#cites w/e

[shopcat]

one thing i will never get over is people insisting INSISTING with the ferocity of a frothing at the mouth cishet incel on a woman's tiktok that joe keery playing steve harrington is done up to the nines getting lip gloss and blush and brown mascara applied every morning during season 3 when it is proven with both common sense and basic observational skills that the previous seasons are darker less saturated filmed on the inside of a matchbox and that they boosted the saturation and vibrancy in three to achieve a summery look and used better lighting and more people focused close ups especially in the bright indoor starcourt scenes which means doing the math HE JUST LOOKS LIKE THAT NATURALLY HE'S JUST BEAUTIFUL. you people make me hysterical he just has long eyelashes that you're finally noticing because you can actually fucking see them for a change. and pink lips. he's not wearing anything everyone's lips are redder in that season. what you're noticing here is a guy who is pretty and you're collectively losing your minds insisting there has to be something he's doing when he's just showing up looking like that being naturally beautiful which is actually infinitely impossibly funnier than anything else.

[hawkeyebj]

I quit the job so this saga should die down, BUT. i have to tell you i dodged a bullet with flirty coworker guy … i think we were weeks away from something Worse happening there ahahahah because 👀 the day after I quit, I had to go up to work to turn my uniforms and stuff in, etc, right? and he was there 😌 and he hugged me when he first saw me but it was a normal quick little hug in front of other people and like that was Enough. BUT THEN

when I left, he walked me outside and he hugged me Goodbye again while we were outside alone and when I tell you it ??? was the most … passionate hug I have ever had w/ a non-partner …. 🫣. he did not want to let go of me…. and when I finally was able to start pulling back, he like ? pressed the side of his face up against the side of my face ? like nuzzling me????? and I have never been so concerned that someone was about to kiss me let me tell you, if he had turned slightly I would have been TRAPPED bc he still had a hold of me. thankfully 😌 he did not do that. but he trailed his hand down my arm when we pulled away after that and like held my hand for a moment until I finally was like “ha okay… bye buddy” and left. he had me NERVOUS

haven’t seen him since then obvs but I did get a “what are you doing?” text a couple days ago 😗

[dreams-in-daylight]

.

[ashes-and-loveletters]

Starting a book I got for Christmas and the introduction is basically 15 pages of the author complaining about the downfalls of trying to compile stories from Greek myth together because of the vast geographical and linguistic and societal diversity present when these stories were still part of everyday culture + the Romans being a thing threw a wrench into the whole affair + the fact that a lot of these stories were either lost or told completely differently depending on where you were meaning there wasn’t a really a solid ‘canon’ like many other religions. And I just get so much glee reading scholars and academics complaining about having difficulty finding information then deciding what of that information they should include and what they shouldn’t because, like, I have that struggle too and it makes the whole thing feel more human... like these people aren't machines or smth- the have souls that also get eroded by bad citing of sources and historical destruction of like... so many documents. vibey af

[contact-guy]

“#I read so many gay Victorian love letters and books to get the tone right lol #Plato‘s symposium reference was THE way to signal you liked men in the late 19th century“ would you mind sharing some of your sources? 👀 I also want to write gay Victorian fanfiction am just naturally curious about the victorians

Omg 1000%, let me cite my sources:

Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteeth Century by Graham Robb - this book is a treasure trove of well researched information. A lot of queer history focuses on men and I really appreciate all the stories about women in this one. It’s 20 years old and by (as far as I can tell) a straight author, so there’s some limitations - a total lack of awareness of bisexuality and trans identity - but I really enjoyed it regardless. There’s also like four pages where he discusses Sherlock Holmes as an iconic gay protagonist that changed my brain.

Fanny and Stella by Neil McKenna - a heavily researched story of two trans femmes in Victorian England, the crossdressing trial that scandalized London, their sisterhood and surrounding community, and the love triangle they were involved in. It’s written in a VERY fun and gossipy way, with a ton of primary sources, and is such a compelling story! This author also wrote a book about Wilde I haven’t read yet.

Gay History and Literature by Ricor Norton - it’s a website, not a book (I can’t find his books except at really high prices!) but it’s an obsessively compiled list of…basically…what it says on the tin. There’s a collection of gay love letters and newspaper clippings that are fascinating to read!

The Portrait of Mr. W. H. by Oscar Wilde, heard of him? This is my favorite Wilde story! It’s about the theory that Shakespeare’s sonnets were written to a young man, and how the desire for proof drives a man to death, and the frustrations and joys of looking for yourself in long-dead writing.

Before Queer Theory: Victorian Aestheticism and the Self by Dustin Friedman - reading this book felt like making my brain lift weights, but it was really interesting - it’s about the Aesthetic movement and how modern queer identity began in the nineteeth century.

Maurice by E. M. Forster (not technically Victorian but close) is a story written in 1913 about gay love (published in 1971 and dedicated to “a happier time” 🥲). It gave me some ideas about how a confession could play out. Plato’s Symposium is used as a pickup line, of course.

[secretmellowblog]

The thing is, Jean Valjean’s “nineteen year prison sentence for stealing a loaf of bread” from Les Mis isn’t actually unusual….not even today! I see people talking about it as if it’s strange or unimaginable when it happens every day.

In modern America — often as a result of pointlessly cruel (and racist) habitual offender and mandatory minimum laws— people are routinely sentenced to life in prison for minor crimes like shoplifting or possession of drugs.

