#bringing this back since we talked about piecemeal

[atinylittlepain]

Of Saints and Sinners - Chapter 5

Joel Miller x f!reader/f!oc

masterlist

warnings | 18+ angst, dark themes, canon-typical violence, descriptions of injuries

a/n | she's long, she's dramatic, she's got people stabbing each other, she's got the smallest little smeck of fluff at the end :)

There’s a rushing in her ears as she starts to come to. Her brain is sluggishly crawling through the events that have led her here, laying on her side in damp grass. She remembers the moment just before the blow, seeing people she thought she’d never see again. There’s piecemeal memories of flurries of activity and sharp pinpricks. They’ve been drugging her, keeping her under. She keeps her eyes shut for now, not wanting to alert the men to her conscious state. She can hear them, quietly talking, picking out four distinct voices, though she’s pretty sure there were six of them in total. Too many for her to take on her own. Her mind spins. She lets her eyes barely crack, trying to get some idea of her surroundings. It’s either dusk or dawn, one of those in between times when there’s still a dim light. She can see a sliver of crumbling highway to her left, the grazing tops of trees to her right. She guesses they’ve stopped for the night in a field alongside the highway back to Seattle. She’s slowly letting a plan settle in her mind. She won’t be able to take these men on her own, but she won’t have to.

… 

It’s early, before the sun has fully spilled over the horizon, Joel and the men are getting ready to get back on the move. As they’re getting ready to mount up and head forward, a piercing, drawn-out scream rings out through the forest. It’s not a clicker, and it’s not an animal. It sounds like a woman. The men all look at each other, eyes wide, and then Steve is already running into the treeline and all Joel and Alex can do is follow. Since when did he run towards a sound like that?

They don’t get far into the woods before there’s another scream, followed by punctate gunshots. The men are blindly running toward the commotion, moving as silently as possible through the underbrush of the trees. They're coming towards a break in the treeline, and that’s when Joel sees about ten clickers running in the very same direction. 

…

The sound she made was guttural, coming from somewhere deep that she hadn’t unearthed in a long time, maybe ever. A long preening scream into the dim morning. The men were stunned still, at first they didn’t really understand it had come from her, thinking she’d be out for a while longer. She scrambled to her feet quickly, getting ready to shout again. Before she could, one of the men was on his feet yanking her back by her hair and smothering her mouth with his grimy palm.

“You fucking bitch!” He seethed. The other men were on their feet now, guns cocked.

“We can’t kill her! We have to bring her back alive.”

She bites down hard on the man’s fingers, tasting the thick warmth of blood in her mouth. He shoves her forward onto the ground, another man kicks her in the ribs, hard, and she wheezes out a muddled yelp. She reels for a moment, pressing her cheek into the cool earth, a flickering worry that her plan won’t work.

And then she hears it. Those warbling, inhuman shrieks. The clickers heard her scream and they’re coming for a meal. The men are jerking their necks, pointing their guns towards the treeline, distracted by the sounds. She scrambles back onto her feet, and lets out another wail just as the first infected come darting out of the woods. She grabs a knife out of one of the packs on the ground, the men too distracted by the oncoming clickers to care. They do exactly what she was hoping they’d be stupid enough to try. They start shooting, even more noise to draw even more bodies.

She knows that none of these men can be left alive. She must make sure none of them make it back to Seattle with the story of her survival. They weren’t expecting someone to be crazy enough to kill a human in the midst of a clicker attack. But they also weren’t expecting someone to be crazy enough to attract clickers as a means of escaping. She grabs the closest man and slashes his throat just as the first infected descend on the mouths of their guns.

… 

The men have slowed their pace down to a crawl, letting the stream of clickers trickle out into the field before they reach the treeline. Joel’s never seen anything like this. There’s two men left standing in the field, bullets abandoned, fighting off clickers with knives and the butts of their guns. Four men are dead, and scattered bodies of the infected lay around them. And there’s her. At first Joel thinks she’s running towards the one man to help him fight off the infected, but when she comes up behind him, she stabs him in the fleshy softness below his ribs, pushing him off her blade and into the clicker’s arms. It happens like a flash of lightning, she darts across the field to the last man fighting off two infected. It’s a similar move, she stabs him in the back and shoves him forward into the snarling bodies. Joel glances at Alex and Steve and neither of them seem shocked by this display and Joel wonders if they’ve done this before, if she’s done this before. 

She freezes where she stands, moving cautiously, silently around the feeding clickers. She doesn’t seem to have noticed the men in the treeline as she carefully picks up a deserted pack. But as she goes to sling the pack over her shoulders, a metal canteen falls loose from the bag’s side, dropping to the ground with a sloshing clang. A clicker is darting at her in a flash.

Before he knows what he’s doing, Joel is bounding out from the trees towards her, knife in hand. 

…

The clicker has knocked her onto her back as she presses the bulk of the pack she was carrying into its gnashing face, trying to push it away, to gain back some ground. Its decayed nails scratch into her arms, bearing down its weight until she’s face to face with the creature. She has the fleeting thought that it might just be time to give up, to stop running. And then, the clicker suddenly seizes, collapsing on top of her. She rolls out from under it, trying not to scream in the aftermath. When she looks up and sees Joel Miller, knife in hand, she thinks she might have actually died because there’s no world in which that seems a plausible reality.

He raises his finger to his lips, the need to keep quiet and get the hell out of there most obvious. She swallows hard, standing slowly. Her legs feel like lead, the brutal truth of what just happened coming into focus. She shoulders the pack and grabs his arm. He leads her, stumbling, back towards the trees. Alex and Steve step out from the woods, eyes wild, mouths agape. She lets go of Joel’s arm and staggers into Steve’s arms, digging her nose into his neck as Alex wraps them both up. For a moment, everything is still, everything is quiet, everything is alright. And then she has to let go. 

The group moves back into the woods, away from the carnage as the morning’s light lays bare what has happened. She’s following the men, numbly maneuvering through the forest, staring straight ahead, trying not to think, to just move. Her mind keeps going back to Joel, still wondering why the fuck he came. But she’s too tired to follow that thread far. And she’s in pain, the adrenaline wearing off and the reality of another bite and a bruised set of ribs coming into throbbing clarity. She keeps moving, because it’s the only option, the relief of giving up has dissolved into a wistful fantasy.

… 

Joel’s pulling up the rear of the group, keeping his eye on her. She’s limping, sort of crumpling over her right side. There are faded bruises on her neck and arms, dried blood on the side of her face and the ghost of a black eye. The sleeve of her shirt has been ripped clean off and Joel can see that she’s been bitten again on her left forearm. He feels his chest stir, watching her struggle. He wishes he could’ve taken the task of killing those men off her hands. He would have done it gladly. 

Steve glances back just as she starts to falter and he’s at her side immediately, ducking under her arm and holding onto her hip. Alex shores up her other side, both men supporting her steps. They have to keep moving, get back to the horses and away from the infected. 

They break through the trees, horses still tied up at the gas station where they had left them that morning. She’s stilting in and out of consciousness as they hurry her into the building, laying her down as gently as possible. Steve immediately starts rifling through his stashed pack for the first aid supplies he brought.

Alex kneels down by her head, encouraging a few sips of water out of her. 

Joel murmurs as he starts to lift the hem of her shirt, “we need to check her ribs, she was moving like something was broken.”

She hisses as the fabric slides along the bruising. A brilliant blooming bruise across her right ribcage, but the skin isn’t raised or warm or red in any areas. Joel lets out a sigh.

“No sign of a break, just a lot of bruising. There’s not much we can do for it besides getting her somewhere safe.” 

Steve is already wrapping the bite on her forearm, limb splayed out on his lap. For a moment, Joel’s frightened by how passive she is, a far cry from the person he used to do patrols with. She’s practically catatonic, head tilted to the side, staring blankly. Joel looks to Alex.

“She’s in shock. We can’t move her today. We’ll have to wait for tomorrow. We’re not gonna be able to get home right away. She’s gonna need rest. There’s an outpost in Twin Falls. Two days from where we are. Three days from Jackson. It’s all we got.” The two men look at Joel, nodding blankly. 

Alex feeds her expired painkillers from the first aid kit, she flinches under his gentle ministrations. Joel sits along her right side, eyes still trained on her darkened ribs. He didn’t even realize he had grabbed onto her hand, until she starts squeezing hard. He squeezes back. 

… 

It’s later when she starts coming to again, night settling in. She slowly sits up, huffing in pain as she scoots her back against the wall. Alex and Steve are sitting across from her, leaning against broken shelves, both seemingly asleep, or at least trying to be. She glances over at Joel sitting next to her.

“You hungry?” She shakes her head. “Alex forcefed me an expired clif bar, I’m good.”

She rests her head against the wall, tilting her chin up, sighing. “Those weren’t good before and they’re sure as hell not good now.”

Joel huffs at that, “you eat a lot of clif bars before?”

“Oh yeah, it was a pre-meet ritual.” Joel looks at her, questioning.

“You know, like cross country? I ran the 5K. Ran track too. Was supposed to run in college.”

“That is one sport I never understood.” She snorts at his comment, “it was one of the only things I understood.”

“What else did you understand?” He turns towards her, watching the slope of her arched neck.

“Music, mostly. Fucking loved music. Been searching forever for a record player or cassette player of my own so I can start hunting for whatever’s left. Have a few records stowed away. No luck though.” She bends her knees, letting her arms rest over her shins, slinging her head low.

“Well, if we get back to Jackson alive, I’ll give you unlimited access to mine. Got a record player that works pretty well at home, so long as Ellie hasn’t messed with it.” She visibly brightens at his words, head popping up.

“You’re shitting me. I didn’t know anyone in town had one of their own. Just the one in the bar that Sam likes to play dictator over.” He just nods, a slice of a smile on his face. 

It’s quiet for a moment before she glances back at him, swallowing, “you worried we aren’t gonna make it back?” He sighs, “mostly I’m worried you’re not gonna be able to handle the trip in the state you’re in.”

“I’m fine to travel. Believe me, I’ve had a lot worse.” She’s bristling up again, Joel can feel it.

“I know you have. From what they told me you’ve had a whole lot worse.” Her eyes flash furiously at him, mouth twisted up in a grimace. “So they told you, huh?”

Joel nods, “they had to, had to tell me what I was walking into.” She shakes her head, drawing her lips back in a sneer, “and just why did you walk into this? I wasn’t expecting a rescue party, and especially not one headed by you.”

“You know, most people would be saying thank you right about now for saving their life.” She glares blatantly at his words.

Joel sighs, scrubbing a hand down his face, “I don’t know why I came. Don’t even know why I ran out into that field after you.”

She glances at him again, eyes softened, before looking back down at her hands. It was barely a whisper, but Joel still heard it.

“Thank you.”

[bu1410]

Good morning TUMBLR - March 14th - 2024

''Mr. Plant has owed me a shoe since July 5, 1971."

Bir Rebaa – Algeria - September 1993 - Dec. 1995

Part 3

DJEN DJEN MASSACRE

The social situation in Algeria was worsening – every day the terrorist attacks became more serious, and the reprisals from the security forces multiplied. Fomented by the proverbial conspiracy of the Algerians, everyone had their version of events, which changed with the passage of time and the acquisition of news fabricated ad hoc by the Government's disinformation services.

In this chaos of massacres and killings, the news arrived that 7 Italian sailors had been killed in Djen Djen, a port on the coast 300 km east of Algiers. Following the serious event, the Algerians who worked with us and the employees of the Subcontractor company lined up to express their condolences. Within a few days, however, things began to change - in the sense that the ''elaboration'' of the facts as usual took shape. For the Algerian, things are never as they appear, but rather must be interpreted in light of the twisted mentality that this people represents. People who - since the war for Independence from France - have always been told ''a version of the truth'' and never the real truth.

Even on the occasion of Djen Djen's attack, after a few days the Algerians had gone from ''quel malheur……inacceptable……un honte pour tout le peuple Algerien'' to ''Peut etre…c'est pas claire…je ne sais pas…''. (''what a misfortune…unacceptable…a shame for all the Algerian people'' to ''Maybe…it's not clear…I don't know…''.)

Finally, after a couple of weeks, the massacre was dismissed as the consequence of ''an affair amoureaux'' (A love affair....) implying that the FIS terrorists had nothing to do with the killing of the Italian sailors. It could have been a ''revenge of betrayed husbands and brothers'', and therefore a trivial matter.

FIRST COUNSELOR OF ITALIAN EMBASSY - ALGER.

Following the serious events in Djen Djen, the Italian Embassy in Algiers sent the First Embassy Counselor to our site. A meeting was organized with all the expatriates, and we were told that the Italian Embassy and ENI Group would never have order the preventive evacuation of personnel from Algeria's project. The economic and strategic interests at stake were too great (i.e. Vital gas supplies from Algeria to Italy). Nonetheless, the Embassy, with the agreement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, believed that the internal situation of the country had reached a point where it was recommended to bring back to Italy all ''Non-mandatory'' personnel (the usual terminology used by the Diplomatic Corps and the police…).

So in the following days during radio communications, or simply when meeting on construction sites, it became common within us the practice to address a colleague with:

''Am I talking with a mandatory person''???!!

Or: ''You too are mandatory''?

Naturally, the moment also came when what was said above was contradicted by the facts: having returned to Italy for the 1993 Xmas holidays, in January we were informed by the Company that ''for the moment there are no plans to return to Algeria, given the continuing civil war underway."

We returned to Algeria piecemeal only in mid-February, but the new travel procedure included a night in Paris, and the next morning the departure from terminal T3 of Charles De Gaulle airport. T3 was the terminal designated for ''at risk'' countries departures. From Paris a flight chartered by ENI Group took us directly to Hassi Messaoud, skipping the stop at the very dangerous Algiers airport.

TRIP TO CONSTANTINE

The PROJECT was having problems with cement supplies, so Site Manager Mr. Morello decided that I would go to Batna, a city about 800 km North from Bir Rebaa, to inspect a cement factory that could become one of our suppliers. Two young local engineers from SONATRACH accompanied me. The journey could only take place in daylight, and after a stop in Hassi Messaoud, and one in Biskra, we arrived at the Batna cement factory. Undoubtedly the plant - built by a Belgian company - was the best that the technology of the time offered.

We met the cement plant Director, a very kind person, and a positive report was made on what we saw. Then we went to lunch on the main street of Batna where – according to my two friends – we could ate the best meat brochette of Algeria. In fact the meat was very good, and many customers crowded into the dozens of outdoor stalls. Obviously the hygienic conditions were very questionable, but to my observation my traveling companions responded in unison with the most used expression in those days:

''Quest-que tu veut......c'est ca l'Algerie'' (What you want......this is Algeria…).

Then we left for Constantine, where we would spend the night waiting to catch the plane to Algiers and than to Hassi Messaoud. We wanted to avoid to drive the other 800+ kilometers to get back to Bir Rebaa. I had been to Constantine in 1975, the city had not changed since then: before evening we took a walk to the Sidi M'Cid bridge: it was still there, as it had been since 1912.

When we returned to the hotel, we been informed us that someone from Algiers had called, and that they was waiting to be called back. I called the number, and the telephone operator of SNAMPROGETTI Branch of Algiers answered - I was put in contact the Branch Manager, who once on the phone started shouting:

What the f*** are you doing in Costantine??? Who gave you permission to go there??? Don't you know there's a civil war going on!!!??? That region is full of terrorist????!!! And so on.

Listen - I told him - I was sent here on a mission by Mr. Morello to visit a cement factory, I didn't asked to come here - Site Manager is perfectly aware of my movements, if you have anything to say, call him at Bir Rebaa!

Good - he continued - then we'll settle things with that idiot of Morello - any case tomorrow morning at 7.30 you have a seat booked on the Costantina - Algiers plane. Once you arrive in Algiers, don't leave the airport, board the plane to Hassi Messaoud at 10.30, okay?

''I'll follow your orders Sir' '' and I cut off the conversation.

So it was like that my way back to Hassi Messaoud and then the next day to Bir Rebaa with the Pilatus.

ATTACK ON SCHLUMBERGER BASE.

A evening of September 1993, a bad news shook our small community: a base of the Canadian company Schlumberger, just fifty kilometers away from our location, had been attacked by a terrorist group. The toll was terrible: 23 expatriate dead, and only one survivor: an Somali-Italian guy who had begged the terrorists to save his life, as he was Muslim. He was probably spared so that he could report the horror he had witnessed. Having reached a Gendarmerie National barracks on foot, the survivor was then accompanied to Hassi Massaoud to be treated, given his state of shock.

ROTATION TRIP TO ITALY - October 1993.

Having reached Hassi Messaoud in the morning, in the afternoon we boarded the charter to Paris. We were a group of ten people that time. On the same plane we also found the Somalian- Italian guy who had escaped the massacre at the Schlumberger camp. More than a month after the incident, the guy had still not recovered and looked like a robot He responded only with nods to any questions and requests of the doctor who accompanied him.

RETURN TO ALGERIA - October 1993

The 21 days of vacation had passed, and I met the colleagues at the Marriot hotel, just beside Paris Charles de Gaulles airport. Early the next morning, we got on the shuttle bus to the airport - next to me on the mini bus was an American lady who, in the 15 minute journey, told me ''much of her life: she was 84 years old, and was going on a safari in Botswana.

Are you traveling alone? I asked.

Yes, alone, why? She answered.

The rest of the journey was quite boring, until, on approach to Hassi Messaoud airport, the Captain said:

Here is your Captain, we are about to arrive at Hassi Massoud airport, and according to the new protocol the landing procedure will be slightly different. To minimize the risk of a terrorist attack, from an altitude of 5,000 meters we will swoop down towards the runway, and once landed passengers are asked to quickly get off the plane - this is to allow departing passengers to board just as quickly, and leave Hassi Messaoud immediately.

''During the descent you will feel the plane vibrate and make unusual noises, don't worry, everything will be fine. Thanks for understanding.

Hassi Messaoud Airport - Algeria

With these premises we fastened our seatbelts, looking at each other with expressions on our face like ''but who made me do it''.

The plane – a Boeing 737 – began the dive for which it was NOT designed. Everything was shaking, seats, windows, the overhead bins, I thought personal items would fall on us before landing…………

The noise was deafening, the stewardesses sitting in their seats pretended that everything was under control and made an ''ok'' sign with their thumbs up. None of us had been warned upon departure that the landing would be like that, in this case I think half of the passengers would have refused to board.

When the plane touched the runway the oxygen masks fell from their slots, causing an ''Ohhhh…'' from the passengers. Once the Boing stopped, we ran down the ladder, someone on the ground with a sign showed us that our Pilatus was already ready with the engine running.

We headed towards the plane, wondering what would happen to our suitcases. Once we climbed onto Pilatus we were reassured by Palomino: our luggage would be recovered by an airport employee and sent to Bir Rebaa the next day.

We landed at Bir Rebaa in time for dinner.

END OF MY ASSIGNEMENT

The time had come for me to leave the project. Mechanical completion of the plant was just completed, and commissioning-start up would start soon. It was almost Xmas, and with a large group of expatriates I was crammed into the cramped ''depart'' lounge of Hassi Messaoud airport. All of a sudden I heard someone call me out loud: Monsieur Monsieurrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!

