surprise others, whereas her intense desire for privacy can perplex even those who are close to her. She prefers to mind her own business and have fun with people she cares for at times, and what she wants from others is respect and not attention. In short, people can try to pay tribute or validation to her, but they shouldn’t expect true gratitude or appreciation from her in return.

Far beyond that calm and powerful facade is a great deal of anxiety and confusion. Rafaela knows well that she’s here to strive for success and status since that seems to be the only way to keep her going. Until now, when she’s done with self-pitying and blaming the world for her weaknesses, she’s still struggling to find what makes her genuinely happy. While she’s got rather healthy self esteem but a quite serious trust issue, and she still needs to learn the true meaning of self-love and, to a further extent, love for other people.

HISTORY: TW: mention of mental disorder, self-harm, sexual harassment, abortion

Rafaela’s birth coincided with the formation of the Gordon, a devastating hurricane, in the southwestern Caribbean. Her mother always included that fact in the explanation, convincing exclusively to her, for Rafaela’s thunderous vagitus and later, her forcefulness.

Being a middle child and the only daughter of a Spanish-American hotel-resort group owner and his young Korean wife, little Cordelia received too much yet too little attention from the world. Intense sibling rivalry, constant peer pressure, and lack of life purpose were the major theme of Rafaela’s life growing up among the brilliant García boys. As a kid, she didn’t mind that at all. The bright side of being the only girl in the family was still enjoyable, as long as she kept being good enough to maintain a decent amount of attention on her existence.

Unfortunately, innocence could never last long. The early adolescent years mercilessly knocked out Rafaela’s sunny core, pushing her right down the bottomless hole of depression. They said she was just another rich kid dealing with trivial struggles typical of her age, and she also believed it. Hence, she did what a teenager in her inexplicable quarter-life crisis would do. Each decision made came out worse than the last, confirming the label that had been unfairly - or fairly? - sealed on her. Spoiled brat, attention whore, brainless rebel, drama queen. Ironically, she had never been or felt like a queen, definitely not at home, and only in her wishful thinking at school. Top education and affluent background didn’t make the kids any nicer, and with her stubborn quietness, Rafaela effortlessly turned herself into an outcast.

One day, at the tender sixteen, when the love letter she wrote to her classmate, a sweet girl with an angelic face, was read aloud in the middle of the school cafeteria at lunchtime, Rafaela revenged herself with a razor. Today, that stupid decision still makes her laugh.

Her poorly planned revenge obviously didn’t work out well, but at least, she was pulled out of that high-end school and instead trapped in their house’s four walls, with CCTVs, a butler, and tutors. She also got a personal chauffeur whose main duty was taking her to and from the office of a prestigious psychologist in town. Six months after her first therapy session, Rafaela was taken to the hospital to take a growing life out of her, while that psychologist was sent to jail for child sexual abuse.

In the next few years, nothing really looked up, except for a really interesting self-discovery. One particular morning, when Rafaela had to walk past that damn psychology office, a tidal of wrath suddenly rose in her chest. Right at her curse, a bold of lightning stroke down from the clear blue sky, setting fire to the whole property.

It would have been only a bizarre coincidence if the same incident hadn’t happened again, then again, whenever she verbalized her wish for destruction. Cool, she thought, since those accusatory fingers pointed at her for being a freak was actually not at all far from the truth. Contrary to popular belief, Rafaela’s supernatural power discovery fueled her confidence rather than deflating her, as she knew that at least, she felt weird in her own skin for a good reason. Being totally aware of the destruction the power could cause, she started to practice methods to control her tempers, and inner peace and a truce with herself followed as side effects.

Soon, the college era came. It almost magically put an end to that long gloomy winter of her life, for suddenly, she was free to do whatever she wanted, including what she had never thought that she would want to do. Unlike everyone’s, including her own belief that she would never be interested in banking and finance, Rafaela turned out to be one of the best with money among her siblings and half-siblings. With the family’s prosperous assets and what a master degree in finance had taught her, Rafaela made her way to the seat of financial manager of the García’s hotel chains. She also had been venturing into the stock market since her college years, not without some memorable mistakes, but Rafaela’s earned much more than just money from it.

However, it wasn’t all that she wanted. Disliking working under her father’s power and her brothers’ influences, Rafaela constantly sought a way to be completely independent of her family. Finally, on a stormy day, that opportunity came in the form of a mysterious stranger. They gave her the instruction to an equally mysterious island, namely Mount Phoenix, where she was promised not only the independence she had been longing for, but also the truth of who she was. That decently triggered her curiosity, enough for her to actually give it a try.

It turned out that Mount Phoenix really exists, and living in it are real deities and their half-human descendants. And she, not really surprisingly, is one of them.

PANTHEON: Mayan CHILD OF: Huracan (Mayan god of rain, storm, and lightning) POWERS:

Lightning Manipulation: She can generate and manipulate bolts of lightning, and other electronics to some extent. Besides her purposeful use, lightning can also strike the subject of her anger when she curses at it.

Rain manipulation: She can generate and manipulate rain in different forms, including drizzles, light showers, downpours, and monsoons. The scale and duration of the rain will depend heavily on her physical and mental strength at the time she uses the power.

Storm Manipulation: She can generate and manipulate a few types of storms, including rainstorms, hail, thunderstorms, and cyclones. Currently, she can create and control small storms within a small area for approximately fifteen minutes. Using this power demands lots of physical and mental strength.

STRENGTHS:

Despite her rather cold and intimidating look, she likes to socialize and knows how to have fun.

She’s a creative problem solver who loves dealing with good challenges, and to some extent, puzzles and crosswords.

She’s an astute businesswoman with a no-bullshit attitude and the true grit of a survivor

She’s a walking lie detector, so please don’t try to fool around unless you really know how to

WEAKNESSES:

Her stubbornness’ level: 3000 (and counting)

She’s calculating and manipulative at times, especially when it comes to the real business

She requires lots of privacy and alone time. Nothing will upset her faster than being disturbed in her resting time, and sometimes that means real lightning will strike

While she’s approachable and friendly, it’s actually challenging to get to know the true her, for she’s a well-trained sceptic with six-foot walls built around her core self.

#kpop rp #krp #red velvet #kang seulgi #red velvet seulgi #mp; welcome

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sharinluna · 4 years

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Thoughts on Chapter 21

Evolvers and Miracle Finders

In 1-18, the main villain was Black Swan with their Evol superiority complex who wanted to get rid of all non-Evolvers. And STF who used their Evols to suppress innocent people(although this was more about the problems of military dictatorship than Evol itself)

Now, let’s add a third party and now EVOLVERS are being branded as EVILs! This feud between Evolvers and non-Evolvers reminded me of real-life conflicts between minority groups and the major populace throughout history. From holocausts to segregation laws, to conversion therapies. From “a terrorist attack? we don’t know who did it yet but let’s blame the Muslims first!” to “Syria refugees? we don’t want them in our homes cos they may cause trouble!”