The ACLU did a report in 2013 detailing the lives of various people who were sentenced to life in prison without parole for nonviolent property crimes like:

•attempting to cash a stolen check

•a junk-dealer’s possession of stolen junk

metal (10 valves and one elbow pipe)

•possession of stolen wrenches

•siphoning gasoline from a truck

•stealing tools from a tool shed and a welding machine from a yard

•shoplifting three belts from a department store

•shoplifting several digital cameras

•shoplifting two jerseys from an athletic store

• taking a television, circular saw, and a power converter from a vacant house

• breaking into a closed liquor store in the middle of the night

And of course, so so so many people sentenced to life without parole for the possession of a few grams of drugs.

And we could go on and on!

Gregory Taylor was a homeless man in Los Angeles who, in 1997, was sentenced to “25 years to life” for attempting to steal food from a food kitchen. He was released after 13 years. The lawyers helping to release him even cited Les Miserables in their appeal, comparing Taylor’s sentence to Jean Valjean’s.

And there’s another specific bit of social commentary Hugo was making about Valjean’s trial that’s still depressingly relevant. He writes that Valjean was sentenced for the theft of loaf of bread, but also that the court managed to make that sentence stick by bringing up some of his past misdemeanors. For example, Valjean owned a gun and was known to occasionally poach wildlife (presumably for his starving family to eat.) . So the court exaggerates how harmful the bread theft was—he had to smash a windowpane to get the bread, which is basically Violence— then insist the fact that he owns a gun and occasionally poaches is proof that he is habitually and innately violent. Then when Valjean obviously becomes distressed traumatized and furious as a result of his nakedly unjust sentence and begins making desperate (and very unsuccessful/impulsive/ poorly thought through) attempts to escape…. the government indifferently tacks more years onto his sentence, labels him a “dangerous” felon, and insists that its initial read of him as an innately violent person was correct.

And it’s sad how a lot of the real life stories linked earlier are similar to the commentary Hugo wrote in 1863? Someone will commit a nonviolent property crime, and then the court insists that a bunch of other miscellaneous things they’ve done in the past (whether it’s other minor thefts or being addicted to drugs or w/e) are Proof they’re inherently violent and incapable of being around other people.

A small very petty fandom side note: This is also why I dislike all those common jokes you see everywhere along the lines of “lol it’s so unrealistic for the police to want to arrest Valjean over a loaf of bread, there must have been some other reason the police were pursuing him. Because the state would never punish someone that harshly and irrationally for no reason. so maybe javert was just gay haha”. (Ex: this tiktok— please don’t harass the creator or poster though, I don’t think they were intending to mean anything like that and its just a silly common type of joke you see made about Les mis all the time so it’s not unique in any way.) because like.

As much as I don’t think Les Mis is a flawless book or that its political messaging is perfect….the only way that insanely long unjust sentences for minor crimes is “unrealistic” is if you’re operating on the assumption that prisons are here to Keep You Safe by always only punishing bad criminals who do serious crimes. And that’s just, not true at all. Like I get that these are just goofy silly shallow jokes, and I’m not angry or going to harass anyone who makes them. but it feels like there’s an assumption underlying all those goofy jokes that “this is just not how prison works!” “Prisons don’t routinely sentence people to absurd laughably unjust pointless sentences!” “Prisons give people fair sentences for logical reasons!” When like…no

Valjean being relentlessly hounded and tortured for a minor crime in a way that is utterly ridiculous and arbitrary in its cruelty is not actually a plot hole in Les mis. It’s a plot hole in …..society ajsjkdkdkf. And the only way to fix that is to fight for prison abolition or at least reform, and (in America) stand up against the vicious naked cruelty of habitual offender and mandatory minimum laws.

But yeah :(. I hate how Les Mis opens with a prologue saying the novel will be obsolete the moment the social issues it describes have been resolved— but two hundred years later, the book is still more relevant than ever because we’re dealing with so many of the exact same injustices.

[saintofpride201]

Horrible concept: Text to speech / screen reader that reads each individual word, but agonizingly spells out each word after the words are said, citing the capitalisation status of each letter

"He went to the park" becomes "He. Capital H. Lowercase e. went. Lowercase w. Lowercase e. Lowercase n.-"

[professorspork]

@oodlyenough replied to your post:

"if [x] is your favourite character you're not looking for fluff" lmao I know a lot of people will disagree judging by the volumes of fluff and fix-its and "no [trauma] AU"s I see but man do I agree personally. I think stories that are 'cruel' to characters are stories that neglect them pretty much… bad stuff happening to a character isn't really 'cruel' if it's like, meaningful and in service of an arc and theme and that sort of thing.

YES YES YES

like not to cite the deep magic or w/e but I remember so many circular arguments about, like, Buffy for example, where some people were like "well Joss is a misogynist because bad things happen to Buffy." and like. no, Joss is a misogynist because bad things happened to Cordelia because he was pissed at Charisma Carpenter for getting pregnant; bad things happening to Buffy is the architecture of the show because she is the protagonist. like girl I'm sorry your first time resulted in your true love turning evil, that sucks, but. this is a metaphor and you're living in a story.

and you're SO right about how under-utilizing or ignoring characters being the true cruelty. not respecting them enough to let them play the role they were built for is maddening

[deedala]

🌱w e e k l y t a g w e d n e s d a y🌱

BIG THANKS @energievie for the game today!! and thanks for tagging me!! + @darlingian @mybrainismelted @lingy910y <333

Name: deanna

Age: noel-aged <3

Location: ohio (it exists) (or does it)

What's one of your go-to karaoke songs? Singing by yourself in the car or in the shower totally counts. what if i said kate bush's wuthering heights? hmm? what then??

