#eponymous laws

[dreamy-conceit]

Schneier's Law: Anyone, from the most clueless amateur to the best cryptographer, can create an algorithm that he himself can’t break.

— Schneier's Law, written by cryptographer Bruce Schneier

[bennettmarko]

Augustine's Law Number XXI: It's easy to get a loan unless you need it.

[rearranging-deck-chairs]

disappears off the face of the earth and reappears just to say hey have you guys seen this show?

[mraskilaasan]

pregaming media i know is going to make me cry by listening to select empx songs

[gowns]

Why Kids Aren't Falling in Love With Reading - It's Not Just Screens

A shrinking number of kids are reading widely and voraciously for fun.

The ubiquity and allure of screens surely play a large part in this—most American children have smartphones by the age of 11—as does learning loss during the pandemic. But this isn’t the whole story. A survey just before the pandemic by the National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that the percentages of 9- and 13-year-olds who said they read daily for fun had dropped by double digits since 1984. I recently spoke with educators and librarians about this trend, and they gave many explanations, but one of the most compelling—and depressing—is rooted in how our education system teaches kids to relate to books.

What I remember most about reading in childhood was falling in love with characters and stories; I adored Judy Blume’s Margaret and Beverly Cleary’s Ralph S. Mouse. In New York, where I was in public elementary school in the early ’80s, we did have state assessments that tested reading level and comprehension, but the focus was on reading as many books as possible and engaging emotionally with them as a way to develop the requisite skills. Now the focus on reading analytically seems to be squashing that organic enjoyment. Critical reading is an important skill, especially for a generation bombarded with information, much of it unreliable or deceptive. But this hyperfocus on analysis comes at a steep price: The love of books and storytelling is being lost.

This disregard for story starts as early as elementary school. Take this requirement from the third-grade English-language-arts Common Core standard, used widely across the U.S.: “Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, distinguishing literal from nonliteral language.” There is a fun, easy way to introduce this concept: reading Peggy Parish’s classic, Amelia Bedelia, in which the eponymous maid follows commands such as “Draw the drapes when the sun comes in” by drawing a picture of the curtains. But here’s how one educator experienced in writing Common Core–aligned curricula proposes this be taught: First, teachers introduce the concepts of nonliteral and figurative language. Then, kids read a single paragraph from Amelia Bedelia and answer written questions.

For anyone who knows children, this is the opposite of engaging: The best way to present an abstract idea to kids is by hooking them on a story. “Nonliteral language” becomes a whole lot more interesting and comprehensible, especially to an 8-year-old, when they’ve gotten to laugh at Amelia’s antics first. The process of meeting a character and following them through a series of conflicts is the fun part of reading. Jumping into a paragraph in the middle of a book is about as appealing for most kids as cleaning their room.

But as several educators explained to me, the advent of accountability laws and policies, starting with No Child Left Behind in 2001, and accompanying high-stakes assessments based on standards, be they Common Core or similar state alternatives, has put enormous pressure on instructors to teach to these tests at the expense of best practices. Jennifer LaGarde, who has more than 20 years of experience as a public-school teacher and librarian, described how one such practice—the class read-aloud—invariably resulted in kids asking her for comparable titles. But read-alouds are now imperiled by the need to make sure that kids have mastered all the standards that await them in evaluation, an even more daunting task since the start of the pandemic. “There’s a whole generation of kids who associate reading with assessment now,” LaGarde said.

By middle school, not only is there even less time for activities such as class read-alouds, but instruction also continues to center heavily on passage analysis, said LaGarde, who taught that age group. A friend recently told me that her child’s middle-school teacher had introduced To Kill a Mockingbird to the class, explaining that they would read it over a number of months—and might not have time to finish it. “How can they not get to the end of To Kill a Mockingbird?” she wondered. I’m right there with her. You can’t teach kids to love reading if you don’t even prioritize making it to a book’s end. The reward comes from the emotional payoff of the story’s climax; kids miss out on this essential feeling if they don’t reach Atticus Finch’s powerful defense of Tom Robinson in the courtroom or never get to solve the mystery of Boo Radley.

... Young people should experience the intrinsic pleasure of taking a narrative journey, making an emotional connection with a character (including ones different from themselves), and wondering what will happen next—then finding out. This is the spell that reading casts. And, like with any magician’s trick, picking a story apart and learning how it’s done before you have experienced its wonder risks destroying the magic.

-- article by katherine marsh, the atlantic (12 foot link, no paywall)

[lucysgraybird]

whoa...part 3 of modern!university!coriolanus x fem!reader, and it's 18+? who is she. anyways part 1 here, part 2 here

warnings: mdni, oral (f&m receiving), p in v (unprotected), blood mentions (minor), religious imagery (minor)

The summer between junior and senior year comes and goes, as does the first semester of your last year in college. It's filled with internships and grad school applications, but you're still going strong with Coriolanus. You get through the most unguarded you've ever seen him – the weeks leading up to the release of LSAT scores. You're actually unaware that it's coming up because he's been so private about the whole process until you get into a screaming match in the Snow apartment with him about something you can't even remember now. When you threaten to leave if he can't be polite, he breaks down crying – something you didn't even know he was capable of. He apologizes and explains himself, and though you suspect his tears aren't genuine, you catch him in a hug and hold him on the couch until he falls asleep. 

A week letter, his score comes in the mail: a perfect 180. The celebration is quiet – just you, his family, and his boss, who Coriolanus is closer with than you knew. He's an interesting man – his name is Strabo Plinth, and you learn that he's the CEO of a company that manufactures weapons for the government. You want to tell your boyfriend that such a job may not play well on his resumé at the polls, if that's where he wants to end up, but it's not your place and you're sure he's thought about that. 

All in all, by the time the spring semester rolls around, your futures are beginning to take shape. You both get into your dream schools, him for law and you for intelligence analysis. When that letter comes in, Coriolanus teases you up and down about being the stereotypical academic recruit into the CIA, but you care more to understand these agencies than work for them. You won't attend school together anymore, but it's not more than an hour by train to visit, and there's been no indication of the end of your relationship nearing. In fact, when your parents come down for parents’ weekend, Coriolanus spends about forty minutes talking to your father away from you and your mother, and when they rejoin the group, your father claps you on the shoulder and tells you that you found a good man.

There's a brief, blissful period at the end of the year before graduation when everything's been turned in and you can just enjoy the sunshine and new warmth. One of these days finds you and Coriolanus lounging on the quad on a blanket. Your head is in his lap as he plays with your hair, working his fingers through the small tangles that the early May breeze has created. It is quiet, and you are bored.

“Oh, Coriolanus,” you say, opening your eyes to lock on his. The midday light turns them almost white, like his eponymous snow. It takes a lot of willpower not to pull a face. 

“Yes, darling?” A nickname he's picked up in the last month or so. It made you laugh in shock the first time he said it, but now it feels lush. 

“I got an email from the dean the other day. I made valedictorian,” you say with a toothy, cruel grin.

You're hoping for a reaction, maybe a flash of anger. It dances across his features for the barest fraction of a second, enough to work a little adrenaline through your body, and then you get a neat smile and a cock of his head.

“Congratulations.”

“You're not mad?”

“Why would I be? You've worked hard, you deserve it. I'm not going to get upset over a silly title.”

You sit up and turn to stare at him. “What do you mean, silly?”

Coriolanus rolls his eyes. “Don’t be like that. I mean that I decided it wasn’t important to me anymore, now that I’ve gotten into law school. I thought you had gotten over it too, but since it’s important, congratulations.”

He’s deflecting, obviously, and you tell him as much. 

The corners of his mouth quirk up and he shrugs. “Okay.”