Yōurán’s father taught her to think that with or without Evol, people were just people and should be viewed as equals. Oh, I solute you, Yōurán’s father. You definitely raised your daughter well.

Because Miracle Finder is a show about that. There may be some Evolvers out there who are bad people(Hello, Black Swan) but many others are just living their lives like ordinary people and trying to do their best in this world. And some are even using their powers to help others like many of the characters we love.

Yōurán’s Evol

We now uncovered another aspect of her Evol. And honestly the descriptions are very abstract. I felt like I was reading a geometry book when I was reading about her powers.

Precognition(She can now use this power somewhat proactively)

Evolving other people(I think this has more to do with her Queen gene and not something she can have control of.)

Black line invisible force???

She used this new power for the first time in chapter 20 when Helios was threatening her with a knife, and again when Lucien was trying to kill her.

Let’s try to figure out her new powers.

This ability manifests itself when she is constrained by Evol and unable to move in life-threatening situations(Helios about to stab her with his knife/Lucien choking her to death.)

Her mind goes to a place where there is a white light. She described that her consciousness seemed to have escaped reality.(My guess is that her mind came to contact with Black Cabin for a fleeting moment.)

Numerous black lines appears and fluctuates into waves and patterns.

She is able to shake away the evol forces that constrain her and with Lucien, she was able to constrain him, albeit briefly.

It seems that all of this happened in the short span of 1/1000 second. (0.001s)

@love-p said to me that the shifting of black lines are like oscillations of a wave function, which means that Yōurán’s evol is related to quantum superposition.

Yōurán’s Battle against Black Queen

Besides fighting for peace, harmony, inherent rights of the people, intrinsic values of life, and for equality among Evolvers/Non-evolvers, Yōurán is also fighting an internal battle with her alter ego aka the Black Queen.

BQ: I told you that no one would remember your sacrifice. Don’t you regret saving these ungrateful humans?

MC: No, I don’t regret it. As long as there is hope, what I did is still worth it

BQ: Humankind sucks anyway. They are always fighting and killing each other. Why bother saving them?

MC: That’s not all true. I would still protect them.

If Yōurán gives up hope in humanity and thinks that it’s not worth it to go into all the troubles saving them, Black Queen will be given free reign to bring the end of the world à la chapter 18 style. (I think this is what Shaw meant that she could create chaos or end the world if she wants to.) Her struggle to keep her faith and her refusal to succumb to fatalism(I should credit @wedreamedlove for this thought) is the true battle here. The strong tenacity and resistance is what makes her character unwilling to give up.

#mlqc #mr love queen's choice #mlqc analysis #mlqc spoiler #mlqc mc

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judgmentofcorruption · 4 years

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Episode 0

Judgment of Corruption, pages 4-18

Is it greed to wish to be pure?

This world has now become a bundle of impurity.

I don't think that's a bad thing. This world certainly wasn't originally created to be absolutely clean and free of imperfections.

Take, for example, "water".

This thing that is vital to so many living beings is not pure in actuality, by and large. Mud, sand, salt, bacteria, and other sorts of organic matter besides…Despite all these impurities being mixed in it still wets the earth, or falls from the sky.

You need to perform a little bit of effort if you want to get purified water. The simplest and easiest method that humans undertake is distillation. You heat water until it evaporates, and then you cool it so that it condenses back into liquid. What you produce by doing this is still not “pure” water in the true sense of the word, but it is at least relatively safe to use to slake one’s thirst.

Even such a fundamental component like “water” needs to go through these phases in order to become pure. And since it isn’t completely so even then…It’s obvious that it’s a much harder matter to make pure something more complicated than that, like “humans”.

You could say that for humans to become pure beings in a material sense is largely impossible. Therefore, humans seek a spiritual “purity”, and have the tendency to make this into a virtue.

This in turn means that when it comes to those who differ from them physically and spiritually in this world—Or perhaps calling it “society” would be more accurate?—they have a habit of taking these heretics in society and loathing them as “impurities”.

Leaving the preface aside for the time being, right now I shall elucidate on the sight that stretches on beneath me.

First, relating to the whole region that this area is in--Humans have given this place the country name of "Holy Levianta". There was also a time long ago when it was called the "Magic Kingdom Levianta". Or, going off of a denomination particular to this current time period, combined with several of its neighboring countries you could also call it the “USE (Union State of Evillious)”.

Anyway, a red-brick building stood at the very center of this country—and I was clinging to the ceiling of its biggest room.

A big black star was painted on the ceiling. I don’t know if this building was named “the Dark Star Courthouse” as a result of this feature or if it was because it’s called “Dark Star Courthouse” that this star was painted--I know I learned it somewhere, but I've forgotten which it is.

Here and now, a bit of history was coming to an end.

A woman who had sought to be “pure” was now, for that reason, being eliminated from society as an “impurity”.

This social event by the name of a “trial”—she was the lead role, standing in the center of the Dark Star Courthouse’s great courtroom as the defendant.

“I will declare my verdict.”

The young head judge's calm voice rang through the courtroom.

The whole visitor’s gallery was packed full of people. That spoke to how much of the world’s attention this trial had.

“For the crimes of murder, larceny, and violation of the special law on witchcraft, the defendant Elluka Ma Clockworker…is sentenced to death.”

Upon hearing the judge’s verdict, all of the audience started to rustle.

"Oh…Oh God."

"How could this be…"

All of those who clutched their heads despondently were wearing the same religious habits. There were also those among them praying, rosaries in hand.

They, and Elluka who had just received her death sentence, were clergy of the Levin faith.

On the other hand, there were those who smiled with satisfaction at the verdict, those who glowered at the defendant with anger in their gaze, and those who simply watched over the proceedings without changing their expression.

"Kill the witch!" someone in the gallery suddenly shouted. Perhaps one of those who had a grudge against the defendant.

With that shout as the trigger, the courtroom began to grow increasingly into an uproar, and the judge slammed the gavel in his hand twice against the stand.

“Silence.”

His voice was unconcerned, and by no means loud, but with that the court became quiet once more.

The power to command the room—you could say that was one of the abilities sought after by judges. Just by seeing this single scene you could infer that he was quite capable in his job.

After letting out a sigh, the judge began his explanation on his verdict.

