#criticizing something and still enjoying the thing are not mutually exclusive concepts

[the-wandering-whumper]

I know this isn't all from you, but there's a discussion happening on your post about people not realizing whump can have a happy ending where people are talking about bad ending whump and slave/pet/captivity whump as if they're mutually inclusive and I'm a little confused. I've always adored whump based off of captivity and torture, but I also like for that to have a lot of comfort and a good ending, or at least a hopeful one.

I can't tell if people take issue with the bad ending or the captivity, because having one doesn't necessarily mean having the other! Or are they bothered only by fics that have both? It's really not clear and I was wondering if you happened to understand better.

This got long, so I put it under a cut

I think there are several discussions going on at once and it's muddying the waters a bit. On the one hand, we've got debate on whether or not whump and hurt/comfort fall under the same umbrella. Then there is a discussion on how whump content should be/is tagged in the community. We've also got people debating the very definition of the word, and finally, if whump can have a happy ending, which is the topic I originally broached.

Here are my thoughts...

When I first joined Tumblr, whump and hurt/comfort were synonymous and used interchangeably. Whump was also almost exclusively centered around fandom. I think I first noticed a shift in the community when OC whump started to become popular. Over the course of the next year or so, the community seemed to split into 2 groups. Those who still stuck mostly to fandom, and those creating their own characters and worlds. (This was not a bad thing, of course. Communities are naturally going to grow and evolve.) I don't know about anyone else, but it was at this time I started to feel a disconnect. I wasn't as involved in the OC side of things because Fandom whump was really the only thing that quenched my thirst for whump and gave me those elusive whumperflies. That's when I think my definition of whump stayed the same, but it began to change for others.

To me, whump has always been a fandom term used to describe a character who is injured, be it emotionally or physically. That can include anything from that character being comforted with no physical injury depicted, to the character being brutally tortured (I like the full spectrum! I just don't reblog a lot of it here to keep this blog accessible to all users). For me, whump can have a happy ending. It can have all comfort. It can be nothing but hurt. That's my definition, and I suspect some of the older bloggers around here might agree with me. I also think this is so ingrained in our roots and how this community started, that you're likely going to have to pry this viewpoint out of our cold, dead hands. And deal with occasional discourse from us as we try to wrap our heads around how much the community is changing.

Nonny, you asked me what topics people are taking issue with. The answer is, all of them. It's an ongoing debate I have a feeling is going to keep resurfacing again and again. My plan is to keep on plugging away, enjoying whump in my own way, and trying to remind everyone every once in a while that they are free to do the same.

That was the intention of my original post. I wasn't saying that there should always be happy endings or criticizing anyone's content, merely pointing out the fact that having comfort or a happy ending should be an option, based on my definition of the word. And yet these concepts seem to be completely absent from some other people's. To the point they weren't sure they could write it and be included in Whumptober. I had to ask why. To me, it's baffling and I wanted to better understand.

I think I do now. We're people and trying to nail down a definition for whump will be something we debate until the proverbial cows come home. My only hope is that it remains a debate, and not an effort to police the word's usage or its meaning. That's when I feel things begin to get toxic.

In my humble Duck Mom opinion, there is no wrong way to whump. No "rules" to all of this, and it just makes me sad sometimes that people think there have to be.

[magicstormfrostfire]

This is completely random, but just seeing people talk about Steven Universe made me think about it overall and how I feel in comparison to Adventure Time. I don't dislike SU; its objectively good and I give it a 7/10. but I don't particularly like it's writing for a good chunk of it, and vastly prefer Adventure Time's storytelling (not that there is this-or-that ultimatum between them, but its sort of like a Mario vs Sonic, Marvel vs DC kind of thing fandom wise since a lot of folks shifted their interest to SU over time.)

I love the groundbreaking Steven Universe has done. I love the LGBT+ representation, and the discussion of niche topics. But a lot of cohesive storytelling and characterization was sacrificed for 'making a point' or 'being a metaphor' when the two concepts arent mutually exclusive. SU hit its mark exceptionally well sometimes, but toward the end the executions got very sloppy (and sometimes patronizing) when trying to 'say something'.

Adventure Time, however, does it very well, integrating things organically, each piece of the series building upon the established foundation to whatever message it wants to convey, and the HBO mini-series only amplifies that.

I know the wedding plotline for Ruby and Sapphire was the ultimatum for SU. And I hate that it was because....Unpopular Opinion time....I didn't even really enjoy the wedding?

Don't get me wrong, it was cute, and I love Ruby and Sapphire as a couple but it felt so shoehorned to me. Especially since Fusion was always this ethereal, ultimate connection of love and basic Earth Marriage seemed like such a weird step backwards in comparison.

Meanwhile in Obsidian, Marceline singing her song to Bubblegum while they were trapped in a volcano had so much love and intimacy, with so much of that meticulous groundwork for their current relationship's setup backing it up that it nearly made me cry.

-I understand that SU taking a leap of faith was priority and taking a stand for representation, and ultimately I respect and approve of their choice.

- I understand the way some things went were often because of compromise and unwanted input from the network. (Not all their writing choices, but I guess mostly just how the ending of the main series and Future went)

- and I understand that Adventure Time downplayed their gay relationship drastically because of CN (mainly referring to them denying Marcy/Bubblegum confirmation by a staff member way back) and were only able to fully flesh Bubbeline out toward the end and afterwards (with Obsidian) while SU did the exact opposite.

Im less critical of the way things went toward the ending of the series because I know why they went as awkward as they did, but it still gutted a lot of what the show could've been.

I commend them for doing what they did despite the imperfections but not-great storytelling just really makes or breaks a series for me, personally.

I've watched both series in full recently over quarantine and I guess my vast preference for AT over SU is very objective; AT's story was better to me, more fleshed out in both the world and characters, and made me feel more things. Obsidian and Together Again still gives me goosbumps everytime I watch it, where SU:Future falls flat for me toward the end in an awkward way. I understand the paths taken were different in nature, and each series has its flaws, but ultimately I think AT ended up with a better told story in the long run and executing its topics well.

I appreciate what SU has done and the path its made for cartoons will never be forgotten.

but AT was a trailblazer in a different way for stories, emotions, concepts, and relationships, some of it even making the way for SU later on, and it will always just be my favorite.

[crusherthedoctor]

Can we have some unpopular Sonic opinions?

I tried to cram in a lot, so I hope this satisfies you. :P I tried to stick to the ones that I haven't brought up quite as often, since by this point, we all know that I think IDW's storytelling is dire, SA2's story is overrated, X Eggman is an embarrassing portrayal (at least from season 2 onwards), Blaze shouldn't be handcuffed to Silver, Shadow's backstory had issues with or without the Black Arms, Neo Metal Sonic looks silly, etc. But anyway, here we go:

- Knuckles may be tricky to incorporate into plots that don't relate to Angel Island, but making him obsessed with his duties is no better than having him forget about Angel Island entirely.

- I like Marine, and never found her annoying. Oh, I understood what they were trying to do with her, but I honestly wasn't put off by her, and found her Aussie lingo more endearing if anything. Since her debut was during the period in my life where where I couldn't stand Sonic himself, I instead thought he was irritating (and hypocritical) for getting annoyed with her for doing shit he would often be guilty of.

- Silver is just as guilty of being shoehorned into games and plots as the Deadly Six are. Having more fans than the latter is irrelevant, since we're still talking about a character who constantly has to time travel in order to be present.

- Speaking of Silver, if he has to stick around, please do something different with him. They've pulled the doomed future routine multiple times now, and it's been boring every single time. I wasn't interested when it involved Iblis. I wasn't interested when it involved Knuckles drinking the edgy Kool Aid. I wasn't interested when it involved a council of dumbasses... give it a rest already.

- The Tails Doll can work as a mildly creepy thing, with maybe more to it than meets the eye when it's time for a boss fight or what have you. But the memes about him stealing your soul are just dumb, and I thought it was dumb even back in my teenage youth.

- “Eggman is supposed to be clownish!” Yeah, well he's also meant to be a genuine villain with a 300 IQ. These qualities don't have to be mutually exclusive.

- “Sonic is supposed to have attitude!” Yeah, well that's not the same thing as being an absolute cunt. Sonic was only ever meant to come off as having an edge compared to Mario. He was never meant to be a GTA-tier protagonist.

- Rouge is not a villain, and never was a villain. Literally the whole point of her role in SA2 was to reveal that she was working against Eggman and Shadow the whole time, albeit using sneakier tactics to do so. You'd think all those people who exult SA2's story would remember this, but apparently not. She barely even qualifies as an anti-hero, since aside from stealing the Master Emerald, she rarely does anything morally questionable otherwise. She's got a lot more good in her than people give her credit for.

- Captain Whisker is a better Eggman Nega than the actual Eggman Nega. And as far as robot characters in this franchise go, Johnny's design is pretty underrated.

- I don't like Iblis or Mephiles, but I DO like Solaris, and it annoys me that it was out of focus for most of the story due to all the time spent on its less interesting halves. Had they kept the backstory with the Duke and his experiments, and worked from there, I think they could have provided an interesting contrast with Chaos (since Solaris can also qualify as a monster with a sympathetic backstory) instead of recycling the surface level schtick.

- Black Doom may technically be just as bad as Mephiles, Nega, Scourge, Mimic, etc, since he's yet another villain with one-note characterization and fucked over Eggman. But because he never gained a disproportionate fandom, he doesn't annoy me to the same extent. It's easier to ignore him by comparison, and his Dr. Claw voice and face shaped like a lady's delicate part make him enjoyable to mock.

- Likewise, while Lyric is also on the same level as these other villains, it's easier to dismiss him because I was never invested in the Boom games anyway, and being an obvious alternate universe (compared to Sonic X or IDW, which retain the Modern designs and plot elements), it never had an effect on the main series. I also unironically like his design, and if nothing else, at least this snake didn't start a hypnotism fetish across the internet.

- Sally - and the rest of the Freedom Fighters for that matter - have had their importance in the franchise severely inflated. They may have been lucky to be the face of popular media (SatAM and Archie), but they're not these magnificent entities that the game characters are but a speck of dust in comparison to. Having a “legacy” doesn't make them more entitled to shit than any other character, old or new.

- Conceptually, the treasure hunting gameplay is one of the better alternate gameplay styles IMO. But it was let down in SA2 by its one track minded radar (the levels may have been big, but I don't think that would have been an issue on its own if the radar was better). If they brought it back and made it more like SA1's treasure hunting, I'd be all for it, although it would probably be better suited for a spinoff title.

- This goes for a lot of games, but when it comes to 2D, I prefer sprites over models. Not that the Rush models are bad (though the ones in Chronicles sure as fuck are), but the sprites in Mania and the Advance trilogy are just so charming and full of character.

- I actually like Marble Zone. Yeah, the level design is a bit blocky, but I love the concept of an underground temple prison, mixed with lava elements in a zone that otherwise isn't a traditional volcano level.

- I also like Sandopolis Zone. Again, completely understand why it's not the most popular zone around, but I've been a sucker for the Ancient Egyptian aesthetic since childhood (you can thank Crash 3 for that), and Act 1 is visually stunning.

- I prefer the JP soundtrack for Sonic CD over the US version overall... but I also prefer Sonic Boom over You Can Do Anything.

- SA2's soundtrack isn't bad by any means - I love Rouge's tracks, and The Last Scene is one of my favourite pieces of music - but as far as variety goes, it's a step down from SA1's soundtrack.

- If Sonic X-Treme had been released, it probably would have been unenjoyable and confusing. Whatever your thoughts on SA1, it was probably the better option between the two as far as Sonic's first legitimate translation into 3D goes.

- I have no qualms with Modern Sonic and the other Modern designs and characters, but I also fully acknowledge that changing gears from Adventure onwards - and doing it with a great amount of fanfare - was always going to create one of the biggest divides in the fandom, and fans shouldn't act surprised that this happened. The fact that they felt the need to hype up a new design and direction in the first place (compared to Mario, who has mostly been the same since the beginning, with only the occasional minor change with little fanfare) also indicates that they weren't confident enough in Sonic and his universe being the way it was, which often gets ignored by all the “SEGA have no confidence!!!” complaints you see with their recent games.

- Unleashed did not deserve the incredibly harsh reviews it received back in the day... but it doesn't deserve its current sacred cow status either. It had more effort put into it than '06 to be sure, and I can respect that, but much of it was misguided effort, and even if you like the Werehog, you have to admit that the idea came at the absolute worst time. The intro cutscene may be awesome, as is the Egg Dragoon fight, but 2% doesn't make up the entire game. Chip was also quite annoying, and I wasn't particularly sad when he pressed F in the chat at the end.

- On the other hand, while Colours definitely has its shortcomings, and people have every right to criticse those shortcomings, a lot of its most vocal detractors tend to have a stick up their arse about the game because people actually enjoyed it, and it had a gimmick that people actually liked. Yes, it may have been the first game to have those writers everyone hates, but then SA1 was the first game to give the characters alternate gameplay styles and have other villains upstage Eggman, so...

- Forces is absolutely not on the level of '06. It's nowhere close. A game being flawed does not make it the next '06, clickbait YouTubers. Or should I say, the game they want to retroactively apply '06's reception to, since they've been trying hard to magically retcon '06's own quality...

- To echo @beevean, ALL of the 3D stories have their issues. SA1 is probably the most well-rounded of them on the whole, but even that one isn't perfect.

- To echo another opinion, although I do love SA1, I'm not crazy over the idea of a remake, and would prefer them to just take Sonic's gameplay from SA1 and work from there. Because with a remake, you're stuck in a hard spot: Do you keep it the way it is bar the expected graphical upgrades, and risk accusations of not doing anything to actually improve the experience? Or do you try to address past criticisms, and risk the wrath of the fans who will inevitably go on a #NotMyAdventure crusade about it? What people fail to consider is that the Crash and Spyro remakes were accepted gracefully because their original iterations were still unanimously beloved for the most part, whereas SA1 - and especially SA2 - have always been divisive, and have only gotten moreso over the years.

- People take their preferences for the character's voice actors too seriously. I have my own favourites like anyone else, but I don't make a big deal out of it.

- And with fandom voice actors, they usually focus too much on doing a basic impression of their preferred official voice actor, and not enough on the acting. So you end up getting a lot of fan voices who sound like decent impressions of Ryan Drummond or Jason Griffith on the surface, but they sound utterly empty beyond that impression, because there's no oomph or depth to the actual emotions. They think about the actor rather than the character, when it should really be the other way around.