“No, you are! What, did you get salutatorian? Since when are you fine with second place?”

“Since first place wouldn’t have gotten me anything, darling. You’re ruining this for yourself, okay? I’m glad you got what you wanted.”

You’re left with nothing to say, searching his face for any mark of that brief rage from earlier before flumping back into his lap. He laughs. 

“I’m sorry, baby. You don’t need to pout. I would’ve said something else if I had known it was going to upset you like this.”

“I’m not upset.”

“Whatever you say.”

“I’m not,” you say, giving him a gracious smile, having found a new mate-in-one. “Whether or not you wanted the title anymore, we’ll always know who’s smarter.” 

Your face says teasing – your tone has teeth. Coriolanus’ eyes narrow. 

“That’s not what this means.”

“It’s what it means to me. And you clearly don’t care about that, so it should be no problem if that’s how I’m taking it.”

And ooh, you know it’s petty. You know this is possibly the most childish conversation you’ve had with anyone in years. But he doesn’t reply, opting instead to settle back on his hands and stare across the quad. There’s a mean tension in the air now, blooming hot, fizzy pride in your sternum. It’s nearly suffocating, but you breathe through it until it’s just another triumph. 

Graduation goes as smoothly as anything run by the school can – which is to say, too long and a bureaucratic clusterfuck – but you give your speech and get your diploma and take about forty pictures of Coriolanus onstage, and it feels like the perfect punctuation on this chapter of your life. After seemingly endless festivities and photoshoots with various family members, you’re dropped back at your apartment. There is no work to be done, for once: nothing to write or study, and your lease doesn’t end for another month, so nothing to pack. For the first time in your memory, you are truly idle, and you’re learning that it is not a feeling you enjoy. You pick up your phone and call your boyfriend.

“Hi, darling,” he says when he picks up. His voice is brighter than usual, a sure sign that he’s been drinking. “Did you get home okay?”

“Mhm. Did you?”

“Just laying in bed now.”

“Oh.” You try to keep yourself from sounding too disappointed, but from the huff of laughter on the other end of the call, you know he’s picked up on it. 

“What’s wrong?”

“Well, I was going to ask if you wanted to come over, but if you’re in bed, then nevermind.”

“Come over, like–”

“If you want.” You have yet to go this far with him, but tonight seems like as good a night as any. 

“Um, okay. Yeah, I’ll be right over.” 

The line goes dead, and you have to laugh. For all his airs and poise, he is still just a man. 

The benefit of today being important is that you’re already pretty done-up: your makeup is still perfect, though your lipstick gets a reapplication, your hair looks good, and you have matching, nicer undergarments on. Honestly, you’re not really sure what you’re supposed to do for this, not with him, and the confidence you had calling Coriolanus is fading fast. 

Unfortunately, it’s too late to be having those thoughts, because within twenty minutes, he’s knocking on your door. You let him in. He's still in his button-down, tie, and slacks from graduation, though he's shed his suit jacket. He leans down to catch you in a quick kiss. You wrap a hand around the Windsor knot in his tie, though whether it's to steady yourself or pull him closer is a mystery even to you. Not like it makes a difference; it elicits an electric, low groan from him anyways, his mouth opening over yours and deepening the kiss. He tastes like champagne, sweet and shimmery and young. It is a contrast to the way he grabs your waist with a heavy hand and presses his tongue in to fight yours, which feels like whiskey; all heady, stinging heat. You have not had anything to drink: you are starting to wish you had. 

When he pulls away to catch his breath, his lips are swollen and slick and stained with your blood-red lipstick and finally, finally, something alights in your chest and in your stomach and even lower, a ball of fire sitting in the cradle of your pelvis. You release his tie and drag a manicured thumbnail under the line of his bottom lip, smudging away the rouge you left there.

“Pretty,” you murmur, though you're not sure where that comes from. He is pretty, though, especially like this; undone and imperfect and desperate (you can tell as much by the way he's pressing into your hip), all for you. 

A growl releases from Coriolanus' throat and his hand goes to the belt of your dress, deftly undoing the buckle. He is desperate, but desperate for you to know that you haven't made him weak. You can only have from him what he is willing to give, he will take from you anything he wants. Or, at least, that's how he thinks as he starts dragging the zipper of your dress down, crowding you against your apartment wall.

“I have a bed, Coriolanus,” you protest weakly, the complaint dying on your lips as his latch onto your pulse point. He scrapes his teeth over the tendon in your neck, and you recall how he smiled at you when you were first dating, like he wanted to eat you. You realize he could now, if he tried, open his maw wide and sink sharp canines into the side of your throat, pierce the carotid artery and stain perfect teeth red with blood. Tipping your head back against the wall, you shiver and give him better access.

“Let’s go, then,” he murmurs, not stopping his ministrations on your collarbone, where he's working a bruise into the hollow between your clavicle and the muscle of your shoulder.

You shove his head back gently and lead him to your room, which is tidy save for your desk, which is still scattered with papers from exams. Coriolanus doesn't seem to care, just crowding you back towards your hospital-cornered bed. Once you're down, he's crawling over you and returning to suck marks down your shoulders and chest as he tugs your dress off your body. When he gets to your bra (a small, silk thing, meant to lay smooth under the dress you wore today), he just stares for a moment, tracing a finger over the fine fabric. Just as you're about to tell him to do something, Jesus Christ, he latches his lips over your nipple and mouths at it through the cloth, sending sparks down your spine and a wavering moan up your esophagus. When he switches to the other side, the wet patch is exposed to the air and the sudden chill is almost more electric than the warmth of his tongue. You wonder if he could push you over the edge with just this; it certainly feels like he could. Then he shoves a hand under your back to release the clasp and tear your bra off, and the two seconds his mouth is off your skin gives just enough reprieve that when he returns and bites down, the rush of pleasure drops straight to your core with an ache that has your hips canting up. This inspires a breathy, warm chuckle from Coriolanus.

“Impatient,” he teases. 

You swallow hard. “It's not my fault you're…”

“Good at this?” He says, dipping his hand between your legs and dancing his fingers over the gusset of your panties, eliciting a whimper and an honest nod from you. 

“You don't know the half of it, darling,” and he hooks his arms under your knees to drag your hips forward until they're nearly off the bed. He's knelt between your legs like he's taking the Eucharist, ready to devour the blood and body of all that is holy. You watch his blonde head through fluttering lashes as he licks a line up the inside of your thigh before biting down right where it meets your hip. He breaks the skin, soothes the little wound with his tongue as he works your underwear down your legs. The way he stares at you – all of you – while he's still fully clothed, no mark of the past half-hour except his loosened tie and lipstick-marked mouth, makes you squirm. He braces your hips down with a strong forearm and looks up at you with a hunger in his icy eyes that is yet unfamiliar to you.

“Pretty,” he whispers like the beginning of a prayer, echoing your earlier utterance, and collects your wetness on his index finger as he runs it through your folds. 

The foreign feeling makes you whine. Coriolanus’ tongue flicks out over his lips like a snake before he dives into your cunt like a man starved. When your hand shoots down and grabs his hair, the groan that he lets out against you has you jerking like you've been electrocuted. He only grabs the fat of your hips harder, the pads of his fingers pressing in so hard that you're sure you'll have little dotted bruises there in the morning. It's almost embarrassing how quickly he works you to orgasm, your body trembling and your breath stilted as you teeter on that peak. His eyes flash and one hand releases you. Before you can ask what he's doing, he plunges two fingers into you and curls them up right as he sucks your clit hard, and that pain-pleasure of the sudden intrusion combined with his mouth has white-hot flames engulfing your body as stars explode in your vision and your legs very nearly go numb. His tongue and fingers don't stop until you're coming down and pleading with him in a broken voice, an orison to the congregant turned deity drunk on newfound power. He acquiesces, though, crawling up your body to kiss you and lick the taste of your pleasure into your mouth. Underneath it, there's the bitter, sanguine taste from his bite to your thigh, a reminder of the vulnerability necessary for that blessing. 

