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tyrantisterror · 3 years

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I did a four part series of trivia posts when ATOM Volume 1: Tyrantis Walks Among Us! came out, and that was pretty fun! You can see that set of trivia posts here if you’d like. I thought it’d be fun to do another now that ATOM Volume 2: Tyrantis Roams the Earth! is out - just one this time, because a lot of the trivia I talked about with Volume 1 still applies.

I’m gonna divide this into two sections: non-spoiler trivia, for things that really don’t give a lot of plot points away, and spoiler trivia, for things that DO give away major plot points. I recommend not reading the spoiler trivia until after you’ve read Tyrantis Roams the Earth!, for obvious reasons, and will put the spoiler trivia under a cut.

Ok, let’s go!

- So if you read ATOM Volume 1, you probably noticed that the book is split not only into chapters, but “episodes,” which consist of four chapters a piece. It’s kind of a nod to how the series owes a great deal of its DNA to various monster of the week shows, with Godzilla: the Series and The Godzilla Power Hour being obvious influences. It also allowed me to pepper in some illustrations and cheesy b-movie style titles into each volume.

- The first “episode” of Volume 2, Tyrantis in Tokyo, pays explicit homage to the giant monster movies of Japan, perhaps even moreso than the chapters that came before it. Given how much Japanese media influenced ATOM - from tokusatsu like the Godzilla, Gamera, and Ultraman franchises to anime like Digimon and Evangelion (hell, the title of this episode itself is a tip of the hat to Tenchi Muyo by way of one of its spinoffs) - it kind of felt obligatory that Tyrantis visit Japan and pay his respects.

- Tyrantis in Tokyo also fits in a tribute to another staple of Atomic Age pop culture: Rock and Roll.

- Kutulusca, the giant cephalopod that appears in Tyrantis in Tokyo, is one of the oldest kaiju in this series, dating back to the first iteration of Tyrantis’s story that I put to paper back in 2001 or so. It’s changed a lot since then, but its fight with Tyrantis goes more or less the way it originally did.

- Old Meg, the giant placoderm/shark, and Nastadyne, the bipedal beetle, both owe their existence directly to Deviantart’s Godzilla fandom. Old Meg originated as a dunkleosteus monster I submitted to a “create a Godzilla kaiju” contest held by Matt Frank, while Nastadyne is based on a Megalon redesign I made during the “redesign all the Godzilla kaiju” phase of DA’s kaiju fandom.

- The second episode, Tyrantis vs. the Red Menace, gets dark as we visit the USSR, which had enough REAL horror with atomic power in its history to make creature features seem a bit defanged by comparison. It’s probably the episode with the strongest horror elements - ATOM’s always been influenced by Resident Evil, and this is probably where that influence shows the most strongly.

- It also features the first fully robotic mecha in the series, the mighty Herakoschei! Its name is a combination of “Heracles” and “Koschei the Deathless,” with the former part being added by its Russian creators to make it seem a bit more international as they offer it to the U.N. in hopes of gaining aid for a very extreme kaiju problem they’ve developed.

- Most of Tyrantis vs. the Red Menace takes place in the Siberian Monster Zone. Its name is a reference to the Lawless Monster Zone in Ultraman, which is such a cool fucking name I wish that I wish I could go back in time and steal it.

- The next episode, Tyrantis’s Revenge, is... full of spoilers, so we’ll move on for now.

- The penultimate episode, Tyrantis vs. the Martian Monsters, is a love letter to MANY different sci-fi stories that involve life on Mars, though the most prominent of them is of course The War of The Worlds (one of my top 3 favorite books) and its various adaptations. From its tentacles sapient martians, the tripodal leader of the titular monsters whose name includes the word “ulla” which is uttered by said sapient martians, the plant monster made of red vines, the cylinder-shaped spacecraft the Martian monsters are sent to earth on, the copper-skinned stingray-esque flying martian who shoots lasers from its tail, and the fact that every chapter title in this episode is a quote from the book, the H.G. Wells influence is STRONG.

- The final episode, Invasion from Beyond!, is shamelessly inspired by Destroy All Monsters, although there’s a dash of “To Serve Men,” Godzilla vs. Monster Zero, and The Day the Earth Stood Still mixed in as well. It’s also sort of a tribute to my first “published” bit of a kaiju fiction - a rewrite of Destroy All Monsters that included EVERY Godzilla monster that had appeared at the time, which my middle school self wrote back in 2002 or so for Kaiju Headquarters, a kaiju fansite I’m not sure exists anymore. Invasion from Beyond! is just as ambitious (but hopefully better executed) as my DAM Remake, with dozens upon dozens of different kaiju duking it out, earthlings vs. aliens.

- There were three different documents I made to outline the final battle of Invasion from Beyond! It’s the largest episode of the series so far and more than half of it is that fucking fight. My inner child is pleased, though, so hopefully you will be too.

Ok, that’s all I can share without spoilers. READER BEWARE WHAT FOLLOWS BELOW THE CUT!

JUST MAKING SURE you know that SPOILERS will follow from here on out. Read at your own peril! YOU WERE WARNED!

(I’m gonna start with lighter ones just in case you scrolled too far and want to turn back)

- There’s a number of explicit Spielberg homages in ATOM Volume 2, from a “we need a bigger boat” joke during a chase with a giant shark to the fact that Invasion from Beyond! opens with a group of people flying to an island of monsters to review whether or not it should get more funding.

- When Tyrantis appears in the first chapter, I snuck in modified lyrics of The Godzilla Power Hour’s theme song. “Up from the depths”... “several stories high”... “breathing fire”... “its head in the sky”... Tyrantis! Tyrantis! Tyrantis!

- The two rock bands in Tyrantis in Tokyo have real life inspirations ala Gwen Valentine, albeit a bit more muddled than hers. The Cashews are inspired by The Peanuts (see what I did there), while The Thunder Lizards are a mix of The Rolling Stones, the Beatles, Buddy Holly, and the Big Bopper. I wanted The Thunder Lizards to be more akin to the myth of a famous rock and roll band than the reality - less the real Beatles and more the Yellow Submarine cartoon version of them.

- The song The Thunder Lizards write for Tyrantis was written to fit the tune of “The Godzilla March” from Godzilla vs. Gigan, though ideally if someone made an actual song of it it would be its own song. I got the idea from Over the Garden Wall, which used the Christmas song “O Holy Night” as a a starting point for “Come Wayward Souls.”

- Perry Martin, UNNO reporter and peer of Henry Robertson, is a nod to Raymond Burr, with his name being a combination of two of Burr’s most famous roles: Perry Mason, and Steve Martin from Godzilla King of the Monsters (1956).

- Dr. Rinko Tsuburaya is a few homages in one. Her name comes from Rinko Kikuchi (who played Mako Mori in Pacific Rim), while her last name is obviously in homage of Eiji Tsuburaya. Her being the daughter of an esteemed scientist is inspired by Emiko Yamane from the original Gojira.

- Nastadyne’s Burning Justice mode is named after a similar super mode from various Transformers cartoons, though it’s more directly inspired by the Shining/Burning Finger super move from G Gundam.

- Martians sending kaiju to different planets via shooting them out of cannons (with or without cylinder spaceships around them) is another War of the Worlds shoutout. So is martians living on Venus after their homeworld was made uninhabitable, actually.

- Kurokame’s vocalizations are described as wails in explicit homage to Gamera. His name can be translated as either “black tortoise” (a reference to the mythical guardian beast Genbu, which can also be construed as a Gamera reference thanks to Gamera: Advent of Irys implying Gamera and Genbu are one and the same) or a portmanteau of the Japanese words for crocodile and turtle - “crocturtle.”

- Burodon’s name is just a mangling of “burrow down.” It also sounds vaguely like Baragon, who Burodon is loosely inspired by. AND, since Burodon is sort of a knockoff/modified Baragon, that kinda makes him a reference to various monsters in Ultraman!

- The final battle of Tyrantis in Tokyo is sort of a hybrid of the finales of Ghidorah the 3 Headed Monster and Destroy All Monsters.

- The Japanese kaiju teaching Tyrantis the art of throwing rocks at your enemies is both a joke on the prominence of rock throwing in Japanese kaiju fights AND the tired trope of an American hero learning secret martial arts from a Japanese mentor ala Batman, Iron Fist, etc. In this case, the secret martial art is throwing rocks at people.

- When introduced to Herakoschei and its pilot, we are told that the strain of piloting this early mecha is so intense that many pilots have died in the process, with the current one passing out on more than few occasions. This is of course a Pacific Rim homage - sadly, no one invents drifting.

- Herakoschei’s design is a loose homage to Robby the Robot and Cherno Alpha, because big boxy robots are cool.

- The Writhing Flesh and ESPECIALLY Pathogen are both hugely influenced by Resident Evil and The Thing. Giant body horror piles of raw flesh, tendrils, mismatched mouths and limbs may be a bit outside the main era of monster design ATOM homages, but they fit the themes and bring a nice contrast.

- I came up with Pathogen long before Corona but MAN it definitely feels different in 2021 to have a giant monster whose name is a synonym for disease driving other creatures crazy in a quarantine zone than it did when I plotted out the story in 2016.

- The chapter title “Hello, Old Foes” is a riff on “Goodbye, Old Friend”

- Minerva, the kaiju-fied clone of Dr. Lerna, is meant to be an homage to Attack of the 50 Foot Woman, which is a genuinely good giant monster flick. I am sure many of you will also believe I included her because I’m a pervert whose into tall women, but you’d be wrong! I included the seven foot tall Russian mecha pilot Ludmilla Portnova because I’m a pervert whose into tall women. Minerva’s inclusion was just coincidental, I swear!

- Since Promythigor is a play on the archetypal ape kaiju to contrast Tyrantis as a play on the archetypal fire-breathing reptile kaiju, their fight has a lot of nods to King Kong movies. Promythigor attempts the famous jaw-snap maneuver of Kong (with less success), J.C. Clark paraphrases the “brute force vs. a thinking animal” line from the King Kong vs. Godzilla American cut, and Tyrantis slides down a mountain to knock Promythigor off his feet in a reversal of Kong doing the same in King Kong vs. Godzilla.

- Tyrantis sliding down a mountain on his tail doubles as a Godzilla vs. Megalon homage.

- Though Promythigor is the archetypal Ape and Tyrantis the archetypal Fire-Breathing Reptile, I think it’s fun to note that in some ways, Promythigor is the Godzilla equivalent in their matchup, and Tyrantis the Kong. Promythigor has a slight size advantage, was scarred by humans performing unethical weapons technology, and is associated with violent explosions. Tyrantis is a good-at-heart prehistoric beast who humanized in part by his unlikely friendship with a human woman.

- Of course, in the context of the famous quote from the American cut of King Kong vs. Godzilla, they remain in their archetypal lanes. Promythigor is the more intelligent of the two (though not necessarily wiser), and Tyrantis is in many ways a brute reptile. Their battle is a rebuttal of sorts to the assertion that Kong is the “better” animal because he is closer to human. Promythigor’s near human creativity and emotions don’t make him the kinder/more benevolent monster, but instead fuel a very self-centered and destructive attitude that makes him the far more dangerous threat. On the other hand, Tyrantis, who is less intelligent, limited in communication with others by his reptilian mindset and instincts, and simple in his thoughts and desires, is nonetheless a sweet creature that is easily dealt with when others consider his animal needs and mindset. There’s a quote from Hellboy I love that probably sums up all of my writing thus far: “To be other than human does not mean the same as being less,” and that’s what the matchup between these two in particular tries to illustrate: the “less” human Tyrantis is nonetheless more benign than the “more” human Promythigor.

- Kraydi the psychic lizard began life as a soft sculpture I made of the Canyon Krayt Dragon from The Wildlife of Star Wars. The sculpture didn’t look much like the illustration, but I liked how it came out, and so I made it an original monster named Kraydi (see what I did there). Figuring out an explanation for that name in ATOM’s world was possibly the most difficult kaiju naming task in the series, but it worked out in the end.

- Kraydi and Promythigor having psychic powers is a result of my time on Godzilla fan forums in my middle school years. Most of the forums had OC kaiju battle tournaments, and SO many of those kaiju had a wide array of beam weapons and psychic powers just to win the tournaments by beam-spamming and mind controlling their foes into oblivion. There’s a special kind of rage you get when your original creation is beaten by “Fire Godzilla” because he has a genius level intellect and the power of unstoppable telekinesis. Kraydi began as (and still is I suppose) my attempt to do a psychic kaiju well, while Promythigor’s villainy being tied to psychic powers being forced on him is sort of my passive aggressive commentary on people foisting powers on a monster without any real thematic reason for them.

- Henry Robertson and Dr. Praetorius chewing out the laziness of people giving kaiju completely unaltered names of mythic beasts will probably be seen as a jab at the Monsterverse and/or the numerous writers in the kaiju OC scene who do the same, but it’s ACTUALLY a jab at my past self, who had DOZENS of kaiju whose names were just Greek mythological figures verbatim. There are dozens of kaiju named Hydra, Scylla, Charybdis, Chimera, etc., past me, try to make the names stand out! Oh wait you did. I mean, don’t pat yourself on the back too much, you still went with “Mothmanud” as a canon name and never came up with something better, but, like, good on ya for trying I guess.

- Dr. Praetorius takes his name from the evil mad scientis in Bride of Frankenstein, who basically has all the wicked traits that Universal’s Frankenstein downplayed in their take on Dr. Frankenstein. Ironically, ATOM’s Dr. Praetorius is a bit less evil than his fellow mad scientists in ATOM. I really like how his character turned out, he surprised me.

- Isaac Rossum, the pilot of the USA mecha Atomoton, is named for Isaac Aasimov, whose robot stories are to robot fiction what Lord of the Rings is to high fantasy. His last name is a reference to Rossum’s Universal Robots, which is where the word “robot” came from.

- The unfortunate pilots of MechaTyrantis in ATOM Volumes 1 and 2 are all nods to Jurassic Park. John Ludlow = John Hammond and Peter Ludlow, Ian Grant = Ian Malcolm and Alan Grant, Dennis Dodgson = Dennis Nedry and Lewis Dodgson.

- A good way to pitch Invasion from Beyond! would be “what if the staff and monsters were able to fight back when the Kilaaks tried to take over Monsterland?”

- Ok, here’s a fun joke that no one will get but me because it requires a very specific chain of logic based on some obscure and loosely connected nerd bullshit. There’s a rocker in ATOM’s universe named Sebastian Haff, right? One of his songs, “Darling Let’s Shimmy,” is referenced right before a mothmanud larva emerges from the ground in both ATOM Vol. 1 and 2. Ok, so, in the Bubba Hotep, an aging Elvis impersonator named Sebastian Haff claims he is actually the real Elvis Presley, having changed places with the real Sebastian Haff as a sort of Prince and the Pauper deal that went wrong. Got that? Ok, so, in UFO folklore, a common joke is the theory that Elvis didn’t die, but was rather abducted by aliens (or he actually WAS an alien the whole time - the whole “Elvis didn’t die, he just went home” joke in Men in Black is a good example of this). Ok? Ok. So, in ATOM’s universe, we can surmise that their equivalent of Elvis, whose name is Sebastian Haff, WAS abducted by aliens, and that his song “Darling Let’s Shimmy” is subconsciously influenced by his repressed memories from his time aboard the Beyonder spaceships, which is why it accidentally awoke a Mothmanud larva in Volume 1. There’s a lot of bullshit jokes I put into ATOM, but this is perhaps the bullshittiest of them all.

- One of the most common bits of feedback on ATOM Volume 1 I got was “I kept waiting for something to eat Brick Rockwell, he’s such an asshole.” And I had to smile and go, “Oh, yeah, guess he never got his, huh?” the whole time without letting on that he was going to die here all along!

- Dr. Lerna and Brick Rockwell’s nature as foils to each other is probably most apparent in Invasion from Beyond!, where both are given fairly similar situations - a nonhuman approaches them with a solution to a global crisis - and react to it very differently. I worry that some people may think they both made the same choice and got different results, and that that’s hypocrisy on my part, but I hope I wrote it so you can see how their choices and situations actually differ in key ways, and why their decisions, while similar on the surface, are ultimately very different, and thus result in almost opposite outcomes.

- So, when I planned out this book in 2016, I swear I didn’t know about the Orca from 2019′s Godzilla King of the Monsters. Having the plot hang around Dr. Lerna deciding whether or not to use a sonic device to rouse all the kaiju to save the earth was not INTENDED to be a Monsterverse reference - it came about from me looking at Pathfinder’s take on kaiju, who are all explicitly influenceable by music, and thinking, “Oh, wow, music and songs DO have a major connection with kaiju in a lot of media, I should do something with that.” Whem KOTM came out a few days after Volume 1 came out I realized I was kinda fucked here, because the comparison was definitely going to be made, but I’d also set this all up already and you can’t just change suddenly to avoid looking like a copy cat and make a good story, so... I dunno, I leaned into it a bit, but it is what it is.

