#he's fundamentally misunderstanding the situation of course but it makes sense from his point of view | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

angelinthefire · 7 months

Text

Solitudes: director's commentary

So this is a thing I do now, post commentary on my fics. I've been sitting on this fic for a long time and I'm excited to finally talk about it!

Read the fic here

Chapter 1

The title of this fic is a reference to “Two Solitudes”, a novel which I’ve never read, but which is a point of reference for Canadian political science, about the fundamental division between Quebec and English Canada, and the two never being able to connect or understand the experience of the other. And that’s one of the inspirations for this fic, exploring the degree to which Dean and Cas understand each other and misunderstand each other, and their attempts to communicate what they want from their relationship. I do believe that Dean and Cas understand each other and connect and relate to each other to a large extent, and far better than some fans give them credit for. Sometimes I see the “Don’t go/Ask me to stay” dynamic exaggerated to an extent that I believe no longer makes sense, given their friendship. At the same time, there is an underlying tension and disconnect between them. They don’t have a perfect understanding of each other. And that still matters quite a lot.

The other source of inspiration for this is that I haven’t written anything where Dean is the one with a handle on his feelings and wants to initiate something, since like 2013. And that I’ve never written anything set in season 12, despite that season having the perfect setup for Dean and Cas getting together. And I was thinking, how do I push things further than what happened on the show? I usually like my fic to feel very situated in canon, and since Dean and Cas didn’t actually get together in s12, something else would have to happen, something to push Dean over the edge. Something that would also push Cas to make a realization. So that’s how I ended up with the idea to lock Dean and Cas in a room together, with Dean thinking that Cas is dead, and Cas unable to do anything but watch. In my head, the alternate title for this story is “The Pear Jiggler fic”. Just stick them in a box and fuck with them. We also often talk about how Cas never gets to see how Dean reacts when he dies, so that was a fun thing to do as well. And I just love a good bottle episode. Something that’s just all character-driven.

In terms of characterization, one thing that’s very important to me is that Cas knows that Dean cares about him. He’s not some poor soul who thinks he’s on thin ice all the time, or thinks that he has to be useful to be loved. He understands that Dean cares, but the misunderstanding is the degree to which Dean needs him in his life. Cas does have a drive to be useful, to solve problems, but it’s internally motivated. He has to prove that he’s useful for himself, not for Dean. Even when Dean gets pissed at him, Cas doesn’t take it too, too personally, because he does still know that he’s important to Dean.

For Dean, the emphasis is really on the way he retreats when threatened, emotionally. When he behaves badly, it’s partially because he’s worried, but also as a defence mechanism. He only puts words to his feelings when he has nothing left to lose.

It’s been a while since I’ve written a version of Cas that wasn’t fully tuned in to his feelings for Dean. One of the more fun things about this angsty fic was having Cas thinking about Dean wistfully, and not imagining that Dean might be in love with him, or that his feelings are anything other than friendship. I guess the other option was to write mutual pining, Dean and Cas both being aware of their feelings but neither realizing the other feels the same way. But for me, the realization that what they feel is love is a really fun part of the story, so I wanted that moment for at least one of them. Of course, Dean isn’t fully there yet either. Like he knows, but he’s not 100% there. But it’s just caution that’s holding him back. A lot of the time in fic, when it’s Dean’s POV and he knows he’s in love with Cas, there’s a whole big self esteem thing that holds him back. And I never really buy that. Plus it’s unnecessary.

I’ve noticed that in a lot of my fics, I get Dean out of the driver’s seat of the Impala, or out of the Impala entirely. It is about getting him into a new situation, making him feel off-kilter in some way. Switching up the status-quo.

I’ve been playing the Sims quite a bit, mostly building homes, and therefore looking at a lot of fancy real estate postings for inspiration. I find brutalist architecture quite compelling in its own right. I wanted a setting that feels foreboding, but still like a place where someone might actually have lived. A room with very little in it that could provide distraction. And a space where light plays an important role, which it does in brutalist buildings, I think. I do find it unlikely that a desk and chair would have survived, but Dean needed something to smash up, so. And the fountain wall is there to create a sense that the building is being taken over by something, it has something growing in it.

The monster itself isn’t consciously based on anything. It’s what it needs to be for the story. Whatever lore I made up only exists to support its function in the story. Even the way Sam kills it, just serves to underline that it’s unique and powerful, and therefore able to keep Cas contained.

Chapter 2

I didn’t have the idea to do the split-screen until I was well into planning the fic. To emphasize the division between Dean and Cas, their mismatched perspectives. For a second I considered just having two unbroken columns, so that the reader would have to decide when/if to go back and forth, but that would have been kind of confusing. And ultimately, Cas is reacting to Dean, so you need to keep going back to Dean to understand Cas. I wrote Dean’s side first, as the independent variable. Deciding where to break, and switch to Cas was a bit of a back-and-forth process, because it had to work both in terms of story and in terms of rhythm. One thing I liked about this is that I didn’t have to decide whose POV to write in. Unless a story is strictly one character’s POV I usually plan out scenes from both of their perspectives and then decide which one is better to take for the story, and sometimes that can be kind of tough.

Of course, the entire conceit of this scenario is that it’s a metaphor for their relationship. Or it takes the tension in their relationship and brings it to the next level. They’re together, but there’s something preventing them from fully connecting. They understand each other, but they misunderstand each other at the same time. And it’s by making that disconnect physical that they start to kind of be able to deal with it. Because it gives Cas a perspective on Dean that he didn’t have before. They don’t fully resolve their problems by the end, and to be honest I wouldn’t want them to. But they make some progress.

I had fun with the imagery for this. Dean and Cas sharing the same space, being separated by light, and by illusion.

Dean’s alcoholism figures very heavily in this. But it is not addressed as a problem for him to overcome. I neither feel equipped to write a story about alcoholism per se, nor do I want to. A running theme throughout a few of my fics is that Dean and Cas do not fix each other. They keep being the same fucked up guys. And I think getting Dean to a place where he wants to deal with his substance abuse problems would require a lot more story behind it.

The withdrawal is there to make things that much more horrible for Dean, not to actually deal with alcoholism as an issue.. And it adds an extra sense of threat. I didn’t do a ton of research on what happens when someone goes through withdrawal, I just looked up a timeline for symptoms (it can start after just six hours! I didn’t know that before). And I confirmed that someone could die from withdrawal.

For Dean, chapter 2 is about making him sit with his misery. Unlike every other time he’s lost Cas on the show, there’s nothing to distract him here. And that’s one of the things that pushes him to vocalize his thoughts and feelings.. As well, anger, guilt, fear and love are all very much intertwined for Dean. And that’s accentuated by the situation. So he says “I hate you” before he says “I love you.” But then, as his motivation to survive kind of drains away, his defensive instincts do as well.

For Cas, it was about forcing him to accept that things are outside of his control. There’s no more desperate moves, he can’t throw himself on his sword. Like Dean, there’s nothing to distract him, he’s forced to stop and reflect on what’s happening. He has to face what he means to Dean. When Cas says “I’m not worth it” - that’s something that came up when I was freewriting dialogue and it just felt right. But I spend zero time unpacking it. Again, it’s one of those things - Dean and Cas are both fucked up, they both have their problems, and this experience doesn’t change that. In fact, it probably makes him worse. Another aspect of Cas’ powerlessness is how he relates to his human body. Not having it, or not being able to use it, makes him more possessive over it.

Still on the topic of Dean and Cas not being able to fix each other, you see that when Dean says he’s in love with Cas, and it finally clicks for Cas. It doesn’t solve anything. I did really want to make the point that the two of them being in love doesn’t change anything in terms of their plans or obligations. And it doesn’t really change much about how they relate to each other either. I’ve said before that their friendship and their romance are indistinguishable imo. And the other side of that is that Dean and Cas are both more than their relationship, and the pressures and stresses they face mostly come from outside their relationship (which is a fact that fans lose sight of sometimes). Whether they’re officially In Love or not, they want to be together, but there’s other forces, both internal and external, keeping them apart.

I hope Dean lying down with Cas’ dead body works. It’s super melodramatic, but it’s also kind of gruesome and I like that. I also love the idea of Cas being jealous of the illusion of his dead body.

Chapter 3

A dynamic that I really like in storytelling is when The Big Event in the story is not the thing that pushes the characters towards the resolution, but it primes them for the next little thing tipping them over. I do that here, and I kind of do that in Life Skills too. It feels more real to me, and it creates more space to explore the ending imo. So Dean tries to go back to normal!

The fight in the parking lot was probably the scene that was the most fun to write. Like it’s still frustrating and angsty, but it’s kind of funny too.

And yeah, Cas still feels trapped. The repetition of the gray and green imagery reflects that. He still feels powerless, and it just takes one more shove to get him to open up about it.

Dean has a bit of an impulse to be controlling here. First of all, because I do think it’s in character, but also because I think it’s fun. Like I don’t like to go super-toxic with Dean and Cas, but there’s a measure of toxicity. Again, they keep being fucked up. For Dean, I just touch on it briefly, but I think one aspect of his upbringing is that love has to be proven. Like, he loved his father, so he did what was asked of him. If Cas loved Dean, then he would do what Dean asked of him - this is the main concept that underlies my read of Dean’s reaction to Cas collaborating with Crowley in s7. For Cas’ part, he doesn’t really register that there’s anything wrong with Dean’s behaviour, or he reads in the best intentions. Which is a fun idea to me.

I really grappled with whether or not to have a sex scene as part of the resolution. It felt formulaic to do so. There wasn’t a story that I wanted to tell with their sex. But on the other hand, I know there would have been a time when I would have been disappointed to read something like this and not get a sex scene out of it. They go through such intense emotions, it only seems fair to the reader. Ultimately it came down to the fact that there wasn’t anything else that I wanted to say about Dean and Cas.

I kind of grappled with the end in general. Usually, I write fic with a particular ending in mind. For this one, the journey was the focus more than the ending. But I think the ambiguity works. Nothing is fixed, but they’re trying.

And that’s what listening to the tape at the end is about. The tape is Dean’s way of trying to communicate with Cas. But Cas didn’t really get it before. Now Dean is trying to help him to understand. I considered including lyrics at the end. But the scene isn’t about the lyrics, the lyrics could be anything, it’s about the fact of them listening together.

#spn #supernatural #destiel #deancas #by mi #solitudes

33 notes · View notes

jebiknights · 2 years

Text

This isn't me trying to shift blame or anything, but I will say I think something fandom seems to fundamentally misunderstand about Anakin's insecurities and issues with the Council, is that he wasn't actually power hungry really at all. He consistently expressed discomfort with certain responsibilities - especially power over others. He had a strong sense of duty, but also felt that he knew where he was best suited, and didn't think he should be wasting time on things that he felt others could handle.

And his biggest issue with the Council and Mace Windu? Was that he felt they didn't respect him.

Anakin very clearly functions off of the mindset that "respect is earned and not given". While the members of the Council arguably have done plenty to earn that respect, Anakin - especially with his background of being a former slave - is not going to see just the rank of Master and a seat on the Council as proof of their accomplishments and therefore worthy of respect. Especially when he feels that they don't respect him in return.

In ROTS when he complains about getting a seat on the Council but not the title of Master is unfair, he isn't just protesting because he thinks he's owed the title or anything or because he's whiny. He feels that by granting him a council seat but no title means they don't respect him. It's hard for him to see that just him getting a seat on the Council is an honor, when by keeping him at Knight it feels like they are still keeping him below them. (It also doesn't help that any of Anakin's own efforts to work through his emotions healthily or by talking to the other Jedi are always undermined by Palpatine sowing doubt in his ear, but that's another post.)

I think that's where a lot of his perceived arrogance comes from, too. Not to say he can't be a cocky little shit, but also anyone who knows Anakin as a character knows how deeply insecure and anxious he is as well. He's not really asking people to sing his praises (he will point to his men and Padawan and their efforts just as much), just that people acknowledge that he does good work and is therefore worthy of respect.

Respect is just, so, so important to Anakin. One of the first things Anakin says on screen is that he's Anakin Skywalker and "I'm a person", demanding respect and autonomy for himself when he has none.

He also consistently wields disrespect as a weapon, I think some like to see him as simply irreverent but I really do think it's something he does on purpose. Age is not necessarily a factor, nor is skill or position. So much of it is about treatment of him and treatment of others, that is what he is measuring the world by.

Of course, this doesn't always pan out in his favor (gestures at Palpatine) but I just don't think it's as malicious on either side of the constant disputes between Anakin and the Council as some people make it out to be. I don't think that the Council viewed him as lesser really when Qui-Gon brought him before the Council, it's easy to see how a recently enslaved 9 year old would view that interaction poorly. And it can be very hard to shake first impressions. I also think that Anakin feeling disrespected can come across as really childish to the Council when you forget the context of his upbringing and how important respect can be for people in bad situations.

It's something that very much carries over into his time as Vader too, considering that Vader is known for going after disrespectful and maliciously incompetent officers and not normally his troopers or those further down the rankings.

(I could honestly use even more examples if I dove into Legends with this, but was trying to keep it mostly canon verse for this post, so I'll end it here.)

Just! The thing Anakin values possibly even more than loyalty is! Proper respect!

#anakin skywalker #darth vader #revenge of the sith #jedi council #star wars meta #sw meta #note this is NOT jedi negative i think its just a miscommunication that became insurmountable in the end #anakin #vader #comm chatter

144 notes · View notes

dutchdread · 3 years

Note

Bruh, we don't want to hear about your negative views about cleriths. Cloud loves Aerith and he always has. He lives in her church because he loves her. He thought of Aerith a lot in OG , On the Way to A Smile, and AC. He went to live in her church. Why tf would he go live in her church if it wasn't for Aerith? There are millions of places he could've gone but he chose the church. You don't have to believe our way of thinking if you don't want to, but don't tag clerith in your posts.

Thanks for your question. I think it's important to have these conversations so we can clear up these misunderstandings. Clouds motivations have been well documented so it's unfortunate that large swaths of the fandom seemingly are still in the dark about something that has been known for quite a long time, and I blame lack of communication. Before I answer your question though I'd like to address the style of it, since I find it amusing that in response to my article concerning productive conversation styles you not only used one of the styles I described, but even the same exact argument. This is a nice confirmation for me that I am right on the money. In my article, I said that the "dishonest inquiry" is the Clerith conversation style of choice. The example I gave was as follows:

The dishonest inquiry: “Why don’t you admit that Clouds actions in AC show that he doesn’t love Tifa?”

You mirrored this approach by saying "Why tf would he go live in her church if it wasn't for Aerith?". The defining characteristic of the dishonest inquiry is that the question isn't asked with the goal of seeking clarification, but as an offensive tactic meant to attack the others position, you're not trying to evaluate your position, you're trying to get others to re-evaluate their position under the guise of a question. If we look at the rest of your post we can see the indicators I described for someone who has reached the last stage of the debate style. "Cloud loves Aerith and he always has. He lives in her church because he loves her". As I noted in my article:

If assertions are backed up, they are backed up with other assertions designed to dissuade rebuttals, rather than investigating veracity.

This "argument" had no actual arguments, it was a meaningless assertion. Stating that you are correct in an attempt to avoid having to actual show that you're correct. "Cloud loves Aerith and he always has. He lives in her church because he loves her": This is what you're trying to prove, you can't state what you're trying to prove as your starting premise.

If you're honestly interested in learning more about FFVII then leave out the baseless assertions, they literally just waste peoples time and makes them less willing to engage with you.

If I had to rephrase your question in a way that's more inviting for a productive discussion it would be something like this:

"Why do you believe Cloud chose Aeriths Church as his hiding place in AC? He thinks about Aerith a lot, what do you think the reason is for that if it's not love?".