He was a supervisor of our Civil Works Sub-Contractor, whose family owned an oasis and had very kindly brought me an entire branch of ripe dates, to take to Italy! Now beyond the kind gesture, Ahmed did something that now - 30 years later - would never be allowed to be done in any airport: access the departure gate with the passengers ready for boarding, holding a huge dates branch in his hand. dates!

And I believe that today, with all the restrictions due to Security rules and Covid19, a branch of that size would never be accepted on board an airliner.

However, it was a much appreciated gift, once at home there were delicious dates for everyone, relatives and friends.

Pilatus PC6

[yourplayersaidwhat]

Admiral Bacon is born a hero... and dies a villain.

Gryff (5 Cavalier, 1 Sorcerer) is keeping watch while the rest of the party sleeps.  He hears something in the dark and goes to investigate, finding about 3 dozen Goblins following the party's trail. Gryff:  Hey, I'm Gryff!  You guys look hungry, want something to eat? DM: The goblins stop as they're about to charge you, and start jabbering to each other. Gryff (OOC): I'm a polyglot and I have unspent Languages points.  Can I learn Goblin like Anthonio Bandares in 13th warrior? DM:  Roll languages, I guess? Gryff rolls a nat 20. DM:  They're talking about how Captain of the Hobs (the hobgoblin pirates you met in Silverton) are looking for a Centaur, a Sea elf and a Halfling.  They're paying in meat for it, but Gryff is just one halfling, so they better wait for the other two to show up before they eat you. Gryff:  Cool!  While I'm learning Goblin, I unfurl my Hero's Feast Table cloth.  It says it produces a feast for 12 people that lasts an hour.  Can I choose WHAT the Feast is? DM:  Yeah, we can do that for flavor.   Gryff:  I want it to be ALL bacon and bacon-related foods.  Bacon wrapped shrimp, bacon wrapped turkey legs, bacon kebabs... ALL bacon. DM: They goblins are in AWE. Gryff, in Goblin:  So, you serve the Captain, huh?  Well, I'm an ADMIRAL.  That outranks Captain.  My name is Admiral Bacon... and I'll give you a whole feast of Bacon like this for every Hobgoblin ear you bring me here.  Understood? DM:  The goblins all cheer, shove bacon into their face, and ride off toward the campfires where you last saw the Hobgoblins. Gryff, waking up the rest of the party:  Hey, uh, guys.  We.... need to go.  Like... now.  Also, (Oracle), I borrowed your tablecloth.  I'll put it back later. TWO YEARS LATER. DM:  The army of dragons, hobgoblins and goblins have amassed outside the city walls.  You can see the city is burning in places, but you've setup along the main road where it's been fortified to allow the civilians to retreat to the temple.  You've been fighting all night when you hear a familiar trumpet call in the distance.  It sounds like... Gryff's battle charge. Gryff:  Uh... but... I'm HERE, how can I be out THERE? Oracle:  What did you do now, Gryff? Gryff:  It wasn't me, I swear!  Probably. DM:  Around a bend in the road come riding a dozen Goblin Warg-riders.  They're dressed in piecemeal armor and wielding lances and swords that are far better constructed than typical Goblins.  The leader is flying a banner.  It looks like Gryff's banner, except instead of crossed lances it's strips of bacon and instead of a lion rampant opposing a dragon, it's a PIG. The Goblin Chief, in Goblin:  Surrender, humans!  We ride in the name of our great hero, ADMIRAL BACON.  I have seen the truth, and the Admiral has told me to purge all humans from this town.  None can stand before his mighty hand! Gryff:  Oh.  Ohhhhhh no.  This is bad.  (in Goblin)  I said kill the HOBGOBLINS, you idiots! (in common)... do either of you speak Goblin? Party:  No, what's he saying? Gryff: ... uh... something about some guy.  Totally not me, by the way, who is a big hero and handsome and stuff.  Anyway, some guy that told them to kill Hobgoblins, but they got confused and they're killing humans instead.  Man, it would suck to be that guy, right?  Anyway, we should probably kill them before they talk any more foolishness.  And we need to burn that flag.  Like, fast. Goblins, in common:  In the name of Admiral Bacon... you DIE humans!  Our Admiral will give us bacon for your EARS! Cleric:  ... Gryff, didn't you say you told some Goblins your name was Admiral Bacon? Gryff, sulking:  Since when do Goblins speak COMMON.  This isn't fair.  I don't want to talk about it.  Let's just kill these idiots.  Obviously someone has sullied the good name of Admiral Bacon.  They're not getting bacon for this, I'll tell you that right now.  I don't care how many Hobgoblin ears they bring me. Clerif and Oracle:  Hobgoblin WHAT!?  Gryff, what did you DO!? Gryff:  ... can we focus, please?  Stuff happened, things were said, and now we have to kill these Goblins.  The rest isn't important.  Now let's burn that flag, I have an image to maintain. Gryff, grumbling under his breath: Now I'll never get an army of bacon-crazed goblins.  SO unfair.

[skypalacearchitect]

[Source only allows 1 free article per month, so I’m copying it all here]:

Date: May 27, 2020, 10:47 AM

On Nov. 25, 2019, while thousands of women took to the streets of Mexico City to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, Abril Pérez was shot to death by a hitman. The 48-year-old executive of a Mexican online retail store and mother of three was on her way to the airport to return home to Monterrey after a custody hearing. She’d recently divorced Juan Carlos García, a former Amazon Mexico CEO and the father of her children, whom she had accused of attempted murder 11 months prior for allegedly creeping into her home in the middle of the night and beating her with a baseball bat. The gunman and his driver were arrested in March, but García, the suspected mastermind behind Pérez’s death, has reportedly fled to the United States.

What remains an open question is what role the United States played in the murder itself. As coronavirus-related lockdowns worsen the threat of domestic violence for women around the world, women in Mexico face an additional danger: the flood of American guns into the country. “The U.S. talks about how drugs and migrants cross the border from Mexico,” said Maura Roldán, a researcher on gun violence from Mexico City. “But it hasn’t recognized its role in the rise in violence in Mexico. It doesn’t mention the fact that it’s providing the guns.”

While it’s impossible to know the provenance of the murder weapon in Pérez’s case—Mexican homicide databases do not include this information—what is certain is that a steady stream, or torrent, of American firearms since the early 2000s has contributed to a spike in gun-related deaths in Mexico, in turn transforming and exacerbating gender violence. Seventy percent of guns recovered as part of a criminal investigation in Mexico are traced back to the United States, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

That influx of guns has taken a toll on women’s safety. Ten women were killed each day in 2018, according to Mexico’s national statistics agency. Roldán and a handful of other researchers and activists, almost all women, point to another statistic: In 2018, six in 10 of those women were fatally shot.

“The proliferation of guns, the huge presence of guns, including in homes, is changing the nature of domestic violence,” said Ana Pecova, the director of the human rights organization Equis. “In the past, a fight would descend into punches. Now, a gun gets pulled out, and a woman ends up dead.”

Not only has gender violence become more lethal, but it has also spilled out of homes and into the streets. Since 2009, more women have been killed in public spaces than in domestic settings, according to a 2015 report by Data Civica. While fewer women than men die of gun violence, the rates at which women are dying from firearms are growing faster: Between 2007 and 2018, gun violence rates for women rose 357 percent (compared to 311 percent for men), and 500 percent in public spaces (347 percent for men), according to Estefanía Vela Barba, one of the authors of the Data Civica report who continues to research the link between gun violence and femicide. Gun-fueled gender violence in public spaces is multifaceted. It can be outsourced intimate partner violence, as is suspected in Pérez’s case. Or it can be cartel messaging.

The scale of violence in Mexico, which abets both forms of public gender violence, comes down to the country’s drug war and the militarization of public security, local experts and activists said. Then-President Felipe Calderón’s mission to uproot organized crime in Mexico has, since its start in 2006, spectacularly failed, fracturing and multiplying cartels, and leading to soaring levels of violence, the most prominent evidence of which is the disappearance of some 61,000 people. While the violence can be blind to gender—stray bullets are indiscriminate—it is often targeted. There are clues in the swirl of statistics: rape, mutilations such as cut off breasts, or shots to the genital region all point to violence against women specifically. But many bodies are hidden or destroyed, or mistabulated. While government registries counted 1,012 femicides last year, activists say the number is likely much higher.

The data in Mexico correlates neatly with a short history of increasingly relaxed gun control laws in the United States and the steady growth of both a legal and illegal firearm trade. The 2004 expiration of the assault weapon ban in the United States ramped up the production and sale of military-grade weapons. By the time Mexico declared its drug war two years later, American manufacturers were ready to pump these high-grade weapons into Mexican military arsenals. Organized crime responded by ratcheting up its own caches, buying more weapons through its own channels: third-party straw purchases; buying on the extensive black market, which lately consists of bringing gun parts in piecemeal fashion across the border and assembling them in Mexico; and even obtaining weapons directly from Mexican security forces. Some 20,000 firearms were reported lost or stolen from state and federal police between 2006 and 2017.

Citizens, caught in the middle of a bloody turf war, armed themselves too. Though Mexico boasts some of the world’s strictest gun control laws, 16.8 million firearms were estimated to be in civilian hands in 2017, according to the Small Arms Survey. Only a small fraction of these were registered. Due to the vast illegal trade, it’s impossible to know exactly how many American guns are sold into Mexico. But the numbers are large enough that Mexican authorities are concerned—and even more so recently.

A slump in domestic sales since 2017 has further turned U.S. gun manufacturers’ attention toward Mexico. In a bid to support the industry, the Trump administration recently moved firearm export oversight from the State Department to the Commerce Department, in what John Lindsay-Poland, the director of Stop U.S. Arms to Mexico, said is designed to loosen oversight and increase the number of firearm exports. “For the U.S., I contend that the assault weapons ban is a foreign-policy issue,” said Lindsay-Poland. “U.S.-sourced assault weapons are used in many more crimes in Mexico than in the U.S.”

In addition to reinstating the assault weapons ban, Eugenio Weigend Vargas, the associate director for gun violence prevention at the Center for American Progress think tank, said the United States should implement universal background checks and ensure stricter regulation of American gun stores. “The measures we advocate for won’t just reduce violence in the U.S., but will also reduce gun traffic to Mexico and Central America,” Vargas said. “The more guns there are, the more domestic violence.”

Meaghan Beatley is a journalist based in Barcelona. She has written for the Nation, the New Statesman, National Geographic and others.

[stillness-in-green]

The MLA(/PLF) Headcanon Post (1/2)

In response to this nice ask about whether I have any headcanon or thoughts about the current members of the MLA/PLF, I spent two weeks blithering 16.5K words of exactly that into a Word file, because when it comes to underappreciated characters I love, I do not understand restraint.  This post and its follow-up will cover all ranked ex-MLA members of the PLF, as well as Original Flavor Destro and Curious, since I wasn't going to leave them out of a project like this even if they aren't "current."

The ask only mentioned having previously read The Lore Post, the last exercise in ridiculousness that I wrote at the tail end of MLA Week, so I wrote this to summarize everything that doesn't appear there—which is to say that a lot of the material in these two posts will look familiar to anyone who's read my fanfic about the MLA cast.  There’s still plenty of new material to go around too, though!

So, I don't have much in the vein of askblog-style headcanons where I can randomly tell you stray trivia about a character’s favorite foods or their love languages or what have you; that stuff either comes up when I'm writing fanfic or it doesn't.  That said, below, please find a mix of thoughts I keep in mind when writing characters, facts that have only turned up in my fanfic/notes so far and not the Lore Post meta, and a selection of lightning round headcanon provided by cross-referencing a random number generator with some old questionnaires I keep around for OCs and tabletop characters.

In this post: Destro, Re-Destro and his advisors, and Geten.

Destro— 

General Thoughts The whole "revolutionary leader" thing came very naturally to him. He was committed, charismatic, very willing to risk his life and safety for the cause, and he cared about his people. All that said, he absolutely had a pompous, prideful streak, especially where it came to his justification for terrorism.  You only have to read his own words to see that.  Still, he was in large part reacting to the world he lived in, one of greater violence and danger than the current day. 

I like to think that—because he was genuine in wanting freedom for all—he would not approve of what became of his Army.  He'd be able to see how they got there, and he would probably have made much the same choices if he'd been there with them, but while he would have agreed that his role should be remembered—that's just Due Credit—he would never have wanted to become the nigh-on religious figure his followers turned him into. Continuing to fight the good fight for his ideals is one thing, but secret salutes and isolated villages and being raised from infancy to know your life has only as much worth as it can contribute to Liberation…  Well, it's just not what he would have wanted for his people, much less his descendants. 

Family Situation Chikara was only around 7 when his mother was killed, the event that would shape the rest of his life.  He wasn't hiding in the closet from the mob, either; he was kicking and punching and biting, his motivation to save her overflowing—but he was still only 7, and eventually overwhelmed.  His own life might well have ended there with hers, but for a group of neighborhood vigilante types (at least one of whom probably went on to a career as a hero, after legalization).

He went most of his adolescence without getting involved with anything more sinister than student newspapers, founding a secret meta-rights "club," and attending the odd larger protest, but when the government started talking about passing laws restricting the use of meta-abilities, he started getting very radical very quickly, and when some absolute snake started to use his martyred mother's words to bang the drum for banning quirk use outside the home outright, he went off the deep end.

Lightning Round (Randomly Selected Headcanons)

Favorite book genre?  Memoirs and biographies—he wouldn't have written his own if he didn't appreciate their value.  The intimacy of the personal juxtaposed against the broad scope of history appeals to both his regard for individuality and his revolutionary mindset.

Most prized possession?  Thoughts on material possessions in general?   He doesn’t generally prize material possessions—in fact, he’s something of a skinflint.  His most prized possession is an old pair of gloves that belonged to his mother, which he'd been wearing at the time of her murder.  He didn't come from money to begin with, but his mother’s story made enough of a splash that his financial situation was improved by well-meaning sorts sending along donations and contributions and the like, as well as government officials knowing they needed to be sure that he wound up somewhere at least semi-reasonable lest they court further outrage by mishandling the son of a martyred woman.  The money all went towards school and living expenses, though, leaving him quite experienced at balancing a budget, which would come in handy for that whole ‘leading a violent uprising against the state’ thing later on.

Academic Background: Got all the way through college!  Was involved in student groups as far back as middle school, and only got moreso the further in school he got.  Majored in Human Development; he was intending to go into the public health and policy sphere before the appropriation of his mother's language pissed him off so much he got into terrorism instead.

THE MODERN MLA

Re-Destro—

General Thoughts A huge amount of the way I write him is influenced by one single thing—his characterization as described in the second data book.  His personality is summed up there as "sokoshirenai yami"—bottomless darkness, or, as a friend translated it for me, "unfathomable gloominess."  That really, really stuck with me, because on the one hand, it's so opposed to virtually all of what we see of him on the page, where he's being cheerful or scornful or sycophantic; the closest he ever gets are his brief tears for Miyashita, Curious, and his other followers.

On the other hand, it makes so much sense that the man we see—the man who talks about the heavy burdens of his legacy, who was handed that legacy when he couldn't possibly have been any older than 6 or so, who willingly straps on a self-designed torture device to wring out more power, who all but worships the ground Shigaraki walks on even though Shigaraki is the reason Re-Destro no longer has legs to walk that same ground with—should be "unfathomably gloomy."  Of course he's gloomy!  He was never allowed to be his own person!  He has never in his life known true freedom, only existed as a vessel to bring that freedom to others!  And he can't really even talk to his closest friends about it, because his closest friends are still his followers, and he wouldn't want to weigh them down!

With that context, it makes all the sense in the world that he'd be so devoted to the man who relieved him of that burden.

Family Situation He loved his mother Yukie a great deal, despite knowing from early on that he was carrying the weight of the title because she believed she couldn’t.  (Perhaps growing up hearing about the martyrdom of Destro’s mother left him wanting to ensure the happiness of his own, for her happiness was very rare.)  He was 10 when she was killed in a Villain attack; she’d been on a daytrip over to a neighboring city to visit some of her erstwhile school friends.  The requisite mourning period was 49 days, and as the only surviving family member, quite a lot fell to him even before considerations of his role as Re-Destro.  it was perceived as better—for both the Army’s morale and for his own stability—for him to be involved with as much of the work of transition as possible, but obviously he couldn’t do it completely alone, nor should he.  Thus, for two months after Yukie’s death, the previous generation's Sanctum[i] stayed with him in his family home. Afterward, he moved in with Anchor (one of his grandfather's advisors), where he would spend the rest of his young adulthood until moving away for college.

Claustrophobia The name of that literal-iron-maiden deathtrap he brings to bear against Shigaraki is no coincidence: Rikiya developed claustrophobia over the course of a stint of abusive training when he was thirteen. He generally has a pretty good handle on disguising it, thanks to a combination of people being unwilling to ask him questions they don’t actually want the answers to and the fact that he had to learn how to operate through it in order to complete the training at all. He has never told anyone, largely because he’s never been able to recognize that it was abuse, and so his abuser remains a figure of some influence.

Education He was largely taught by private tutors, in his home and in theirs, rather than attending school, but I think he probably wasn't completely home-schooled.  Particularly once he'd decided that he did want to attend university—and not just some little local technical program, but a major school in a proper city—he probably attended classes a few times a week at his local high school just to get a feel for being around other people his own age. He'd been friends with Koku for several years by that point, otherwise he probably would have been pretty hopeless, but he was still a pretty odd duck by the time he got to university.

This, incidentally, is why he never pushed Geten too hard about school—his own experience of it was so weird and piecemeal that he mostly thinks of school as relevant only for the education it provides, and less so the crash course in social dynamics.  Since Geten doesn't care about getting an education (nor, indeed, about learning how not to be a rude little troll), and has a strong enough quirk that he'll never lack for a position in the Army even without a formal education, Rikiya is perfectly happy to let Geten have his way and just be minimally learnèd.

Stress His powers operate by infusing his body with the characteristic black matter of his manifested stress; he can increase his size with this (his so-called Liberated Form isn't just armored up; he becomes physically taller and bulkier), as well as throw handfuls of the materialized power.  A side effect of this is that his stress can also infuse itself into his bodily fluids. The stress matter is a highly dense particulate, so if Rikiya is not in proper control of himself, his proverbial blood, sweat and tears can be literally heavy with the weight of his power.

The Value of Life He cares very much about the lives of his followers, but those genuine feelings are filtered through both the mental compartmentalization required by an emotion-based quirk, and an upbringing that taught him to care about his underlings in the same way one would rare goods.  Valuable goods, certainly, goods worth being proud of, goods to be maintained with care, but still, ultimately, things that can be sold or traded or bartered off as necessary to further one's goals.  Even his own life, while "objectively" the most valuable of them all, isn't an exception to that policy—the Great Cause is more important than any individual life, up to and including his own.

On a Personal Note He’s something of an obvious weirdo to outsiders—his enthusiasm comes off as strident, his smiles overly polished—but despite that, he's bizarrely hard to dislike once they start spending real time with him.  He's not anywhere near as prideful about himself as he is the legacy of the MLA, for a start; he's actually pretty self-deprecating when he's not performing the whole Heir of Destro's Great Bloodline routine at people.  He's also happy to go along with other people sharing their hobbies (because he doesn't have any of his own).  The more you get to know him, the more obvious it becomes that he's a total basket case, but “total basket case” is still an improvement over “self-absorbed 1%-er CEO” that people like Spinner come in expecting.