If you had the power to control one of the four elements, which one would it be and why? water because i *would* become a blood bender and commit crimes

Think of one of your defining personality traits - which animal embodies it? i dunno...a tiny shivering dog that just looks like its at a 10/10 anxiety all the time

Are there any fan theories that have stuck with you? Think of the infamous "Scooby and the gang are all actually high" uuuuhhmmmm...whats the one about the old gods being somehow extremely connected to the ancient elvhen pantheon, the ones trapped somewhere between worlds. DA4 please we need you.

Name a movie you watched or a book you read as a kid that you were totally not supposed to watch/read at that age. okay can i actually cite the soundtrack to the musical Les Miserables? which i have known all the lyrics to since i was like 6 or 7 years old???

Name a food or drink that you totally hated as a kid and now you really like. hmm having a hard time thinking of like a real food but dark chocolate is for sure something

How about one you still hate? brussels sprouts

What's your least favourite chore? DUSTING for sure

Do you have one that you actually enjoy? i love folding a warm basket of towels straight out of the dryer, ooohhh so cozy

And to close it off, share a lyric or two that really resonate with you. I wish I was a mayfly on the River Tay I'd fit all my joys and my pleasures in one perfect day I wish I was the sunlight, just sitting on the Mississippi I'd settle for a shopping trolley in the Liffey

And now i shall tag some precious nuggets to play if you want and if not please consider this me giving you awkward finger-guns from across the room xoxo @too-schoolforcool @michellemisfit @mmmichyyy @juliakayyy @iansw0rld @heymacy @heymrspatel @gallawitchxx @metalheadmickey @mickeysgaymom @softmick @sam-loves-seb @themarchg1rl @loftec @the-rat-wins @crossmydna @vintagelacerosette @palepinkgoat @sleepyfacetoughguy @whatwouldmickeydo @transmickey @tanktopgallavich @sickness-health-all-that-shit @rereadanon @thisdivorce @lee-ow @jrooc @gardenerian @callivich 💖💖💖

[ja-lin]

Lovestruck in-game vs real life -- Los Angeles (Gangster's in Love, My Siren Crush backgrounds, but also used in other series), all photos taken by me w/ my phone

Los Angeles skyline (night) -- Photo taken from Griffith observatory. The observatory closes at 10PM, your car will be locked-in/cited if you park at the top and don't leave by 10PM. Suggestion is to park at Greek Theater and walk up to the observatory, it's a 15-20min walk. 2800 E Observatory Rd, Los Angeles, CA 90027 Griffith observatory (night) -- While the observatory is closed on Mondays, this is the best time to visit with less people there. You can still walk around the grounds and take photos. The parks, grounds close at 10PM. 2800 E Observatory Rd, Los Angeles, CA 90027 Rodeo Dr -- In Beverley Hills there's a street with all high end shopping and eateries. Worth a walk through even if you don't buy anything. 9480 Dayton Way, Beverly Hills, CA 90210 Santa Monica Pier -- During weekdays you can drive up to the boardwalk and park there. During weekends it gets pretty crowded and you'd have to park at the public garages nearby in downtown. The Ferris wheel is worth a ride during the day to get a high view of the entire beach. Surfing classes, rentals are available. 200 Santa Monica Pier, Santa Monica, CA 90401 Santa Monica beaches -- I went on a weekday and there were still a lot of people, but the beaches are nice especially at sunset. I didn't get a chance this time, but I heard beaches at Malibu are also very nice. Los Angeles skyline (day) -- There's free parking about 1 mile down from the observatory and a dirt hiking trail (it's kinda steep) that leads up to the observatory. The short hiking trail is a good spot to get a view of the skyline in the daytime. 2800 E Observatory Rd, Los Angeles, CA 90027

[super-paper]

what context did bnha mean by "fantasy becomes reality?" how is it used in the story

Hmm?  This question is kinda broad, so I'm not really sure how to go about answering it, but.............

I do talk a bit about how MVA plays with the idea of fantasy vs reality + how the league all noticeably use "masks/villain identities" and "fantasy" as a coping mechanism in this post, and I talk a whole lot about how MHA itself plays w/ these concepts in this post.

Other than that-- There are like, three or four BIG lines in the first chapter that firmly establish what the core ideas of the series are, and the "fantasy became reality" line is one of them:

“Fantasy Became Reality!” <- The "establishing line" of the series. Izuku uses this line to establish what sort of world they live in (a world that has become "just like a comic book"), and he later repeats this line when All Might becomes the first person to validate his "fantasy" about becoming a hero while offering to make that fantasy into a reality. It sets the tone for the type of series MHA is. AFO later repeats this line during Izuku's OFAFO dream, where he witnesses AFO forcing a quirk/"role" on Yoichi-- The entire scene depicts AFO acting as a dark echo to both Izuku and chapter one of the series, taking the idea of "fantasy becoming reality" it to its darkest possible conclusion and showing us how people ACTUALLY reacted to this concept. This is the chapter that cements why AFO is the main villain of mha, with AFO using MHA's establishing line to instead ask the readers: If reality is now fantasy, and a fantasy is something that's written.... then who gets to be the author of that story? :) (he then proceeded to write the worst, most self indulgent Captain Hero x Demon Lord self-insert fanfic the world has ever seen. boo this man.)

"You looked like you needed saving." <- The heart of the series.

“You CAN become a hero.” <- The point of the series.