Legs still shaking, head still a little fuzzy, you use his determination to kiss you breathless to flip the narrative so you're straddling his hips, his growing need heavy and hard against you through the fabric of his dress pants. One eyebrow twitches up as he grins, though it wavers when you shift on him. 

“My turn?” He asks as he smooths his hands down your thighs, and you know he can feel the way your muscles twitch and jump under your skin.

“Your turn,” you reply, and shift so you can undo his belt. 

The metal of the buckle is cold in your hands, your skin still feeling a little like it's been set aflame, but you get it off and shove your hand into his boxers, unceremoniously pulling out his cock. He lets out a choked groan at the speed, and you think his eyes roll back in his head when you slide down his body. You allow yourself a moment of hesitation, having never done this before (or even really thought about it) before taking the head in your mouth and swirling your tongue around it. The moan he lets out is primal, raw, and you are determined to get another from him as you hollow your cheeks and sink down further, minding your teeth enough to let them just graze the shaft. He shudders and jerks upward, hitting the back of your throat, and though it makes you gag, there's a certain pride in knowing you're breaking his composure, so you hold him there for a moment until he whimpers and slides a hand into your hair and you know you've taken the power back that he stole from you a moment ago. You swallow around him there before slowly moving back up, flattening your tongue against the underside before licking over his slit and sinking back down as far as you can bear, and his voice cracks around a moan as he cums down your throat. 

When you pull off him and swallow, he has an arm thrown over his eyes as he catches his breath.

“Where did you learn to do that?” He asks. His hair is tousled, sweaty strands stuck to his forehead and you grin, toothy and mean.

“Beginner’s luck,” you say as you take his softening dick in hand and watch how quickly he sits up.

“What are you-” he starts, but cuts himself off with a whine as you slide your hand up and down a couple times, trying to work him back up. “Stop, stop, that-”

Another moan, and you watch, pleased, as he starts to harden again in your grip. To be honest, you don't know where you're going with this, or what you expected to happen, you just wanted to see what other reactions you could get from him, how far you could take your regained power. 

As it stands, not very far, because he's hissing as you slide your thumb over the tip and flipping you over again so his elbows are braced next to your head.

“You're on the pill, right?” He reaches down between you to swipe his fingers over your clit.

You nod and buck your hips up into his hand, and with a breathy chuckle, he takes himself in hand and starts to guide himself into your entrance. There's a slight sting - he's bigger than anyone you've ever been with before - but he takes it slow, an uncharacteristic tenderness.

That is, until he's buried to the hilt and staring down at you, then snapping his hips in a way that should hurt but doesn't. It feels full and close and warm, his skin sliding against yours, sweat and other fluids mingling. You sneak a hand down to your clit and rub quick and hard, the way you do when you're alone at night and just need to get off and go to sleep. You're determined to reach your release before he does and you succeed, catching him in a kiss just as you cum, muffling your moans against his lips. The way your walls clench around him has him going rigid and giving you the most raw, tearing groan as he spills deep inside you, clearly not having expected to get there as quickly as you forced him to. He doesn't pull out immediately, opting instead to kiss you again, and you're not sure where you end and he begins, every bit of you mixed, in some way, with every bit of him. You stroke over the tense muscles in the back of his neck and he lets out a shaky breath onto your skin. Somehow, you know you've won this round, taken a weakness from him that he never meant to show you. When he rolls off you and tugs you into his side, you close your eyes, sleepy and sated in more ways than one.

[myrddin-wylt]

not me thinking about how Alfred must’ve actually been a very obedient and easy teenager for Arthur to parent, at least until the end of the Seven Years’ War. like Arthur would’ve been immensely proud of him??? the Thirteen colonies were the center and world leader of Enlightenment/Western political theory, the colonial colleges were respected institutions of learning, a surprising amount of the (white) population was literate -- just in general, it’s easy for me to forget that the US was a major epicenter of law, political theory, and to a lesser degree science in general before it became the US.

like Arthur spends the mid 17th century unable to spend much time with Alfred until the Restoration, but every time he does get to sit down with Alfred for a few hours or so he’s always greatly impressed by how much Alfred reads and writes and debates and experiments. maybe he does or doesn’t realize Alfred is trying to impress him, but either way he’s got a lot of reasons to be very proud of his prodigy of a son, and he’s especially pleased to see him living up to his eponym’s love of learning.

like the English colonists were a bit unique in how they saw themselves and England? like the English colonists considered themselves Englishmen, not, you know, Americans or English colonists. they expected the same treatment from English regardless of which side of the Atlantic they were on. so imo Alfred was actually a very loyal and obedient kid, and he sorta ended up parentified if only to parent himself because Arthur was so busy. I just [clenches fist] love hcs where Alfred is genuinely the Dutiful Son and heir growing up, he manages the businesses of the Kirkland household (because Duncan sure as fuck ain’t doing that at this point in time) and the administration of the colonies in father’s absence and he does a damn good job at it. he’s resourceful and self-reliant enough to take care of himself and of anyone Arthur trusts him with. Alfred being his father’s right hand man is just so special to me.

also I like this characterization a lot because it makes their later relationship more interesting. Alfred goes from heir and trusted lieutenant to the family disappointment no one talks about to eventually Arthur is his right hand rather than the other way around. Alfred is the golden scapegoat personified lol.

I also like the dynamics it makes with his siblings since he’s so aloof that he doesn’t... really even see them as siblings all the time? not maliciously, but he just didn’t grow up with them. prior to the 20th century, the most time he spent with any of them was a single decade with Matt that was honestly pretty antagonistic at points. Successful Eldest Son/Golden Scapegoat embodied, man.

[charmedreincarnation]

A long motivating list of celebrities who have admitted to using manifesting/shifting practices

Believe it or not, some of the biggest names in the entertainment industry have harnessed the power of manifesting to help get to the top. From athletes to actors and singers, there is no shortage of big names who have used this powerful method of change to turn their dreams into reality.

Beyoncé is a celebrity who openly talks about manifesting and shifting her emotions to create a world that makes her happy and successful. She believes in expressing herself through song and art and believes that those forms of creativity have helped her to create an amazing career.

Leonardo DiCaprio has also been vocal about how he uses manifesting and shifting practices in his own life. He says that by visualizing his goals, he's able to set himself up for success, making sure to focus on the good that comes from any situation.

Next we have, Oprah Winfrey. According to one of the most influential women in show business, she used a visualization technique called "The Law of Attraction" to manifest her success. She said, "The Law of Attraction says that whatever you think or feel, you attract into your life. I use this philosophy daily and have achieved great success."

Another star who has shared their success story is actor Will Smith. The award-winning actor said that manifesting how his future would look was an important factor in his success. He said, “I would literally forget what my goals were and start imagining myself achieving them. This created a strong feeling within me, allowing for a stronger connection to the Universe and helped me access greater opportunities."

Singer Ariana Grande also admitted that she has used manifesting techniques to reach her goals. In one interview, she said, “I practiced positive thinking and visualizing what I wanted during those times when I was going through hardships and it really worked. Little by little, I saw my life become what I wanted it to be." has been open about her journey with manifesting. She says, “If you are constantly affirmatively speaking — even if it's out loud — ‘I'm going to make this happen’, your energy shifts and you start to become magnetic and draw those experiences to you."