What Are Boundaries? He has very little understanding of how to enforce boundaries around his private life, or, indeed, of why such boundaries might ever be necessary.  Oh, he can do the double life thing, keep the CEO of Detnerat separate from the Grand Commander of the Metahuman Liberation Army, but when it comes to the MLA itself, he's so groomed to devote himself to the cause that he doesn't really distinguish between the responsibilities of Re-Destro and the needs of Yotsubashi Rikiya.  Rather than being the egomaniac you might expect of a man with the absolute power over others he has, he instead struggles to assert himself as his own person at all.

Issues with boundaries are not uncommon with the MLA—they're all raised to see themselves as warriors to advance the cause before they are, like, “human beings”—but Rikiya’s are particularly exacerbated because he was raised by adults who were getting pretty paranoid about his bloodline's tendency to die young, and thus were always checking in on how he was doing, dictating his schedule, weighing in on his plans, and so on.  He just wasn’t raised with reasonable expectations for privacy.  Even as an adult, he'll give his apartment door code to pretty much anyone in the MLA who has even a semi-plausible reason to want it—certainly quite a few of the elders know it!  And it isn’t only the elders, either; Rikiya's phone and several of his accessories carry tracking chips courtesy of Skeptic, which Rikiya knows about and doesn't think is at all untoward.

While his experience dating Koku definitely taught him some hard lessons about how much he could allow himself to ask of people who would obey him without question (they broke up over Rikiya’s realization that Koku would never deny him anything, thanks to a cracked rib Koku didn’t see fit to tell Rikiya about until Rikiya hugged him a little too hard), he never learned how to value his own autonomy in turn.  Oh, he's the Grand Commander, and everyone around him has been raised to venerate his bloodline, so most of them would never even think about trying to take advantage of him as such, but it's absolutely the case that people who are bold or familiar enough to try can basically run right over him with minimal efforts made at obscuring the fact.  His life is full of people who do and have done exactly that, some to a net positive effect, and some—well.  See again the entry about his claustrophobia.

The abjectly terrible state of his sense of self-worth is also the reason the Claustro exists.  While he was relatively capable of trying to work around his phobia when he was younger, the older he got, the more it started to feel like leaving doors cracked behind him or only working in offices with big spacious floor plans and oversized windows was, in some way, Letting Down The Cause by allowing his fear to control him, rather than embracing it so he could properly stockpile it for later use.  A dinnertime chat with Curious about turning one’s trauma into a weapon for the good of others catalyzed this, leading to the development of the “burden-enhancing steel pressure mechanism,” Claustro. 

(It also means the clone of him made by Twice to handle Detnerat after Deika is bizarrely okay with its circumstances, which I will almost certainly write more about one of these days, but I’m still kind of reeling from that reveal, so more on that another time.)

Lightning Round

Religion?   He doesn't identify as being of a religious faith, but he was brought up in the same peaceful marriage of Shinto and Buddhism that the majority of Japanese people are, and like many, he adheres to a number of traditional practices more out of habit than devout faith.  There are two celebrations that demand significant emotional investment from him.  First comes the New Year's celebrations, important because the MLA prides itself on looking to a brighter, freer future, and it's a period when he can let himself think that maybe he'll be just that little bit closer to Liberation by the end of the year than he was at the start.  Second is Obon, a summer festival for honoring one's departed ancestors. Since his authority and his life's work derive entirely from his bloodline, he's obligated to care about this one, though in practice, he tends to shy away from thinking much about Destro (who he has very twisted-up feelings about indeed) in favor of less emotionally fraught waters.

What did he dream of being or doing as a child? Did that dream come true?   He never really had a significant period where he thought about being e.g. an astronaut or a doctor or a hero; in fact, it came as something of a surprise to him the first time Koku asked him what he was planning to do when he grew up.  He always just had the nebulous expectation of, "Be the Grand Commander," and the elders were happy to leave it at that until he brought it up on his own.[ii]  

How does he behave around children? He likes kids!  He’s wistful about the freedom enjoyed by happy children while also being sympathetic to ones that seem overly burdened.  He’s not the most natural person in the world with them, but most of them can tell that the awkwardness comes from a well-intentioned place, and will treat him as a funny-looking man who’ll let them bother him at length without getting mean.  It turns out he’s actually pretty good with them, then, if only by virtue of being easily bullied.  (This, notably, goes for non-MLA-affiliated children.  Everything’s much more formal within the cult, though it didn’t Geten long to suss out the “easily-bullied” part, either.)

Trumpet—

General Thoughts The largest factor in how I write Koku is, of course, the headcanon that he and Rikiya are ex-lovers, and neither of them is 100% over it even all these years later.  Beyond that, though, Koku is the most temperate of the group, the one with the most easy charisma (MLA members are more swayed by Re-Destro, but Koku does better with outsiders who aren't predisposed to hanging on Rikiya's every word).  He strives to come off as The Sensible One, and given the extremes the rest of the inner circle are capable of, it's not hard for him to maintain that title.  He's as messed up as any of them, though, second only to Rikiya in levels of childhood grooming.  He thinks of himself as a practical man, but he is deeply indoctrinated, the boundaries of his expectations very much defined by his upbringing, so he never really sees it coming when he gets clobbered by something from out of left field.

Family Situation: Koku has the largest family of the identified members.  Aside from his grandfather (called Old Man Hanabata, the founder of the Hearts & Minds Party, and passed away by the canon era), Koku has cousins, nieces, nephews and more, courtesy of his uncle, his older sister and her husband, and other extended family.

He’s also the member most accustomed to wealth, power and influence.  He's from a rural area, certainly, but being in a family of hereditary politicians (and with that family not suffering a string of untimely deaths and disappearances like Rikiya's did), he was raised from the start with ready access to money and nice things.  Still, for all his family's sway in a major branch of the MLA's operations, they're not First Families, and thus don't have any elders in their ranks, making them still somewhat subordinate to said elders when it comes to orders about the Great Cause.  (He’s working on it.)

Meeting Re-Destro Koku and Rikiya met at 12 and 10 respectively, when Koku tagged along with Old Man Hanabata for a meeting RD was likewise accompanying Anchor for.  It had been the better part of a year since Rikiya's mother passed away, but he was still strikingly melancholy for a boy that age, which—along with all the weight given to the importance of the meeting—left quite an impression on Koku.  Koku thus became Rikiya's first real friend in his own age group, a friendship heartily encouraged by everyone around them.  Koku was well-behaved, intelligent, a little older but not too much so, and set to become influential without a danger of becoming too influential; he was seen as a good choice for a friend.[iii]

The Break-Up Painful as it was at the time, there was a silver lining to his and RD's post-college break-up: it got Koku out of the elders' pocket.  He’s been groomed for one thing or another all his life, but after he became friends with Rikiya, he was always getting leaned on to report back to the First Families about how Re-Destro was doing, and to try to influence him towards actions the First Families approved of.  In a very real sense, Koku was part of the apparatus keeping Rikiya from any real freedom.  Their break-up and subsequent estrangement meant that the elders had far less to breathe down Koku's neck about, and by the time they reconciled, Trumpet had gotten his feet under him, as had Re-Destro, and they were both better able to fend off such background meddling.

This doesn't mean Trumpet's not still carrying a torch, however.  He thought he was handling his long-banked feelings pretty well—being Professional, being the advisor Re-Destro needed and as much a friend as Rikiya would allow—right up until Rikiya scared the life out of him by nearly dying in Deika.  He's all but glued himself to Rikiya since, as much as he can get away with given their respective responsibilities.

As an Advisor Other than leading the HMP, he does some work with internal politics and reputation. It's not, strictly speaking, his actual job as advisor—Re-Destro or the elders would probably be sought for more formal or critical mediations—but he and the people who report directly to him do enough travelling around to see constituents that they're often in a position to field those tensions before they get big enough to require attention from higher up.  Koku's happy to do so, in fact—not because he just loves handling petty arguments about resources, but because the HMP is a faction of the MLA in and of itself, and mediating is a boost to that faction's standing and autonomy.  (Also, it's that much less on Rikiya's ever-overburdened plate.)

Lightning Round

What would he do if he needed to make dinner but the kitchen was busy?Ahahahahaha, “make dinner but the kitchen was busy,” please.  Any time there could feasibly be someone else occupying a kitchen he has any business being in himself, it would be a housekeeper, and s/he would be making food for him/his family.  It’s not as though Trumpet has never cooked—he did live alone for some years after school—but outside of a scant few years in university, there’s never really been a time that kitchen use overlap would have been a problem for him. 

Favorite indulgence and feelings surrounding indulging. Probably gourmet cuisine, especially imported stuff. He’s had tailored clothes all his life; they’re just part of the job.  Expensive alcohol also doesn’t wow him; it wouldn’t be strange to find some sake maker whose family has been doing it for sixteen generations in the village he grew up in.  It’s a lot harder to cultivate a true gourmand’s palate out in the sticks, though, no matter how rich your family is.  Living in actual civilization affords a great deal more variety—and anyway, nice dinners are one of the few things he can reliably tempt Rikiya into accepting.  As to his feelings about indulging in general, he’s broadly For It.  He works very hard, he seldom gets real time off, and it doesn’t help the Great Cause for him to deny himself nice things, unlike some people.  (He’s maybe a bit bitter.)

Does he like to be the center of attention all of the time? Not especially.  Oh, he’s very good at it, certainly, and he doesn’t dislike it, but being the center of attention is practically always going to be tied up in The Great Work, so he desperately needs to get out of the spotlight from time to time, if only to be able to turn off the persona.

Curious—

General Thoughts There are two main factors in how I write Chitose: her practicality and her rapaciousness.  I write her as having an appreciation for good moral character in other people, especially when it makes a good story, but not considering herself particularly bound by conventional morality: her moral compass is Liberation, and she follows it unswervingly.  I also write her as predatory, lusty about a lot of things, often to the point of overstepping.  It doesn't hurt anyone that she likes hearty foods and strong alcohol, but she also doesn't have much regard for peoples' boundaries, and even less so when she thinks they have something to offer the Great Cause.

While that trait isn't without its benefits, it can get pretty ugly, too, as we see in how she treats, and talks to, Toga.  Even with Rikiya, the only person she thinks of as 'above' her in any meaningful sense, she's not at all above manipulation.  She's respectful of him, but knows him too well to always take him at his word.  He plainly can't always see what's best for him, but what's best for him is best for Liberation, and therefore, as a Liberation warrior, it's her responsibility to sometimes make decisions for him.  He'll appreciate it in the long run—he always does.  (Skeptic and Geten have similar views—Rikiya makes it easy.)

Family Situation She probably has the best actual relationship with her family of the group—her mothers are removed enough from the heart of MLA politics that her relationship with Rikiya doesn't color her family life the way Koku's does his, and she's much more sociable than Skeptic or Geten.  She doesn't get home much—just the major holidays, work permitting—but she's in frequent enough communication for a grown woman, and chats with her younger sister more often than that.

Meeting Re-Destro She met Rikiya properly when they were 21 and 27 respectively.  They were living in the same city at the time (him running Detnerat, her in university), so of course she'd seen him at the odd MLA event he turned up at, but when she landed an internship in her junior year, she cheekily turned up one day in her reporter capacity to interview him as “a local rising star of industry.”  It was the first chance they'd had to talk one-on-one, and would not be the last, as she frankly elbowed her way into his life and gradually sussed out that here was a man with Problems.  He and Koku were still in a distant patch at the time; she is largely responsible for getting them back on friendly terms as a way of showing her Pure Intentions.

The fact that her Pure Intentions both land her a square position as one of RD's advisors herself and get Rikiya to a better place emotionally is calculated, but not, therefore, untrue.  Ironically, while she was concerned about looking like a gold-digger, the MLA elders were probably thrilled and relieved to hear rumors that Rikiya was getting romantically involved again.  And with a lovely young MLA woman!  They wouldn't even need to worry about surrogacy arrangements!  (Not having grown up around the Yotsubashis, Chitose is unaware of exactly how pointed an interest the elders take in the matter of securing that bloodline.)

Feelings Today She loves Rikiya dearly, and prizes his regard more highly than anything in her life, but has not devoted much thought to the idea of being in love with him. She's married to her work, as they say, but she's also keenly aware that Rikiya would, for a great many reasons, be a lot of work to be in love with.  She's decided it's generally better for his mental well-being, and therefore also better for the Great Cause (she’s much more capable of reading that relationship reciprocally than Rikiya is), to make sure he's eating at least one good meal a week and getting some proper socialization in outside of MLA meet-and-greets.

As an Advisor She handles external politics and reputation--it's her job to prime Japan culturally for the Liberation agenda in ways more wide-reaching than Trumpet (he's head of a political party, and that's not nothing, but that party is still a small minority on the floor of the Diet).  She pulls attention to stories that benefit the MLA, and diverts attention from stories that don't.  This is far broader than just publishing Destro's memoir; it also means poking holes in the broader Hero Society narrative.  She does this by providing as broad a platform possible for stories about the tragedies of excessive regulation, the evils of quirk-related bias, the abuses of power heroes are capable of, and so on.

Lightning Round

Does she remember names or faces easier? She’s quite good with both, actually, but I’d give names the advantage because she works primarily with written rather than visual mediums.  (Also, BNHA names being the ridiculous puns that they are, you can probably tell more about a person in HeroAca Land by analyzing their name than their face anyway.) 

Is she more concerned with defending her honor, or protecting her status? Her status, absolutely.  Impugning her honor hurts no one but her; she can laugh that off because honor is a silly social construct anyway.  Threatening her status is a much more dangerous prospect—her status is long-cultivated to enable the advancement of Liberation ideology; it lets her keep an eye on Re-Destro, who needs as many people looking out for him as he can get; it’s what she’s worked for all her life. Curious will fuck you up if you threaten her status.

In what situation was she the most afraid she’d ever been? The time she got in trouble for nearly exploding some dude’s face off for stealing her purse.  She was 17, had spent very little time in non-Liberated territory before, and was not raised to wait on heroes to solve her problems.  She wasn’t afraid of the thief or the hero, really, but she was completely terrified that she might have just blown over half a century of secrecy by not performing Helpless Civilian well enough. The terror was pretty convincing to the police interviewing her about it, anyway.  On the whole, it was a very valuable learning experience!  

Skeptic—

General Thoughts Tomoyasu is a character I haven't written extensively yet, but what I think is most interesting about him so far is the contrast of his hyper-modern methods with the bone-deep zealotry for the cause.  See, Rikiya, Koku and Chitose all grew up in the sticks; Rikiya and Koku had money from a young age, but it was old money, tied up in trusts.  (Geten didn't have any of those, but Geten's a different story for other reasons.)  Tomoyasu grew up in a major city from the start; he was a technological prodigy from practically as soon as he could hold a tablet.  He has very little respect for the old ways of doing things when he knows there are newer, better ways of advancing the Cause. However, none of that makes him more likely to break from the MLA's ranks—if anything, his idiosyncratic approach just causes him to approach Liberation in really weird ways, ways no one else would ever come up with.

Pressganging Bubaigawara Jin based on a plan to clone Re-Destro?  Who else would that ever even occur to, much less such that it became the basis for an elaborate psychological assault?  But that's Skeptic in a nutshell—respect the old for what it did at the time, but don't think that means you have to use the same methods they did forever as you pick up the torch to carry it forward.

Family Situation He has an amicable but not intimate relationship with his family.  His parents are very proud of what he's done for the cause and how he won the confidence of Re-Destro, but they don't make much claim to understand how his mind works.  In turn, he recognizes the value of their support over the years—he certainly made a lot of waves with his unabashed venom for the MLA leadership's hidebound traditionalism, and his parents' staunch backing meant a lot for him being able to take the stands he did—but is not very emotionally close with them.  Might find himself with an older brother, if I ever occasion to write about his family situation in more depth.

Education He graduated a four-year university program for getting his computer science degree in two very intense years, during which he did virtually nothing for the Great Cause, his intention being to better position himself for maximum ability to advance Liberation afterward.  See above re: battles his parents fought for him while he was busy modernizing.

Meeting Re-Destro He met Re-Destro via Curious.  He was 22, just a year out of university and already climbing the chain of command at a young telecommunications company.  Rikiya was 33, working on the Claustro, and needed proprietary comms built to a higher standard of security than Detnerat was focused on.  Curious, who was always better positioned to be keeping up with the local personalities, introduced them.

Tomoyasu attempted to keep a civil tongue in his head the first few times he and RD met, but he'd been running on bile and energy drinks for years by that point and was hard-pressed to stop just because he was meeting his Grand Commander.  If anything, finding out that Rikiya was okay with his direction and his mouth eventually helped him chill the fuck out, marginally.

On that note, Skeptic is absolutely the advisor most willing to backtalk Rikiya right to his face.  (Rikiya loves him for it.)  Oh, he'll still accede to Rikiya's wishes, and Re-Destro's orders are his highest priority, but that doesn't mean he feels obligated to be diffident about it.  Like Curious, he has a highly developed sense of, "It's fine if it's for the greater good," which will and has led to him taking things into his own hands when he thinks he knows best (which is always).  He's not going to explicitly disobey orders, but he will creatively interpret them if he feels strongly about them, and he will try to "anticipate" orders before anyone has time to give him specific ones, the better to tailor his efforts towards proving his methods and goals correct rather than being stuck with orders he hates.

On Names I’ve definitely evolved some in my approach on this since I started writing the MLA cast, but at current, Skeptic and Geten are the only ones I consistently write as using and thinking mainly in terms of code names rather than given names.  Trumpet is too familiar with the public/private divide, and has too much intimate history with Rikya-the-person, to default to Re-Destro; Curious is too trained to look for The Human Heart of the Story.  Re-Destro himself, ever since breaking up with Koku, has always tried to use code names for people (himself excluded, because he has enormous self-confidence issues about measuring himself up to the original Destro), but can slip into given names when he’s vulnerable.  To Skeptic and Geten, though, the code name is the real name, for all intents and purposes.  The cover identity is a fake; the whole point of the code name is that you’re proving yourself worthy of taking up your proper place in the Army.  Of course the name you win for yourself is the name that counts.

Lightning Round

Given a blank piece of paper, a pencil, and nothing to do, what would happen? You’d pretty much have to lock him in a room with nothing but paper and pencil in it for that to be his first resort rather than whatever item of personal electronics he’d otherwise have on his person.  But assuming some actual plausible scenario—couldn’t bring his electronics into a government building, let’s say—he would find trying to do something productive on paper and pencil rather beneath him, and he’s an inveterate fidgeter.  I mostly see him folding that ludicrously tall frame of his into a chair and setting to using the pencil to poke about three hundred holes in the sheet of paper, meticulous and orderly, while muttering complaints to himself the whole time until something annoys him a bit too much and he jabs the whole pencil through the page. 

Who does he see as his best friend?  His worst enemy? I headcanon him having a very reasonable, functional, productive relationship with his No. 1 advisor, Red, and being reasonable, functional, and productive probably goes a lot farther on making you Skeptic’s “friend” than any amount of emotional intimacy.  But “best friend” is not really the kind of language Skeptic uses for his relationships; if you were to ask him who his best friend is, he’d probably tell you, “Iced coffee.”  As to his worst enemy, that’s just whoever is annoying him most on any given day, from difficult clients, to people annoying Re-Destro, stodgy elders, that hero grinning like a tool, that couple walking too slow in front of him on the sidewalk, etc. And Skeptic is pretty proactive about dealing with enemies, as much as he can be.