- While most people will probably think they’re a reference to the Reptoids of UFO folklore, the Reptodites are more inspired by the Dinosapien of speculative evolution fame and, even morso, by the Reptites from Chrono Trigger. Me wanting to avoid the “lizard people control the government” conspiracy theory trope is one of the main reasons why Reptodites have this non-interference clause with humanity.

- Lieutenant Gray is a bunch of different humanoid aliens rolled into one - a little Hopskinville goblin, a little classic gray, a little this one weird alien with five-fingered zygodactyl hands, etc.

- There’s some Beyonder Mecha in this volume that are basically kaiju-fied versions of the Flatwoods Monster. The species that built them ALSO engineered the Mothmanuds, because connecting Mothman and the Flatwoods Monster is fun!

- Pleprah is, obviously, a one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater.

- Tyrantis’s brush with death, in addition to being so very anime, was inspired by my dad outlining how mythic heroes often have to travel to the underworld/land of the dead before they can finish their journey. It’s one of the plot points that I’ve had planned for this series since middle school.

- I’m sure some will view it as hackneyed and corny, but as a person who’s battled with depression for decades, having Tyrantis’s choice to live be the big heroic turn of the finale was very important to me. Tyrantis incorporates elements of a lot of imaginary friends I made as a kid, and in many ways he’s kind of the face of my more positive side in my head. He’s been telling me to choose to live for a while, and while maybe to an outsider it may seem hackneyed, it’s just... very Tyrantis. He chooses life and kindness in the face of pain and struggle. That’s Tyrantis.

- Tyrantis’s powered up form is called “Hyper Mode,” which is another Gundam reference. Originally it was a lot gaudier and involved him turning gold like a fuckin’ Super Saiyan. I opted for something a little more toned down here.

- Also, speaking of KOTM references, I decided to make Hyper Mode Tyrantis’s final duel with Pathogen be a sort of foil to Burning Godzilla’s final bout with Ghidorah in KOTM. Instead of ravaging the city, Hyper Tyrantis’s pulse of energy rejuvenates his fallen allies, and as a result he is “crowned” not out of fear for his supremacy in the wake of killing a powerful enemy, but in gratitude for his kindness. See? Leaning into it!

- And now I can finally reveal that Yamaneon is ATOM’s equivalent of The Monolith Monsters - that is, a kaiju that is also a mineral. I took the “strange continuously growing rock” thing in a very different direction, though, as unlike The Monolith Monsters, Yamaneon is actually alive.

- At various points in the pre-writing process, either Promythigor, MechaTyrantis, or both were going to die fighting Pathogen. I ultimately decided to let them both live, with MechaTyrantis even getting his flesh and blood body back, because I think it’s more interesting and thematically consistent that way. They get a chance to heal their wounds by changing their ways.

- The Great Beyonder and Dorazor both almost didn’t make the cut, as I felt they didn’t have the same pull as villains that Pathogen, Promythigor, and MechaTyrantis did. But then I thought that could actually be the gag - build them up as the final boss, only to have Pathogen take their crown. I want to explore post-face turn Dorazor a bit more, though. We’ll have to see about that in a later volume.

- Volumes 1 and 2 make up what I call “The Ballad of Tyrantis Arc” for ATOM. I call it that because Tyrantis’s storyline in these two volumes was patterend after Chivalric ballads like Yvain the Knight of the Lion. Tyrantis, a heroic warrior who is kind but dumb of ass, learns of strange goings on outside his home and investigates. During his journey into the unknown he falls in love with a powerful woman, whose favor he tries to win. Through happenstance he is separated from his love and, distraught, wanders around fighting various foes to prove his worth, before finally returning to his love a better hero. Invasion from Beyond! could even be seen as a sort of Morte d’Artur, with Tyrantis and a bunch of other kaiju heroes (including Nastadyne and Kemlasulla, who are built up as Hero Kaiju of Another Story) take part in a huge battle that threatens their idealic kingdom (of monsters).

- Volume 2 isn’t the end of ATOM, but it’s designed to work as an ending if you want to tap out here. As a reader I feel a definitive ending is important, but as a writer I’m always tempted to revisit my beloved characters, so I feel giving closure while leaving a few doors open for possible future adventures is a good compromise between these positions. There will be more ATOM stories, some (but not all!) following Tyrantis and Dr. Lerna, but if you want to know that Tyrantis and Dr. Lerna get an ending and the resolution to their arcs such a thing promises, here you go. An ending, if not THE END.

#The Atomic Time of Monsters #A.T.O.M. Trivia

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awful-roffle-archive · 2 years

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🎥🏟️📣

🎥 Were there any tv shows, books, or movies that influenced this verse, if any?

For Whisper Creek -

Welcome to Night Vale is a big one. The Umbrella Academy also had its influences on some of my characters. iZombie probably had its influences, but could probably have even more now that I'm working on the Affected. I should rewatch that. Hilda also has its influences, though that's fantasy in a slightly different direction than mine is. Tales of Arcadia is also a strong contender for inspiration in media, as well as Santa Clarita Diet. What we Do in the Shadows is also a good one. I've got lots of various places I pull inspiration from for Whisper Creek!

For Frozen Over -

Do games count? I think about The Outer Worlds as inspiration for Frozen Over sometimes. What Happened to Monday, The Mitchells vs The Machines, Carole & Tuesday, I am Mother, and Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts were all pretty solid and probably engrained myself in my brain as inspiration for Frozen Over! (Once again I should rewatch some of these and take notes! :D)

🏟️ Who was your intended audience?

I don't really have a targeted audience for either of my stories! Definitely more YA to Adult if anything, though. My writing isn't really geared towards kids.

📣 What was the best piece of encouragement you got?

Genuinely? Anything from you. You're so supportive of everything I do and I love you so so much.

Send me an ask!

#yeehaw!#i love u thank u for the ask

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robboybot · 2 years

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art ask game - 1, 8, 16, 17, 23 🥚

OOGH you have given me many!! thank you for this!

1. how would you describe your style?

I often find the most common description I give my style is 'comic book style' but if I were to push that I'd say it's specifically american comic book influence, but I've definitely taken tips from older cartoons (vintage and 2000-2010's styles) as well as 3d game models of various kinds haha. super smash bros and typical 'anime style' is kinda where I started!

here are two super old pieces to show where I began (with image descriptions in their alt text):

8. what’s the most fun and the least fun parts about your process?

GOd. the least fun is definitely figuring out anatomy and getting the flat colors down, I absolutely hate both of those LMAO. Sketching is fun at first until I have to make it LOOK accurate and fix the proportions. Flat coloring is also just STUPID tedious LOL

the most fun I have is LIGHTING! I love love love adding the finishing touches with light, slapping all the beautiful light refractions, highlights, glow, shadows- you name it! lighting makes me happy and I have fun with it. By far way more easy to be messy about and have it look good than the other processes!

16. favorite media to work with when drawing traditionally?

markers!! I actually really enjoy ink pens and markers! There's something about the way the ink bleeds over the paper that makes my brain happy, it just lends itself to solid pleasing aesthetics to me. Also ink pen sketching has a unique quality that ballpoint and pencil doesn't have!

17. what do you love getting compliments about?

First off: everything and anything, if you compliment anything about my art I WILL LOVE YOU FOR IT. But I think my two big favorite compliments are having my art style praised in some way and also being told my art was impactful to someone. If I'm told a piece I made really stuck with someone it means so much to me! I also love in general if people point out details, because it's nice knowing someone really saw my work longer than a glance haha.

23. what’s something you hope people notice when looking at your art?

Honestly mostly the feeling of it! I want them to really FEEL what I'm trying to put into my work, or draw a feeling from it! I also hope they appreciate and notice my lighting details haha, but what people notice will always be different. Also, yknow, being told people can see my hard work is nice :P

Art ask game!

#ask #egg-exe

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himbohargreeves · 4 years

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The link between diet and autism: a critical analysis of the recent Earth Locker episode and a chance for River to relive her lab report title writing days

Link to the original video

So as I already mentioned I’ve seen a few people talking about the recent episode of the Earth Locker (a podcast by Robert Sheehan, Tom Hopper, and Bryon Knight) where they talk with Tom and his wife Laura about their experiences raising their autistic son. I watched the whole episode and while there were a lot of good points made, there was also some misinformation, statements that were poorly explained and could be misinterpreted, and a couple of pretty harmful ideas put across which I’m gonna go into below.

Disclaimer one: I’m gonna be saying a lot of stuff that I’m not going to be posting sources for. This is because everything I’m saying comes from my experiences as an autistic person, my experiences working as a support worker for adults with autism where I am currently a key worker for two autistic individuals, my work related training on autism, mental health, and diet & nutrition, and my knowledge from my psychology degree in which I also spent a lot of time studying biology and physiology. This is all just stuff that I know, and at some point I might try to add some sources but I’m writing this fresh off watching and making notes on this video so my energy is already running a little low and I’d rather focus on getting my points across instead of having to take time to source every piece of information.

Disclaimer two: The purpose of this post isn’t to attack or defend any of the people involved in the podcast. This is also in no way a criticism of Tom and Laura’s parenting. This is purely a criticism of the discussion that took place on the podcast, not on any of the choices they’ve made for their son.

Disclaimer three: I’m going to be using the phrase “challenging behaviour” a lot while I’m explaining things as this is the term used in most modern research and is what we use at work. This basically describes any behaviour that causes harm to the individual or to other people around them, or behaviour that is detrimental to the individual’s wellbeing.

So the main thing I want to go into with this is the misinformation and misinterpretation of information that was central to the discussion in this podcast, and that was around the connection between diet and autism. Most of the things Tom and Laura said about the effects of diet weren’t incorrect, but it wasn’t explained accurately and missed out on some key points so let’s go:

In terms of whether diet can “cause” autism: no it can’t. There’s absolutely no evidence to suggest it does. It also can’t “worsen” autism because autism isn’t something that can get “worse” or “better”. A person with autism can develop and learn new skills and they can also regress (and diet can influence this, which I’ll go into further on), but an autistic person at a lower stage of development does not have “worse” autism than a person at a higher stage of development.

Poor diet can have an impact on autistic people in the same way as with neurotypical people. If we eat junk, we tend to feel like junk as a result, and when we feel like junk it can be harder to concentrate and carry out our usual day to day tasks. However, autistic people are also significantly more likely to suffer from digestive problems and food intolerances, and so for a lot of autistic people (or parents of autistic children) diet may be something that requires close attention. So saying that an autistic individual’s challenging behaviour could be a result of their diet isn’t necessarily untrue, but it does massively oversimplify the issue. The challenging behaviour is more likely a response to pain or discomfort, (as well as frustration if they are unable to communicate this), which is caused by a diet unsuitable for this specific individual, which is caused by an intolerance or digestive problem, which they were at greater risk of developing due to their autism. It’s worth mentioning that medical professionals still don’t know why this comorbidity exists.

So, referring back to Tom and Laura’s experience with their son, they were explaining that their son’s challenging behaviour spiked while he was on a high-sugar diet. Laura also added that he had been suffering from increasingly frequent infections in his ears and throat while eating these foods, which makes sense because high blood sugar levels can weaken the immune system and make us more susceptible to infections. They then explained that these infections stopped following a tonsillectomy and a change to a sugar-free diet, which then also lead to a complete reduction in their son’s challenging behaviours. Again, implying that the reduction in behaviours is a result of cutting out the sugar is oversimplifying. It’s most likely that their son’s challenging behaviours were a response to the pain the infections were causing, which may or may not have been linked to his sugar intake. Either way, autistic people are all individuals and so while a reduction in sugar intake has benefited their son, by no means does that mean that all autistic people should be following a low-sugar diet or that this would be beneficial for them.

This isn’t entirely on topic but there are two other things I want to address in terms of what Tom and Laura said while talking about their son, the first being when talking about their initial approach to their children's’ diet before they were aware that their son was autistic. Laura essentially said that she wanted their children to be able to try different foods and that the focus would be on education about health and diet rather than cutting “unhealthy” foods out of their diets completely, which I thought was a great way to approach things. However she then added that, had they known about their son’s autism at the time, they may have approached things differently, which I was confused about. I think (and hope) she was just trying to say that if they had known upfront that sugar particularly seemed to be detrimental to their son, they would have reduced that straight away rather than having to use a process of trial and error which makes sense, but just the way it was phrased set off alarm bells because it sounded like she was implying that they would have controlled his diet more strictly if they had known he was autistic. Hopefully this isn’t the case because autistic people don’t need to have their choices limited if there is no detriment to their health or wellbeing.

Another thing I was confused about, and I’m not sure if this was supposed to be more of a weird analogy rather than factual information, was when Tom started talking about “sensory glands” when talking about their son’s hypersensitivity to sounds. I think his exact words were something along the line of saying that the high sugar levels were causing his “sensory glands” to “swell” which was heightening his sensitivity. And like... unless I missed something there is no such thing as a sensory gland and they certainly don’t swell up when we’re over stimulated or when we have a lot of sugar. Sugar triggers high dopamine responses in our brains which then leads to cravings and can cause spikes and crashes in mood, and it can also cause inflammation, all of which can cause discomfort and in turn could lead to an increase in sensitivity, but as far as I know sugar doesn’t have a direct effect on our senses.

Now on to the elephant in the room and the two big, glaring no-no's in this podcast, both of which were said by Tom (these are not direct quotes because I didn’t get a chance to jot them down in time so I’m paraphrasing slightly):

“we cannot ignore the correlation between rising autism rates and the increase in fast food consumption” (spoiler alert: yes we can)

“I really want to get to the cause of autism and see if there’s something that can be done to prevent it”

So, first of all, autism isn’t something that needs to be prevented. Autistic people are not a detriment to society. We don’t have an illness, we just experience the world differently and, in some cases, require additional support to live our lives as fully as possible. Obviously it can’t be ruled out that fast food, or anything else, has a part to play in rising rates, but there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that it does and correlation absolutely does not equal causation. Gay representation in the media has also been steadily rising with rates of autism diagnosis. Does this mean that seeing gay people on TV makes people autistic? No. As Laura briefly mentioned, it is far more likely that the rising rates are actually due to an increase in understanding about autism and the accessibility of diagnosis, especially when you consider how many people are still slipping under the radar even with all the knowledge we have today.

I appreciate that most of this podcast is just a conversation between friends about various topics, but when the goal of this podcast is to “raise awareness”, and with the shared platform the people involved have, casual statements like these are incredibly dangerous. With the general implication that if everyone lived a healthy, clean, and organic lifestyle, we could reduce the number of autistic people in our society, this not only puts the “blame” on parents of autistic people, and on the individuals themselves, but is also dipping into eugenics territory. And while I don’t think the intentions behind either statement were malicious, they were incredibly ignorant, and the fact that they went completely unchallenged was concerning and made me pretty uncomfortable.

There were still a lot of positives in the podcast. I’m really glad Laura was also involved because she definitely came across as being the most educated on the subject of the four of them and did make a point of bringing up issues with diagnosis (particularly among girls with autism), her and Tom’s privilege in terms of being able to work with doctor’s to find out as much as possible about their son’s dietary needs and to then provide him with a tailored diet, and also addressing the issues with “high functioning vs low functioning” when Rob asked about the “severity” of their son’s autism. However there was still an undeniable amount of inaccurate or poorly presented information, as well as some things that were just plain incorrect and offensive. I appreciate that a lot of this was coming from personal experience rather than being generalised information, but I think this could have been communicated a lot more clearly and effectively considering the intention was to spread awareness, and the episode would have massively benefitted from the input of an autistic adult. Rob specifically had a lot of questions about autism in general and I think they would have been much better answered by somebody with autism, rather than a parent giving an outside perspective of their child’s experiences. It’s always a little uncomfortable to watch four neurotypical people discuss autism, regardless of how positive their intentions are, and I don’t think it would have been a great challenge for them to find an autistic person who would have been willing to talk about the topic with them.

#YES it took me two hours to write this NO I won't elaborate #tom hopper #robert sheehan #the earth locker

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icannotreadcursive · 3 years

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Sometimes, people have different--very different--sets of headcanons and sets of ships etc for a given piece of media and cast of characters because they have basically different understandings of who those characters are.

A lot of times, that’s just because every fan as their own unique life experience to apply when engaging with and interpreting a work, so they see different things reflected back.