"To begin with…Though all present to witness this today already know of this, bizarre phenomena have been occurring in every region. For example, the other day a small forest here in the east of Levianta changed into a desert overnight. That was something that occurred spontaneously. If that were the only thing it would not be entirely beyond the realm of possibility. However, the issue is not limited to just that. --A baby was born between a certain husband and wife. By all rights this should be a happy occasion, but the second he saw that child the husband went mad with rage, and the wife grew severely disturbed. Why? ...Because even though the husband was an Elphe, and the wife was from Marlon, the baby was born with black skin, resembling neither of them."

I could hear a woman sobbing from the visitor’s gallery, but the judge ignored it and continued on.

“The husband sued the wife for the crime of infidelity. This trial was conducted by one of my subordinates, and the end result was that the wife was cleared of any wrongdoing. For no matter how extensively the World Police investigated, no evidence came forward to suggest that the wife had had an affair. Perhaps there are those who think this absurd. But the Dark Star Courthouse judging the wife innocent was not done on the basis of this fact alone. –Examples like this are occurring in every household in the world right now. The birth of children that are unlike their parents or their ancestors, completely ignoring their genes…Things that are scientifically impossible are genuinely occurring.”

His explanation seemed fairly roundabout. I would have liked him to just get onto the main topic of the basis of his verdict, but perhaps it was appropriate consideration for a judge to have, given the world’s interest in this trial.

Not all of the people in the visitor’s gallery were highly educated. By so neatly explaining the line of his reasoning, he may have been trying to get them to understand how he arrived at sentencing the defendant to death.

“In the kingdom of Beelzenia to the south, creatures with skin an inhumanly white like limestone are said to be rampaging all over the region. The truth is unclear, but there are reports that these are corpses that have crawled out of graveyards. The world is in a whirlpool of chaos so severe that we cannot laugh these off as jokes. And the source behind all of these things—"

“Are witches!"

Again someone shouted from the gallery.

The judge cleared his throat, and pounded the gavel.

“—The USE unified government has concluded that the cause of this progression of bizarre occurrences is that they are done by the magic of ‘witches’. At first there were objections that this was an unscientific, even anachronistic conclusion. However…as a result of the research done by our scientists, we have already confirmed the existence of ‘witches’ throughout Evillious history. This was made clear by the testimony of historian Sir Heaven Jaakko given in this court.”

The judge dropped his gaze to the defendant's chair. The woman there—Elluka, having just received her death sentencing, made no sign that she was losing control. She only looked up at the judge’s seat, silent.

She just looked to be faintly smiling.

“—Due to the ‘special law on witchcraft’, the World Police have up until this point arrested many suspects who were thought to be witches, and in this Dark Star Courthouse all of them have been given the death sentence. However…the strange occurrences in the world have shown no sign of resolving. This does not mean the conclusion of the World Police and the Dark Star Courthouse is incorrect. This worldwide chaos cannot be brought about by a single ‘witch’. Peace will not come to the world until we have exterminated all witches.”

The judge once again looked at Elluka.

“The defendant is also someone who was arrested by the World Police under suspicion of being a ‘witch’. However unlike the others, she bears the name of the witch ‘Elluka’, who appears in history. This court is treating the name ‘Elluka’ as one that is passed down among witches throughout the generations, and has acknowledged that the defendant is the current holder of the title.”

Humans are clever creatures, but that doesn’t mean that they could always derive the correct answer on everything.

I knew that the woman in that defendant's chair was certainly "Elluka". But she by no means was a figure who had merely inherited that name.

The Sorceress of Time, “Elluka”, had always been the same being.

Of course, the average human wouldn't know that.

--It sounded like the judge’s story had finally moved on to the main topic.

“The immediate charges the defendant was arrested for was the murder of Sir Mata Corpa, the Minister of Finance of the Lucifenian Republic, and larceny. A priestess of the Levin church, the defendant did on the night of April 4th, Evillious year 944, sneak into the Corpa estate and murder the afore-named victim. Upon stealing the ‘Marlon Spoon’ which was being stored inside the estate, she was caught in the act by an investigator of the World Police’s International Works Department ‘Justea’. Thanks to investigation taken afterward it was confirmed that the defendant had eighty-four other offenses—”

After that the judge rattled off both the nature of those offenses, and just how heinous a person Elluka was.

“—Furthermore, the World Police’s main office has determined that the defendant is ‘Elluka Ma Clockworker’, who is thought to be the leader of all ‘witches’, and this court has now indicted her as such. The defendant has acknowledged all of her crimes but shows no sign of introspection in her conduct; the blame that she must take responsibility for as the cause of all the chaos in the world is enormous, and from a societal point of view I have determined that there is no other recourse than for her to face capital punishment.”

The long explanation on his verdict had come to an end.

“Court is adjourned.”

Immediately after the judge pounded his gavel one last time, the viewing gallery once more broke out into an uproar.

But the judge showed no sign of quieting them down. He silently stood up and then started to walk towards the exit. Other judges followed suit.

Several reporters with notebooks in hand dashed outside from the gallery. Their articles that “Defendant Elluka Ma Clockworker Given Death Penalty Verdict” would surely be front page news tomorrow.

Elluka did not look towards the viewing gallery. She showed no indication that she concerned herself with the cries and jeers from behind her, still simply standing there with the same expression on her face.

Two of the courthouse’s guards approached her, and seized her arms. She did not resist them, and was taken out of the courtroom.

I also left the courtroom, following after Elluka. When I caught sight of her in the hallway I once more clung to the ceiling.

Elluka and the guards walked on without saying a word.

But an intruder suddenly appeared there.

"Elluka!"

I could see a single man running towards them from deeper in the hallway, opposite the direction they were heading.

Three other guards were running after him.

Right before he could reach Elluka he was tragically seized by the guards.

"Let go!"

The man struggled but his lean body was no match for the brawny guards, and he was unable to shake them off.

Elluka stood in place, silently gazing at the man.

Her expression appeared to have changed slightly from when she was in the courtroom.

It was slightly…it was only slightly, but she looked sad.

After a moment, a new figure appeared from a nearby door.

"Release him."

It was the young head judge who had run the court session earlier.

“Uhh…But…”

While the guards holding the man hesitated, the head judge continued, "It doesn't matter. He has a relationship with the defendant. We can allow him one last conversation with her at the very least.”

An act of kindness by the soft-hearted judge…so it may have looked to someone watching.

But as the guards released the man he grew enraged at the judge.

"You bastard…So you betrayed me, did you!?”

“Betrayed you? Now now, what are you saying, Gandalf? I merely made a just and upright judgment…No more, no less. What? ‘The defendant will surely be found innocent, as she has the backing of the Levin church and the Freezis Foundation’--Was that your simplistic line of thinking?”