Has he ever been bitten by an animal? How was he affected (or unaffected)? lol he is a city boy and always has been.  He probably tried to pet a stray cat once out of curiosity, and because it seemed like the sort of thing people did, and then has never forgiven Animals In General when it bit him and then ran off. 

Geten—

General Thoughts Another one I haven’t written a great deal about yet, particularly in the present day, though I’m looking for that to change soonish.  One thing I’d like to explore is Geten when he’s not seething with rage and shame because he failed to bring Re-Destro a victory in Deika. The fandom tends to write Geten as an always-angry attack dog barely contained beneath a chilly veneer, and that’s fair—ever since we got the face reveal, ever since the MLA’s defeat at Shigaraki’s hands, Geten has been an always-angry attack dog barely contained beneath a chilly veneer.

But if you look at Geten from before we knew what was under the hood, you find a different story.  “Chilly and angry all the time” is not at all how he acted when he was fighting Dabi!  At that point, he was talkative, even chatty.  He engaged in a lot of snide smack-talk; he was obviously confident in himself and he spoke very proudly of the MLA as a collective.

He was still quiet at the dinner he attended with Rikiya and his advisors, yes, so I don’t think Geten’s done some kind of full 180 on characterization.  I do, however, think that Geten has a sense of humor in there, has a sense of camaraderie with the MLA rooted in more than just his relationship with Re-Destro, even if Re-Destro is obviously his most important person.  I don’t know if we’ll ever see that in the manga proper, given everything that’s happened, but it’s worth remembering in terms of what Geten is like when he’s solely among allies.

Family Situation Orphaned at a young age, and a problem child from then on.  He passed through a series of foster parents and state facilities before eventually crossing paths with the leader of the local MLA branch in Kesseru, Beacon (more on him next time).  This encounter would lead to him being sent to a group home with a reputation for being good with such difficult cases, giving them Structure and Companionship and Meaningful Work.  (Spoilers: It’s Liberation.)

Despite evening out considerably after a significant meeting with Re-Destro when he was 7[iv], Geten never got particularly close to his adopted family/the other kids at the group home.  He's very favored by the Grand Commander, for one thing, and he has the strongest quirk in the home for another—and since he learned the quirk supremacist stuff from them, that’s a pretty significant part of the dynamic!  Both of these factors mean there's some distance between him and the rest. Still, he's not on bad terms with them—indeed, his foster parents are quite proud of him—and he would probably tear out someone's throat with his teeth for threatening them, if only as a matter of pride.  

There are 4-6 other kids there at any given time; for the bulk of his young adulthood, there were two older than him, the others younger.  He doesn't have much time for Big Brother Pastimes, but is not completely immune to them, either, particularly where the youngest kids are concerned.  His tolerance for Little Brother Antics, however, is nonexistent—if the older kids think they can ruffle his hair and treat him like a kid, they can square the fuck up; he is Number One around here and don’t forget it.

Education Geten never went to school, but he's not completely uneducated.  He had some tutoring in the group home, some more from Re-Destro personally, and has a pile of books he keeps at his bedside, mostly strategic in nature.  He finds them vexing at times, but is slowly reading through them anyway because Re-Destro asked him to.  He’s been a bit more diligent about it since he was made a regiment leader, because lord knows Dabi isn't contributing much.

On Re-Destro Re-Destro became fond of Geten for the same reason he became fond of Skeptic and Curious—Geten was willing to push back.  He really did make some attempts early on to keep Geten at a proper distance, mindful of anything that would look too much like favoritism.  And Geten knew, in the hard-headed way of a child, that Re-Destro was being a grown-up about things, trying to be mature, trying to be impartial.  Geten just didn’t care about any of those things.  Every time, he would listen very seriously to the things Rikiya told him, nod attentively, repeat back what he’d been told, and then go on about doing his own thing anyway.  And his own thing was, typically, to keep coming back.

Of course, if there’s anything we can tell about Re-Destro from the way he treats Shigaraki, it’s that Re-Destro loves people who take the choice away from him.

Eventually, of course, Geten grew up (mostly; I peg him at 19 now), joined the MLA officially, and had to settle into the structure of the Army.  It began to lead to trouble for Re-Destro, when Geten blatantly disobeyed him; it stopped being cute.  Still, the sense that he Knows What’s Best lingers, so Geten works himself very, very hard to be everything Re-Destro needs him to be and more, so that maybe Re-Destro’s burden will be just that little bit lighter.

On Quirk Supremacy (and Re-Destro, still) Here’s the thing about Geten and the whole, “A life without a strong meta-ability has no value,” line, and this continues to drive me mad because of how people getting it wrong influences the bad takes on the MLA in this fandom: Geten is not a reliable witness.  He is not one of the leaders of the MLA, nor does he speak for its rank and file. Even if you assume the absolute worst about his implications there, far worse than is justified by the text, Geten’s very name, Apocrypha, means that he cannot be presumed to be aligned with MLA orthodoxy.

The only one of the people close to Re-Destro who wasn't born and raised MLA, he still manages to come off, in some ways, as the most zealous of the lot of them.  But really, it’s very noticeable that Geten—unlike Re-Destro himself, and unlike even Re-Destro’s close cohort—never talks about the original Destro, never even mentions him.  When he thinks about his leader, he only ever thinks about Rikiya.  Geten doesn’t follow Re-Destro because of his bloodline, because of the tenets; he follows Re-Destro because of personal loyalty.[v]

So how best to do that?  Well, think about it: Geten is not terribly intelligent, nor wealthy, nor well-connected. He and Trumpet are the ones most influenced by the quirk supremacist line of thought, Trumpet because his relatively weak quirk comes off as exponentially stronger the more he can surround himself in people it works on, and Geten because his strong quirk lets him mentally justify Re-Destro's investment in him despite his other insufficiencies.

Compare this with Re-Destro, who only ever talks about quirks in terms of freedom. Even more prominently, look at Skeptic and Curious, who are not at all defined by their quirks and how strong or weak said quirks may be.  Indeed, those two devote scarcely a thought to the matter because they contribute to the cause in much more important ways and seem to be perfectly comfortable with where that leaves them.

Geten may not be very smart or influential, but he’s very capable of looking at what strengths he does have and focusing hard on those.  That, I think, is what really lead to his embracing quirk supremacy, even in the face of evidence that he doesn’t have the whole picture: the search for a way to measure himself up to the movers and shakers Rikiya is otherwise surrounded with, and not come up drastically wanting.  

“Apocrypha” Geten has been Geten for a long time, since long before the MLA types usually take up their code names. He’s also an outlier in the MLA for having a name in Japanese instead of in English—the only one who does!  My headcanon, unless and until we get some other members with Japanese code names, is that he got the name directly from Re-Destro—possibly even in the conversation that lead to him imprinting so hard on the man when he was 7—and insisted on keeping it before any other code name that was suggested to him in later years.

But yes, he does have a normal Japanese name on file at the group home, which he’s obligated to answer to on the rare occasions that someone from Child Services is checking in or he and Re-Destro are out in public.  I don’t plan to bother coming up with it unless I need to, as I expect we’ll get it in a character profile one of these days.

His Quirk While a lot of people like the vibe of Geten and Dabi being somewhat equivalently vulnerable to their own quirks, and I agree it makes for good fanart, in truth, Geten is only as vulnerable to his ice as Endeavor is his flames.  Which is to say, he isn't immune, but he's certainly more resistant to it than the average person would be!  There’s already plenty of good material to contrast Dabi and Geten without pretending their quirks are more mirrored than is actually the case.

Lightning Round

How does he treat people in service jobs? He doesn’t, because he’s never in a position to interact with people in service jobs.  There have been times he’s gone out with Re-Destro, but in those cases he’s mostly let Re-Destro handle the human interaction.

What does he dislike in other people? Laziness; the lack of a higher purpose of some kind.  (It’s possible he’d thaw out on his disdain for Dabi considerably if he knew more about Dabi’s plans to undermine the whole of the Hero System than Dabi is inclined to tell him.)

Is he always there for a friend in need? Sure, as long as by “friend” you mean “fellow Liberation warrior” and by “need” you mean “in need of an icicle punched through one of someone else’s desperately fleshy body parts.”

Footnotes

[i]  Sanctum II's tastes being what they are, this probably means Rikiya is the MLA member most likely to be able to perform traditional Japanese tea ceremony.

[ii]  And there were elders who would have been happy to leave it at that permanently, I'm sure.  There are always going to be those regents who have trouble relinquishing power back to the boy prince when he grows up and becomes king, you know?

[iii]  And, when it eventually got out that they were dating, a relatively solid match, give or take the surrogacy arrangements that would eventually need to be made.

[iv]  I’m hoping canon gives us some details on this eventually, so I’m not planning to iron out more headcanon on the matter unless I absolutely have to.

[v]  This, incidentally, is a large part of why Rikiya does keep him around—it’s soothing to have someone around who never brings up his ancestor.  Anyway, after Geten evolved his quirk, people stopped complaining so much, even though RD never did get around to, like, giving Geten any formal responsibilities.  Geten, who knows very well that Re-Destro’s real advisors have real jobs, mostly took this as reason to be all the stronger, in hopes that he’d eventually be given one.

[funkymbtifiction]

Since I get asked about ENFPs a lot, I can describe a bit of what having Ne/Te is like while working on a recent project. You may relate to it or see yourself in it if you are a fellow Ne/Te user.

It occurred to me awhile back that I should compile my knowledge about MBTI gathered over many years of studying it into book form and make it available, but I’m caught between Ne and Te in the process of doing it.

My Ne is coming up with all kinds of different approaches (ideas), as I attempt to figure out the best method in which to translate this information for readers. (Should I write it omnipresent and describe the inner workings of the types, or should I attempt to personalize it through “if you are this type, you will focus on these things…”, should I use real person anecdotes as an illustrative process, or focus more on fictional characters who did that thing so readers have a visual source they can go to for an ‘example’ or write stories that illustrate each type? Should it be more factual and dry or more playful and engaging? I can visualize how to accomplish each one and see how it could be useful in its own way.) I’ve started in on and then cast aside a dozen different techniques as I ‘figure it out as I go’ with Ne, while bouncing around various ideas and sometimes soliciting feedback from friends into typology (although whether they come to fruition will determine on how much potential is there once I use that approach—in typical Ne fashion, an idea might be good, but if it has no weight once I start using it, I will abandon it completely in favor of something that actually works).

In the process, I’ve compiled things piecemeal (working on various dominant function sections as I wanted to and fleshing out subsections for individual types at random, while leaving myself notes about everything I want to cover) with an overall desire to just slap stuff up on the page, so I can rework it later into a cohesive whole. (I would never write a book like this, because I’m such a linear thinker, but I’m totally okay with doing this for nonfiction since it doesn’t have an overall ‘structured plot.’) My Te is struggling to keep up with my Ne in terms of which method to choose—because it is bringing in a bunch of linear judgments. It wants me to figure out who I am writing the book for (beginner typists or experienced ones?), which will dictate how much detailed information I include in it (beginners will get confused by loops, grips, etc, but experienced people may want to know more about them). It also wants to figure out a structure for the internal integrity of the book—the way to organize the information so it makes the most sense in a greater whole, and is the most informative to the reader. It reminds me I’m writing it for people who read this blog and want the information in an easily-accessible place, and for my friends, who want to hand their friends a book and say, “Look, chapter six is why we don’t understand each other.” So I have to find a way to introduce people to the system but also expound on it.

Typically this is my creative process – utter pandemonium at the start, while I test out ways to do something, and at some point my Te will make a decisive judgment about the best method based on a random thing Ne has provided and run with that in a straightforward manner, with clear goals for what it wants to achieve within a certain time frame. I feel disorganized and overwhelmed at the start of any creative project, because Ne is overriding me with multiple variations on how this could work – and about three chapters into a writing project, things settle down and I’m more able to get an instinctual feel for what works in the long-term. But for awhile it’s like trying to control a runaway horse.

Before you ask “how soon will you be done with this?” the answer is, I don’t know. Once I figure out what I want out of a manuscript, it goes quickly because I can easily assemble information and edit it to stay on track. Being a Ne-dom, I can work fast and effectively, but MBTI is also a complicated system, it has a lot of pitfalls to try to avoid *, and I’m running profiles past people of those dominant types to check for whether I have captured them well or not. I’m aiming for this summer. So… wish me luck. It’s a lot of information to parse through.

* The more I learn about Enneagram the more I can see that the stereotypical descriptions of certain types are influenced largely by the assumption that person has a certain Enneagram type -- Ne/7w6, Fe/2, which means I have to figure out how to talk about the function itself stripped of that bias, so people who do not share that core Ennegram type can identify with it. Also, in the introverted perceiving types, the second function changes the dominant function, which means sometimes people cannot relate to their type, because the description for Ni or Si is skewed in favor of NiFe or SiTe. So... it’ll be a challenge.

[ghostbustermelanieking]

oddly specific memories i have of listening to tma

in honor of the finale, and because i am a sentimental asshole, i bring you this potentially uninteresting and completely pointless list. i'm gonna miss this show a lot

half my original reasoning for listening to the podcast was to motivate me to walk on the treadmill. this did not work. but i did it the first time, when i was going through the trailers and anglerfish, and i remember the room where my dad keeps the treadmill is really dark and the spooky chanting sort of freaked me out

after the treadmill, i ended up listening to the bulk of the first four episodes on the couch, and halfway through i let my oldest cat, winnie, who always lived outside (i know, i was very against actually keeping her outside) in the house. and she jumped up on the couch with me, which she literally never did. (she was very grumpy and not super affectionate.) i had that cat since i was five, and she passed last june, and i really miss her. quarantine kind of gave us the opportunity to hang out with her a lot, because we were home so much. so i'm glad these memories are kind of intersected in my mind. (below: a pic i have from that day.)

my friend sarah relistened along with me the first time around, which was extraordinarily sweet of her, and also led to some interesting interactions. for example: she forgot when it was revealed that sasha was dead, so she accidentally spoiled that for me when i asked when the others would find sasha (and i spent all of season 2 just like. anxiously vibrating over this fact). she also made this post, when i was still in like early first half of season 1, and my immediate thought was "oh no martin is dead." i hadnt even MET martin at this point

back in early quarantine, my mom had this rule that we had to do something new every day (to keep away the depression... ha ha). anyways, all i wanted to do in my free time was sit around and listen to tma (and also watch this show i was into on netflix), so i came up with some lame excuses, one of which was "i'll give myself a pedicure." this led to the memory i ultimately associate with mag 56 (trevor herbert 2) being me sitting out on our roof balcony thing, giving myself a horrendous pedicure

another time, my family wanted to go play tennis, and they brought me along and brought a hammock for me to lay in. there was this excess material from the hammock, and the sun was in my eyes, so i ended up pulling it up and over me to block the sun and creating this ridiculous hammock cocoon thing. one of the episodes i listened to that day? "tucked in."

before i ever started the show, my friend sarah stayed with me while i was pet sitting. i remember when she got there, she'd just listened to 150 and was telling me how freaky it was (she was still trying to get me into the show), and she was like "of course we're staying on a CUL DE SAC." (that was also the weekend she watched us for the first time and was very upset because i slept through the whole thing, which is scary when you're staying somewhere by yourselves.) anyways, i spent the whole show waiting for the scary cul de sac episode

while i was listening to the show for the first time, my step-dad (an artist) started painting an EYE on the door downstairs near my bathroom. a fucking EYE. he didn't finish it til i had finished the show. but still weird!!

i binged like 12 episodes in one day to finish season 4, which is not impressive at all, but it's still my personal record. i just remember staying up late in my dark bedroom (til like.... 11 i'm lame and i go to bed early), listening to like 158 & 159 & 160 and just being knocked on my ass by how good it all was... i was SUPER spoiled by this point, through my own fault, and i knew exactly what was coming, but actually experiencing it was nuts

the second week i listened live was 167, where the public release was delayed by a couple hours by accident. i spent like 20 minutes refreshing spotify, thinking it was broken, before going on tumblr and seeing what the deal was. (and 167 remains one of my favorites of s5 because i remember just going "thank god it was worth the wait.")

this one car ride where sarah and i made some of our friends listen to the first three episodes of the show. it was the middle of the night and we were just like blasting down i40 listening to anglerfish and do not open etc

the night the what the ghost episode publicly dropped was the night after my graduation, and i was sleeping out on the couch in the living room so my grandfather could sleep in a bed. it was super dark, and i am a jumpy person, and i Remember being mildly disgusted with myself because the corny sound effects were actually freaking me out. (i think i mightve actually seen something weird that night, maybe, but that's another story.)

the weekend my parents moved me into college, we couldn't get the cable in the house we were staying in, and we were all sitting around doing nothing, so i jokingly suggested starting tma with them, and they were like ok grace. my step-dad promptly fell asleep and my mom zoned out -- which is probably good, she doesn't like horror and she's super claustrophobic, so it's probably better we never got to do not open

my brief roommate in college talked about how she was into those youtube channels where people just read scary stories, so of course i was like try tma out. so she listened to the first episode on her own, and we were out one night, and she started mag 02 while i went into an ice cream place. she was into it (she kept being like open it, ya pussy) and wanted to keep listening while we went home, and even back in our room. i had only been in town for a couple weeks, and barely knew my way around, but i also didn't want to turn the gps on and be interrupted every five seconds. so i tried to find our way back on my own. it took the entirety of mag 03, and into mag 04, before i did it. so now i will forever associate across the street with all those wrong turns i took in a dark, semi unfamiliar city, trying to get back to our college without a gps

the day of the early drop for 179 was the day i moved back home from college -- a five hour drive by myself. i ended up listening to it on the final stretch of the trip, when i was super tired and it was dark and i knew it'd probably be a crazy episode. just me full blasting down i40, drinking an energy drink (which i never do) through a hole punched in the top, listening to daisy's death

186 early dropped the day after initial u.s. election day (when we still didn't know anything). my mom had set up a "watch party" in the living room with these giant air mattresses, and we all sort of spent the day crowded around the TV watching the numbers. not much of a memory, but i remember sitting on that air mattress and listening to martin's monologue in the midst of that messy week

i had a virtual therapy appointment on the day of 187's early drop, and my dad was home, so i drove to an empty parking lot to do the session in some privacy. i was trying to listen to the episode before the session started, so i ended up listening to the last half sitting in my car, in the pouring rain, just staring at my radio in shock (187 remains one of my favorite s5 episodes)

my friend sarah had just come home for winter break the day 189 dropped, and we decided to listen together, just like driving around in circles drinking coffee and listening and speculating on whether or not that was really martin

i started my relisten right after thanksgiving and was just kind of blowing through fast as i could through the whole of december. i had to go back to college to empty out my dorm, and i went to the beach after, and i ended up listening to mag 11 while just like walking around in circles in the tide pools. the closer it got to christmas, the more christmassy i wanted to keep things, so i would like. listen in the mornings and turn on one of those Netflix fireplaces and get all cozy

my other friend went with me on a mini bagel road trip in december, and he was still trying to get caught up, so we listened to mag 169, 170, and 171 on the drive home. (by this point, i was accustomed enough to s5 and smiting scenes to automatically reach for the volume controls when jude perry and jared hopworth died.)

when i relistened to mag 47, i was sitting with my cat beezus. i paused the episode to write this big long meta, so i was in a different headspace when i pressed play again. jon immediately yelled for sasha and i immediately jumped, and beezus gave me a searing glare and just got up and left

i relistened to piecemeal while i was cooking, which i thought was kind of funny and also disgusting

after christmas, i got into the habit of bringing my cat georgia into my room in the mornings, and she'd crawl under the covers with me while i listened to tma

one story i've always liked to tell from my first listen is how when i first listened to the meat arm grinder episode, my dad asked me to help him cook hamburgers later that day and explained how hamburgers are ground up (to my disgust). i hit meat grinder in my relisten and um. you'll never fucking guess what i made for lunch that day

so i had all these arbitrary rules for myself when i started tma last april, and i've broken like all of them. i started listening to tma while virtually working -- you just pull it up on your computer and it works. (i got the life scared out of me when one of my coworkers started talking over the podcast, wondering who it was that had walked into jon's office and why he wasn't reacting and why i didn't remember it.) i also started listening a lot while driving, which led to several long meta posts i wrote being typed up in a parking lot somewhere

i spent the entirety of 194 anxious-cuddling georgia. (i tried to do this for 198 and then didn't have any anxiety to cuddle her over.) i fully plan on doing this for 200, where i am sure i will need it again

my favorite place to listen to tma probably ended up being the roof room at my mom's, and unless something goes awry, this is where i will listen to the finale. (with georgia, of course.)

this list is super uninteresting, like i said, but here it is. i'm gonna miss this show a lot. i can't wait to return to it, later in life, and make all new listening memories in the process

[thgfanficinspo]

Fear of the Water - 20

Annie meets the other victors from District 4

From the Start - Jonsa - Coryo

(ANNIE)

There are nice clothes in my closet but I don’t want to wear them because I know they’re from the Capitol. And I’m not in the Capitol anymore and I don’t want it on me I don’t want it hanging off my skin.