But when it comes to what I call Legacy Characters--characters that have had their story told and retold, adapted and readapted, reinvested and reset time and again; such as comic book characters--a huge part of who a fan understands a character to be is determined by what versions of that character they’re familiar with, what aspects of different versions have coalesced in their brain to form their sense of that character in general. Usually, the biggest influence there is which version of a character that fan encountered first.

I see both knock-down drag-out fights and casual disrespectful disparaging comments within some fandoms--especially big comics fandoms like Marvel--that on the surface of them are more of the typical dumb “my interpretation is the only right one and anyone who disagrees is wrong and Doesn’t Understand The Media” stuff, but that I am SO SURE mostly boils down to this issue of having very different but all equally legitimate senses of the characters from having familiarity with different appearances of the character, or in a different order.

For instance--using what I find to be the most glaring case as an example--the Marvel shipping wars amongst Steve/Bucky, Steve/Tony, Sam/Steve, Bucky/Natasha, and (increasingly) Sam/Bucky shippers. Sometimes the Pepper/Tony, Pepper/Natasha, and Bruce/Tony shippers join the fray.

These conflicts get so nasty. Even a lot of the more chill shippers, when prompted, have very ugly things to say about ships other than their own and the people who support them. Allegations of racism, misogyny, fetishization, and general toxicity run rampant and are often talked about as though they are the only possible reasons someone could ever have for shipping or not shipping a given pair.

I want to make it clear that I personally do ship or have shipped several of the above, including ones that mutually exclude each other. There’s a few I’m neutral on up there, and one that kinda squicks me--we’ll get to that later.

Every single one of them is a perfectly good ship. None of them are inherently fucked up in any way and I will not hear any argument to the contrary.

Do some supporters of these ships get overzealous and obnoxious? Yes, that’s kinda why we’re talking about it, but that’s not a problem with any of the ships themselves.

I’ve noticed some patterns around people being into particular ones of these ships and their personal histories with various Marvel media.

Steve/Tony: mostly comics fans at this point, either were into the comics before the MCU became a thing or the early days of the MCU got them into the comics and they’re now more into the comics than the films. Because there’s a LOT of material in the comics to support the ship! There’s so much! Including the fact that in one comics reality where Tony is a woman, she and Steve get married!

Now, there was a ton of this’ere Stony fic that got churned out in the early days of the MCU, a lot of it from fans getting into this world for the first time through the phase 1 movies, at which point other potential partners for these guys either hadn’t been introduced as characters yet, or hadn’t been fleshed out. A lot of film-main (as opposed to comics-main) Stony shippers moved away from the pairing as the MCU continued, Bucky became the counterpoint of Steve’s Character arc, Sam got brought in, Pepper and Bruce each got more screen time, and the dynamic between Steve and Tony in the films got increasingly adversarial in a way that’s less sexy more fucked up.

The battle cry against Stony from other factions, especially from the Steve/Bucky camp is usually “but they’re so toxic!” and, I mean, yeah--if your sense of these characters is primarily based on how they are in the MCU, they are. But in my experience, even if they’re working MCU events and settings, the Steve and Tony being imagined by Stony shippers aren’t really that Steve and Tony.

Steve/Bucky: look, Stucky is an MCU thing. Articles have been written and published about the fact that the dynamic between Steve and Bucky in the MCU follows the beats of an epic romance to a T. The basis for this ship is all there on screen--throw in a little bit of history nerd mojo and you’re in deep.

By my observation and estimation, most new or formerly-very-casual Marvel fans who came in via the films and remained film-mains, and who are inclined to not-strictly-heteronormative shipping at all went the Stucky route. Folks who initially shipped Stony then switched to Stucky are pretty common. People starting with Stucky and then switching to any other ship with Steve to the exclusion of Stucky? Very rare. And while for a lot of people Stucky is their OTP in the strictest sense, I do see a lot of Stucky shippers who are here for other ships as well, either in an alternate realities kinda way or an amicable exes/polyamory kinda way.

The only people I’ve seen who have a problem with Stucky as a ship (other than “my ship is a different ship, therefore this one is bad and wrong”) are comics-mains whose sense of Steve and Bucky is heavily informed by runs of the comics in which Bucky is significantly younger than Steve and kid sidekick type figure. For them, the dynamic between the general forms of these characters leans mentor/student or protector/charge, so the inclination is to read the MCU relationship as fraternal, because it being romantic is squicky based on their sense of the characters.

Sam/Steve: comics-mains, film-mains with significant comics familiarity, film-mains who just aren’t into Stucky for one reason or another, or film-mains who are just really into Anthony Mackey which is a perfectly valid reason to get behind a ship. People who know Falcon from the comics seem much more likely to be into this ship and also more invested in this ship. I’m not qualified to say much about support for this ship from the comics themselves because my personal familiarity with Marvel comics doesn’t include much of Sam Wilson at all, but I am absolutely qualified to say there’s support from the films, especially CA:WS.

The worst vitriol against this ship tends to come from overzealous Stucky OTP shippers who really need to remember that fandom is supposed to be fun, and flat out racists. That must be acknowledged and needs to be addressed. Fandom racism in general, and against Sam in particular is a thing and it can absolutely be a factor in shipping.

However it’s not inherently racist to just not ship Sam/Steve because you see them as bros, or because Stucky is your OTP, or because you ship Sam with someone else, or whatever. Worthwhile to take a minute to examine why you don’t ship it, if you don’t, and check that for racial bias in how you view and treat Sam as a character, especially if you’re white.

Sam/Steve and Stucky are the two ships I see coexist the most! A lot of people ship both of them separately and exclusive from one another, but a lot of people also go ether the OT3 or the “Steve and Sam were definitely a thing for while there but now they’re not” route.

Bucky/Natasha: comics-mains or film-mains with significant comics familiarity, particularly for the comics worlds in which Bucky and Natasha are a couple, which seems self explanatory as to why that correlates. Not a lot for it in the films, Nat and Buck don’t interact much in the films that we see, and they’re kinda trying to kill each other in much of what we do see. But, like I said, they’re a thing in some of the comics so there we have that.

This is the one that squicks me. Clearly it’s a super valid ship; depending on the canon it’s a canon ship. Frankly, they make sense together, canon or not--their individual backgrounds as spysassins and with brainwashing etc means they’d be able to understand one another in ways no one else around them really can. But my personal amalgamation of these characters from the films and what comics I’m familiar with has Bucky having been Natasha’s teacher when she was a kid in Red Room. So I cannot ship it, I can’t do it.

The fact that I personally am squeaked by it has absolutely no impact on the fact that it’s a good ship, and the fact that it’s a good ship cannot and does not negate the fact that it squicks me.

Bucky/Sam: okay, there’s not a lot of this out there yet, but what there is seems to mostly be coming from film-mains who either don’t ship or co-ship Stucky and/or Sam/Steve, and who really liked the dynamic between these two in Civil War, and I guarantee you we’re about to get so much more of this ship with Falcon and Winter Soldier premiering. I’ve already seen some hate directed at this ship from the same places Sam/Steve gets hate. I predict, though, that this one will also get co-shipped alongside Stucky by the less strictly OTP of those shippers and I’m curious to see what the dynamic ends up being between Bucky/Sam shippers and Sam/Steve shippers as this camp grows.

In conclusion, I guess, note that not shipping a ship doesn’t have to mean attacking that ship (and it shouldn’tI) and not liking a ship, even being deeply uncomfortable with a ship for your own reasons doesn’t mean that ship is bad. We’ve all got our own individual sets of experiences both in life and with the characters in our fandoms that can dramatically change how we see those characters and their relationships to one another. This gets especially complicated and diverse with Legacy Characters like those from sprawling long-running comics multiverses. Someone’s understanding and interpretation being different from yours does not make either of you wrong!

As long as no one is an asshole about it it, it’s actually really interesting and cool to compare interpretations and see how your understandings overlap and differ, to think about what bits of canon have been formative for you and what personal experience may have made you inclined to interpret certain things certain ways.

Fandom is supposed to be fun. Shipping is supposed to be fun. You can and should hype up and express love for your own ships without tearing down others.

#long post #meta #fandom etiquette #marvel #shipping #stucky #stony #sam/steve #bucky/nat #bucky/sam #squick is a useful word #don't be an asshole

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rpgmgames · 4 years

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April’s Featured Game: Nobody's Home

DEVELOPER(S): oates ENGINE: RPG Maker MV GENRE: Survival Horror SUMMARY: After a night of extreme drinking and partying, you wake up in stranger's bed to discover... Nobody's Home.

Buy the game here! Our Interview With The Dev Team Below The Cut!

Introduce yourself! *oates: Hi, this is oates! I'm a pixel artist and game developer, I've started making games with rpgmaker in 2016 with VX Ace and now currently using MV for recent projects. Previous projects I've worked on were the FNaF-inspired Souls-like One Night at the Steeze, my first rpgmaker game and it's prequel, the FNaF-inspired roguelike No Delivery. Other games I've worked on include the fangames Day Dreaming Derpy, made in VX Ace and Spike's Day Off, made in MV and the latest in a series of previous fangames previously developed on Adobe Flash.

What is your project about? What inspired you to create this game initially? *oates: Nobody's Home is largely based on my experiments to find and apply horrific elements in modern situations or phenomena. The scenario being explored here in Nobody's Home is the aftermath of some crazy party. Sound design is especially important when crafting a horror scenario, so I often look to music to draw inspiration. Much of the atmosphere and house design was inspired by music and imagery associated with '70s yacht rock (a sub-genre of soft rock). Another important note is a lot of the general mood and 'weirdness' was inspired by a band I listen a lot to, Dance Gavin Dance, specifically their "deathstar" album. However they have a tendency in all their albums to switch genres mid-song, often going from their post-hardcore sound to funk, pop, and even rap; aside from that, some of the subject matter covered can range from disturbing to unpleasant to nonsensical, but combined with the amazing music, it creates an experience that pulls the listener in all different directions. It got to the point that I was naming events in the game after some their tracks so I had to be careful not to inadvertently make a fangame haha But there are some easter eggs in Nobody's Home that were intentionally left in, and I'm fairly certain players have identified it already.

How long did you work on your project? *oates: I used much of the same framework left over from my previous project No Delivery for this development cycle, so the hassle for setting up asset pipelines was very much mitigated. I started in earnest, making assets back in January this year so it took roughly 2+ months to finish development for this project.

Did any other games or media influence aspects of your project? *oates: Aside from the previous music inspirations, I was really intrigued with the way Resident Evil 7's Beginning Hour demo was able to pick up where Konami's cancelled PT left off in terms of survival horror games to look forward to back in 2017. Prior to later updates, the initial demo really only included a few set pieces, basic item interaction, and almost no puzzles from the full game. It was largely able to pull off scaring players from almost atmosphere alone (if you exclude the Jack Baker and ghost encounters). It was later in the full game that it was able to show off it's metroidvania-esque design to its fullest. After my previous project, I wanted to step away from roguelike design for a bit and focus a little more on an exploration-based experience, so I took a few notes from the way RE7 and RE2: Remake handled map design and progression.

Did you come across any challenges during development? How did you overcome or work around them? *oates: I was coming off a severe cold last year and it took most of January for me to recover, so it was a little hard to start full-on development immediately like I normally would on top of other career matters. And looking at events today, it's even more imperative that developers practice healthy habits during development.

Did any aspects of your project change over time? How does your current project differ from your initial concept? *oates: I've had the idea for Nobody's Home as a concept for a while, but filling in those gaps with actual gameplay between centerpieces was a big variable. I went back and forth between the turn-based item combat from the previous project to cutting out combat entirely. While I didn't implement it, I also brainstormed a few concepts for overworld action and combat ala Zelda, but it seemed too complex given the time frame I set for myself. Eventually I settled on a middle ground between full combat and separate encounters, with "enemies" acting as essentially a toll gate. The rest of the game followed suit with various tolls and "mouse traps" for the player to trigger at their own behest. This wasn't necessarily the design I had in mind at first, but it helped to concisely fill a relatively small location with specifically "deadly" content.

What was your team like at the beginning? How did people join the team? If you don’t have a team, do you wish you had one or do you prefer working alone? *oates: I largely work solo for both development and art, but I do regularly work with a few musicians for an original soundtrack. I first started working with other composers for the fangame Day Dreaming Derpy, where after the initial demo was released, I received emails from a few musicians volunteering to contribute some tracks for the game. In all, the original soundtrack contained 9 tracks in total, with 3 tracks from each composer; each of them doing an amazing job and, in my opinion brought the project back then to a higher degree of quality. This was how I met some of the composers I still work with today and they all have some really great work! TheNGVirus @NGVirusNG1 Kaminakat @thekaminakat dRedder @HornyGremlin

What is the best part of developing a game? *oates: It's a toss up between the initial brainstorming/research and the first run-through when you have your desired maps linked together. For the brainstorming, it's pretty fun to learn about subject matter you want to do justice to as well as stretching your creative muscles for the first time in service to a certain concept. However this obviously wears off when you devote too much time to a particular concept, but it's still enjoyable nevertheless. For making that run-through, it doesn't necessarily mean to have all the events implemented, but to experience your game the way players will experience it for the first time does give a sense of completion/cohesion to what you, as a developer, are trying to accomplish. It essentially puts what you're working on into a different perspective for you.

Do you find yourself playing other RPG Maker games to see what you can do with the engine, or do you prefer to do your own thing? *oates: I do keep an eye out for what other rpgmaker projects are doing, and to see what others can do with the engine helps get the creative juices flowing; it's also fun to try to mentally reverse engineer how certain mechanics or effects were made. And it's always great to see fellow devs showcase what's possible with the engine.

Which character in your game do you relate to the most and why? (Alternatively: Who is your favorite character and why?) *oates: Nobody's Home has a relatively small cast of characters, whom you do interact with but never see, this is largely to done to create a sense of "un-relatability", but if I had to pick a character, it'd be "car guy", the guy you find stuck in the car. They have a good line, " ...there'd be a good reason for this, but there isn't..." Story of my life.

Looking back now, is there anything that regret/wish you had done differently? *oates: There were a few areas I would have liked to expand on or add, specifically- the attic + roof, the front lawn, behind the walls, and an entire second floor. Unfortunately that meant potentially adding more questlines and NPCs while the first set of questlines were pretty interwoven so it would have been way more complex, also again, given the time frame I set, it would have extended the development cycle way beyond what I had time for. But if I had implemented those extra areas, the game's length would also go way beyond the 30 min - 1 hr it takes to complete the game as it is now.

Do you plan to explore the game’s universe and characters further in subsequent projects, or leave it as-is? *oates: I'd like to do both really, each installment of the VCRPG line of games is definitely a stand-alone story, or an isolated incident, but I would love to explore the aftermath of the game's events and how the passage of time ravages and twists the story into urban legend. I like to treat places and environments like characters as well, capable of making memories, being misunderstood, preserved, destroyed, and ultimately capable of change.

What do you most look forward to upon finishing the game? *oates: Both the fan reaction and free time honestly speaking. Once the development cycle finishes and the game is published, your work isn't really finished as there's always a chance someone's feedback can apply to immediate changes or patches you can implement, even during the release period. Marketing is also another large step to take into consideration after release, this includes tweeting, sending keys for lets plays, etc. Watching playthroughs is also a really good way to collect data on what parts of your design fall through and what fail to land. But after all that is said and done, some free time really helps the brain recuperate.

Was there something you were afraid of concerning the development or the release of your game? *oates: Just whether or not I handled the game's subject matter tastefully. Like horror cinema, everything done is in service the the themes and message of the piece as a whole.

Do you have any advice for upcoming devs? *oates: The game engine is essentially a tool, and like any tool you can find plenty of creative ways to get the same result. And don't be afraid to research whatever it is you need help with, it also helps to be specific with what you want.

Question from last month's featured dev @moca-pz: If you can collaborate with any game developer in the world, who would it be? What would be their role(s) and what would be your role(s)? *oates: Game developer I'd like to work with: Hidetaka Miyazaki His role: Story Lead and Director My role: Drinking buddy Game we're working on: SciFi Souls

We mods would like to thank oates for agreeing to our interview! We believe that featuring the developer and their creative process is just as important as featuring the final product. Hopefully this Q&A segment has been an entertaining and insightful experience for everyone involved!

Remember to check out Nobody's Home if you haven’t already! See you next month!

- Mods Gold & Platinum

#rpg maker #nobody's home (game)#nobodys home #nobody's home #game #rpgmaker horror #pixel horror #horror game #indie game #gotm #game of the month #oates #gotm 2020 #2020 #april #april 2020

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thelittleredheadedmusician · 4 years

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I’ve been thinking a lot about political structures in children’s fantasy. I’m positive this ramble is just going to end in more questions than answers but I need to organize my thoughts.

