#i only know 3 people here. untenable.

[pegglefan69]

I did not realize how disappointed I was about having to wait a whole nother month to start prep. well. sigh. at least I got my nipples pierced? when I am not feeling awful about my physical self I feel pretty good about that.

[kcyars99]

The truth about Tim Miller:

A gay man whose world view led him to become a lifelong Republican has the political acumen of a Jewish man who becomes a Nazi.

But it's even worse than that: it's like a Jewish man who helped build the Nazi party. That type of person can never be one of the faces of the Democratic party because he'll never understand it. And honestly, how could he?

To be part of a persecuted minority but find your identity in an alliance with the persecutors? You're unable to grasp any kind of reality that exists outside of whiteness. Whiteness is going to always come first.

And after you spent a decade being Frankenstein, your Republican monster inevitably chased you to the only other game in town: the Democratic party.

Because the GOP never really stood for anything but racism, sexism, and chasing power, and because there's no culture, no values, and no soul, a totally insane lying lunatic was able to swoop in and demagogue his way into ruling the party with an iron fist.

And I get it, you're gay, and now your allies wants to destroy the lives of everyone like you while being happy to use you to further those ends. It's untenable. But instead of putting up a fight and trying to save your party, you go to where the grass is bluer.

One problem: the Democratic party has a soul and it's name is the BLACK VOTER.

Where you wouldn't fight for your party? We will. Where you wouldn't guard your party from demagouges? We do. We don't have the caucasity to assume that we'll be alright. We're not white. It's always existential for us. We can never take our political power for granted.

That's why when you were grooming your party to fall victim to Trump, Bernie Sanders was over here falling flat on his face. Hillary built with us. Biden spent his whole life with us. They have equity. If you want anything over here in Dem land? You need us. Being a former Republican, you have no idea how we work because YOUVE NEVER HAD TO LISTEN TO US.

I'll get to how I know YOU, Tim Miller, have never listened to us in just a second.

That's also why we kill off culture vultures. We're so sensitive to anyone who wants anyone who wants to use us for their gain when we know they'll never get in the trenches with us. And we see it coming a mile away.

That's why we never fall for Trump scams in trying to astroturf black support. Not only does our life depend on us seeing through it, we're disgusted by it.

Now you've abandoned your party. Despite all the money you've made grifting off the party, you have one bad day in your new Democratic life, and now you're trying to rally us to abandon our decades long investment in Joe Biden because he needed a nap, a Joe Biden who beat Trump when you losers couldnt, and you are flumoxed as to why we won't give up like you.

It's because you don't belong here. You have no equity. You haven't built anything with us. You've never been in the trenches. You're not in touch with us. You don't know the community. And more than anything, you don't have the first clue about Black culture.

And in the past 3 days, with endless Black people, specifically Black women, telling you you're wrong, you have no idea what you're talking about, and that you need to LISTEN to Black people, your every response has been the white privileged casually racist response of "I know the Black community better than you."

You don't.

Hell, the idea of representation never even occurred to you until you adopted a Black kid and you're walking through the toy aisle and couldn't find any black dolls. If you couldn't grasp that until it was forced upon you, what makes you think you know us better than we know ourselves? We've been black our whole lives.

And how do I know you'll NEVER have a place in our party?

759.8K

You adopted a little Black girl and still don't even bother to listen to Black women, let one Black people.

In the words of Kendrick Lamar: You're not a colleague. You're a fucking colonizer.

[bestworstcase]

I find it silly that people take the idea that Salem ultimately turning out to not be the bad guy and that she'll end up helping the heroes against the gods as being the same as "SHE'S THE BIG GOOD WHICH IS BAD WRITING".

Did we just forget the concept of enemies working together against a common foe or something? Or the fact that the characters would realistically be incredibly uncomfortable around her and be rightfully distrustful of her even as they recognize that she's as much a victim as she is a villain in this whole clusterfuck? That given that Ozpin has absolutely no idea of what to do against the gods, that they NEED someone who clearly has a plan?