And I'll throw the opening line in as a bonus:   4. “People are not born equal—that's the hard lesson I learned at age four. But that was my first and last set back.” (<- i'm including this one bc so many people cite the first part of this line as evidence that the series is about how “life isn’t fair + some people are just dealt a bad hand and there's nothing you can do about it + you can’t save everyone, actually”..... while completely omitting the second part, which establishes that the first part of the line is just that: a setback that can be overcome, not an ironclad rule that chains people in one place. Like sorry, but MHA is all about PLUS ULTRA + GO BEYOND + BELIEVE IN THE U THAT BELIEVES IN URSELF + ETC. It is NOT a fatalistic, nihilistic, pessimistic series. )

Back on topic!

There is smthing wrong with him ❤ (part 538 of ???)

MHA's relationship with fiction as a concept or w/e is baked into the story on practically every level-- it's both a love letter to and a deconstruction of the art of telling stories, of comic books, and of the conventional expectations people have of "fiction" and "hero/villain" stories. MHA understands the value of fantasy in saving/inspiring others while also exploring what drives people to use fantasy as an escape from reality. Understanding how MHA plays with these ideas is fairly integral to understanding what's going on with Tomura/AFO.

Like, there's really no way to summarize it briefly, but here are some of the other ways MHA utilizes these concepts:

The idea of "Heroes" and "Villains" being exaggerated alter egos or "roles" that might not be a 1:1 reflection of who that person truly is. Tomura, Endeavor, All Might, and AFO are all big examples of this.

The concept of defying fate (i.e. the narrative/author) and breaking free from the villain/hero/mentor archetypes also plays heavily into Tomura, Izuku, and Toshinori's respective arcs. "The mentor dies once he completes his role so his protege can take up his mantle" isn't anything unique, ya'll-- it's a classic and wildly popular trope. Toshi's arc is about breaking free from the constraints of "the mentor role" and expectations of that particular narrative, and shaping his own fate while wrenching his story away from a particularly malicious author (i.e. AFO). side note: AFO getting curb-stomped by a "character" he helped create and having them basically call his writing shit right to his face will never not be funny btw-- let's go three for three, Tomura.......!!!!!!!!!

Izuku is trying to break free from the narrative of "the hero killing the villain at the end of the story" and outright rejects AFO's idea of a "happy ending" (that is, an ending where Tomura disappears and AFO gets to keep wearing his skin as a cool villain costume).

Meanwhile, Tomura is trying to force the whole story to perma end 😬. Which is like, fair enough, bc he's the character who has been hurt by "fantasy" more than anyone else and he's completely over it at this point-- but destroying that fantasy means losing himself in the fantasy of being "Shigaraki Tomura", which implies that he is going to destroy himself in the process of tearing the story apart. Not a good thing. Treat him gently, Izuku.

Also, here are some choice panels/excerpts that I feel emphasize MHA's relationship with fantasy and the above bulletpoints:

the absolute state of the mha fandom lmfaoooooo

iirc the anime also has a neat scene where they include a sort of "television suddenly being turned off" effect to emphasize when AFO completely takes over Tomura's body during the PLW-- you can see part of it in this video, around the 8:36 mark. I gotta give Bones credit where it's due-- it's a really fuckin' cool way of emphasizing what exactly AFO is doing to Tomura + how AFO is treating Tomura as more of a fictional construct than an actual person:

Tomura: sensei you don't get to be a voice in my head you lost to all might like a punk bitch and I'M gonna be the one to surpass YOU 😤

AFO:

tbf if i had the power to permanently mute the mouthy little teenager who keeps bringing up my Ex and our embarrassing break up, I would also abuse tf outta it. That and the boyish appreciation for eldritch body horror is where I draw the line at relating to AFO, tho.

----- Anyway!

MHA's premise basically asks: “wow, what if fantasy suddenly became reality? what if we started treating reality like it's a comic book? what if.... we started treating actual people like they were comic book characters? what if we implemented a system of justice that's ripped straight from the pages of a comic book WHILE treating actual people like they're comic characters?? :D wouldn't that be wild ha ha”-- and after that question has been popped in the most deceptively flippant way possible, Hori spends the rest of the story holding his readers in place with a white-knuckled grip while fixing them with an unblinking stare as the entire concept just gets more and more (VERY INTENTIONALLY) uncomfortable lmfao.

At any rate, sorry if this doesn't answer much-- but like I said, the topic is a broad one bc the way MHA plays with the concept of fiction/fantasy is baked so deeply into every aspect of its narrative that like....... it's impossible for someone like me to summarize it succinctly. It's just one of the foundational aspects of the story!👍

[doberbutts]

i see the way people have taken intersectionality to mean 'you're privileged bc of one identity and oppressed bc of another therefore you're privileged' so often in radfem circles regarding marginalized men and it sure is fascinating to me because they're going on about how black men are oppressed for their blackness and not their masculinity, but then, somehow.....none of them wants to acknowledge the way white women are privileged for their whiteness. they change the definition of intersectionality to fit their narrative in a way that is just like. say the quiet part out loud.

if you're going to use intersectionality to disguise your racism, homophobia, ableism, transphobia, say that (men who are poc, gay, disabled, trans, aren't oppressed for being men, they're oppressed for all of those identities). you're practically begging to but you know you'd get shit for it so you steal terms like these and use them to get people on board. like....it's so transparent and i'm so tired of white people taking black theory and distorting the meaning and then those posts taking off and going viral and reinforcing the misunderstanding of that theory.

The very end of the article sums up your point about marginalized men:

Indeed, intersectionality is intended to ask a lot of individuals and movements alike, requiring that efforts to address one form of oppression take others into account. Efforts to fight racism would require examining other forms of prejudice (like anti-Semitism, for example); efforts to eliminate gender disparities would require examining how women of color experience gender bias differently from white women (and how nonwhite men do too, compared to white men).