So Oz has an obvious, if confusing, political structure. (I’ve only ever read The Wizard of Oz though I know Baum went into a lot more of Oz’s history in his others, that’s what I’m sticking with rn cause that’s also the base of the media most are familiar with.) So, when Dorothy lands in Oz she kills the Wicked Witch of the East and frees the Munchkins from her tyrannical(? We’re lead to believe) rule leaving the Munchkins free(? Or maybe under Glinda’s rule?). Regardless, Oz has a political structure & Dorothy’s actions directly upset it — as she goes on to kill the Wicked Witch of the West who was ruling over the Winkies — but we never see her involved in politics. If anything she’s a tool of Glinda and the Wizard, upsetting the current balance of power before heading back to Kansas and not getting involved in the political restructuring. (Look I know there’s other media that might include this & I know I’ve read some but I’m thinking of strictly L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz. Which is political to begin with since it’s an allegory for a silver backed dollar but I’m not talking American politics here.)

Then there’s Alice. Both Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass involve Alice directly dealing with, and often arguing, contradicting, and outright defying, royalty of both of the lands she finds herself in. While in Looking Glass Alice manages to become a queen she is still shown to not have any real political power or even anything to be queen over before waking up. Like Dorothy, Alice upsets the political landscape of the world she finds herself in without being able to restructure it. (Again, I’m not taking into consideration all the various adaptations and retellings.)

There’s probably something to be said about them both being girls and the eras in which the books were written or just the more overtly nonsensical or fantastical facets of both but still. Alice and Dorothy were both, undeniably, used as political pawns and then sent home.

The Chronicles of Narnia get to more of what I’m actually interested in. The Pevensie children show up, literally wage a war, and rid the country of a tyrannical dictator. Then by divine right of Aslan they’re made kings and queens. While it’s shown that there are other humans in the world, at this point the Telemarians don’t have any contact with the Narnians. So like, these kids first had to learn how to wage war (which I think might be the bigger takeaway here? That there’s a whole lot of child soldiers and political pawns going around.) and then they suddenly have to run a country? Granted it’s a magical one that seems to pretty much govern itself but like, these are kids! They don’t know what they’re doing! They got guidance in the war because they joined up with the resistance movement! Now suddenly the country’s at peace and very few people in it remember peacetime at this point so you’ve got a population that has to readjust to peace (and seasons) as well as four kids who are expected to run a country. I think the books said Mr. Tumnus and the Beavers ended up being advisors for them but like what do they know? What’re their qualifications? And I’m almost certain they got in contact with Telemar before they left the first time. So like how were they handling international relations in a world that wasn’t their own with people who knew this and while children? I just. I want to know how that worked, how it happened, how did these four kids — specifically SIBLINGS — actually manage to work out how to govern.

In Harry Potter there’s a mix between what happens with Dorothy, Harry is used as a pawn in a preexisting political structure with very little knowledge of his own, and the Pevensies, he and his family are thrust into the midst of a war and suddenly become child soldiers. But there’s less responsibility because at the end of the day the structure itself is largely unchanged, the Ministry being relinquished by the Death Eaters & Kingsley being elected Minister, and there are adults to pick up the pieces around them. Harry & co went through terrible, traumatic events and were forced to grow up too quickly, but they are given a reprieve and allowed to be kids again. Hermione goes back to Hogwarts even and completes school with Ginny and Luna. But we know that she also then goes on to work for the Ministry, and Harry becomes an Auror presumably right away and Neville eventually a professor at Hogwarts. You can’t say that these children, who by virtue of being war heroes, now have power and influence but don’t wield it. That they’re not included as members of the Order of the Phoenix or that Dumbledore’s Army doesn’t carry weight akin to a political party. Are we just expected to believe that the boy who felt played, betrayed, and controlled his whole life suddenly steps back and continues to allow someone else to make decisions now that he’s undoubtedly free to act on his own accord? Why would Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Neville, or Luna give up their newfound power either? It doesn’t make sense for any of these characters who have felt as though they have no control over their lives or the world around them to suddenly gain the ability to and yet not use it. I’m not saying they staged a coup or anything but they must have been included on discussions of what to do with the remaining Death Eaters and how to rebuild. They must have wanted to be included. So, what happened?

Now this one I’m less familiar with and there’s already been a lot of meta done but it’s the most similar to Narnia and definitely needs to be included. So, Avatar: The Last Airbender is very much along the same lines as Narnia and Harry Potter, child soldiers & taking over running a country that’s suddenly finds itself at peace. Though the Gaang has a whole lot more awareness of the broader ramifications of their actions. Kinda. Vaguely. Zuko is well aware that he’s a prince and that one day he’s expected to run a country and Aang knows he’s the avatar and the weight that carries. Sokka and Katara also have a sense of weight and Toph knows the weight her family name carries. But like, they don’t really expect that this is going to translate into politics. But by the end Zuko does have to run a country, granted with the help of ministers and advisors and we all know Iroh, but with Korra we know that the Gaang goes on to found a whole knew country. Just like the Pevensies you have these people who are literally or nearly siblings who suddenly find themselves world leaders and dealing with other political leaders. And how did that go over? How do you go from being best friends one minute to hashing out tarriffs the next? And while all under the age of 30?

Now Percy Jackson and the Olympians is the only one I can think of (without venturing too far into YA lit) that actually sees the main character wielding hard won power. (And I do mean only the first five books.) Percy is definitively a pawn and when the war is over he actively asks the gods to restructure power by claiming their kids. It’s nowhere near the extremes that Luke wanted or control that Kronos did but Percy sees the validity that Luke had and uses the fact that the gods owe him big time to have some sort of change enacted.

I don’t know what exactly but there’s something here about children, power, politics, war, and how children who go through war together and form bonds and are in each other’s pockets by choice, necessity, and blood go about being allowed to stop growing up so fast while also being expected to govern to actually governing and shaping politics. And if children as political pawns and soldiers and “saviors” is such a reoccurring theme, why isn’t them wielding their newfound power and influence to govern? To restructure the worlds they saved?

#meta #harry potter #atla #percy jackson #chronicles of narnia #wizard of oz #alice in wonderland #to narnia!#wonderland #look i've been thinking A Lot about this the past couple days #idk what this is but it's something

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akari-hope · 3 years

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So I’ve heard differing arguments relating to it, ranging from “Well, if we shun content created by this person and/or everyone who’s done anything problematic, that’s a slippery slope that’ll lead to us being unable to enjoy anything” to “It doesn’t matter if you can separate the author from their creation to an extent, there’s ultimately other content to be consumed, & shunning the work of the problematic author in order to deny them or their progeny traffic is more important than salvaging

2/4 said author’s work.” Pablo Neruda, Yukio Mishima, & JK Rowling are authors that come to mind in these discussions. (For example, I’ve seen several SPOP edits ft. Pablo Neruda’s love poetry, & when his problematic history was explained to one creator, they cited death of the author.) Another argument against the concept, or rather, against how the concept is often applied, that I see is that people cite it in order to uncritically consume whatever they want.

3/4 Yet others say that people who say this often take the concept too far, to the point where no one can enjoy anything, ever, unless they’re obsessively analyzing every last detail of something for potential problematic tropes or other problematic content. I just don’t know where I fall, because I both agree and disagree with various parts of these stances, but see how all could be taken too far and used poorly, if that’s a sensible way of wording it. But I don’t know what dictates “too

4/4 far”, so I’ve never voiced a definitive opinion on the matter. I hope this makes sense, it’s a bit more jumbled than I had intended.

total sense!

death of the author is such an interesting concept, purely bc how it was MEANT to be used and how it has come to be used are so different. for transparency, death of the author is a lens of examining a piece of work which states that the author’s original intent does not matter, that the metatextual elements of a work do not have any bearing on what is actually present in the text.

to use an example, fans of spop will likely know that adora and catra are at least somewhat inspired by noelle stevenson’s own relationship. since we know this, we can see this in the text. the more you know about noelle and molly, the more you can see what parts of their relationship influenced those characters. we don’t have to guess that catradora is meant to be viewed in a positive light - we’re told by the showrunner itself it should be. if we were to apply death of the author, though, we would ignore this. it is not written explicitly in the text, and is therefore metatextual. we can still come to the same conclusion based on information within the show itself, but we would not use that “word of god” type of information.

and you can do this with basically anything. an artist said their song is about romantic love, but you see it as platonic love? claim death of the author! once it’s out in the world, it’s up to the audience to decide what a piece means.

now, here’s where it gets tricky: you can’t just ignore bigotry in a piece, even if you are applying death of the author. let’s look at hp lovecraft for this one. anyone with even passing knowledge of lovecraftian horror will know that the main element of it is fear of the unknown. sure, there’s many ways you can interpret that within the text! but fact of the matter is that lovecraft was a horrible xenophobic racist. and knowing that, it becomes very hard to separate the “fear of the unknown” in lovecraft’s work from real world xenophobia. you can still claim that within the text you interpret it differently, sure. but you can’t go so far as to pretend the intent isn’t there. the author’s interpretation doesn’t have to be yours, but it’s impossible to separate the author’s worldview from the text - it’s baked in.

okay, so, interpret however you want, but acknowledge prejudice. easy enough. until we get to the elephant in the room, joanne rowling herself. now, we know she has horrible ideas baked into her text. but that doesn’t necessarily mean we throw it all away, right? after all, people still love lovecraft’s work, and he was horrible. there’s an entire horror genre coined after the man. if we don’t throw lovecraft away, why throw joanne away? and the big difference there is that...joanne is alive. and wealthy. with friends in high places. and a large public following. even when he was alive, lovecraft didn’t exactly have millions of followers on twitter. pablo neruda and yukio mishima were not good people, but again, also dead and not with the same level of power. meanwhile joanne is actively using her wealth and following to influence british lawmakers.

and here’s where people lose death of the author. bc yes, you can still examine harry potter however you want. you can still say the books were an influence or that they meant something to you. but you cannot use “death of the author” to substitute an answer to a moral dilemma. and the moral dilemma is simply that supporting joanne, be it by word of mouth or monetarily, is supporting her ability to spread transphobia. this is why we see a more active push than usual to stop consuming hp and related rowling works. the driving force is not just “thing bad”, but the active harm joanne is causing to trans people in the uk.

so, what does that all mean? basically, use death of the author responsibly. you don’t have to toss out every single problematic work ever penned. if we did that, we wouldn’t have much left, and the foundations upon which modern media were built would be gone. but, you also can’t say that you don’t have to acknowledge biases and prejudice in media. bc you still do. there’s not a filmmaker in hollywood who can claim they’re not using some amount of technique pioneered by alfred hitchcock, but we also can’t pretend like “psycho” didn’t have transphobic undertones. it’s possible to both appreciate “psycho” for its importance to film history AND acknowledge those problematic elements without beating them to death.

basically, if you’re thinking of applying death of the author, you need to ask yourself two questions:

-am i using this to analyze the work, or am i trying to make myself feel better? -is my consumption of this work allowing the creator to cause harm?

if you’re trying to make yourself feel better, you don’t need death of the author; being aware of the problems within the work is sufficient. and if your answer to the second question is “yes”, that’s when you need to wonder if your consumption of said work is really more important than the harm you may be inadvertently causing.

bc it feels wrong to not include them, lindsay ellis has two wonderful videos on death of the author, which i will link to below (as well as a video on transphobia in pop culture, which i sort of touched on here, that helps give a better sense of how you can consume and even admire problematic media while acknowledging its flaws)

Death of the Author

Death of the Author 2: Rowling Boogaloo

Tracing the Roots of Pop Culture Transphobia

tldr: death of the author is a great tool to analyze media, but all too often gets used as an answer to a moral dilemma when that was never its intended purpose. you can invoke death of the author without ignoring problematic elements of a work, you don’t have to self-flagellate over said problematic elements, but be aware of if your consumption of a work causes active harm to people.

#anon #long post #i was going to include a section on work where the author is not problematic but the content is but then that felt not related lol #but my same thoughts more or less apply! okay to consume provided said consumption doesn't cause active harm.

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staircasttext · 3 years

Text

Ep 04 Transcript: Purr-fidy

Episode 4

[intro music]

PAZ: Hello everyone, welcome back to Stairway to Starclan, a Warriors Cat reread pawdcast. I'm Paz.

JULIAN: I'm Julian.

LIZ: I'm Liz.

PAZ: And we're back today to tackle some very action-filled chapters. And because the reading this week, we finally get to go to Moonstone and tangentially get some of that StarClan action, I thought we could all go to the official site where they let you ask the Moonpool a question. "Seek the wisdom of StarClan. Enter a question with a yes or no answer and let them guide your path." And I think we should give StarClan some questions.

JULIAN: Hell yeah.

PAZ: I wonder if they'll let you curse in this. Will warriorcats.com let you say fuck?

LIZ: Wait, wait.

JULIAN: There's a nice little shimmer when you click the Start.

LIZ: "This page is currently not supported on your platform."

JULIAN: Oh no.

LIZ: And I'm getting a little crying cat emoji.

JULIAN: What browser?

PAZ: I'm on Firefox too. It's working fine for me.

LIZ: You'll have to ask Moonpool questions for me.

PAZ: I'll ask you a question for you. Okay. I think the first pressing question is, are these cats gay? [typing] "StarClan lights your path with a yes."

LIZ: [gasps] Get a screencap. Oh my god.

JULIAN: Word of God.

PAZ: Word of God. You heard it here from StarClan. These cats are gay.

LIZ: You know it.

JULIAN: I have a question.

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: Will these cats be held accountable for their many crimes? "We have heard your call and answer in turn. StarClan sees a yes in your destiny."

PAZ: Oh.

JULIAN: All right, StarClan, get the tribunal together.

PAZ: Okay. These cats are going on trial for their war crimes. They're gay and they're going on trial. Liz, what's your question?

LIZ: Will warrior cats and kittypets ever reach an accord and maybe be friends?

PAZ: Okay, I'm asking. "The stars shine brightly in favor of yes."

JULIAN: Does this thing ever give you a no?

PAZ: I feel like StarClan might be a bit of a yes man.

JULIAN: I want to ask another question and see if we can get a no. Will it snow tomorrow? "The strength of Starclan is with you." It didn't tell me yes or no.

LIZ: Maybe it's like prophecy. You have to interpret it.

JULIAN: Oh, I see.

LIZ: Like do you need the strength because it'll snow.

JULIAN: Yeah, I think this may just never tell me no.

PAZ: Well, you know what? That means everything we say is right.

JULIAN: There you go.

LIZ: Can you ask it like, does my cat know that I love it? Yes. No. Not me personally because I don't have one.

PAZ: Okay, does my cat know that I love them? If it tells me yes-- "StarClan guides your question with a yes." I was about to say, if it tells me no, that'd be real sad. Well, I'm happy that everything I said now has the support of StarClan. So that was a fruitful visit to the Moonpool. And I think we can go into the summaries now.

LIZ: All right.

PAZ: Okay. So this week we read chapter 15 through 18. Chapter 15 follows Bluestar, Tigerclaw, and Firepaw into the cave as they travel to the Moonstone. It was pitch black and they all have to follow Bluestar by scent who knows the way. Firepaw notices that Tigerclaw seems very scared as they travel inside. When they actually reach the Moonstone, Tigerclaw gets so scared he runs out of the cave. Bluestar then sleeps by the Moonstone while Firepaw watches. When Bluestar wakes up she seems very worried and insists that they return to the ThunderClan camp immediately.

In chapter 16, the cats begin the journey back to camp. The three apprentices have a brief conversation and Graypaw notes that Ravenpaw seems very on edge whenever Tigerclaw is around. On the way back, the group meets a loner named Barley, who lives near a Twoleg farm. Barley warns them to go back a different way because the dogs from earlier are now loose in the field.

And Bluestar takes his advice and the different way leads them to be attacked by a bunch of rats. Everyone gets really battered, but Barley comes in to help them. Tigerclaw says Barley sent them into a trap, and Barley was like, No I did not. Then everyone realizes Bluestar is gravely injured, possibly dead, but she soon revives. Bluestar says she lost a life. When they finally began to move again, Tigerclaw very nonchalantly asks how many lives Bluestar has lost and she says this is her fifth.

In chapter 17, which is a hefty chapter, the cats finally arrive back to the ThunderClan camp, only to see it under attack by ShadowClan warriors as Bluestar saw in her vision. There is a huge cat battle happening in the camp, and everyone joins in. There are some action scenes, and then Firepaw is the shadow plan deputy kill an elder who is guarding the kits. Firepaw is unable to get there to rescue them because he's fighting another cat. And by the time he rushes to the nursery, the ShadowClan deputy is gone.