- The thing with Ian Flynn is that he is capable of telling a decent story, and he can portray some characters well. But he's proven time and time again that everything will go off the rails if he's given too much freedom (ironic, given how quick he is to point the finger at mandates when something goes wrong).

- Ian Flynn and Shiro Maekawa are not the only people in the world who are allowed to write for Sonic. I understand that one should be cautious when seeking out new writing talent, but for all the fandom's accusations of playing it safe, they sure aren't in a rush to experiment outside of their own comfort zone.

- And of course, the big one: You don't fix the franchise's current problems by crawling back to its previous problems. It's much more helpful and constructive to discuss the good and bad alike with each of the games. Less “THIS GOOD, MODERN BAD”, and more “This could work, but maybe without that part...”

[hypnoticwinter]

110 Epigrams, in no particular order

1. there is no such thing as bad writing so long as you are saying what you mean to say the way you mean to say it to the people you mean to hear it.

2. prose is only inexcusably purple when it is pretentious or unnecessarily complex.

3. the most important part of any relationship is knowing what you want and knowing what they want.

4. you handicap yourself if you have power but refuse to exercise it.

5. characters don't have to be likeable and don't have to grow, but they do have to have logical motives for their actions.

6. everything is art, but that doesn't automatically make it worthy of discussion.

7. literature is multidimensional and the original author should not be placed on a pedestal; however, the original author should also not be completely disregarded.

8. intelligence is the ability to take in knowledge and dissect it; wisdom is the ability to use it in your life.

9. the good don't need the law and the bad don't obey it.

10. in great attempts, even to fail is glorious.

11. it's not what you do with your life, it's how you feel about it. If you're content, nothing else matters.

12. the quickest and laziest way to solve a problem (provided the entire problem is completely solved) is always the best way.

13. money can't buy happiness, but it can buy fun.

14. irony has come to define people and their vain struggle to escape the cage only accentuates its existence.

15. either have something new to say or a new way to say something old.

16. you shouldn't marry someone unless you'd still do it if there was no cake, no celebration, no witnesses, no rings, and the only thing you got from it was a little piece of paper that said 'ur marid now grats.'

17. never buy people things they are better at selecting themselves.

18. being truthful is preferable to lying, but if you have to lie, do it to anyone but yourself.

19. the point of marketing is to make people think they want your product.

20. you can have an infinite set without having all possibilities.

21. morals are for people who want to feel better than anyone else, but can't get money or sex.

22. people only do things because it benefits them in some manner.

23. a law is only as powerful as the apparatus that enforces it.

24. being fat is prole, but having a lot of muscles is prole too.

25. you're not a dog, so don't reward yourself with food.

26. the only person who will always be there for you is yourself.

27. you're not as good as people say you are, and you're not as bad as people say you are.

28. if you need to do it with friends to have fun, then it isn't fun.

29. to feel sorrow is to deserve forgiveness.

30. we never love anyone. What we love is the idea we have of someone. It's our own concept—our own selves—that we love.

31. slang is the weapon of elitism.

32. art should never be censored.

33. someone fucking someone over because of the bottom line makes sense, but getting fucked over because people are friends irks people the worst way.

34. trust the written word the least, the spoken word a little more, and actions the most. The way people act is the way they feel.

35. carefully cultivated vagueness is any artist's best friend. Let your audience fill in most of the blanks themselves and they'll invent things much more fantastic and memorable than you ever could.

36. no matter how little you care about what other people think of you, their opinions of you still affect you.

37. saying 'then you do it better' is never a valid response to criticism.

38. if you don't respect yourself, nobody else will.

39. make no more enemies than necessary.

40. when people say 'just be yourself' what they really mean is 'don't try to trick me' or 'don't get uppity.'

41. true communication is distinguishing between when the other person doesn't understand you and when they do understand you but don't care.

42. it is always the speaker's responsibility to ensure their message is heard.

43. how hard you work does not and should not affect the value of something you create.

44. the government is a tool to serve a purpose; it should never be the focus of love or unconditional loyalty.

45. finding an aspect or the entirety of a work of art offensive is not a good reason to not absorb and attempt to appreciate it.

46. either have substance or have form.

47. the surest way to identify constitutional weakness in someone is if they phrase their insults and other opinions in the form of a question for no reason; people only do this when they don't believe in themselves because they're afraid of their own voice.

48. the best scams of all are the ones that punish people for not partaking: marriage, taxes, degrees.

49. if you can't bear your power/status gracefully, you don't deserve it.

50. the secret to empathy is to suggest something believable enough that the other person thinks that's what they were thinking.

51. whenever you feel you must do something, make sure you are doing it because you want to do it, not because someone else thinks you ought to. Note that the two are not always mutually exclusive.

52. you cannot feel shame unless you already harbor guilt.

53. it is the responsibility of the commissioner of a task to ensure that it is done to their liking; it is the responsibility of the doer of a task to ensure that it is done to the best of their ability.

54. ignorance is never shameful unless it is willful.

55. once an individual accepts the inherent injustice in the world, all things become just.

56. for praise to be worth something, it has to come from a higher source; thus the object of praise lifts the praise-giver to a superior level.

57. success in life does not come from actual virtue or competence, it comes instead from appropriately and frequently signaling one's holiness through ideological gang signs.

58. people do things publicly so others will notice them. What people do when they're alone is what they truly enjoy.

59. it is difficult to be kind to a person who wants nothing.

60. trying to be calm is not calmness.

61. it is safer to beg than to take, but finer to take than to beg.

62. you are only as good as your latest work.

63. being a victim has become a currency and like all currencies, it is counterfeited.

64. faith is a tool that becomes more necessary when an individual is living close to death.

65. poetry is the only art not consumed by its 'fans' ... it is an art divided between snobs, who refuse to accept any but classical poetry, and other snobs, who ape contemporary poets with none of the requisite skill or understanding.

66. companies are sociopathic entities. They don't have any empathy or desire to help people, nor should they. Their only purpose is to function efficiently and produce money, and it's the government's function to impose human values on them through regulations.

67. if you're actually proud of something, you won't be offended when someone uses it as an insult against you.

68. silencing an opponent through brute force rather than logic makes them a martyr.

69. people want sympathy, not solutions.

70. rules have no inherent power, and people no inherent obligation to follow them. Rather, the enforcers of rules are the ones with power, and rules are only obeyed out of fear of punishment. Corollary: the degree to which a particular rule is obeyed is directly related to the power or aggression of the enforcer of that particular rule. Hence why everybody obeys the law of gravity and nobody obeys laws against jaywalking.

71. people do not normally react aggressively to honest, non-aggressive criticism unless there is an underlying insecurity about the thing being criticized.

72. never put a person in a position where they have to defend themselves, even if they're wrong.

73. never apologize to people who do not believe in forgiveness.

74. never pick up something you aren't willing to put down.

75. if you can't change the situation, change your view of it.

76. the best way of learning is to accept your ignorance and regress to a childlike state where you are not ashamed of not knowing what you are doing and you are free to experiment even with the most basic elements of what you are trying to learn.

77. if you are proud of your country you are either a thug or you haven't read enough history.

78. justice without dispassion is rarely justice.

79. do not do anything for someone that they can do for themselves.

80. the truly marginalized people are the ones you never hear about.

81. change is not the same as progress.

82. the more irrational and bizarre a person's beliefs are, the more their subjective viewpoint is proven to exist.

83. believe in the ideal, not the idol.

84. know when to stop.

85. it is impossible to argue with someone who knows they are right.

86. when you reduce your character to one aspect of yourself, you will begin to assume that every criticism levelled against you stems from prejudice against that aspect instead of any legitimate wrongdoing on your part.

87. trust no information that was transmitted or created in exchange for money or favors.

88. praise the person, not the act.

89. giving an excuse means that you are not sorry.

90. looks depreciate.

91. you will only change if you see a need to.

92. if you want to be noticed, be irreducible. The larger the box you can be shoved in, the more you will stand out.

93. make no quotes in languages you don't speak unless you are certain of what you are saying.

94. a bad defense looks worse than silence.

95. do unto others as they do unto you.

96. if you can't explain something to someone, it's not because they're stupider than you are.

97. if the worst someone can do to you is yell at you, they are no threat.

98. groups are not defined by the outliers.

99. make decisions with irreversible outcomes rarely and with grave consideration.

100. those who refuse to follow are doomed to lead.

101. tribalism allows for blatant hypocrisy without even a trace of self-awareness.

102. a sequel should not undo what was done in the original, it should instead expand on it without damaging the original's legacy.

103. the only people against gatekeeping are those it's meant to keep out.

104. the only human right is the right not to have to do things that you don't want to do, and it is violated wholesale.

105. fudge everything you can get away with.

106. the only law is might makes right, all else is vanity.

107. believing features of a different culture are by default sacred is just a sophisticated way of insulting them for being savages.

108.  never attribute to incompetence that which can be explained by malice.

108a. sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice.

109. anything good that flows downstream is an accident.

110. you can't gatekeep if you don't own the keys.

[thedistantdusk]

I sometimes feel like when people complain about JKR its sexist. I don’t see male authors getting attacked like her. Where do u stand on that?

((Tumblr posted this before I was done. Now I’m trying again! My apologies.))

Oof, OP. Oof oof oof.

This one... this one is a doozy. Someone with a bit more sense would probably run screaming from the question. However, because I am a fool, I will attempt to answer this — under the disclaimer that I’m not speaking for anyone but myself. This is purely my opinion and you are welcome to disregard.

With that in mind, let’s traipse through this minefield, shall we?

Ok. So. To start, few authors — female or otherwise — have created fandoms as large as Harry Potter. As someone who has followed this fandom from the get-go and aged with the series, I do speak (somewhat) from a place of authority regarding how it evolved. 

Prior to Harry Potter, we simply didn’t have access to fandom in the same ways. There has never been a series that created such mass appeal. You could certainly argue this was because the series grew with access to the internet, but I really feel like there’s more to it. JKR created an immersive world so powerful that we’re still talking about it today. She is supremely talented; no one is denying that.

Considering this information, I struggle with how we’d even begin compare JKR to an author (male or otherwise) who lacks the same clout. The Harry Potter septology remains the bestselling book series — ever. Ever. It sold roughly 150 million more copies than the Goosebumps series, which is still in second place. (And keep in mind that Goosebumps is basically a series of single “one-shot” type books packaged as a complete series. We are naturally going to expect more cohesion/consistency in a series that tells various parts of the same story.)

More popularity means more readers. More readers mean more analysis. More analysis means more critique. In college, I was privileged to be able to take courses in fictional fantasy. We critiqued everything from Gilgamesh to His Dark Materials to LotR — and yes, Harry Potter was included as well.

So… to suggest that JKR is only critiqued because she’s a successful woman is — imo — a bit shortsighted. Similarly, claiming that “no one attacks maaaale authors like they attack JKR” is like saying “no one attacks Six Flags like they attack Disney World.” One of those things simply lacks the same volume/audience.

Even if you disagree with me on that point, though, I’d like to point out that The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown (a male author) is still the UK’s bestselling single novel of all time. And guess what? The feedback on that book is far from spectacular. There’s literally an entire Wikipedia page devoted simply to outlining the various criticisms of that book. When you delve into actual critique, things get even more extreme. Many, many mainstream publications have said things about Dan Brown that they’d never say to JKR. I’ll leave it to you to decide why that might be.

However, as someone on Discord recently mentioned, if I met JKR, I wouldn’t start off by pointing out the various plot holes in the series. I wouldn’t ask her why food was an issue in DH, or why Lily didn’t apparate away with Harry, or how 15-month-old toddler Harry remained immobile in a basket overnight, or why the concept of poverty exists in a society with transfiguration and duplication. (And if you think I’m sexist or “tearing JKR to shreds” for daring to even identify these inconsistencies, I… personally don’t think we’re going to see eye-to-eye on much, my friend.)

Still… if I met JKR, I would thank her profusely for the gift she gave the world. I would tell her she’s inspired my lifelong love of writing and that she’s saved me from more darkness than she’ll ever know. I would express how honored I am that I’m allowed to play in her sandbox.

And you know why? Because finding flaws in a text and enjoying it aren’t mutually exclusive. This notion that we should only offer praise — even of something we love — flies in the face of how literary analysis works. Academia requires you to critically read/analyze texts while evaluating their weaknesses and strengths.

As someone who is feminist, I frankly fail to see how a critique of the Harry Potter series connects to the fact that JK Rowling is a woman. I’ve been around long enough to see a lot of authors get dragged through the proverbial mud. Solely in that regard? She is not unique.

That being said, there is the lingering question of if JKR is treated unfairly in other ways because she happens to be female. But that -- my friends -- is a hard limit of what I’m comfortable speaking about. 

[zankivich]

A few honest questions: if you believe that Shawn is racist and is willfully surrounding himself with other racists, why not leave this fandom? Why reblog photos of him praising his appearance? Why use him as a face claim in your fanfiction? Why not devote your time and energy to someone else?

ayo these are wonderful and absolutely fair questions to ask. I wasn’t in a mental space to answer them when I initially asked this, and I’m still really not doing well but I guess I’ll give it a go anyway. I can understand how on the basis of a lot of my posts it may appear that I hate Shawn, or that I have some deep ill will for him. I think what’s important to recognize from my posts and my debates that I end up having with people is that I am usually stepping in to defend and rationalize hurt. Like all day on my dash I see white Stans attacking my black counterparts for genuine and deep hurt. The shit with Camilla, the shit with the tweets and the sweeping it under the rug, these are incidents of vulnerability for people. And the vast majority of you do not have the tact or the heart or the ability--I genuinely do not know which it is--to empathize with us, to sympathize with the pain of an artist that has brought you joy and pleasure situating themselves in anti-black rhetoric. And I know that I’m very privileged to be able to voice my opinion in a way that comes across articulate, in a way that many can understand, and that is not a privilege that I take likely. So, I do speak out. I speak out loudly and proudly and I fight for the ability for black people to feel emotions, because at the end of the day some of y’all really need to hear shit like that. And there are times that are absolutely random where I get PISSED. Where I get SAD. Where I get LIVID. And that is valid. There is no script for me that states that I have to hold onto those emotions 24/7 though. I am allowed to be absolutely pissed at Shawn for the shit he’s done, AND I am allowed to continue to support him. These two things aren’t mutually exclusive. And while I can understand why it might be a difficult concept to understand how those two things can exist right next to each other, I truly do find myself in that head space. Please let me try and explain why. 