Emma Chamberlain who was literally one and maybe still is a YouTube sensation is also a self-proclaimed manifestor. She is often seen talking about how she uses manifesting and shifting to get the most out of her life. Chamberlain has been open and candid about her success and how she believes in the power of bringing your dreams into reality.

In her videos, she has talked about how she visualizes what she wants and then takes steps to make it happen. She has also said that when things don't go as planned, she shifts her energy to get what she wants. Chamberlain believes that these techniques give her an advantage and help her create the life that she wants for herself.

Melanie Martinez who become well-known for her hit single "Cry Baby" as well has her own eponymous album. She is also a self-professed manifestor and has said that she believes in the power of intention and shift to bring her dreams into reality. Martinez has said that through visualization, meditation and setting intentions, she has been able to create the life that she always wanted. She also has openly talking about shifting realities !

Chris Pratt, the star of movies like Jurassic World and Guardians of the Galaxy. Chris recently spoke out about his faith and specifically about how he uses manifesting and shifting practices in his everyday life. He says that every day he writes down what he wants for his future and visualizes having it and spoke about the power of belief.

Model, actress and entrepreneur Tyra Banks also shared her story of manifestation. “I've always believed in manifestation. You know when you're a kid, you decide what you want to be and you go do it? I just always do that. It's not so much hard work, it's affirming. You affirm what you want and you work hard."

actor Ashton Kutcher wrote a heartfelt post on manifesting: “If ‘you manifest your dreams’ means having faith that if you believe something in your head and heart and take actions towards making it a reality, then that has been my experience.”

This one shocked me but Chris brown (ew) also had something to say about shifting and manifesting. He said Well, I use both of these tools daily. Whenever I have an idea or goal that I want to achieve, I focus on it completely. I visualize it, speak my desires out loud, and take action to make it happen. This helps me stay motivated and allows me to put my energy into what I really want.

I also use shifting to stay positive and creative. Whenever I'm feeling down or uninspired, I focus on positive thoughts and visualize what I want to achieve. This helps me shift my energy and get into a more creative headspace so that I can create the best work possible.

He said “My biggest tip would be to practice self-care and take time for yourself. When you are feeling overwhelmed or stressed, take a step back and focus on how you're feeling physically and emotionally. It's important to take care of yourself so that you can stay focused on your goals and manifest the things that you want in life.” I guess I’m not shocked because it would explain how he has gotten away with so much abuse and bigotry during his career.. but I digress.

Katy Perry has also spoken out about how she turned her dream of being a successful singer into a reality by using manifesting practices. To this day, she continues to use these practices to reach her goals. Taylor swift also admitted to doing something very similar and has her own manifesting method when she was a child.

NBA superstar LeBron James. Is also a celebrities who has openly shared his beliefS about his success. He recently revealed that he uses visualization techniques to help him reach his goals - from on-court performance to off-court business endeavors.

Jackie Chan also uses meditation and mindful exercises that he had admitted helped him a grove everything he wanted in this life.

Finally, professional athlete Kobe Bryant was open about his use of manifesting techniques to achieve his goals. He revealed that he used visualization techniques and positive thoughts to help reach his goals. He said, “By visualizing yourself doing something before you even attempt it, you can increase your confidence when you actually do it. This can help you become an even better athlete or performer."

[wjbs-bonkle-au]

Random small-scale Bionicle AU ideas; feel free to ask what your blorboes (or canon-set OCs, provided you explain what their Thing™ is) are doing in each:

Golf (Turaga-centric AU where they all play golf; side-stuff features the Toa Mahri working at a Crazy/Mini-Golf place.)

Bowling-alley (I think I already posted about this ages ago, but I'm bringing it up again to add some context; it's set in a pseudo-80s world, but everyone's still a biomechanical thing. The Metru and Hagah are the staff, Helryx is the manager, and everybody else are the regular bowlers.)

Age of Sail (technically-a-morality-swap pirate AU; the Makuta are further towards the "lawful" edge of the morality-grid, the (non-evil) Toa are more like Robin Hood figures, and the Dark Hunters and Piraka are more traditional pirates. The Red Star is a ghost-ship crewed by the dead, and Spherus Magna is basically Atlantis.)

Superhero (Human AU offshoot where all the regions are modern-day cities and everyone wears modern clothing; the Toa, Order Of Mata Nui etc. are superheroes, and the various antagonists are supervillains.)

Battle of the Bands (another Human AU offshoot, where the Toa Teams and other factions are bands in a mundane setting, and all the major conflicts are formatted as the eponymous style of contest; the main story is set contemporarily to the respective story-arc's out-of-universe storyline, with relevant musical genres (e.g the Inika are an indie-rock band in 2006, facing off against the Piraka, who are a rap-metal band), and the Metru Nui flashbacks take place in the mid-1980s (with the Toa Metru being a New wave act).)

Reversal (AU where the Magnans live in the GSR and the MU characters live on Bara Magna.)

Broken Mirror (basically just Transformers: Shattered Glass but Bonkle,)

Steam-Age (Bionicle, but in a world where the Magnan society was in the aesthetic and technological equivalent of the mid-to-late 1800s; Bota Magna is a large industrialised city, and Bara Magna is essentially the Wild West. Metus is a literal snake-oil salesman. Some areas of the Matoran Universe has progressed past this a bit, with Metru Nui being Art Deco and having Dieselpunk technology.)

MMORPG (yet another Human-AU spinoff, this time with the characters playing characters resembling their canon selves in a popular MMORPG.)

YA Dystopia ("what if Bionicle was an early-mid 2010s Young-Adult dystopian novel?")

Detective Takua (Takua but as a Poirot-meets-Columbo detective in an early-mid 20th century-flavoured world that coincidentally happens to be shaped like a jumbled-up version of the Matoran Universe; showing up unannounced/coincidentally happening to be at the Big Isolated Mansion™, Large Isolated Boat® or Vaguely-Mediterranean Island©, being very friendly to literally everyone there while also using his... Takua-ness(?) to disarm potential subjects and try to catch them out. Also Kapura is there sometimes.)

[queers-ahoy]

ket's 2023 favorite fanfiction reads!

here ye here ye! come one come all to hear about my Favorite Fics of 2023! A surprising number of these aren't even complete, but isn't that just how the cookie crumbles sometimes. I highly recommend all of these, completed or not! Most are Gentlebeard, but the last two are little wildcards! Fics that had their word count marked with an asterisk are incomplete.

Once Upon a Summer in San Francisco by samwise | E | 209k*

A charming and thrilling AU set in San Francisco in 1978. Ed, a career drug dealer, meets Stede during a music festival after getting drugged by his office co-workers. They become intertwined in a relationship that puts both of them in new territory. I think my favorite part of this fic is all of the music and fashion references, as well as how all the crew members (and others!) are woven into the story. All the side relationships are adorable, and Stede and Mary have an ADORABLE friendship that I can't get enough of.

2. In Favor With Their Stars by @mxmollusca | M | ~62k

This fic was my introduction to sci-fi AUs in this fandom! It's a gripping story that follows Ed, an engineer who finds himself awoken early from cryostasis on an "interplanetary research vessel" travelling to Jupiter's moon, Europa. Ed soon discovers that the ship's artificial intelligence, STE/DE, is likely sentient. Chaos and love ensues as they spend several months together, flying through the void. This story is uniquely multi-media, told through prose, code, poetry, audio transcripts, and even music!

3. Famine and Feast by zemph147 (@gaypiratebrainrot) | E | ~19k

This fic is a HILARIOUS and fascinating modern AU where Ed is the owner and head chef of his fine dining restaurant, Blackbeard. He finds himself full of renewed passion for his craft after tasting the menu of The Revenge, a new food truck owned by one Stede Bonnet. As someone who works in a kitchen and LOVES any media about food, this fic really indulged me. The description of every dish had my mouth watering!