Yellowfang, who is inside, reveals that she fought him off to protect the kits. The battle soon dies down, and one of the queens publicly declares that Yellowfang saved the kits. Then Bluestar delivers the news that Lionheart, the ThunderClan deputy is dead. Graypaw is devastated. Firepaw realizes that the whole situation is exactly like a dream he had before. There are some scenes of various cuts morning and being looked at after the battle.

Bluestar then announces she has to declare a new deputy before moonhigh, and uh-oh, it's Tigerclaw. Next to Firepaw, Ravenpaw reacts in dismay and lets it slip that Tigerclaw took care of Redtail because he wanted to be deputy.

JULIAN: Duh-duh-duh.

PAZ: Chapter 18 opens with Tigerclaw overhearing the conversation and menacing Ravenpaw. Firepaw quickly salvages the situation by saying Ravenpaw was wishing Tigerclaw was there to take care of Lionheart as well. Ravenpaw refuses to speak to anyone after this interaction. Firepaw then goes to sleep and is woken up when Bluestar calls another meeting.

Tigerclaw speaks at the meeting, declaring that he has decided Bluestar must be guarded at all times by his lackeys, Darkstripe and Longtail. He says that no cat is allowed to approach Bluestar otherwise. Bluestar then asks Yellowfang to officially join ThunderClan, which Yellowfang accepts. Tigerclaw then insinuates that there is a traitor in the camp who must have fed ShadowClan information, and looks at Ravenpaw. Both Firepaw and Graypaw are worried for their friend.

Firepaw goes check on Yellowfang first, and they have a brief conversation about how Yellowfang misses the old ShadowClan, before Brokenstar became leader. She then tells him to roll around in garlic to help heal his rat bites. Firepaw tries to leave camp to get to the garlic patch, but Darkstripe refuses to let him out. So he sneaks out instead.

And on the way to the garlic, he overhears a conversation between Tigerclaw, Darkstripe, and Longtail. Tigerclaw lies to the two cats and says Ravenpaw left the group and must have gone to ShadowClan during the journey. He implies they need to kill Ravenpaw. The chapter ends with Firepaw racing back to camp in the hopes of convincing Bluestar of Tigerclaw's danger and Ravenpaw's innocence. And that ends that set of chapters.

JULIAN: Lot of intrigue.

PAZ: Yeah. We're getting to that murder plot mystery. Who could have seen this coming?

LIZ: Yeah, you know that Tigerclaw is so subtle. I never would have expected it.

PAZ: I'm shocked. I put down the book. I was so shocked. I also put down the book because that was the end of our reading.

JULIAN: I was trying to remember like, what my reaction was to this when I first read it as, you know, a fourth grader or whatever, but I could not remember. I think that I saw it coming. But I was still like upset.

PAZ: Yeah, because I read A New Prophecy first, I knew that Tigerclaw was evil like, because I mean, it's all in the past at that point. So I certainly was not surprised when I read the first book and the first book only.

LIZ: Well, I have never read these before. And you can definitely see it coming. And I think that's like good. Because it's like, yeah, this is your first big series as a kid. Author is laying down clues to lead to like a conclusion that makes sense, which is that Fire-- sorry, not Firepaw. Tigerclaw is a shady little bitch.

PAZ: Yeah, and I mean, I think there's nothing wrong with a mystery being obvious or predictable, especially not in kids media. Like, that whole shit with like Game of Thrones, where they changed the ending or whatever because someone predicted what would happen, and they were like... and it's like, that's just good storytelling if people can predict what's happening based on clues you've put in the text.

JULIAN: Congratulations, you've successfully deployed foreshadowing.

PAZ: Yeah, exactly.

JULIAN: I was into like Tigerclaw being like afraid of StarClan in the Moonstone. I thought that was neat. Some sort of like, yeah, he's shady. Also. The ancestors fucking hate him.

PAZ: Yeah. That was very funny and very like, evil cats go to hell. Good cats go to heaven. You can't enter our good vibes cave, you little piece of shit.

LIZ: Yeah, um, I would like to draw some comparisons between two great pieces of literature: the first Warrior Cats book and Hamlet.

PAZ: They're on the same level, I think.

LIZ: I mean, listen, there's the dude who commits a terrible secret murder and is shown to be super shady, and then he shows fear at the first mention of any sort of, like, mystic or religious kind of influence. Like, oh, I've sinned against StarClan. The parallels between Tigerclaw going into the cave and what's his name's, Hamlet's dad.

PAZ: Hamlet's dad?

JULIAN: Claudius?

LIZ: Hamlet's stepdad.

JULIAN: His uncle?

LIZ: Hamlet's uncle. I read Hamlet many times.

PAZ: C-something.

LIZ: Yeah. Claudius being like, praying because he did a bad murder and knows he's going to hell. It's the same thing. It's the same.

PAZ: It's the same.

LIZ: Can't believe Shakespeare totally just like cribbed the style from Warrior Cats.

PAZ: And Graypaw is Horatio. It's all there.

LIZ: He is Horatio, right down to the people shipping him with Firepaw.

PAZ: Yeah, exactly. Um, I mean, I guess I can kind of go in chronological order now that we've gone back to Moonstone cave.

JULIAN: I have an important question about Barley. But if we're still-- if we have more on the Moonstone.

PAZ: I guess the one other thing was like Alix's question from last week about Bluestar like planning this was on my mind, when she like, decides to take Firepaw into the cave. I wonder if she was like, hey, Starclan is this who you mean? If she was hoping to get some answers there?

JULIAN: Yeah, he did have like a prophetic dream. So that was cool.

PAZ: Yeah. But yeah, that's the only other thing I had to say about the cave chapter.

JULIAN: My Barley question was just um, does he got balls? What's his soul doing?

PAZ: That's a great question. I wonder if my Cats of the Clan book will give me insight. I don't have it on hand. Um.

JULIAN: Let me pull up the trusty wiki.

PAZ: I feel like barn cats in real life aren't often like neutered or spayed.

LIZ: I guess only if like people do a lot of catch and release, right? Like they do that.

PAZ: Yeah, which obviously they're not doing in the Warriors universe, or all these cats would be fucking snip snip.

JULIAN: [muffled shriek]

LIZ: That would be so terrifying as a warrior cat.

PAZ: I think warrior cats--

JULIAN: I found some very tasty information about Barley on the the wiki.

PAZ: I like Barley.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: So I couldn't find a way to see if maybe he had had any kits to see if that would tell us his ball status. No kits, um, is gay.

PAZ: What?

LIZ: Wait, what?

JULIAN: He's gay.

PAZ: Wow. Barley, gay king.

JULIAN: His partner is kind of a spoiler, I guess.

PAZ: Oh, I think I remember. I think I remember that.

JULIAN: Yeah.

LIZ: Wow, good for him.

PAZ: I didn't know they were officially partners.

JULIAN: Yeah, no, officially listed as a partner.

PAZ: Oh, fuck yes.

JULIAN: Barley's a gay.

PAZ: StarClan was right.

JULIAN: Gay ally and a gay.

LIZ: And Tigerclaw is homophobic. Of course.

JULIAN: You know what?

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: This whole story is about homophobia.

PAZ: Tigerclaw's like, that little fruit told us to come this way. He's betrayed us.

LIZ: Barley is a type of wheat, or grain.

JULIAN: And that's why Tigerclaw hates--

PAZ: Ravenpaw.

JULIAN: Right.

PAZ: My god, it's all coming together.

LIZ: I knew it.

PAZ: I do remember liking Barley because I think he shows back up in A New Prophecy because they, you know, go places. And he's like, chilling. And I was like, that's a cool cat. And now I know it's because I sensed a fellow in him.

LIZ: I just like his name a lot. That's a good name to have for a cat.

PAZ: It's a great barn cat name.

JULIAN: Oh, great news. Vicki believes that Barley will not go to StarClan when he dies as he lacks the necessary faith. No word about his balls, though. So he might still have them.

LIZ: He's an atheist.

PAZ: Does he go to that--

JULIAN: Kate however, believe that he'll live just on the outskirts of StarClan.

LIZ: Oh, there's some contention.

PAZ: What was that-- I was on the wiki looking at where like cats who don't go to StarClan and don't go to the Place of No Stars go. It was called like the something residence. Let me see if I pasted it.

LIZ: Just another neighborhood? Because that's what it sounds like. Yeah, it's like StarClan is like Los Angeles and the whatever residence is just the outer LA County.

PAZ: It's the ghost residence.

LIZ: Yeah, that's where I live.

JULIAN: Incredible.

PAZ: "The unnamed residence serves as a place for ghost cats, acting as a purgatory of sorts."

LIZ: That's still where I live.

PAZ: The ghost-- no, okay there's another residence. Unnamed residence. "This is a list of cats that currently reside or have resided in an unnamed residence. Cats in this category our cats that have died and been seen as spirits but do not reside in StarClan, The Place of No Stars, the Tribe of Endless Hunting, or as ghost cats."

JULIAN: I love that there are ghost cats.

PAZ: Me too. What?

LIZ: What?

PAZ: There's another gay cat in this place.

LIZ: Oh my god.

PAZ: The gay cat that Liz doesn't know about yet. Unnamed residence is the gay commune of Warriors.

LIZ: You know what, good for them.

JULIAN: Stray cats go to heaven. Gay cats go to unnamed ghost residence.

PAZ: The homophobic cats do go to hell.

LIZ: Confirmed.

JULIAN: Yes.

PAZ: Yeah. Um, well, yeah, I love Barley. Um, it does lead to an extremely funny scene of rats attacking these cats and like, absolutely wrecking them. Like, they killed Bluestar. I was like, what the hell are these rats?

JULIAN: Maybe the rat situation is like, you know, these are like concerted rats. These are like, a lot of rats working in concert for a shared goal, which is to beat the fuck out of the cats.

PAZ: Oh my god, okay.

JULIAN: Like rats will like kill a baby.

PAZ: Will they? What?

LIZ: Probably.

JULIAN: I'm actually basing this off of the plot of the dog movie? Lady and the Tramp, which may not be accurate, now that I think about it.

PAZ: I think maybe that might be inaccurate. Um.

LIZ: Well, I've got a very reliable source and it is Dishonored. And rats will totally eat a cat and a baby. Like all the way to the bones right in front of you. Definitely.

PAZ: "Cats or rats? Rats win in New York hands down." I'm clicking. I want to learn.

JULIAN: This is an educational podcast.

PAZ: This is like Goku vs. Darth Vader. Who will win?

LIZ: Why do we have to pit two queens against each other?

JULIAN: Yeah, this study says that cats are not good predators of rats. The rats actively avoid the cats and the cats only recorded two rat kills in 79 days. That's not a good record.

PAZ: Damn. These cats really need to step it up. Well I guess-- this doesn't say anything about the rats killing the cats. But it does say that cats suck at fighting rats, I guess.

JULIAN: Yeah, I guess that's why we have like terriers for rats.

PAZ: Yeah. This article says that people see fewer rats and assume it's behavior-- it's because the cats have killed them, whereas it's actually due to the rats changing their behavior so the rats will just like leave.

JULIAN: I mean, that's not-- that's like, fine.

PAZ: Yeah, it achieves the same result.

JULIAN: I don't mind if the rats live in the sewers. They're allowed. I don't go down there.

LIZ: This is their city.

PAZ: It is their city. Well, I still think it's very funny that all these rats fuck them up.

JULIAN: It is. it's very good. Bluestar loses a life.

PAZ: She loses a life to these rats.

LIZ: Yeah, just like in Dishonored.

PAZ: Should have just gone on with dogs.

JULIAN: God. I also like, if I were Bluestar, I would not have told Tigerclaw my life count.

PAZ: No. Once again, she's--

JULIAN: I realize that she's very trusting but like, you can't tell him you only have four left. He's counting.

PAZ: That was so suspicious.

LIZ: He's just gonna bring some more rats.

PAZ: Like who is like, hey, like, how like-- what are your weaknesses? Can you tell me them? Can you make a list of them? Not for suspicious reasons. Thanks.

JULIAN: Yeah, deeply sus.

PAZ: Yes. I do also gotta shout out Barley for saving them and being the only one who knows how to kill rats apparently. He jumps in and fucking owns these rats.

LIZ: Yeah, he has--

JULIAN: He does a great job.

LIZ: --the rat eating term?

PAZ: In Dishonored? Yeah.

LIZ: He gets HP from it. Crunch.

PAZ: Oh, I looked down at my notes. I did indeed write "died to rats, dot dot dot... just like Dishonored."

LIZ: It's like in the same brain here. Okay, hold on, speaking of Barley, I googled him and there's on his Facebook page or something, there's just a picture of a regular black and white cat.

PAZ: Oh my gosh. That's his face cast.

LIZ: I love it.

JULIAN: That's him.

LIZ: Perfect part nose.

JULIAN: Are Barley and Chloe related?

PAZ: We have no choice but to stan Barley.

JULIAN: And they have this like horrible, brutal rat fight. And then they go straight to like, fucking horrible, brutal ShadowClan fight.

PAZ: I know.

JULIAN: It's just, it's out of the frying pan that's full of rats into the fire full of cats.

PAZ: That's what they always say.

JULIAN: That's how the saying goes.

PAZ: Yeah, shout out to the action sequences. They are fun. But--

JULIAN: They are fun. They're good to read.

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: Yeah, so the next next bit is the fight at ThunderClan cat camp. And it's kind of a bloodbath, huh.

JULIAN: Is it time to talk about war crimes?

PAZ: War crimes and murder. Uh-huh.

JULIAN: Yeah. Like, they go after the kits.

PAZ: Yeah. Julian, I did think about you saying, like, are they stealing the kits, which I still don't remember, cause it was described as Blackfoot, the ShadowClan deputy was like picking them up. I was like, oh, is he gonna whisk them away? But I don't know. We never find out.

We never find out.

LIZ: Also, that's an unfortunate name for a cat to have.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: Yeah, that is-- that already belongs to something. And you should not be using it.

JULIAN: Yeah...

PAZ: British authors not doing their research, I guess. Or...

LIZ: Yeah. Hey, there's eight of you. I know you're all very old, but come on.

JULIAN: Also, I feel like you know, Harper Collins is... I'm sure they have a UK imprint. But like there are also editors in the US. Surely someone should have, uh.

LIZ: Someone out there must know what Google is.

PAZ: Yeah. Hopefully that character dies soon. We don't have to see the name anymore.

LIZ: They use that name so much in this chapter.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: But yeah, back to the kittens, right?

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: Yep.

PAZ: A cat does just die also. He kills one of the old cats, cold blood.

JULIAN: Yeah, I'm looking at the Wikipedia page for war crimes.

LIZ: Like in general?

PAZ: Yeah? Do you have a list? Do you have a list of what constitutes a war crime?

JULIAN: Well, so there's a lot of them. But intentionally killing civilians or prisoners is definitely one of them. So I think killing an elder kind of counts.

PAZ: Check that off.

JULIAN: Yep. Destroying civilian property. They did destroy the camp. So that's one. They did not take any hostages. So that doesn't count. I don't know what performing a perfidy is.

PAZ: Me neither.

JULIAN: Oh, it's when you like, lie about... Basically, you're like, oh, I'll make a peace treaty and then you don't.

LIZ: So is that spelled--

PAZ: Mm, I don't think they did that.

JULIAN: P-e-r-f-i-d-y. Perfidy.

LIZ: Not p-u-r-r-f-i-d-y?

JULIAN: [cackles] Damn. We don't see any child soldiers onscreen. At least I don't think so.

PAZ: Are the apprentices child soldiers, though?

JULIAN: Are the apprentices here?

PAZ: They're not...

JULIAN: How old are they?

PAZ: The book says apprentices are more than six moons old.

JULIAN: I mean, you're basically an adult cat.

PAZ: So most of them are probably under a year. Yeah, I guess they're like adolescent, I don't know. Yeah.

LIZ: Teen?

JULIAN: Like, it's not great, but.

PAZ: Yeah, they get away. They get away with that. Not a war crime.

JULIAN: Pillaging? Oh, looting. Um, I mean, they don't take anything. So I don't think they pillage.

LIZ: No. There's not really anything to take this except like food and maybe medicine. There's not a lot of like, property.

PAZ: Yeah, unless they take those kits.

LIZ: Well, that's a person.

JULIAN: Well, that would be-- that would be taking a hostage.

PAZ: Okay, yeah.

JULIAN: Declaring that no quarter will be given, which they did at the gathering. So that was sort of a pre-war war crime.

PAZ: Really talented.

JULIAN: And then it just says "seriously violating the principles of distinction, proportionality, and military necessity." And I don't know what the fuck that means, but I think we can check it off.