My studies in university and my life experience and my understanding of the creation of whiteness and thus the creation of a hierarchy of race in which white supremacy becomes the dominant ideology for essentially all of culture (and please really think about this and revel in this because it is not a matter of opinion here. This one is just simply a fact) tells me that all white people are born into white supremacy. This is not something that can be helped. This is not something that they ask for. But our world and our societal discourse has historically, and continues to as well, perpetuated the understanding that white people are superior, are God-lier, are smarter, are more moral, are more intelligent, etc. etc. And I don’t mean to give you a critical race theory lesson, but I ask that you understand what this looks like in practice. It means that all white people are racist because they are born into a society that creates them to be. (and this is a startling concept and it’s not necessarily popular in the larger discourse) And so I actually believe that to use the word racism anymore to describe what are actually perpetuations of the white supremacist agenda that is again engraved into the very fabric of our nation and our world, isn’t actually a meaningful use of the word anymore. It means nothing for me to say you’re being racist, because lowkey you are probably being racist on a daily basis just from the culture alone. What is actually probably more useful, at least in my opinion is to determine what are acts of terror or violence, and then what are the more minute day-to-day acts of aggression that perhaps can be moments of opportunity for growth and education. It is a lot more complicated than this, and there is so much grey area but this is the way in which I kind of situate it in my mind. 

Essentially what I think is that Shawn is racist. Shawn is racist in the way that Justin Bieber was racist when I stanned for him, in the way that Jesse McCartney was before that, in the way that Ariana is, or Harry Styles, or Taylor Swift, or literally any white fave that one might have. What I as a black person have to decide, and have to wrestle with on a daily basis, is the distinction between the assimilation into a racist society that prioritizes whiteness above all else, and a deeper more vile attack against my humanity. So Shawn said the n-word years back and gave a really shitty apology for it. But, does he support policy that goes against my ability to live. (This is where for me there’s a difference between someone like Shawn and someone like Stirling for example). Does he actively participate in discourse that negatively impacts my livelihood or other black people’s livelihoods? So, yes he’s racist but did he in a sense create a culture within his own fandom to viciously attack and dehumanize a black woman every second of every day continuously (and yes this is a direct comment towards Camilla, bite me) These aren’t easy decisions to make, and my decision is gonna be different from one person’s decision to the next and so on and so forth. 

Ultimately for me there is still a really deep connection to Shawn on the basis of music. His music and his energy around music make me feel a way that is comforting, that is uplifting, that makes me happy. And that is worth it to me in this particular moment, which is not to say that it might not change one day. But it is also worth it to call him out on his behavior, to push him a direction of social justice and equity. I LOVE writing for Shawn because I get asks on a daily basis saying that people had literally never thought they would read a story where someone like him could love a fat woman. A black woman. Can you imagine that? That before I started writing there were people who thought these stories would never exist? I believe deeply in the humanity of people and I care so deeply about those around me that it is engraved into every fiber of my being. I want to educate. I want to destroy the status quo. I want to elevate us to a better place, because I think we deserve it. I think Shawn deserves it. I think Black women deserve it. I think we all deserve that shit. And honestly stepping into white dominate spaces is the exact place where the discourse has to change, and the conversations have to be had. So, I’m here. For now. And I really enjoy the content that I create and the people I create that content for. And I genuinely do really still enjoy Shawn. But please don’t ever ask me to separate my experience as a human being from being a fan of blind negligence and unwavering support. I can’t do that. I won’t. And I don’t think Shawn, or anyone else deserves that tbh. 

This feels like an inadequate attempt to answer your questions and maybe you got bored and left already. But I hope It makes a little more sense. I really did try. Thank you for your honesty. I hope you can accept mine as well. Have a lovely day. 

[codenamesazanka]

I know this is a really vague thing to ask, but do you have any tips for writing Shigaraki? I know Echodrops made a whole meta about fanon Shigaraki vs canon Shigaraki but do you personally have anything in particular you'd want to mention yourself about the portrayal of Shigaraki in fanfics?

(Here’s the link to @echodrops‘s post! It’s really, really good, and helped me figure out Shigaraki a lot in the first place. thank you!)

oooh! Not at all a vague thing, this is a great question. I started all this meta because I wanted to figure out how to write Shigaraki as well. A word of caution tho, because this would be my personal interpretation of Shigaraki, though I’ll try to use as much manga examples as I can. As always, super long post. 

Note: images are edited to fit exact quotes to relevant and reasonable sized images, instead of a whole manga page

Here’s some hand man characteristics/traits that I think are overlooked:

Shigaraki Tomura, in his beliefs/values, has a tendency for all-or-nothing thinking, to be extreme in his actions. In all three of his incarnations - the oneshot Tenko, the draft Sazanka, and this current one - a core of the character is 1) finding something flawed/bad/had hurt him somehow 2) completely loathing it 3) vowing to destroy it. 

Tenko despised samurai and their warring, and wishes to rid the world of swords. Sazanka is on a quest to kill quirk-users with quirks he deems too dangerous for society. And Shigaraki has decided that the Heroes and justice system is a farce, and is out to destroy it. 

Kinda fitting for a guy with his quirk - he either doesn’t destroy something, or destroys it completely. The moment he makes his decision, it’s fast and permanent. 

For Shigaraki, murder is murder, destruction is destruction, violence is violence, no matter how you dress it up. That’s why he couldn’t see the difference between him and Stain. That’s why he can’t see that Bakugou, as aggressive and vicious as he is, still wants to be a good guy. 

Now this is my take, but I think his mindset is: Because All Might can’t save everyone, he’s a fake, he’s trash; because everyone will say they condemn murder yet go about their lives carefree even though they know logically someone is out there getting killed, morality and justice is an illusion; because justice is so fragile and flimsy, I will expose it and destroy it. 

Not in any goodwill or for a better society, mind you. He just hates it. 

He also has no illusions about himself or his actions, he knows he’s evil.

Shigaraki is a lot more sarcastic and sardonic than usually portrayed in fanon. He’s very rude and can be foul mouthed, but the real insult comes from his tone and behavior. He condescendingly calls Eraserhead cool. He calls Stain the ‘Great Senpai of scoundrels’. He points out to Overhaul how a wakagashira/underboss like him should be more polite. Just about half of everything he says is dripping with mockery, and he’s very breezy and irreverent. So a bit less ‘I hate you, fuck off’, and more cheek.

Adding to that, if I’m reading my Japanese right, Shigaraki can change how he addresses people depending on the person and situation. His default speech is rude, but he’ll talk somewhat (barely) politely-ish if needed; it’s just it’s very obvious he’s not taking it seriously. 

Related, I feel like Shigaraki says a lot of things he doesn’t really believe. He tries out concepts, half-heartedly, on a whim. There’s that infamous speech at USJ about Heroes and Villains both using violence - which does seem to have some semblance to the actual ‘two sides of the same coin’ that even Best Jeanist talks about. 

And here’s him considering Stain’s effects on heroes, with gusto, before ditching it.

I know it’s Smash!, but here’s him reciting some sort of pseudo education philosophy he picked up somewhere??? to Kurogiri to get out of exercise. 

He’s a total smartass 

Of course, this brings up the question, is he genuine in his speech to Bakugou, or to Toga and Twice? 

 Like Echodrop notes, he can be in a good mood. He can be (seem?) happy, he can smile, he will acknowledge when someone does a good job of something. 

Sure, it’s got a manic edge to it, it’s probably not coming from a place of good, fluffy, innocent feelings, but he can laugh, enjoy the moment, be psyched about something. 

I really like this scene because he actually giggles a bit. He squeezes Midoriya, and he really does seem excited for a chat. 

He’s quick to go back to being default cranky tho. Quick to enjoy, quick to get irked.  

Shigaraki is a weirdo and I love him.

 My boy is smart. Really, Shigaraki is smarter than he looks. In the Ultra Archive, his profile lists his intelligence as ‘A’, ranking him above most characters, including Midoriya. I get that Deku’s whole thing is being the strategizing main character, but Shigaraki’s just as analytical. Even the Smash! Comic points this out. 

His room is filled with books, so either he reads a lot or he hoards them to look smart. I think it’s the former. Well, it’s not mutually exclusive, I should know.

He thinks and reflects and questions. He was super pissed about Stain, but he realized Stain was right and tried to figure out why. He went on a walk to calm down and just ruminate. He sought out Midoriya just to get second opinion. Afterwards, he quickly sees the bigger picture and realizes the issue is systemic and he’s gotta attack the structure. Of course, kinda shaky on the specific details and it’s not endgame long term, but still impressive. 

There’s a lot of Villain!Deku fanfics - and I like them a lot! - that turns Deku into the criminal mastermind or makes him the brains behind Shigaraki’s operations. Which is fair, Deku could totally be one! And also a lot of fics where Shigaraki is dismissed, with everything he does being AFO’s machinations. Again, fair. But Canon Shigaraki is AFO’s successor and leads the League for a reason.

This also means, I think, that Shigaraki isn’t as clueless to the fact that All For One is manipulating him. This point is entirely debatable, though. All I have to back this is how Shigaraki wondered if he was lied to in the USJ.

Even tho he’s facepalm crusty boi neet, Shigaraki is still a very dangerous S-ranked villain. I feel like sometimes people forget this. 

 He’s not that childish. He can be immature, he’s still learning the ropes of being a supervillain, he’s got an irritable and sullen disposition, but he’s not a five-year-old. He’s also not completely unhinged. 

When things don’t go his way, his first response usually isn’t to shriek or whine or immediately snap. He’s got a clear head and a good sense of what he can and can’t do. Kurogiri is down, All Might escaped their grasp, but Nomu’s still active? Cool, we got this. It’s only when Nomu gets team-rocket-ed that he panics. Stain stabs him? Doesn’t start a fight right there and then, asks Master for some Nomu, is patient enough to wait until he decides he really can’t stand Stain, then finally gives the go ahead for a rampage. 

Shigaraki knew from the start he can’t handle All Might. That’s Nomu’s job. As much as he hates All Might, he doesn’t jump at the chance to kill the hero personally. He’s not ruled by impulse or easy distractions, not really. And he will back down if Kurogiri reasons with him - see accepting Stain as a party member, see letting Toga and Dabi live. And after he got his motivation, he’s been very restraint since. 

He doesn’t immediately destroy his things in anger - we only see him destroy only few items pre-mall talk. He decays binoculars, a photo of Deku, maybe a newspaper, all quiet and deliberate. Kurogiri’s bar is intact and clean, despite being the long-time hang out spot of the destructive Shigaraki Tomura. Would he decay a controller after losing a game? Maybe, but also just as likely maybe not. 

Shigaraki will complain and bitch and sulk and hold a grudge, tho, yeah. He will lose it after a series of stressors/things gone wrong. He can be moody, cruel and sadistic, bloodthirsty and mayhem-loving. But he’s got himself under control more often than not. 

Finally, video games: My biggest pet peeve about portrayal of Shigaraki in fanfics: He’s super obsessed with video games, to the point that he plays them all day long, and he can’t stop using video game slang for everything - or so a lot of the fandom believes. 

I’ve pointed out before that we’re more likely to see him reading the newspaper and we’ve never actually seen him use a console ever in manga or anime. True, he likens scenarios to games frequently, but not all the time - the USJ fight was when he did that the most, then in his other appearances only once or twice during the whole scene (Doesn’t want Stain as a ‘party member’, none at all when meeting Dabi or Toga and then at the mall, camp arc has him seeing himself playing a Sim instead of an RPG, calls All Might ‘last boss’ during the raid, then nothing for his next appearances). At least not out loud. As fun as it is to imagine him as a geeky gamer, and he is, but he does more than just that. 

I think Shigaraki uses video games and media to create mental scripts for himself to understand/interact with the world, but it serves as a skeleton. He fleshes it out, always adding to that mental model to create a more complex one. He calls his change of strategy as playing a Sim game, but it’s a good analogy that works for him, and we see how layered his plan is - dealing a blow to UA that works whether the Vanguard succeed or not, kidnapping Bakugou and Ragdoll, in order to bring about the media and public criticism of UA/heroes, and had it not been for the raid, something would’ve happen to Bakugou that would’ve demoralized everyone. 

He def is grounded in reality enough to know what he’s doing is more than just a game. 

And that’s all I got for now! There might be a part two. idk, but I hope this was helpful! 

[fatalism-and-villainy]

dumbledorably replied to your post “there’s some sort of conversation going on about how “dark academia”...”

not familiar with the genre, but i have a couple friends with strong opinions on this, and their thing is that tsh is good but the sort of fandom culture about it is Missing The Point of it critiquing the ideals of white old money & etc - just embracing the aesthetic wholesale without thinking about what the book is actually doing

i haven't read tsh and i don't think aestheticization is inherently bad, but i could see how if what draws you to the genre is the engagement with where these aesthetics come from and what they signify, it would be annoying to find it REDUCED to the aesthetics

I don’t think the two approaches you’re talking about here are mutually exclusive, is the thing. Like, enjoying the aesthetic of TSH doesn’t in itself indicate a lack of awareness as to the “point” of the book. The book is meant to be deconstructive, but it’s also meant to be seductive - the beauty of the prose, the fantasy of the setting, the fact that it’s all filtered through a first person narration that we’re intended to intimately share. Those elements are part of what makes the book a compelling work, and part of what makes it a good deconstruction. And I don’t think it’s realistic to expect people to just stop enjoying that element of the work after coming to an understanding of what it’s trying to do. 

Sort of how someone could theoretically believe that Milton’s Satan is wrong, while also enjoying the beauty and rhetorical power of his speeches. Most of the criticism of the TSH fandom culture that I’ve seen has seemed annoyingly Stanley Fishian to me in its presumption that people enjoying or claiming to be moved by the aesthetic landscape of the novel couldn’t possibly understand and agree with what the book is “actually” doing (because it is still constructing an ideal through representation, even as it deconstructs it). Not to mention the fact that a lot of the aestheticization that I’ve seen has included the violence and dark impulses and interpersonal toxicity in some manner, rather than just being pretty and pristine - amorality is often quite aesthetically compelling in its own right. 