The answer to this is pretty simple of course, it's been restated several times, this is not something that is some grand mystery, it's not even an aspect of FFVII that's particularly ambiguous. The reason he stays in Aeriths church is the same reason he's seen lingering at Zacks "grave", it's guilt. As stated in the 10th anniversary ultimania, and several other times:

when Cloud contracts Geostigma he disappears. Behind these actions lies feelings of guilt towards his past failure to protect people who were important to him

While this is an element of the story that has been explicitly confirmed through ultimanias and quotes, this is not an element of the story that was ever in any way unclear, its a direct continuation of Clouds character arc in FFVII. Infact, Clouds mental health issues are the central part of the fake persona storyarc, and is arguably the core of the story. The rough order of events shown in FFVII, on the way to a smile, and Advent children (and also CC) concerning Clouds mental health is as follows. 1: Cloud as a boy want to protect Tifa. 2: Cloud fails to protect Tifa. 3: Cloud and townspeople blame Cloud for Tifas injuries. 4: Cloud internalizes this and beats himself up over his failure to protect Tifa. He develops a fear of failure. 5: Cloud starts acting up, starts wanting to prove himself, and decides to join Soldier to impress Tifa. 6: Cloud fails to get into Soldier, develops an inferiority complex. 7: Cloud is too ashamed of his failure to face Tifa. 8: Cloud fails to save his mother. 9: Cloud fails to save Nibleheim. 10: Cloud fails to save Tifa, again. 11: Cloud fails to save Zack. 12: Cloud develops a soldier alter ego that is everything that he isn't, as a defense mechanism. He hides from his own weakness. 13: Even as a soldier, Cloud fails to save Aerith. 14: Cloud regains his memories in the lifestream, and discovers he did fulfill his promise to come save Tifa. Here we basically end FFVII, and go into on the way to a smile. At this point Cloud has overcome the alien parasite messing with his mind by establishing a stronger sense of who he is. However, now that he's lost his fake soldier defense mechanism he's forced to deal with the past. His past failures haven't been fixed, he doesn't suddenly think he's a great person now, he simply can no longer use his fake persona to hide from his own weakness, and is forced to confront it. 15: Cloud still blames his own weakness for the deaths of Aerith and Zack, he thinks that he needs to atone for his sins, and thinks that the only way to do this is through living* 16: Cloud starts living with Tifa and experiences happiness and peace for the first time in his adult life.** 17: Cloud develops cherophobia and survivors guilt. He feels ashamed for being alive and happy while Aerith and Zack are dead because of him.*** 18: Clouds mental health deteriorates because of these feelings.**** 19: Cloud finds Denzel and sees him as a way to atone, having found a pathway to redemption, Clouds situation improves.***** 20: Cloud is unable to save Denzel from geostigma, and contracts it himself. 21: Clouds mental health worsens again, he failed again, he is unable to save Denzel, he is even unable to save himself, he won't be able to atone for his sins through living. He potentially brought an infectious disease into the house and as a result of his actions Tifa and Marlene will now lose him. 22: Depressed and ashamed, Cloud runs away. He thinks Tifa and Marlene are better off without him, he doesn't want them to see him waste away and die, he feels like he doesn't deserve to be happy and should instead die alone, Etc. Classic depression. (Some quotes concerning the *** are at the bottom of the article)

As for why he thinks about Aerith and Zack a lot, and hangs around the places that are connected with them, what else do you expect? Of course he's thinking about them, they're the people he failed, they're DEAD because of him. Cloud is a caring man, he beats himself up over it, of course he'd be thinking about them. And where else would a man wallowing in guilt and self-pity go than to those places? But the important thing to remember is that none of this is supposed to be seen as romantic. It's supposed to be viewed as sad and negative. Every internal character arc has something to overcome and this is what Cloud has to overcome in Advent children.****** Tifa to Cloud: "have we lost to our memories?" Cloud to Sephiroth: "Stay where you belong, in my memories" A well written story has internal and external obstacles to overcome, and ties the two together. In the case of advent children, the return of Sephiroth is the physical representation of Clouds internal character arc, which is that he should stop living in the past, and should move on. The past here isn't a positive thing he wants to get back to, Clouds past has always been a thing he's ran away from, but then is forced to accept. The past in Clouds case is a bad thing, his failures, and is something he should stop dwelling on. If you've ever seen the lion king, this resembles the scene where Rafiki hits Simba with a stick. "What does it matter, it's in the past", "yeah but it still hurts", "Oh Yes, the past can hurt, but the way I see it you can either run from it, or learn from it".

When Cloud returned to his normal self, he stopped running from the past, but as a result, he started dwelling in it. That's what he's doing in Aeriths church; dwelling in misery.

If we juxtapose Aeriths church with the 7th heaven, we can start to see where peoples misunderstandings are taking place. When some people look at the events of ACC they think that 7th heaven is a place of sadness, which Cloud leaves to be happy at Aeriths church, the place of happiness. The "have we lost to our memories" is then seen as a confirmation of this and that the memory, which they think corresponds to Aerith, is better than life with Tifa. This character arc then concludes with Cloud being happy by finally leaving Tifa behind, and riding off in the sun-set in search of Aerith at the end of the movie. But this interpretation falls apart as soon as you apply context to it, both narratively, and factually, it doesn't fit with with developer quotes, as well as the fundamental story themes of FFVII. 1: If 7th Heaven/Tifa is a place of sadness, then why has Cloud been consistently quoted to experience happiness there? 2: If 7th Heaven/Tifa is a place of sadness, and Cloud leaves at the end of the movie, then why has it been stated to be his promised land, aka, his land of supreme happiness (the reason it's literally called 7th heaven), and why is he stated to return there? ******* 3: If Clouds "memories" are positive, why is the plotarc resolved by Cloud telling the villain to "stay there"? 4: If Cloud is happy at the church, why is he living in self-deprecating squalor? 5: If Cloud loved Aerith and thought Denzel was sent to him by her, why did he abandon him? 6: Do you really think SE would write a story about a "hero" whose main emotional hurdle concerning the past comes down to. "I am sick of the girl I am with, I prefer the one that is dead, so I will get over the past by letting go of the girl I am with, as well as my adoptive children, to go chase the dead girl"? 7: Don't you think this would do Tifas character a tremendous disservice and do you think SE would be that preferential in their treatment? I could go on, but I think the point is clear. While the "Aeriths church is a happy place" interpretation is semi-coherent when looked at in isolation, it becomes exceedingly bizarre as soon as you place it in context. As I am fond of saying, this is not a matter of personal interpretation, it's a matter of lying to yourself vs not lying to yourself. I also suspect that this is the reason why SE changed the ending to advent Children, because people were misinterpreting it in this bizarre way, so they made it more in your face. In context, the following interpretation is much more fitting. Aeriths church is a place of sadness that Cloud runs to because of his guilt and depression. The "memories" line refers to Cloud dwelling on his past mistakes, as evidenced by his constant quotes about needing forgiveness. The character arc of moving on from the past is then resolved when he forgives himself, and as a result, defeats sephiroth, the metaphorical demon of his past. This allows him to return to his place of joy, his promised land, the 7th heaven, with a more positive outlook on the past. Instead of tarnishing Aerith and Zacks memories by wallowing in the past he instead moves on from it, thereby allowing it to become beautiful, which is represented by him planting Aeriths flowers on Zacks grave, and placing Zacks sword in the church. Instead of Zacks grave being the place where Zack died, it is now the place where a hero was born. Cloud has moved on, he has let his mistakes go, and has learned to come to terms with himself. I think it's hard to argue that this version of events is much less shallow, and much more meaningful than the story of a lovesick guy who abandons his partner and adoptive kids to go chase after a dead girl, but that's just me, what's more important is that it's the only version of events that's corroborated by the evidence. Thanks for the question. __________________________________________________

Corroborating quotes (not comprehensive)

* from case of Tifa: "“I’m going to live. I think that’s the only way I can be forgiven. All sorts of things…"

** Nojima in AC prologue: "“Cloud never had a candid personality to begin with, and although he started living with Tifa and even started working, he obtained a peaceful livinghe’s never experienced before, and this conversely made him anxious. And in the midst of this he contracts Geostigma himself, and rather than being able to protect the people dear to him, he instead was forced to face his own death, and so ran away.” (among other quotes)

*** 10th anniversary ultimania: "when Cloud contracts Geostigma he disappears. Behind these actions lies feelings of guilt towards his past failure to protect people who were important to him"

Aeriths 10th anniversary profile : Aerith still lives on in the hearts of her friends who saved the planet. And in particular to Cloud, as a symbol of his failure to having being unable protect those dear to him, she was a major factor in causing him to close himself off. -Aerith’s 10th anniversay profile.

And more, really this is reiterated constantly.

**** From case of Tifa: "During that time, it was Marlene who noticed a change in Cloud. She told Tifa how Cloud would sometimes space out and not listen to her.

Transporting mail around the world meant he was traveling around his past too. She knew that Cloud was in great pain because he couldn’t protect Aerith. Cloud was trying to overcome that and live on. But, going back to the place where he parted from Aerith might mean that his sorrow and regret was going to tear his heart again.

It was night, and they had closed the bar. Cloud was drinking alcohol even though he rarely did. He drained his glass. Tifa thought about it before going over and filling his glass.

***** From case of Tifa: "Tifa wondered if they became a real family after Denzel appeared. Cloud was clearly taking less jobs. At night, he would always make sure he had time to spend with the children. The silly little conversations he had with Tifa were also back."

****** Reunion files, page 58: "As long as Cloud blames himself for Aerith’s death, he won’t be able to move on with his life. One of the first ideas we had for Advent Children was to have Cloud overcome and resolve that immense feeling of guilt. For Cloud, no one other than Aerith can solve that problem for him."

- Takahiro Sakurai pg. 15 reunion files: After Cloud was told, “Which is it? A memory or us?: by Tifa, he tells Sephiroth, “Stay where you belong. In my memories,” just before he defeats him. I think Cloud finally becomes free at this moment. Deep down, Cloud knew that he shouldn’t be so hard on himself, but at the same time he couldn’t let go of those feelings of guilt for what happened to Aerith and Zack, or the thought that he could never forgive himself for it. But then his companions made him feel better by telling him to let go. ******* "The place where he awakens—- That is Cloud’s Promised Land As he sleeps, Cloud hears two voices. The voices of two people very dear to him, who are no longer with him. Playfully and kindly, they give him a message: he doesn’t belong here yet. When he awakes, there was his friends. There were the children, freed from their fatal illness. Tifa and Marlene, and Denzel asking for Cloud to heal his Geostigma— his family were waiting. Engulfed in celebration, he realizes where he is meant to live."

"Aerith lends her power to the people suffering from Geostigma in Edge, and personally provides for Cloud’s recovery. Geostigma is cured. Cloud returns to Tifa and the children."

- FFVII 10th Anniversary Ultimania Complete Timeline

#Cloti #FFVII #ffvii remake #cloud strife #advent children

123 notes · View notes

felassan · 3 years

Text

Zero To Play podcast episode: John Epler, Narrative Director at BioWare

In the most recent episode of Zero To Play podcast the guest was John Epler, Narrative Director on DA4. He talked about narrative games, how they fit inside an industry leaning towards games as a service, his experience being at BioWare for almost 14 years, and advice that he has for aspiring devs who want to create memorable, impactful and transformative moments in games.

The episode summary read as follows:

In this episode John brings his 13+ year experience being at BioWare and working on titles like Mass Effect & Dragon Age: Inquisition to explain how he believes storytelling will evolve and develop through the medium of games.

He shares some of his favorite moments and why he thinks games are the most powerful and interesting medium to be exploring in this generation.

It’s a good and interesting interview, so worth checking out if you can! You can listen to it here or on Spotify.

This post contains some notes on what was talked about in the episode, in case a text format is better for anyone (for example folks that can’t listen to it due to accessibility reasons). It’s under a cut due to length.

A bit of paraphrasing.

The average dev stays with a game company/studio for about 5 years. John joined BioWare right after the EA acquisition happened.

[on going into Trespasser] “Myself and the Lead Writer Patrick Weekes both knew that we needed to wrap up at least this part of the Inquisitor’s story, and set up where we want to go next with the franchise, with the IP. We learned a lot of lessons from DAI itself. DAI was a game with a lot of exploration and open-world content, and while we stand by that (I still think it was the right call for the game), one of the pieces of feedback we got from the fans was that they really wanted some more directed storytelling. Jaws of Hakkon was more of a continuation of open-world, more free-from exploration and free-form design. Trespasser was our opportunity to tell a story in a much more linear and focused way. [this way of telling stories] really does help to be able to create that sense of pacing and emotional escalation. It’s a lot harder to do that when you’re mixing up storybeats with big, wide open-worlds. Trespasser was a project where everyone was kind of in sync, we were all building [towards] the same thing.”

“There were [story]beats [in Trespasser] that I don't think we would have been able to get away with in basegame DAI, one of those being the - quite frankly - incredibly lengthy conversation you have with Solas at the end. Because by this point we knew that if someone is playing this DLC then they are in it - they’ve been in it for the last two DLCs, they’ve played through the entire game, they want something incredibly story-focused. And we were able to really dive deep into that, some of the deep lore, some of the narrative. This was one of the only conversations that I’d worked on which, due to limitations of the engine, we actually had to break into two different conversation styles because it was so massive. We also got opportunities to do some fun callbacks. One of my favorite ones was one Patrick suggested which was, ‘What if I [didn’t like Solas much and] spent the entire basegame telling Solas I didn't want to hear anything he had to say?’ So we had the option that if you never chose ‘Investigate’ or a dialogue option that implied that you wanted to hear him blather on, there was one dialogue option that you could pick which was basically ‘Solas, when have I ever wanted to hear any of the shit you have to say?’ And it just kind of wrapped up the conversation super quickly, and Solas looked exasperated. It was fun because it’s not the kind of thing you can necessarily do in the main game, but in a DLC which is entirely for those core fans, you have a lot more options as to what you can do.”

John has an understanding of games as an interactive medium.

“Choice of combat, choice of mechanics, all of that does have an impact on the storytelling and on the narrative that you’re trying to put through. A lot of storytelling in games is trying to make sure that the - there’s a phrase, ludonarrative dissonance - [for example, say] I’m making a game where I’m trying to make the player feel powerful. How do you [do that?] [...] In games, this is kind of the challenge. Interactivity is so key to it. [...] It’s a lot harder [compared to characters in film] to put the player in a situation that they are going to lose, because as soon as you take away that autonomy, you’re taking away some of that interactivity. [...] If as a player I'm making you feel strong and powerful, and then I pull you into a cutscene and suddenly you’re losing the fight, you’re losing what’s going. That is a much different sensation, that is something movies can get away with that games can’t.”

“What are [players/our audience] actually meaning when they say that they ‘want choice’? I think that in a lot of cases we conflate that with ‘Oh, they want to make a big decision that changes the world’. But in a lot of cases what players want is the game to react to what they’re doing and the choices that they’re making in a way that feels organic and natural. I think this is something CD Projekt Red and the Telltale games did really well - of making it clear when the game is actually going to pay attention to what you said or did, so that when you see it later you’re like ‘Oh right yeah, I made that choice, the game said it was going to remember it, and it remembered, this is cool’.

And it doesn't always mean completely changing the course of events. The Telltale writers, as they got on through the games, they realized that the better way to address choice - and something we’ve done too - is, if we make the game have three endings, four or five - like DAO had an absolute massive amount of ways that it could turn out. How do you pay that off if you want to do a sequel? There's basically two choices. One is that you make an incredibly short game because you have to account for these very different branches, OR you collapse them and say ‘Sorry, this is what we’re going with’. And I don't think either of those are necessarily satisfying. For me it’s about making the players feel like their time and the choices they made have been respected. More than anything else that's the key, it comes down to understanding your fanbase, what it is they’re looking for, what it is they’re asking for, because there is that desire for choice, reactivity, consequences. And it’s something that BioWare, that we’re especially sensitive to because it’s always been a big pillar of the games we make. It’s just about understanding what this actually means from a practical standpoint and how you execute on that in a way that makes your fans feel satisfied, while still not writing yourself an impossible check to cash, because, you know, you can react to anything, but if you have a game that ends in three separate ways, you have to go with one of those two options and neither of them is going to be intensely satisfying to the player.”

“A phrase I’ve been using is, what I'm describing as - the half life of quantum. ‘Quantum’ is what we say when it could be like, one of six different things. The half life of this is how long before you actually resolve that down to a single point. Like, provide the player with that reactivity, but collapse those into a way that you can proceed forward. This is 100% a lesson learned from Dragon Age, for all the games. ‘Ok, what do we do with this? Holy shit, that is huge, how are we actually going to pay that off?’ Reactivity, but without putting yourself in an impossible-to-win situation [from a story/writing standpoint].”

“More than anything else, the advice I would give [to aspiring devs] is, come up with some fundamental pillars of your story and of your design. There's a misunderstanding that we plan out the exact story for years in advance. We know what we want to get to, we kinda know how we’re going to get there, and a lot of it is just making sure that you have those pillars and those razors. So as you go through development and find, ‘Oh this piece is not working, this piece is clunking’, you’ll always have principles that you can go back to. What is important about this story? Does the piece that isn't working satisfy any of those things? If no, then we have to change it or get rid of it.”

[more advice] “Don’t be afraid to fail (I say fail here as a good thing). Don't be afraid to put something out there and have it absolutely torn to shreds. Feedback is your best friend, having people that you trust to provide that feedback. If I were building a big epic narrative, a big epic franchise, [I’d advise that you] start with your principles and the core of what you want to do, and then just start putting out ideas. ‘Here’s my idea for this story’. It’s easier for me, I'm inheriting a lot of work that's already been done, a lot of ground that's already laid - I have a Lead Writer that has been doing this longer than I have, PW is fantastic. But for myself, it’s just been a lot of like, okay, taking this stuff that's already been built, and making sure that I know what we want to do with whatever the next project is. It sounds overly reductive and overly simplistic, but it really is about just having a really strong sense of what is important to your franchise, what’s important to your brand. If you’re coming up with a new IP, it’s a little trickier. You need to spend some time thinking: what’s the tone, what’s the setting, what kind of story do we want to tell.”

[more advice] Don’t be afraid to heavily reference existing media [as actual razors, internally]. But that's not something you ever want to have go out to the public, because people go like ‘Oh, you’re just being derivative’. It’s like no, we’re just leaning on cultural touchstones that people know, so that when you’re communicating with people outside your discipline, or with people above you like executives, they can at least get a sense like, ‘Oh I kinda get what you’re doing, okay that makes sense’, versus ‘Let me first of all explain the entire history of the world’. My experience with executives is that they don't have time for that and justifiably so. But if I tell them we’re doing X but with Y and Z it’s like, ‘Ok cool, we get that’. [...] It’s a tiered approach. You have levels of detail that you provide to different people based on what they need to know. You yourself may need to know the history of these characters and how they relate to each other and the thousands of years of history for that, but the person building combat probably doesn't need all that detail and just needs to know ‘What am I working with, how do these characters fight.”