"Guh…"

"You're far, far too naïve. Unfortunately she earned far more enmity than necessary. ‘Elluka Ma Clockworker’ must be put to death…The people who believe such are in far greater number than you’ve imagined.”

“…And how much did you accept from these ‘people who hate Elluka’?”

“Ha ha, now what could you mean by that, I wonder…Are you suggesting that I, the director of the Dark Star Bureau, have been paid off by bribes? To think that I would be suspected of such by one of my own colleagues…how sad,” the head judge said, pressing on the inner corner of his eye in an affected manner.

“How dare you speak to me so shamelessly—"

“It’s quite unlikely, most unlikely for that to have happened, Gandalf. Unlikely, and yet…Well, let me put it this way…‘Money is the best lawyer in hell’.”

“Why you…”

Even now Gandalf grit his teeth as though he were about to knock him out, but the head judge quickly held a hand out in front of him as though to restrain him.

“Please calm down. I have no wish to make you a defendant too. …Honestly, on the contrary, you should be thanking me. Right until the end I never revealed your—relationship with Elluka. By all rights that is improper of a head judge to do. But…I didn’t want to tarnish your career with this. As a colleague, and as your friend.”

“…I no longer have any wish to stay in the Dark Star Courthouse. I’m fed up with this corrupt organization.”

“Are you insane? You would waste my help after I went to such pains…Fine. You’ve made your decision. I won’t stop you,” the judge related, his tone extremely mournful but his expression joyful.

Gandalf clenched his trembling hand into a fist, but eventually he let it drop, shoulders dropping with a crestfallen air.

No matter how he struggled, he could not stop Elluka’s execution—He had given up on it.

Someone else starting walking over from the entrance to the courtroom that Gandalf had run in from.

“Sir…”

It was a woman wearing a servant uniform, looking roughly thirty years old.

She was holding a young baby against her chest.

After briefly patting the baby’s head, Gandalf made this request of the head judge:

“In the end…Only a few words would be enough. Please, let me speak with Elluka.”

“Of course. That’s why I originally had the guards release you, after all.”

“With…the baby, if possible.”

“That baby—Ah, I understand. I see. So that’s how it is. Well, I don’t mind.”

Upon hearing those words, Gandalf gratefully inclined his head. Then he and the servant started to move towards Elluka—but there he turned back to the head judge for a moment.

"I said this earlier, but I will quit being a judge. …However. This doesn't mean that I have completely lost hope. This doesn't mean I'm going to quit being a man of "justice". I know that someday, someone who has a truly just heart will change this corrupt institution. When that happens, I know that rotten bastards like you will see hell. Head of the Dark Star Courthouse—Hanma Baldured!”

"Ha ha ha, that’s quite the bark for a beaten dog. …Well, I look forward to when that day comes." The judge--Hanma, returned once more to the door while laughing him off.

After seeing him leave, Gandalf turned back to Elluka and walked to her side.

"Elluka…"

"Gandalf…"

The two of them gazed at each other, bringing their faces closer and gently exchanging a tender kiss.

"That I should be parted from you like this--"

“I’ve been prepared for this, Gandalf. I do use ‘magical arts’. That is a true fact. …And you accepted me anyway, despite knowing that.”

“But…this trial is no more than a farce! I know there’s no way these bizarre events in the world are your fault. You—the Elluka that I love, could never be the kind of person who would do such things! It’s obvious that this story of you murdering the Minister of Finance is a false accusation!”

"--Thank you. It does my heart good just to have someone here now who believes in me."

The two of them kissed one last time.

A tragic parting of two people who loved each other. An innocent defendant and her lover. Well, something like that I suppose.

But I’ll say it again. Humans are not always wise, and cannot always derive the truth.

I knew. It was indeed utter nonsense, this idea that Elluka was causing the chaos in the world with magic.

And not just Elluka. All of the "witches" judged at this Dark Star Courthouse were innocent.

These strange occurrences. Their cause lies not in “witches”.

These were errors induced within a much larger stream than that.

And the only ones who knew the true reason for them--

Were "Gods".

…In that sense, you could say that Elluka was innocent.

However.

The other crime that she’d been charged with—the murder of Minister of Finance Corpa, that was without a doubt something Elluka committed.

It was a crime she had carried out in order to obtain that “Marlon Spoon”…Or to speak more accurately, to obtain the being that was inside it.

The baby abruptly started fussing.

“Oh dear, do you need some milk? Or a new nappy?”

The servant flusteredly started to rock the baby.

Upon noticing that, Elluka leisurely made her way over.

"Lady Elluka…Please, hold your baby,” the servant said with tears in her eyes, handing the baby off to Elluka.

The moment that Elluka gently held him in her arms, the baby immediately ceased crying.

"…He's a smart boy."

“Yes, he properly knows who his mother is."

"And he also understands that his mother--is a 'scary woman when angered'."

"Ha ha…Perhaps so." While holding the baby, Elluka turned to Gandalf. "What you said to Hanma earlier--"

"Hm?"

“That one day, someone who has a truly just heart will change this corrupt institution…I hope our boy becomes that person.”

“…Honestly I have no desire for him to ever get involved with the Dark Star Courthouse.”

“…That’s pretty unfair coming from you, having already made your decision to quit this place.”

"I'm sorry. I know better than anyone what a weak man I am. But—"

“It’s alright. Not everyone has the determination to fight. But…the one who will ultimately decide what he does is this baby himself.”

“Yes…True.”

Elluka brought her face close to the baby and lightly kissed his brow.

“Bye bye. Grow up to be a good man like your father…Gallerian.”

Led along by the guards, Elluka disappeared further inside the courthouse.

As he watched her from behind—No. Gandalf could not continue to watch any longer.

He had fallen to his knees on the floor, and started to loudly sob.

As though following along with him, the baby being held in the servant’s arms also began to wail.

Well then.

This is a very intriguing matter to me.

In this world—this space that I call the “Third Period”—Elluka is a very singular being.

She possesses an extremely long lifespan, and has continued to involve herself in the history of this world.

…To speak more strictly, it’s a bit of a faulty expression to call who she is now by the name “Elluka”, but explaining that would be very complicated, so I’ll leave that alone.

She is a mere shadow of what had once been the Sorceress of Time “Elluka”…If you think of her that way you would not be mistaken, for the time being.

I’m not just interested in her, but also the fact that she’s given birth to a baby.

As far as I know, she has until this point never done such a deed before.

What sort of change has there been in her mental state?

And what sort of path will that child—Gallerian Marlon, take from here on out?

I think I shall observe Gallerian for a short while.

Perhaps he could become a savior for this world.

Or perhaps he could become a pest that leads it to its ruin.

I still don’t know which.

All I can do is to simply gaze on.

--I have yet to introduce myself.