I find one of my everyday dresses that Bosun brought along to the new house and slip it on. I always wear big shapeless dresses that go to my knees. I like them because they don’t get in my way – I can run around or work or sleep or do anything without them causing me any trouble. They’re long enough that I don’t have to worry about people seeing too much if I crouch or bend or climb, and the materials are simple and comfortable, and the fact that they’re so loose means I don’t have to keep adjusting them like I would with regular dresses. And I like that they’re dresses, too.  Pants always trip me up, and I don’t like worrying about two different pieces of clothing when I can just wear one.

I don’t like being in this new bedroom, at least not yet. I don’t like being in this house. It’s too big. Too many rooms. Creaky floorboards and rusty door hinges. Too many places for something to hide.

I change as fast as I can and then run back downstairs. Bosun is pacing in a circle around the main room. He glances up at me. “Get changed; we’re gonna be late.”

I shake my head.

He opens his mouth and curls his lip like always does when he’s about to yell at me but he makes himself stop and take a deep breath to calm down because I think he knows he shouldn’t yell at me, at least not yet. He’s trying to wait a couple days to let me settle in before he starts up again. I hope he doesn’t start up again at all.

When things are good with Bosun, they’re great. It’s like we’re the only people in the world and we’re everything to each other. But then when I start counting things or get “stuck in a loop,” as he says, he gets annoyed and tells me to stop even though he knows I can’t. if I stop it feels like a million tiny ants covering every bit of my skin and I can’t move or do anything until I’ve finished counting.

He raises his eyebrows at me in some sort of prompt. “Ready?”

There are three big dogs in front of Mags’s porch that stare at us as we approach. I think of the dogs in the arena and start to pull away from Bosun, but he holds onto me. “They’re just dogs,” he says. “You can’t be afraid of dogs forever.”

Mags appears in the doorway. “Annie! Bosun!” She waves her hand at the dogs and they disperse. “Ignore them. They hang around wherever they think they can get food. They’re harmless.”

All the homes on Victor’s Isle follow a formula, but there are subtle differences in each. My new house seems to have less walls than Mags’s. Hers is artfully decorated and looks comforting and warm. She’s had almost sixty years to work on it.

“The others are already inside. I don’t think Eefa will make it, though. She’s not one for socializing.”

The others, including Broadsea.

Broadsea. He was a member of the Career pack during his Games. He betrayed them relatively early on – probably because he didn’t like working with other people and he didn’t want them out there working against him. Broadsea was on watch one night while his allies slept. He killed them each, one by one, by slitting their throats or stabbing them through the heart.  

One of them managed to get a knife and hack his face apart before dying.

I’m still lost in my thoughts when we find him in the kitchen.

“Annie, Bosun, this is Broadsea.”

And there he is – arms crossed over his enormous chest. He’s well over six feet and at least two inches taller than Finnick, who’s already taller than six feet, too. The best word I can think to describe him is sturdy.  He looks like he could stand in one spot during a tidal wave and not even notice it crashing over him. He has hazel eyes and his jaw is strong and square and half his face is hardly a face at all.

That scar – it’s one thing to see on television, but completely different in person. He had some medicine to treat the wound, but not enough. The wound was infected. He did a piecemeal job of stitching it back together with threads pulled from his fallen allies’ clothing.

They cleaned it up as best they could in the Capitol, even removed some tissue and tried to build him a new cheek artificially, but it didn’t work. I still can’t believe he survived such a thing. Now it’s as wide as a finger from his right cheekbone to his jaw, where it dips under his chin and stretches down almost onto his neck. Ghostly pale against his coffee-colored skin. He grew a beard to partially cover it, but no hair grows over the corrupted flesh, so it just makes it stand out even more.

Not to mention the fingertips and toes he lost to frostbite. And the tip of his nose. But those have all been patched up.

He gives of us each a good up and down look before turning away without a word.

Proteus turns away from the stove to greet us and I feel a little bit better because Proteus is not scary or mean and I sort of know him. “Ah, I’m glad you’re here. I wanted your opinion on the sauce I made for the duck before I serve it.” He gives me and Bosun each a little spoonful of orangey-brown stuff. Bosun takes a lick and offers his compliments.

Finnick strolls in as we taste, completely ignoring Broadsea even though they’re about to walk right into each other. He stops for a moment and shoots him a mocking smile before he steps aside to let him through. Broadsea keeps on walking, knocking back another glass of liquor as he makes his way to the sitting room. Finnick is bright again as soon as Broadsea gone. “Do I get a sample?” he asks, flashing that winning smile.

He was fourteen when he was in my place. A child. But he doesn’t look like a child anymore. He was never exactly childlike, though; in the arena he was handsome and young with a chiseled face and sparkling eyes, his cheeks always flushed from being outside. He was gorgeous, and everyone was impatient to watch him grow up and therefor more handsome. And so they could touch him. So he could touch them.

I still don’t understand that – why he wants to jump from bed to bed. Surely the gifts they give him can’t be worth all the trouble. Is he just bored? Or is sex really that good? Having someone flop around and sweat all over you doesn’t sound terribly appealing to me, even with someone like Finnick.

Finnick pulls me out of my mind when he sidles up next to me. “I see you met Broadsea,” he murmurs. He produces a handful of sugar cubes seemingly out of nowhere, pops some in his mouth, and stars crunching away. He speaks through the mouthful: “Don’t feel bad – he hardly ever talks. And he’s an asshole anyway.” He realizes something. “Oh, do you want some candy or sugar or something? I keep a stash in the pantry. Mags thinks it’s bad for me, but I’m nineteen, so what I eat doesn’t really matter.”

If only he knew what it was like to be a woman.

“You might as well sit down,” Proteus says to us over his shoulder. “I’m almost ready to serve.”

Proteus’s wife, Brona, is already seated at the oval dining table, which is made of reclaimed wood.

Her clear, smooth skin is the color of honey and almonds, and she keeps her dark hair tied behind her head in a tight bun that pulls the skin on her forehead taut. Her mouth and teeth are big, but they fit better with her face than my big mouth and teeth fit with mine. She introduces herself and shakes Bosun’s hand. She doesn’t try to shake mine; somebody probably warned her about it.

I wonder how hard it must be for her and Proteus, to be separated from your love for the whole summer. Assuming they love each other.

It surprises me that so many victors have families – about a third of them, I think – but the fact that any of them has one is surprising. Any one of us, now.

Eefa got married at nineteen – a normal age in the districts but unbelievably young for the Capitol – and had two children, but she only speaks to one of them now. Proteus is married, of course, which honestly seems odd to me. He and Brona appear more like friends than lovers, but even friends might be too intimate a term. They don’t have children. On television, they always show Proteus next to a victor from District 5 who won a few years after him – the 55th Games, I think. He actually shows genuine fondness for the man; that’s obvious even through a televisions screen.

I wonder if Brona knows about this man. She seems very cold so I don’t know if she’d care.

We sit down and tuck in to eat. Finnick pulls out Mags’s chair and then mine and pushes them both in for us. He takes the chair between us and smiles at me as he settles in and my ears get red. Bosun is on my other side. Broadsea is directly across from me. I try not to look at him.

Proteus brings out a thick orange soup as our first course. He tells us what it’s made from but I don’t pay attention since the smell is so distracting. I start eating before everyone’s been served, which I think is rude but I don’t care. I slurp down two bowls and a fist-sized loaf of bread before anyone else finishes their first serving. I don’t care enough to look up at them or excuse myself.

I didn’t really eat today. Our kitchen isn’t stocked yet but I found some nuts and hid them in my pocket because I forget that there will be more food and that I don’t have to be hungry anymore ever. I haven’t counted them yet.

Bosun keeps looking back and forth from me to the other victors – trying to gauge my reactions to them and their reactions to me. He looks like he’s ready to leap across the table if he has to, though I don’t know why he would. He’s too smart to tangle with a victor. And he doesn’t even get into arguments with people he’s not related to. But he’s plenty argumentative with me and our cousins and Chelsea and me and me and me.

Broadsea observes me throughout the first course, which takes about half an hour for everyone to finish. He looks at me like some new trinket – strange and intriguing and more than anything else, a source of amusement. He’s continually eating hunks of bread which he tears from the rolls with his stumpy fingers (they had to amputate four fingertips above the knuckle after he won due to frostbite) and dips them in the soup. For every mouthful of bread he tears some off and puts it in his pocket. Maybe he forgets, too. About not being hungry anymore.

Finnick watches me too, but in a much softer way. His pretty green eyes are warm where his gaze touches my skin. He smiles whenever I do, and he’s quick with a story whenever there’s a lull in conversation.  

Proteus brings out the main course, which is made with duck rather than fish. People in District 4 get sick all the time from eating too much fish, so duck is a usual substitute, since that’s really the only other animal around except for seagulls. Duck is fancier than seagull. More expensive. But I guess that’s not a big deal since victors have so much money and we don’t ever have to be hungry anymore.

It’s served with turnips and Katniss root.

When I see it on the platter my stomach starts to roll over itself. My hands are shaking.

“Annie?”

I don’t know who says it. I don’t know who they’re saying it to.

I stand up fast, knocking my chair over and then tripping on it as I try to get away. I can’t be here. They’ll kill me to get my food. They’ll kill me for still being alive. I have to get away or they’ll kill me like they killed Piers and I don’t want to die but my legs aren’t working so I have to drag myself across the floor I can’t breathe.

“Annie! Annie!” It’s many voices now. They’re behind me, above me, closing in on me and I can’t breathe. I scoot back until my back slams against the wall. Put my hands over my ears so I can’t hear the mutts eating the boy from 6 or Piers screaming while they saw through him.

Bosun’s face is right in front of mine, saying “Annie? Annie?”

He’s not supposed to be here. His name wasn’t drawn. Why is he here? Why isn’t he home? They’ll cut his head off and they’ll poke out his eyes I’ll poke out his eyes and get goop on my hands and I can’t wipe it off.

“Run!” I scream at him. “Bosun, run! Run!”

And all the voices start screaming “Annie!” too loud and I don’t like it.

I try to shuffle further back but my head hits the wall and it goes dark.

[solarisposting]

I've spent I think five weeks now trying to work my way up to telling my therapist that I want to start talking about (processing? dissecting? digesting? untangling?) several friendships that have done a number on me one way or another. Primarily the one that came to a head (in a sense) in 2019 and has been haunting me relentlessly ever since, but I don't believe I'd be able to force myself to start with that one.

For whatever reason, I can't bring myself to start this new direction. When I had a horrible panic attack over seeing a crowd of people praying in unison, I was able to say look, this is hard to address but I'm driving myself crazy and my religion took root in me and damaged something vital. When I was having myriad problems with my job, we talked about that a few weeks in a row and it culminated in me resigning my position. I've taken initiative on tough things before, but I'm struggling with it right now.

I think one of the biggest issues, obviously aside from how reluctant I am to proactively face this "genre" of my problems, is that there's no immediacy. I have been buckling under the weight of the aforementioned 2019 thing on my own since everyone else who knew that person stopped collectively discussing it and mourning it, so it isn't disrupting my daily life. The other friendship collapses have left me with questions and ghosts coming back lately, or specific anxieties and a fear of intensity and speed. These things don't have me unexpectedly curling into a ball on the couch, shaking and unable to breathe for all the hyperventilating and sobbing, or swaddling myself into bed to snivel for hours until I pass out for the night; these things are more piecemeal and long-term and everywhere in everything.

So I've been spending these last few weeks basically shooting the breeze with my therapist because I don't know how to start these next steps, and I feel like I'm running out of time, somehow.

[things2mustdo]

Face it, the mainstream media is not only full of contradictions, but deep-seated, institutionalized biases. When a male or conservative does something, it is often considered horrendous. Yet when a female, liberal or a member of another “special” group does the same thing, passes are given or journalists’ eyes are averted.

Social media users with common sense political opinions have already started to compile these glaring double standards. Return Of Kings and its supporters should continue doing the same thing.

So here are five of the most egregious recent examples of hypocritical mainstream media madness:

1. Use of dead veterans’ families at political rallies or conventions

When Khizr and Ghazala Khan appeared at the Democratic National Convention to lambaste Donald Trump for his views on Muslim immigration and supposed behavior, commentators and journalists went wild with fanfare. Their son Humayun, a Muslim soldier, had died in Iraq. Trump was attacked for allegedly grandstanding about and minimizing Humayun’s death.

Meanwhile, many of these same newsmen and women, including Rachel Maddow’s stooge Steve Benen, derided the Republicans for featuring Pat Smith, mother of Benghazi fatality Sean Smith, as a speaker at their own Convention. Mrs. Smith had laid into Hillary Clinton over the latter’s role in and perceived indifference to her son’s death in Libya. So one family became heroes to the media for going public after their tragic loss, while another was portrayed as so weak in their grief that they were manipulated by big, bad Republicans into talking.

Moreover, Trump had nothing to do with Sean Smith’s death. Compare this to Clinton, who was the Secretary of State at the time of the American deaths at Benghazi and whose State Department had received numerous calls for assistance. Considering that Sean Smith and others died alongside U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, the first American ambassador to be killed whilst serving since 1979, the woefully insufficient security precautions taken by the Obama Administration and Secretary Clinton should not have transpired. But this spotlight on Clinton does not make for good (liberal) news.

2. Psychiatric records for a war hero vs. medical records of a pathological liar

Countless liberals, both in the media and within other leftist cabals like mainstream Hollywood, have attacked those questioning Hillary Clinton’s health as “misogynists,” “sexists” and other undesirables. When these tags are unable to be used, leftists claim that even piecemeal doubts about her physical condition are nothing but conspiracy theories on par with Roswell UFOs and lizard people running the world.

Yet eight years ago, these same people were frothing at the bit to out John McCain for his supposedly poor health. Most perversely of all, they homed in on his decorated military service, suggesting he had Presidentially disqualifying mental health conditions from his service in the Vietnam War and the multiple years he spent as a prisoner-of-war. “Where are his psychiatric records?” bellowed one piece from Salon, in addition to a number of other articles that more than hinted at the same topic.

Whilst I, like many of you, revile his putrid, watered-down “Republican” policies on many issues, McCain had gargantuan balls in Vietnam. Here is a man who spent more time as a tortured prisoner-of-war, including a stay in the notorious Hanoi Hilton, than Barack Obama spent in the US Senate. As the son of the commander of US forces in Vietnam, McCain received numerous offers of repatriation from the North Vietnamese. He refused and would only accept being returned home once fellow American soldiers captured before him were released. By contrast, Hillary lacks the mental fortitude to tell the truth most of the time, not even after she’s had seizures, coughing fits, and dramatic collapses on camera!

3. Sexualizing political candidates (and removing their genitals)

When an artist by the name of Lushsux painted a mural of a scantily-clad Hillary Clinton, a local Melbourne, Australia council and numerous global commentators derided it as “misogyny” and “sexual objectification.” “Take female politicians seriously!” was the crux of their shrill arguments against the rendering. Lushsux then trolled his critics by repainting the mural so Hillary was dressed in an Islamic burqa. Soon after, multiple statues of a nude and testicle-less Donald Trump appeared in American cities. Unlike the Hillary artwork, the proliferation created huge fanfare and delight amongst both prominent leftists and run-of-the-mill liberal voters. Why is one act so offensive and the other so funny, particularly in age where body-shaming and mocking someone’s appearance is meant to be so taboo?

Most of the critical commentaries about the Trump statues that appeared in the mainstream media, of which there were few, failed to take into account one glaring significance of the testicle-less Trump. Short of them being violently taken or hacked off, how exactly could Trump have no balls? Imagine the furore if a statue, mural or other representation of Hillary Clinton had lacked breasts or shown her vagina circumcised/mutilated. “They’re condoning violence against women!” would be the stock-standard answer from liberals and their even more deranged SJW cousins.

4. Lesbian’s Olympic marriage proposal vs. heterosexual male’s Olympic marriage proposal

This is bad and misogynistic:

This is love and should be applauded:

Leftists rejoiced when Olympic official Marjorie Enya asked her partner, rugby sevens player Isadora Cerullo, to marry her using a microphone. Love wins, right, especially when it’s gay love? But when Chinese athlete Qin Kai asked silver medalist He Zi to marry him, the knives from the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) came out. The BBC, unfortunately taxpayer-funded, published an article insinuating that Qin Kai was attempting to control He Zi with the very public marriage proposal. Not only could it be control, it could be awfully pernicious “male control.” Coverage of Enya’s proposal to Cerullo, however, got the broadcaster’s tick of approval.

If either of the two proposals is a form of control or narcissistic, it was the lesbian one. Unlike the Chinese diver, who was competing individually, the lesbian proposed to was part of the Brazilian team, which had not even been awarded a medal. Brazil had come ninth and that night Australia had beaten New Zealand for the gold medal. He Zi may not have won the gold medal, but she had actually participated in the final. But do not let facts get in the way of a good male-bashing.

5. Objectifying men vs. objectifying women

Cosmopolitan has established itself as a dual enabler of both ditzy female airheads and SJW political freaks. Over time, the magazine has come out strongly against countless normal displays of male sexuality, admonishing men who appreciate female breasts and buttocks for being “horrible.” Of the many Cosmopolitan pieces to take this line, an article in mid-2014 takes the cake for its ridiculous shaming of harmless, healthy behaviors. Ironically, though, covers for this publication feature the same sorts of thin, healthy women that men desire most in the first place.