“A razor is a statement that you use to slice away what doesn't fit. The narrative razor for Trespasser was, I can’t remember exactly, we were basically trying to go for the Avengers meets Indiana Jones, Winter Soldier. Avengers meets Winter Soldier. [a razor is] a statement that you take all the content [by], ‘Okay, does this actually fit this statement? No? Okay, get rid of it’. It’s about focusing your game. Cutting away the ideas that don't really fit is how you avoid scope-loading and people crunching, and how you keep your project focused.

Trespasser was an intensely-focused DLC, in that it focused on basically two main core things, Solas and the fate of the Inquisition. Everything kind of wrapped into those two razors. As we were going through content, we had stuff like - I said this at a GDC presentation in 2016 - the Qunari are farming lyrium to make Qunari templars. And then we looked at it like, how does that apply to either razor? It doesn't, it doesn't fit either one of them. So we simplified it to, ‘Okay, what actually makes this work in the context of what we’re building?’. [a razor is] a statement that you use to slice off what doesn't fit into the game that you’re building. It can be painful, but having strong razors means that it never comes across as a personal thing.”

Narrative does not mean story.

Two of his least favorite mechanics in games [not including Stalker and DayZ] are weight limits and weapon degradation.

On games as a service:

Interviewer/host: “Talking about games as a service, it’s definitely something that is talked about a lot in gaming in terms of the most successful games. With Dragon Age, putting DLCs out is kind of maybe that same influence, but games that are launched and then iterated on and updated and pushed with content every month, like Fortnite, Riot Games, League of Legends, Valorant etc, that's kind of I feel where the trend of games are trying to go and make the most of those interactions between other people, to make replayability possible and easier. How do you see narrative, do you see it being forgotten with this increase of games as a service? [...] Do you see that as a positive part of narrative in games or do you think there’s still work to be done in that space?”

John: “[...] The place we start to see some confusion, a lot of people think it’s one or the other, but to me, it’s another way, another option for telling stories that by their nature have to be different. I think that's where you need to be, again, very cognizant of what you’re building and of the genre you’re working in, because a story that works for a more traditional box product is not necessarily the kind of story that would work for a games as a service product. [...] Games as a service, understanding what the cadence is that you’re planning to deliver to and what kinds of stories best fit that cadence - some games are better at it than others.

One game that did a pretty decent job of it is Destiny 2, through patches. Final Fantasy 14 is another example, they do a lot of their storytelling between the big expansion releases as part of their free patches. They always know that they have - I think, five big patches? - between each expansion, and they’ve structured their stories to fit into that very specific five-act structure. If they tried to do it weekly or bi-weekly it would be a very different experience. I think there’s always room for narrative. It’s about knowing that there are different lessons to learn and not being afraid to learn those lessons, as opposed to trying to fit the traditional box product square-peg narrative into a live service round hole. And that’s why you need to have a strong vision and why you need to have somebody at the Director level who understands and plays the kinds of games that you’re building, so they kind of understand what works and what doesn't - ‘This type of story worked really well for this game, and I'm not saying you should copy it, but you should at least be willing to learn those lessons and not reinvent the wheel every time.’

We’ve been making games for a long time now, there’s lots of lessons to learn, we should be trying to learn from them and not trying to like, change everything every single time.”

[on length of narrative] “In a lot of cases you know how long your game should be and the hardest part is sticking to that. [...] There is always a worry that fans are going to see a number and be like ‘That’s not big enough or that’s not long enough.’ I do think that there is sometimes a lack of confidence in what you're building, and a desire to make it shorter or longer, but I think at the core, the people building [a] game know how long it’s going to take to tell this story that they want to tell. I say this specifically for narrative, but even stuff like progression, you know how long you want it to take. For myself, I will always take a short but well-executed game over a long game that feels that it has a lot of [useless/boring] padding. It’s about identifying the kind of game you’re building. Open-world games are always going to be bigger and longer than more linear games. Being confident in that number and recognizing when you’re adding time and space for no other purpose than just to make that number on the back of the box longer [is important]. Fans don’t love that, they can see right through that.”

“It was nice to see the amount of hard work that went into DAI rewarded by the press [with the Game of the Year award]. There are definitely parts of it that didn't land that we wish we could have done differently, but it was a project that felt like we were all pulling in the same direction and when we started getting that positive feedback, it was definitely a sense of relief. Especially because a lot of us had been on DA2, and while we were proud of that project, it obviously didn't get the reception that we wanted at that time.

[when they were watching DAI’s release and tracking its reception] We’re keeping a running tally, like ‘Okay, this is really looking like we did something special here’. I’m proud of every project that I’ve worked on but DAI is definitely one that I’m especially proud of.”

“Part of the advantage to being at a company for as long as I have, I've worked with a lot of the other people [responsible for things in other departments like art, writing, audio etc], so while there is that anxiety like ‘I reeeally hope that this works out’, I know it’s going to, because I know that everyone who is doing these roles, like our Animation Director, our Audio Director, Levels, all those other people on the project know what they’re doing and they know their shit better than I could ever hope to. So I’m just kind of standing here like ‘Hey y’all this is what we need’, and it’s coming in. And when it does come in, when you see the pieces together - I think for myself, on DAI, the moment that I first finally started feeling like it was really all coming together was, one of our music designers, going into one of the moments at the end of Redcliffe, doing the music/audio pass, and me finally seeing this scene that I’d been staring at and banging my head against for months - turn into something that actually conveyed emotion, that actually was something that I was excited for our fans to get to see and get to experience. That’s always a special feeling.”

Cinematics is one of the last things to come in, which means that audio is always waiting for them to come in: “They always did an amazing job with very little time, I will never not praise our audio and music designers.”

“Patrick Weekes is the Lead Writer, which means ultimately PW is responsible for the writing side of the game. As Narrative Director, I’m there to offer, to basically take the vision of the project and interpret the part that focuses on narrative and then provide that to my team - because I work with writing, cinematics, level designers and everyone - I’m there to be like ‘Hey this is the narrative we want to achieve’, which sometimes involves getting involved in the story side of things. But a lot of that is PW’s job as Lead Writer, they’ve been doing it for a long time, they’ve been in the industry longer than I have. It’s a really good working relationship. We worked together when I was in cinematics and they were in writing, we worked together on the Iron Bull, then we were both leads on Trespasser, so we have a trust.

I think what’s been really helpful is that they know that if I tell them something’s not working, it’s not coming from ‘I wanna do it my way, you better just do it my way because I’m the boss’, it’s coming from ‘This is something I think we need to do for the project’. And vice versa, if they push back on me about something, I know it’s not coming from ‘Screw you I'm the Lead Writer, I make the decisions’, they’re saying it because this is an actual concern. I do writing, I’m a writer on the project too but I will fully admit PW is a way better writer than I am, so I'm comfortable leaning on them for that stuff, and then I’m the person who can provide that ‘Okay, we know that gameplay is providing this, we know levels is providing this, let’s shift the priorities'.

It’s also about knowing, being able to take that back from any one discipline and say ‘Okay, what is the right decision for the project as a whole’, and sometimes that means telling PW something that they may not think is their favorite thing to do, but they will listen because they trust me and I trust them. I don't know how it works at other studios, there are places where Narrative Director is also the Lead Writer, or where there is Narrative Director and Lead Writer is the highest authority on narrative that exists, but it’s worked for us again because we have that lengthy experience. It would be interesting to see how it would work if we didn’t know each other for a while before this. It’s largely a relationship of trusting each other to know our areas of expertise and also just understanding what’s important to the narrative vision of the project.”

When they did Tevinter Nights it was ‘extracurricular’ work: “It was fun, I got to do some writing, I got published, which was really fun”.

[source]

[☕ found this post or blog interesting or useful? my ko-fi is here if you feel inclined. thank you 🙏]

#dragon age 4 #the dread wolf rises #da4 #dragon age #bioware #video games #solas #long post #longpost

65 notes · View notes

ouyangzizhensdad · 3 years

Note

what’s the line between a good adaptation and a bad adaptation? I’ve been running circles in my head thinking about where cql stands these past few days. Because i was also thinking about other adaptations like the pjo films and howl’s moving castle, like one of these is hated and the other is very much loved but both of them change so much from the original source material that it cannot be considered the same, movie howl and book howl are completely different characters and the plot for pjo was messed w so much in the films. So I was thinking about how much an adaptation can change before it’s considered a bad adaptation? or if changes really even matter if the adaptation achieves what it set out to achieve regardless of how different it is to source material? For the record I think cql is a bad adaptation but I’m unsure how to word it because the line seems kinda blurry

Hi anon,

As much fun as it would be to be the final arbiter on what constitutes a good or bad adaptation, it is a question to which there are unfortunately no definitive answers. But I am of course happy to share my opinion and thoughts on the topic!

I think a good adaptation needs first to meet a crucial condition, which is that it must be, on its own, a good work of fiction. That means on the one hand that it should not rely on the source material to be thematically or narratively cohesive--if prior knowledge of the source material is necessary to understand fully the adaption, I personally consider it a failure. On the other hand, this also simply means that the work of fiction must be competently-made, coherent, enjoyable, etc. on its own merits. However, some adaptations that are well-made and generally self-contained works of fiction remain bad adaptations. There is obviously more to the process than just producing a strong work of fiction based on elements of another work.

It’s good to keep in mind that changes are not inherently a bad thing since the process of adaptation requires change. Generally an adaptation aims to tell a story through a different medium, which requires changes even when the creative(s) in charge of the adaptation want(s) to remain as faithful as possible to the original. Telling a story through a visual medium vs the written form demands a different approach! And technical limitations might end up having a huge sway in the process: do you have the budget or the technology to execute everything described in a fantasy novel, for instance? how much time or locations do you need to tell the same story? As well, since adaptations are generally spear-headed by different creatives, changes to the source material are part of the creative process, by adding another perspective and by being forced, in a sense, to choose a specific interpretation of the source material. And that’s not even covering how adapting something from a different era or from a different cultural moment will require a form of “translation” to make it both intelligible and relevant to contemporary audiences.

In addition to these sort of “unavoidable” changes, there are many other factors that may enter into question. With CQL and MDZS, we have a salient example of how censorship might influence the process of adapting a property. The people who have a veto, in some shape or form, over the project may also pursue their own agendas. Matters of marketability and of targeting a specific market will also influence the direction an adaptation takes, especially when an adaption is done in a medium that requires large initial financial investments.

Personally, I believe that the way to make a good adaptation is to go either of these three ways: 1) take a source material that contains obvious weaknesses and improve upon them; 2) figure out exactly what is the appeal of the source material and what makes it original, and make sure that these elements are kept in the adaptation; or 3) reinvent the source material. In the first scenario, it is a case of stronger story-teller being handed a property that has a lot of flaws, and either doing away with them or filling up the gaps in the original narrative--thereby allowing the good in it to finally shine. A good example of that, imo, is The Old Guard movie, a tight narrative that excised a lot of the less savoury elements of the graphic novels and included a lot more emotional depth and pay offs.

In the second scenario, the most important factor is that the creative (or creatives) in charge of the adaptation really understand not only the source material but also why it became loved enough to be picked up for an adaptation--why it appeals to people, what makes it unique, what stands out. What I mean is that creative liberty and changes to the source material are totally fine so long as they do not lose the identity or appeal of the source material and do not present an interpretation that is not actually rooted in the original text. For instance, I personally hate the Anne with an E adaptation of Anne of Green Gables because to me it fundamentally misunderstands the point of the novels and why they became a phenomenon. Making a story that was written to be an uplifting fantasy about an abused orphan who still managed to find beauty in the world and to find love and acceptance in it into a grim “realistic” drama to try to “appeal to modern audiences” is fundamentally stupid and, honestly, offensive. As well, while I enjoy Pride and Prejudice 2005 as a film, I think it is an horrid adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, mainly due to the fact the director Joe Right clearly did not understand the novel. As a result the film is a representation of what he projects unto the narrative (something that is very clear when he talked about the novel in interviews or in the bts), and not what is actually in the text.

In the third scenario, what would be a loose adaptation is a situation where perhaps very little of the source material may remain. It might only be the premise, or some plot points, or some character relationships that are ultimately kept. These also include for me the “what if X narrative but Y set-up”, which can be awful (the Pride and Prejudice and Zombies movie is so shockingly bad when it could have been a fun, campy romp) but also a way to explore a source material in new ways or underlining certain themes that might have been not given as much light in the source material. In this case, I guess that what really makes it a good “adaptation” is whether it has something new or interesting to add to the source material through this loose adaptation, or whether it is just a gimmick.

To me, CQL fails as an adaptation both on its own merits (due to plot holes, on-the-nose and clumsy storytelling, inconsistent characterisation, technical failings, etc.) but also as it does not retain, for a number of reasons, what makes MDZS appealing imo (WWX’s characterisation, Wangxian’s journey, its heavy reliance on mystery, intrigue and themes, its willingness to show characters do cruel and violent things, etc.), all the while making the cardinal sin of being a weaker story than the source material (when the source material already provided them with all the material they would have needed to tell a story of at least equal complexity and competency).

#anon ask #long post

70 notes · View notes

dannypuro · 4 years

Note

Okay but what was the heinous spelling error Enj made 200ish years ago and was it really as bad as he said it was ?

Also I am here to further scream over your fics and flail about how Good they are and how On Point your characterization is and how I am still thinking about them all. All at once. No exceptions

THANk YOU VERY MUCH AND GOOD NIGHT :^D (the nose is there for Grantaire reasons) - boom-goes-the-canon because Tumblr disallows sending asks from side blogs like governments ban personal lives

( Something Telling verse, post-chapter 9 (aka time-zapped Enjolras, modern-era). also THANK YOU!! HELLO!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!! GOOD JOB ON YOUR MOST RECENT FIC I ADORE. to everyone else... send me prompts/questions/thoughts. i shall respond to them. thank u)

Feuilly and Bahorel come over for brunch on a Sunday in December. Grantaire makes a quiche, sets the table all nice, and everything, and then realizes, ten minutes before they’re supposed to arrive, that they ran out of coffee the day before.

“Fuck,” he hisses, as he stares down into the empty bag and wishes that for once in his fucking life he could have just a tiny bit of forethought. “Fuck.”

Enjolras hums from where he sits on the kitchen counter, where he’s been steadily working his way through a truly impressive number of clementines. “Something is wrong?” He asks; he passes Grantaire a piece of clementine, as he says it. (God, Grantaire fucking loves him.)

“Yeah,” he says, but his heart’s not really in it, anymore--it’s hard to keep up any semblance of anger past annoyance when Enjolras is doing things like- like feeding him orange segments, and shit like that. “We- I forgot we’re out of coffee. And Baz and Feuilly’ll be here in, like, a second, and the quiche is still in the oven and I don’t-” he doesn’t have time, and he has never been a shitty brunch host but brunch without coffee is a shitty brunch, and-

“Grantaire,” Enjolras says firmly. He hops down off of the counter, takes a second to frame Grantaire’s face in his hands. “Please do not panic over brunch. I shall go and buy some more coffee.”

Like it’s simple. Fuck, it is simple, and Grantaire loves him, and he’s not going to be a shitty brunch host, and-

“God, I love you,” he says.

Enjolras smiles, leans up for a quick kiss. “I love you, as well. Now, mind your cookery--I shall return before the hour, and all will be well.”

He leaves, and Grantaire repeats it to himself--All will be well--and as soon as he’s done that, there’s a crack of thunder, and it starts pouring, icy and relentless, outside the kitchen window. And. Well. So much for that mantra, then. But oh, God, it’s raining, and Enjolras never takes an umbrella with him, and if he had any sense he’d just turn back and come back to the apartment, damn the coffee, but Grantaire knows him, and he knows that he doesn’t have any sense, most of the time, so he stares out the window and wills the rain to stop before his boyfriend freezes to death.

No such luck. By the time Enjolras gets back, coffee in hand, he’s soaked to the bones, and he’s got an equally-as-sopping Feuilly and Bahorel in tow.

“R!” Bahorel crows. “Found your boy!”

Grantaire sets the quiche down on the table and looks them over. Feuilly’s teeth are chattering. They’re all three of them dripping on his carpet. Enjolras is wearing Grantaire’s hoodie instead of a coat and beaming.

Right. A change of plans, then.

They eat brunch on the couch, once Grantaire’s thrown all of their clothes into the dryer and they’ve changed into some of Grantaire’s spare sweatpants. Of course, Baz and Feuilly borrow his clothes because they need to; Enjolras borrows his clothes because he’s fundamentally ridiculous. (Grantaire loves him so fucking much.)

“You know,” Grantaire says, over couch quiche, despite the fact that he already knows that Enjolras does, in fact, know, “You could have just changed into your own clothes. If you wanted to. Since you live here, and all.”

Enjolras gives him a very, very pointed look. And you know what? Fair.

They eat brunch.

“I did have a question about your essays, actually,” Feuilly says, once they’ve finished the quiche and moved on to coffee and coffee alone. He’s tucked under the same quilt as Enjolras--one of Jehan’s, bright and warm.