It’s not that I’m trying to hide it, or put on airs about it.

Only, in this story I am a simple observer, and as such I don’t have any particular importance.

Even so, if you would like to know about me—

Then for now I will at least tell you my name.

My name is “Sickle”.

I am a simple bat, with nothing unusual about me at all.

directory------next>>

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tipsydipsydo · 4 years

Text

Hello!! ❤

This here is going to be the "prologue" for every BTS Dog Hybrid-Fanfic I'll write! In here I'll explain to you, how my "dog hybrid universe" will work. Some things are similar to the common Hybrid AU Headcanons, but there are also some things they'll be very different to you.

That's why I explained everything so detailed in here in the hope y'all will understand what I mean! 😅😂

Because I think I have to overwork this prologue here and there again for some details, I’ll write my last update down.

Last Update: 1st Feburary 2020

My BTS Dog Hybrid-Series🐾

Then... there we go! 🐶👣

Once upon a time where everything started...

The Evolution🌱

When the evolution of the human being began several million years ago, there was not only one single line of development, two ethnic groups of the human species developed almost completely independently of each other.

There were the "completely normal" human ethnicity and then the whim of the nature came up with something very unique. Even today, the researchers are pretty much groping in the dark as how the evolution led to the origin of the hybrid human ethnic group and how two genera that hardly related to each other were able to merge.

But this is how it happend and now 35%-40% of the hybrid human enthic group (also just called "hybrids") live on the earth beside the approximately 60%-65% purely human world population. They are capable of changing their shape and shifting into the form of so-called wolves and dogs.

The special thing about this phenomen is that there doesn't exist a pure species of wolves/dogs like the "normal" human. The hybrids are the only one of their shape-shifting species.

Just as the homo erectus is the basis for the human evolution, the Wolf hybrid represents the beginning of the hybrid evolution. Over the millennia, a wide variety of different "hybrid breeds" have developed from it, right up to today's modern domestic Dog Hybrids.

The civilization🏘

For the most of the time of their evolution, human and hybrid developed as a ethnicity independently from each other. Only a few hundred years ago, human and hybrid decided to build a civilisation together and benefit from each other's abilities.

For example, hybrids have much sharper senses than humans and because of their ability to shift into their their animal form, they can defend themselves much better against various enemies. Especially in the military, security services, police and criminal cases, drug control, food control, diseases, therapy, rescuring peoples etc.

Their excellent skills have improved the society's social live so much more.

However there are also some unpleasant sides. The animalistic habits, behaviours and instincts play a particularly important role, when they haven't learned to control them from a young age. For example it's not always the case that young hybrids learned properly during childhood and puberty to control their emotions and their shape shifting.

Unfortunately, it still happens sometimes that hybrids cannot deal with their fear or anger and then shifting into their hybrid shape to attack and hurt humans out of their primal instincts.

That's why living together is sometimes still a challenge and there have been up's and down's in this relationship ever since. At some points in the history it was even on the verge of both ethnic groups whiping each other out. But since 300 years the relationship between these two ethnic groups has been going relatively well, even though of course the society isn't perfect yet. Especially because tue hybrids are still a minority in contrast to the human population.

Hybrid Sexuality and their Behaviours❤

The topic of the hybrid sexuality and with it, the somewhat complicated sexual behaviours of them are still a little bit difficult for the human society to understanding and respecting it.

Young hybrids experiences puperty in a similar way like human teens do. Around the age of 15-16 years both, female and male hybrids get their first so-called "primal heat" phase. With the start of this first heat phase they reach now the sexual maturity. It's based on the animalistic nature of their hybrid genetics and lasts for about a week.

The Heat-Phases🐺📅

Female and male hybrids get such a heat phase for two or three times a year (depending in their hybrid breed). In these phases the sexual desire of both gender is very high and the urge to reproduce is extremely strong.

During this week, male and female hybrids should avoid meeting the opposite gender to prevent themselves from an unwanted pregnancy. Male hybrids can smell immediately when a female hybrid in their environment is in heat and their primal sexual instincts react instantly on the changed scent.

It costs them a lot of discipline and concentration not to rush to the female hybrid and try to get her pregnant.

It's very similar the other way around too, the primal instinct to get pregnant takes up the whole mind of the female and both gender can't think "humanely" and rational in these phases anymore.

Especially when it's their crush or even their mate it's hardly possible for a male hybrid to think clear and logically. Romantic feelings are mixed up with primal sexual needs, which is why couples who don't want pups yet should spent their primal heat separated from the other.

After the first primal heat, two to three weeks later the menstruation of the female hybrid set in. The period of hybrids is very short with 1-2 days menstruating compared to human females. In addition, once in a month hybrid girls also has the "ovulation heat" which lasts around two or three days.

Heat suspressants that are harmless to their health have already been developed for this specific heat. The ovulation takes place nevertheless, but these medications suspress their sexual desire and the sweet, aphrodisiac-like change in their scent is also suspressed to avoid attracting the attention of other hybrids. There also exist special birth control medication for female hybrids. Except for the primal and ovulation heat phase they can take birth control pills too.

Male hybrids are a pain in the ass when they are in their primal heat. They shouldn't be with their female hybrid or vixen mate in this specific week (they “shouldn't” be with their mate in their shared apartment, when they still live separated from each other, the following risk wouldn’t be that high) because sometimes they can't resist the urge to steal and hide the ovulation heat suspressants and birth control pills of their mate. This instinctive impulse comes from the secret hope that their mate could become fertile again during their own primal heat and are able to impregnate them. Just the thought that their mate could give birth to his pups drives some hybrids crazy.

But this extreme urge to impregnate their mate is only in their own primal heat phases so unusual strong.

If neither of them is in a heat phase it's usually sufficient to satisfy the sexual needs of the partner and only have dirty talk about impregnation.

There are special condoms for hybrids available but the majority of the hybrid population (males and females as well) prefer birth control pills for females because of their impregnation instinct. However, condoms are occasionally used as a necessary contraceptive when hybrids have sex during the ovulation heat.

Thanks to the suspressants, the male partner can't smell their ovulation heat, so the extreme impregnation instinct doesn't occur. During the short time period of the menstruation, female hybrids are not fertile.

How strong the impregnation instinct really is depends mostly in the character of the hybrid, but sometimes it's also a little bit influenced by their hybrid breed.

So far, no harmless contraceptives for the primal heat could been created until now. Although there are illegal drugs that can suppress the primal heat, but these drugs dangerously disrupt the hormone balance of a hybrid. So after taking the drug for a longer time, they could become infertile or, in the worst case, could die from an overdosis.