PAZ: Yeah, I think they do that.

LIZ: It's quite a count already.

JULIAN: Yeah, they're not doing great.

LIZ: No.

PAZ: Yeah, this book also absolutely does not shy away from like death.

LIZ: Nuh-uh.

PAZ: Like on screen death too.

JULIAN: Onscreen death. Like very brutal onscreen death of like the elderly.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Right off the jump.

PAZ: Yeah, it's like, very soon after the chapter starts.

LIZ: Yeah, and the part where that one cat is trying to get at the the kits. That's very distressing. Like there is--

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Yeah.

LIZ: Like, whether it's for a hostage or just, you know, straight up child murder. There is definitely like the threat implied in a very effective way.

PAZ: Yeah, I mean, like, good job to the book for making like, a distressing battle scene. Like, because it did. It did. It was like, intense.

JULIAN: Yeah, yeah, I was watching a lot of Warrior Cats AMVs this afternoon. And a lot of the many great animators in the Warriors AMV community have really picked up on the style of the books, which is very bloody.

PAZ: Great, because that's important, essential aspect of the book. It's in the name.

JULIAN: Yep.

LIZ: Yeah, these are not peacetime cats.

JULIAN: No. These are... I am really glad that Yellowfang got to save the kits and redeem herself.

LIZ: Yay.

JULIAN: Good for her.

PAZ: She's so cool.

LIZ: She's the best.

JULIAN: She's so cool.

PAZ: Old, like badass lady. And then Bluestar is like, you're so cool, Yellowfang, haha, will you join my clan?

LIZ: What if we were both old lady cats and I asked you to join my clan? Haha, just kidding, unless.

PAZ: You should make an edit for that. Post to Twitter. I'm sad we don't get to see her fight on screen.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Yeah, I would have liked that.

LIZ: It's a good moment to have it. We're almost at the end of-- we're like at the last quarter of the book?

PAZ: We're very-- more than a quarter.

LIZ: I don't know, I switch between like--

PAZ: I think we're about like 70% done, 75% done.

JULIAN: Let me see. We're 69.3% done.

PAZ: Oh nice, nice.

LIZ: Nice, nice.

PAZ: I did write down, "all these cats are dying. Just go live inside, idiots." Which, I'm like reading these horrible battle scenes. And I'm like, if you were just kittypets, you wouldn't have to deal with any of this shit. No rats. No cat murder.

JULIAN: It's true. No one is gonna tear your throat out if you just live here.

LIZ: Just Temptations and cushions.

JULIAN: If you live in my house on the heated bed I bought.

PAZ: I was absolutely right about the Lionheart death flag.

LIZ: Uh-huh.

PAZ: Fucking typed it. I was like, wow, I called it.

LIZ: What was it that Graypaw said before they left, like I will always remember what you taught me.

PAZ: Yeah, it's like, exactly. I was like, this is a little...

JULIAN: Like, oh, good job, Graypaw. You doomed him.

LIZ: Just start--

PAZ: I wonder-- Oh, go ahead.

LIZ: No, just start saying shit like that every time you say bye to anyone. Like I will always [dissolving into laughter] remember you.

PAZ: Oh no.

JULIAN: You just never thank your mentor. That way he'll never die.

PAZ: Yeah, I do wonder if Tigerclaw-- I assume Tigerclaw murdered him as well. Or rather than it being a happy accident, but I don't know.

JULIAN: I also assume that. I don't think there's any way that, given Tigerclaw's significant looks at Ravenpaw, that Lionhart died of ShadowClan-related causes.

PAZ: Well, I assume that significant looks are just still like Redtail-related like, don't give out my secret, but it would really suck for Tavenpaw if he had to watch this, like, shitty guy kill another person.

JULIAN: He has so many traumas.

PAZ: Poor Ravenpaw.

LIZ: Ravenpaw's just Hamlet but like without any... He's not angry. He's just sad.

JULIAN: Well, he's like, he's Hamlet. But he also like he doesn't have any of the doubt.

LIZ: No.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: He just saw it happen.

PAZ: You know that video of the guy yelling at the cat in the store, like I'm gonna get you out of there? That's me with Ravenpaw.

LIZ: Ravenpaw, come into my house. [everyone laughing]

JULIAN: Yeah.

LIZ: Get a Temptations every other day. I think that's-- I don't know what's healthy to give cats. Like what's the rate of Temptations?

PAZ: Probably not too many.

JULIAN: I feel like you can get them like a treat a day.

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: One treat.

LIZ: You'll get a Temptations every day.

JULIAN: I don't know, though, cause last time we went to the vet, the vet said we had to feed Chickpea less, so my calibration may be off.

PAZ: Tigerclaw's really setting Ravenpaw up to take the fall.

LIZ: Mm-hmm.

PAZ: And I don't know why anyone would believe him because that's like a young adult. That's like a-- that's like if you were pointing at like a high school senior and being like, they committed these war crimes, not me.

LIZ: They killed the vice president and the other vice president.

PAZ: And now that I'm vice president, that means nothing. It was this teenager.

JULIAN: Well, it's also a teen that he's responsible for. Like if your apprentice grows up and becomes like a conniving little shit, isn't that partly your fault? Like, if you're so mean to your apprentice that he runs into the welcoming arms of ShadowClan, which he didn't, but like if he had.

PAZ: Yeah, I wouldn't blame him.

JULIAN: You know, I think I think it's a little bit on you.

PAZ: Yeah. Where is the accountability in like this mentorship program?

LIZ: He's not even--

JULIAN: The unpaid internship.

LIZ: Ravenpaw's not even that conn-- he's just like, terrified so he doesn't talk to anybody.

JULIAN: Yeah. But like, Tigerclaw is making him out to be this like, big sneaky, you know,basically being like, all these things that I did, this person that I am, that's Ravenpaw.

PAZ: The fact that he already has like lackeys, is like so much. Tigerclaw does. But it seems like he's like lying to them versus them knowing he's trying to do a weird takeover.

JULIAN: Yeah, I mean, I think Longtail at least, it was like, easily persuaded to to believe in like, this secret outside conspiracy because he was the one who attacked Firepaw at the beginning.

PAZ: Yeah. Didn't we read the other day that Longtail is Ravenpaw's like, sibling?

JULIAN: Oh, you're right.

LIZ: That sucks.

JULIAN: I think he's his half-sibling. That sucks.

LIZ: Aww, Ravenpaw.

PAZ: Man.

LIZ: He's getting like a really raw deal.

PAZ: He really is. If the book was from his perspective, it would be so sad.

LIZ: My sibling hates me enough to conspire against me. Or at least believe that I'm a terrible murderer.

JULIAN: Poor little guy.

LIZ: My mentor hates my guts and also is trying to frame me for murder.

PAZ: Yeah, and it takes Firepaw so long to figure out what's happening.

LIZ: Oh my god.

JULIAN: It has to be explicitly spelled out for him.

PAZ: Yeah, literally.

JULIAN: Like, he doesn't figure shit out.

PAZ: Yeah, Ravenpaw just says something and then he overhears it.

LIZ: Firepaw is so very dumb.

PAZ: It's so funny too, because Yellowfang has like a section where she's praising him for being clever. And I'm like, Yellowfang, he's so stupid. There's nothing going on upstairs.

LIZ: It's air. It's just fluff.

JULIAN: Is Firepaw a himbo? The greatest thread.

LIZ: Since we're talking about Ravenpaw too, the part where later on Bluestar asks him to go train with her alone, where no one's gonna bother them. And he's like, I should tell her about Ravenpaw and Tigerclaw. And he's like I should tell her. I should tell her, and he just forgets.

JULIAN: He was too overwhelmed by her girl boss, uh. Her girlboss nature.

LIZ: It's very overwhelming, true.

JULIAN: I do think like Tigerclaw appointing bodyguards to-- "bodyguards," quote unquote, to like, prevent anyone from ratting on him, was a very savvy move, even though it's like patently evil. It was smart.

PAZ: He's a decent conniving villain for a kids' book in which the protagonist is very stupid and doesn't realize what's going on.

LIZ: And just forgets key points.

PAZ: He has a little cat brain. How's he supposed to remember all that?

LIZ: His friend's gonna die! Okay, but yeah, the guard thing is like very smart. Feels really ominous too because like there's an extra layer of removal of Bluestar from like everyone else.

PAZ: Yeah, he's like already like, taking over like public power by, like putting her behind a wall, essentially.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Security theater baby.

PAZ: Yeah, there's also like another like thread of-- I mean, like the continuing thread of intrigue with like what happened with Yellowfang and ShadowClan because she kind of drops more like, oh, everything was fine till Brokenstar was leader. So that's also a mystery we have going on.

LIZ: Um, yeah, there's a cute section when she's talking about like what ShadowClan used to be like. And I think she and Firepaw are like joking about like, who replaced her as the medicine cat, and she's like, oh, not Runningnose.

PAZ: Yeah, like, he can't even cure his own cold. It's cute.

LIZ: Hey, maybe it's allergies. Don't be mean. Cats get allergies.

PAZ: Cats also get chronic infections.

LIZ: That's what Oliver has, right?

JULIAN: Especially if they live in the outdoors and won't visit the vet.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: Like, wow, a whole bunch of nonvaccinated, fighting cats on the brink of starvation all the time feel sick. No shit.

JULIAN: It's okay though. They have berries.

PAZ: Why are they doing that? Go inside.

JULIAN: I do have a-- when Darkstripe tells Firepaw that he can't go roll in the garlic, which is just really funny as a premise. But also, Firepaw like mutters under his breath, "Dirtstripe," which is such a teen thing to do.

PAZ: Got them.

LIZ: Owned, wow.

JULIAN: It's such like a shitty little teen move. It's really fun.

PAZ: It's very funny.

LIZ: You're not my real dad, Darkstripe. I will roll in the garlic if I want to. God.

PAZ: Do we think rolling in garlic has any medical backing, or?

LIZ: Smelly.

PAZ: Cause it's very funny.

LIZ: Smelly cat.

JULIAN: So garlic is-- like I don't know about the greens of it, but like garlic bulbs are antibacterial, like slightly.

PAZ: Oh, okay.

JULIAN: Which is why, like if you have a throat infection, sometimes like doing like a garlic rinse can be sort of helpful.

PAZ: Good to know.

JULIAN: Not a doctor, not a doctor. But yeah, I think that's where they're getting that.

LIZ: Just like the picture of like this. Like Firepaw at this point is like, not an adult but like the kind of teen cat that's all like gangly, I bet.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: And just picturing that like having a fun time in some garlic is so good to me.

PAZ: I do love it. [inaudible] a good picture of these little cats doing stuff.

LIZ: He's a garlic boy.

JULIAN: And then he overhears a conspiracy.

PAZ: Yeah, very very classic of the villains to just openly talk about their evil moves.

JULIAN: Well, they said no one could leave so I'm sure it'll be fine.

PAZ: Yeah. I mean, I don't-- I think, I mean that covers everything.

JULIAN: I have just, uh, "that'll go well" about him going to talk to Bluestar.

PAZ: Yeah, Firepaw, I think you might also get blamed.

LIZ: God.

JULIAN: Yeah, all is not well in the kingdom of ThunderClan.

PAZ: No.

LIZ: I'm still just a little like, aghast that he does, he just forgets. I know she's the most amazing girl boss you've ever seen. But oh my god.

PAZ: It's fine. He's--

JULIAN: He's just a stupid little boy.

LIZ: I know. He's orange too. He's a little orange cat, you know.

PAZ: Yeah, he's gonna go work on it now. It'll be fine.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Bless him.

PAZ: Should we move on?

LIZ: Yes.

PAZ: Maybe get some levity after the war crimes chapter.

LIZ: So we've returned to wikiHow, a wonderful font of knowledge and activity. And this article is called "How to host a Warrior Cats themed birthday party." Who's birthday is coming up in June so, a little...

PAZ: Mine's in August.

JULIAN: Mine's in July. Lotta summer babies here.

LIZ: Well, we got time to prep then.

JULIAN: Yeah.

PAZ: Yeah. I want to note that this was last updated June 20, 2020. There are 26 co-authors.

LIZ: Oh my god.

PAZ: And 42,000 views. So you know this is a good, good peer-reviewed article.

LIZ: Yeah, let me give you the blurb that will entice everyone in. "Do you sleep, dream, smell, and eat Warriors? Do you want to have a party sleepover for your birthday based on the books? Well, this guide to a snappy party is a great idea." It's also available to download as a PDF just so you know, in case you need it.

JULIAN: Oh good, so you can print it out.

PAZ: Yeah, and check it off.

LIZ: And you know, in the wikiHow to set up their beautiful, beautiful illustrations that-- I don't know, is it legal for us to post wikiHow images?

PAZ: I don't know.

JULIAN: Yeah, they're public domain.

PAZ: I mean, they're all traced, so really, how can they get on our case?

JULIAN: I'm really pretty sure they're Creative Commons. I think we're good.

LIZ: Yeah. Okay, so let's plan. "One, make sure your parents agree." So, let's go check.

[laughter]

PAZ: Uh....

JULIAN: Wait, I need to call my dad. Why does-- I just want to describe to our listeners, um, the parent in this image has the largest nose I have ever seen.

PAZ: You could land the plane on that.

JULIAN: It's like, you know the phrase, a ski jump nose. This is a ski jump.

LIZ: Because we're seeing the back of his head so it's the perspective, that's all. This is a front nose on--

JULIAN: It looks like a Hershey's Kiss is stuck on his face.

LIZ: This young man asking his parent for permission looks very smug, too, so I think he got a yes on that. "Step two, start planning early."

JULIAN: Oh, we're doing step two.

PAZ: Well, we are, because we're all summer birthdays.

LIZ: There's a picture of a person looking very determined, with a little three mouth. And that's because this is about cats. "Invite a couple of people to the party. See if they like the idea of having a Warrior Cats theme." Okay, well, I don't know whose birthday we're actually celebrating, so we're all invited in a circle.

JULIAN: There we go.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: You guys okay with the theme?

PAZ: I love it.

JULIAN: Yes.

LIZ: Wonderful, wonderful. Okay, we're getting to the meaty part of things. "Part two: decorations." Now to just give you a word picture of what's going on, there's a sort of cushion bench chair thing, covered in sticks and leaves. The floor is also covered in leaves. The wallpaper has grass on it. There are paw prints on the wallpaper and the floor. There is a separate panel of just a spider web, with a spider in it. And there's another panel of some-- seaweed?

PAZ: It's vines.

LIZ: Vines.

JULIAN: The green silk or fabric.

LIZ: Does anyone else want to have a have a stab at reading this? It's very good.

JULIAN: Sure. "First, decorate. Before your guests arrive, decorate your houses with posters, paw prints, and anything else that will complement the theme. If you have any party games, make sure you have anything you need for those games. Instead of decorating the whole room, make a fort and say it's the den, and fill the blanket draped chairs with the items suggested. To make it even more forest like, you could use camouflage blankets and cover them with sticks and leaves, if strong enough."

I'm not sure if that's the sticks, or the blanket. "Take out spider webs from Halloween and decorate a few corners with the spider webs. Cover doorways with green silk or fabric, and cut some of the fabric into slivers, making a vine-themed door entranceway."

LIZ: Finally a use for my green silk.

JULIAN: I'm just, if I were an adult and my kid is like, I want to have a Warriors-themed birthday party, I'd be like, Oh, sweet. That sounds fun. And then they brought a bunch of sticks and leaves into my house, I would not be thrilled.

PAZ: Yeah, it doesn't specify like fake sticks and leaves. I think it just means you're, like, go out into your garden.

LIZ: That's authentic to the books. You have to.

JULIAN: It is.

LIZ: This also sounds like something a kid would absolutely do.

PAZ: Absolutely.

JULIAN: Oh, step two. "Make each room a den." They have suggestions for each of the rooms. How many rooms do they think your house has, cause this is a lot. They have a kit's room with pillows and stuffed animals, and spiderwebs scrunched into soft play balls, which apparently is a thing that kits play with.

LIZ: Aw.

JULIAN: A warriors den, a leaders den for the largest, least occupied room. An apprentice den, "which can be made just like the warriors den, but larger, and less comfortable." [laughter]

"Make the medicine cat's den. Outside, in the kitchen, or by a window would be the best place, because there are plants you can use to heal. For the comfort of the person who volunteers to be the medicine cat, place down multiple blankets on top of one another, to get that carpet effect, just like inside. Use a brown or blue tarp to make a ceiling, and add cozy green spiderweb beds, and the best pillows you got. Offer spoons, forks, sticks, and ground-like bowls to be able to make the treatments. To ensure your medicine cat is comfy and not lonely, ask a friend to be the apprentice of the medicine cat." Yeah, it would suck to be the medicine cat.