Enjolras nods, snuggles back against Grantaire, where Grantaire’s got an arm wrapped around his chest, where he leans up against him in an awkward half-pivot. “Of course,” he says. “Anything you require, easily.”

“Awesome, great,” Feuilly says, with a smile. “What’s lacrity?”

Grantaire can feel Enjolras tense against him, freeze. Which is… not what he was expecting. “You jest,” he manages, eventually, and Grantaire holds him a little tighter, never mind that he doesn’t know why.

Feuilly frowns. “Um. No? I mean, I looked it up, but I couldn’t find anything.”

Enjolras is breathing a little faster, now; he takes Feuilly’s hands in his own. “Feuilly, my dear fellow,” he says, and his voice shakes. “Tell me you jest.”

Grantaire doesn’t know what the fuck is going on.

Feuilly looks just about as confused as Grantaire feels. He reaches into his bag, pulls out a book--Enjolras’s book, a little thing, six essays bound in public-domain paper. He opens it to his bookmark, hands it over. “Lacrity,” he says, and then he reads, “It is only through lacrity and fortitude that the people of this nation might ever be free; it stands testament to the chance of man, then, that itis lacrity and fortitude both which comprise the foundation of the citizen’s heart. It’s in the fifth one?”

Enjolras stares down at the book. He clears his throat. “Alacrity,” he says, very, very softly.

“Uh, yeah,” Bahorel says, from where he sits with an arm thrown over Feuilly’s shoulders. “A lacrity. But, like, what is it?”

A pained noise rises at the back of his throat that Grantaire can feel, up against his chest. “You misunderstand me,” he manages. “I- This is a nightmare.” His heart is beating just a little too fast for Grantaire’s comfort.

“Enj?” he tries. “Are you-”

“Excuse me,” he blurts out. “I- Excuse me.” He’s on his feet in an instant, making off for the bedroom before anyone can stop him. Grantaire’s side feels pretty fucking cold, without him.

Feuilly looks stricken. “I don’t- Did I say something?” Grantaire’s feeling pretty stricken, himself--he doesn’t know what happened, doesn’t know what could have gone on in Enjolras’s head that would make him talk to Feuilly with anything other than kindness edging on reverence.

“I’m gonna go see if he’s-” he gestures towards the bedroom. Bahorel and Feuilly nod. He goes.

Enjolras is sitting on the edge of the bed, head in hands.

Oh, Jesus.

“Enj?” he hazards.

He doesn’t look up. “This is mortifying,” he mumbles into his palms. “I have been personally wronged by every single editor who has ever lain their hands upon my essays.”

Grantaire still doesn’t- doesn’t really know where they’re going, here. He sits down beside him on the bed. “Did-”

“Lacrity,” Enjolras grits out, half frantic, and finally, he turns to face Grantaire. “Lacrity is not a word. It is- It- Alacrity. Which I did not know when I wrote those essays, because I was twenty-two years of age and a fool. And this is something which, despite the fact that he was paid to do so, my editor did not deem necessary to correct!”

Ah.

Um.

Grantaire doesn’t really know that he’s qualified to offer comfort on 200-year-old publishing woes, but fuck, he’ll try. “I’m sure-”

Enjolras holds a hand up to stop him. He stops. “This was bad enough. I was already aware of this injustice. What I cannot abide is the fact that evidently, in the two hundred years since its unfortunate publication, nobody has taken pity enough to correct it! And now Feuilly thinks that I am a fool! Grantaire, this is humiliating!”

He’s looking pretty genuinely distressed; Grantaire can’t bear to do anything but to pull him into a hug, firm and solid. Enjolras, for all his bristle, folds in against his chest. “Feuilly doesn’t think you’re a fool,” he says, into his curls. “Feuilly thinks you’re awesome.”

He lets out a pained groan. “I shall never recover.”

Yeah, okay. Grantaire holds him a little tighter. Only- “Hey, why don’t you care about me or Baz thinking you’re a fool?”

Enjolras snorts a laugh against his chest. “I have personally witnessed Bahorel misspell his own profession. I hold little concern that his regard for me will be impacted.”

Honestly? Fair. “But-”

“Grantaire,” Enjolras says, and he pulls back just enough to press his forehead to Grantaire’s. (Grantaire’s heart thrums.) “We live together. We are courting. If you do not already know that I am a fool, I worry that you never will.”

“You’re not-” he says, on impulse, and then he thinks about, like, actually living with Enjolras, fucking wonderful thing, and he grins. “Well. Maybe a little,” he admits.

Enjolras smiles back, still half-shaky. “Perhaps a little,” he says.

“Feuilly doesn’t think you’re a fool,” Grantaire reminds him, firm. “Feuilly likes you no matter how many typos you made when you were twenty-two.”

He sighs. “Oh, I suppose so.”

Grantaire kisses him, because he can. Enjolras takes a minute to kiss him back, then stands with a sigh.

“I suppose that I had better explain my pitiable situation to Feuilly, then,” he says, with a hint of a smile.

“Guess so,” Grantaire says, and he lets Enjolras tug him to his feet and press a kiss to his cheek, before they go.

#enjoltaire #enjoltaire fanfiction #exr #exr fanfiction #les miserables #something telling #les miserables fanfiction #les mis #writing #Anonymous

92 notes · View notes

teeforhee · 3 years

Text

Fuck, I'm not sure I'll ever get over how much CAMHS (child and adolescent mental health service, it's the under-18s mental health service in Scotland) let me down as a kid.

It's like this. You're 11 and you're traumatised but you're scared of using that word, you don't know if you're allowed it, but you are traumatised. And you're so anxious you can't breathe most of the time, you can't sit down and speak to any of your friends, you can do your school work but you keep falling apart and everything feels like it's getting worse all the time. You don't fit in, you're weird and awkward but your schoolwork is good so you aren't worrying about your grades, you're not even sure why you feel this way (it's unprocessed trauma, but again, you don't feel like you're allowed that word). You're s/hing and struggling with suicidal ideation, and you're lucky enough to still trust authority figures, so you do what everyone says you should. You trust an adult. And she calls your GP, who is another adult you choose to trust, who you bare your heart to with all of these symptoms that make your feel sick to even acknowledge, and then they make you an appointment with CAMHS. You came in asking for treatment. They referred you to CAMHS. They did not explain what CAMHS was other than what the letters stood for. That's okay - it's treatment, right? They're gonna help. You can talk this through and they'll help- just gotta be careful you don't get institutionalised. You don't want that, yet.

You talk to a CAMHS worker. She's a psychologist. She says it's very likely you have autism to your mother after your first session. Your mother broaches the topic gently. You are overjoyed: there's an answer! oh fuck, this explains so much! but it's not treatment. It's a word. The psychologist puts you on a waiting list and you have 22 sessions of CBT with her, trying to unpack your trauma and trying to build up coping skills. So many of them feel like just denying the truth, so many of them feed into your magical thinking ("the one thing you can control is your thoughts, you must always control your thoughts, good things will happen when you control your thoughts and stop thinking the bad thoughts"), but it's treatment, mostly. You stop seeing her twice- once because you are trying to develop an eating disorder and having a mental health professional who wants to hear how you're doing is totally cramping your style (I wasn't actually trying to develop an ED really, I was trying to cope in ways other than s/h, in ways that felt honest to the situation and real and gave me a sense of control that "controling my thoughts" just wasn't doing). You come back for recovery. You tell her you want an eating plan. By the time she even considers an appointment with a nutritionist, you've moved past that stage in your recovery on your own. You stop seeing her again because you get into an abusive relationship who doesn't really like you having contact with people who aren't him, and he super super doesn't like you not being able to talk to him for a whole hour every week. That part isn't their fault: no one could be gotten me out of that until I decided to; believe me, everyone around me tried, and it didn't work until I wanted I to, the third time.

But I left, again, I was without support for 6 months, and when I came back it was after my father (the earliest source of my trauma) had died. They take 4 sessions compiling evidence as to what treatment i needed going forward, without telling me that was what they were doing (I was trying to build trust with an adult again after 6 months of constant reinforcing that I couldn't trust anyone but my abuser), and then an appointment with a psychiatrist and your mother and a new psychologist. They dismiss and justify the symptoms that most worry me, they have at this point turned down my request to be institutionalised multiple times (including after an aborted suicide attempt, I presume they thought that was fine because made it clear that I did want to live), and they say at the end of the meeting that they are going to give me an official diagnosis of autism and that after that CAMHS has nothing more to offer me.

They say that if after 22 sessions with a psychologist I am still struggling so much (bear in mind that probably close to half of those sessions I was concealing factors that were actively making my mental health worse and which were traumatising me) I clearly can't gain anything more from their service, and anyway, autism isn't a mental illness and CAMHS as a service can only help while waiting for/trying to get a diagnosis, or if you have a diagnosis or a disorder for which they could provide specialist treatment. My very obvious PTSD? nah, no big-T Traumas, and c-ptsd is way too hard to diagnose. I receive a hilarious letter detailing all of the evidence (I mean genuinely insightful but also fucking hilarious and I do want to note down funniest bits and post them hear at some point, stuff like "unusual speech was noted, (exclamations of 'wacky!' while describing his symptoms)") and then they refer me to a charity which, at time of writing, I have had 1 assessment phone call with, and am waiting for a call back for my next and first proper appointment.

They did not inform me when I was first referred that CAMHS is a diagnostic and specialist treatment service and if they did (this was well over two years ago now, I don't remember word-for-word what my GP told me), they did not tell me that meant that they would kick me out to a charity once they figured they couldn't label me with anything requiring specialist treatment. During our last sessions they were unyeildingly focussed on the trauma of my father dying and of the "shock" of my diagnosis (that I had been waiting for for 2 years. yes, very shocking/s) when those were not my biggest problems. My relationship with my father is complex and I won't get into it here, but suffice it to say that his death was the last step on a very, very long journey, and honestly one of the least traumatising.

I let them keep the focus there because I desperately hate talking about the actual, recent, debilitating trauma of being in lockdown with an abusive partner for 6 months. That shit hurts, I can't even say his name, but that is the thing that I need to unpack if I'm ever going to be able to go outside in the sun again.

Repeatedly ignoring the requests I made for specific treatment until past the point where I needed it anymore, not informing me how the service I was going to be working with for 2 years even worked in something so basic as "what is this for? what will happen to me if I get a diagnosis they can't give me specialised care for?", telling an 11 year old child that suicidal ideation is "not that serious", a fundamental misunderstanding of what I needed and wanted to hear ('normal' is not a helpful word. 'normal' tells me 'suck it up, everyone experiences this and they're all fine, you're normal, just think better' why are they all so adamant that I am normal? Not even considering my mental health I am an autistic bisexual gnc trans guy, we went past whatever 'normal' means a long time ago, fucking listen to me), at every single step of the way this system has left me in the same state I was before, the only improvement being through support from my friends, fucking Childline (gd fucking bless Childline volunteers, but still, I shouldn't have been getting so little support that that felt like my only option), mental health masterposts on Tumblr, chats with my (luckily) very nice guidance counselor (they're called pastoral teachers here but I know most folks reading this are American or are most familiar with the American school system) and what amounts to gritting my teeth and getting through it.

It was worth it, of course my life was worth it, of course I say the same thing every person who's attempted suicide says, I'm more grateful than words could possibly express that I survived, that I get to go home in a few minutes and feed my kitten and write and message my friends, but for fucks sake it didn't need to be this hard. And it doesn't need to be this hard. I'm not out of the woods yet, I'm still waiting on that second appointment with this charity, I'm still 3+ months behind at school, and I'm one of the lucky ones. My boyfriend has been hurt worse by CAMHS, left even more isolated than I was, even more traumatised by the way he was treated, and every single person I know who's been in this system agrees that it's deeply, deeply flawed.

I don't want people to have competitions over who's medical experiences are worse, who's country has the worst mental health system, who's been the most traumatised by their psychiatrists or lack thereof, please. Please don't make this the suffering Olympics. I'm just making this post cause I know, I know that other people have had similar experiences, whether with CAMHS or whatever their equivalent is. Mental health services need serious reform that puts patients first, listens to their needs and requests, that is well funded and well staffed by people who care about their patients wellbeing more than they care about controling other people's lives.

Austerity in the UK is a huge reason why this happened the way it did- my first psychologist left the service to go work somewhere that pays better, leaving just one newly-graduated psychologist that clearly had no idea what she was doing and didn't care to sympathise or show compassion for me.

This shit needs to change, because kids need help, and this is not good enough.

#mine #newt writes #oh boy ask to tag #tw s/h mention #tw school #suicidal ideation #tw eating stuff #tw food #tw eating #ed mention #tw suicide mention #ok to rb

3 notes · View notes

fortunatelychaoticphantom · 4 years

Text

Agency and Aang’s Arc

A while ago I made a big comment regarding the debate about Aang’s final choice to spare Ozai’s life in the finale and how that fits into his character arc. I feel like this is an important issue that deserves its own post so here’s a revised version of what I said.

----

Every time this debate is brought up I usually see the same comments; whenever people talk about Aang’s recurring running-away problem and how it influences his actions in the final battle, others claim that choosing to spare a life is not the same as running away and immediately accuse the criticizers of wanting a child in a kid’s show to kill someone. There are two fundamental misunderstandings that need to be addressed here.

First of all and most important, no one says that Aang should have killed Ozai. There is some very good, interesting and important debate on whether or not Ozai should live, whether death as a punishment is acceptable at all and if so when and how, and what specifically these character in these circumstances should do. But the issue that most of the criticism has is that this debate is never fully explored or resolved in the show but is instead magically swiped aside by two very glaring deus ex machinas that specifically come at the expanse of Aang’s arc.

Second, the whole “running away” issue is not about killing or not killing Ozai, it’s about Aang’s agency and his choices. It’s about the fact that in the end he could not overcome Ozai without the Avatar State and he could not avoid killing him without Energy Bending, both abilities he didn’t work to gain. It’s about how he got to that point in the first place and how the accumulation of his decisions throughout the show influenced the course of the final battle.

(continue after the break)

When it comes to running away, Aang is more than entitled to freak out occasionally. He is a child in horrible circumstances. Even before he was frozen, the knowledge of being an Avatar was thrust upon him too early because of the coming war and that is quite a lot to ask such a young child to handle. And if loosing his friends and being overwhelmed by his duties and responsibility isn’t enough, the fact that he overhears that he would be separated from his father-figure makes his running away all the more understandable. But just because we understand the reasons, that doesn’t make it the right choice. Of course, had he not run away he would most probably have died and, well, I guess we would have no show. But just because it turned out good for him (as good as waking up to a war-torn world knowing his entire people were murdered while he was asleep could be), it still doesn’t make it the right choice. If Aang had died, as long as it hadn’t happen in the Avatar state, a new Avatar would have been born in one of the Water Tribes. I can’t say if it would have been good for the world or not, it would simply have been different. But the point is that Aang did run away. He could have talked to Gyatso, he could have tried to convince the other masters to let him stay or try to find some middle ground where he would train in another temple but still be able to keep in touch with Gyatso or any other possibility, but he didn’t. He didn’t face his problem, he ran away. By having Aang freak out and run away again in “The Storm” and having Katara comfort him (which is great!) and tell him that it was meant to be (which is not so great) she is actively rewarding his behavior and he keeps doing it again and again.

Running away in its broader sense was a major issue for Aang in his Earth Bending training as well. I have written about this before in regards to “The Great Divide” and “Bitter Work” being two of the most important episodes in my opinion for Aang’s character. I’m probably the only one in the world who ever said it, but I LOVE “The Great Divide”. It is such a wonderful show of Aang’s character and it deals specifically with the most important trait of Air Bending - avoiding a direct conflict and circumventing around it to find a different solution. It shows a lot of imaginative ingenuity from Aang and shows us that situations aren’t always as binary as we might think. But in “Bitter Work” Aang is confronted by the fact that this tactic doesn’t work in every situation and that sometimes he has to face his issues head-on (literally for Toph…). This seeming dichotomy is the major conflict that defines Aang’s character arc for two season and climaxes in the ending of “The Guru” and “The crossroads of Destiny”, and is directly linked to the Avatar State and Aang’s journey growing up.

In the end of “The Guru” Aang has a vision of Katara being imprisoned and decides to abandon his training leaving his chakra blocked and the Avatar State as well in order to save her. He chooses personal attachment over his duties as Avatar. We understand why he did it, but that doesn’t mean he should have done it. We don’t know exactly what would have happened if he had stayed in the Eastern Air Temple with Pathik. Sokka would be fine because he was with Hakoda at the time, Toph would have still escaped her captors because her story didn’t touch the Gaang in the episode at all, Katara and Zuko would still be prisoners while Iroh would still be free, and Ba Sing Se would still fall (honestly, it fell the moment Azula stepped into the city). Maybe the third season would have started with a “Boiling Rock” type of prison-break to free Katara, I don’t know. But the thing is that Aang would have been a fully realized Avatar at that point, who can choose to enter the Avatar state at will and not have it control him, endanger him and everyone around him. But he doesn’t do that. He runs away again. But even though he runs away in that moment, in the final battle in the catacombs he actually does make the choice to let go of Katara, open his last chakra and achieve the Avatar State. But doing this complicated process in the middle of a battle field is less than ideal and he is struck down by Azula, blocking his chakra for good. And after a two season build-up, the whole chakra-letting go of Katara-Avatar State issue is just never touched on again and Aang’s arc comes to a screeching halt.