And it's important to keep in mind the original context for which Crenshaw coined the term. Examining a case in which black women were told there was no evident discrimination in employment, with employers citing that they hired both black men (so surely can't be racist) and white women (so surely can't be sexist), while the black women argued that they were being skipped over due to being a combination of those factors rather than just one or the other. In this way, black women were at a specific intersection of discrimination, one in which it was impossible to separate the "black" from the "woman".

And when viewing things through an intersectional lens, we discover that we are all culpable of harm towards each other and that no one is fully innocent. It is important to then address the power imbalance by acknowledging and reconciling with these differences in experiences, rather than continuing to posit that one experience must take precedence over any of the others.

Instead there is this focus on uniqueness to the point where people rabidly insist that no one else shares similar experiences to their specific intersection. But black theory tells us this is not true- to dismantle anti-black racism we must examine and dismantle other forms of ethnic oppression and discrimination. To dismantle misogyny we must examine and dismantle other forms of sexism and gender-based oppression, yes, even that of men, like it or not the very coiner of the term mentions that when marginalization comes into play, gender still plays a role in the oppression of marginalized men.

As I have said multiple times on this blog, most of what I opine here is black feminist theory and black antiracist theory. I was raised by a deaf black man who grew up during the Civil Rights Movement. I'm usually getting this straight from the source here, folks.

(Also also the foundational ideals of intersectionality were written before Crenshaw by W. E. B. Du Bois- but he did not take gender or gender identity into account when he wrote his theory, and Crenshaw was- rightfully- unsatisfied with that.)

People often don't like doing this because it is hard. And because at some point you take a step back from what you've uncovered and go "hey wait a second, that means the whole system stinks, even the part I actually like". And that's a difficult situation to reconcile because it means to truly rid ourselves of these problems, we would need a complete and total society reform, and that is so very difficult and most people will not be on board for that.

And this is where a lot of the pushback happens, and the deliberate misunderstanding, because it's easier to go "you just want to be a victim" than to examine that maybe we are all victims of the system. It's where we get people saying "wokeness is a ploy installed by the Jewish elite to incite the black mob to purge the country of white people" when the concept of being woke was about paying attention to your political and physical surroundings and making smart, safe choices for your community rather than letting barely-disguised dangerous people (violent racists) and politics (segregation and Jim Crow laws) continue unchecked. It's where we get people saying "black lives matter hates cops and wants to kill all cops and hunt them for sport" when BLM was founded by people who were just tired of their community members being killed in the street for nonsense crimes (or no crimes at all) and wanted the killings to stop. It's where we get people woefully misunderstanding defund the police and prison abolition and civil disobedience and even boycotts and walk-outs and sit-ins and strikes and more.

And it's where we get people hearing someone say "I am hurt in this way, because of the sum of my whole identity, and it informs the way people harm me" and react with "LEARN INTERSECTIONALITY". Most recently, a white disabled person telling a black disabled person to learn intersectionality because the black disabled person (ME) said it's better to meet as many people's accessibility needs as possible rather than prioritize one over the other.

And this is why I do not trust black theory in white mouths because time and time again white people will pick and choose what parts of black theory apply to them that they like, separate them from the context, and then use those parts as a bludgeon to silence black people who are talking about the rest.

[counttwinkula]

hi i have been obsessed with your “the monster’s body is a cultural body etc” post since i saw it like a month ago. do you have any book recs where i can read more about this, like, forever. (I’m aware of your podcast I’m checking it out too) <3

i'm glad you liked it, it's an honor to introduce the people of tumblr to cohen's seven theses

first and foremost i would recommend The Monster Theory Reader, ed. Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock, which includes several seminal essays including:

"The Uncanny" by Sigmund Freud

"The Uncanny Valley" by Masahiro Mori

"Approaching Abjection" by Julia Kristeva

"Horror and the Monstrous-Feminine: An Imaginary Abjection" by Barbara Creed

"The Monster and the Homosexual" by Harry M. Benshoff

i would also recommend the book in which Cohen first published his seven theses, Monster Theory: Reading Culture, ed. Jeffrey Jerome Cohen

(i must admit that i haven't gotten around to reading either of these books in full yet)

aside from the essays mentioned above, here are some foundational texts for monster theory but not specifically about monster theory:

The Uses of Enchantment by Bruno Bettelheim

Mythography: The Study of Myths and Rituals by William Doty

Vested Interests: Cross-Dressing and Cultural Anxiety by Marjorie Garber

monster theory/horror criticism texts i've read:

Monsters in the Closet by Harry M. Benshoff

Skin Shows by Jack Halberstam

Murder Most Queer by Jordan Schildcrout

It Came from the Closet, ed. Joe Vallese

Horror by Brigid Cherry

Men, Women, and Chain Saws by Carol Clover

Dark Places by Barry Curtis

The Dread of Difference, ed. Barry Keith Grant

The Monster Show by David J. Skal (SEE NOTE BELOW)

Darkly: Black History and America's Gothic Soul by Leila Taylor

The Ghost: A Cultural History by Susan Owens

and some others i own but haven't read yet:

Dark Carnivals by W. Scott Poole

Phantom Past, Indigenous Presence: Native Ghosts in North American Culture and History by Colleen E. Boyd and Coll Thrush

Queer for Fear: Horror Film and the Queer Spectator by Heather O. Petrocelli

Pretend We're Dead: Capitalist Monsters in American Pop Culture by Annalee Newitz (just started this, already love it)

Theatre and the Macabre, ed. Meredith Conti and Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr.

and i can't neglect to mention The Monster in Theatre History: This Thing of Darkness by Michael Chemers

before i say anything further i want to give one warning. my particular interest is on monstrosity and queerness (probably evident based on some of my recommendations). monster theory and horror criticism have generally been rooted in psychoanalytic theory, particularly as it has been interpreted through a feminist lens. unfortunately, this leads to a lot of arguments and interpretations that are sex essentialist and fail to address gender with the necessary nuance. this is particularly true in Men, Women, and Chain Saws and The Dread of Difference.