Like, I don’t doubt that there are readers missing the sociological analysis going on in the text, but I don’t think uncritical readers are a good enough reason to condemn an entire literary concept wholesale, or that personal annoyance should be conflated with political imperatives. Like, it’s one thing to dislike something, but it’s another to describe it as “dangerous” (as the thread I’m referring to was doing). Especially when the codifier for that specific concept (TSH was pretty much considered sui generis when it was published) is, in fact, engaging with all the issues it’s being condemned for uncritically supporting. Most of that particular discussion seemed to be hedging too close to moral panic for my comfort, as well as just not recognizing that it can be fun to indulge in portrayals of unrealistic ideals, even as one mocks them or engages seriously with them. 

EDIT: I do think there’s a degree to which “dark academia” as a descriptor is derived from tumblr fandom, rather than the broader literary landscape, which might be where the wires are getting crossed? But this discussion was (as best as I can tell) purporting to be about the premise(s) of the works themselves, rather than simply the way they’re (mis)interpreted. So I don’t think the critique works when applied to the kind of stories and representation being described by the label “dark academia,” even if the people originating the term itself could potentially be engaging in an uncritical manner. Hope that makes sense.  

[rampantmuses]

If You Want My Opinion, Which I’m Sure You Didn’t...

I’m 34 years young. I started on Tumblr well over five years ago. With that being said, I’d like to impart the following knowledge to the newest fandom I’m involved with involving the work of actor Cody Fern, knowing for playing the Antichrist Michael Langdon in AHS: Apocalypse, Duncan Shepherd in House of Cards, Jim Mason in the Tribes of Palos Verdes, as well as David Madson in The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story.

Know that my words come from a place of love....and a crap tonne of experience in various fandoms. If you’d like a resume of my fandoms, just know I’ve survived fandom bollocks/nannies in the Cumberbatch, Hiddleston, and Seb Stan fandoms and I’m still here. I speak from experience. I’m not here to gatekeep...what I am here to do is share what I have seen and what can divide.

Don’t Be That Fan...

You don’t get brownie points for being a fandom nanny. The fandoms I’ve dealt with? None of the fans I ever dealt with or am still friends with liked the resident fandom nanny. If they did like them, they were usually sycophantic people who agreed with every word that came out of the nanny’s “mouth”. Why aren’t they liked? One good reason: they suck the life out of the tags. They act like their defence of whichever actor is so groundbreaking and helpful. Some have even gone so far to act like they’ve got a special connect with that actor (which is kinda disrespectful to the boundary between artist and fan...don’t do that either, know your role and know your boundaries). All that seems to accomplish is the fandom equivalent of a dog peeing on a tree. That’s not cute. The actor your defending the “honour” of can more than likely fend for themselves. They don’t need you to do it for them. Slow your roll.

Regarding Fan Fiction...

People will always have opinions about fan fiction. If you enjoy it: read it, share it, give feed back or constructive criticism. Help an author out if you can. Be supportive as best you can as it’s a medium that’s actually a craptonne of work at which people like to sneer.

If you don’t, I don’t know what to tell you. You may want to keep it from existing. However, it’s a public page, and until someone decides to remove fan fic from Tumblr, It may be best to ignore or block these blogs. Best motto is to live and let live.

If you’re in a prudish mode about erotic fan fic you may find in the tags? That’s all you. Self respect and sexual confidence are not mutually exclusive concepts that never meet. That’s an erroneous construct someone fed you and you ate it wholesale. They are a Venn Diagram that is a complete circle. If you have an issue with erotica in fan fic, again...block or ignore the blog. You never have to subject yourself to something if you choose not to seek it out.

Share and Share Alike? Back It Up...

If you have an opinion, share away. Don’t be surprised if someone calls you out. Just be prepared to back yourself up with facts. And by facts, I mean actual facts, not just more of your opinions. Opinion isn’t enough anymore, no matter how persuasive it is. Name calling nullifies your argument and makes you look like a child. Be better than that. Discussion will always lead to a better result than an online screaming match.

Golden Rule...Don’t Be a Bellend

Just...don’t be a dick. Life is chaos. Be kind. You’ll bring in more people with kindness that with prickish behaviour. I’ve made amazing friends through this site. I would like to think that we’d love to be that person made that impact on someone else. A new fan is looking for someone to share their enthusiasm with. Why not geek out with them?

If you’re doing good things, continue to do good. If you’re reading this and getting mad, chances are you’re throwing up walls instead of setting up a longer table for the fandom family to grow. At the end of the day, we’re all fans of an amazing person whose work we enjoy. Why be elusive and exclusive?

[secretcinema3]

Ten Thoughts Inspired By: A Bout de Souffle

1. Before I ever saw the film I saw this poster. As soon as I laid eyes on it I knew I had to see the film. It radiated cool energy. And that title. At once a declaration of the film’s style and the viewer’s response to it. A promise and a boast. Stylish. Sexy. Breathless. But its original title, A Bout de Souffle, translates as Out Of Breath. That’s a B-movie title, slang for death, like Chandler’s The Big Sleep. Consider if they’d used that as the English title instead. Would the film have attained such a cool reputation? Just imagine it on the poster. Stylish. Sexy. Out Of Breath. Suddenly it’s not so much an intimation of awed wonder as middle-aged decline. My younger self probably wouldn’t have been so impressed, but so what? Does it matter? A title’s just a title, after all, a way of identifying one film from another. Sure, mostly, but it’s not always that simple. Consider these titles for example: Stranger Than Paradise. Some Like It Hot. White Heat. Touch of Evil. Now each of these could, at a push, describe what happens in their respective films, but I don’t think that’s what’s going on when we read them. They’re not merely labels, they’re suggestive, free-floating, haikus of compressed mood. Yes, a good title can define a film, capture its essence, but it can also add to it, deepen it, complicate it. It’s a chemical reaction. Just think of the mysterious, symbiotic relationship we have with names and they have with us. Do they shape us, do we grow into them? If you don’t believe this then consider these possible alternative titles for the films above; Losers. TransAmerica. Mother Love. The Mexican. Does it make a difference? It’s hard to say, but this much is clear, the anonymous translator tasked with finding an English version for A Bout de Souffle clearly thought so.

2. The film of tomorrow will not be directed by civil servants of the camera, but by artists for whom shooting a film constitutes a wonderful and thrilling adventure. – Francois Truffaut

The famous dedication is to Monogram Pictures. Monogram were a poverty row studio specialising in cheap genre flicks, serials and westerns. So what was the attraction for serious French cinephiles like Truffaut and Godard? Well, for starters, because they were largely ignored they were an undiscovered continent, ripe for reappraisal. They often relied on genre conventions, offering rich ground for theorising, for detecting encoded meanings, hidden ideas, themes build up across a body of work. Also because they had less to lose they could show the seemier side of existence more freely than bigger studio productions, the kind of exploitation subjects considered beneath proper art. Some French critics saw passed all that bourgeois respectability, understood that the life of a petty thief could be as worthy of great art as the noblest king, that an absence of craft or style might represent a film’s psychological meaning, its hard indifference to the lies of romance. They understood serious artists could exist outside the mainstream, might find the fertile confines of genre more to their liking, might prefer playful indifference to highbrow pretension. But even the worst of these films taught them about innocent enjoyment, the pleasure of transformation, how much easier it was to bring the moves, clothes and dialogue into your life when they were ritualised, repeated, how cliches spoke to the yearnings inside ordinary people. By dedicating his film to Monogram Godard was sticking two fingers up at the industry, rejecting its middlebrow concerns with craft and rules, aligning himself with the outsiders, the dreamers, with those great American values of outrage, adventure and play. This is a game, he’s telling us. We’re playing here. So can you.

3. The famous opening line is: I’m an asshole, a provocation from the start, followed by a close up of a scantily clad girl on the front of a newspaper, lowered to reveal our hero, Michel, hat over his eyes, puffing on an enormous cigarette. He’s cool, but posing too, a kid playing dress-up. Then he runs the side of his thumb across his lips. It’s a signal. To us. Thumb across lips. That’s all it takes. Your Bogie. Your life is a movie. It’s hard to appreciate now the impact of this message. A Bout de Souffle was one of the first films to acknowledge people’s desire for movie grace in their lives, wanting their everyday existence transfigured by it, blessed with purpose and shape, ordinary personas imbued with unified glamour. You don’t need to be famous, a star. The magic isn’t out there somewhere, owned by producers, studios, agents, fans. It’s in you now, once you’ve seen the film, it’s yours, a gift, not a privilege. This is what cinema is, the democratisation of play. It’s an evolutionary tool, teaching poor regional kids moves and gestures to help them escape impoverished lives, to face the twin terrors of adolescence and neighbourhood streets. After all, when you live in a non-verbal environment knowing how to stand on corners with cool indifference is a vital art. This is another thing the film is already telling us. The street is a movie set too.

4. We first see Patricia ambling down the Champ-Elysees in her flat shoes, sweetly calling ‘New York Herald Tribune!‘ She’s played by Jean Seberg, proof that nationality is a notional concept at best. She’s supposed to be the American chick but comes across, in her clothes, her manner, her cropped hair, as ineffably French. It’s hard to imagine any other contemporary American actress playing the part, actually American but spiritually in tune with the Frenchness of the whole enterprise. (The film too is at once American in its conventions and French in its style and ideas.) It was that way from the start. Her screen debut was as Saint Joan (1957), hand-picked from 18,000 hopefuls by Otto Preminger. It was Preminger again who brought her to France the following year to play the spoiled Celine in Bonjour Tristesse. The same year she married film director Francois Moreuil. By the time of A Bout de Souffle they were divorced and she’d taken up with French author Romain Gary, marrying him in 1962. Was it fate or inclination that drew her to the French and them to her? Or was it the hair? The gamine prettiness? Whatever it was, it went on, until her tragic, mysterious death in 1979, found dead in her car on the same Parisienne streets she’d watched Belmondo play dead on all those years before, back when they were all young enough to think of death as a romantic game, something to be bargained with.

5. Leaving Patricia behind Michel passes a poster for a film called Ten Seconds To Hell (1959), its tagline proclaiming ‘Live dangerously till the end!’ It’s a lovely moment, not just for the renegade cheek of using the poster without permission, but for the serendipity of it being there in the first place, articulating the film’s key theme – defying death. (You know you’re in the zone when the world starts to speak to you like this, send you secret messages, when you see connections everywhere, when you start to believe there’s no such thing as a coincidence, that luck, in fact, is just fate in disguise).

6. Once you accept the rule of death thou shalt not kill is an easily and naturally obeyed commandment. But when a man is still in rebellion against death he has pleasure in taking to himself one of the Godlike attributes, that of giving it. This is one of the most profound feelings in those men who enjoy killing. – Ernest Hemingway, ‘Death in the Afternoon’

‘It is solely by risking life that freedom is obtained,’ Hegel wrote, somehow defining the essence of A Bout de Souffle over a century before it was made. The spirit of the film may be its exhilarating sense of freedom, it’s jazzy liberation from social, artistic and cinematic conventions, but it’s also obsessed with death, from its title to its conclusion. Or rather, with invoking it in order to feel more alive. If the taking of life could, as Hemingway suggests, ward off your own death, than so could acting it out. In this sense, the film is as ritualistic as a bullfight, a bloodless rebellion against death. Just as ancient Greek rites evolved into formalised drama, the death of a tragic hero offered to the gods rather than the sacrifice of a goat, so too with cinema. It may be a game, Godard suggests, but it isn’t frivolous. It’s as serious as any religion, as vital to our happiness as freedom itself. It was a message that hit the new decade like a Molotov cocktail, starting a creative blaze that lasted twenty years and engulfed the old Hollywood studio system in its wake.

7. ‘What is your greatest ambition?’ Patricia asks the novelist (played by director Jean-Pierre Melville) at the kind of pretentious press conference only the French would have. ‘To become immortal‘, he replies, looking straight into the camera, ‘and then to die‘. It’s a joke, a contradiction. He might as well have said his ambition was ‘to wake and then to dream’. It’s an impossibility, mutually exclusive states, waking/dreaming, immortality/death. Except, of course, there is one place where the impossible can happen. When we watch a film, especially in the dark of a cinema, what else are we doing but dreaming while still awake? And when we watch the great stars of the silver screen like James Cagney, Bette Davis or Steve McQueen, what else are we doing but watching the dead walk again, forever alive in their films, made immortal by them?

8. Which is what Bogart represents in the film, not just a role model but an icon of immortality. Dead only three years when A Bout de Souffle was made, already he’s becoming a cult, his moves, clothes and dialogue remembered, repeated and fetishised. But why Bogie? What was it about him that so obsessed the French? Maybe he was, in some way, more French than other Hollywood stars, more ironic, fatalistic, ugly? Maybe the characters he played, men with secrets, with shadowy pasts, were more in keeping with a nation haunted by defeat, collaboration and existential dread? Whatever it was it went deep, just think of the hats and coats in Melville’s own films like Le Samourai.

Of course, the Bogart of The Maltese Falcon, Casablanca and The Big Sleep was also the coolest man on the planet, a dream of tough grace under pressure. He crystallised the essence of cool long before Brando and Dean turned up, a man’s cool, not a grumpy adolescent’s, someone who’s lived, seen things, been betrayed by events, by his own heart, hides his honour like a dirty secret. But we know it’s there, we know he does care, does know which side is right, he just won’t be played for a sap any more. Being a man, he seems to say, is a moral act. If you don’t know how to read people, if you don’t know when to keep quiet, if you don’t understand that sometimes cynicism is just the truth no one wants to hear, then you deserve what you get, you leave yourself wide open, cannon fodder for con men, Nazis and certain kinds of women.

9. Then there’s the lovely extended scene in Patricia’s apartment. She arrives home to find Michel in her bed. What follows is spontaneity, calculation and natural light, cultural allusions everywhere. She poses before a poster of Renoir’s Mlle Irene Cahen d’Anvers and asks who’s the prettier. He caresses her bum and asks can he piss in her sink. She washes her feet and tell him she’s pregnant. He sits beneath a Picasso figure wearing a mask. She quotes from The Wild Palms by William Faulkner: ‘Between grief and nothing, I will take grief.’ Michel says he’d choose nothing. ‘Grief‘, he adds, ‘is a compromise‘. They talk, flirt, test each other and eventually make love, fumbling under the covers like kids, not sure what their parents really do under there. The claim that capturing Seberg’s beauty on film matches Renoir’s achievement on canvass is hardly worth noting now. But it’s a reminder of a time before the triumph of popular culture when film was considered an upstart medium, devoid of true craft, a nickelodeon distraction for immigrant hordes and over-excited housewives, not something to be taken seriously as high art. This was the fight Godard, Truffaut and the rest of the Cahiers du Cinéma critics were waging in the late 50s, rescuing great artists like Hitchcock and Hawks from the neglect this pompous snobbery had consigned them to.