Now, I said “seeming dichotomy” because, like I said before, the whole issue of running away vs. facing conflicts head-on isn’t about the question of killing or not killing, it’s about making an active choice, and that is something that in the end Aang doesn’t do, and we need to talk about this.

Aang’s past lives advised him about the issue and I think it’s important to see what exactly did they say to him. Roku lamented that he didn’t act sooner on Sozin’s actions and told Aang “you must be decisive”. Kyoshi said that even though she didn’t technically kill Chin the Conqueror, she would have done whatever it took to stop him and told Aang “only justice will bring peace”. Kuruk told the story of losing the woman he loved to Koh, blaming himself that had he been more attentive and active he could have saved her and said “you must actively shape your own destiny and the destiny of the world”. And lastly, Yangchen said that while Aang’s values and education are important, it isn’t about him since his duty as Avatar is for the world and not himself and said “selfless duty calls you to sacrifice your own spiritual needs, and do whatever it takes to protect the world”.

Now, the thing is - technically speaking, not a single one of the old Avatars actually told Aang to kill Ozai. This is very important. Is Aang talking about the question of killing Ozai? Yes. Is any of them telling him directly that he should kill? Absolutely not. They are talking exactly about Aang’s unresolved character arc - about facing your problems, about not running away, about making an active choice, shaping your own destiny and not letting destiny control you and making sacrifices for the world.

In the end of “The Phoenix King”, After arguing with the rest of the Gaang about what to do with Ozai, Aang goes to his room and meditates for a while but soon falls asleep. And then, literally out of nowhere, deus ex machina #1 appears off-shore and lures a half conscious Aang to it. Is this an active choice? No. Aang has no idea where he is when he wakes up or what is he supposed to do. He doesn’t even try to find out until the very end of the episode. He does use this opportunity to communicate with his past lives and later on with the Lion Turtle as well. But again - he made no effort to seek out the Lion Turtle, he didn’t choose to find it. It appeared out of nowhere at the very last minute before the final battle, brought Aang to it, and gave him the technique to defeat Ozai. That is the literal definition of deus ex machina. And if that’s not enough, the Lion Turtle brought Aang to the shore where he would wait for Ozai to come to him. There isn’t a single active action from Aang in all of this. None of this happens on his own terms, it is the Lion Turtle’s terms. That is not a character in control of their destiny, that is destiny in control of a character.

That’s just the stuff leading up to the battle, now let’s talk about the battle itself. Twice during the battle Aang chooses to spare Ozai’s life. This is very important to talk about, because almost no one talks about the first time, and the focus is mostly on the second time. The first time Aang chose to redirect the lightning away from Ozai instead of back at him, and the second time was stopping the attack at the peak of the Avatar State and using Energy Bending instead - and that’s the most important difference between the two that surrounds his character arc. The whole conflict is exactly this - becoming a fully realized Avatar in control of the Avatar State to be able to defeat Ozai without killing him while paying the price of letting go of Katara or not finishing the training, not being in control of his powers, keeping his feelings for Katara but having to kill Ozai to defeat him and paying the price of giving up on his ideals. That is it. That is the conflict that was completely dropped from the third season. That was the process Aang was supposed to go through, that was the choice he was supposed to make, but didn’t. It was made for him instead.

Aang lost the battle. There’s no buts, no ifs, no nothing. That amazing moment, that incredible shot of Aang using a technique that has been so intrinsically woven into the narrative of the show on so many levels and for so many characters, the exact opposite of a deus ex machina, using the ability he worked for, that he learned, to redirect Ozai’s lighting away in order to keep his ideals was the pivotal moment that brought his loss. Aang lost. Without the Avatar State, without being in full control of his powers, even with his immense strength and resilience, Aang couldn’t defeat Ozai. Aang was exactly two strikes away from death before deus ex machina #2 reared its ugly head in the shape of the Magic of the Pointy Rock. Under incessant attacks that he can no longer hold, Aang is shoved (passive voice again) on a rock directly on the scar where Azula hit him with lightning. This magic solution opens up Aang’s chakra with zero explanation that it is even possible, achieves full control over his powers and the Avatar State while doing absolutely nothing to gain it.

Don’t get me wrong. Aang grabbing Ozai’s beard through the rubble and just bitch-slapping him to the spirit world is probably one of my favorite shots in the entire show. Everything in this battle is magnificent, and Aang’s final choice to come out of the Avatar State and spare Ozai is wonderful. But non of it would have been possible without the Pointy Rock and the Lion Turtle. Aang needed both the Avatar State and Energy Bending to defeat Ozai without killing him - two abilities that he didn’t have, that he didn’t learn, that he didn’t even know existed in the energy bending case until a literal divinity showed up at the last second to bestow it upon him. And that cheapens his entire arc, or more accurately negates its very existence. (We could also go into the moral, political, tactical and social aspects of Energy Bending itself, which is not at all touched in AtLA and only kind of awkwardly and incompletely dealt with in LoK, but this is not the place)

I want to address the issue of deus ex machina. I mean, It’s a cartoon! Everything is there for a reason! Every shape, every color, every word. So what’s the difference between a giant Lion Turtle with magic powers and a guru who happens to know everything the protagonist needs to know about his main conflict? Guru Pathik is a great example - he sends Aang a note through Appa telling him he wants to help Aang achieve his full potential as an Avatar. We see this happen. We see that Pathik has been living in the Eastern Temple, following the teachings of the Air Nomads, implying on a rich world of inter-cultural exchange of ideas and practices and even hinting on the possibility that the Air Nomads might not all be gone or that remnants of them have remain in various ways around the world. He comes across Appa - who reaches the Air Temple because he feels safe there - gains his trust, helps him heal and asks him to bring the letter to Aang. We also know why Aang didn’t get the letter - because Long Feng has been intercepting any and all correspondence and information to and about the Gaang. The guru and everything about him and the process of getting Aang to meet him makes sense within the working of the established world - that is what makes him a plot point instead of a deus ex machina. And above all, Pathik might have sent Aang a letter promising solutions to all his problems, but it is Aang who chooses to go to him and learn from him. It’s active instead of passive.

The same can be said about Katara’s spirit water and about her final battle with Azula, where she the epitome of a warrior the way Piandao describes it to Sokka in “Sokka’s Master”. This is another great example of the difference between plot point and deus ex machina, and more specifically an amazing example of a hero defeating their enemy and choosing to spare their life in an active way with no deus ex machinas.

And the funny thing is, they already made all the preparations to make Lion Turtle such a plot element as well! We know Lion Turtles exist because Aang sees them in a book in “The Library”. The Gaang made an active choice to seek out the library in order to find some information that would help them fight the Fire Nation, and they did find the information about the eclipse. Not only is this an important piece of information for the rest of the show, but it also sheds more light on Zhao’s character, his actions and what led to the siege of the North and Zhao’s quest to kill the Moon Spirit. Imagine that Aang would have taken the book with him, or at least did more than randomly flip some pages. Imagine him asking Pathik about it, and Pathik maybe knowing some stories about the powers they might have, about Energy Bending. Imagine that at the end of “The Phoenix King” Aang would have meditated in his room and asked the guidance of his past lives. Imagine him listening to them and taking an active choice to seek out the Lion Turtle. Imagine him talking to the Gaang and deciding together to split, Aang seeking out what he needs (maybe even going back to Pathik to finish his training and open his chakra, because, again - he can’t spare Ozai’s life without the Avatar State), while the rest of the Gaang joins the White Lotus on the other efforts to end the war, since the Fire Nation does not equal Ozai, and just because he is defeated doesn’t mean the army would stop attacking and there is still Azula to contend with. Imagine him seeking out the Lion Turtle asking for help and learning Energy Bending. Imagine him doing all of this and how great a story it could have been.

Aang had a choice - ideals or attachment. I would’ve said he chose both, but the thing is he didn’t choose at all. It was chosen for him. This is completely passive. There is no choice, there is no agency. He is no longer an active participant in his own story.

#i clearly have some feels #i didn't even touch the shipping issue because that's just a bottomless pit that i can go into now #anyway #aang is a great character that was ruined by bad writing #aang #avatar aang #ozai #atla #avatar the last airbender #katara #sokka #azula #atla meta

73 notes · View notes

morlock-holmes · 4 years

Note

I never said that I expected you to have *positive* strong opinions about that story :)

2) Damn, what I wrote could be interpreted as tumblr-style not-so-passive aggressiveness, “of course you'd dislike it because it shows how horrible you sound :) ” — it wasn't that, honest.

Oh, no, no, that's okay, I was theatrically overreacting, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable.

It turns out that I have a lot to say about this story, it's just all of it is negative.

Here are several billion more words of close reading that you may feel free to skip.

Everybody in the story talks like they're on the internet all the time. Tony Tulathimutte has a relatively good ear for how people talk about this shit on the internet, and I won't lie, one or two passages even moved me, but this is because we are projecting our own knowledge of why people talk like this onto the story, not because Tulathimutte has given any of his characters any real internal life.

The fact that his feminists and Bros are just as much two-dimensional troglodytes as the story's anti-hero doesn't make it better.

Also this character is not an overly scrupulous feminist. The entire first half of the story is meant to be an ironic send-up of the way his feminist pieties contrast with his actual behavior, and I'm surprised people don't see that.

For example:

One classmate junior year had a crush on him, but he wasn’t attracted to her curvaceous body type so felt justified in rejecting her, just as he’d been rejected many times himself.

"Curvaceous" is a euphemism for "Fat". Notice that the first time he rejects someone is given significant time in the story; this character later reappears, complete with eating disorder. The first time someone rejects him is entirely glossed over, with the woman who did it never appearing in the story and the whole thing glossed over and forgotten in a few words.

Wouldn't we expect this character to obsess over those first rejections? To play them over and over in his mind?

This is why I say that, as much as any individual passage might be moving, this character has no real internal life.

Note also that the woman's disquiet about her body is expressed in neutral, sympathetic terms ("eating disorder") and given a sort of origin story: we are told she was fat in high school, was rejected for it, and has since developed an eating disorder.

In contrast, the main character's dislike of his body is expressed in absurd, satirical terms (his obsession with "narrow shoulders") and we are never given any insight into why that became his focus.

Now that he’s self-conscious, he realizes he can’t compete along conventional standards of height, weight, grip strength, whatever.

How did he realize it and when? Has he ever been shamed for his body? Notice that this realization predates his internet radicalization. Why did he fixate on his physical attributes, rather than, say, his economic situation? Tulathimutte shows no indication that the question has even occurred to him.

Nor, for that matter, does Tulathimutte spend much thinking on why feminism in particular appealed to this character.

Still, the school ingrained in him, if not feminist values per se, the value of feminist values.

Ah, see, he always viewed feminism instrumentally, never as a serious deep down commitment.

But why did he choose that instrument rather than another?

Again, we won't be shown.

Also, in a different thread @thefeministthrowaway spoke very emotionally about going through high school and even into college terrified that any expression of sexual interest in a woman would constitute a terrible burden on her or even become sexual harassment, and scrupulously avoided it.

Our main character did not go through such a phase; he had, according to the narration, already been rejected several times in High School.

Which leads me to the question of why on Earth this is written in third person. A first person account might allow us to read the narrator as unreliable, reading between the lines to see that what he viewed as a lifetime of rejection was really him blowing a small number of incidents and misunderstandings out of proportion; the third person narration invites us to see it as fundamentally honest and accurate: he has already asked many girls out by the time he leaves high school.

Certainly he asks out several more in college; and rather than the exagerrated fear of imposition we have, he sends several pestering, passive-aggressive emails to a woman who turns him down.

This exact scenario happens four or five more times.

He's not scrupulously terrified of women; he pursues them to an uncomfortable and borderline stalkerish degree.

Later, he has an exchange about sexual mores with men who are identified not as friends, but "co-workers", and he calls them out for their anti-feminist ways. This is part of a general issue where everyone acts like they're on the internet all the time.

I was once out with a friend of a friend who convinced us to go meet some girls he knew (No shit, part of his pitch was, "They're real dumb") and when we got to the bar they had an elaborate drinking game from their sorority days and part of the mnemonic for the rules was about "bitches."

So, as a brittle feminist, I of course got up and made a big speech about how they shouldn't devalue themselves-

Of course I fucking didn't. I privately thought "that seems like a gross way to think about yourself" while being God damned terrified of what I'd have to do if someone asked me a question about sex during the truth or dare part.

There's no awareness in this story about the difference between real life and internet behavior, or how they modify each other. (The same problem crops up later when QPOC friend calls him out in a way that, if we saw it as a Tumblr anecdote we'd all respond with, "And then everyone got up and applauded")

“Go ahead then,” his coworker smirks, “ask your female friends what they think.”

Bristling, he calls his QPOC agender friend from his college co-op, whom he’s always gotten along well with, in part because he’s never been attracted to them.

It took me a while to twig that QPOC here was assigned female at birth, even though on a second read the juxtaposition is obviously deliberate, but I just can't fathom why our main character appears to have no male, or even AMAB friends. Doesn't that seem utterly bizarre? That he's so self-conscious and self-hating and also totally willing to expose himself and his questions to women and co-workers?

Shouldn't that be explained?

This time she gives him a two-armed shove, sending him to the ground, and instead of yelling, her mouth opens into a smile and she says, “Oh my god are you wearing shoulder pads?”

Tulathimutte knows that sport coats and suit jackets can have shoulder padding, right? Like as a completely normal thing? Why wouldn't our main character wear a suit?

Does Tulathimutte not know about suits?

Anyway... I have trouble placing this story ideologically because the main character is an awful person but his feminist "friends" are gaslighting assholes and I'm really not sure if that part is deliberate or not. They tell him that he should never act like his bro-y co-workers while privately resenting the fact that he doesn't just go ahead and do what it takes to get laid again.

There's also his date with the girl from high school; her neediness and damage turns him off as much as his turns off other people, and also she treats him like shit, but his friends ask why he doesn't see her again.

I have trouble understanding whether we're supposed to see this double standard because, as I said earlier, her damage is comprehensible and sad while his is portrayed as a sort of BOGO deal, where every bad feminist dude has bonus body image issues shrink wrapped to him when he comes out of the factory.

Nothing in this story gives us any sense of why the actions any of the characters take appeal to those characters.

@self-winding I believe it was, said that the main character can't get laid because his try hard feminism is a turn-off and I really hope that's not the point because if it is, Jesus Christ this is just a circa late 2000s Amanda Marcotte style rant about "Nice Guys" that has been sitting in the back of the fridge gathering mold for a decade.

I know I said that I went in wanting to hate it, but I don't want it to be that awful.

47 notes · View notes

tanadrin · 5 years

Text

@bpd-anon:

I think I agree on some points and disagree on others but mostly I would love an expansion of this part: "I don’t think he actually understands fantasy as a set of generic conventions as well as he thinks he does." Can you explain the parts that he is misunderstanding and what true understanding looks like?

For some context, I have never seen GOT. I read the first book and it's tied for my favorite book ever but then college and its stress hit and I mostly stopped reading (same reason Blindsight is another favorite book ever but I haven't read Echopraxia). I mostly read science fiction books and I haven't even read the all-important LOTR (mainly because I hear there isn't any moral greyness, sounds boring).

Martin has said things like this:

“I admire Tolkien greatly. His books had enormous influence on me. And the trope that he sort of established—the idea of the Dark Lord and his Evil Minions—in the hands of lesser writers over the years and decades has not served the genre well. It has been beaten to death. The battle of good and evil is a great subject for any book and certainly for a fantasy book, but I think ultimately the battle between good and evil is weighed within the individual human heart and not necessarily between an army of people dressed in white and an army of people dressed in black. When I look at the world, I see that most real living breathing human beings are grey.”

“Ruling is hard. This was maybe my answer to Tolkien, whom, as much as I admire him, I do quibble with. Lord of the Rings had a very medieval philosophy: that if the king was a good man, the land would prosper. We look at real history and it’s not that simple. Tolkien can say that Aragorn became king and reigned for a hundred years, and he was wise and good. But Tolkien doesn’t ask the question: What was Aragorn’s tax policy? Did he maintain a standing army? What did he do in times of flood and famine? And what about all these orcs? By the end of the war, Sauron is gone but all of the orcs aren’t gone – they’re in the mountains. Did Aragorn pursue a policy of systematic genocide and kill them? Even the little baby orcs, in their little orc cradles?”

“By the time I got to Mines of Moria I decided this was the greatest book I’d ever read… And then Gandalf dies! I can’t explain the impact that had on me at 13. You can’t kill Gandalf… Tolkien just broke that rule, and I’ll love him forever for it. The minute you kill Gandalf, the suspense of everything that follows is 1,000 times greater. Because now anybody could die. Of course, it’s had a profound effect on my own willingness to kill characters at the drop of a hat.”

Taken together, Martin is one of the people I’m thinking most of when I say things like “nobody reads Tolkien, only their caricatures of Tolkien.” About the only thing I can say for him is that he’s right on Tolkien being about an external battle of Good versus Evil a lot of the time; though for my part, Martin’s world doesn’t come off so much as Gray versus Gray as Evil versus Evil, and a lot of what he seems to take for “moral ambiguity” to me is perfectly unambiguous: they’re all (or mostly) villains, doing villainy things to each other. Sometimes for quite human reasons; but the best villains have comprehensible motivations beyond pure evil. Doesn’t make them not villains.