4. Kalahari Down by @oatmilktruther | E | 31k*

Kalahari Down is a wild and stylized fic, written from Ed's pov as a 19 year old rancher working in Montana on Bonnet Ranch. When Stede returns home from boarding school, the two boys find themselves whipped up into a Brokeback Mountain-esque romance. However, canon-typical miscommunications make their journey a rocky one. This fic is INSANE in the way that it's written, and absolutely must be read in a southern accent (or at least, that's how I have to read it in my head :3). The series is smartly inspired by the eponymous album by Orville Peck, Bronco. Each chapter takes the name of a song written by him, and the vibes certainly shine through. It's hard to say since it's yet to be completed, but it's certainly lining up to be one of my favorite ofmd fics of all time.

5. Fine Wires by Nospaceforjack, ThePirateRoo | E | ~114k

Set in London, 1887, this fic follows the meeting of Blackbeard, the infamous burglar, and The Gentleman Thief, new to a life of crime. The two men are quickly charmed by each other, but their relationship becomes caught in the clutches of the law chasing them as well as Stede's need to prove himself. This story is charming in aesthetic, originally an AMAU, and is told through collages of images, letters, composed ambient music, as well as prose. The setting really comes to life with the mixture of multimedia content along with amazing description.

6. Liquid Gold by @perkynurples | M | ~79k

This is another modern AU that was originally an SMAU! Stede returns to his family's summer home in following his divorce from Mary in an attempt to reconnect with himself. He takes to beekeeping, a hobby his mother enjoyed in his youth, and it soon connects him to resident beekeeper, Edward Teach. They become swept into a honey sweet relationship where they uncover more mysteries than they ever expected to. This fic is ADORABLE as much as it is captivating, and as a beekeeper myself, this fic holds a special place in my heart <3

7. not pickles by smallestchurch | E | ~83k

Yay another modern AU! This one is an Ed pov, and really focuses on Ed's progression through his mental health struggles and such. Ed and Stede live in the same apartment building, and Ed finds himself pulled into Stede's adorable family, whether he likes it or not (he does). There's plenty of adorable Alma/Louis content in this one, and Ed is no surprise GREAT with kids. It's heartwarming, gut-wrenching, and tear-jerking all in one! Total triple threat.

8. the knife and the throat by darcylindbergh (@forpiratereasons) | E | ~35k*

This is a post-s1 canon fix-it fic that is just SWARMING with all kinds of delicious angst. After Stede fights to reunite with Ed, he finds that healing their relationship won't be nearly as easy as the gut wound he's given when he tries. This fic alternates pov, but I'm especially entranced by the way Ed is written in particular. This fic hasn't been updated in a while, but the author told me that they hope to complete it eventually! Finished or not, it's a great read.

9. if i was pure, you know i would by bitethehands | E | ~2k

Dead Dove: Do Not Eat! This fic is a delicious body horror one-shot where Izzy is immortal and Kraken era Blackbeard finds that *fascinating.* It's gruesome and horrifying and so well-written.

10. bend over, doll (it's all a game) by Sweveris | E | ~91k

Modern AU with a sick twist! Edward is the leader of a crime ring and married to Stede Bonnet. Ed is quick to discover that his husband is less than faithful, but decides to play along for a while, just to see where it goes. Everyone in this fic is TERRIBLE and it's AMAZING. I usually hate fics with Calico Jack in them, but somehow this one coaxed me into reading full chapters from his pov. There's also some really yummy Stizzy content that simmers throughout.

//And that's that! I have plenty of honorable mentions that I'll probably add soon, especially if people want more recommendations! Happy New Year, and here's to many lovely fics in 2024!

[bennettmarko]

The most ineffective solutions come from those initially tasked to solve the problem.

- Anon

[leporellian]

jokes aside i'm kind of surprised nobody has brought up how the season 2 poster of succession pretty much completely lays out who will 'win' succession and become the next CEO, as long as you have an eye for art and opera.

(spoilers incoming, obviously.)

that painting there in the back is like, weirdly prominent. so what the hell is it of?

well, hell, actually. specifically these guys.

this is dante and virgil, a painting by william-adolphe bouguerea. it depicts a scene from the divine comedy in which dante and virgil witness a fight between capocchio, a heretic, and gianni schicchi, who was sent to hell for using fraud to claim another man's will.

which on its own is something. but there's even more going on here. you see, in 1918 giacomo puccini was looking for a subject to write a one-act comedy opera about, and he settled on telling gianni schicchi's story in an eponymous opera. gianni schicchi the opera starts with a wealthy patriarch dying, and his morally bankrupt family coming in to collect their inheritance- only to find that the patriarch hadn't actually willed them anything. they settle on summoning gianni schicchi- local trickster and the father of a family in-law- to help. through some looney tunes-esque slapstick shenanigans, gianni schicchi gets control over the will- and then uses it to will himself and his daughter everything and lock out the original family from what they thought was theirs. the in-laws win, and the original family is chased out of the house they thought was theirs and into the streets.

they had to have put that painting in there for a reason. and they would have had to have known about the opera the painting is tied to. and there's only one in-law in the show who could have reasonably snagged the position the roy siblings were all vying for.

tom was always going to win.

[justforbooks]

In 1964 the theoretical physicist Peter Higgs, who has died aged 94, suggested that the universe contains an all-pervading essence that can be manifested in the form of particles. This idea inspired governments to spend billions to find what became known as Higgs bosons.

The so-called “Higgs mechanism” controls the rate of thermonuclear fusion that powers the sun, but for which this engine of the solar system would have expired long before evolution had time to work its miracles on earth. The structure of atoms and matter and, arguably, existence itself are all suspected to arise as a result of the mechanism, whose veracity was proved with the experimental discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012.

The Nobel laureate physicist Leon Lederman infamously described the boson as “the God particle”. Higgs, an atheist, found this inappropriate and misleading, but the name stuck and helped bring fame to the idea, and to Higgs. He in turn became a Nobel prizewinner in 2013.

It was at Edinburgh University, as a young lecturer in mathematical physics in the early 1960s, that Higgs became interested in the profound and tantalising ways in which properties – mathematical symmetries – in the equations describing fundamental laws can be hidden in the structures that arise.

For example, in space, unaffected by the earth’s gravity, a droplet of water looks the same in all directions: it is spherically symmetric, in agreement with the symmetry implied by the underlying mathematical equations describing the behaviour of water molecules. Yet when water freezes, the resulting snowflake takes up a different symmetry – its shape only appearing the same when rotated through multiples of 60 degrees – even though the underlying equations remain the same.

The Japanese-American physicist Yoichiro Nambu first inspired interest in this phenomenon, known as spontaneous symmetry breaking, in 1960.

Inspired by Nambu’s work, in 1964 Higgs’s own theory emerged with its explanation of how equations that call for massless particles (such as the quantum theory of the electromagnetic field, which leads to the massless photon) can, via the so-called Higgs mechanism, give rise to particles with a mass.

This idea would later be at the root of Gerardus ’t Hooft’s proof in 1971 that unification of the electromagnetic force and the weak force, responsible for radioactivity, where a massive “W” particle plays the analogous role to the massless photon, is viable. The subsequent discovery of the W in 1983 gained Nobel prizes, both for the experiment and for theorists who had foreseen this. Underlying this success was the so-called Higgs mechanism, which controlled the mathematics in this explanation of the weak force.

When Nambu won the Nobel prize in 2008, it began to seem likely that the way was being prepared for Higgs’s eventual recognition.