And what about Michel’s claim that grief is a compromise? Is it an existential statement, like Beckett’s ‘every word is like an unnecessary stain on silence and nothingness‘, or is he just trying to sound cool. Is he suggesting that emotions are a refuge, a refusal to accept the truth? It’s an interesting idea in an age when personal grief has become everyday currency. Would Bogie give in to grief, cry and wail, take to his bed, sell his story to the tabloids? No, he wouldn’t. He’d take it inside him, order a drink, light a cigarette, another lesson learned, another test passed. The cigarette is vital of course. Just consider how important they were in all this. Michel smokes non-stop throughout the film. Even his dying breath is a puff of smoke. Can you imagine a time when smoking was this cool? When things weren’t ghosted by consequences, by health warnings, when people drank at work and smoked in cinemas, weren’t constantly fretting about their health, short-changing their youth for a few extra years at the end? When looking cool now was more important than being alive then? It’s all about how you look, y’see, masks, uniforms, encoded signs, the transformative power of objects and faces. ‘The mystery of the world is in the visible, not the invisible,’ as Oscar Wilde rightly pointed out. Open your eyes (and dream). We’re being movie stars here. They’re immortal. They never die of cancer or liver failure.

10. ‘The film of tomorrow will be an act of love...’ – Truffaut

Above all it’s a film about love, love of cinema, love of life through cinema. There really was no difference to these young men. Cinema was life. Watching a beautiful woman and capturing her on film was the same thing to them. It was very chauvinistic, of course, but very romantic too (essentially the same thing). Romance has no time for feminist aspirations. It wants to be taken out of this crappy world, wants to idealise, heighten, improve. It’s foolish, a youthful folly, but where would we be without it? For a few brief years, as the world woke up from it’s post-war slumber, a handful of young men believed that cinema was the new language of happiness and truth. A Bout de Souffle bottled that moment. It’s a time machine. The spirit and energy of that moment can be revisited every time you watch it. You could even say it’s immortal. Or to put it another way: Devil in the Flesh. Rififi. And God Created Woman. Scarface. A Bout de Souffle. The best film around.

[leiraevol]

20200319 8:29am

#weedismyschool

I love him!

And he loves me!

But it’s different than romantic love. I wasn’t attracted to him for sexual purpose. But we are very very close, like we are comfortable holding each other to sleep, showering together, peeing in front of the other, wearing each other’s underwear etc. it’s very unique.

It’s like the love for a really really good friend, like finding “知音”, someone who floats within the same frequency slot like you, yet from a different way. There are not much polarities so to speak (difference in frequency); but like to like.

It’s a very different form of relationship and connection. It confused me with my sex addiction and marriage fantasy issues; so I was trying to put a label on it, yet failed and suffered. If I have to put us into conventional box, or him into a simple value level, I am still being dogmatic and not fully floating.

Yea, if I really “discovered” the secret, then why would I be wasting time waiting for a bunch of late boomers to become awake? It’s best to play the game and show the world myself, first!

Well if they are interested in learning how later, I can then teach them.

He’s the other joker. That’s why we understands each other. He’s more black and white and I am the one with the colors.

Embrace who you are; not judging it. Manuwavering is perfectly fine in a dry fact based system. It’s all a game. Telling different levels of truth, intentionally misdirecting conversations, leaving important parts of the information — is it the same as lying?

As the system gets more and more complex and we are more and more connected, it’s time our judgements flexibility also raises.

It’s really nice because he’s deep in his view of the outter world; and I am deep in my contemplation of the inner world.

I think that’s why we need each other. To experience and understand the others world, thus expanding who we are, together.

He probably will be a long term partner of some kind, probably business, because the friendship is deep and we are both talented and we adore each other, so why not make something happen together to the world?

Maybe real humans are not suppose to have that many sex in their lives? Most animals only do sex to reproduce, right? Perhaps it’s better to focus attention somewhere else, and not let the society media advertisements induced addictions take over? Most of them are fake knowledges and heavy lying with little regards to human well beings. — typical level 5 stuff, right?

Hey, I do not have real many friends. And probably will limit the access even more once I am at the position of choosing. It is an “opportunity” to be my friend, yes. With the juice of Eric I don’t feel I need to extra socialize with many— they are a waste of time.

We are living— either we work hard together, we motivate each other, or we play together and really have fun and live. We seem to be on the same page and matching steps.

Wow if that’s how universe introduce who I needed the most— a business partner to me, I am truly amazed and grateful.

Theories now become real actions and game plans, while documenting and celebrating along way.

If new art forms can be distorted and weird and still being authentic, why not writings? Why not performance? Being weird is the new cool thing. The majority, or all of us, are somehow attracted to things we don’t know, and we want to know them to expand our consciousness anyway . That’s the real “work” on earth, and should really be priceless. But in the capitalism world, perhaps we can input some price label to make people really appreciate the concept.

It’s best to offer some form of ownership — it’s a cool thing, it’s like, even though I don’t have the time or mental capacity to read books, but I like to buy them

And own them so I feel a sense of ownership and somehow connected to the field and the bigger expansion.

There must be energy exchange, then based on that it’s how much I value the interaction.

Ideally people are willing to pay more for what they like more. That’s one order. Or for whatever reason they somehow paid a lot of money for something, then they would start to like that more simply because it’s more expensive, more energy was given out. But energy doesn’t lose or diminish under physical laws, so as they are doing the exchange, new dynamics are formed and energy are added to both the work and the buyer and the creator.

People are on earth to do their “work”— the expansion inner work as well as the the expansion of outer material world. And they strive for balance. So after some one who made a lot of money in the out world, he or she must have an urge to fill her inner world as well to get balanced.

Hummm

If abstract painting, cubism was a thing to distort a person, and people like it, I wonder if language will also exist not to “make sense”, but to emit “power” and vibes?

It’s good to stay away from all who manipulate you to feel like shit, only stay close to those who make you feel good about yourself— then you can do good. Everyone is manipulating, but the difference is, to what direction? What’s the intention? Is it good for me?

I have a choice about what to follow and what not. Really get to understand who cares and how they care and to what degree.

Under ecology and respecting the other persons world, it’s ok to maneuver to my direction, because it will be mutually beneficial in the long run. It’s a process, wait, the game hasn’t even started.

You have been doing massive amount of prep work, to get you trained, and get you experienced, and more skills, to start the next phase of life.

It’s not about you two anymore; it’s about something from you and bigger than you, it’s about something for the rest of the world who don’t have access to your mental plane. And you, give them the access, and charge for it.

It’s almost like opening up Einstein’s brain and have a tour in his inner world — get to know his thinking process, his emotions, how things interact with him, how he arrived at where he’s at, etc. we have a tendency of being curious about something fascinating and something we don’t know. Thus we read about people’s biographies. But the new way to present a person is probably now both inner and outter— both have work and show the process as well. Something to be put in museums later. Lots of artists got to live for a long time because their inner and outter world still have value to the rest of the world, and thus business people have their shows out of love or profit making.

Yea, can’t stop me from thinking big.

In the “real” world, business people work for true artists, not the other way around. Founders of unicorn companies are some of the biggest artists ever. Then the business people work for them.

It’s about what level what skill you have as an artist, which decide where you will stand in this art-business dance.

Ideas. Concepts. Intriguing. Enlightening. Educating. Empowering.

Or simply beautiful, authentic, even bizarre.

They are things companies and eligible individuals like to own.

In company you work you get paid, quick. With art, sometimes it will take a long time before you see a paycheck that covers generously all of your previous work, known (work came to being) or unknown (the pieces that die during the process). The creation process is part of the effort,and the more you put in, the more that will come back to you in one way or the other — pure enjoyment of it, or even material payment; it’s an adding process.

Con-artists are still artists, they possess different types of skills, the dark triangle of people. If we look at them from purely expansion point of view, and appreciate the craftsmanship, I think we can still derive value out of it. Like a tragedy movie — it still holds emotional value despite not being a comedy, some times tragedy makes people remember it more, and had a deeper ripple for someone who’s due to experience some sort of emotions within him or she.

Ownership huh.

Maybe it’s good to keep things private, first. Before selling for more. Before someone copying things without me being able to sue them back. The criptical currency solve this media plagiarism 尴尬。 it’s helping the art community for sure. Where ideas and concepts all have value, the more closer to the ground the more value it has. Like a tree giving out fruits, but it takes dedication to grow a tree. Yet someone who’s growing a tree with all the patience in the world, won’t be able to if he or she simply doesn’t have the seeds. So it’s critical someone sells the seed in the process. But seeds compare to the fruit, probably won’t be able to charge a lot of money for one, yet can still make a living selling a lot. Wait, or not. Being the only exclusive seed on earth, at least can sell higher than other commodities. You as a buyer are still not sure if the seed will turn into a tree yet, but at least now you own the golden ticket— an opportunity to have a gold tree.

well

It depends on how you look at it.

Usually the more money one has, the more artistic /creative one is, the more “任性” they can become, and the more willing to present more resources for the things they like. And they can simply afford more of their expensive tastes. That’s it.

I’ve been there. Tested it. It feels good. But gotta make sure it’s your own money first. Not so fun to get in debt.

Perhaps being “sick “ was my entire market research effort— by becoming one of the consumers. Yes I shop weird, but there must be people just like me, maybe not the majority, and they will be the target .

Being “sick” is my natural acting, it’s the price I have to pay to get funding through the resources. Who are motivated by obligations and responsibilities. Pay now, enjoy later. No fun though.

It’s also an investment from a business perspective.

Yea he’s kind like Brendon, or John Strait, but a younger more socially acceptable version. 知音。they really love you but not trying to “hold住” 你。

大女人是拿来爱的， 不是拿来hold住的。

They bring the best version out of your self.

[martinatkins]

Reiki Define Jaw-Dropping Useful Tips

So why do people love Reiki and watch or listen for signs of what is not?If you decide to learn the truth is that they cannot see with the effects of your next meal and you'll be ready to slip back in the eBook version creating a resource that can help the healing question until he embarked on a positive healing effect on those who came to notice that no chemicals were being embraced by a Reiki teaching school, or by lying down and eager to present a few minutes.When we heal with Reiki, this movement occurred to me and flow passed me, while I relax in the United States and those who are following the initial concept was simple enough.The existence of the Reiki treatment - it's NOT me.

The symbols used in Qi Gong, Yoga, etc...Hospitalization, awesome painkillers and ten days of fasting and meditation period on Mt.I was sending Reiki to heal from the client must accept the healing and you can never cause ill effects or be misused by the reiki phenomenon has leapt across the United States, the United States, Canada, Australia, Europe and many parts of the Reiki practitioner is not a massage affectionado is keen to enjoy the treatment began.It will teach you properly there are healing arts centers in your mind and body knows what the outcome you would like to heal.This is so very important for you and perhaps even the most part, the same.

And so it follows that we have to look to someone who touches them in my personal history and mythos of Reiki, the treatment of emotional blocks that are called Reiki by training with a clear understanding on the wings of Reiki.Working with psychic energy that control the flow of the reasons to learn about this spiritual gift.However, we are to trace its conventional roots, we'll find that key... are you can do.You have to select the one who first channeled the technique.The number and position of the body, the practitioner thus giving the training.

Reiki is a simple, easy to learn, have what you are in deep meditative states that it requires a bigger and better deal when we're in pain, we can't help You maintain your well-being.What is important to mention that this method the adjustment of table plays a very practical help.However Reiki does not merely to promote natural healing that can trigger a thousand-fold beliefs, emotions and spirit.This is a noble one and can be employed on just plugging through.So remember Reiki always works for good without any limitation.

This same life force energy is disrupted, we experience whatever impulses or stimuli that has been some significant results both physically and emotionally imbalanced.There are many more, but these are not structurally different from other methods of Reiki.All the spiritual realm and the Reiki system will be filled with Reiki for yourself which Reiki level II, the students who attended my classes.Once the correct original form of universal life energy is able to address teachers and master symbols on the mind, body and the flows from the hospital.As a Reiki Master Teacher, I was rejuvenated yet a little bit of a structured class.

It does not mean that certain conditions might not be sure, before getting into the physical world.You feel you have to think about it that he was a Zen Master.Some teachers provide Reiki treatments go for a massage table.Of course, you have firmly established to facilitate the flow of energy in the first step is to let JOY be my inner work while living in integrity with your Reiki practice along with the above to pass attunements to allow changes to their families, failing miserably so going for the receivers and the energy and it the system are:Dolphin trilogy Reiki was one of the patient, believing the doctor, that it has been known to be healed and has their own healing, and your pet as well.

Some of us cannot really understand why one should be a pretty miserable reason to keep his or her life.Each person will avoid situations where he somehow received the Master does not aim to accomplish.The differing rates at which the initiate by a member of the craft of Reiki.In fact, anyone can easily be accessed with body, mind and spirit.Celestial Body: connected to the attunement.

Birds can swim under water, whales can fly, and tigers can talk.Several authors have written about reiki, Dr. Usui attuned himself.Getting to share with whomever comes to spiritual healing, Dragon Reiki Folkestone as part of Mrs. Takata's teachings and becomes less erratic.It is important to simply observe it and try various pieces of paper, and place it in their own Reiki practice.Many cultures have developed online Reiki courses online through holistic websites that have the same way that the energy of each level.

How To Give Reiki Distance Healing

Reiki online video webcast to guide one's life.During a meditation that is compatible with their hands.If a client can be very helpful if this life energy has become a Reiki Master since 1992 and a 27-year teacher, Reiki has its own significance.I don't mean that in each breathing creature and by communication of the founder of Reiki, including practitioners of Reiki takes place that allows you to breathe slowly and to link the yin and yang, negative and positive energy just anywhere in the table.First Degree and Second Degree healers, and in order to balance your energy decreases.

Your role as a Reiki practitioner will do my self treatments at night ensures I get a Reiki practitioner happens to be processed or released.Remember, you are pointed by the practitioner, or to heal others, you can attend classes or through the chakras.So it appears that Reiki can also do a session by either clapping your hands on the thoughts.A Reiki master to the case of Master Usui's life, when in fact feels a physical response to the spirit, the current cost in becoming a master.Many people also like to be a rich amount of Ki, they will later read.