(Vested Interests is… complicated. it's not monster theory exactly but cohen cites it. garber is generally better than the others mentioned here in her consideration of trans people but her work can still be uncomfortable.)

i have a lot of reservations about recommending The Monster Show. i loved reading it and i think skal has great analysis. somehow, however, in the middle of his discussion of how marginalized people have been historically monsterized in american culture, he has the audacity to cite The Transsexual Empire by Janice Raymond, the ur-text of TERF ideology, and skal uses this text to monsterize trans women. it's disgusting and reprehensible, and if the rest of the book wasn't so strong i wouldn't recommend it

the best medicine i have are texts by trans people. It Came from the Closet is an anthology with several essays by trans people, i adore it. i am forever obsessed with Gender Outlaw by Kate Bornstein, which isn't exactly monster theory, but i would say it's monster theory adjacent and i wish everyone would read it

and if you haven't, you must read "My Words to Victor Frankenstein Above the Village of Chamounix: Performing Transgender Rage" by Susan Stryker. (see i even put a link to that one. drop everything and read it now)

alright if you're still with me i have a couple other things to put out there:

the docuseries Queer for Fear, available on Shudder, is incredible and i'm obsessed with it

she seems to be inactive these days but @draculasdaughter has a lot of posts quoting texts and articles on monster theory/horror criticism that i highly recommend

i've only seen the jacob geller videos on this list but i mean to watch this youtube playlist of video essays about horror, fear, and dread

and i also keep a #monster theory tag on my blog that has various posts on the subject, some funny and some earnest

[goodqueenaly]

Would Prince Viserys actually need to come up with something akin to the Salic Law to justify his own claim ahead of his nieces ? Wasn't that precedent already set at the point of Baelor I's death?

For one, we do know that there was some attempt to justify Viserys II’s succession in a legal context. Yandel notes in TWOIAF that following the death of Baelor, “[t]he precedents of the Great Council of 101 and the Dance of the Dragons were therefore cited, and the claims of Baelor's sisters were set aside” so that “[t]he crown passed to [Baelor's] uncle, the King's Hand, Prince Viserys”. Because Yandel uses passive voice to describe those citations to dynastic precedent, we cannot say for certain who organized the legal support for Viserys’ claim, but I think it highly probable that Viserys himself took an active role in promoting his own kingship (as he definitely had pretty clear and ambitious ideas about his own reign, which he pursued enthusiastically if relatively briefly after he became king). While these legal citations do not necessarily indicate that Viserys II invented a specific new law to support his accession, I do not think it so far a leap to suggest that the use of these citations might have come with, if not a full-blown newly invented law, a legal concept along the lines of the real-world Salic law. 

More to the point, I could see where the new King Viserys II would have found his own accession too uncertain to simply proceed as though he were the obvious heir apparent. Even if he did not himself murder Baelor - although I very much think he did - Viserys would likely have been very aware that he would have been seen as, at best, a highly interested party in the question of succession thereafter, and at worst a suspect in the late king’s death, murdering him so as to gain supreme royal power. Nor do we have any sense that Baelor ever formally named an heir during the course of his reign: with the king very obviously and deliberately childless, Baelor (like the similarly pious (and similarly childless) Edward the Confessor) may have simply left the question of succession open until his death - too open, perhaps, for Viserys’ liking. Too, as Yandel notes, “there were some amongst the smallfolk—and even some lords—who felt that the Iron Throne should by rights [have passed] to Princess Daena” at the death of Baelor. However few these supporters of Daena (and, more generally, female royal Targaryen succession) might have been, their existence meant that Viserys could not assume the throne without comment or some degree of challenge, and consequently that he needed to bolster his accession against the claims of his nieces. 

Nor did history necessarily entirely support Viserys’ claim, or at least so unambiguously as to allow Viserys to succeed without question. To be sure, the “iron precedent” of the Great Council of 101 AC certainly suggested that “regardless of seniority, the Iron Throne of Westeros could not pass to a woman, nor through a woman to her male descendants” - but this precedent might have only invited counterarguments citing Viserys I’s own choice of Rhaenyra as his heir, over would-be heir presumptive Daemon. Nor had the end of the Dance clarified the issue of succession, with Rhaenyra killed by Aegon II, Aegon II himself assassinated thereafter, and Aegon III acclaimed without retroactively acknowledging Rhaenyra formally as a Targaryen monarch. Moreover, when Aegon III’s regents had faced the issue of what to do if the young king died childless, Grand Maester Munkun had reminded the council that “[t]he male claim comes before the female” - yet when Tyland Lannister had then wryly asked who would succeed, as “[w]e seem to have killed them all [i.e. all the male claimants]”, the Grand Maester had had no ready reply. While the regents had agreed, with some hesitation and uncertainty (especially on the part of Unwin Peake), to allow for the potential succession of Aegon III’s half sisters and/or their (male) offspring, only the return of Viserys himself truly “resolved the question of succession”, since “[a]s the king’s brother, Viserys was the undisputed heir apparent, ahead of any child born to Baela Velaryon or Rhaena Corbray, or the twins themselves”. Viserys, the son of that same would-be queen, may have felt uncomfortable simply assuming the role of royal heir ahead of his brother’s daughters with such an uneven historical background - at least without him explicitly setting out a strong legal foundation for doing so. 