Hybrid-Rights🛡

Therefore, in the equal rights of both ethnic groups and taking into account the special needs of the hybrids, the government has passed the law, that every hybrid has the right to take leave from work or other appointements during their primal heat. This is also a protection for hybrids from sexual assault and rape.

Since the first long-term rapprochement of the two ethnic groups, it has also become apparent that both ethnic groups can reproduce children with each other, resulting in half-hybrids, so-called "vixen".

"Vixen"🐶👣

The child of a hybrid and a human is a half hybrid, called vixen. Up to half of their genotype consists of hybrid and half of human genetics. Since hybrid genetics are not predominant here, they are not capable of shifting into their hybrid form, but they are able to procreate fully formed hybrid pups together with a hybrid.

Vixen also have stronger senses than humans, but they don't match the abilities of real hybrids. In addition, they may have certain physical characteristics and personal traits/behaviours of their hybrid breed.

Like humans and hybrids, vixen reach their sexual maturity at puberty, a special feature is that they will get into a heat-phase twice a year too, for around 3-4 days.

Female vixen gets her first heat-phase around the age of 13 to 14 years, where upon her first period should occur two or three weeks later.

The menstrual cycle is not really different from that from a human girl/woman. At the time of their monthly ovulation they don't have a ovulation-heat, which is based on their human genetics.

Nevertheless, when they're ovulating they notices it by themself and hybrids smell the slightly changed, a little bit sweeter scent too. Sometimes also perceive vixen with a very sensitive nose notice the smell of a ovulating vixen too, for example hunting dog vixen.

For some years now female and male vixen have also had the legal right to take leave during the heat phase. This must be taken by account of their comany where they work.

The genetic dispensation📊

Hybrid = 100% hybrid genetics

Human = 100% human genetics

Partner A (50% genetics) x Partner B (50% genetics) = Baby (100% genetics)

▪Hybrid x Hybrid = Hybrid pups (100% hybrid)

▪Hybrid x Human = male/female Vixen (50% hybrid/50% human)

▪Hybrid x Vixen = Hybrid pups (75% hybrid/25% human)

▪Vixen x Vixen = Vixen (50% hybrid/ 50% human)

▪Vixen x Human= Human/Vixen Baby (25% hybrid/ 75% human) [second generation vixen]

▪2nd generation vixen x Hybrid= Vixen Baby/Hybrid (62,5% hybrid/37,5% human)

▪2nd generation vixen x human = human/ 3rd generation vixen (6,25% hybrid/93,75 human)

▪...etc.

The more generations of vixen there are and the more there are mixed up with human genetics, the less likely a hybrid child would be born.

Up to 70% of hybrid genetics always result a fully formed hybrid (hybrid genes are dominant and prevail against the resessive human genes, the genetic of the child/pup will turn into 100% hybrid genetics again during the fertilization. This based on the not yet fully clarified so-called phenomen of the self-preservation of the hybrid-ethnicity).

Between 50%-70% of Hybrid genetics can succeed hybrid pups as well as vixen babys (probability depends on the genetics of the parents, the lower the hybrid genetics, the more likely a vixen could be born).

It's common that between 60%-70% of hybrid genetics it's more likely to have a hybrid baby. Between 50%-60% the probability decreases increasingly, so that between 50%-55% mostly only vixen are born.

Nevertheless exceptions confirm the rule!

For example:

2nd generation vixen x hybrid = First pregnancy a vixen baby could be born and in the second pregnacy a hybrid pup (62,5% hybrid/ 37,5% human).

With less than 50% the offspring are only Vixen, depending on the genetic distribution several generations. With each generation the hybrid characteristics and their sensitive senses decreases. In addition, their heat time shortened, the symptoms and the scent becomes weaker until they finally appear only sporadically and/or disappear completely.

That's also why so many "breed hybrid" vixen are possible too.

For example:

Golden Retriever! Vixen x Poodle! Vixen = Goldendoodle! Vixen Baby

3rd generation German Shepherd! vixen x Husky! vixen = Gerberian Shepsky! vixen

and then:

Gerberian Shepsky! vixen x Alaskan Malamute! hybrid = Gerberian Shepsky Malamute! hybrid pups

If in the area between 50%-70% hybridal genetics results in a hybrid children, their genetics also turns into 100% hybrid genetics too. However, the probabilitly of having a fully formed hybrid pup when both parents have 50%-60% hybrid genetics together is very rare. Mostly the result will be a vixen baby, because there is too many human genetics involved.

[To be honest the only thing you really need to know is, that all Vixen! Reader are first generation vixen and they're able to have fully formed hybrid pups with the boys! ...I just love it to make complicated xD]

Scenting and Marking💋

Male and female hybrids as well have the habit of marking their relationship partner and their children/pups "as theirs" (sometimes even very close friends as an evidence of trust and affection).

They usually rub their head against their loved one or kiss/lick their partners neck to transmit their own scent to them.

An another possible was would be the visible marking with lovebites and hickeys, where they also transmit their scent on this person at the same time.

How strong the urge for scenting and marking is, depends individually on the hybrid.

Vixen also have a slight form of this instinct, but that's only a stronger way of attachment and the intense habit of marking their partner with hickeys.

Mating♾

"Mating" is a ritual of hybrids when they choose a certain person to become their life partner (it's the hybrid way to marry someone). Mostly this happen while they have sex together. Then they bite their partner gently in the area between neck and shoulder. During the process their canines lengthen so that they look very similar to the fangs of their hybrid form and so they inject their own scent into the body of their partner.

Now the partner adopted the particular scent nuance of his hybrid and each hybrid will be able to smell that you two are mates now.

A mated person has become uninteresting to other hybrids (unless a hybrid are searching for a fight...).

Since then the freshly mated partner no longer arouses the interest of other hybrids, the hybrid partner usually becomes much calmer, jealousy decrease moreand more or disappears completely.

Scenting and Marking is then only used as a evidence of love and affection, because it's not really "needed" anymore.

When a male hybrid mated a female human, the hybrid can smell the ovulation days of her cycle. Either then his mate takes scent suspressants for female humans or she will get pregnant doubtlessly in his next primal heat. ;)

Knotting🐺❤

The penis of a hybrid in his human form doesn't differ in any way from that of humans. Mostly there just larger and thicker than the average human cock size. However, a certain area of their shaft, short before the base of the cock is reached, swells during the ejaculation. This swelling is called a knot and prevents the penis from sliding out of the vagina for the next 20 minutes. This phenomenon is intended to ensure that the female is definitely impregnated.

(This only works when they doesn't use birth control.)

While mastubation and the following ejaculation the knot swells slightly too. But when there is nothing around the shaft (like usually the vaginal canal), the knot doesn’t has anything to keep hold of and swells down really quickly again.