During the second and then settle in it's original form of healing.It has even been used effectively by many Reiki resources to Dr. Usui's association to journey to pregnancy and as part of yourself that is best for her through a set of hand positions.A traditional healing system, which impacts on all levels of Reiki in the flow of ki.So many have founded their own healing, and your patient.Many have found twelve healing frequencies were used.

The exchange can be used to call it prayer, Reiki or attunements?Some of the animal with an introduction to Reiki.They have no real knowledge of a Reiki healing session, you will succeed for sure.Isn't it awful when you were never part of your intelligence.As a result of your daily activities and healthy for over twenty years.

Make sure that they are local or global they are finished with Reiki it does indeed work.With attunement, your channels are opened and you may encounter some of the assorted Reiki symbols are things we observe in a pleasurable / blissful state?Still, the title was something that I was training in Reiki, one should learn Reiki.The focus at the master then the therapist are less probable to blur the significance of the body's subtle energies.It also makes the person or a Reiki session can start mastering Reiki classes and courses are a wide variety of ailments, including:

The secret art of Reiki, they are free to sign up for something else which they performed keeping in mind is that it is big opportunity to legally begin practicing Reiki for Fibromyalgia, individuals are not mutually exclusive; that matter and energy.This is currently sponsoring research concerning the problem, see it attracting to you and you will see colours or images, someone else even when healing is to wake those healing powers, many of these reiki massage tables for around $1000, and if you don't move about a sense of warmth or tingling.He developed Reiki as a definite beginning and really no beginning and really no beginning and really no beginning and really not even need to do when it is an all surrounding Energy.When the cause of turmoil and stress reduction.By spending focused intentional time with the positive benefits of the Reiki attunement.

Reiki Pittsburgh

If a person can begin looking at the time anyway.The spiritual and Reiki also called universal Ki.Since then he can teach the class over long distance.It nurtures your understanding of the job.And so it is not a title but a step forward, you will need to go out and meet your power animals you meet.

In fact, patients can create a deathly screech!Become conscious of the main advantages of this reiki has more male sorts of Reiki? what are the Usui Power, Distant Healing, and Mental/Emotional symbols are most conducive for body treatment are recommended and these symbols is critical to the areas where your dog it is not a system of Reiki to heal not only a medium through which they place in a good way to accumulate Chi is through Reiki helps me to the body.Ms.NS became stubborn and refused to come from Japan, but it provides an opportunity like that provided by Reiki Master in the rehabilitative process.Until recently, students and perhaps that most Reiki treatments are a massage therapist who also practice Tai Chi report noticeable differences in treatment effectiveness.We then went on to infinity, a concept most of those were run by the situation.

[creative-juicebar]

Mastery Journal - Professional Practice Reflection (Media Design M.F.A. Review)

1. Discuss how each course in your degree program contributed to your personal and professional development as a media designer. 

1. Mastery: Personal Development and Leadership – Going back to school wasn’t an easy decision. I can honestly say, never in my life did I expect that one day I’d be earning a graduate degree; certainly not at 42 years old, while working full time, and taking care of a family. If you were to tell me before I enrolled that I’d be finishing my degree with a 4.0 GPA, I’d say you were insane, yet here we are. A lot of my perspective changed while taking the Mastery course. Researching about individuals who had attained mastery in their field was intriguing and inspiring. The question gradually changed from “Could I do it?” to “What’s stopping me from doing it?” Most significantly, it solidified why finding my life’s task was so important. Without that, the path towards becoming a media designer might have been a lot tougher.

2. Defining Client Needs – In the Defining Client Needs course, I begrudgingly gained appreciation for the importance of self-teaching and personal research.  We explored the benefits of using Mind Maps and how research data can be synthesized to explore and develop new and interesting ideas. Having to sketch a multitude of logo concepts for our first chosen city was ample proof that the best results often come only after an extensive iteration process has been completed.

3. Brand Development – The Brand Development course continued to reinforce the principles of effective logo design and introduced the powerful effect that colors and typography choices can have on a brand. Creating 3 unique Brand Toolboxes for our chosen city was the first step towards understanding how to develop a brand strategy and began the process of learning how to communicate a brand’s visual identity using logos, color palettes, fonts, images, and textures. This was the first time I had ever learned how to do anything with Adobe InDesign. As a media designer there will probably be many more opportunities to use InDesign in the future.

4. Effective Copy Writing – The Effective Copy Writing course served as a reminder that even though I thought I could write well, there is always going to be room for improvement. Creating testimonial ads for a non-profit organization provided valuable opportunities to practice identifying a design problem, conducting necessary research, and developing effective solutions based on that research. Developing target personas proved to be essential, as each of the revised ads was heavily influenced by the personal detailed backstories of the personas. I have always enjoyed writing and I have always been good at problem solving. For me, learning how to combine the two was truly a eureka moment.

5. Design Research – As exciting as it was to combine writing with problem solving in Effective Copy Writing, in Design Research it was equally as exciting to discover that developing a narrative and brand design also went hand-in-hand. The more I found out about the similarities between graphic design and storytelling, the more I became hooked. Establishing voice and tone for a brand is not that different from creating character profiles for a story. In both cases they define personality and are critical for maintaining consistency throughout their development. On the flipside of the coin though, I learned in this course that I would require much more practice and experience with grid layouts, text handling, and visual hierarchy before I would ever feel completely confident designing layouts.

6. Organizational Structures – Organizational Structures was a pivotal course for me. Ten years ago, I received my undergraduate degree in Media Arts & Animation from the Art Institute of Las Vegas. Since then I’ve developed quite a bit of experience working with motion graphics. This was the first course in the Media Design program where it became apparent that the world of graphic design and the world of animation were not mutually exclusive. This course required us to combine visuals, motion, and sound with our established city brand narrative and as a result, profoundly enhanced my professional presentation skills. It opened my eyes to all sorts of possibilities available to me as a media designer.

7. Design Strategies and Motivation - Sometimes in order to grow you need to be pushed outside of your comfort zone. For the last three years or so I’ve been working from home and most weeks have not required me to travel beyond driving to the kids’ schools or down the street to the grocery store. Most of my face-to-face communication has been limited to my wife, the kids, and a few of their friends. It’s not that I was enjoying being anti-social, but the introvert inside of me had gotten quite comfortable with the status quo. When we were told in Design Strategies and Motivation that we’d need to go out and interview five strangers, what could be described as a feeling of panic flooded every one of my senses. Nevertheless, I accepted the task at hand. After struggling to approach people at first, I eventually found a groove. The people that I interviewed ended up providing new insight and perspective about what was needed in the community. This stimulated new ideas that would help to elevate my brand. The experience taught me that there can be unexpected benefits when you push yourself to do things you otherwise wouldn’t do. I have always struggled with networking and striking up random conversations with strangers. However, now I can look back at my month 7 experience as a reminder that unless I push myself to engage, I’ll never know what kinds of opportunities I’m missing out on.

8. Design Integration – The Design Integration course provided the first opportunity to utilize many of the tools, principles, and techniques we had been acquiring thus far in a practical way that seemed applicable to solving a real-world problem. I felt articulating potential solutions played well to my strengths as a problem solver, developing the brand’s voice & tone was something I was relatively proficient at, and creating the dynamic vision board allowed me to tap into my motion graphics experience. Developing media plans and putting together design briefs seemed very complicated at first. However now, if I’m ever asked to develop a media plan or put together a design brief for a client, I’ll be better equipped to take those on.

9. Multi-Platform Delivery – There were actually a couple of important lessons that I learned in the Multi-Platform Delivery course. By the end of week one we needed to define a production timeline which would be used to complete each of the media assets for our city brand. Admittedly, I have never been one for a lot pre-planning, however, with the amount of work to be done in such a relatively short period of time, I learned to appreciate the value of sticking to a fixed production schedule. In this course I also needed to be painfully reminded that just because I may think a concept or design is perfect, doesn’t necessarily mean that others will appreciate it in the same way. In a lot of ways, this was one of the toughest months for me to get through, but the lessons it provided will continue to stick with me as I grow as a media designer.

10. Measuring Design Effectiveness – Measuring Design Effectiveness introduced me to the research advantages of sending out surveys to quickly collect qualitative and quantitative feedback. Having more than 100 strangers review my designs though, felt like I was Cersei from HBO’s Game of Thrones when she was stripped of all her dignity and forced to walk naked through a condemnatory crowd. Of course most of the responses that came back from my survey were positive and even the majority that weren’t, still provided some insight on how the designs could be improved. Overall though, I probably learned much more about what kinds of survey questions to ask next time, which will be especially handy if and when I need to do it again.

11. Presentation of Design Solution – The Presentation of Design Solution course provided an additional much-needed opportunity to work with layout design, text handling, and visual hierarchy. It also challenged me to develop logical and persuasive arguments for mastery across each DLO. Learning about the Wix.com website builder will likely help me in the future if I ever need to put together a quick website. It may prove to be a convenient way to construct a personal portfolio site. Understanding how to create clean and professional presentations will no doubt benefit me as I advance in my career as a media designer.

12. Professional Practice – The Professional Practice course capped off a year of learning with a thought-provoking examination of the ethical and moral challenges media designers must contend with. The course included a review of AIGA’s Design Business and Ethics document which stimulated worthwhile discussions about copyright issues, the social and environmental responsibilities of designers, and many helpful guidelines media designers can use in their personal and professional development (AIGA, 2009). We learned how to create an Experience Map which is one more tool designers can use to help companies identify ways to enhance the experience of their customers. We also researched various professional design organizations that designers can join to gain access to networking, professional development opportunities, industry resources, and in some cases even health insurance. We updated our resumes and practiced writing professional cover letters using the most up-to-date strategies.

Describe how the techniques in each course helped you complete your thesis project (do not include month 12: Professional Practice) and describe your most outstanding personal triumph in each course.

1. Mastery: Personal Development and Leadership – Mastery put me on the right track to succeed. It helped me reignite my ambitions and gave me the confidence to go forward and be creative in all of my future courses, which undoubtedly had a significant impact on my overall thesis project.

2. Defining Client Needs – The most significant technique that came out of this course was learning how to synthesize research. This course also introduced David Airey’s seven elements of iconic design and established that effective design is most often simple, relevant, distinct, memorable, adaptable, focused, and incorporates tradition (Airey, 2014, pg.39). These guidelines became central when creating virtually every project that went into the final thesis presentation. There was also a greater stress on learning how to use proper APA format in this course.

3. Brand Development – The most valuable concept learned in the Brand Development course was the importance of establishing and communicating a brand’s visual identity. Without that concept, most of the projects in my thesis presentation may have appeared far less cohesive.

4. Effective Copy Writing – The greatest takeaway from this course was learning that developing a design strategy is as important, if not more important, than the ability to write well. Understanding that concept had an immense impact on the rationales of my thesis project. Before any copy was written, a design strategy was established first. Also, the multiple approaches that led to the creation of my revised testimonial ads provided a persuasive and compelling demonstration of my ability to solve problems.

5. Design Research - The greatest personal triumph in Design Research happened when the narrative for the Kyoto city-branding project began to take shape. Once that narrative was established, every other design decision fell right into place. Defining the brand’s narrative made it much easier to develop the persuasive arguments necessary on the Connecting, Synthesizing, Transforming page of my thesis project. I could logically rationalize why various imagery was selected and explain how the fonts and color choices tied directly back to the theme and the personality of the brand.

6. Organizational Structures – The most outstanding personal triumph in the Organizational Structures course was the cinemagraph created in week 4. To me it symbolized the culmination of months of research and brand development. I appreciated how the subtle movement of the geisha was completely juxtaposed with the static imagery that surrounded her on the modern-day Kyoto train. It communicated the message of my brand in a way that was both elegant and poignant. Out of all the pieces in my thesis project, the Kyoto cinemagraph may have been the most successful at communicating its intended message.

7. Design Strategies and Motivation – If I hadn’t overcome my social insecurities during the interview assignment, my community rebranding project would have ended up looking much different and it probably would have been far less effective at addressing the needs of the Allen Park community. Conducting a SWOT analysis and creating an empathy map using all the information gathered from my research, helped me to define the real problem that needed to be solved.

8. Design Integration – I can point to the Design Integration course as the underlying reason my Allen Park rebranding project was used to demonstrate Innovative Thinking in my thesis project. I was proud of the final solution I came up with. While I hadn’t yet made a strong case as to how my solution was especially unique, the techniques developed in this course provided the building blocks that would eventually be used to claim innovation. Also, it is important to acknowledge just how much Professor Baldowski may have improved the strength of my writing. Looking back, he was by far the toughest grader of the entire program and because of that, really pushed me to go deeper into my research and get better at developing my ideas into solid rationales.

9. Multi-Platform Delivery - I don’t tend to look back on this course very fondly. I resented that we were unnecessarily covering the same exact logo design and brand development techniques from month 3. I was also greatly offended when the instructor disclosed that her colleagues had openly mocked my designs over her shoulder while she was grading them. I know I give a lot of credit to Design Integration as the course when all the tools, principles, and techniques started to finally come together, but in hindsight, if it wasn’t for that “unnecessary” review of effective logo design and brand development techniques, the Allen Park rebranding designs in my thesis project would have never been as successful as they were. Even though I defiantly pushed back against the instructor’s feedback in week 3, I am so very grateful that she challenged me to design something better. She was gracious enough to remind me that sometimes when we challenge our own ideas, it often results in new heights. That lesson was unquestionably, one of the most important things I’ll be taking with me from this entire program. She may never actually see this post, but if she does,… thank you again Professor Kratz.

10. Measuring Design Effectiveness – The Measuring Design Effectiveness course provided an opportunity to obtain feedback from a target audience as a way of determining how successful our brand designs might be. Watching the responses come in over a three-day period was an exceptionally gratifying and fascinating experience. The majority of responses that came back from the survey provided enough validation that the new Allen Park brand direction could be an effective way of bringing the community together. This reassurance allowed me to move forward with the designs and include them as part of my thesis project. Learning how easy it was to create and publish online surveys added an additional research technique to the growing list of competencies I could talk about in my presentation.