Fast-forward a mere two years and Cosmopolitan went to the extraordinary effort of cataloguing 36 men whose crotch bulges tickled their fancy. Of course, numerous other articles during that time had objectified men in a way considered misogynistic when males do it to women, but the timing was amusing. After so much talk of valuing female athletes, whose physical accomplishments are far less than men, for their work and not their bodies, Cosmopolitan celebrated the years of sacrifice of male athletes by effectively taking photos of their barely clothed genitalia.

We could keep on going

Many other hypocritical pieces were penned about these situations, not just the ones I have referenced. Then there’s the great number of other articles we could assess and critique on separate issues. You may be convinced, and rightfully so, that the mainstream media is inherently biased. But we need to take this to the next level and disseminate the proof to wider audiences.

Journalists and commentators will continue their bad habits, that much is clear. What matters now is fighting back. Complaining about double standards only goes so far. Exposing them in an organized fashion stands a better much chance in helping us to arrest and then reverse this institutional bias.

As Return Of Kings readers, you are our extra eyes and ears. If you find more examples of extreme leftist media bias, bring it to our attention.

https://www.returnofkings.com/19995/anti-female-stem-bias-a-bayesian-explanation

The New York Times recently ran a long piece exploring the history of women in STEM fields and attempting to explain the ever-present difference between men and women in performance and participation in these fields. The article begins by citing research on perceptions of female aptitude in math and science:

“Researchers at Yale published a study proving that physicists, chemists and biologists are likely to view a young male scientist more favorably than a woman with the same qualifications. Presented with identical summaries of the accomplishments of two imaginary applicants, professors at six major research institutions were significantly more willing to offer the man a job. “

She shares an anecdote that is supposed to display the prejudice of professors against females in the field, but instead illustrates one valid reason for the bias displayed by the Yale study:

“Other women chimed in to say that their teachers were the ones who teased them the most. In one physics class, the teacher announced that the boys would be graded on the “boy curve,” while the one girl would be graded on the “girl curve”; when asked why, the teacher explained that he couldn’t reasonably expect a girl to compete in physics on equal terms with boys.”

Enter Bayes’ Theorem

Bayes’s theorem is a foundational principle of statistics and probability that allows us to update our estimations about the trueness of a fact based on new evidence. The math of Bayes’ theorem is simple and elegant, and the overarching idea is powerful — we can use evidence in a formalized manner to change the probability that something may be true, and this can often have non-intuitive results.

The classic example of Bayes in action is medical tests — for example, if 1% of women have breast cancer, and a mammogram detects the cancer 80% of the time with a 10% false positive rate, what is the probability that a positive result means the woman has cancer? If a mammogram is positive, the chance of cancer is less than 8% due to the presence of false positives, as well as the low baseline population rate of cancer.

What does this have to do with women and STEM fields? Readers of this site are familiar with the allure that even a plain looking girl can have at the height of her availability and youth. This isn’t just a factor when getting free drinks at the bar – it extends to the classroom, hiring for jobs, treatment in everyday life, and many other areas. Girls in primary and secondary school are judged to be better students, despite boys showing a significant advantage in standardized tests starting around middle school. The article highlights the ways that women are supposedly discouraged by the system, but makes no mention of the advantages they enjoy.

Put simply, women are more likely to be handed accomplishments without having to work for them, both due to the power of their sexuality and as unconscious overcorrection for their supposed disadvantages in opportunity. Given an applicant with a certain pedigree – a Ph.D, say, from a top graduate program —we will have a certain estimation of that person’s intelligence and aptitude. However, the “false positive” rate on those qualifications identifying extremely high aptitude is likely to be much lower for a man, who has not enjoyed the advantages of a feminized education system, catch-up programs, and the hint of his sexuality influencing the evaluations of his superiors.

The bias against hiring a woman whose qualifications are equal to a man, and their subsequent lower salary offer, is simply a use of Bayesian inference. It accounts for the implicit probability that the female will not be as good as her résumé suggests, to say nothing of the chance that she will leave her job to begin a family and leave her employer empty-handed at some point in the future. If, as the example above states, both men and women implicitly behave as if men are superior in math and science, we must give some consideration that this is a possibility.

If Men Are Better At Math/Science — What’s The Big Deal?

The media is encouraged to sing the praises of women where they excel compared to men, and females indeed show demonstrated advantages in many cognitive areas. They are better at language acquisition, picking up on non-verbal cues, and we are all familiar with their evolved capacity for psychological manipulation. Many would suggest that women have better organizational skills. They are incarcerated for violent crimes less often, are less prone to risky behavior, and are more resilient to psychological trauma such as PTSD.

But when it comes to exploring why men have long-demonstrated advantages in certain disciplines, the media scrabbles to ascribe the boogeyman of injustice perpetrated on the protected class. The article is quick to dismiss the repeatable and longitudinal difference between males in females in standardized testing, a long-standing form of evaluation that every college and grad school uses to give out valuable admissions spots. It also does not mention the lack of female representation in technology entrepreneurship, a field that is less dependent on credentials and more on individual drive, creativity, and aptitude.

It could certainly be true that women are discriminated against AND that they are simply less common at the far right of the aptitude bell curve necessary for competitive positions in academia. But I challenge you to find this idea entertained in any mainstream publication despite the mountains of circumstantial evidence. Larry Summers was tarred and feathered for even mentioning research on population dynamics as a potential driver of this difference. The lesson here is that, when you begin an “inquiry” by presupposing the conclusion, you will end up with a politically correct and eminently intellectually dishonest worldview.

Read More: The Anti-Male Commercial

[thessalian]

The Long Road to Recovery (Fic)

Varric stared at his drinking companion across the table of his rooms at the Hanged Man, incredulous and more than a little amused. "I think my jaw just landed in the Deep Roads someplace. You are coming to me for relationship advice?”

Aveline sighed. Varric wasn’t her first choice for this sort of thing, but her first choice ... well, Hawke wasn’t in any fit state right now, even if Aveline could bring herself to turn up at the Hawke estate. The guilt over what had happened to Leandra ate at Aveline; if she’d taken Emeric’s warnings more seriously to begin with, they might have stopped Quentin before he got to Leandra, at least. If not, at least it would have been Aveline and her guardsmen who saw the horror that Quentin had made of Hawke’s mother. It was one thing to hold your father’s hand while he was dying in a Denerim wasting ward, but quite another to hold your mother’s piecemeal-necromancy-altered body--

No. Aveline couldn’t think about that. Honestly, going to Varric about this was almost penance. Instead, she said, “Not advice, exactly. I’m not an idiot, Varric. And I was married once. I’m fairly sure he’s interested. It’s just ... nice to have the confirmation, is all. Not to mention that we’re both guardsmen. There might be ... accusations and pointed fingers.”

Varric tutted. “Come on, Aveline. Everyone knows you’re as fair and just as they come.”

“Oh, do they now?” Aveline raised an eyebrow at her dwarven sometimes-comrade. “Consider my companions. The apostate in Darktown--”

That got a scoffing noise from Varric. “No one patrols Darktown. You’ve got plausible deniability. Besides, Lirene and company make a perfectly adequate smokescreen for your turning a blind eye there. Blondie’s the only one around who really does anything for the refugees and the poor. He heals people. We’d probably have plague coming out of Darktown if not for him. You’re providing a public service.”

“And the apostate in the Alienage?”

“Also plausible deniability. It’s the Alienage. And Daisy doesn’t exactly call attention to herself. Well,” Varric added in a brief moment of honesty and with no small amount of rue, “not as an apostate, anyway. At least I’m not having to pay protection money on her behalf anymore.”

Aveline sighed. “I suppose both of those things are technically Templar business anyway. And you’d just have a smart answer for Isabela and Fenris, if I brought them up. Not to mention you.”

“I am shocked and offended!” Varric didn’t sound in the least bit shocked or offended - just amused. “I am a perfectly legitimate businessman! Member in good standing of the Merchants’ Guild and everything! But you see my point,” he went on, getting back to business. “You look at every situation on its actual merits rather than being swayed by emotional considerations. Let’s face it; if you were motivated by feelings, you’d have turned Blondie over to the Templars about ten seconds after those cracks about ‘the secret desire demon and the acolyte’.”

“Don’t remind me. Especially not given Donnic.” Aveline sighed and stared into her mug. “This, by the way, is exactly why you were not my first choice for talking about this.”

Varric looked Aveline over for a moment, and his expression was a lot more sympathetic when he spoke again. “Still steering clear of Hawke, huh?”

“Not entirely. We went on a patrol, after ... it happened. She wanted to go after those Dog Lord people who interrupted us while we were following Quentin’s trail.” Aveline sighed. “Not that a few minutes would have made any difference, in the end, but it probably made her feel better.”

Varric made a noise that was somewhere between a grunt and a growl. “That’s all well and good, Aveline, but what I’d really like is for someone to get a laugh out of her. Hell, even a smile would do. According to my sources, she hasn’t so much as cracked a smile since that whole mess.”

“That’s hardly surprising.” Aveline spoke mostly by rote, automatically saying the words that worked for the situation, but she didn’t really believe them. She remembered the trip to Kirkwall, after all; even crammed in a hold with so many other refugees, even with Carver’s death weighing on her mind, she’d kept a smile on her face and a joke on her lips. When Aveline, dealing with her own grief, had snapped at her about it, Hawke had gone serious and grim for a moment. Everyone here is grieving, Aveline, she’d said. If no one has a reminder that life goes on and that those we’ve lost would want better for us than eternal woe, why did we even bother? Remembering how Hawke had danced and sung in her Maker-be-damned awful voice and cracked jokes all throughout the trip, making it more bearable, Aveline understood how serious the situation was. “Your ‘sources’ said this?” Given her previous statement, it was the closest she could come to asking Varric if there hadn’t been even the tiniest smile, just once, just somewhere.

Varric shrugged. “Well, she hasn’t been seeing anyone much - just the elf, just once - but he’s been slipping me some coin to bribe her household help with. Won’t let me turn it down, either. After your little patrol in Lowtown, she didn’t leave her room for a week. If she smiled in there, it’d be a miracle.”

With a sigh, Aveline drained her mug of ale. “That’s not like her,” she said, not caring how much of her worry showed on her face or came out in her voice. “I’m not one to tell people how to grieve - I may have had words to that effect, when we were dealing with the Dog Lords - but there must be some way to bring her out of herself a little bit. Or at least encourage the process. It’s no more than she did for me,” she added, staring into her mug and feeling obscurely disappointed that it now stood empty.

“Well...” Varric refilled Aveline’s mug from the flagon on the table, but the gesture did nothing to hide the look of mischief and epiphany on his face. “I think I might have an idea about that.”

After reading his facial expression, Aveline gave Varric a wary look. “I’m not going to like this, am I?”

“Look, you wanted relationship advice from Hawke. Let’s say you asked for it. In the most ridiculous way possible. Pull out all the stops; make it as awkward as possible. If that doesn’t get a smile out of her, I’m a nug. Plus, you work it right, and she feels like she helped you. You know that sort of thing always cheers Hawke up.”

Aveline sipped at her ale, thoughtful and a little worried. It might ruin her chances with Donnic, if she didn’t handle it right. Still ... much as she cared for Donnic, Hawke had taken her in when she’d had no one; had stood by her when she was feeling her worst about Wesley. She owed Hawke no less. “I think I see your drift,” she said. “That sounds like a plan. If you think you can pretend total ignorance about it. She’s smarter than both of us combined; you start with that grin of yours and she’ll figure it out in no time.”

“It sounds like you’re impugning my acting ability,” Varric said, albeit good-naturedly. “I’ll play along beautifully, you’ll see. Just ... tell Donnic how you feel first. Let him in on it. Have it be your first couple’s activity. He owes her too, remember?”

“Just about everyone in Kirkwall does,” Aveline admitted with a small smile. Then she raised her mug to Varric. “To well-meaning mischief, I suppose.”

Varric chuckled. “The big bad guard-captain’s all grown up and making mischief like a professional! I’m so proud I might cry.”

A few days later...

Aveline watched, amused and proud and not a little smug, as Varric - face buried in one arm, banging his free fist on his table - laughed himself into breathlessness. “Goats, Aveline?”

“It’s a legitimate courting ritual in Ferelden!” As much as she tried, she couldn’t quite keep the laughter out of her voice, or the pride. “I was rather proud of the copper marigolds, myself.”

Varric finally raised his head, barely able to see Aveline through tears of mirth. “And that bit where Donnic said he thought she was interested in him? That was inspired!”

Aveline blushed a little, and the pride in her voice became a bit more outward-directed as she admitted, “That was Donnic’s idea. I’m just glad Fenris didn’t take issue with it. I didn’t want to have to explain the ruse to more people than I had to.”

“Good point. The elf’s acting ability’s probably not up to it. But he knows Hawke would never go after someone you wanted, so good call on Donnic’s part.” Now that his breathing was finally under control, Varric straightened up and reached for his ale mug, grateful that he hadn’t tipped it over during his long-stifled laughing fit. “Still, it definitely worked. I haven’t seen Hawke so amused in awhile.”

“She was so happy to have helped. I almost felt bad about deceiving her about that part.”

Varric shook his head. “Thing is, you didn’t. Or are you really telling me you’d have approached Donnic so easily if you hadn’t had that plan in mind?”

After a long moment’s thought, Aveline nodded acknowledgement. “Perhaps a little embarrassing, that whole thing, given that everyone else had to believe that I was that awkward about courting someone ... but it was in a good cause. I think my pride can take it.”

“And Hawke’s on the road to recovery, which is all we can ask for.” Varric raised his mug. “Here’s to us.”

Aveline raised her own, and replied with an old soldier’s rallying cry: “Who’s like us?”

Varric, who’d heard that one, grinned and said, “Thankfully not too many people. I don’t think Kirkwall could take it.”

They tapped mugs, then drank. They might never see eye to eye, figuratively or literally, but Hawke had a way of bringing people together.

[jq37]

The Report Card – Fantasy High Sophomore Year Ep 13

What the Hell?

Hey y’all. We’re back with a very eventful episode of Fantasy High--both from a plot an RP perspective--so let’s not waste any time getting into it. As you remember from last week, the kids are split up doing their various investigative activities. The first group we’re gonna check back in with are the Owlbears--Gorgug, Fabian, Ragh, and the Hangman--who are with the gnomish tinkerers.

Gorgug talks to the head gnome dude (Krumpkin in case I didn’t mention before) and asks to have his shoes loaded up with springs, which he is happy to do. Lou--via an offhanded comment that he absolutely commits to--establishes that Fabian has extremely small feet which is not plot relevant but I felt like I needed to mention. While they’re waiting for the shoes to be done, Krumpkin brings in a logbook so they can see what Killian--the elf working for Arianwyn--bought. It was a lot of stuff used in making magical candles and 2 blocks of Dusk Moss Incense. Dusk Moss is a hallucinogenic moss that people use recreationally to have sort of lucid dreams while awake. Gorgug knows that some kids in school do Dusk Moss but he’s never heard of it being in incense form before. He decides to buy everything that Killian did to be safe--including the drugs which he and Fabian are (hilariously) very flustered about.  

The gnomes give Gorgug his upgraded shoes and, in return, they just want to check out his crystal. Easy trade. He explains to them how the crystal works and Gorgug realizes, “Hey. I’m surrounded by people who know how to build stuff.” Maybe they can help with making a cell tower. They think they might be able to do it but they’d need access to more raw materials. Either that or access to a satellite. Gorgug (with the help of Fabian’s Bardic) suddenly remembers: while he was in jail the year before his parents actually launched a satellite into space! And a bunch of the schematics and stuff for it are in the Van. They go to get it while we flash over to see how the Nerd Squad is doing. 

They’re still casing the room Arianwyn was staying in at the Owl and the Harp. Adaine finds non-detection runes her mom put up to keep Falinel from finding her. She also can tell that two rituals happened in the room: one to kill Killian and the other to put the Devil’s Heart Ruby (ie: The Gorthalax one) into his body. Riz realizes that the ritual isn’t about getting into Sylvere so much as getting the Shadowcat into Sylvere by way of having the gem Petrosmos (as is rock+osmosis--as in what’s going on with Ragh’s mom) with someone she’s infected. He also finds a lot of super old school medical texts written in, like, hieroglyphs almost. Adaine ritual casts Comprehend Languages so she can read it and one of the texts is a diagram of a centaur with scary looking cat symbols at its eyes, ears, tongue, sinuses, and spine but not the brain (which they later deduce means that she can access their senses but not their thoughts).  He also knows that the two rituals were cast 24 hours apart which means that either Arianwyn left while they were partying or somehow knew to do the ritual the second they initially grabbed Aelwen.

Adaine rolls to try to find proof that her mom cares about her any personal effects left behind and does that thing people always do in movies where they lightly shade over a piece of paper to see what was written on the sheet on top of it. She finds a note written in her mom’s handwriting that says: Aelwen is with me. You are betrayed. You have no other choice, darling. Come join us. It seems as if she wrote it down to make sure she was under the limit for Sending. Adaine assumes it was to her Dad since it wasn’t to her. Riz also sees that the amount they were packing is way more than they would need to get to the temple. It’s hard to tell exactly what they were going there to do though because they brought all the important stuff with them.

They discuss Kalina’s abilities some more and are pretty confident that she can only be in one person at a time. They also think she’s unable to get into a Moon Haven/the Hallowed Van but they’re not sure if she can get in if she’s already in one of them before they go in. Adaine wants to establish that any private info, they Message to each other instead of saying it out loud. With an 18 Medicine check, Riz knows there’s a cure but he doesn’t know what it is. He takes all of the research to bring back to the party clerics who we’ll visit right now actually.

The Clerics and Fig are in the shrine with Vrath, the super aggro devil who’s just served Fig a subpoena. Fig reads it and sees that she’s being subpoenaed as a witness for a Tribunal against Gorthalax for neglecting his domain (he’s gotten 9 summonses which have all lapsed). Fig thinks it’s just a misunderstanding since Gorthalax is in a gem. Fig wants to do some court shenanigans but Kristen convinces her to at least get everyone together first.

Gorgug gets the research to the gnomes and they think they can rig something up in maybe a day. Then, the Owlbears go check in with the other two groups. After being told about the whole subpeona situation, Sandra-Lynn points out that Gilear actually knows a good amount about the law. He insists he’s not a lawyer but agrees to help and, upon reading the subpoena, says it seems pretty above board. Fig and Kristen also think they might be able to recruit the devils to fight against the NK while they’re in Hell since devils hate demons.

Adaine sets up the Message system they talked about earlier and Kristen decides to peruse the medical docs Riz found. NAT 20 BAY-BEE! And Kristen might have a -3 to Dex but she has a +9 to Medicine. That’s a big ol’ 29! 

After taking a second to eat his dice and contemplate how jossed his plans are, Brennan says that they can make a tincture using Dusk Moss and some other alchemical supplies from Sylvere that would cure it and that, with a Nat 20, she understands it so well that she specifically can cure it with Greater Restoration. Sandra-Lynn talks about what she found (where Arianwyn and Co. entered the forest) to cover the fact that Adaine and Fig are Messaging this information mentally to the group so Kalina doesn’t know what they know. Adaine thinks maybe they should start saying things that are untrue out loud so that Kalina is getting bad info. Fig thinks maybe they cure everybody but one person so they can control the info she’s getting but realizes that Kalina would probably realize what they’d done and catch on. Tracker pitches that they also could just all go in the Hangvan to be safe and then Kristen could one by one cast Greater Restoration on everyone who needs it. But she can only cast it once a day so it would probably take longer than they have.   