PAZ: So is everyone separating into their room and not interacting? Is this how the birthday party goes?

JULIAN: They have instructions for making the High Rock, and a fresh kill pile. Um.

LIZ: We should--

JULIAN: And then we get to games.

LIZ: We should describe the fresh kill pile.

PAZ: It's very good.

JULIAN: Oh yeah, you're right, I'm sorry.

LIZ: It is a cardboard tree stump drawn pretty well and also shaded, and some green pillows surrounding it, and a bunch of stuffed animals. There is a panda, a teddy bear, a lion, some sort of pink horse thing, and a monkey. You know, regular parts of a cat diet.

PAZ: And the final step in the decoration part is, "decorate the forest, or, quote, 'forest'. Your outside or quote, 'forest' can be a room decorated with cardboard cutouts of trees, spiderwebs, and badger holes. Under furniture you can place a skunk, or borrowed stuffed animal, green moss, or a fake river." I think you should just use the actual forest.

JULIAN: Yeah.

LIZ: What if we don't have a forest? What if you live in, say, just shot in the dark here, LA County, where--

PAZ: Don't.

LIZ: Okay.

PAZ: Problem solved.

LIZ: Everyone's telling me that lately.

JULIAN: Just move.

LIZ: [claps] All right, part three.

JULIAN: Part three is games, which is really important.

LIZ: One for the gamers here.

PAZ: Okay, "step one, welcome each guest, maybe with a dip of your head or a whisper of 'Welcome to the home of the clans.'"

JULIAN: The next picture. [dissolving into shriek-laughter]

PAZ: The art for this is extremely good as well. So we have-- it's featuring that beautiful green silk vine curtain from before. And in front of it is a girl, in like-- doing that like butler pose, where it's like, come in, sir. Except she's wearing a black t-shirt, and nothing else except a black bow tie and a cat ears headband with cat face paint.

LIZ: She also has these um, these side bangs that are very like 2010-specific. Maybe earlier.

JULIAN: I was specifically losing my shit over the next picture, for "start with some roleplay."

LIZ: This is our new header image.

JULIAN: Which features some incredibly drawn visitors who have attended this party, all wearing all black, all wearing those same drawn on whiskers. There's some really interesting things happening with their faces. And the girl in the back is on all fours.

LIZ: She's doing it right.

JULIAN: She is, she's--

PAZ: Dedicated to her role.

JULIAN: "Once everyone has arrived, why not pretend to be warrior cats?"

Why not?

"Everyone could be one RP character-- roleplay-- and one real warrior. If you have the time, you could make name badges." So you have the time to spray paint spider webs green to make moss, but you couldn't make name badges? So everyone can remember who Pinestar is?

PAZ: You hit the deadline.

LIZ: Is that a soap? It sounds like soap.

PAZ: It really does. Moving on to step three of games, "have a hunting party. People can hide stuffed animals while others try to find a stuffed animal with a number they were assigned to written on a card around their neck."

JULIAN: I like the next one a lot.

PAZ: Yeah, we can just move on to four.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Sorry, the art for number three for having a hunting party is very good. It's a child with a cat hat, just really smirking.

LIZ: At a little giraffe stuffed animal.

JULIAN: But game number four, "have a twisted version of egg toss."

PAZ: Welcome to my twisted mind.

JULIAN: "Have everyone pair up and give each pair a spoon. Fill water balloons up with dyed water." Nothing to do with cats.

PAZ: That's so twisted.

LIZ: What's the catness?

PAZ: Uh, you know. Self-explanatory.

JULIAN: You know, cats.

PAZ: Number five, "come up with a collect a resource game. In this game, each den will be removed of its items and hidden among the forest. Teams assigned to each den must collect the items and amount wanted. Give them a checklist to cross off items safely brought back to the den. The first to bring back and arrange the interior like before everything was pooled will get prized with an extra piece of fresh kill and a new piece of bedding from leftover pieces not collected."

LIZ: The image for this is--

JULIAN: My favorite part of a birthday party, resource management.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: Can we--

JULIAN: Sorry Liz, please describe the image.

LIZ: Yeah, it is a picture of four people. There is a just a camping tent and two of the black jumpsuited cat headband ear wearing people are sneaking into it, while two other people in just shorts and shirts, holding a giant caterpillar and different colored hats of of cat like description are walking away totally unaware. I think this is a war crime. This is looting, I think.

JULIAN: Oh, you're right, this is looting. This is pillaging.

LIZ: War crime. Number five, commit some war crimes.

PAZ: Yeah. Gotta be accurate. Number six, "play pin the tail on the warrior. Select a cat from one of the books and make a large cardboard cutout of this cat, and make its tail separately. Put a pin or tack on it to make it stick to the back of the cat." Now which cat do we want to do this to?

LIZ: Longtail. Obviously.

PAZ: Haha, No-tail. [laughter] Got 'em.

JULIAN: How long until Firestar-- sorry, Firepaw does that?

LIZ: In the heat of battle, haha, No-tail.

PAZ: Number seven, "do some more evening activities. Once you've eaten, maybe you could play some Warrior Cat games with your friends on the Internet. In the evening, have a mini battle– doesn't have to last long– and then a gathering, if your party is on a full moon. Lucky you. Otherwise, make an exception just for the party." Well, there are many Warrior Cats games to play with your friends on the internet. So great suggestion.

LIZ: Start a podcast. That's a game, basically.

JULIAN: There you go. That's a game. That's a game that keeps on giving.

PAZ: Number eight, "sleep over, if that's part of the plan. Not all birthday parties need to be sleepovers, but they can be lots of fun. In the morning, depending on the time you wake up, you could play some party games or read books and have breakfast." This does picture people sleeping outside in a tent. Should we move on to part four?

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Yes.

PAZ: Food.

LIZ: Okay, so step one of food is "make dinner Warrior Cats themed too. When it's time for dinner, call it fresh kill instead, and ask everyone what they would like. Obviously don't really serve mice at the table. Think of something everyone would enjoy, maybe something fresh, like a pizza you can have delivered to your house." So, this is the--

PAZ: Same thing.

LIZ: The image is the previous fresh kill image from before, with all the stuffed animals, but, um, the children are sitting and having a great time with pizza, just chomping down. Makes me, you know, makes me think we should do this.

PAZ: They have more suggestions for food in step two.

LIZ: Okay, "provide lots of meaty foods. Food is fresh kill warriors, so you must get something close to meats, Think, think, think. Have meat skewers, steak, meatballs, pepperoni, salami, and hamburgers. Anything with tasty meat will do. If you have a vegetarian, then offer veggie patties, cheese, and anything that sticks to the theme."

PAZ: Wait, why does cheese stick to the theme?

JULIAN: How does cheese...

LIZ: Wait.

JULIAN: You know. Fresh killed cheese.

PAZ: I mean my cat right now is extremely into eating cheese, so I guess...

LIZ: Yeah, see, it's accurate. The image for this is just some food. There are kebabs. You know, like cats enjoy. Just like a whole steak, you know, like children should have. A very smooth sliced hot dog, and just a burger. Just a burger with the cheese on entirely different levels of the burger, which is new to me. Like there's multiple cheese. Okay.

JULIAN: My favorite image is--

LIZ: In three.

JULIAN: Step 3, the birthday cake.

LIZ: Yes. "Get a birthday cake. The best birthday cake can have something printed on it, such as the cover of your favorite book from the Warriors series, or a map of the territory. Some local businesses in your city may offer custom cakes. Even better as some may even be able to design a 3D landscape." That is not what's on this cake that they've shown us and--

PAZ: It's a beautiful cake. It's so good.

LIZ: It's so much better. Yeah, it's a round yellow cake with just a little-- like just a huge cat face on top of it, and a candle. It's very happy looking. And then there's like little black and white cat silhouettes like around it.

PAZ: I want this to be my cake.

LIZ: It could be.

PAZ: It's so good.

JULIAN: It's so good.

PAZ: The face on top is so good.

LIZ: Beautiful. What flavor do you think it is?

PAZ: Um, red velvet because it's red inside like fresh kill.

LIZ: Got it.

JULIAN: Oh, we don't have to go through the whole Q&A but the first one is I think very important. Um, "what do I have for food if I have a vegan friend?" And the answer is, "provide berries and greens for them to eat. Warrior cats use them for medicinal purposes, but you can pretend they are an elder or a sick cat."

PAZ: Oh my god.

JULIAN: If you're vegan, you're old or sick. "You can also just ask your vegan friend what they like to eat and provide that." Yeah, I would go with that one, animebread.

LIZ: That's exactly the answer you'd--

JULIAN: wikiHow user anime bread.

PAZ: Here's another question, "how do I not be embarrassed about my Warrior Cat party?"

LIZ: Aw.

JULIAN: Aw.

PAZ: "It's a decision you make just not to care what others think. Of course, if you're selective about who you invite, you'll be less embarrassed. Invite friends who will enjoy this kind of party." If your friends have a problem with your Warrior Cat party, then they're fake. They're fake friends.

LIZ: Okay, these questions are really good. I have one more. "What if my friends make up unreal Warrior Cat names such as Fluffyhead?" This is a community answer. "Just tell them that it makes no sense, or provide everyone with a name badge at the start of the party using names you've chosen. Of course it's important that everyone have a good time, so it's fine to loosen the rules a little bit for your friends."

JULIAN: God.

PAZ: Isn't there a canonical cat Fuzzy-- like Fuzzypelt?

LIZ: Yeah, that's--

JULIAN: There is, yeah.

PAZ: I would say Fluffyhead is accurate.

LIZ: Yeah, he's like Ravenpaw's dad. That's like an immediate connection.

PAZ: I think Fluffyhead is a perfect name, and if you come to my Warrior Cat party, you can have that name.

LIZ: Oh, there's some tips and warnings.

JULIAN: Oh good.

LIZ: The best one from tips to me is "ask older siblings to be rouges." Not rogues, rouges, "who hate the Clans. Maybe they could get their friends to help making a rouge group."

JULIAN: You know what I love about a birthday party, built in bullying.

LIZ: For your older siblings specifically.

JULIAN: The warning about, "make sure everyone is comfortable with the battles, or anything else you may be doing," and then "make sure nobody gets hurt."

LIZ: Very important.

PAZ: That's good advice all around.

LIZ: Yeah, So we've got three months till any birthdays happen. Better get planning. I wanna see those cardboard cutouts.

JULIAN: We got time to plan.

LIZ: Just ready.

PAZ: I'm going to give this five stars.

JULIAN: Do we each have to provide our own?

LIZ: Communal effort, you know. They have the fresh kill pile, we have the freshly made and painted cardboard scenery pile. This made me want pizza. That one person in the corner on the right, eating that pizza at the Warrior Cats party is just having the best time I think.

PAZ: Yeah, I could go for some pizza too.

JULIAN: Well, is that it for us?

PAZ: Yeah, I mean, we covered the war crimes and we covered the party, and I think that's all. So, thanks everyone for joining us again this week. May StarClan light your path. [outro music begins] Bye.

LIZ: Bye.

JULIAN: Bye.

[outro music ends]

PAZ: I'm gonna post some little Barley art. Very handsome.

LIZ: Love to see some Barley. Oh, he's a little cow.

PAZ: Black and white cat.

JULIAN: Aw, he's just a little guy.

PAZ: He is a little cow.

LIZ: I love that. Is this official?

PAZ: Uh, no, this is Warrior-- he has official art but it's the weird manga art style that I--

LIZ: He deserves better than that.

PAZ: His pants.

LIZ: Oh my god, pants.

PAZ: Anyway, back to the rats.

JULIAN: Um, yeah, the rats, I guess it's like a sort of...

LIZ: Wait, I'm listening and I can't. It's gone. Sorry, Julian, Julian.

#into the wild ep #transcript #ep 04 #purr-fidy

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massmediaquiroga · 1 year

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While internet communities do change with the times, some things stay the same.

A common thing that's associated with the rise of the internet is the ability to connect with people in just a few clicks or taps of a screen. For example, you could find likeminded people that enjoy the same hobbies that maybe your coworkers or friends don't necessarily do and become acquainted over that. This week's readings were interesting to look at because they discussed community over the internet, but the examples given in the readings were different from each. It's important to know that while apps like TikTok and Instagram thrive on creation of "personable" content, there is still a demand for websites such as Reddit that resembles more of an anonymous community that work differently compared to an app like TikTok.

I've always been curious about Reddit as a source of research. I've casually used the website since I was a high schooler to keep up with various subreddits such as r/Soccer, a community that post news and highlights of popular soccer matches or another subreddit like r/FIFA, which is dedicated to news and video clips about the FIFA video game line. While you don't need an account to browse Reddit, many people make an account to either interact with posts they see or essentially create a feed that's only pulls posts from subreddits they choose to follow. Nicholas Proferes and his team discuss the use of Reddit in research, but the obstacles they face were what I expected as someone that uses the website and has learned a thing or two during graduate school. Pseudonymous participation and the inability to pull demographic data due to that is a big obstacle. Additionally, the pseudonymous role could also affect how users interact on the website compared to a platform like Twitter or Instagram where an account is likely to have identification in the form of a media. Reddit is definitely an interesting website to monitor, but I believe its ability to be used in research requires a lot of additional work that most researchers are probably better off putting the effort into elsewhere.

On the opposite tone of that, TikTok has risen to popularity embracing the opposite approach that Reddit has: empowering the users through self-representation. Aparajita Bhandari and Sara Bimo do well to explain the background of the app as well as explaining the algorithm and how it's had success mixing what other apps do and adding its own touch to it. I thought this piece was written well, but I'm curious how it holds up in a few years since TikTok is still a relatively young social media platform compared to its competitors. I'm also curious about how we'll look back at TikTok influencing other apps and changing the general approach for social media. It's already joked about that Instagram's reels feature is essentially based off TikTok model. When LSU Athletics met with representatives from Meta a few months ago, they said that reels were what they were recommending to focus on to get more views and interactions. This, in my opinion, was likely influenced by the current domination of TikTok.

The final reading touched on influencers and how they grow on the internet. The article essentially explains that influencers gain "celebrity capital" on the internet and that social media has a connected "ecosystem" that extends beyond just one platform. I don't think anything in this article was revolutionary or anything, but it was unique in the way of creating a "economic model" for fame and popularity on the internet. I'd be interested in seeing a future article that follows this one up that looks to use qualitative research on the celebrity capital that internet influencers are using (knowingly or unknowingly)!

#mc 7019 #tiktok #internet communities #reddit

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waritawrites · 3 years

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Tales from the Hood: Rhodie (black elitists) or Duke Metger (Biden) - Who was the Bigger Threat to Black People?

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2021/05/05/tales-from-the-hood-rhodie-black-elitists-or-duke-metger-biden-who-was-the-bigger-threat-to-black-people/

#Prolife #LABlackAdvocatesforLife #LouisianaBlackAdvocatesforLife #BlackGenocide #AbortionIsEugenics #PlannedParenthoodIsElitist #Elitism

#ElitismIsHomicidal #LouisianaRightToLife #PlannedParenthoodPredators #PlannedParenthoodOwesReparations #Reparations

In Rusty Condieff's 1995 horror movie Tales from the Hood, there is a story called KKK Comeuppance which starred Corbin Bersen as senator and former KKK member Duke Metger and Roger Guenver Smith as his Public Relations consultant Rhodie (a black elitist) who are working to get Duke elected as governor. Duke faces great opposition because of his past membership with the Ku Klux Klan and AND his choice of the location of his campaign headquarters - his grandfather's old plantation. His grandfather murdered his slaves were upon finding out slavery in the south had been legally ended. There is an old legend that says that a former slave woman used witchcraft to capture their souls and place them in the bodies of dolls. The dolls would periodically come to life and their leader was the woman's husband who had been killed. A mural of the woman and her dolls was located Duke's office.