Pregnancy and Birth 🤰🤱

Hybrid pups are usually slightly larger than human babies. Female Hybrids are able to give birth to twin pups or even triplet pups because they have a wider and therefore anatomically more advantageous pelvis for pregnacy and birth.

Vixen also have a slightly wider pelvis than female humans and can give birth to a single pup or twin pups as well.

Female humans always get pregnant with one vixen baby and they're a little bit bigger than the normal, average human babies too. But that's not a problem, they're just like a big human baby.

Female Humans are as usual nine month pregnant, female Vixen eight months and Hybrids only seven month. Most of the time female hybrids give birth to their babies like vixen and humans, in their human form. Except they're in a enormous stress situation they feel instinctively safer when they give birth in their hybrid form.

After delivery, the hybrid pups immediately shift back into their human form.

When a female hybrid transform while pregnancy or giving birth, the embryos in her womb shift at the same time with her body together.

The first months 👶🐾

Hybrid pups, vixen and human babies need about the same time to grow up and become full upgrown adults. So the hybrid pups aren't any different in their human form to vixen or human babies.

But there is still one small difference, hybrid pups already starts crawling around five months and they shifting their shape dir the first time of their life between the 6th and the 8th month.

Just as for human parents the first step of their baby is a very important moment, for hybrid pups parents it's the first shape shifting of their pups. Because then they see for the first time the fur colour and the physical characteristics of the hybrid form of their pup. Their hybrid shape accords to a five week old dog puppy.

From this point on, the hybrid form adapts to the growing pace of their human form.

Childhood and Teens🎒📚

Hybrid children have to learn how to control their shape shifting. Especially at the age of a toddler is the time when they shift unpredictable. In Kindergarten and elementary school it's often the case that they notices their shape shifting too late or are distracted while shifting back into their human form, so that they get stuck in a kinda "half-transformation" for a short time. In this "half-transformation" only their ears shifted into the hybrid form and their tail comes out.

When they get into middle school, all hybrids should have learned to control the shifting and the emotions they're connected/caused their shifting.

Soo... I hope you readed everything until here and unterstand hopefully the most of it! When there still some questions don't be shy to ask! I'll always open for tips/questions!!

Why the Half-Hybrids are called "Vixen" (I know it's usually a word for a female fox). But this was the translation for the german word "Fähe" (means female foxes and sometimes also wolves!) and I kinda like this word. It's better than the biological word "Bitch" for female dogs xD (But maybe I'll use it for dirty dirty talk in there~).

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disneyat34 · 4 years

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Dumbo at 34

A review by Adam D. Jaspering

We remember things as we want to remember them. Memories distort perception and perception distorts reality. Childhood is especially remembered well. If not the entire childhood, elements. People romanticize memories from the feelings they evoke, and discard the reality.

The circus is a prime example. The circus was once a staple of American pleasure. It brought entertainment, excitement, and exotic animals to small towns across the US. In days before the internet, before TV, and before movies were mainstream, it was a necessity.

People remember the old-timey charm, the whimsical environments and otherworldly aura. Nobody wants to remember the adverse working conditions, the high rate of injury, or the gross abuse of animals. Nobody remembers the smell of port-a-potties or the heaps of animal manure. People remember the calliopes and cotton candy.

It’s quite appropriate Dumbo takes place at a circus. Everybody remembers the movie fondly, but nobody seems to acknowledge its flaws. It’s heralded uncontested as a Disney masterpiece despite a number of problematic issues.

For starters, the film is only 64 minutes in length. This includes the opening credits. From a logistical standpoint, one can understand the purpose. Disney Studios took a financial hit from Pinocchio and Fantasia. They needed something not only profitable, but cheap. The same way that a three-wheeled car saves money on tires.

The story of Dumbo is one of growth and confidence when faced with adversity and doubt. However, the plot is about a young elephant finding an act in a circus. Dumbo tries, and he fails. He tries again, he fails again. Finally, he tries and he succeeds. An entire plot thread seems missing from the film. Dumbo learning to fly (both literally and figuratively) should support a larger narrative.

There are no stakes for Dumbo. His failures don’t affect the circus’s income or popularity. Dumbo is ostracized, but still cared for as well as any other animal in the show. He is ridiculed, but still performs every night.

The movie ends before any growth or change is displayed by the secondary characters. Everybody likes Dumbo once he can fly, but do they like him, or do they like his profitability and popularity? If a lion with an extra long tail is born, will he be mocked until he earns respect too?

Everybody in the circus feels comfortable calling him “Dumbo” at the movie’s end. Canonically, his official name is Jumbo Jr, named so by his mother. Everybody calls him Dumbo, a deliberate insult. The name sticks, even for the viewing audience. Either Dumbo begrudgingly accepts this epithet, or reclaims it. Either way, at least his mother should refuse it.

Dumbo’s mother is Mrs Jumbo, a pariah and outcast among the other circus elephants. What causes this exclusion is never explained or hinted at. The other elephants are just jerks. She has no friends, no confidantes, and is apparently widowed; there is never a mention or allusion of a Mr Jumbo. She has nobody in her life. This is presumably why she is so desperate to become a mother at the movie’s inception.

The film begins with a muster of storks delivering babies to various circus animals. It’s a cartoon staple and a very convenient workaround, explaining the miracle of a baby without the depiction of childbirth or implications of procreation. It also justifies how Dumbo is born despite there being no male elephants anywhere in the circus.

For whatever reason, these storks all deliver their parcels on the same night. All except for Mrs Jumbo’s coveted baby elephant. Baby Dumbo is delivered the following day. After seeing everyone else enjoying their children. After her hopes are dashed. There’s no explanation why the stork arrives late, well after the circus is dismantled and loaded aboard a train. Dumbo is delivered a day late for the sake of drama.

The train itself is almost a character itself. It has a name: Casey Jr. It has a face. It emotes. It speaks. But can he be rightfully called a character? Casey Jr doesn’t interact with other characters. He has no goals or desires besides acting and moving like an ordinary train. It’s an odd design choice, leaving Casey Jr halfway between being a robot and the pathetic fallacy.

Casey Jr is an interpretation of the famed children’s story, The Little Engine That Could. Casey Jr even uses the famous line, “I think I can, I think I can” as he climbs a hill. The story’s most famous interpretation was a 1930s picture book by Watty Piper (a name one could only have in the 1930s). The character and story itself belongs to the public domain.

It wouldn’t surprise me if somebody at Disney Studios tried and failed to make an animated short based on the story. As consolation, they retrofitted the character for a bit part in an unrelated, developing film. The cumbersomely named 'Little Engine That Could' was renamed ‘Casey Jr,’ and a new character is added to Dumbo's universe. A character Dumbo never meets or interacts with, and has no bearing on the plot. If nothing else, he adds five minutes to Dumbo’s anemic runtime.