Gorgug asks a very insightful question that hadn’t occurred to me--if Sandra-Lynn is infected, why isn’t Gilear? Fig relays the question to her slightly embarrassed mom who says she must have gotten it within the past 3 years. Not info Fig really wanted to know I’m sure but these things come up when you go adventuring with your parents.

Anyway, after some more discussion, they decide that they have to go the tincture route so they can all get cured at once since doing it piecemeal means they lose their element of surprise and they also decide that going to Hell to clear up Gorthalx’s tribunal is top priority. Tracker stays behind in the Van since she can’t get into the temple where the door is because of the mural while everyone else tries the door. Fig goes in first but stands in the doorway so it stays open (if anyone else tries to approach, the door starts growing thorns). Gilear walks in, Riz is hanging onto Fig. Fabian and Adaine are next, both on the Hangman but the doorway recognizes a devil (the Hangman) going through the door and shuts, leaving Fig, Riz, Gilear, and the Hangman in Hell and everyone else in the shrine.     

Gilear immediately gets knocked out by fire-rain but Riz brings him back with his healer feat and the Hangman (who is very sad puppy about being separated from Fabian) gives him a devil mark on his forehead that protects him from fire. Gilear also says that, as long as they go to the tribunal, the devils will have to send them home afterwards. On their way to the tribunal, Gilear has some playful banter with Fig which Riz is immediately suspicious of he gets Gilear to blurt out in a panic that he’s feeling confident because Sandra-Lynn and Jawbone broke up and she asked to sleep with him and he declined. They had a good talk and they left it on good terms but that’s what’s going on. Fig is happy Gilear is feeling more confident, especially since she feels a little guilty about his whole deal, a fact that shocks Gilear. She thinks it’s obvious. She’s a living reminder of the fact that he got cheated on by his wife. He pauses. Then he says he’s going to step up for her and turn his life around. Oh, also, Riz going absolutely feral but that’s unrelated. 

They get to court which is overseen by Vraz (plus a Spiked dude and a Chained dude--Blozo, Vraz’s boss, is stuck in traffic). Fig is called up and asked if she knew of any intention by Gorthalax to neglect his duties. She says no and that Gorthalax was trapped in a gem by Kalina via a proxy (which, you will remember, was her). Brennan makes Fig roll to get away with that tricky wording of the technical truth and Adaine gives her a Nat 20 portent roll to beat Vraz’s 23. That gets Gorthalax off the hook for punishment but they still have to get someone to run the place while he’s gone and the tribunal isn’t over. Vraz calls a recess and puts the party on house arrest in hell. Also, Fig cut herself to show her blood to prove she was Gorthalx’s daughter and inadvertently created a fully sentient imp valet for herself so that’s also something that’s happening.   

Back in the shrine, Adaine checks out the mural and sees an occult rune on the spellbook and realizes she’s seen it somewhere. They then go check out the spot Sandra-Lynn found where Arianwyn entered the forest and the briers there are actually more tangled than in other places, not less. It seems like they were trying to throw people off by entering through a less intuitive spot but also that it will probably slow them down. They go back home to prep and wait for the rest of the party. Fabian gets a ping from the Hangman asking if he should try to call his dad. After a little bluster, Fabian admits that yes, yes he should. 

Meanwhile, Kristen wants to check out their coins to see if they have the spellbook (though Gorgug thinks the baddies already have it) and Adaine realizes she saw the symbol at the Compass Points library so Ayda would know what it means. She doesn’t have Sending stocked so she decides to trance so she can either get a short rest or have a long one and get the spell prepared, depending on when they need to leave. Gorgug decides to go see how the gnomes are doing with his crystal. Since he’s there, he can help out. Nat 20! They get the crystal to work. He now essentially has a satellite phone.

He magic Facetimes Zelda who is at a party with the rest of the 7 Maidens. She’s shocked that Gorgug was able to rig his phone to work on the road and she’s not even mad at him anymore. She apologizes for reacting so strongly and says she misses him so much. In the background, her party members do the extremely teen girl thing of hyping up the boyfriend that they all like. He and Zelda have a sweet little conversation and Gorgug lets her know that they’re about to go into the forest so their service might not be great. Zelda says that they’re done with their quest so he shouldn’t worry about her. She also says he loves him which the gnomes with Gorgug are super stoked about. They pop some bottles. 

Adaine wakes up from her trance, restocks her spells, and casts Sending to ask Ayda about Planeshift and the rune she found. Ayda says they should use the Synod of Spires and has Adaine check her right jacket pocket where she finds a glowing blue key. When Adaine uses it on a nearby, glowing lock, she finds herself in this cool pocket dimension which Ayda also appears in. She gives Adaine a copy of the spell (it’s 1st level I believe) so she can use it too when they need to talk and the Sending spell would be inconvenient. Re the symbol: Ayda says it’s an Abjuration rune (but not a protective one, a meta-magic one ie: modifying magic) that masks powerful curses and spells by letting them Trojan Horse under a different curse (she says the underlying curse could be a vessel for other spellcasting which sounds like a spellbook to me). She also says the larger Trojan Horse curse would be better if it was something static--Adaine suggests the wall around the forest and Ayda says that could work.     

When Adaine offhandedly mentions that Fig is currently stuck in Hell, Ayda freaks about rescuing her immediately, eventually revealing that they kissed for an hour the night before (“AN HOUR???”) to Adaine’s immediate delight (until she starts in on the TMI at least). Ayda actually was about to call Adaine as well so she could ask her to use her Oracular abilities to suss out how to avoid any possible futures where Fig doesn’t want to be with her anymore which has got to be the most teen girl thing Ayda has ever done in any of her lives. Adaine tells her that that’s not really how her powers work but reassures her that Fig wouldn’t play with her emotions and it wouldn’t be weird for her to ask Fig for clarification about their relationship status. They end up having a little talk about how both of them are wired differently which they bond over and the episode ends with Ayda mentioning that she created the friendship section of the library that Gorgug found a while back out of loneliness. And now she has a best friend and a girlfriend (probably)! What a different ending that a devil subpoena.  

 Detention

Kristen for Trying to Handcuff Sandra-Lynn 

No one actually did anything too crazy this episode so I’ll give it to Kristen for a joke I have no idea how she saw going over well.   

Honor Roll

Kristen for Making Brennan Eat His Dice (And Going Full Jonas Salk All Over Kalina’s Ass) 

I think the only other person who’s made both lists in one ep is Fig.

Anyway, you know I had to give it to Kristen for that Nat 20 to figure out literally everything in those medical texts and how to cure everybody. What a clutch time for Ally’s dice powers to kick in. This is why Kristen had to almost break her leg ribbon dancing out a window. Equivalent exchange. 

(Also, props to Brennan for honoring the roll and probably jossing some of his own plans in the process.)

Random Thoughts

Housekeeping Update: There are only 7 episodes of Sophomore Year to go (not counting this one)!  March 25th is the last one so prepare accordingly! As much as I’m enjoying these, I’m pretty OK with this since I think more digestible content is one of the big strengths of Dimension 20 content. 

Also, for those of y’all who don’t watch Critical Role or missed last episode, on Friday (2/14) Ally will be playing on their Valentines Day one-shot of Monsterhearts (monster high school setting) and, based on the promo, looks like they’ll be playing a werewolf so be sure to check that out if you want more of Ally’s shenanigans in your life.  

I feel like Brennan must have a lot of fun coming up with nonsense gnome names. They’re all so insane. 

“Anything is an alchemical ingredient depending on what you’re trying to do.”

Lol at Lou being like, “We all have the same information and I didn’t figure out any of that,” when the Nerd Squad was figuring stuff out irl.

I love how Gorgug has no patience for eleven nonsense but someone says the word, “crystalmatron” to him and he doesn’t bat an eye. 

“This is in hell.”/”What!?”/”Hell.”/”What!?”/“Hell.”

Gilear: Everyone is in great danger all of the time

Adaine: I agree.

Gilear: Good? But also disquieting coming from the Oracle.

It occurs to be that Garthy is a really bad person to be infected by the Kalina Virus considering their occupation and how good they are at it. 

Fig is right. A simultaneous, “Bye Kalina,” would be very dope. 

If Kalina happened to be watching them at any in this episode, it’s good that they bought the Duskmoss beforehand. Like, if Kalina knows they bought Duskmoss blindly because they just bought everything Killian did, she’d be a lot less suspicious of them than if she sees them suddenly buy 2 huge bricks of an important ingredient in the cure for her.  

It occurs to me that Jawbone is also a bad person to be infected with the Kalina Virus. 

Oh man, Jawbone and Sandra-Lynn just got a house together with so many people. And now they broke up. I know they’re both being adults about it and all but you can’t tell me it’s not gonna be a little awkward.

I wonder what Zayn is doing back in the haunted house while this is going on. No real reason. Just wanna know. Like is Adaine gonna come back and he’s like, “I taught Edgar how to do a trick. What about you?” And she’s like, “Hoo, boy. Where do I even start.”

Fantasy drugs in D&D are always so so funny to me.  Also, lol at the fact that Adaine is actually pretty down to do fantasy hallucinogens (she thinks they might be therapeutic). 

The 6/7 Maidens texting Gorgug to be like, “Good job buddy!” is such a sweet detail. 

The vulnerability from Fig talking to Gilear in this episode. Gah. Fig’s thing is that she’s not a closed book despite what she says. She’s a wide open book for the most part. But that’s not the same as letting yourself be vulnerable necessarily. And the clear shock from Gilear that Fig would not only concern herself with his wellbeing in that way (like, she’s always head of the Gilear cheer squad but this is like, more than surface level, you know?) and that she would put it upon herself--something that she should never have to deal with as the child? I did not ASK for touching scenes from GILEAR but by God are they happening anyway.

Upon learning that Fig is wearing her library card behind her ear now instead of a clove (in tribute to Ayda of course) I got my library card and tried that and, folks, it is for sure a Choice. 

Man I hope Adaine messes with Fig over Ayda. Them acting like bratty sisters (like them fighting for rooms in ep 1) is one of my fave dynamics amongst the Bad Kids. 

Do we know how/why Ayda ended up in Leviathan in the first place? Like, did Aguefort just drop her there for some reason? Is that where she was conceived? How sentient are phoenixes? Does she have any kind of relationship with her mom?

“I want to be alone but also surrounded by my friends at all times.” Again, too real. 

Siobhan knows so many crazy words offhandedly. When Brennan said “synod” I started Googling and before I even pressed Enter she was like, “So it’s a church thing.” Wild.

@jamiebluewind has a Galaxy Brain theory that the kids need to get rid of all of their Kalvaxus gold for the coin/spellbook to reveal itself (details here) which I think makes a lot of sense because from a storytelling/gameplay perspective it would be weird for them to have possibly spent it before they even knew it was a thing they were looking for.

The obvious person that Arianwyn would have sent that Message to would be her husband but I’m wondering if either it’s a mislead or a trap because we know they’re not working together because of Aelwen (who I’m inclined to believe). What is your game Mom Abernant? What are you doing?

They got Gothalax out of punishment by saying that the reason he hasn’t shown up is because he’s been in a gem but 9 seems like a lot of summonses to have received in the past, what, four days (?) since he’s been trapped. Feels like a longer-standing issue potentially. 

Kristen and Gorgug each roll one Nat 20 in this episode and Fig gets one via Adaine’s portent roll. Fig and Fabian each roll one Nat 1. 

[inspirationdivine]

(Nearly) Dead Poet’s Society || Lydia and Deirdre

Murder moms take a much-deserved wine break, until somebody screams.

Brief talk of domestic abuse tw/emotional abuse tw

“Deirdre! Come on in! Are you in the mood for a Bordeaux or a Malbec?” Lydia asked, tilting her head curiously. She hadn’t seen Deirdre since Haven Hotel, where… let them be completely honest, Deirdre had been a wreck of a person. At one point the cleaning staff had come over to check on them, and Lydia had shooed them away with a glare. Her own imminent loss was difficult, of course, but Deirdre’s was so very current. “How are you, my dear?”

Deirdre, despite being an avid wine drinker, knew next to nothing about the drink. There was some power to be had in going to a restaurant and proudly proclaiming for then to bring them their most expensive bottle. What was in the bottle, however, she had no idea usually. "Bordeaux," she answered; it sounded fancier. If wine at Lydia's was going to be a regular affair, which she hoped it would, then she really needed to read up on it. "Better. So much better. I really can't thank you enough for that." She stepped into the home, a smile wider than she was used to it being this past week. "How are you? You know, with…" she gestured, "...everything? And the—uh—mimes?" 

“I’m glad to hear it, my dear,” Lydia replied with a soft smile, leading Deirdre to the sitting room and the cream leather sofas there. She returned quickly with the wine glasses filled up and the bottle for top ups, and settled comfortably into the couch beside Deirdre. “With the dying human upstairs? As well as can be expected, frankly. I’ve promised to talk to Regan soon as well, so we shall see how that fairs.” She shrugged about the mimes, waving them off. “I honestly think it may have been a fluke. The humans are a little shaken up, and Chloe can’t speak, although that’s a blessing in disguise, I suspect. The outdoor alarms have rung a couple of times, but it doesn’t seem to have been anything.”

"Are you sure?" Deirdre asked, less uncertain about Lydia's words and more...simply concerned. "I mean the talking to Regan..it didn't—well, if anyone could do it, it would be you." Jealousy cut through her, and she hid the feeling with a sip of wine, and then another. But at the rest, she let out a gentle laugh. "Might be better then, especially with Annaliese..." Deirdre trailed off, taking another sip. "Do you ever worry about getting caught, Lydia? With Annaliese about to die and Chloe being...what I assume is insolent...do you worry about someone poking their head around too much? Is that...ever an issue?" She took another sip, showing worry for her friend plainly across her features. "If you ever needed more help with covering things up, I'm admittedly very good at that." Years of murder and coming from a family that did exclusively that, she had some expertise in evading the law—not that she imaged Lydia would even need her help. And like Regan, there was a sense of helplessness that filled her. Lydia had aided her, was it so bad to want to do that in return? 

“I am not sure, but when I heard your scream, and you didn’t reply to me, I tried asking Regan about it, which of course set off certain alarm bells. I’ll approach it with compassion, and I will pray for an outcome where I’m not barred from her life.” Lydia said, trying not to worry about it too much. Regan liked her, and the truth could be piecemeal. Lydia had promised to tell the truth soon if it was to Regan’s liking, which meant that anything Regan wouldn’t like, she could withold until Regan could at least handle it. The ‘soon’ itched at her ankles, but Lydia suspected she would have ample opportunity. It would be easier, without the human in her head, too. “No. I have had a few close shaves, but that’s in part because I’m on every warden’s kill list anyway, no matter how knowledgeable or honorable they think they are. Certainly, I could worry about it either way, but that would only result in me making my life miserable. I have complete control over them, between the kiss and all the promises I have extracted from them, over the years. A police officer could walk in right now and demand to speak to Chloe, and for however much she likes to test boundaries, she would tell them nothing I didn’t want her to. Ultimately, all of them know that they want to be here.” Lydia spoke about them blythely, uncaringly. She was arrogant, and had few compunctions about it. “I appreciate that, darling. I hope you know that I don’t hold you to any debts. But if the situation arrives, I’m glad to know that I could rely on your help.”

Deirdre frowned, "But you promised to talk to her soon...are you sure that's—" she bit her lip, quieting her concern for the moment. She felt like she might have had a little too much of it for a woman that seemingly... wasn't affected. Or did a good job of hiding it. Deirdre, by comparison, had become very poor at hiding her feelings, once she learned she could indulge them. "There had to be a time when enough people tell you about the car for you to assume there's some truth in that, right? I'm sure Regan can't deny it forever." She sighed, taking another sip to find that her wine glass was suddenly empty. "Well, if you're not worried about it then.." she trailed off, reaching for the bottle of wine to pour herself more. "You could hold me to anything you'd like." There was a habitual flirtatious tinge to her words, lips curled up into a soft smirk. "But I do want to help you and...well, maybe one of us can be a little cautious about things. Some things, at least. You will let me worry about you, won't you?" Lydia was understandably arrogant, and while Deirdre's arrogance had mostly been shaved down since failing miserably with Regan, she could understand why. Most days, she felt untouchable with her own righteous criminal activity. "Have you ever killed before, Lydia? Personally, I mean. Beyond feeding and beyond getting others to do it for you." 

“Indeed. There are things she already cannot deny. I’ll start there. She needs to control her wings without the use of an amulet. If nothing else, I can teach her that.” Lydia said, looking to Deirdre’s concern softly. She gave the other woman’s hand a quick squeeze. “However, I can’t teach her her heritage. If I manage to get through to her, I’ll do my best to get her to speak to you again.” Ever the quick host, Lydia reached for the bottle to fill up Deirdre’s glass. “I worry. I just don’t see any use to that specific worry.” Laughing, Lydia easily flirted back as much as they had been since they first met. There was something so easy about being with Deirdre, sipping wine and curled on a sofa with her legs tucked underneath her. “Mm, don’t tempt me.” 

“What brought on that question? I did not plan for Miccy to survive even being successful, although I suppose I wouldn’t have done it myself.” Lydia wracked her brain. “If using my words don’t count, then only a couple. A warden thirty odd years ago, and a member of Sammy’s family several months ago. When I can, I prefer to avoid conflict, considering that I’m five foot and my natural weapon is to spit on people. Why do you ask?”

Deirdre smiled softly, a grateful glint in her eyes. “You’d do that?” She perked up, biting the inside of her cheek to stop from smiling too wide. She extended her glass out for the pour and decided then that there wasn’t any point in hiding how much she enjoyed Lydia’s company and friendship. She released the inside of her cheek from her teeth’s grip and shone a grin at her. “Mhm. Hush and let me worry about you, Lydia. I’d like to.” Concern was care, after all. Deirdre took a slow sip of her newly filled wine. “Oh--uh--” She shifted. Of all the people that would have a problem with her fate killings, she imagined Lydia to be at the very bottom. But still, she worried. She always did when a part of her would be laid bare. “It’s just that I--” Her body stiffened. She curled her hands tighter around her glass until her grip turned white-knuckled. Fire licked up through her insides and she turned her head, momentarily caught off guard by the abruptness of the scream coiling around her. But expertly, as she’d done numerous times before, she swallowed it back down despite every instinct begging her not to. And as her eyes dipped into pure darkness and her pale face became marred with black veiny cracks, a vision took her mind.

She saw Annaliese first. Then Lydia with hands woven into her soft brown locks. The lighthouse stood valiantly behind them. Annaliese leaned back, her mouth moved. Lydia leaned forward. Their lips met and--- 

Deirdre blinked, snapped back into Lydia’s impeccable living space. “Oh.” She turned to the other fae. “That-uh--vision.” She pointed up, imagining Annaliese was right above them somewhere. “Her. Vision. For her. That--” she swallowed. “Are you okay? Are you sure you’re--is it really okay?”