First of all, he’s simply nakedly incorrect that Tolkien never considered the difficulties of rule, or never looked at the practical aspects of his worldbuilding. They don’t come in much for emphasis, but they’re absolutely there (most notably in the scenes set in Minas Tirith, in the run-up to the Battle of the Pelennor Fields), and indeed the moral nature of the Orcs, and therefore the correct stance to take toward them, was of deep concern to him, and subject to a lot of later revision as he struggled with the idea of what we would now refer to as an Always Chaotic Evil fantasy race.

Tolkien certainly critically interrogates the morality and moral authority of rulership. In the Silmarillion, he has plenty of figures who cut heroic profiles but make bad (or at least ambiguous) kings, with much resulting conflict; and indeed, that ambivalence is something he’s in part borrowing from his medieval sources! To say that the medievals had a totally black-and-white view of kingship is to betray a lack of familiarity with actual medieval writers, who even (especially?) in the Early Middle Ages are adept at portraying leaders with powerful qualities that turn against them in the wrong situation. Beorhtnoth, the heroes of Njal’s Saga, and Beowulf would have all been extremely familiar to Tolkien, and are good examples I think. Tolkien absolutely understood that people come in shades of gray, and there are various admixtures of light and dark in almost all his characters. Even Frodo for Chrissakes puts on the Ring at the end--and Gollum redeems him. Like, come on! That’s one of the most memorable parts of the main trilogy! But from Galadriel right down to the Sackville-Bagginses, Tolkien is intensely conscious of the moral complexity of everybody in his stories, he just doesn’t need them to say “fuck” in order to express that.

What Martin seems to have confused for Tolkien is, like, the semi-mythic style of Arthurian romance (which... is still not always super black and white?), which is only a small part of the generic conventions Tolkien is drawing on. Tolkien is much more steeped in the conventions of the realist novel, with its penchant for psychological complexity, even as he’s borrowing the setpieces of older literature. I think that’s important because it’s what marks Tolkien out as a fundamentally modern writer, despite his sources; yet people skate over this and like to pretend he was some kind of reverse Connecticut Yankee who stumbled out of the 13th century with medieval sensibilities intact. Which is... weird.

The quote about Gandalf is especially telling. Gandalf’s death happens for extremely clear structural reasons: it provides a climax to Book II (if you’ve never read LOTR: each volume is divided into two “books”; the three-volume split was a post-writing publication decision, LOTR was originally written as a single continuous unit, and the “books” are like mega-chapters), much like, but stronger than, the Flight to the Ford at the end of Book I; it sets up the sojurn in Lorien (recovering from the trauma of the loss of their nominal leader); it helps the narrative transition from the low-stakes, bucolic setting of everything west of the Misty Mountains to the high-stakes dangers of the rest of the story; and it serves the conclusion of the story because without Gandalf’s sacrifice (plus many other events), the Ring never would have made it to Mount Doom. Also, not to put too fine a point on it, but Gandalf comes back, in a way that feels sensible within the world Tolkien has built, and which sets up further development of both the main plot and the the themes Tolkien is concerned with.

If Martin had written Lord of the Rings, Gandalf would have died to a random Orc arrow, would never have come back, and the Ring wouldn’t have made it to Mount Doom at all. And you’d be left feeling like Gandalf dies for basically no reason--and you’d be right. The suspense in Lord of the Rings doesn’t come from wondering who will die (the only major named characters who die permanently are Boromir and Gollum; both similarly serve important thematic and plot functions when they do, but by Martin’s standard, Tolkien isn’t even trying), or wondering how things will turn out--does anyone ever doubt that the good guys will win?--it comes from seeing how they get there, from wanting to experience the emotional and narrative beats of the story, wanting to see the narrative logic being brought to its conclusion. It’s why it’s a good story even if you know the ending! And all of Tolkien’s work is like that: a well-constructed narrative that is perennially satisfying is far better than a one-off surprise that can never be repeated. That’s a mistake a lot of modern media is making right now, which the rise of undue emphasis on spoilers isn’t doing anything to reduce.

More generally: there’s nothing wrong with high fantasy externalizing the conflict between good and evil. That is in fact one of its functions, as a kind of moral metaphor or moral proving ground in the same way that, say, science fiction often serves as moral and philosophical proving ground for ideas around technology or exploration or the alien. It’s not obligatory, but to cite that as an insufficiency of any work in the genre is to fail to understand the genre. Tolkien specifically provides some arch moral figures (Morgoth, Sauron, Manwe, Aragorn), but he also provides some much more mixed ones: Denethor, Saruman, Grima Wormtongue, Boromir, Gollum, etc. (also Thorin, Feanor and his sons, and in fact just like a huge chunk of the cast of the Silmarillion in general), and gives his characters plenty of opportunity to reflect that, even in a conflict with a literal evil spirit, there is room for ambiguity (cf. Sam’s meditation on the Haradrim in Ithilien). And the sum total of the effect in Tolkien’s work is that it actually feels like something is at stake. I don’t feel like that in Martin’s world. I feel like if the Night King were just to destroy all of Westeros that would make as much sense and be about as satisfying as any other outcome, because there’s nothing that feels especially worth preserving there.

In discarding everything about both the moral and narrative structure of high fantasy, Martin’s world leaves nothing for one to hang one’s hat on, nothing to use as a fixed point of reference when it comes to orienting yourself in it; he is writing a critique against many things, perhaps, but not an argument for anything. The result leaves me quite cold.

155 notes · View notes

gffa · 5 years

Photo

QUI-GON JINN PONDERS A SEAT ON THE JEDI COUNCIL IN MASTER & APPRENTICE – EXCLUSIVE EXCERPT (x)

As ever, after a mission, Qui-Gon had been summoned to the Jedi Council’s chambers for his report. It was nighttime—later than the Council usually met, at least for ordinary business—and the darkness around them was illuminated by the cyclone of Coruscanti traffic and ships’ lights. Yet here, within this room, a sense of serenity prevailed. Qui-Gon relished the contrast.

Master Billaba leaned forward, studying her datapad with a frown on her face. “It worries me, this misunderstanding between you and your Padawan. This isn’t the first time you’ve reported such difficulties.”

Qui-Gon bowed his head slightly. “It worries me as well. Obi-Wan is strong in the Force, and eager to do his duty. The failure must be mine. Fundamentally, I fear, we are a mismatch. I’ve been unable to adapt my teaching methods to his needs, despite my best efforts.”

Yoda cocked his head. “Adapt he must as well. Cooperation is learned not through individual effort. Only together can you progress.”

Agreeing to that proposition—sensible though it was—would mean shifting some of the blame onto Obi-Wan, which Qui-Gon preferred not to do. He simply remained quiet. The Jedi Council had a habit of assuming that silence equaled agreement; Qui-Gon had found this habit useful, from time to time.

Regardless, he expected the Council to eventually ask him if he wanted them to reassign Obi-Wan’s training to another Master. He’d known before this meeting began that they might even ask the question tonight, but he still wasn’t sure what he would say. The suspense seemed worse than he would’ve anticipated, maybe because he didn’t know what he wanted to answer...

... or because the silence in the room had lasted a suspiciously long period of time.

Qui-Gon focused his attention back on the Masters surrounding him. They were exchanging glances in what seemed to be anticipation. He straightened. “Have you another mission for us?” Maybe they intended to test him and Obi-Wan one more time before any decision about reassignment would be made.

“Yes, another task for you we have.” Yoda’s ears lowered, a sign of deep intent. “Consider it carefully, you must.”

Mace Windu drew himself upright and folded his hands together in a formal gesture of respect. “You may not have heard that Master Dapatian intends to retire from the Council, effective next month.”

Qui-Gon glanced at Poli Dapatian, a Master of great renown . . . so much so that Qui-Gon had failed to note, in recent years, how aged he had become. “That is our loss.”

“We hope it will also be our gain,” Mace replied. “Qui-Gon Jinn, we hereby offer you a seat on the Jedi Council.”

Had he misheard? No, he hadn’t. Qui-Gon slowly gazed around the circle, taking in the expressions of each Council member in turn. Some of them looked amused, others pleased. A few of them, Yoda included, appeared more rueful than not. But they were serious.

“I admit—you’ve surprised me,” Qui-Gon finally said.

“I imagine so,” Mace said drily. “A few years ago, we would’ve been astonished to learn we would ever consider this. But in the time since, we’ve all changed. We’ve grown. Which means the possibilities have changed as well.”

Qui-Gon took a moment to collect himself. Without any warning, one of the turning points of his life had arrived. Everything he said and did in the next days would be of great consequence. “You’ve argued with my methods often as not, or perhaps you’d say I’ve argued with yours.”

“Truth, this is,” Yoda said.

Depa Billaba gave Yoda a look Qui-Gon couldn’t interpret. “It’s also true that the Jedi Council needs more perspectives.”

Is the Council actually making sense? Qui-Gon hoped none of them had picked up on that thought.

Mace nodded. “Yes, Qui-Gon, we’ve disagreed often. Butted heads, even. But you’ve always acted with respect for the Council’s authority, without compromising your inner convictions. This shows a great gift for—”

“Diplomacy?” Qui-Gon asked.

Mace replied, “I was going to say balance.”

It was a delicate line to walk, one Qui-Gon had stumbled over on many occasions. But those occasions had become rarer as the years went on. He’d learned how to handle the Council well enough. Now, it seemed, the Council had become ready to hear him in return.

Qui-Gon had never imagined sitting on the Jedi Council itself, at least not since he was a youngling. Dooku had chuckled once, early in Qui-Gon’s training, when they spoke of the Council. “You have your own mind, my Padawan,” he’d said. “The Council doesn’t always respond well to that.” Given how many times Qui-Gon had clashed with the Council—from his earliest days as a Jedi Knight up to six weeks ago—he’d always assumed that he would never ascend to the heights of the Order.

But now it could happen. Would happen. He’d be able to weigh in on the Council’s decisions, and perhaps create some of the change he wanted to see. It was the greatest opportunity of his life.

“You honor me,” Qui-Gon said. “I ask for some time to meditate upon this before I accept.” Of course he would take the seat on the Council. But in doing so, he wanted to more fully reflect upon how this would change him, and the breadth of the important role he would assume.

“Very wise,” said Depa. “Most of those asked to join the Council do the same, myself included. If someone didn’t—well, I’d think maybe he didn’t know what he was getting into.”

Laughter went around the room. Amusement bubbled within Poli Dapatian’s respirator mask. Depa Billaba’s grin was infectious, and Qui-Gon realized he was smiling back at her. Although the Council had never been hostile to him, this was the first time Qui-Gon had felt a deeper camaraderie—the friendliness of equals. Already Teth and the Hutts seemed like a problem from years ago. The future shone so boldly that it threatened to eclipse the present.

Steady, he told himself. Even an invitation to the Jedi Council mustn’t go to your head.

“Consider carefully, you must,” said Yoda, the only member of the Council who remained gravely serious. “No hasty answer should you give.”

“Of course,” Qui-Gon said. Hadn’t he just indicated that he intended to do exactly that?

Before he could think more on it, Mace said, “In some ways, this invitation comes at an opportune time. This change could, potentially, resolve other problems.”

Only then did it hit Qui-Gon: If he took a seat on the Council, then Obi-Wan would be transferred to another Master.

It wasn’t forbidden for a Jedi on the Council to train a Padawan learner; one of Qui-Gon’s crèche-mates had become the Padawan of Master Dapatian, back in the day. Exceptions had been made during times of crisis as well, when everyone needed to take on extra duties. But such exceptions were rare. Serving on the Council required a great deal of time, concentration, and commitment. Balancing that commitment with the equally sacred task of training a Padawan—well, it would be a difficult situation, one potentially unfair to both Master and student. Only those who had served on the Council for a long time, and had adjusted to its demands, contemplated such a step.

“I see what you mean,” Qui-Gon said. “Perhaps it would be for the best. But I must think upon it.”

“Of course,” Depa said warmly. Yoda nodded, clutching his gimer stick and saying nothing.

Mace Windu rose from his chair to put his hand on Qui-Gon’s shoulder. “We will of course keep this invitation private unless and until you choose to join us. At this point, the only person outside this room who knows of it is Chancellor Kaj herself. But if you need to discuss it with Padawan Kenobi, or any other friends, you may feel free to do so, as long as they will promise to be discreet.”

“Understood.”

Qui-Gon walked out of the Council Chamber into the Temple in a strange state of mind. He couldn’t call it a daze, because this was in some ways the exact opposite. Every detail of his surroundings struck him with fresh vividness, whether it was the colorful patterns of inlaid marble beneath his feet or the scarlet trim on a young Jedi Knight’s gown. It was as though the invitation to join the Council had given him new eyes. A new way of seeing the world, one that he would no doubt spend the rest of his life learning to comprehend.

The Council, he said to himself. By the Force, the Council.

Perhaps another Jedi might have given way to elation, or even the temptation of pride. Qui-Gon Jinn was made of sterner stuff. Besides, he couldn’t bring himself to feel entirely happy when he considered the question of Obi-Wan.

He’d already come to believe that they were mismatched as teacher and student. The main reason Qui-Gon hadn’t asked for a transfer before was that he knew Obi-Wan would be hurt by it, and would blame himself. The Council’s invitation would allow the transfer to be impersonal, merely practical. Obi-Wan could then be reassigned to a teacher who would serve him better.

Why, then, did the idea fill Qui-Gon with such a profound sense of loss?

#obi wan kenobi #qui gon jinn #yoda #mace windu #depa billaba #novels

168 notes · View notes

thelightfluxtastic · 5 years

Text

Mages, Magicians, and Kin Identity

Below the cut, a long (almost 2000 word) essay exploring the differences between the historical therian/otherkin communities and the “tumblrkin”/”kinnie” community and subculture, through an extended metaphor about magic. At full disclosure, I am personally very much an “old school” therian. Nevertheless, the essay, to the best of my efforts, is not an attack and does not take sides, instead hoping for honest discussion. I know there are other communities I might not know about or be active in, I welcome people to share this there (with proper credit).

Say you have a Mage (think Harry Potter, Dungeons and Dragons, and similar). In their experience, magic is an inextricable from their life: it affects how they perceive the world around them, how they interpret and understand things, and it can manifest effects (spells) through them, either voluntarily or reflexively. The visible, tangible acts of “magic” are a direct expression and consequence of the natural state “being a mage”. They don’t “do magic”, they “are a mage”, and magic happens as a result. A mage remains inherently a mage, even when they are asleep or having breakfast or otherwise not doing anything obviously magical.

Then, say you have a magician (Harry Houdini, David Copperfield, etc.). For them, “magic” is a thing you do. Some people may have more talent than others, and people may have different reasons for doing it (some make it a career, some put on performances, some just do it on their own out of personal interest or fun), but at the end of the day it’s an activity, a practice.

Then, say, these two completely different people meet, and start discussing “magic”. Here, a sudden conflict arises.

It would be very tempting for the mage, seeing the magician using scarves and cards and coins, to say “What I’m doing is real magic, what you’re doing is fake”. The mage might remember really struggling to understand and control their magic- early accidents and mishaps, unintended reflexive spells- and think “This is something I live with, good or bad. Something that, in certain situations, I have to work to manage, and it’s all just a game to you.” If the mage runs into someone who is only familiar with magicians, who, upon seeing them cast fireball, says “oh, neat trick with the flash paper!” the mage might get frustrated, angry, defensive. Insisting that no, they’re doing something very different. The mage might try to draw the line between identity an action, or even try to insist on differentiating terms (“I’m doing magic because that’s what magic means, you’re doing legerdemain”).

But the magician might argue back that the magic he does is what magic means to him, what it has meant for as long as he’s known it, and what it means to his community. There’s no deception, trickery, or malicious intent involved. When he meets with other magicians, they’re all discussing magic as a practice, their tools and skills, not pretending or claiming to be supernatural. And even the audience to magic performances ultimately understands and expects that it’s all illusion and a demonstration of clever talent. It’s just as ‘real’ in that sense. Furthermore, the magician might argue that, just because magic is an activity, that doesn’t mean it’s shallow or meaningless. There are magicians that take their craft very seriously, and for whom it’s a really significant part of their life. Furthermore, it’s not so easy to distinguish action from identity: nobody is born a “writer” or an “artist”, but these can be as much core identities for a person as their inborn traits. Some magicians might accept ‘legerdemain’ as a term, but it would be very difficult to convince all magicians to suddenly stop using the term “magic”, especially if that is coming as an external pressure and not a natural linguistic shift within their own community.

If the magician assumes that the mage is using stage magic whenever they make grass grow or call down a lightning bolt, then the mage will seem to be too authoritarian- why are they so angry? Why are they so insistent on using different terminology? Why do they pop up with “No, that’s not how it works” every time someone mentions doing magic for fun? How rude! The magician would see that mages see magic as an identity- which, yes, some magicians do- but might think “why can’t they accept that that’s not how everyone does magic?”.