And … I know, I know, it me, but I have to talk about The Accursed Kings in the context of Viserys’ accession, because I think it provides a (potentially) very applicable point of inspiration on which GRRM may very well draw.  I very much believe that GRRM has already been inspired by Philip V in creating Viserys II (which does not lessen, of course, the use of Philip V as an inspiration for Aegon V, which I still very much believe). Both  were second sons (or, at least for Viserys, the second surviving son of his father), both depicted as intelligent and capable lieutenants well worthy to rule as kings but barred by accidents of birth from immediately doing so, both frustrated by their lack of power and agency when ruling as regents/de facto regents for nephews, both heavily rumored (and to some extent truly, at least with Philip V) to have poisoned those nephews in order to become kings in their own right. In both cases, moreover, Philip and Viserys faced the problem of how to claim their respective crowns in the face of problematic claims from their nieces: where Philip’s niece Jeanne was officially the daughter of his elder brother Louis but was rumored to have been born of her mother’s adulterous affair, Viserys’ eldest niece Daena “was seen by many lords as being wild and unmanageable besides … [sic] and wanton as well, for a year earlier she had given birth to a bastard son”. Nevertheless, both female claimants found aristocratic support (albeit somewhat more powerful and meaningful for Jeanne, the niece of the Duke of Burgundy, compared to those "few" lords and smallfolk who called for Daena to become queen).

In the fourth novel in The Accursed Kings series, La Loi des mâles (The Royal Succession), the new King Philip V solves the issue of his own succession by having bills drafted by legal scholars (in his own pay, of course) to support his claim to the throne. Some of these bills renew “[t]he arguments of the Constable” (a reference to earlier misogynistic assertions on the part of of Gaucher de Châtillon, Constable of France) “that lilies could not spin wool and that the kingdom was too noble a thing to fall into the hands of women”, while other bills put forward the claim “[t]hat there were … three intermediate generations between the venerated Saint Louis and Madame Jeanne of Navarre, while between Saint Louis and Philippe there were but two” (a point Viserys could also reiterate, if he claimed for example that there was but a single generation between himself and King Viserys I but two between Daena and this last (mostly) undisputed king). Yet the clincher - what becomes known as the Salic law - is described in detail by Druon:

Finally the councillors to Parliament, spurred on by Messire de Noyers, exhumed, though without much belief in it, the ancient code of the customs of the Salian Franks, before the conversion of Clovis to Christianity. This code contained nothing concerning the transmission of the royal powers. It was a fairly rough system of civil and criminal jurisprudence, and almost incomprehensible moreover, since it was over eight centuries old. A brief paragraph laid it down that the inheritance of land must be by equal division among the male heirs. That was all.  No more was necessary for certain doctors of secular law to construct a thesis and support the doctrine for which they were being paid. The Crown of France could go only to males, because the Crown implied the possession of land. And the best proof that the Salian Code had been applied since the beginning was clearly to be found in the fact that only men had indeed succeeded to it. Thus Jeanne of Navarre could be eliminated without the unprovable accusation of bastardy being even brought forward.

So all of this is to say that I definitely think Viserys II, at the time of his accession, promulgated something along the lines of the Salic law as Druon describes it in The Accursed Kings - maybe not exactly a formal, specific law as such, but perhaps more like an official restatement that the Iron Throne was a male-only institution (or, at least, male until and unless all legitimate dynastic male claimants had died, perhaps). I would not at all be surprised if, in citing “[t]he precedents of the Great Council of 101 and the Dance of the Dragons”, Viserys crafted the same sort of sexist quasi-legal argument that Philip V did in justifying his own accession - namely, the fact that only men had succeeded to the Iron Throne proved that the crown of the Targaryens could only go to males, and that the kingdom of the Iron Throne was too noble to be handed over to a woman. (This might also be the moment where, in a twist from The Accursed Kings, Viserys could have refuted any connection between the royal succession and the Widow’s Law - reiterating, perhaps, Druon’s dry amusement in observing how Philip’s legal doctors relied on a “brief paragraph” in this “ancient code” which only concerned “the inheritance of land” to make a convoluted argument about the succession to the throne.) 

[sattlite]

・﹒⏳﹒✦ Os alunos do último ano desejam fazer uma viajem ao Havaí, com tudo pago pela escola eles embarcam no vôo 47 em rumo ao pacífico central, mas o que acontece quando o avião não chega ao seu destino? E mais, onde afinal estão os alunos do vôo 47?

✦﹒◤ Primeiramente me chamo Nero (ele/dele), e receba todo meu agradecimento por querer fazer parte dessa interativa, já faz literalmente anos que eu pretendo por a mão na massa nessa idéia, me veio a inspiração de quando eu assistia a série Lost na adolescência, então espero que se divirtam tanto quanto eu!

✦﹒◤ O vôo 47 é um avião que uma turma de alunos do último ano pegou para sua última viajem juntos para o Havaí, os que sobreviveram acabaram caindo juntos com os destroços do avião numa ilha distante da civilização, agora eles terão que aprender a sobreviver em comunidade num local totalmente novo.

✦﹒◤ A história se passa numa ilha tropical no oceano pacífico, mas os estudantes são naturais da Austrália.