A problem though, as Higgs was always the first to stress, was that he had not been alone in discovering the possibility of mass “spontaneously” appearing. Similar ideas had already been articulated: by the condensed matter physicist Philip Anderson, though in a more restricted way, and by Robert Brout and François Englert in Belgium, who beat Higgs into print by a few weeks. A former colleague of Higgs at Imperial College, Tom Kibble, and two colleagues were to write a paper along similar lines weeks later.

Where Higgs had justifiable claims to uniqueness was in the boson. He drew attention to the fact that in certain circumstances spontaneously broken symmetry implied that a massive particle should appear, whose affinity for interacting with other particles would be in proportion to their masses.

It would be discovery of this particle that could give experimental verification that the theory is indeed a description of nature. Although even this boson was arguably implicit in other work, it was Higgs who articulated most sharply its implications in particle physics.

The eponymous “Higgs boson” became the standard-bearer for the Large Hadron Collider. In the early 1990s the science minister William Waldegrave issued his challenge: explain the Higgs boson on a sheet of paper and help me to convince the government to fund this.

Among the winners, the most famous was the analogy, by David Miller of University College London, of Margaret Thatcher – a massive particle – wandering through a cocktail party at the Tory conference and gathering hangers-on as she moved. Higgs, whose politics were diametrically opposite to hers, expressed himself as being “very comfortable” with the description.

He was always uncomfortable as a celebrity. When Cern – the European Organisation for Nuclear Research – prepared to switch on the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in 2008, the media promoted it as a quest for the Higgs boson.

Higgs felt that Cern was misguided to talk up “the” boson – he was always the first to stress that others had had much the same idea and that naming it after him was unfair. He once modestly described the detection of the boson as “tying up loose ends” and regarded the main excitement of the LHC as its potential to reveal the secrets of dark matter and other kinds of new physics.

Nonetheless, in July 2012, Cern announced the discovery of a particle “with Higgs-like properties”. Media frenzy grew, and Higgs bravely accepted his fate as a centre of attention.

Although most physicists were sure that the eponymous boson had been discovered, several months’ more study would be needed before complete confirmation could be assured: the Nobel prize for 2012 went elsewhere. By 2013 the evidence was compelling; there was a general expectation that 2013 would be the year.

By this stage, 49 years had elapsed since Higgs had written his first paper on the subject. In a final, nailbiting twist, the announcement of his long-awaited success was delayed by an hour as the Nobel committee struggled to reach the famously reclusive scientist. Aware of the media attention he was likely to get, Higgs had decided to be “somewhere else” when the announcement was made, and told colleagues that he planned to take a holiday in the north-west highlands of Scotland.

As the date approached, however, he realised that this was not a good plan for that time of the year, so he decided to stay at home and be somewhere else at the right time. At around 11am on 8 October, he left home and by noon, when the announcement should have been made, he was in Leith, by the shore, in a bar called the Vintage, which Higgs famously attested sold both food and “rather good beers”.

Thus with Higgs incommunicado (he largely avoided using mobile phones or the internet), after more than an hour of unsuccessful attempts to reach him, the Swedish Academy decided to make the public announcement anyway. The ironic result was that by 2pm, the news that Peter Higgs and Englert, of the Université Libre de Bruxelles, were the winners of the Nobel prize for physics was known to the world, but not to Higgs himself. (Englert’s colleague Brout had died in 2011, and was unable to be included as Nobel prizes are not awarded posthumously.)

Higgs later recalled how, “after a suitable interval”, but still ignorant of the news, he had made his way home from lunch. However, he delayed further by visiting an art exhibition, as “it seemed too early to get home, where reporters would probably be gathered”.

At about three o’clock he was walking along Heriot Row, heading for his flat in the next street, when a car pulled up near Queen Street Gardens. A lady got out “in a very excited state” and told Higgs: “My daughter’s just phoned from London and told me about the award.” To which Higgs replied: “What award?” As he explained, he was joking, but that is when his expectations were confirmed.

His plan had been a success, as, “I managed to get in my front door with no more damage than one photographer lying in wait.” A little more than a decade later, the main focus of the LHC has been to produce large numbers of Higgs bosons in order to understand the nature of the omnipresent essence that they form.

During the coronavirus lockdown I talked with him for hours on the phone at weekends in the course of researching the biography Elusive: How Peter Higgs Solved the Mystery of Mass (2022). When asked to summarise his perspective on public reaction to the boson he said: “It ruined my life.” To know nature through mathematics, to see your theory confirmed, to win the plaudits of peers and win a Nobel prize, how could this equate with ruin? He explained: “My relatively peaceful existence was ending. I dont enjoy this sort of publicity. My style is to work in isolation, and occasionally have a bright idea.”

Higgs spent more than half a century as a theoretical physicist at Edinburgh University. Perhaps because of this, he was described in many media reports as a “Scottish physicist”, whereas in fact he was born in Newcastle, of English parents, Thomas Ware Higgs and Gertrude Maud (nee Coghill).

His father was a sound engineer with the BBC, and the family moved almost immediately to Birmingham, where Peter spent his first 11 years. In 1941, with the second world war intensifying, the BBC decided that Birmingham was too dangerous, and its operations were transferred to Bristol. The Higgs family duly moved there, with the intention of avoiding aerial bombardment, but the following weekend the centre of Bristol was heavily bombed.

In Bristol, Higgs attended Cotham grammar school, where a famous former pupil had been the Nobel physicist Paul Dirac. Dirac’s name was prominent on the honours board. Higgs followed him, but initially in mathematics rather than physics. Higgs’s father had a collection of maths books, which inspired Peter and enabled him to be become far ahead of the class. His interest in physics was sparked in 1946, upon hearing the Bristol physicists, later Nobel laureates, Cecil Powell and Nevill Mott describing the background to the atomic bomb programme. Although this helped determine his career, Higgs himself later became a member of CND.

At King’s College London he studied theoretical physics, going on to gain his PhD in 1954. He was working on molecular physics, applying ideas of symmetry to molecular structure. His interests moved towards particle physics, although his office was on the same corridor as those of Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins, two of the co-discoverers of the structure of DNA, though his own work had no immediate link to their programme.

He won research fellowships, first at the University of Edinburgh (1954-56), then in London at University College (1956–57), and at Imperial College(1957–58). He was appointed lecturer in mathematics at University College London in 1958, and then moved to the University of Edinburgh in 1960, where he spent the rest of his research career. Initially lecturer in mathematical physics, in 1970 he was appointed reader and, in 1980, professor of theoretical physics. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1974, and FRS in 1983.

He met his future wife, the linguist Jody Williamson, at a CND meeting in 1960. They married in 1963, and had two sons, Christopher and Jonathan. Although they separated, they remained friends until her death in 2008.

Higgs won several awards in addition to the 2013 Nobel prize. In addition to numerous honorary degrees, these included the 1997 Dirac medal and prize from the Institute of Physics, the 2004 Wolf prize in physics, the Sakurai prize of the American Physical Society in 2010, and the Edinburgh medal in 2013. That year he was also appointed Companion of Honour, and two years later he won the Copley medal of the Royal Society, the world’s oldest scientific prize.

His sons survive him.

🔔 Peter Ware Higgs, theoretical physicist, born 29 May 1929; died 8 April 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[fcble]

ZENITH ENTERTAINMENT is a fictional South Korean entertainment company. It was founded in 2016 by former SM Entertainment executive LEE TAEIN, shortly after his supposedly amicable departure from the company. 

They are best known for their first and flagship group FABLE, who continues to be the only artist formed solely by the company. Zenith is also notable for the way CEO Taein notoriously inserts himself into the smallest of business decisions, and their refusal to take trainees since Fable’s debut.