It's like, storytelling 101.

there’s i think a few factors at play here:

#1 - lots of people take what is said about salem by other characters at face value if those characters are in the “salem wants to destroy the world” camp (ozpin, tyrian, raven), because jinn’s framing of the story is presumed to be the whole and absolute truth. characters in the “salem wants to change the world” camp, consequently, are interpreted as either deceived pawns (hazel, mercury), lying (salem), or just memetically transposed into the “destroy” camp (ruby, qrow). 

in part this happens because the people doing this don’t pay any attention to how rwby thematically positions salem relative to ozma in regards to the truth, but it’s also because the (deliberately shocking but also vague and out-of-context) statement she makes in the lost fable—why redeem these humans when we can replace them with what they could never be—sounds damning if you don’t, like, stop to think about it for two seconds in context with the part where salem has been wanting humanity to replace The Gods Who Demand Redemption From These Humans for two hundred million years. i wonder who she meant by “them!”

#2 - this is compounded by the very christianized lens that a lot of the fandom applies to rwby; it’s not even tapered off since 9.10 dropped the hammer on the nonsense about light being the “benevolent” brother, the fandom has largely just pivoted to the blacksmith as the benevolent capital-G “God” (which she’s not) and the idea that what’s wrong with salem is she Hasn’t Learned Her Lesson and Needs To Repent persists as a load-bearing pillar in the standard fanon reading. 

the possibility that salem is right about anything is untenable if salem is read as evil because she is wrong. suggesting that salem is both right and evil makes people extremely uncomfortable, as does the implied corollary that the heroes are wrong even though they’re good, because the fandom’s moral reading of the story depends on salem being wrong. 

#3 - the (countertextual) fanon that has grown out of these two intertwined readings—that salem 1. hates humanity, 2. thinks modern humans are pitiful imitations of real humans because they lack magic, 3. sees only herself and ozma as really human, 4. believes magical power is the only true determinant of worth, 5. views ozma as her possession, and 6. is motivated primarily by spite and obsessive rage because he rejected her so she wants to burn the world down to punish him—is deeply entrenched and, for obvious reasons, makes it very difficult for anyone who buys into it to wrap their heads around how in the fuck salem could ever be persuaded to AGREE to work with the heroes.

because she thinks they’re ants, you know. 

and even if you point out that, like, salem is ready and willing and able to pivot or change tactics if something doesn’t work or a new opportunity presents itself, or that salem in fact states quite clearly that she thinks reliance on strength is ozpin’s downfall, the fanon is too strong to budge. she’s just throwing a tantrum and lashing out in blind rage, actually. or she’s just tightening the leash on cinder even more before turning cinder into another hound, actually. or she’s a hypocrite who’s going to be made to eat her own words, actually. one time i saw someone misattribute “there will be no victory in strength” TO OZMA and i would not be remotely surprised if a lot of the fandom turned out to be misremembering that line as something he said to her. 

if you read salem in this way—as someone who is fundamentally unreasonable and too egotistical to even see other people as people—of course the obvious endgame of the heroes reaching out to her or (as i think is more likely) salem reaching out to them sounds wildly out of character. 

#4 - for some unfathomable reason most of the fandom still hasn’t put two and two together to get Summer Joined Salem and that means they are missing the obvious and crucially important bridge between salem and the heroes. if you say “summer is salem’s general” the average rwby fan is going to hear “summer is one of the bad guys and ruby and yang will have too fight her, ooh so dark and edgy” but the actual point is that salem has someone in her corner who can give ruby and yang a really compelling reason to think that truce might be possible AND that trying to negotiate with salem is a risk worth taking. 

it is infinitely easier to get everyone in this mess to the table if summer is willingly on salem’s side. it’s infinitely harder if salem killed her or broke her into a monster. at this point i am sure the wider fandom is just not going to let go of the latter assumption until they see summer and salem, like, catching up in front of summer’s memorial or what the fuck ever; at which point i’m convinced the fanon is going to pivot immediately to 1. placing bets on when summer will kill cinder and 2. expecting summer to stab salem in the back and redemptively sacrifice her life to save ruby and/or yang because the salem fanon is not going to fucking budge until the peace talk starts. 