✦﹒◤ Os personagens terão que ter entre 16/19 anos, e é permitido aparência de influencers, cantores, atores, desde que sejam reais e que você que tenha o nome do faceclaim ou o @ do mesmo.

✦﹒◤ Estarei aceitando fichas até a data de: 30/04. É permito até 3 fichas por user, sendo o gênero delas uma escolha pessoal do participante. Elas devem ser feitas por docs, carrd, ou tumblr e entregues na MP do autor: @satllite

✦﹒◤ Por favor coloque a frase "Um líder não pode liderar até saber para onde está indo", no início ou no fim de sua ficha para eu saber que você leu até aqui.

PERSONAGENS

◤F◢◤r◢◤e◢◤d◢◤e◢◤r◢◤i◢◤c◢◤

◢◤W◢◤a◢◤l◢◤s◢◤h◢

𝟭𝟴 𝙖𝙣𝙤𝙨 | 𝙗𝙞𝙨𝙨𝙚𝙭𝙪𝙖𝙡 | 𝙙𝙞𝙨𝙥𝙤𝙣𝙞𝙫𝙚𝙡 𝙥𝙖𝙧𝙖 𝙥𝙖𝙧

Criado por uma mãe solteira, desde sempre Fred soube ser responsável e tomar decisões por conta própria, algo que acarretou em Walsh ser o presidente do grêmio estudantil da escola, e tendo uma mãe superprotetora muitas vezes faz com que os seus colegas de classe o dêem o apelido de "sr. careta" e "filhinho da mamãe", entretanto ele não deixa de usar sua inteligência para benefício de si próprio e inclusive de todos ao seu redor.

◤R◢◤i◢◤v◢◤e◢◤r◢◤

◢◤F◢◤o◢◤s◢◤t◢◤e◢◤r◢

𝟭𝟳 𝙖𝙣𝙤𝙨 | 𝙩𝙧𝙖𝙣𝙨𝙗𝙤𝙮 | 𝙙𝙞𝙨𝙥𝙤𝙣𝙞𝙫𝙚𝙡 𝙥𝙖𝙧𝙖 𝙥𝙖𝙧

Foster é um garoto excêntrico e filho de biólogos, apaixonado pela natureza e animais desde sempre ele é um jovem curioso e muito inteligente quando se trata de novas criaturas e lugares misteriosos, sempre levando consigo sua mochila cheia de livros ele sempre terá uma resposta pra qualquer dúvida que você tiver.

FICHA MODELO

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝙉𝘼𝙎𝘾𝙄𝙈𝙀𝙉𝙏𝙊 (nome completo, idade e nacionalidade):

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝙄𝘿𝙀𝙉𝙏𝙄𝘿𝘼𝘿𝙀 𝘿𝙀 𝙂𝙀𝙉𝙀𝙍𝙊 & 𝙊𝙍𝙄𝙀𝙉𝙏𝘼𝘾𝘼𝙊 𝙎𝙀𝙓𝙐𝘼𝙇 (se for lgbt+ descreva como lida com isso):

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝘼𝙋𝘼𝙍𝙀𝙉𝘾𝙄𝘼 (descrição opcional, fotos ou pasta se preferir):

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝙋𝙀𝙍𝙎𝙊𝙉𝘼𝙇𝙄𝘿𝘼𝘿𝙀 (aceito bíblias):

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝙃𝙄𝙎𝙏𝙊𝙍𝙄𝘼 (descreva sua trajetória de vida antes e no momento do vôo, apenas cite os momentos mais importantes):

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝙃𝘼𝘽𝙄𝙇𝙄𝘿𝘼𝘿𝙀𝙎 & 𝙄𝙉𝘼𝘽𝙄𝙇𝙄𝘿𝘼𝘿𝙀𝙎 (para que eu possa desenvolver seu personagem na ilha, seja realista):

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝙋𝘼𝙍 (aqui você pode fazer um ou escolher um personagem caso queira um par):

⟢﹒—⚒️﹒𝙋𝙀𝙍𝙂𝙐𝙉𝙏𝘼𝙎:

◤𝟭. 𝘾𝙤𝙢𝙤 𝙨𝙚𝙪 𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙨𝙤𝙣𝙖𝙜𝙚𝙢 𝙫𝙖𝙞

𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙜𝙞𝙧 𝙘𝙤𝙢 𝙤 𝙖𝙘𝙞𝙙𝙚𝙣𝙩𝙚 𝙙𝙤 𝙖𝙫𝙞𝙖𝙤?

◤𝟮. 𝘾𝙤𝙢𝙤 𝙨𝙚𝙪 𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙨𝙤𝙣𝙖𝙜𝙚𝙢 𝙫𝙖𝙞 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙜𝙞𝙧 𝙨𝙖𝙗𝙚𝙣𝙙𝙤 𝙦𝙪𝙚 𝙣𝙖𝙤 𝙫𝙖𝙞 𝙥𝙤𝙙𝙚𝙧 𝙨𝙖𝙞𝙧 𝙙𝙖 𝙞𝙡𝙝𝙖 𝙩𝙖𝙤 𝙘𝙚𝙙𝙤?

◤𝟯. 𝘾𝙤𝙢𝙤 𝙨𝙚𝙪 𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙨𝙤𝙣𝙖𝙜𝙚𝙢 𝙫𝙖𝙞 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙜𝙞𝙧 𝙩𝙚𝙣𝙙𝙤 𝙦𝙪𝙚 𝙩𝙤𝙢𝙖𝙧 𝙙𝙚𝙘𝙞𝙨𝙤𝙚𝙨 𝙚𝙢 𝙜𝙧𝙪𝙥𝙤?

✦﹒by: satllite on spirit・﹒