BASICS

NAME: Zenith Entertainment

TYPE: Private

INDUSTRY: Music, entertainment

FOUNDED: 2016

FOUNDER: Lee Taein

HEADQUARTERS: Jongno-gu, Seoul, South Korea

AREA SERVED: Worldwide

NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES: 20+

ARTISTS

FABLE (2018 — present): eight seven member boy group

NEON NIGHTS (2021 — present): five member girl band

JAESUN (2023 — present): idol soloist

NOTABLE PEOPLE

LEE TAEIN (1969) … Founder, CEO, and Fable's creative director. Former SM Entertainment talent acquisition director. Played by Lee Byung-hun.

PARK SANGHYUN (1972) … COO and CFO. Has been trying to get a private office for the past seven years. Played by Lee Seo-jin.

CHEN YUXUAN (2002) … Taein and Sanghyun's executive assistant. Underpaid and overworked intern. Played by Liu Yu.

WOO HYEKYUNG (1997) … Social media & marketing manager. Has held the position since 2017. Rules the open office with an iron fist. Played by Park Soobin.

SHIN JUBIN (1985) … Neon Nights and Jaesun's creative director. Classics fan. Can conjugate ancient Greek. Played by Hwang Jung-eum.

KIM GAEUN (1981) … Fable's lead stylist. Co-founder of modern hanbok brand Shinbok. Played by Son Ye-jin.

HONG SHINUI (1975) … Historical consultant for Fable. Korea University adjunct professor. Historian specializing in the middle period of the Joseon dynasty. Played by Lee Tae-ran.

JEON DAEWOONG (1995) … Fable's manager. Former SM Entertainment trainee, 2014-2017. Always thinking about who he could have been. Played by Ahn Hyo-seop.

LEE AERIN (1990) … Neon Nights' manager. Not their first fan, but still their biggest one. Played by Tiffany Young.

NAM CHOHYUN (1998) … Jaesun's manager. Also his cousin. Otherwise unqualified for his job. Played by Han Gichan.

MAJOR SHAREHOLDERS

LEE TAEIN (1969) … 60%. Founder and CEO.

AHN █████ (197█) … 15%. ███████ Group ███. Played by ████ ███.

JUNG SEOBUM (1990) … 10%. Venture capitalist, representing Daehan Ventures. Played by Lee Junho.

████ █████████ (19██) … 7%. Lawyer, the eponymous ████ of law firm ████ & ███. Played by ███ ████████.

███ █████████ (1969) … 6%. Senior Superintendent in the █████ ████████████ ██████ ██████. Played by ███ ████████.

LEE JAESEOP (1995) … 2%. Idol, member of Fable. Played by Kim Doyoung.

[1997thebracket]

Round 3

Blur's Self-Titled: And when she lets me slip away… Some bands make their debut with an eponymous album (Placebo did the year before, as would Albarn's second great success Gorillaz) but Blur knew that declaration of self-actualizion was worth saving. Blur by Blur is the fifth studio album by the acclaimed English pop-rock-alternative-shoegaze-anything that'll stick-band, fronted by 90s coverboy Damon Albarn. The album brought us the singles Beetlebum and Song 2, the former of which debuted at #1 on the UK charts, and the latter of which would properly break in the US and give the band the footing on American soil they'd previously missed. Woo-hoo! Despite its mainstream success (the album is certified Platinum) Blur has a distinctly more experimental sound than their Britpop classics and explores rougher indie production sentiments; guitarist Graham Coxon centers his widening musical tastes and produces some of his proudest work, while Albarn has stated that the track On Your Own may be regarded as the first taste of Gorillaz-before-Gorillaz. Although it would not be the end of the road for the band's internal turmoil and eventual reconciliation, it would come to represent an era of growth and emotional authenticity in their music.

The Aqua v. Mattel Lawsuit: Life in plastic is fantastic... but outside of it, mega-corporations are litigious. In 1997, the world was introduced to the Danish-Norwegian group Aqua via their Europop smash hit Barbie Girl; the song was so big, in fact, that Mattel sued the band's American record label MCA over the lyrics and the use of their trademarked shade 'Barbie Pink.' Turns out Lady Justice would not be on Mattel's side as Barbie's original messaging rang true, confirming that girls in the 90s could be anything, including tongue-in-cheek pop performers protected under parody law. Mattel would even petition the Supreme Court (really!) while Aqua and MCA would file a countersuit, but none would find great success in litigation. The whole debacle is best summarized by Judge Kozinski's iconic line, "The parties are advised to chill."

[homomenhommes]

THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … March 2

1799 – U.S.Congress adopts a law to "suppress all dissolute, immoral, and disorderly practices" on Naval ships.

1853 – The Washington Territory is created and given all laws of Oregon. Since Oregon doesn't have a sodomy law, Washington doesn't get one, either

1866 – The English poet John Gray was born on this date (d.1934). His works include Silverpoints, The Long Road and Park: A Fantastic Story. He is purported to be the inspiration behind the title character in The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde, with whom he had a homosexual relationship. Gray distanced himself from this rumor. It should also be noted that Wilde's story was serialised in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine a year before their relationship began.His relationship with Wilde was initially intense, but had cooled for over two years by the time of Wilde's imprisonment. The relationship appears to have been at its height in the period 1891-1893. Like many of the artists of that period, Gray was a convert to Roman Catholicism in the late '90s. He left his position at the Foreign Office and studied for the priesthood at the Scots College, Rome and later became a priest at Saint Patrick's and a rector at Saint Peter's in Edinburgh.

His most important supporter, and life partner, was Marc-André Raffalovich, a wealthy poet and early defender of homosexuality. Raffalovich himself became a Catholic in 1896 and joined the tertiary order of Dominicans. When Gray went to Edinburgh he settled nearby. He helped finance St Peter's Church in Morningside where Gray would serve as priest for the rest of his life. Supposedly (and we highlight *supposedly*) the two maintained a chaste relationship until Raffalovich's sudden death in 1934. A devastated Gray died exactly four months later at St. Raphael's nursing home in Edinburgh after a short illness.

1895 – The legal case of Oscar Wilde begins with the arrest of the Marquess of Queensberry on criminal libel charges for having accused Wilde of being a sodomite. Through three trials the truth of the charge comes out and Wilde is convicted of "gross indecency" and sent to prison for two years.

1942 – Lou Reed (d.2013) is an influential American rock singer-songwriter and guitarist. He first came to prominence as the guitarist and principal singer-songwriter of The Velvet Underground (1965-1973).

An enduring but complicated figure whose shadow stretches back four decades to the very beginnings of the American rock underground, Lou Allen Reed was born on Long Island to a middle-class, suburban family - a family with whom he soon found himself at odds, as they were unable to accept his unconventional attitudes and sexually ambiguous behaviour. During his teen years, they went so far as to have him confined in a mental hospital, where he was forced to endure electro-shock treatments and drug therapy as a means to ward off any nascent homosexual tendencies; somehow Reed managed to emerge from this ordeal with his attitudes intact, and, despite his parents' disapproval, continued to pursue his musical interests.

John Cale and Reed enlisted guitarist Sterling Morrison and drummer Angus MacLise to become The Velvet Underground in 1965. Later in the year MacLise quit and was replaced by Maureen Tucker, at which time the band began performing in local clubs and cafés; not long afterwards they came to the attention of art prankster Andy Warhol, who, intrigued by their unconventional approach, offered to assume management duties for the band. During its time, the band was commercially unsuccessful, but has now assumed cult status.

In 1971 a contract with RCA finally initiated the launch of his solo career, and an eponymous album followed in 1972. Primarily featuring Velvets-era material, the release accordingly received the same lack of interest that had plagued the previous band.