[nshtn]

5, 12, 24! asking lots because your writing is amazing, plus i have to see more of your sona ❤️❤️

Here you go, Little Anon! You're so sweet ahhh little bean eee!!

5) "They had become well acquainted with him, he thought."

24) The amount of cool adventures and smut I write is untenable and largely unpublished because it's all OC x Canon bullshit I don't think anyone wants to see, such as... (though the one below also applies solid information on my WIP Uroboros Wesker verse).

12) Wesker but he's niceys because of extraneous reasons explained in extreme and unfortunate detail below. ⬇️⬇️⬇️

I apply the currently understood theory that the hippocampus is physically different in a sociopath / psychopath vs individual not identified to have it, plus the personal verse headcanon that human brains can unassign synapses and their associated axons without neural loss (e.g. emotion ranges in a psychopath, or vision pathways in complete 20-year-sustained blindness, in the same way a Creatures 3 Norn can unassign movement neurons and can have their axons jostled to refresh the synaptic connection).

Then we sandwich the classic "Uroboros, but he lives" and "Uroboros, but he comes back wrong because it infects his brain, even if he's totally compatible". Now, we divert again: What if it reconnected all those silly diminished axons to their previous "known-healthy" state, meaning Wesker is stuck burning alive in a volcano Feeling™ about it? He's burning alive in tarry bubbles of magma, having ego death after ego death while being brazen-bulled over and over until his form finally melts out of the way and re-integrates into a "Wesker-y shape"...

This sets the stage for the story / roleplay, but it's also set-up for my personal Uroboros Wesker I want to write headcanons and xreader content for, whom I don't have a verse name for yet. I am open to suggestions!

[You don't have to read further below if you don't care about the OC x Canon version of this, but I've included lots of juicy medical details with reading links if you'd like more facts about my Wesker's state.]

Wesker ends up going a bit feral for an undisclosed period of time (2-6 months, presumed dead) and eating everything on the island that he can grab in a state of depleted cognitive and physical strength, in a fugue energy starvation state mimicking severe Cannibal Disease, though temporary. He instinctually heads to a TRICELL scientist's house, specifically one who had the gall (or nerve, or bravado) to strike casual conversations with him when he was their boss and they worked on Plaga subspecies classifications in the same building (they're a paleo-biologist(?)) because they're one of the only people he can think of in that moment.

More on that in another post which I'll tag as Hector Maxwell.

Wesker breaks open their door and collapses on their floor not knowing where he is or quite frankly who he is, with extreme, crippling hunger and low insulin, begging for help, something absolutely unprecedented of him. His ghrelin is high, his motilin is out of control, his leptin is nonexistent, and his thiamine is low. His clothing is basically nonexistent save for some flesh-burnt scraps that cling to his skin. He is in unbelievable pain. They load him up on Oxycodone and inject him with insulin and thiamine, give him a glucagon nasal spray and rush him microwave meals (hey, don't judge them) until he stops moaning their name brokenly while trying to resist chewing their hair.

They treat his wounds as best they can with a spare health kit and stitch lacerations shut, and, thus, a type of mysterious acquaintanceship begins as Wesker begins to regain his faculties...

Wesker finds that though he is no less rabidly intelligent, he is afflicted with various irreversible phenotypical mutations and Uroboros has infiltrated his brain tissue. The veins nearest his skin have receded due to T-Virus malnutrition-conservation, his nails are tough, keratinous and claw-like, his teeth are carnivorous with a few extra small canines, his palate is carnivorous with a preference for iron-rich raw red meat with a severe uptick in necessary intake, his scars are scaly, and he has gained an entire sense revolving around his Uroboros tentacles. They now allow him to sense the lightest step from up to a mile away, able to predict earthquakes before they happen and the marching of men or helicopter blades at the expense of severe constant overstimulation he must learn to harness and tamp down.