What the magician fails to see, in this case, is that this is not a shared identity with different perspectives, but a fundamentally different experience. The magician sees their difference in the use of the term “Magic” as a difference in connotation and interpretation. Really, what’s happening is more like a homograph: two words with different meanings and origins that look or sound the same (e.g. “dove” the bird vs. “dove”, past tense of “dive”). And in discussion, mixing up “lead” as in the metal and “lead” as in “leader”, or using them interchangeably, isn’t an alternate definition or linguistic drift, it’s misinformation and misunderstanding.

The above extended metaphor is the closest I have come to explaining the difference between the “old school” therian/otherkin community, and the subculture commonly referred to as “tumblrkin” (which I use as a point of reference here, not derogatorily). For the sake of clarity, I will be referring to these as “mage kin” and “magician kin” from this point forward. My observations and direct experience in this come from Therian Guide, Werelist, Youtube, Therian Wilderness, a few therian Telegram groups, and, yes, Tumblr. As you can see there will still be gaps in my knowledge (especially as I am far less familiar with non-therian, otherkin communities).

Mage kin see therianthropy/otherkinity as an inherent identity. Language reflects that- one has a kintype or is __kin/a ___ therian, and might be discouraged from saying “my wolf” or “my dragon”. A lot of emphasis is placed on distinguishing kintypes from ‘external’ forces, whether personality traits, likes/dislikes or distinct spiritual entities. A kintype in this community is (almost) always discovered, not created and definitely not chosen. It is found the same way a new continent is found- it was always there, and simply needed to be mapped. Mage kin communities are, broadly speaking, older and more interconnected. The various forums tend to share some members, and this is usually where you will find the community elders that have been around since the Elf Queen’s Daughters and alt.horror.werewolves. While terminology has shifted slightly with time (from elvenkind and weres to otherkin and therians), and broadened to include things like fictionkin, this has been natural drift, and mage kin have a shared definition/understanding of kin identity, whether on Tumblr or TG: an inherent, internal, nonhuman identity. A mage kin is always kin, whatever their shifts or self-expression.

In magician kin communities, “kinning” is a verb. It is a thing someone does. “X kins Y” or “I’m kinning ___” are common statements. This is how it was expressed by someone who identified as kin, and was earnest as far as I could tell (not trolling)- that people can “kin” for various reasons, including mental health or for fun. Because of this action aspect in the general understanding, the magician kin community is much more open to the idea of choosing a kintype- both in picking what to “kin”, and in being able to say things like “don’t kin outside of your race/culture”. It also broadens the umbrella of what a kintype can be, with people further subdividing into things like “ID’s”. The magician community is more insular- as far as I can tell it is fairly localized to tumblr (and personal discords/aminos) but has little to no overlap with other therian/otherkin websites and forums. This leads to a lack of exposure to terminology and history (I’ve had someone ask me, in earnest, that wasn’t fictionkin different from otherkin?). And much like on islands in biology/ecology, being insulated in that way leads to very sharp, extreme differentiation. Magicians rarely meet mages (and when they do, often assume them to just be belligerent magicians) and have branched off to the point of being nigh-unrecognizable from the mage perspective.

Hence, conflict. Notice how often discourse boils down to whether kin is a noun or a verb. Mages see magicians as disconnected from the community history and terminology, and thus misinformed- and put time, effort and energy into ‘educating’ and ‘correcting’ (whether politely or angrily). They blame magicians for muddying the water of what ‘magic’ means, causing confusion, and for making a mockery (in their perspective) of magic- making a game of what was often serious and sometimes even painful for them. Magicians have their fellow magicians and are perfectly happy with their magic, and don’t see why some other ‘magicians’ feel they have any authority to barge in and tell them they aren’t doing real magic and should start using words like “legerdemain”. From a complete outsider’s perspective, it’s all chaos. Because the two groups aren’t using neatly distinct terms like mage and magician, they are all just using “magic” and arguing with each other (and of course, the worst extremes will always be the most visible). And, as tempting as it is to think so, magicians aren’t responsible for trolls and aggressors attacking the ‘magic’ community as a whole; and strictly enforcing only mage terms wouldn’t stop willful misunderstanding and attacks. People that want to be jerks and bullies would be jerks and bullies, even to the most respectable.

So…what do we do? I’m solidly in the mage kin camp. I found the tumblr kin community first, and felt alienated and out of place in it. Finding fellow mages is where I have found community and shared understanding that matches my experiences. And, like many of my peers, I’ve spent time and energy being angry at tumblrkin, and aggressively defensive of terminology. But here’s the thing- that’s wasted effort. However the linguistic divergence came about, it happened. There’s no point closing the barn door after the cows get out. Contranyms (words that are their own opposite) are a known linguistic fact. In some cases, it’s a matter of a specific word broadening until it contains its own opposite. In other cases (which I think are closest to what’s happening with “otherkin”), a word with a broad meaning splits into more specific sub-definitions, which relate to the original meaning but develop separately in parallel until they ultimately contradict one another. And, well, as to how that will end in the long term: how well is the fight to get people to stop using “literally” figuratively going? Does “sanction” mean to permit or penalize?

I don’t know what the answer is. As someone who likes labels, terminology, and clarity, I’m tempted to hope that labels (maybe even ‘magician’ and ‘mage’) can help clean up the overlap between these two very different camps. But I’m doubtful adding more words into the mix will really help this terminological clusterfuck. From the perspective of mental and emotional health, I’m tempted to let the island be an island, and just stick with the community that I’ve found, that fits my needs and experiences, and clarify on an individual level if someone asks me about my identity and what it means to me. It matters for people just starting to question their identity- there is a lot of contradictory information they would be blasted with. And I know there is a fear among mage kin that fellow ‘true mages’ would get lost in the weeds. But I found my way, and I’m going to continue presenting as the kind of therian I am, so I can act as that example to others. I don’t know what else can be done.

So I guess my final thoughts would be: To any magicians reading this- please try to understand and respect that there really is a fundamental difference in experience here, not just a parallel perspective. To my fellow mages- is it really worthwhile to mount a crusade, or more important to lead by example and be a beacon?

---

Requested edit: Reminder that all of the above is an extended metaphor. I am talking about otherkin/therians using the idea of “magic” to illustrate my perspective. Which, again, is my own and based on my own experiences, with the intent of being fair, but is neither universal nor perfect.

#otherkin #therian #mine #essay #kin

11 notes · View notes

judgeanon · 5 years

Text

The Way of Masters

(art by Phil Noto)

So with her likely upcoming appearances in Young Justice and maybe Gotham and maybe Birds of Prey, I’ve had Lady Shiva on my mind again. Well... more than usual. And I managed to keep it bottled up so far but now I feel those urges again so let’s at least try to channel them into some hopefully decent comic book analysis. Today’s subject: why I can never get really behind any story that involves Lady Shiva teaching anyone martial arts.

Expect the usual copious amounts of NOT MUH under the jump:

The concept of Lady Shiva as a teacher comes from two main sources: Jim Starlin’s Death in the Family, which established her as a teacher for hire, and Chuck Dixon’s first Robin miniseries, where Tim Drake ran into her and asked her to train him. It was further solidified in Gulacy and Dixon’s Knightsend, where she helped Bruce get his kung fu mojo back after healing from his spine injury. And then there was Gail Simone’s Birds of Prey, where Shiva trained Dinah Lance to try and turn her into her successor. On top of all that, there’s New52 Shiva having trained Jason Todd, and while I have no idea if it’s been confirmed in canon, I’m like 90% sure she must’ve trained Damian at some point too. So it’s pretty much a solidly established fact that Shiva trains people.

And I personally find it to be a fundamental misunderstanding of her character.

(art by Brian Bolland)

Now, first of all, logistics-wise I have a problem with people repeatedly going to train with a known killer when guys like Richard Dragon are just, y’know, there. And while there’s a dozen of possible in-universe explanations that you could possibly wield (It’s faster! It’s harder! It allows you to learn her techniques should you ever have to fight her!), ultimately I think the best explanation is just that it’s more dramatic. To be trained by someone diametrically opposed to your ideology in stuff you want to know but have vowed not to use is an absolute no-brainer in terms of dramatic tension. And that’s exactly why I don’t like it from the start: because every. Single. Story. That involves Shiva training anyone always ends in the exact same place: with Shiva ordering her student to kill and her student refusing to. Or in Bruce’s case, just pretending he killed someone.

This is nothing but a pointless exercise in character reaffirmation that does nobody any favors. Of course Batman/Robin/Black Canary is not going to kill anybody. Tempting them with it is just going through the motions. It was old hat in the 90s, let alone now. And yet, in one form or another, it just keeps happening. And it keeps happening because none of these stories are really concerned with Shiva herself. They are stories about Batman/Robin/Black Canary getting stronger, with Shiva used as a tool whose characterization is based on the most surface-level reading possible of her. The problem is that these stories also feed into each other, just like how Hush establishing Shiva as a member of the League of Shadows snowballed into this hellscape where she’s literally nothing but a member of the League of Shadows. Lack of interest in her actual character creates and perpetuates these misunderstandings until nothing else exists. But now the question becomes, well, what is her actual character? Good question.

So in Denny O’Neil’s Question run, which I am never going to shut up about until everyone who even thinks about writing Lady Shiva reads through at least twice, Shiva physically and metaphorically kills Vic Sage, then saves his life. I’ve talked about this before but the short of it is that not only does she kill his body, but by presenting him with something he can’t understand, she also kills his stoic, narrow-minded idea of a black and white world. But once she’s saved him, she doesn’t stick around to train him. Instead, she gives him the address of the aforementioned Richard Dragon, who takes him in as a pupil. And this is where things start getting a bit floaty.

(art by Denys Cowan)

Because there’s a difference between teaching someone and helping them learn it on their own. Zen Buddhists know this. The idea is not to build a path for someone, or to guide them through it. The path is unique to every person and they have to walk it by themselves. But that doesn’t mean you can’t at least point them towards it. Which is what Richard does. Sure, he teaches Vic how to fight, but way later in the run, Richard explains how unimportant that is:

And make no mistake: Shiva is very similar to Richard in this aspect. Her interest in Vic is not about whether he can become a mighty warrior, but in what motivates him. She’s interested in seeing how Vic develops, and her reasons are, in her own veiled way, pretty much the same as Richard’s:

Right before this page, Richard explained that Shiva thinks Vic is fueled by a lust for combat, while he argues that it’s curiosity that motivates him. And the book never gives a clear-cut answer, showing Vic as an intensely curious creature (in fact, it was his curiosity about Shiva’s motivation that helped tear down his old black-and-white worldview) but also as someone prone to seeking the simplicity of punching dudes in the fucking face when the world gets too complex. Which is part of the genius of this Question run: nobody is ever that simple.

Now, it’s possible to transfer this to the exampled provided below and say that Shiva is similarly interested in Robin/Batman/Black Canary’s development. But only if you don’t really go any deeper than the pure surface. Because the difference here is that at no point through the entire Question run does Shiva demand that Vic take a life. She doesn’t want to prove to him that her way is superior, or that killing people makes you better. She doesn’t want Vic to become like her. She’s just interested in seeing how, once violently stripped of all his preconceived notions and brought back as an almost clean slate, he evolves. And it’s an evolution Shiva has respect for.

And that’s why I can’t get behind any story about Shiva as a teacher. Because just like Richard, she’s not there to try and tempt people to walk her same path of slaughter, sneering smugly at their heroic ideals of the sacredness of life. That’s a dangerously bi-dimensional reading of her that leads to endless rehashes of tired plotlines that go to the same wretchedly familiar places we’ve been to a thousand times before. There’s no deeper insight into the character of Tim Drake or Bruce Wayne to be gained by putting them in a situation where they’re forced to kill but they don’t. There’s no evolution, no characterization, there’s nothing to be gained except for a physical upgrade. And while they may not lose much from just going through the motions over and over again, Shiva gets it so much worse because her character is eroded by these nothing plots.

(art by Ed Benes)

In BoP, Simone tried to give Shiva a new reason to actively seek an apprentice, which at least demonstrates more agency on her part than the usual row of Bat-people knocking at her door. Simone’s Shiva is preoccupied with the future and creating a legacy, but again, that’s an idea I just can’t get behind at all. To have a character as steeped into Zen Buddhism and Taoism as Lady Shiva worry about life after death feels like a betrayal, and wanting to turn Dinah into a new version of herself clashes with everything explained above. And Starlin, Dixon, Gulacy, Loeb, Gabrych and Tynion IV don’t even try. It’s enough to make one wonder, is there any writer who actually paid attention when reading Question?

(art by Damion Scott)

Look, call this a reach, but I think there’s a pretty good reason why Lady Shiva’s first appearance in Kelley Puckett’s Batgirl has her wearing a purple coat that’s basically an update of her design in the very first issue of Question. And considering Puckett actually collaborated with O’Neil on the tail end of that run, it’s not even that far of a reach. More importantly, however, Shiva treats Cassandra pretty much the exact same way as she treats Vic: she tears her apart and then leaves her alone for a year so she can rebuild herself. That’s not to say it’s a 100% perfect callback. She does help Cass get her body-reading skills back, and sadly, some of Shiva’s kill-crazy personality has seeped in, making her give speeches about how Cassandra is a waste because she doesn’t kill and how if they are to fight they must fight to the death and whatnot. Which makes sense for Cassandra’s development since rejecting such notions is a big part of her character, although that doesn’t make it any less tired.

But ultimately, the reason why I bring up Puckett’s Shiva is because he’s pretty much the only one to actually take those aspects of O’Neil’s Shiva and bring them back into the light. In a perfect world, the whole “you must kill” thing wouldn’t exist and Shiva would just be satisfied with seeing Cassandra develop on her own. And as we move further into pure headcanon territory, I think O’Neil’s Shiva would be downright fascinated by the idea of someone becoming stronger than her in their own terms rather than just by trying to be like her in every way. Sadly, Puckett’s Shiva doesn’t stick the landing, since the respect she shows for Vic’s personal growth is nowhere to be seen here. And once Gabrych takes over, we’re right back into caricature mode, where we’ve stayed for over a decade save for that one Blackest Night Question special. Which was co-written by, big surprise here, Denny O’Neil.

I understand why writers go for it. It’s simple, it’s dramatic, it’s familiar, and it gives their characters something to brag about. “Trained by the greatest martial artists in the DCU, including Lady Shiva” is used to describe even people like Cassandra who never actually trained under her. But I think it’s an error. And I find the alternative not just more gripping and compelling but also ripe with possibilities for both characters in the equation. It forces the person writing it to sit down and think what could Shiva find interesting in each character, and how they could be changed by her presence, framing it all as a two-sided journey of self discovery rather than a melodramatic ideological struggle of which we all know the ending. All you have to do is stop treating one of the most interesting characters in modern DC as a tool to make others get better at punching.

#Lady Shiva #DC #Batman #Robin #Batgirl #Denny O'Neil #Kelley Puckett #Comic books #Ramblings #First Shiva Rant of 2019 #Look #I made it to two whole days #That's gotta count for something #Right?

68 notes · View notes

sportsgeekonomics · 5 years

Text

The Crystal Ball: Predictions of what the NCAA will say when they finally (claim to) allow a limited exercise of athletes’ NIL rights

Today the NCAA issued an open letter to California Governor Gavin Newsom, threatening to cut California schools out of NCAA championships, threatening litigation, and also casually mentioning that when they get around to allowing some form of NIL rights, it is not going to be, um, well, real in the sense of allowing athletes to operate in the market. To this last point, they write:

“The NCAA continues to focus on the best interests of all student-athletes nationwide. NCAA member schools already are working on changing rules for all student-athletes to appropriately use their name, image and likeness in accordance with our values ...”

Since the NCAA’s values do not include that athletes are entitled to the full market value of their NILs, I think we can read this as a pre-announcement of an intent to restrict athletes rights. (side note, if it’s a right, it’s not supposed to be restrictable)

But the NCAA is so predictable in this desire to arrogate athletes’ rights for their own benefit, that with a fairly high degree of confidence, I believe I can predict several other “features” of the new NCAA NIL policy. To wit:

1) It will involve an artificial cap on what an athlete’s “true” NIL value is, determined by a committee of college administrator types, and designed to ensure that athletes are not “overpaid” for their NIL rights.

Recognize that in most situation where we are concerned about young or naïve people contracting with savvy businesses in the market, we have legal protections to ensure the less knowledgeable people are not taken advantage of by being paid too little. But the problem the NCAA will be worries about will be a needless concern that young men and women will be paid “too much.”

This shows you the NCAA’s concern is not to ensure the rights of the athletes to open-market compensation, but rather to ensure they do not get their full value, for fear of what this will say about how valuable college athletes actually are.

2) The committee’s concerns will be

a. Fear that payment for NIL value will be inflated by payment for athletic value

This has two major problems. The first is a purely economic one. There is virtually no athlete for whom his/her endorsement value is separable from his/her athletic value, esp. prior to retirement. When Klay Thompson does an ad for Kaiser Permanente, a large portion of why he is chosen as the endorse, and why he can command payment above a union scale commercial actor is because he is an awesome basketball player, and his value to Kaiser Permanente hinges critically on the fact that he is beloved in Oakland, where Kaiser Permanente has a presence.

For a car dealer in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, the value of Tua Tagovailoa depends critically on him playing well, and doing so for the Alabama Crimson Tide. If he were to transfer to Clemson, his value to the Tuscaloosa dealer declines to zero, or perhaps even negative. So thinking that these values are somehow severable is foolish.