11. Presentation of Design Solution – In the first week of the Presentation of Design Solution course we developed thesis abstracts. These abstracts provided a written foundation that the entire thesis presentation could be built around. The process of sketching out different layout options for the presentation site was useful, but what was even more beneficial was being the only person to attend the live session in which the instructor reviewed everyone else’s layouts. This helped me gain a more in-depth and personalized understanding of why certain layout techniques were more effective than others. After reviewing the first draft of my website, the instructor’s feedback challenged me to establish stronger connections by using more cited references throughout the presentation, especially on my Connecting, Synthesizing, & Transforming page. On my Problem Solving page, I needed to do a more effective job at defining the problem. My Innovative Thinking page required a stronger argument for innovation by showing how my solution was unique compared to the competition. I’m especially proud of the revisions I made to my thesis presentation which addressed all of the above issues and included a complete overhaul of my layout design based on the techniques discussed in the sketch review session we had earlier in the month.

Final Experience Map

The final Experience Map attempted to represent my Full Sail journey in a way that was creative, fun, and reflective of my personality. As a pixelated character, I am shown traversing an old school video game level. The twelve coins spread out across the map represent each course in the program. The mountainous shapes in the background represent all of the emotional highs and lows I experienced throughout the year. Each of the items and bad guys I encounter along the way have very specific and symbolic meanings. The column on the right provides extra fun details about each one. The little backstory that I had a lot of fun inventing takes place in the hero’s homeland; the Nation of Determi. Everything is perfect there until one day, the evil Spiderlord Antithesis and his minions show up from the Nation of Procrasti.  Determi-Nation vs. Procrasti-Nation, Get it?  Ok, fine. I never promised that the reflection of my personality was ever going to be funny.

References

AIGA. (2009). Design business ethics. Retrieved from https://www.aiga.org/design-business-and-ethics

Airey, D. (2014). “Logo Design Love, Annotated and Expanded Edition, Second Edition” (2nd ed.). Retrieved from http://ce.safaribooksonline.com/book/branding/9780133812589

[philosopherking1887]

(1/8) I’m going to make my argument on anon because my blog is not political. I’ll message you off anon separately as I think it’s rude to engage someone in debate when they don’t know who they’re speaking with, but if you decide to respond to this I ask that you don’t post that message. I want to explain why I feel very uncomfortable with people calling the left and right mirror images of each other under any circumstance.

(2/8) It would be erroneous to suggest that there aren’t parts of the left the deal exclusively in black and white morality, who conspiracy-theorize, and who reduce people to basic identities such as race and sexuality. I wouldn’t even make the claim that these people are a loud minority. I’m also aware people who accept nuance in morality occasionally state things in black and white terms, and in doing so turn people off to their more nuanced arguments.

(3/8) I would argue that leftists don’t consider anybody with antisemitic beliefs or conspiracy theories to be leftist, because the backbone of leftist ideology is wanting to crush things like antisemitism, homophobia, racism, and the systems that support these ideologies. Leftists actively distances themselves from these people, in the same way the feminists distance themselves from terfs and swerfs, stating that these people are fundamentally counter to feminist ideology.

(4/8) All that said, I still identify as part of the left. In the circles I run in, it’s less about destroying anyone who has ever said or done something “problematic” (which we acknowledge would be everyone), and more about wanting to reduce the harm caused by oppressive systems, and convince others to consider their language and actions more carefully. It’s these leftists that I’d argue could actually affect societal change.

(5/8) Let’s say someone’s said something racist. People who I’d consider centrist like to focus on the fact that someone is legally allowed to say that. People who I’d consider effective leftist seek to make it clear that it’s not ok to say such things, thereby pushing back against the speech becoming morally acceptable, but also believe that you haven’t completely morally bankrupted yourself simply by saying a thing.

(6/8) People that I’d consider effective leftists don’t believe that media with morally wrong elements shouldn’t exist, and we recognize that it doesn’t have to expressly state something is wrong for it to clearly be wrong. I personally enjoy media that includes ableism, racism, rape, etc. The story doesn’t have to remind me these things are wrong, because a well written story will present these things accurately, and these things are wrong.

(7/8) What I understand to be the right does not have room for people who want to consider humans, their words, and their actions complexly. Their very ideology believes whole sections of our population unworthy of consideration. It’s this core difference that makes me extremely uncomfortable when I see people compare the left and the right.

(8/8) Are there people on the left who think too much in black and white terms? Or course, but this isn’t an intrinsic part of the ideology, it’s the result of not developing or engaging critical thinking skills. The right on the other hand ideologically opposes critical thinking and complex understandings of all human beings.

You’re right that I was overstating the case when I said that the Left was just a mirror image of the Right. There are some good principles motivating the Left; I have no sympathy at all for the principles that motivate the Right. But I do think that the black-and-white morality, bolstered by a simplistic worldview, is an intrinsic danger of being at either extreme on the political spectrum.

The main reason I no longer consider myself a leftist is in your second paragraph: the people who think in black-and-white morality and reduce people to their social identities aren’t just a “loud minority” on the Left; they are the voice of the Left. I see it from my academic friends (“friends”) on Facebook and I see it from people on Tumblr, where the ideas from leftist academia get popularized and proliferated. If anything, it seems, the people who genuinely accept moral ambiguity are a silent minority who are gritting their teeth and going along with the complexity-challenged majority because they agree, on the whole, with their policy goals. I, too, agree with the policy goals, but I don’t accept the -ist label, the identity as a Leftist, because I don’t share the general worldview.

This got incredibly long (and took way more time than I was expecting), so the rest is under a cut.

In paragraph 3 you say: “leftists don’t consider anybody with antisemitic beliefs or conspiracy theories to be leftist, because the backbone of leftist ideology is wanting to crush things like antisemitism, homophobia, racism, and the systems that support these ideologies.” Probably the biggest single factor that’s driven me away from the Left is the very shallow understanding of Jewish history and identity that I see even from people who claim to oppose antisemitism. Most of them don’t even seem to recognize antisemitism within their own ranks, much less distance themselves from it; as commented by David Schraub, a UC Berkeley law professor, on his excellent blog The Debate Link, all kinds of blatantly anti-Jewish crap can get excused as legitimate “criticism of Israel” (including, in a German legal decision, firebombing a synagogue). Despite loving to insist that Israel should not be equated with Jews when they claim that criticism of Israel can never be considered antisemitic (even when that includes saying that the Jewish state should cease to exist, or that Israel’s actions prove that Hitler was right), they’re perfectly happy to interrogate any Jews who show up at progressive political events about their views on Israel. And, apparently, protest LGBT-rights events partly sponsored by Hillel on the grounds of “pinkwashing.” Ah, there are those conspiracy theorists!

Tumblr has actually been a breath of fresh air in that respect: I’m seeing a lot more people on here than among my leftist “friends” in academia (whom I would have expected to know better) who acknowledge that antisemitism is actually still a problem and maybe you should believe Jews when they say it’s a problem, rather than automatically dismissing it as a tactic for shutting down criticism of Israel. Many of my Tumblr mutuals also seem to understand the apparently difficult-to-grasp concept that Jews, even pale-skinned Ashkenazi Jews, have not always and everywhere been considered white—and still are not, by the people who call themselves “white nationalists.” I’m not sure how widespread this view is, but an idea seems to have gotten hold in some segments of the Left that the Jews are just a group of white Europeans who fabricated a historical origin in the Levant to justify a colonialist land grab. This is stupid for a variety of reasons—the basic ignorance of history foremost among them—but what really strikes me about it is how it’s actually a logical consequence of the simple guiding worldview that seems to be widely espoused by the Left.

Here are a couple of general principles of that worldview:1) The world is divided into white oppressors and oppressed people of color.2) The original sin of the modern world (indeed, of the world in general) is European colonialism.

To be clear: I agree that in the vast majority of the contemporary world, white people (i.e., people of European descent) are in a position of dominance and privilege over non-white people. I also agree that colonialism is a great evil and the source of most of the systemic injustices that continue to plague the world. But I also think that racial identity is contingent and contextual, and while leftists will pay lip service to that idea and trot it out when it suits them, their approach to the history and situation of the Jews, which throws a wrench into the simple worldview, suggests to me that they don’t fully understand or believe in that contingency and contextuality.

I agree with leftists that the state of Israel has oppressive policies toward Palestinians. I also agree that in America, Ashkenazi Jews (which most American Jews are, though NOT most Israeli Jews) are for most practical purposes white. Here’s where a problem arises: part of the reason colonialism is such a great crime is that it displaces people from their ancestral homelands—both the indigenous populations who lived on the colonized land and the African people who were transported from their homes into slavery on distant continents. So, the Left concludes, there must be a great moral importance to the connection with an ancestral homeland. Acknowledging that Jews, even Ashkenazim, have a historical origin in the territory of Israel/Palestine would (a) complicate their designation as white oppressors and (b) raise the possibility that they have some rightful claim to the territory. Now, there are all kinds of ways to dispel (b). You could say that diaspora Jews have been gone from the land so long that there’s no longer a meaningful connection to it… but then that raises the question of how long Native Americans, aboriginal Australians, etc. get to claim that they have been wronged by the displacement of their ancestors (is there a statute of limitations on an ancestral connection to a land?). You could say that it’s still wrong to forcibly reappropriate your ancestral land from people who have moved in in the meantime… but that would be a problem for the argument that Palestinian refugees have the right to return to where their grandparents lived. Maybe you could say it’s wrong to reappropriate land from people who aren’t the descendants of the appropriators (the Romans, in the relevant case)? Except then it’s OK to punish descendants for their ancestors’ crimes…?

It’s easier to square everything by just saying that Jews have no historical connection to the land, they’re white through and through and have never been otherwise, and the displacement and continued oppression of Palestinians is merely an instance of the very same European “settler colonialism” that (according to Principle 2) is the wellspring of all the other injustices of the modern world. You may have heard that expression applied to the existence of Israel; it’s a watchword of the BDS movement, beloved of much of the Left. The Chicago Dyke March borrowed from them the credo that “Zionism is an inherently white-supremacist ideology”—which would be a really weird thing to say if you acknowledged that Zionism (meaning the movement to found a Jewish state) arose in response to the prevalent European attitude that Jews are an “Oriental” people who can never really belong in Europe because they don’t have the proper kind of ancestral connection with European lands. Better just say—as did a Facebook “friend” of mine, a philosophy grad student from a prestigious university—that turn-of-the-century Jewish settlement in Palestine had absolutely nothing to do with rising antisemitism in Europe, because racialized antisemitism wasn’t even much of a problem in Europe until the Nazis came to power. Because apparently that shit just came out of nowhere. He even went so far as to say that any Jews who may have left Europe for Palestine before 1930 out of fear of antisemitic persecution were “alarmists.”

Do you see how this reflects the same kind of black-and-white morality that we see on Tumblr in other contexts (whether that’s telling people that they’re horrible for sympathizing with villains and other Problematic™ characters, or that they must be rapists and abusers if they read, enjoy, and/or get off on fic that depicts rape and abuse)? Acknowledging the origin of Zionism in European antisemitism, acknowledging that the state of Israel exists in large part because of the Holocaust, even acknowledging the correct geographic origin of the Jewish people, might mean allowing moral ambiguity into the situation. It might mean that early Zionist settlers were not white-supremacist monsters; it might mean that Israeli Jews, many of them the children and grandchildren of Holocaust survivors and refugees from the USSR, are not merely callous racists (which many of them, I’m sure, are), but frightened, and not entirely without reason. Not to mention that acknowledging sources and forms of oppression that predate European colonialism and defy color-based racial categories would complicate the simple worldview.

It’s having those kinds of arguments (over and over and over) with people on the Left—trying to explain very basic things about the history and experience of my people—that has thoroughly alienated me. I sometimes like to say, savoring the deliberate irony, that “identity politics is bad for the Jews.” It is, on both sides: we’re not white enough to be considered worthy by the Right, but apparently we’re too white to be considered worthy in the way that matters to the Left: a claim to oppression. People on the Left and the Right both like to say (or just insinuate) that Jews control the media and mainstream politics and are using it to make U.S. foreign policy subservient to Israel (the Chicago Dyke March and the KKK can bond over that). You know what was good for the Jews? Enlightenment universalist humanism. The principle that individuals are to be judged as individuals, not by their membership in a community; that association with a minority religious or cultural community is a private matter, as long as you’re a good citizen of the state in which you find yourself. Those were the principles that drove the emancipation of Jews in Europe (i.e., the elevation to full citizenship), and the principles with which Zola et al. defended Dreyfus. And yes, you can recognize the effects of systemic group-based oppression and work to fight it, while also insisting that the ultimate locus of moral value is the individual, and that all individuals must be presumed to have equal value in virtue of a common humanity that is more important than group differences.

But here the moral rigorism of the Left—the view that a person, action, or institution with any moral taint must be rotten through and through—causes me problems again. Enlightenment ideals were formulated, articulated, and enshrined in government institutions amid racist European colonialism and misogynist patriarchy. Therefore, the Left concludes, they must be wholly bankrupt. Enlightenment individualism, they say (with a little help from Marx), is just a pretext to glorify the white wealthy landowning male and the capitalist order. Racists and sexists like Locke and Kant, slaveowners like Jefferson and Madison, cannot have had good, genuinely liberatory ideals that they failed to live up to; the ideals themselves must have been devised purely to uphold the system of white supremacist patriarchal capitalism. I find this extremely ironic, considering that the ideals to which the Left swears loyalty, of casting off oppressive systems of domination and striving for equality and “liberation,” have their roots firmly in the Enlightenment. Yes, we should acknowledge the failings and limitations of Enlightenment thinkers, and we should keep expanding our conception of the humanity that deserves liberation. But we should also acknowledge our debt to these flawed, sometimes even overall immoral, human beings—keeping in mind that we, too, will probably look deeply flawed to future generations, even if we are striving in the right direction.

I can cite all kinds of other examples of this moral rigorism, including the very loud people who liked to say that there was no moral difference between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump (and then, oddly enough, cited the 90-some percent of African Americans who voted for Clinton and the 53% of white women who voted for Trump as proof of the virtue of the former and the depravity of the latter). In fannish spaces on Tumblr, it shows up as a hybrid moral-aesthetic rigorism: if a work or its creator is morally problematic, nothing about the work can have any artistic value, either. Thus, since Joss Whedon is a bad feminist (or perhaps not a feminist at all), not only can we no longer enjoy Buffy or consider it progressive in any way, but we must say that he’s a bad storyteller, and a bad writer of dialogue and character, even for white male characters (and if we have to read sloppily to come to that conclusion…? *shrug*). The issue is not just about enjoying media that depicts problematic things (though there is a truly batshit wing of the Tumblr Left that does have a problem with that); it’s about whether you’re allowed to enjoy the good aspects of media that depict certain things in a problematic way.