He's so hungry all the time. He can barely think through the crippling hunger, and he never feels full. The wheel of Samsara bears its' gear upon him daily, as he now feels the full spectrum of emotion at a dramatic and uncontrollable intensity that leaves his eyes like high-lumen floodlights. Not to mention the mental effects... he often feels like his mind slips from him and he does inexplicably animalistic things, like tracking animals with optokinetic vision, twitching and sudden cursing, drooling when food is present, and what seems to present itself as a sort of accursed pack-bonding to such a previously cold man, one who had erroneously believed himself beyond the need for socialization; the paleontologist that is rooming him has to manage and assist as he adapts while also dealing with Wesker getting oddly friendly (sitting next to them, awkward small talk, touchiness/desire for physical reassurance, being awkwardly followed around, falling asleep on them, ... crying to them and often breaking down or becoming hysterical and consolable only through physical touch [hugs, snuggles, the like]).

Eventually, Wesker is forced to reconcile with painful, uncomfortable feelings and undeniable truths; he needs socialization and support now that his tolerance for human suffering is somewhat neurotypical, has been robbed of his ego, status and pride, and can no longer perform unethical bioweapons science to the degree he did previously due to the sheer mental agony that assaults him almost all hours of the day knowing he... he did that. Did it, caused it, was it, made people feel... feel this hunger. A bludgeon, sharp and inescapable... it eats at him, and maybe, maybe that's why he's so goddamn hungry all the time, some kind of punishment...

Anyway, there's smut somewhere in there where he goes hog wild on the cute dino research twink. They end up very much so situationshipping because it's really difficult not to do that when your ex-boss (world's greatest virologist and mass murderer) is snuggling up to you and crying on you and getting in your personal space and experiencing so much pent-up 'need for human contact'. Wesker is bound to fall for someone who meticulously plays doctor, is much shorter and lighter and weaker than he, and, not bound to Umbrella's teachings, is generally compassionate.

It'd be very easy to just sub in a reader instead of Hector, so I'd do that if I wrote for him (and good god I want to so bad).

[my-mt-heart]

Hey MT, Marketing anon here. Checked the last ask you got and you already covered everything but I’m definitely a Caryler, and I wanted to offer my unrequested 2 cents too. 

“They don't want to just please segregated fandoms”

The whole point of spinoffs is taking supporting/fan-favourite characters and creating a show to explore their lives. These shows appeal to small clusters of the fandom and focus on building those clusters instead of trying to appeal to every fan from the entire fandom, which can get complicated (especially when you have a show with a massive ensemble cast like TWD). 

It’s easy money. You already have the characters, setting, and audience nailed down—all you need is a compelling story and a marketing strategy to keep the ball rolling and bring new audiences in. When you break the ensemble into smaller duos and do multiple spin-offs, you have the potential to multiply each of those clusters of fandoms with newer fans.  

 “...Carol were never the face of the franchise”

…And YET TWDs social media accounts have spent the last few weeks trying to show the fandom how much they stan Carol. Their “We <3 Carol” campaign started slowly in March, and their focus on Carol and Caryl is intensifying as the spinoff comes near. Because they know the irreplaceable value, Carol and Melissa bring to the franchise. 

And you know what? I’m glad I get to see them lift up Danai, Melissa, and Lauren as faces of the franchise. All these women spent over a decade bringing us fierce female characters. I refuse to pit them against each other. Sometimes misogyny rears its ugly head (intentionally or unintentionally). The only way to dismantle it in the world is to start by dismantling it within us first. 

“Daryl was always the most popular one”

*MOST MARKETED one. Daryl’s romantic life has always been mysterious, and it helps that Norman is good-looking and likable (white and rich). 

But Daryl isn’t the one that’s trending effortlessly on Twitter. They’re actively engaging fans there because their target audience uses Twitter. If it had no meaning, then they wouldn't bother at all. And if their sole focus was on Daryl, they wouldn’t be trying so hard to please Carol fans. 