Lydia stiffened too as Deirdre did. The Banshee’s eyes flooded with blackness as cracks spread across her face, staring into some future Lydia couldn’t see. It would have been beautiful had it not been so alarming. Lydia had never seen a Banshee scream before, only heard them, and she stared, transfixed, as moments later the black faded from her eyes and the black veins retreated. “Who-” But of course, she didn’t need to ask. Lydia swallowed as she looked across the halls, to where she could feel Annie struggling to write her last few poems. She knew they were among her last, but not quite how much so.  “When?” Lydia asked softly, shrinking into her seat a little. The pain in her features was unmistakable, and there was little point in hiding them, as she clutched her wine glass tight to her chest. 

“Soon.” Deirdre said, inching closer. Would Lydia like a hug? Was she a hugging kind of person? “It feels like...the end of the week. Sunday, maybe?” She swallowed, then repeated it more confidently. “Sunday.” The banshee placed her glass down, one hand reached out to hover awkwardly over Lydia’s shoulder. She had spoken of it bothering her, but up until that point, Deirdre hadn’t seen much of it physically portrayed. And she’d wanted a way to help Lydia, but it seemed wrong that this was it. She just assumed there might have been something high up on a shelf she could reach. “It was a nice death. If that helps. You’re there, of course.” But she imagined Lydia already knew this. She imagined this wasn’t her first death, and it wouldn’t be her last. Relenting, Deirdre reached out finally and wrapped her arms around the other fae. “Do you want me to…” kill her, her mouth worked around the words. “Is it easier if you do it yourself?”

“Sunday,” Lydia repeated, more for herself than anyone else. She wasn’t truly aware of Deirdre, in that moment. “I suppose it isn’t too much of a surprise. You get to a point where you can tell you’re just drinking the dregs at the bottle of the barrel. She’s barely writing in coherent english, at this point.” She looked up at Deirdre again, her eyes shinier than usual, but as she spoke she managed to push the feelings back and away. “It would be a nice death. She’s earned it.” One of Lydia’s favourite humans in this millenium, too. When Deirdre wrapped her arms around Lydia, it was a little odd, but nothing Lydia couldn’t melt into, resting her head against Deirdre’s shoulder. “You are so very kind to offer. Let me finish my meal, my darling. Would it be alright if I came to find you after, with something stronger than red wine?”

Deirdre had watched enough people die to feel the way it could ring through another. But she'd never known what death must be like with a telepathic bond, how harshly it would rattle inside Lydia. So much of the other woman was a mystery, but only because she'd never bothered to ask. In that moment, watching her rein in emotion, she felt horribly for knowingly keeping her at a length. Projecting her ideal of a fae, she'd forgotten to know Lydia as she was. And here, it was the woman about to lose something dear. "Yes," she said gently, holding her a little closer. "Of course. Find me. We'll drink the stuff that burns on the way down and you can tell me about Annaliese, as she was in life...how does that sound? Or you can...do whatever you need to. But find me, Lydia. Come. I'm here." She softened, though no but disingenuous with her comforting prattle. "Or you can tell me about her now? It helps. What made her special?" 

Lydia leant into that cool squeeze, until eventually she sat back upright, straightening her shoulders, and smiling. “I don’t walk to talk about her as if she’s already dead. I’m sure I’ll be talking about her more than enough in the coming weeks.” She adjusted her hair, fixing it back in place, and drank from her wine. As she spoke, a wide smile spread across her face, with a teasing wink. “Besides, we have much more important things to talk about, like this zombie of yours, or whichever topic you want to try and distract me on to…”

Deirdre frowned momentarily, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean—" but she stopped herself. Lydia was right, to some degree, even if Deirdre had always felt a scream meant someone was as good as dead already. Her mouth fell around the words to vocalize her desire to get to know Lydia more, and by extension, the humans she housed. As Lydia went on, Deirdre found her wish to be a foolish topic, and followed the woman's lead. "Zomb—" Deirdre flushed, quickly shaking her head, "oh no, don't distract me. Not when I've had this burning issue in my mind for weeks now and—" Deirdre gestured around them, matching Lydia's smile with her own. She sat up. Her voice dripped with obvious teasing, and then she set about her dramatic display: "You call this decorating? Where are the bones? The taxidermy? The urns? I'm appalled. Look at that wall. It needs bones. Where are all the ones I give you? What is that painting over there? Zero skeletons! Zero decapitations! And here I thought you had taste, Lydia." And like that, she went on about where she'd put bones. Arguing art for the sake of explaining it needed more murder. Taking thinly veiled attempts at ribbing Lydia. At some point, finding a moment quiet enough, she spoke softly. "I do love you." And strange as the feeling was, she hoped it might be good enough to soothe some ache of Annaliese's impending passing. Lydia deserved just as much. 

[akisazame]

2, 4, and 20 for the writing meta asks?

2. Tell us about what you’re most looking forward to writing – in your current project, or a future project

the only project i’m allowed to think about right now is the queliot friends to enemies to lovers...

i’ve been writing it in a very piecemeal way, jotting down parts of scenes as they come to me, so a lot of the time when i come up with a part that i’m excited to write then i just do it. but it’s a story told in two parts, three years of high school followed by quentin and eliot reuniting at brakebills five years later, and i’ve only written tiny bits of the brakebills part since it will be so heavily informed by whatever i come up with for the high school part. so i’m looking forward to writing that, because it’s where the enemies to lovers bit happens, and if all goes well it will be deliciously messy.

4. Share a sentence or paragraph from your writing that you’re really proud of (explain why, if you like)

still really fond of this bit from solutions:

She wishes this were a Groundhog Day scenario, where she could just keep trying over and over again until she figures out the exact series of events that will make Josh Chan fall head over heels for her and then they can spontaneously buy a house together. Which strikes Rebecca as weird, now that she thinks of it, because Andie MacDowell had only known Bill Murray for like, a day and a half? Not that Rebecca can really throw stones. Which is not a great metaphor, currently.

i was born on this terrible earth to write this sentence! the inspo for this came from the episode of @serpentcast where they talked about groundhog day, and one of the topics of discussion was the inherent imbalance of a time loop romance, where the person looping establishes a depth and breadth of knowledge about the other person that the non-looper can never achieve. despite the truly unconscionable number of times i’ve watched groundhog day, i hadn’t thought about it in that way until freya pointed it out! and, to me, it seemed like something rebecca, with her love of romance tropes but also the high value she places on consent, would notice and comment on. this was also one of those train-of-thought-y type sentences that just flowed very easily from my brain to the page and required basically no editing, which is always both welcome and exciting.

20. Tell us the meta about your writing that you really want to ramble to people about (symbolism you’ve included, character or relationship development that you love, hidden references, callbacks or clues for future scenes?)

ugh neither of the fics that would most apply to this are actually... things anyone can read...

i’ve talked before about the kiss symbolism in solutions but i will use this opportunity to bring it up again because it delights me.

there’s a direct reference to @notbang‘s wildfire quarantine fic in in hopes that the glare... i don’t think anyone ever called me on my bullshit for that.

as far as my wips, for whatever reason i decided it would be a great and fun idea to write high school aus for both cxgf and the magicians, which is interesting because i’ve had to dial back these characters into versions that we either very briefly get to see or don’t get to see at all! i’ve had to think very hard about characteristics and mannerisms that each character has in canon and consider when they might’ve developed that trait. honestly i feel like camp canyon grove au is a bit muppet babies in that the characters are mostly similar to their canon versions except with everything turned up to 11 because they’re teens. the queliot au is a whole other story because we know, canonically, that eliot is Like That because of his own conscious choices once he got out of his father’s house, so i get to dial him back all the way and then slowly construct him over time. on top of that i get to write a version of quentin who is contending with all the bullshit inherent in having brain problems but doesn’t have a formal diagnosis or understanding of any of it yet. it’s been fun, and weird, and challenging.

(fun meta asks for writers)

[reading-writing-revolution]

Heather Cox Richardson:

July 26, 2020 (Sunday)

Reality is disrupting the ideology of today’s Republican Party.

For a generation, Republicans have tried to unravel the activist government under which Americans have lived since the 1930s, when Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt created a government that regulated business, provided a basic social safety net, and invested in infrastructure. From the beginning, that government was enormously popular. Both Republicans and Democrats believed that the principle behind it—that the country worked best when government protected and defended ordinary Americans—was permanent.

But the ideologues who now control the Republican Party have always wanted to get rid of this New Deal state and go back to the world of the 1920s, when businessmen ran the government. They believe that government regulation and taxation is an assault on their liberty, because it restricts their ability to make money.

They have won office not by convincing Americans to give up their own government benefits—most Americans actually like clean water and Social Security and safe bridges—but by selling a narrative in which “Liberals” are trying to undermine the country by stealing the tax dollars of hardworking Americans—quietly understood to be white men—and redistributing them to lazy people who want handouts, not-so-quietly understood to be people of color and feminist women. According to this narrative, legislation that protects ordinary Americans simply redistributes wealth. It is “socialism,” or “communism.”

Meanwhile, Republican policies have actually redistributed wealth upward. When voters began to turn against those policies, Republicans upped the ante, saying that “Liberals” were simply buying Black votes with handouts, or, as Carly Fiorina said in a 2016 debate, planning to butcher babies and sell their body parts. To make sure Republicans stayed in power, they suppressed voting by people likely to vote Democratic, and gerrymandered states so that even if Democrats won a majority of votes, they would have a minority of representatives.

This system rewarded those who moved to the right, not to the middle. It gave them Donald Trump as a 2016 candidate, who talked of Mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists and treated women not as equals but as objects either for sex or derision.

And, although as a candidate Trump talked about making taxes fairer, improving health care, and helping those struggling economically, in fact as president he has done more to bring about the destruction of the New Deal state than most of his predecessors. He has slashed regulations, given a huge tax cut to the wealthy, and gutted the government.

If the end of the New Deal state is going to usher in a new era of peace and prosperity, it should be now.

Instead, the gutting of our government destroyed our carefully constructed pandemic response teams and plans, leaving America vulnerable to the coronavirus. Pressed to take the lead on combatting the virus, the administration refused to use federal power, and instead relied on “public-private partnerships” which meant states were largely on their own. When governors tried to take over, the Republican objection to government regulation, cultivated over a generation, had people refusing to wear masks or follow government instructions.

As the rest of the world watches in horror, we have suffered more than 4 million infections, and are approaching 150,000 deaths.

The pandemic also crashed the economy as businesses shut down to avoid infections. It threw more than 20 million Americans out of work. Republican ideology says the government has no business supporting ordinary Americans: they should work to survive, even if that means they have to take the risk of contracting Covid-19. Schools should open, businesses should get up and going, and the economy should rebuild. As Texas’s lieutenant governor Dan Patrick said to Fox News Channel personality Tucker Carlson in March, grandparents should be willing to contract coronavirus for the U.S. to “get back to work.”

The coronavirus has brought the Republican narrative up against reality. Just 32% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus, and only 38% of the country think the economy is good. Americans believe that the government should have done a better job managing the pandemic, and they do not believe they should risk their lives for the economy.

To try to deflect attention from the failure of his approach to the coronavirus, Trump is once, again, escalating the narrative. He has launched an offensive against Democratic cities, trying to convince voters he is protecting them from "violent anarchists" coddled by Democrats. He is using federal law enforcement officers in unprecedented ways, not to quell protests, but to escalate them. In Portland, Oregon, as officers have used tear gas, less-than-lethal munitions (which nonetheless fractured a man’s skull), and batons to attack protesters, the events, which had fallen to a few hundred attendees, grew again into the thousands. And now the administration is planning to send in more officers, to escalate further.

The Republicans’ ideology is also making it impossible for them to deal with the economy. We are on the verge of a catastrophe as the $600 weekly federal bonus attached to state unemployment benefits runs out this week just as the moratorium on evictions for an inability to pay rent ends. At the same time, state and local budgets, hammered by the pandemic, will mean more layoffs.

The House passed a $3 trillion bill in May to address these issues, along with providing more money to combat the coronavirus, but Republicans in the Senate rejected it out of hand. Today on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) went back to his ideological roots. “The only objective Democrats have is to defeat Donald Trump, and they've cynically decided the best way to defeat Donald Trump is shut down every business in America, shut down every school in America," he said. House Speaker "Nancy Pelosi talks about working men and women. What she's proposing is keeping working men and women from working." "Her objectives are shoveling cash at the problem and shutting America down.”

Instead, both Trump and Cruz want a payroll tax cut, which will do little to stimulate the economy since the tens of millions who have lost their jobs would not see any money, and this late in the year much of the tax has already been paid. But the payroll tax cut is popular among Republican ideologues because it funds Social Security and Medicare. Cut it, and those programs take a hit.

Today Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin took to the Sunday talk shows to try to reassure people that the Republicans would, in fact, manage to cobble together a relief bill in the next few days (after not writing one in the last two months). They are talking about passing piecemeal measures, but, recognizing that this means Republicans will call all the shots, Pelosi says no.

Meadows and Mnuchin say they want liability protection for businesses and schools if they open and people get Covid-19. They were also clear they would not agree to extending the $600 federal addition to state unemployment benefits, arguing that it simply “paid people to stay home.” They say they want to guarantee people 70% of their wages, but the reason the earlier bill had a flat $600 payment was because it appeared impossible for states to administer a complicated program based on a percentage, so this might well just be a straw argument.

The Republican approach to handling the coronavirus and the economy is apparently not to turn to our government, but to put our heads down, go on as usual, and hope for a vaccine. What will end the pandemic is “not masks. It’s not shutting down the economy," Meadows said. “Hopefully it is American ingenuity that will allow for therapies and vaccines to ultimately conquer this.”

[your-curatorial-convivialist]

July 26, 2020, Heather Cox Richardson*

Reality is disrupting the ideology of today’s Republican Party.

For a generation, Republicans have tried to unravel the activist government under which Americans have lived since the 1930s, when Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt created a government that regulated business, provided a basic social safety net, and invested in infrastructure. From the beginning, that government was enormously popular. Both Republicans and Democrats believed that the principle behind it—that the country worked best when government protected and defended ordinary Americans—was permanent.

But the ideologues who now control the Republican Party have always wanted to get rid of this New Deal state and go back to the world of the 1920s, when businessmen ran the government. They believe that government regulation and taxation is an assault on their liberty, because it restricts their ability to make money.

They have won office not by convincing Americans to give up their own government benefits—most Americans actually like clean water and Social Security and safe bridges—but by selling a narrative in which “Liberals” are trying to undermine the country by stealing the tax dollars of hardworking Americans—quietly understood to be white men—and redistributing them to lazy people who want handouts, not-so-quietly understood to be people of color and feminist women. According to this narrative, legislation that protects ordinary Americans simply redistributes wealth. It is “socialism,” or “communism.”

Meanwhile, Republican policies have actually redistributed wealth upward. When voters began to turn against those policies, Republicans upped the ante, saying that “Liberals” were simply buying Black votes with handouts, or, as Carly Fiorina said in a 2016 debate, planning to butcher babies and sell their body parts. To make sure Republicans stayed in power, they suppressed voting by people likely to vote Democratic, and gerrymandered states so that even if Democrats won a majority of votes, they would have a minority of representatives.

This system rewarded those who moved to the right, not to the middle. It gave them Donald Trump as a 2016 candidate, who talked of Mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists and treated women not as equals but as objects either for sex or derision.

And, although as a candidate Trump talked about making taxes fairer, improving health care, and helping those struggling economically, in fact as president he has done more to bring about the destruction of the New Deal state than most of his predecessors. He has slashed regulations, given a huge tax cut to the wealthy, and gutted the government.

If the end of the New Deal state is going to usher in a new era of peace and prosperity, it should be now.

Instead, the gutting of our government destroyed our carefully constructed pandemic response teams and plans, leaving America vulnerable to the coronavirus. Pressed to take the lead on combatting the virus, the administration refused to use federal power, and instead relied on “public-private partnerships” which meant states were largely on their own. When governors tried to take over, the Republican objection to government regulation, cultivated over a generation, had people refusing to wear masks or follow government instructions.

As the rest of the world watches in horror, we have suffered more than 4 million infections, and are approaching 150,000 deaths.

The pandemic also crashed the economy as businesses shut down to avoid infections. It threw more than 20 million Americans out of work. Republican ideology says the government has no business supporting ordinary Americans: they should work to survive, even if that means they have to take the risk of contracting Covid-19. Schools should open, businesses should get up and going, and the economy should rebuild. As Texas’s lieutenant governor Dan Patrick said to Fox News Channel personality Tucker Carlson in March, grandparents should be willing to contract coronavirus for the U.S. to “get back to work.”

The coronavirus has brought the Republican narrative up against reality. Just 32% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus, and only 38% of the country think the economy is good. Americans believe that the government should have done a better job managing the pandemic, and they do not believe they should risk their lives for the economy.

To try to deflect attention from the failure of his approach to the coronavirus, Trump is once, again, escalating the narrative. He has launched an offensive against Democratic cities, trying to convince voters he is protecting them from "violent anarchists" coddled by Democrats. He is using federal law enforcement officers in unprecedented ways, not to quell protests, but to escalate them. In Portland, Oregon, as officers have used tear gas, less-than-lethal munitions (which nonetheless fractured a man’s skull), and batons to attack protesters, the events, which had fallen to a few hundred attendees, grew again into the thousands. And now the administration is planning to send in more officers, to escalate further.

The Republicans’ ideology is also making it impossible for them to deal with the economy. We are on the verge of a catastrophe as the $600 weekly federal bonus attached to state unemployment benefits runs out this week just as the moratorium on evictions for an inability to pay rent ends. At the same time, state and local budgets, hammered by the pandemic, will mean more layoffs.

The House passed a $3 trillion bill in May to address these issues, along with providing more money to combat the coronavirus, but Republicans in the Senate rejected it out of hand. Today on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) went back to his ideological roots. “The only objective Democrats have is to defeat Donald Trump, and they've cynically decided the best way to defeat Donald Trump is shut down every business in America, shut down every school in America," he said. House Speaker "Nancy Pelosi talks about working men and women. What she's proposing is keeping working men and women from working." "Her objectives are shoveling cash at the problem and shutting America down.”

Instead, both Trump and Cruz want a payroll tax cut, which will do little to stimulate the economy since the tens of millions who have lost their jobs would not see any money, and this late in the year much of the tax has already been paid. But the payroll tax cut is popular among Republican ideologues because it funds Social Security and Medicare. Cut it, and those programs take a hit.

Today Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin took to the Sunday talk shows to try to reassure people that the Republicans would, in fact, manage to cobble together a relief bill in the next few days (after not writing one in the last two months). They are talking about passing piecemeal measures, but, recognizing that this means Republicans will call all the shots, Pelosi says no.

Meadows and Mnuchin say they want liability protection for businesses and schools if they open and people get Covid-19. They were also clear they would not agree to extending the $600 federal addition to state unemployment benefits, arguing that it simply “paid people to stay home.” They say they want to guarantee people 70% of their wages, but the reason the earlier bill had a flat $600 payment was because it appeared impossible for states to administer a complicated program based on a percentage, so this might well just be a straw argument.

The Republican approach to handling the coronavirus and the economy is apparently not to turn to our government, but to put our heads down, go on as usual, and hope for a vaccine. What will end the pandemic is “not masks. It’s not shutting down the economy," Meadows said. “Hopefully it is American ingenuity that will allow for therapies and vaccines to ultimately conquer this.”

*Heather Cox Richardson is an American historian and Professor of History at Boston College, where she teaches courses on the American Civil War, the Reconstruction Era, the American West, and the Plains Indians. She previously taught at MIT and the University of Massachusetts.