The second is a civil/economic rights one, which is the idea that a school or sports body should somehow have the right to decide whether two adults transacting in the market for perfectly legal conduct should have their collective judgment of a fair price questioned. In particular, for this third party to step in and override the athletes’ right to engage in commerce to make sure he/she gets less than the market’s own assessment is essentially granting to the NCAA/School ownership over a stream of payments that ought to belong solely to the adult full-citizen.

b. Fear that only the rich schools will be able to offer NIL deals/com balance

There are two fundamental misunderstandings baked into this concern. The first is a belief that caps on individual earnings improve competitive balance in sports. They do not. There are dozens of sports economics papers in professional and college sports that show that caps on what individual can earn doesn’t improve the fortunes of “poor” schools, but instead just changes how the “rich” schools use their money to get talent. (I’ve summarized a lot of them, and discussed the empirical data in the past). If amateurism rules improved competitive balance, we would not have the concept of a Power 5 conference, because all conferences would tend to have an equal chance at being powerful in any given year. We would not have UConn and a handful of other school dominating women’s basketball year-in and year-out. Alabama and Clemson would not be favorites, again, to be in the college football championship after having met up in the CFP the last four years in a row.

Economics has known for 60+ years that talent flows to where it is most valuable, regardless of whether the talent itself receives a share of the profits of not. Prior to free agency, the New York Yankees were more likely to be in the World Series than they are today. This is know as the “Invariance Principle” and you can check out this paper I co-authored for a good discussion of this principle if you’d like. Essentially it says that Alabama will out-recruit Fresno State for QB talent as long as Tuscaloosa has more demand for football talent than Fresno, and allowing that demand to lead to athletes receiving a share of the Tuscaloosa revenue will not change the relative success of Alabama. Ask yourself how many times, currently, Fresno state is able to beat out Alabama if they want the same athlete even when “pay” is capped equally at a scholarship. (spoiler: never)

The second misunderstanding is to think about spending on athletes like a pure consumer luxury good and to imagine a school/community acting like a family with a (short-term) fixed income deciding whether or not to take a vacation. That analogy is horrible for thinking about how major universities decide how much money to allocate to their various means of generating revenue and reputation as educational nonprofits. In that budgetary environment, the value of a star athlete is assessed, not against whether the family can afford a luxury, but rather whether the benefit of adding that athlete is worth the cost. Because it is a business decision, if a school like Fresno State felt it would generate more economic/reputational benefit from a star quarterback than Alabama would, they would offer more. But Fresno’s market is not as lucrative as Alabama’s and so it’s not that Fresno “can’t afford” to outbid Alabama, rather it’s that Fresno’s break-even point is lower than Alabama. So it’s rational for Fresno to stop bidding even when Alabama is willing to continue to up the stakes, and Alabama thus gains the asset.

This is not a argument for fixing prices at the point where Fresno would break even, since all Alabama then has to do is invest in other assets, better facilities, better coaches, etc., (can you say indoor waterfalls?) and since Fresno is already at break-even, for Fresno to invest even a dollar more is wasteful. In other words, it’s not that it’s unfair that Fresno can’t afford to outbid Alabama, it’s actually economically rational for Fresno to let Alabama pay more for talent, because it would cost Fresno more than Fresno would benefit, while the reverse is true for Alabama. It’s win-win for Fresno not to overpay and for Alabama to get the ability to commercialize the athletes’ value. Allowing the money to flow to the athletes instead of the Waterfall Construction Industry just ensures the value reaches those who generate it.

c. Purported Fear that NIL rights will involve too much time away from school

This is somewhat perplexing, for several reasons. The first reason is that shooting a commercial or lending some pre-existing video to a sponsor is not a very time-consuming activity, certainly not compared to the time it takes for a college sport team to travel to a road game (or several) over the course of a week. College Basketball athletes miss something like 40 days of class a year. Suddenly now we’re worried about an afternoon photo shoot?

The second reason is that, of course, activity of this sort can be focused on the summer.

But the third is that the prior goal of making sure athletes aren’t “overpaid” for their NIL goes firmly against the goal of ensuring athletes do not focus on NIL activity too much. If an athlete needs, say, $100,000 to help pay of his mother’s mortgage, wouldn’t it be easier on his time to let him film one lucrative endorsement for $100,000, than to declare that level “too much” and thus force him into doing twenty $5,000 deals? Not everyone has a dollar goal like this, but the best way to ensure anyone who needs money will not do too many side-jobs is to make the first side-job pay enough to cover the financial need.

d. Unsavory advertisers.

This is not as ridiculously as the other concerns. Every sports employer imposes these sorts of terms on their athletes, whether it is a requirement not to endorse a competitor of the team’s official sponsor, or not to advertise for illegal products, or gambling (given that it may be perceived as lowering the integrity of the sports contests themselves, etc.) But the difference here is that these terms are all negotiated as part of an employment contract. If a team wants to tell an athlete s/he can’t advertise for a beer brand, that is baked into the salary they settle on for his/her services, and generally, the salary will rise as the endorsements are more restricted.

In contrast, the NCAA wants to impose these sorts of restrictions, but not compensate the athlete for them. They want to treat the athlete like an employee in terms of imposing rules of employment, but it does not want to grant the athlete all of the benefits of employment, whether it be workers comp, the right to unionize, or even social security matching. To the extent the NCAA needs to control what products an athlete can endorse (which I question), they should be forced to bargain for those concessions, not allowed to simply assert an artificial right to declare them forbidden by fiat.

3) It will involve some mandatory “tether” to education, such as requiring an endorser to offer a summer internship as part of the contract.

By itself, working to get athletes more exposure to the business side of sports is a fine goal. But (a) it contradicts the goal of limiting the impact of the NIL work on school time, and (b) it may force an athlete into internships ill-suited to his/her career aspirations. Take the example of Bryce Love, a recent star at Stanford who also plans to become a medical doctor. He was the runner-up for the Heisman Trophy in his penultimate season at Stanford and he could have easily gotten lucrative endorsement deals from any number of advertisers. But would forcing him to do a summer internship at adidas have helped him get ready for medical school?

So yes, let’s encourage endorsers to offer these sorts of internships, but let’s not allow the NCAA to impose a one-size-fits-all mandate on athletes. There is also ( c) the question of how to handle the star with multiple offers. If the total amount is going to be capped, and if then an internship is also required, an athlete will find his/her ability to do more than one or two sponsorships curtailed as well, which effectively would impose a cap on total earnings on top of individual deal earnings.

4) This will all be done in an effort to maintain a “line of demarcation” between college and pro sports.

Of course, there is, and always will be, a strong demarcation between pro sports and college sports, which is that to play college sports, the athlete must be a student at the college. As long as that “tether” is maintained, no one will confuse the two. It's simple guys: College Athletics = The Athletes Attends College.

Beyond that, further demarcation is unnecessary from the point of view of avoiding consumer confusion. If a real college student is wearing Nike shoes because his school is being paid for him to do so, and suddenly that changes so that he is wearing Nike shoes because his school AND he himself are both being paid, it’s hard to see this as blurring the line. The only way the line between pro and college would be blurred, is if consumer questioned whether the college athlete’s education was genuine. As long as it is, the availability of endorsements, and true access to an open market for those endorsements, will not change that fundamental distinction where College Athletics = The Athletes Attends College.

If the NCAA is worried that endorsements blur this line, it is really a signal they are not confident that college athletes really DO attend college in the same sense as a normal college student. This should be a sign to California to push back and tell the NCAA to focus on fixing that problem, rather than limiting athletes’ economic opportunities to cover up for the NCAA’s failure to ensure all athletes are receiving a true college education.

Conclusion

This ends my prognostication of what we’re going to see from the NCAA. Almost surely, the NCAA plan will seek to override the market assessment of athlete NIL value with the express goal of lowering their income and controlling their efforts to commercialize their image. Whatever the NCAA plan is, it will almost certainly reject the best method of determining fair market value, which is to let transactions in a fair market set value. It will arrogate to the NCAA the athlete's right to determine who he/she endorses, how much he/she can bargain for, and how much time he/she wants to devote to this, in a way that schools do not do for any other student. At core, it will not accept that this is about the athletes’ rights as adults in society, and instead will consider that doling out a slightly higher level of compensation, but denying the fundamental right of market access, should suffice. It is a “how much cash will you need us to dole out to stop insisting on athletes’ getting all their rights” kind of deal.

This is the key. The purpose of ensuring athletes recover their NIL rights is because, well, rights are fundamental. Athletes’ are not second-class citizens – and we should not be fooled by “well, this is less exploitative than before” when the real standard should be “this is no longer exploitative at all.”

This is why my work with the HBL is so vital to my efforts to try to restore college athletes’ full sets of rights. Even when a state passes a law restoring a limited subset of college athletes’ full rights, the NCAA is ready to go to court to use the full weight of our legal system to make sure this doesn’t happen. The NCAA is never going to be on board with the simple concept that College Athletes have equal rights to College Coaches. And so, no matter what the legal question, the fact is we will not see the NCAA pay athletes their full market worth unless and until someone else enters the market and forces them to do so. That someone is going to be the HBL.

The HBL will be the first professional college basketball league. We’re not worried that consumers will be confused; rather we’re confident that when we put teams on the court with the bulk of the elite collegiate talent, fans will be excited to watch, sponsors will be excited to be associated with our league, etc. The league is run by Ricky Volante and NBA legend David West, and you can learn more about us at HBLeague.com.

Remember #AmateurismIsACon

1 note · View note

scripttorture · 5 years

Note

So I know it’s been mentioned that victims do not change beliefs or are brainwashed when undergoing torture but is it completely impossible for a character to undergo so much abuse that they stop fighting, are resigned, or become more submissive. And I know that this might be a bit out of the torture theme but , would a person undergoing abuse/torture and then being comforted by the villain make them more compliant or the likes. Aka how easily does it take for Stockholm syndrome to show up. Thx

Iknow next to nothing about Stockholm syndrome and questions aboutthat in particular are better directed towards @scriptshrink (who hasanswered questions on it in the past I believe). I don’tthink (based on Scriptshrink’s definition) what you’re describingis Stockholm syndrome.

Torturegenerally makes people much more strongly opposed to the torturer(and often anything related to them) then they were prior to torture.

Thatdoesn’t always mean violent resistance because violence is neverthe only way to resist.

Ithink how possible this is depends on what you mean by ‘submissive’and how long term you’re imagining that state being. Because rightnow this looks to me like it could be edging into… ‘torturesurvivors are broken’ territory.

Alot of torture victims dostopphysically fighting while they’re still captive. There are a lot ofvery good reasons for doing that; for starters a lot of commontortures make victims less physically capable of fighting back. Sleepdeprivation, dehydration and starvation all decrease reaction times,lower strength and increase the chances of someone fainting becausethey moved too quickly.

Andbluntly, trauma doesn’t make people stupid.

Torturevictims are perfectly capable of judging how much danger they’re inand what’s likely to increase that immediate danger. Violentresistance, fighting, usually puts victims in immediate danger. Ifviolent resistance fails at any point, if it’s anything short of acompletely successful breakout and escape, then it means reprisalsand possible execution.

Sometimeseven if it doesresult in a completely successful breakout and escape victims couldstill expect reprisals, aimed against their families, friends or hometown. That’s a fairly common feature of a lot of regimes. It’shappening now with the Uighurs in China; people with relatives abroadseem to be especially targeted. It happened in Syria, with wholefamilies ‘arrested’ when male members were suspected ofsupporting an opposing side. It also happened in Nazi-occupiedEurope.

Forthe vast majority of torture victims violence isn’t going to getthem anywhere. The chances of success are vanishingly slim and thechances of more pain are incredibly high.

Thesituations we’re talking about generally are modern high techprisons. Thevast majority of people do not think they’ll be able to fight theirway out a place like this with their fists.

Inthat context choosingnot to fight can be a smart survival decision. Conversely choosing tofight can be a sign of suicidal feelings.

Nowvictims can and do organise.Organised groups of victims canoccasionally fight successfully. But when you’re talking abouttorture specifically, you’re talking about a group of injured,unarmed, malnourished people successfully taking on a group of wellfed, well rested, heavily armed people who are trainedto fight.

Thereis one undisputed successful slave revolt in history: Haiti. And Ithink that number illustrates just how difficult it is for victims‘fighting’ to be successful.*

You’retalking about people without proper clothing going up against peoplewith guns and Kevlar. When those are the odds fighting is usually notthe best option for any individual victim.

Butequating a lack of fighting with a lack of resistance is a veryblinkered view. I think equating a degree of compliancewith a lack of resistance is also a mistake.

Alotof victims pretend to give in and comply over some things as aconscious strategy. It can give them better opportunities to escape,better chances of survival in the short term and better opportunitiesto sabotage the torturers’ operation.

Peoplewho ‘gave in’ under torture have been some of the most successfulspies and saboteurs in history. This is not violence. It is, in theircontext, a more effective way of resisting.

They’vealso been key witnesses in virtually every trial for crimes againsthumanity I can think of.

Cantorture make people seem‘compliant’? Yes. But this is a sham.It’s short term. It’s unreliable.

Victimscan manifest symptomsthat make it more difficult for them to resist in a material way.Depression to the point of catatonia, coupled with forced labour andstarvation does stoppeople taking up arms.

Butit doesn’t stop them refusing to work. It doesn’t stop thembreaking equipment. It doesn’t stop them purposefully doing as poora job as possible. It doesn’t stop them from committing masssuicide.

Thoseare all strategies that people in forced labour situations have used.

Andthere is absolutely no wayfor a torturer to control what symptoms any victim manifests. It ischance. It can’t bepredicted. Hence they can not control whether or not a victim ends inthis state.

Thenthere are the more inventive things people have come up with. There’sthe Chinese man who hid letters in the decorations he was forced tomake. There’sthe American, HenryBox Brown, who posted himselfin a box to the free north.

Thisis not ‘submission’.

Weare resilient, resourceful creatures with an immense capacity forsurvival and recovery.

Barbarismdoes not make people obedient. It canmake people comply over the short term. It can make people wait forthe moment when their personal chance of success is highest. It canmake people go along with things that don’t contradict their moststrongly held beliefs.

Butit fundamentally can’tchange hearts and minds.

Therewill always be things people would rather die then do. Mostpeople would not rather die then put on a uniform, or engage in asimple repetitive task like cutting stone. But the more complex thetasks victims are forced to engage in the more opportunities forresistance they get and the higher the chance of their oppressorsjust failing.

Ifyour story is entirely based around the idea of a character beingtortured and hencebecoming entirely subservient to the torturer- then what you arewriting is unrealistic andit is torture apologia.

Iknow that my two posts on torture survivors aren’t particularlypopular compared to most of my Masterposts, but there’s a reasonthey’re up there. It’s to showcase exactly how different thereality is to this myth. This myth that favours the lies of torturersabove the lived experience of victims and is used to justify andcondone atrocities.

FelaKuti was beaten so many times over the course of his life that it’sthe likely cause of his death. The military government he clashedwith so may times attacked his family, his friends and his home. Theymurdered his mother. They raped and mutilated his friends.

Felawrote songs about it.He marched his mother’s funeral procession up to the biggestmilitary barracks he could find in one of the most populous cities inhis country and left her coffin on the steps.

RonaldSearle drew his experiences as a POW in Japanese camps. He drew thedeaths of his friends. He drew the torture of other prisoners. Hedrew his own emaciated, sick, starved, over worked body.

Hedid this knowing thathe could be killed for these drawings.

Helldid you hear what Bobi Wine had to say a few days after beingtortured? He’d been flown out to America for specialist medicaltreatment. He couldhave stayed put. He couldhave stayed silent. He could have done the safe ‘submissive’thing.

He’sback in Uganda now.

Bywhat measure does this look ‘submissive’?

Becausefrom everything I’ve read this is the normnot the exception. This quiet opposition.

Yesvictims can ‘comply’ in some short term sense; Searle didn’trefuse to work when ordered. He knew that if he did he’d be killedand he saw his duty as bearing witness.

Yesvictims can despair; that is a symptom. But treating that as the onlyemotion survivors can experience is a gross misunderstanding ofmental illness. It is treating survivors as if they are incapable oflife and growth, as if they are already dead.

Asthings stand what you’re suggesting is a fantasy. And it’s onethat’s usually used to demean survivors.

Thinkabout whether your story needstorture. Think about what it’s adding to your story beyond theseunfortunate implications.

Thinkabout why this story,this pattern appeals to you. What draws you to this story? What’sinteresting about it?

Becausethe chances are that the bit you feel is the core, the interestingbit, can be achieved in a different way. Itmay take a little more inventiveness to find that but it’spossible.

*Recentevents make me feel as though I should stress that this dependsheavily on your definition of ‘success’. The enslaved people ofBrazil did not drive their colonial oppressors out of the country asHaiti did. But the establishment of Palmares and the dozens, hundredsof other towns and cities as separate states within states stands asits own form of success.

Disclaimer

#tw torture #torture apologia #forced labour #torture does not work #torture and obedience #torture and compliance #tw slavery #tw rape #tw genocide #haiti #brazil #palmares #resistance #writing victims #etc-please

49 notes · View notes