“She signed a contract and needs to fulfill that, I don't see nothing changing in terms of her and Daryl relationship”

I’m just going to vaguely point at everything that happened last year, which proves that Melissa had to drop out because they made it “logistically untenable” for her to join the French spinoff. You’re welcome to go down to that pit and research all of what happened. She’s returning to S2, which means she signed a new contract. 

Just the fact that they renewed S2 and had to bring her back before S1 even aired tells you everything you need to know.  

Sorry if you found that disrespectful, dear anon.

This is why AMC needed to announce Melissa and give the show a real title. They know what she's worth, so stop giving people reasons to question it.

Thanks for chiming in, marketing anon.

[sonic-spirit]

Okay, let's fuckin gooooo!!!

I'm seeing if I can do a blog post every day to try and get myself through more of that wall of awful brain garbage that's been gumming things up inside me. I have a lot of topics I've been wanting to talk about, and stories I've been wanting to record, and, yanno. The only way out is through.

It was my first day off I haven't shared with one of my mates in awhile, so that ended up shaping how I approached the day. I started a bit of a decluttering project, since we do have a lot of stuff with no homes right now. I'm not willing to mess with my mates' stuff, but in the two years since moving all the way out here my hyper pared-down stuff has grown, and I was definitely due for some re-organizing and looking it all over for stuff I don't want or need anymore. A big part of the project today was breaking down the variety of little caches I'd developed in a few spots in the apartment and keeping like things together, especially toys and art supplies. I have some big traditional media projects I've been gearing up for, and the more ready things are to get started, the more convenient I make my setups to hit the ground running, the more likely I am to actually do them.

Talking about that stuff was supposed to help me ease into writing about one of the more emotionally charged things I've been meaning to write about, ^_^;; but if I segue into talking about Otherkin stuff from decluttering, the post's kinda gonna feel uneven to me. So, okay, let's talk about, as I have it in my notes:

The Time I Drove Across the Country 3 Times to Save My Life

I feel guilty about looking at it as anything but a tragedy, millions of people died, and who knows how many more were permanently disabled, and so many could have been okay if the people in power hadn't been so eager to throw them to the mercies of an uncaring disease. But, selfishly, COVID saved my life.

My mental health still isn't great. There are always ups and downs, and I've been under a lot of financial stress that's been causing me to spiral in a lot of other ways again. But before COVID it was so, so much worse. I wasn't still living with my abusive parents at the time, but I was working for them, and still beholden to them socially and financially. And I was...loosing resiliency. Going to cons and spending time with my friends wasn't...well, if wasn't enough to offset how the rest of it was wearing on me, dealing with my abusers, doing a job I hated and where I constantly felt like I was failing, and I was losing ground. I'd been suicidal for years and years, and I didn't think I had much fight left in me. I'd also been trying to escape, with interruptions to triage myself to keep functioning, for even longer. I was tired, and I was getting desperate.

COVID bought me more time.

Everything going into shutdown was bad. And let me be perfectly clear, shutting down was the right thing to happen, there were so, so many people who should not have died. But for the first time in ten years, I got some distance from my abusive parents. I didn't have to go into a job and see them all the time, I didn't have to go over to their house and play nice and cow-tow to them every week.

For the first time in so, so long, I got a reprieve.

It was still hard, I missed my friends, and the stress of living under the threat of a pandemic was huge. But I finally started to be able to put myself back together again. Just a little bit. And that made all the difference in the world.

And then, in the heart of all this uncertainty, one of my really, really good friends who I'd fallen out of contact with a few years prior reached out, and we reconnected. We talked, and talked, and one thing led to another, and eventually we started dating.

My parents had eroded most of the COVID protections at my job by this time, having us back working in the office, opening the office to the public, and things were quickly becoming untenable for me again. My friends, in person and long distance, did their best to help. As much as I would let them see how deeply I was struggling.

Then came the Thanksgiving trip.