Design is one of Dumbo’s weakest points. Human characters are hyper-stylized caricatures of actual people. Perhaps intentionally, so we empathize more with the comparatively realistic animals. But the animators went too far. The Ringmaster is so rotund, he seems inflated. The clowns have bizarre proportions which are somehow reigned in by their baggy costumes and floppy shoes. The rowdy child who assaults Dumbo looks more like a chimpanzee than a boy.

The character of Timothy Q Mouse is perplexing. Is he employed by the circus, or just a circus enthusiast who hangs around the fairgrounds after hours? What would a circus gain from hiring a mouse? Why does he dress like a bandleader? Does this imply an unseen mouse marching band? He never displays any musical ability. He’s there because the movie needs him to be there.

Being Dumbo’s sole friend is Timothy’s secondary purpose. His primary purpose is to outwardly verbalize the thoughts and emotions of Dumbo. Our protagonist is mute throughout the film and most characters avoid talking to Dumbo directly. Without Timothy, Dumbo would stare at camera sadly for the movie’s run.

The circus folk themselves are weird, and not just their physical attributes. The Ringmaster is a bombastic Italian man who, as Timothy describes, “never had an idea in his life.” He seems genuine, eager to entertain his audience with an entertaining and original show. His real malice is never workshopping ideas. He will not hesitate to endanger the lives of his employees or animals on his fanciful whims.

Can six full-grown elephants balance on a rubber ball? Who knows. Let’s put it in the show. Is it safe to have a baby elephant drop twenty feet into a washtub full of shaving cream? We’ll find out. Is it a good idea to start a fire underneath a canvas tent for the sake of a firefighter sketch? The audience likes it, so who cares? Go stand next to the fire, clowns.

There’s an old adage about doing anything for a laugh, but the clowns from Dumbo take it to a sociopathic extreme. The clowns develop an entire act around humiliating Dumbo. When the skit is a success, they drunkenly decide to put Dumbo in more humiliating situations and more precarious stunts.

It’s implied the clowns are the low men in the circus’s caste; those who cannot perform elsewhere are subjected to the humiliation of clowndom. Does the scorn beget the malice, or did the malice beget the scorn?

Perhaps this is why the clowns are never shown as actual humans. Throughout the movie, they either appear in their grotesque, make-up clad personas, or in various states of undress as silhouettes inside a circus tent. At all times, they are either 100% clown or some spectral figure. They are never seen as human, because there is certainly no humanity to them.

However, the most questionable employees are the laborers. The laborers are not entertainers; they have no face time with any circus patrons. And yet, they are the most important employees of the circus. They are responsible for unloading the train and erecting the many circus structures.

These laborers, tasked with the most arduous and backbreaking of work, are all large black men. As a stylistic choice, they are all depicted faceless. Not even worthy of dignity, they are robbed of any identity and distinguishing characteristics beyond skin color.

To cushion our objections, the laborers sing about how much they like the work. The song is no comfort. They sing about being illiterate. They sing about being underpaid, and routinely subject to wage theft. They sing about how its their very nature to be irresponsible with money. They literally use the word “slave,” and “ape” to describe their circumstances. Thank you, 1940s.

The only other black characters are a murder of crows introduced in act three. These crows must be less racist in depiction and demeanor than the laborers, right? They couldn't possibly be worse, right? Then one learns the leader of the avian posse was named “Jim Crow” on all Disney material until the 1960s.

The entire Civil Rights Movement needed to happen, but somebody eventually realized a children’s cartoon character named after the most provocative blackface character in history, the namesake of the American laws that enforced segregation, was a bad idea. It didn’t help Jim was voiced by a white actor. Cliff Edwards voiced Jim Crow (later renamed Dandy Crow), the same actor also voiced Jiminy Cricket in Pinocchio. Jiminy Cricket has appeared regularly as a beloved figure in Disney merchandise and material. Dandy Crow has not.

To Disney’s credit, the other crows were voiced by actual black actors. Although, one has to wonder if the AAVE was written into the screenplay, or if the director asked the actors to create it on the spot. There’s no good answer.

The crows’ musical number was performed by the all-black Hall Johnson Choir (with the exception of Edwards’s vocals). Their number, When I See an Elephant Fly, is one of the better pieces of music in the Disney catalog. It's full of jazz scatting and clever wordplay. It’s a shame its existence is marred by its racially charged source.

How an oversized pair of ears grants the ability to fly is not important. It’s a cartoon. The ears are a means to an end: the physical feature that made Dumbo a laughingstock also granted him a most unique ability. Differences make us strong. It’s a good moral (even if the film is hypocritical).

The depiction of the moral’s resolution, however, raises eyebrows. Upon discovering he has the ability to fly, Dumbo seizes the opportunity to take revenge on those who wronged him. He circles around the big top, swooping at the ringmaster, scaring the clowns, shooting peanuts at the other elephants like bullets from a machine gun. ‘Make your enemies pay,’ is the takeaway. Suffer all, enemies of Dumbo.

Some may argue Dumbo’s character arc is not redemption for himself, but for his mother. Mrs Jumbo spanks a young boy who assaults her infant son. The circus folk misinterpret this act as a rampage. She’s is subsequently shackled and imprisoned for the forseeable future.

Even after being deemed hazardous and mad, Mrs Jumbo is never sent away. There is no indication of punishment beyond isolation (why the circus keeps a dangerous rampaging elephant on circus grounds is a creative liberty). The true punishment is being separated from her son.

The movie ends with Dumbo as the star of the show. Everyone sings his praises, he has his own personal train car, and Mrs Jumbo is freed. The question is, why is Mrs Jumbo freed? Just because Dumbo is beloved, why is Mrs Jumbo’s perception as a threat forgotten? Why is she forgiven because her son is popular? Dumbo cannot speak, how can he serve as a character witness? Why does Dumbo's achievement redeem his mother's actions? The writers delivered a happy ending by solving a problem that was never actually solved.

Dumbo is a film full of illogical scenes and developments. It's grandfathered into the cultural pantheon despite outdated imagery and storytelling. It has good intentions, utilizing themes of overcoming adversity, the endurance of familial love, and appreciating each other's differences. But these good intentions are drowned in too many narrative shortcuts and a sloppy execution. It’s a pleasant movie the less you remember, and most people’s memories are hazy. What’s more appropriate from a film whose most famous scene is a surreal drunken musical hallucination?

Fantasia Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs Pinocchio Dumbo

#Dumbo #Disney #walt disney #Walt Disney Animation Studios #Film Criticism #film analysis #review #Disney Canon

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