In the hopes of avoiding the dismal response given to his first solo effort, Reed enlisted the help of long-standing Velvets fans David Bowie and Mick Ronson to create his second offering, Transformer (1972). Given a thorough glam makeover by the pair, the album featured one of his most commercially successful songs (Walk On The Wild Side) and at last provided some forward momentum to his floundering career.

The lyrics "But she never lost her head / Even when she was giving head" from 1972's 'Walk On The Wild Side' weren't banned by the BBC because the censors didn't know what "giving head" meant.

Lou Reed teamed up with producer Bob Ezrin who produced many rock operas like Pink Floyd's the Wall and Alice Cooper's Billion Dollar Babies. The result was Seattle Junkie Queen. The story is extremely depressing and sad but at times it can be very awe inspiring. Lou Reed does vocals and guitar. "Caroline Says, part 2" is one of the best off this album and actually reworks The Velvet Underground song Lou Reed wrote called "Stephanie Says" which was written about Lou Reed's homosexual lover.

Reed continued to write and perform over the coming years, and by the turn of the century, in distinct contrast to his years with the Velvet Underground, Reed found himself an established and widely-respected member of the music industry.

1943 – Michael Denneny, working for St. Martin's Press, was one of the first editors to publish openly gay and lesbian material in the early 1970s, and he bought the highly literary, experimental novel KoolAIDS and enthusiastically likened it to Angels in America. He planned to market it as a "gay novel," but he discovered that his straight colleagues "wondered why I thought of Angels in America as a "gay play" – they just saw it as an award-winning play about AIDS. So we decided to market KoolAIDS as a "literary" novel." Although the few reviews it received were positive, its sales were disappointing.

In a move that shocked industry insiders, editor Michael Denneny on March 1, 2002, abruptly left St. Martin's Press, where he had worked (with a brief intermission at Crown Books) since the mid 1970s. Denneny played the leading role in introducing mainstream publishing to gay and lesbian books. Among the many authors that Denneny edited were Randy Shilts, Ethan Mordden, Christopher Davis, John Fox, Allen Barnett, Paul Monette, Nisa Donnelly, Rabih Alameddine, and Ernesto Maestre.

1945 – Gordon Thomson is a Canadian actor widely known for his role as Adam Carrington on the 1980s American prime time soap opera Dynasty.

Thomson began acting while studying English at McGill University in Montreal. One of his earliest roles was "Sir Robin the Brave" in the 1971 version of the Muppets' The Frog Prince. He went on to appear in Canadian television and stage roles, including a stint in Godspell opposite Gilda Radner, Martin Short, and Eugene Levy. In his twenties he also worked as a catalogue model to supplement his acting earnings.

His first main TV role was as Michael Stewart Jr. on the Canadian television serial High Hopes in 1978. He then appeared as Egyptologist Aristotle Benedict White on the ABC daytime soap opera Ryan's Hope from 1981 to 1982. Having received acclaim for stage performances in productions including Love's Labour's Lost, Godspell and Joe Orton's Loot, Thomson advanced to the ABC Talent Development Program. After auditioning for a police series pilot called Callahan, he was instead cast as Dynasty's Adam Carrington. Thomson debuted on Dynasty in October 1982, and remained with the series until its cancellation in May 1989. During the 1985–1986 season, Thomson also appeared in three episodes of the Dynasty spin-off, The Colbys.

After Dynasty, Thomson returned to daytime soaps. In 1990, he joined the now defunct series Santa Barbara (as the third actor to portray the character Mason Capwell). His commitment to Santa Barbara left him unable to reprise his role as Adam Carrington in the TV miniseries Dynasty: The Reunion (1991).

Thomson appeared in eight different series produced by Aaron Spelling: Dynasty, Fantasy Island, Finder of Lost Loves, Glitter, The Love Boat, The Colbys, Beverly Hills, 90210 and Sunset Beach. He guest-starred in a variety of other series such as Murder, She Wrote, The Nanny and Silk Stalkings.

In recent years, Thomson reunited with his Dynasty co-stars in two non-fiction television specials; After Dynasty (part of the UK's After They Were Famous series) in 2002, and Dynasty Reunion: Catfights & Caviar in 2006. That same year, he had small roles in the feature films Poseidon (a remake of The Poseidon Adventure), and the Academy Award-nominated Little Miss Sunshine.

Thomson guest hosted for Britain's ITV network on their then breakfast show Good Morning Britain, for which he covered celebrity events such as Wimbledon and Royal Ascot.

On September 25, 2017, Thomson came out as gay.

"It's not something I've ever announced," Thomson said, "I'm assuming that people know, and now that I'm my age that's fine. I don't go out of my way because it's my generation, I think. I'm probably as homophobic as any gay man alive because of my background." Of course the 80s was hardly a friendly decade for the nation's LGBTQ community, with a mystery disease claiming the lives of gay men before it was identified as AIDS.

"When I was growing up it [homosexuality] was a crime, and then classified as a mental illness," he said. "So you're dealing with that. And the shame, the breathtaking lack of self-esteem, has only just begun to seep out of my soul."

1988 – the Australian, gold-winning Olympic diver Matthew Mitcham was born on this date. He is the 2008 Olympic champion in the 10m platform, having received the highest single-dive score in Olympic history. He is the first Australian male to win an Olympic gold medal in diving since Dick Eve at the 1924 Summer Olympics, and was the only openly Gay male medal winner at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics after landing the highest scoring dive in Olympic history.

Mitcham was born in Brisbane but lives and trains in Sydney. He publicly came out as gay in 2008 to the Sydney Morning Herald when they were profiling Olympic hopefuls. During the 2008 Beijing Olympics, he was also featured on the cover of the international gay publication The Advocate in August 2008 and March 2009, as well as the cover of Australian gay publication DNA. Mitcham's boyfriend, Lachlan Fletcher, attended the 2008 Summer Olympic Games as a spectator. His trip was sponsored by a grant from Johnson & Johnson's Athlete Family Support Program.

Mitcham gained media coverage in Australia as reporters thought he was the first Australian to compete at the Olympic Games as an openly gay man at the time of his competition. However, Mathew Helm, the Australian diver who won the silver medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics in the men's 10m platform, had publicly announced he was gay before the Olympics began. Other notable gay Australian Olympians include Ji Wallace, who competed at the 2000 Summer Olympics and won a silver medal in the inaugural trampoline event; however, he came out after the Games.

Prior to his 10m platform win, Mitcham was reported to be one of only eleven openly gay athletes competing in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, out of 11,028 athletes from 204 countries.

Mitcham has said when asked to comment on his coming out: "I don't see sexuality as influencing my beliefs or opinions or perceptions of anybody, whether they're gay, straight, bi, trans, experimental, I don't care. I see it as a very uninfluential factor in people." Mitcham has said that after the Beijing Olympics, he received many letters from gay teenagers, "and that was really nice, really humbling".

In 2009 and 2010, Mitcham was selected by readers of samesame.com.au as one of the 25 most influential gay Australians.

On 3 June 2019, he announced his engagement to his British boyfriend Luke Rutherford after being together for seven months.

1997 – On this date the British scouting movement, begun by Lord Baden Powell, adopted a policy to protect both leaders and young recruits from harassment because of their 'sexual status'.

Sadly, the American scouting movement, in the throes of the homophobic churches that dominate it— the Mormon and United Methodist churches—refuse to steer toward such an inclusive position.

Currently (2012), Homosexual people are not restricted from membership or leadership positions in Scouts Canada, Scouts Australia, and most European associations, including The Scout Association of the United Kingdom, Ring deutscher Pfadfinderverbände of Germany (German Scout Federation), and the Swedish Guide and Scout Association.