I'd been very resistant to flying to Florida with my family in the Thanksgiving of a pandemic. But my mom had bartered with me. If I went on this trip, they wouldn't force me into going on the Christmas trip. -_- And how could I say no to a deal like that. Look, I didn't have many options, and again, I was beholden to them. I could only fight so hard. So, I went. And it was worse than I had even expected.

Never masking in a state with abysmal infection numbers, never taking advantage of outside seating at restaurants, eating out for every meal was bad enough. The endless refrain of Fox News and fascistic dogwhistles put me over the edge. I knew they wanted who I really was dead. But...living inside it...I was done. I needed to escape, by any means necessary. My friends were alarmed and rightly so. I redoubled my efforts to find another job as means of escape, and determined I would not do this ever again. I would give myself a deadline to get out.

When my relationship started with my mate, I changed my focus to jobs in the San Jose area. And in February, I finally had an opportunity. Two jobs wanted me to come in and interview, and I'd already blocked out a long weekend for that year's virtual FurSquared con. Instead, I loaded myself and my 16-year-old kidney diseased kitty, and everything I though I couldn't do without in case I decided to simply never come back, and drove the 3,000 miles from Illinois to California in 3 days.

It was ROUGH. I didn't give myself a very reasonable timeline to get there, and driving 10-hour or more days, going from cat-friendly hotel to cat-friendly hotel was A Lot. Giving Zi her subcutaneous fluids in hotel rooms was a wild experience. But eventually, we made it. I met up with my mate, changed clothes and ran out for an interview...^_^;; which I actually missed because I'd taken too long to get there. But spending the night with my mate and their partner, feeling safe with them...they offered to let me stay, and I tearfully admitted that I didn't want to leave.

I almost just stayed. I wanted to, badly. But I still had a house to get out from under, and I needed to go back and sell it. I went to the second interview, where neither of us impressed one another, and drove Zi and myself back, escape plan in gear.

My house was a horrifically cluttered mess when I called the realtor who'd helped me buy it and asked him to help me sell, but he was still generous when he came by to talk with me. The market was good, he told me, and places were getting sold even before they were properly listed. I signed the papers, and started getting to work on paring everything down and packing.

It quickly became clear that storage or moving things or Uhauls would be prohibitively expensive for me, easily over $1,000 for the cheapest options. Since I would be moving without a job set up, and without any form of income when I left, the only reasonable option was to only bring what I could fit in my car, and donate or sell the rest. It was hard, emotional work, and I had to make a lot of hard decisions (and a lot of use of Facebook Marketplace for the first time), but I made it happen, and by mid April, I finally left.

I had a celebratory going away party the night before leaving, where we drank and had fun, and enjoyed one another's company. And then my friends came and helped me with the last of the junk I hadn't managed to get through the next morning. They held me while I had a panic attack over telling my parents I was leaving, and helped me to be able to go.

In the end, the people who really knew me, who really loved me, saved me.

Finally, I headed out with Zi, deciding to drive...less stupid hours this time. I limited myself to 8 hour driving days, and just did a few more days. Memorably, one morning when I was trying to get us out the door and checked out, I couldn't find Zi. I searched that hotel room for my kitty for a good half hour before I finally found her--she'd somehow managed to open a drawer, climb inside, and shut herself in!

I'd expected to feel freed, relieved. I'd expected to feel a weight off myself immediately. But mostly, what I'd felt at first was numb grief. I was so tired. I was glad to be going, excited to be with people I loved. But I still felt bad. Everything they would have thought of the situation echoed in my mind, and it hurt. I knew I was right to go. I knew there was no way they'd ever stop hurting me. I knew I needed to get away. But their words, of how selfish I was, echoed inside me.

It's still hard sometimes. Abuse echoes still. But I'm so, so fucking relieved to be out. And so, so fucking grateful to be with my partners.

[todayisafridaynight]

I wanted to write in about my thoughts on Jo as a CSA survivor separately for a couple of reasons:

I already more or less have what I have to say on the topic in order thanks to talks with @starssystem and another friend [<3]

This is a massive tonal shift from anything else I could be discussing

This Is Massive In General For The Love Of God PLEASE Help Me

Obvious CSA CW for anyone else reading; I only discuss statistics, psychology, and the aftereffects seen in survivors here, but it's worth a warning.