Alone, Duke was an unlikeable, arrogant, person. Yet, with the help of Rhodie, his appeal grew which made him a serious contender in the governor's race. When looking at today's political scene, one would easily say that Trump was like Duke Metger - when looking from a superficial perspective. A SUPERFICIAL PERSPECTIVE. He wasn't the most tactful. He was blunt. Some, DEFINITELY NOT ALL, of Trump's were white supremacists (some were also white "liberals" pretending to be stereotypical white conservative Trump supporters) and those who weren't white were anti-black, some of which were black. Yes, there are anti-black black people. One such character in Tales from The Hood was Rhodie. Rhodie seemed to represent a stereotypical black republican. He seems like the type of anti-black, self-hating black person who would pretend to "help" the black people improve their community by getting rid of as many Black people as possible using:

- Forget GOD and uphold multicultural, pagan ideals instead

- Abortion

- Euthanasia (gotta maintain that quality of life)

- Normalization of promiscuity

- Normalization of destructive alternative lifestyles

- The stigmatizing of traditional marriage and family

-The normalization of addiction and substance abuse, such as recreationally smoking heroin

Columbia professor: I do heroin regularly for ‘work-life balance’

https://nypost.com/2021/02/19/columbia-prof-i-snort-heroin-regularly-for-work-life-balance/

https://twitter.com/Joy_Villa/status/1363557914351403016?s=20

People who promote such self-destructive behaviors as normal or even inherently black are an enemy! They are an enemy of mankind, no matter how progressive that they think such behaviors are. Indeed, progressivism, like evolution, is an oxymoron because you don't gain anything biologically nor socially. Things regress to its most basic form. Though, a progressive such as a eugenicist might would tell you, "progressive for the purpose of efficiency - less means more." More for them, more resources for them in their quest to reign supreme in the survival of the fittest, or their horrible misinterpretation of term. Yet, we don't see the promotion of such self-destructive behavior coming from Black Republicans, Conservatives, and Independents. We see the encouragement of black self-destruction coming from Black Democrats

Most Democrat Legislators Champion Margaret Sanger’s Racist Genocide Mission – Are They Counter-representing You?

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2019/05/16/most-democrat-legislators-champion-margaret-sangers-racist-genocide-mission-are-they-counter-representing-you/

Liberals, and some (especially paid) Social Justice activists as well as your various dose-of-distraction-from-news-and-entertainment-attractions.

Black Agents of White Supremacy in the Media endorse racist Joe Biden

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2020/03/04/black-agents-of-white-supremacy-in-the-media-endorse-racist-joe-biden/

Support of the Super Predators: White Supremacists in Liberal Disguise and the Mainstream Media that promotes them

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2020/02/17/support-of-the-super-predators-white-supremacists-in-liberal-disguise-and-the-mainstream-media-that-promotes-them/

Joe Biden & his supporters on Joe's racist association with the klansmen sound a lot like Duke Metger & Rhodie in Tales from the

Hood @ 0:56:22 mins

"We all have a past, now don't we?"

"We all, have a past. Its a better man who can learn from his failures. I know that I have learned from mine and I'm better for it."

Duke Metger & Rhodie in Tales from the Hood, https://youtu.be/5vxHfr3DLKg

Margaret Sanger also used black elitists to carry out her plan for eugenics by way of birth control.

Planned Parenthood has stalked and misinformed Black people, particularly Black people experiencing poverty as well as uneducated Black people about the personhood of an unborn child. However, Black Democrats, Liberals, and some (especially paid) Social Justice activists such as Black Lives Matter:

BLM to Biden & Harris: We want something for our vote

https://www.theblaze.com/news/black-lives-matter-leader-to-biden-and-harris-we-want-something-for-our-vote

- BLM got in the way with their grifting and clout-seeking.

Michael Brown’s father, Ferguson activists demand $20M from BLM

By Kenneth Garger

https://nypost.com/2021/03/03/michael-browns-father-ferguson-activists-demand-20m-from-blm/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

Where is the $90 million dollars collected by BLM? Michael Brown’s father, Ferguson activists demand $20M from BLM

https://twitter.com/TheFabulousRee/status/1371965130578268160?s=20

Shaun King attempted to discredit Samaria Rice when she spoke against the political exploitation of racism and police brutality done by pseudo-social activists, celebrities, and politicians. Shaun King stated that she was not thinking the way that liberal white "woke" supremacy wants her to think. She isn't sticking with their destructive narrative and agenda for Black people. They're redlining us into feeling that we can't be self-reliant! Meanwhile, Closet Capitalist Anarchists ease into the neighbohoods they help to destroy to start businesses, buy real estate for commercial and residential purposes;etc. #UnfollowShaunKing

"I read Shaun King’s piece about Samaria Rice’s critical social media comments and this is some of the most patronizing ugly sh-t I’ve ever seen"

https://twitter.com/ztsamudzi/status/1371882450763329536?s=20

BLM destroyed a beautiful,civilized movement as well as communities. It could have been a beautiful,civilized movement yet they ruined it w/buffoonery such as twerking for Martin Luther King, Jr Day and WAP stupidity

Joe Biden's non-response reminds me of this scene from Tales from The Hood:

Duke Metger in Tales from the Hood, "No Reparations!" https://youtu.be/7vjwA1IkIRk

and Black ministers

Apostate False Preachers for Feticide and Infanticide: Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2020/03/11/apostate-false-preachers-for-feticide-and-infanticide-jesse-jackson-and-al-sharpton/

have been its main proponents and propagandists since the early 1900's when it was known as the American Birth Control League. To appeal to Black people, Sanger said:

The Use of Ministers for The Negro Project in a 1939 letter to Dr. C.J. Gamble:

"The ministers work is also important and he should be trained, perhaps by the Federation as to our ideals and the goal that we hope to reach. We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."

In Birth Control and the Negro, Sanger talked about the value of the influence of black ministers:

“The project would hire three or four ‘colored Ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities’ to travel throughout the South and propagandize for birth control, since ‘the most successful educational approach to the Negro is through religious appeal” (as cited in Gordon, 2007, p. 235).

Dr. Albert Lasker, Sanger (1939) stated, "If we could get the Negro Universities and the Negro medical groups behind this project it will go over really big I think, especially if there is a little money to give to those for time spent and for supplies in their clinics."(para. 3)

One of her biggest propagandists was W.E.B. DuBois (See: Negroes and Birth Control, https://libex.smith.edu/omeka/files/original/16e5b6a56c2c4aedb3274e7124f3006e.jpg)

W.E.B. DuBois (1939) stated:

“Among the more intelligent class, was a postponement of marriage, which greatly decreased the number of children. Today, among this class of Negroes few men marry before thirty, and numbers of them after forty. The marriage of women of this class has similarly been postponed.

In addition to this, the low incomes which Negroes receive make bachelorhood and spinsterhood widespread, with the naturally resultant lowering, in some cases, of sex standards. On the other hand, the mass of ignorant Negroes still breed carelessly and disastrously, so that the increase among Negroes, even more than whites, is from that part of the population least intelligent and fit, and least able to rear their children properly.” (para. 4 and para.5).

Joe Biden has more in common with Duke over the course of his career than does Trump. Here are the facts listed in my article, Joe Biden has built his career by FIGHTING AGAINST EQUITY and EQUALITY, https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2021/01/22/joe-biden-has-built-his-career-by-fighting-against-equity-and-equality/ :

"Joe used the drug epidemic to target Blacks and poor people to serve longer sentences for trafficking by promoting proganda that crack is more lethal than cocaine. Blacks and poor people could afford crack for distribution and sell because it was less expensive than cocaine which Biden gave lesser sentencing. This occurred during the time the number privatized prisons began to increase. These were for-profit prisons. This first company to take over a prison was Core Civic in 1984. Civic Core took over a Shelby County, Tennessee prison.

Vox.com's German Lopez https://www.vox.com/2015/8/26/9208983/joe-biden-black-lives-matter shares Jamelle Bouie's list at Slate.com https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2015/08/joe-biden-presidential-run-why-its-a-bad-idea.html:

"Comprehensive Control Act: This 1984 law, spearheaded by Biden and Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-SC), expanded drug trafficking penalties and federal "civil asset forfeiture," which allows police to seize and absorb someone's property — whether cash, cars, guns, or something else — without proving the person is guilty of a crime. Under the federal Equitable Sharing program, local and state police get up to 80 percent of the value of what they seize as funds for their departments, which critics say creates a for-profit incentive to take people's stuff.

Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986: This law, sponsored and partly written by Biden, ratcheted up penalties for drug crimes. It also created a big sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine — even though both drugs are pharmacologically similar, the law made it so someone would need to possess 100 times the amount of powder cocaine to be eligible for the same mandatory minimum sentence for crack. Since crack is more commonly used by black Americans, this sentencing disparity helped fuel the disproportionate rates of imprisonment among black communities.

Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988: This law, co-sponsored by Biden, strengthened prison sentences for drug possession, enhanced penalties for transporting drugs, and established the Office of National Drug Control Policy, which coordinates and leads federal anti-drug efforts.

Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act: This 1994 law, partly written by Biden and signed by President Bill Clinton, imposed tougher sentences (including some mandatory minimums) and increased funding for prisons, fostering the explosive growth of the US prison population from the 1990s through the 2000s — a trend that's only begun to reverse in the past few years. Since black Americans are disproportionately likely to be incarcerated, the law helped contribute to the mass incarceration of black Americans in particular. But the law also included all sorts of other measures, including the Violence Against Women Act that helped crack down on domestic violence and rape, a 10-year ban on assault weapons, funding for firearm background checks, and grant programs for local and state police.

The RAVE Act: This 2003 law built on the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 to impose civil penalties on businesses that knowingly lease, rent, use, or profit from a space where illicit drugs are being stored, manufactured, distributed, or used. The idea was to go after raves in which drugs are widely used. But the law has been widely criticized for making rave organizers so paranoid about anti-drug crackdowns that they stopped doing anything that would implicate them in drug use, including providing medical or educational services for drug users."

Interesting that Joe and Strom Thurmond partnered to write the 1984 Comprehensive Control Act during the same time period that Core Civic took over a facility in Tennessee. The increase in the number of privatized coincided with Biden's focus on creating crime bill's. To sell his 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act #1994CrimeBill, Biden's rhetoric was "Lock the S.O.B.'s Up" to further vilify the poor and other disenfranchised people to justify mass incarceration.

-'Lock the S.O.B.s Up’: Joe Biden and the Era of Mass Incarceration

He now plays down his role overhauling crime laws with segregationist senators in the ’80s and ’90s. That portrayal today is at odds with his actions and rhetoric back then.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/25/us/joe-biden-crime-laws.html#click=https://t.co/7ck1J9966W

His magnum opus was his 1993 Predators Beyond the Pale Speech

-Joe Biden Warns Of "Predators On Our Streets" Who Were "Beyond The Pale" In 1993 Crime Speech

https://youtu.be/7oDHSt-CKtc

- Joe Biden wrote the Clinton approved Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act:

Bill Clinton's crime bill destroyed lives, and there's no point denying it

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/15/bill-clinton-crime-bill-hillary-black-lives-thomas-frank "

In addition to creating legislation that racially profiles minorities into a system of for-profit mass incarceration, he has also been a loyal supporter of planned parenthood.

Current Planned Parenthood CEO Alexis McGill Johnson says:

"Margaret Sanger’s beliefs caused irreparable damage to the lives and health of generations of Black people, Latino people, Indigenous people, immigrants, people with disabilities, people with low incomes, and many others." Read more from

@alexismcgill

: https://p.ppfa.org/3x3N29f

https://twitter.com/PPFA/status/1383827872628953094?s=20

I’m the Head of Planned Parenthood. We’re Done Making Excuses for Our Founder

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/17/opinion/planned-parenthood-margaret-sanger.html?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=tweet&utm_campaign=healthtwitter&utm_content=nyt2-april21

Despite McGill-Johnson's statement of the racist activities of planned parenthood as well as Kamala Harris' expression of fear of Joe Biden's praise of the known white supremacists of whom he has shown reverence:

What bothered Kamala about Joe? Interview with Kamala Harris on the campaign trail - Face the Nation

11:35 mins: “Praising and coddling individuals who made it their life work and built their reputation off of segregation of the races in the United States........I would not be a member of the United States senate if those men he praised had their way."

What bothered Kamala about Joe?

https://youtu.be/xMqp7A-O0HE?t=695

Let's talk about Joe Biden - 10:53 mins

https://youtu.be/xMqp7A-O0HE?t=653

this year he has still allowed the government to give over 400 million dollars to continue to decimate the Black community.

Joe Biden Gives Abortion Industry $467.8 Billion, 19 Times More Tax Money Than Obama

https://www.lifenews.com/2021/04/29/joe-biden-gives-abortion-industry-467-8-billion-19-times-more-money-than-obama/

https://twitter.com/StevenErtelt/status/1388694739512348674?s=20

Black people make up 13% of the population and Black women only represent 6% of the total population yet account for 36.9% of the nation’s abortions whereas white women account for 36% of the nation’s abortions however white people are 76% of the nation’s population. (Jatlaoui TC, Boutot ME, Mandel MG, et al, 2015).

Jatlaoui TC, Boutot ME, Mandel MG, et al. Abortion Surveillance — United States, 2015. MMWR Surveill Summ 2018;67(No. SS-13):1–45. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.ss6713a1

Regarding the near extinction of the Black population in America due to abortion, Nyhiem Way El stated to reparations group American Descendants of Slaves,

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ados101/permalink/296772141208488/?sfnsn=mo,:

"- Based on the January 2018 estimate that there have been 60 million abortions in the United States since 1973,20 we can deduce that well over 18 million of them were performed on black babies.

- As of July 2017, the black population in the U.S. stood somewhere around 40 million, which means that abortion has reduced the size of the black community by more than 30%—and that doesn't include the children and grandchildren that would have been born to those aborted more than a generation ago.'

Abort73.(n.d.). Abortion and Race. Retrieved from https://abort73.com/abortion/abortion_and_race/

Essentially, this is a 50% halt in population growth if you look at the children and grandchildren who would've been born since 1973 of the aborted. (Way El, 2019)

**As of July 2017, the black population in the U.S. stood somewhere around 40 million, meaning abortion has reduced the size of the black community over 30% and doesn't including potential children and grandchildren born to those aborted a generation ago

https://abort73.com/abortion/abortion_and_race/"

Planned Parenthood owes reparations to Black people, Hispanics, those living in poverty, women, AND fathers who wanted their children that were aborted.

GOD hates the Oppression of the Disenfranchised: Proverbs 30:14 & Jeremiah 34:8 - 22

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2021/04/17/god-hates-the-oppression-of-the-disenfranchised-proverbs-3014-jeremiah-348-22/

Proverbs 30:14

“There is a generation, whose teeth are as swords, and their jaw teeth as knives, to devour the poor from off the earth, and the needy from among men.”

Hypocrisy of Joe Biden: A Legacy of Self-Entitlement and Oppression against the Disenfranchised

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2020/01/08/hypocrisy-of-joe-biden-a-legacy-of-self-entitlement-and-oppression-against-the-disenfranchised/

Biden's overall opinion of Black people continues to be low,especially of those who would vote for him. In August 2020, Biden stated at a meeting with Latino voters:

"By the way, what you all know, but most people don’t, unlike the African American community, with notable exceptions, the Latino community is an incredibly diverse community with incredibly different attitudes about different things.”

—#JoeBiden 8/6/2020 https://youtu.be/f4lXYR0su-8

I'm glad that I'm a notable exception - I didn't vote for him.

I will never support the removal of GOD being THE GUIDE of America, abortion

Scriptures Against Abortion and Child Abuse

https://followerofthewayforever.wordpress.com/2020/03/12/scriptures-against-abortion-and-child-abuse/

HURTING CHILDREN BRINGS ON THE WRATH OF GOD

Matthew 18:5-6,10

5 And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receiveth me.

6 But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea

10 Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven

the destruction of traditional marriage and family, the destruction of traditional gender roles,eugenics, population control,euthanasia, and government and corporate hoarding rationing for totalitarian purposes disguised as environmentalism and sustainability.

Reference

Way El, N.(2019,May 16).Predatory Abortion Industry causes 50% halt in black population growth

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ados101/permalink/296772141208488/?sfnsn=mo

Du Bois, W.E.B.(1939, April). Negroes and Birth Control. Smith

https://libex.smith.edu/omeka/files/original/16e5b6a56c2c4aedb3274e7124f3006e.jpg

Sanger,M.(1939).Letter from Margaret Sanger to Dr. C.J. Gamble December 10,1939. Smith Libraries Exhibit, Accessed January 10, 2019, Retrieved from https://libex.smith.edu/omeka/files/original/d6358bc3053c93183295bf2df1c0c931.pdf

Gordon,L.(2007). Birth Control and the Negro. In The Moral Property of Women, p.235. Urbana; Chicago: University of Illiniois Press.

Sanger,M.(1939).Letter from Margaret Sanger to Dr. Albert Lasker November 12,1939. Smith Libraries Exhibit, Accessed January 11, 2019, Retrieved from https://libex.smith.edu/omeka/files/original/087da25e33426c0e81b01eebcdcc079d.jpg

#population control #eugenics #joe biden #racial profiling #prolife #alexis mcgill johnson #abortion #GOD #Jesus #Holy Spirit #Planned Parenthood #Planned Parenthood Owes Reparations #Reparations

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