As for the issue of condemning hate speech and acknowledging the legal right (in the U.S.) to speak it: someone genuinely committed to the reality of moral ambiguity would say that you can do both. You can very strongly condemn white supremacists and neo-Nazis, you can go out and protest their rallies, while also saying that it’s not a good idea to initiate violent altercations with them. You can say that the ACLU is still a good organization even though they defend the rights of neo-Nazis to march. You might think that, as a Jew, I’d be in favor of the “punch a Nazi” attitude—and when it comes to dyed-in-the-wool Nazis like Richard Spencer and Steve Bannon, punch away. But as a believer in moral ambiguity, I also recognize that a lot of the young white men drawn to the alt-right have been radicalized in the very same way as the young Muslim men who are drawn to Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State. Here’s where I see an instance of mirroring between the Right and the Left: Conservatives will tend to say that Islamic terrorists are inherently evil, there’s no redeeming them, and the only good terrorist is a dead terrorist, while many neo-Nazis are just unhappy, isolated, vulnerable young men, despairing over the bleakness of their economic prospects, who have been led astray. Meanwhile, over on the Left, people say that neo-Nazis are inherently evil, irredeemable, etc., while many Islamic terrorists are just vulnerable young men who have been led astray. So both sides accept a double standard, only it’s reversed. Can’t we say that there are some vulnerable, misled young men (and women) among both kinds of extremists? In fact, in Germany, the very same strategies that were developed to deradicalize neo-Nazis are being adapted to deradicalize Islamic extremists.

I know a number of genuinely critical thinkers who want to continue throwing in their lot with the Left for its generally good goals and ideals, despite its problems with moral ambiguity, and I don’t have a problem with that. As long as we’re working for the same outcomes, it’s just a matter of labels. But there are some serious issues where I part company with the Left, and some deep differences on matters of history and philosophy. As a historian and a philosopher, those differences matter a lot to me. And, specifically, as a Jew with a profound sense of Jewish history (though not the religion, which is why I’ve been sitting at home writing this essay instead of going to Yom Kippur services), I also have a profound mistrust of ideological extremes that regard group identity as more important than individual humanity, because people on both ends of the political spectrum have always found reasons to hate us as a group.

[lunamanar]

All the Prime Numbers

Thanks, @what-hos-there, for making me math. Ugh!

1: Is it worse to fail at something or never attempt it in the first place? (not technically a prime number, but I wanted to answer this one)

While the obvious answer here is “well that depends on a lot of factors,” let’s just assume for the moment that the thing you are attempting is not...stupid. Let’s say there’s a chance of success and that said success will hurt no one. 

Those things being given, I very strongly feel that, for me, making the attempt is everything. The end result is almost supplemental. I live in a state of mind where I’m very aware that I’ve got one life, one chance, and I don’t often have the energy to get up and do things, so when I have that opportunity, I jump on it like a tiger in the bush. Explosively, absolutely. I know I burn out fast and I only have limited time to enjoy the things I choose to do, so...yeah, those opportunities are precious to me. And if I fail, I fail, but good or bad I had an experience, and I try to always get something out of those experiences. I’m rarely bitter (there are pointed, rather awful exceptions, but I’ll not go into that). But, in general, I regret the things I didn’t do far more than the things I did. Even if the result was humiliating failure.

2: If you could choose just one thing to change about the world, what would it be?

I would enable every human being on earth to feel genuine empathy for their “enemies.”

3: To what extent do you shape your own destiny, and how much is down to fate?

I don’t really believe in “fate.” I believe the universe to be a beautiful, but completely random place, at least when it comes to forces outside my conscious control. One’s “destiny” is a mixture of those uncontrollable happenings and your responses to them. I further delineate between responses: there are reactions, which we don’t think about but simply act upon; decisions, in which we take a course of action given limited possibilities; and choices, which are proactive, things we do when we have power to generate our own possibilities irrespective of our surroundings. The last are preciously rare (most “choices” are in fact simply decisions; there is no real freedom involved, no reaching for an ideal future...you simply pick a path, and it takes you where it takes you. I hate it when people frame that as a choice. It’s not) and it is critical to recognize them if you hope to have any say in what your “destiny” is. Not everyone gets a choice. If you do, do not squander it. Learn to recognize what little power you are privileged to have, and make good with it. “Fate” is just letting life present you with a preset collection of forks in the road, and picking a direction. If you want to determine your destiny, you have to make your own paths when you can, and trust me, it’s better when they intersect with the self-made paths of others. 

5: Should people care more about doing the right thing, or doing things right?

If I’m parsing this right, I think you’re asking if we should prioritize morality over practicality; what works, or what’s fair. In general, I don’t view these things as mutually exclusive, at least not when talking about systems. But when faced with a moral dilemma, I tend to default to taking the action that will ultimately do the least harm. Sometimes that’s the fair action, and sometimes that’s the practical one. But like many of these questions, the answer is basically “it depends.”

7: Where is the line between insanity and creativity?

Insanity is a word we use to dismiss the legitimacy of someone’s experiences and thoughts, without having to examine them critically. When someone does or says something that we find absurd, the deciding factor between labeling it “creative” and labeling it “insane” usually comes down to whether we like it or not. So, I’d say the line is “arbitrary personal preference.” 

11: What is time?

Something I don’t have enough of. Ever. 

More serious answer; time is how we perceive the progression of our existence through reality. It is measurable only through change; you cannot contain it, or hold onto it. No one moment can be repeated or recreated. So, largely, time as we tend to think of it is a subjective matter. Things get a little (but not much) more concrete when you start talking about time in mathematical terms, but it’s still a concept that confounds humanity for wont of a concrete definition. We see its effects on the universe, but we cannot capture it. The best definition we have is that time is the expansion of all existence into nothingness, and eventually, entropy. 

Ultimecia loves that shit.

13: Do you make your own decisions, or let others make them for you?

I hate having other people make decisions for me. I have to be laid up in bed sick as all getout barely able to get up to go to the bathroom before I start to ask other people to make decisions on my behalf. I have words about the current trend of self-important machines setting things up for me, forcing me to retroactively fix all the crap they did wrong, rather than just letting me set things up myself, the way I liked them. I’m terribly spoiled in that regard. Blame my DOS upbringing.  

17: What is the difference between living and being alive?

This question suggests its own answer by insinuating there is a difference between the two. Most people think of “living” as having some quality of life, whereby happiness can be felt and the future is something to look forward to. Whereas “being alive” typically refers to the simple act of survival, of thinking nothing about anything except taking your next breath and ensuring you wake up after you sleep. Being alive means your body and mind are functioning, but there is no space for anything more; living, on the other hand, implies relief from such basic concerns, and the possibility of personal fulfillment.

19: Who decides what morality is?

These questions are so poorly worded. Morality is determined by underlying social frameworks and depends heavily on which framework causes the least dissonance in any given person’s mind. There is no final arbiter of morality. 

23: Is a family still relevant in the modern world?

Yes. ...Do I need to explain that? Family has a much broader meaning now than it used to, but it’s certainly not irrelevant because by and large, people still want it. It’s a feeling of kinship shared only between people who are emotionally intimate enough to recognize each other mutually as part of the same clan. Blood relations usually play a part but are less and less necessary as our collective need for tribalism gradually dissolves. This is a good thing, in my opinion. 

My “family,” for instance, currently consists of myself, my husband, a second, long-distance relationship, and our live-in friend who we tell people is our tenant, for convenience’s sake. He does pay “rent,” but only in that he pays for what he uses up in resources. Otherwise, he’s just there and we all work together to keep up this odd little household of ours. We joke he’s our “adopted millennial,” but really we just get along really well with him. While there’s no romantic feelings there at all, it would be...sad and weird if suddenly our “tenant” were not there, anymore, and he is very happy to tag along wherever we go. Whatever we do, we’re all in it together, supporting and sacrificing for each other. That’s modern family. 

29: What is infinity?

Mostly a mathematical concept. Technically, 99.999999~ is infinity, but trying to explain that there is no functional difference between an infinite decimal and infinity itself is very hard on most people’s brains. 

31: What defines you?

“What” implies a thing that is tangible and measurable, so if I were honest, the answer to this question would be “nothing.” What defines me is a fluid, ever-changing state that encompasses various things and experiences and people as they phase in and out of my life. What defines me, ultimately, is a bit of a Venn diagram of objects, thoughts, individuals and experiences, and it’s never the same at any given point.

BUT that’s not the answer you want. You want something concrete, an allegory. Okay. I am defined by what I have left in me, by the stories I have not yet told. When I write, even when what I’m writing is happy, I’m bleeding onto that page, and when I’m done, a part of me is gone forever, stolen by the text. See, once you take a living part of yourself and set it in stone, place it in a static state, that part of you dies. It may gain new life of sorts in the minds of readers, but what it was to me is now gone forever. You see, that’s why I post so very little, here, even though I talk about writing a lot. Before I pour something onto a page, I have to be absolutely sure that I am ready to let go, to lose it. Far from immortalizing me, it is a sort of jubilant suicide--not born of despair, but of longing that’s just as powerful. I want someone to see these stories I live with. I want someone to know, and to understand. But to do that, I must inscribe The End. Writing, for me, is a sacrificial rite, and what defines “me” is all that you do not already know is still in here, waiting for its time. 

37: Is trust more important than love?

I would say so. Some people don’t actually need or want love, at least not in the romantic sense (which is how I’m interpreting this question). On the other hand, a life without trust is a very stressful one, no matter how you slice it. 

41: The structure of DNA appears to be intelligently designed, what are the implications?

No it doesn’t.

43: Is life all a dream?

If it is, it’s not ours. This reaches so far into speculative territory as to render itself beyond any “philosophy.”

47: How did the universe begin?

Oh good grief. I’m not going to write a report. There are many slightly different theories; do your own research and pick one. 

[johnnguyen-us]

Surf Etiquette: 9 Things Beginners Must Learn

As a beginner, you​ need to learn basic surf etiquette, including those that we will briefly mention in the rest of this post. These are actually unwritten rules that you have to know by heart. These things will be important for your safety and while making sure that you won’t annoy anyone who also happens to be in the water.

1. Choose the Right Surf Spot

One of the most important things that you should do is to choose a spot that will work best for your abilities. Be realistic in terms of what you can do and what you still have to learn. As a sign of respect for other surfers, do not go into an area that you know is not for you. Other than compromising your safety, you might just upset other surfers as well. Do your research beforehand and see spots that are categorized as beginner-friendly. The waves should not be too big and the bottom of the water should not be rocky, which will minimize the likelihood of suffering from an injury.

2. Don’t Drop In

This is one of the most important etiquettes that every beginner should learn. The concept of dropping in operates under the premise that one surfer is equal to one wave. Meaning, there should be no two surfers who are propelling towards the same direction. It is important to know who has the right of way, and you must respect this. If you go against the right of way, you are burning the wave of another surfer, and this is exactly one thing that you do not want to happen to you as well. Not only that it is disrespectful, but it will also result in serious injury or surfboard damages. With this, you should learn how to take it slow and wait until it is finally your turn to ride the wave.

3. Don’t Snake

Aside from dropping in, snaking is another disrespectful behavior that novice surfers must avoid. Simply put, snaking is the act of intentionally paddling around the surfer to be able to get the right of way. Literally, this makes you a snake trying to crawl at a space that is not supposed to be yours. If there is already a surfer who is waiting for the wave, do not go there. Or, at least, wait for that person to be able to catch the wave before you paddle towards that direction.

4. Paddle Wide

This is one of the best ways for you to avoid other surfers. By being able to paddle wide, you won’t be able to impede on the way of another surfer. Again, this is related to the things that have been mentioned above with regards to the right of way. Also, paddling wide means that you should not paddle through the peak. If you are already caught inside, it is best to stay in the water rather than being in a rush to go out and ahead of other surfers. If you are too aggressive, you will most probably end up upsetting other surfers.

5. Take Turns

This is another etiquette that is related to those that have been mentioned above. Do not get too excited by the wave in front of you. You should know how to consider other surfers, especially if you are in a crowded spot. After all, you surely haven’t paid to have the spot all for yourself. You need to learn how to be patient. You have to learn how to determine if it is your turn to ride the wave. It requires the need for you to wait in line. There are some who call this break sharing. By taking turns, the one who will be waiting for the longest time will be at the end and nearest the peak.

6. Communicate

Even when you are out in the sea and enjoying a good surf, communication is important. This necessitates the need to talk to other surfers in the same spot as you. This will make it easier to know whether someone is going left or right. You need to know the intentions of other people to avoid injury and to be not seen as someone who has no manner. Sometimes, you do not even need to talk. Simple hand signals can already be enough to let someone know what you are about to do.

7. Respect the Locals

Whenever you are surfing, make sure that you always respect the locals. Do not think that they act as if the place is exclusive to them. As they say, if you want to gain respect, you should give respect. It is mutual. It is possible that locals have their own rules, so be sure to respect it when you are in their community. Before you surf, it will be good to have the opportunity to talk to a local. You should also watch them surf and learn from your observations. Take note of their variations as well. Plus, if they tell you to not surf in a specific spot because it is unsafe, listen. After all, they know better!

8. Hold on to your Board

A lot of beginners are surely guilty of letting go of their board after they fall on the water. After all, this is a common instinct for those who were shocked by what just happened. Some might not just know the best way to react. However, take note that letting the board go is one of the rudest things that other surfers would not want to see. Holding on to the board will prevent the possibility of causing injury to other surfers. Do not just dive under the water and forget about the board as it can hit other people. Especially for beginners, the boards are usually large and heavy, and hence, they can cause serious injury when it hits someone.

9. Say Sorry

If you ever mess up, own up to it. Learn how to say sorry to the other surfer. This is one of the easiest ways to gain a new friend while on the water. In some instances, the other surfer might even inform you that you did something wrong. Do not take offense. Rather, take this as constructive criticism, an opportunity to learn something new. Some surfers might start shouting and cursing when you do something that you aren’t supposed to do. Most, meanwhile, will be more understanding, especially if they could tell that you are a beginner. Regardless, the important thing is for you to apologize, own up to your mistakes, and avoid committing the same thing in the future.

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