With the disclaimers out of the way… I'd mentioned before I've only ever added one thing to Jo's background, and you were right: this is it! To me, there's so much thematic overlap in Jo's narrative with the experience of surviving CSA it's worth it to examine his character through the lens of that being the case. Of course, there are clearly-stated reasons for it all that Aren't That, but…

It's the pervasive guilt and shame, the lifelong secret that becomes too unbearable not to tell, the faulty coping mechanisms aimed at burying the trauma without having to face it, the reluctance to be sincere [vulnerable] and the lies and half-truths used to maintain the facade of invulnerability, the pursuit of power and control and the knee-jerk anger response when it's threatened, the pursuit of mastery over his body and the indifference to what happens to it. And the way a lot of it really does stem from a deeply traumatic childhood sexual experience from before either he or Ikumi understood what they were getting into, from before they could give informed consent.

Statistically, the further below the average age someone is for their first time, the likelihood of [at best] having been introduced to sex inappropriately and [at worst] having been abused at the time or earlier rises exponentially. Jo was 15 when Masato was conceived--possibly 14, since he was saying he "met" Arakawa at 15, and by then Masato was already born. To put this into perspective, since what ages register as concerning is largely cultural, the average age in the US and UK is 16-18. But in Japan, it's over 19.

To a Westerner [or even a heavily Westernized non-Westerner], having a kid at 15 is unfortunate, but not untenable; you've seen it on TV, you might know people like that, you might even be that kid or that parent. But in Jo's case, with him being 4 or 5 years younger than average, it's like if someone told you they had their first time--had a /kid/--at 13 or under. That's the equivalent discrepancy. That /is/ concerning, to me.

It's also something that's linked to negative outcomes in adulthood, partly because of the likelihood of forming bonds with poorly-adjusted peers. Jo specifically states he and Ikumi were only together because others who came from backgrounds like his own were all he had back then. [As an aside, it's interesting to see him instinctively seek out a relationship where his pain would be understood without having to say anything--or one where he could assume it would, at any rate.]

When it comes to his relationship with Ikumi, I've always felt there was this "adult dynamic" between them--in the sense it feels like one that'd be more fitting for adults to get into than a couple of teens. It was, based on his wording, a primarily physical relationship neither of them expected to last even if they were living together. To me, it's one thing if you're fully convinced you're in love or you're experimenting or whatever and that results in an unplanned pregnancy, but it's another thing entirely to have such a bleak yet objective outlook on your relationship so young.

And it didn't have to be that way. He could've been just like Arakawa, head-over-heels in love with this girl who was The Only Good Thing He Had Going, or something like that. But the sheer contrast between how Arakawa was crazy about Akane and never forgot about her for the rest of his life, while Jo more-or-less-clearly didn't have feelings for Ikumi and can't bring himself to remember her name after living with her for at least a year and experiencing life-changing events with her…

It's notable to me that Arakawa maintains an interest in women while nearly every in-character interpretation I've seen makes Jo averse to women. Obviously, we don't really know that; it's probably just based on his general attitudes, his contrast with Arakawa, and maybe his immunity to Charm. But I think there's a reason a lot of people pick up on it and tie it to trauma rather than/in addition to a lack of interest in women.

I've talked about this through the lens of comphet already [and Jo being gay or ace or both would present other difficulties], but I can't overstate how notable it is on its own. We see Jo's response to traumatic events, and it's to become preoccupied with them, to investigate further if he has any leads. That's why he remembers every minute detail of the night Masato was born and the time he saw Arakawa attempt to comfort Masato when he was crying and hitting himself. I think it's also why he gets as far as he does when looking into Arakawa's death, and why he entrusts the search to Ichi. He never seems to manage to block them out, even if that's what he'd rather do--even if that's what he thinks he's doing.

So if he "[doesn't] even remember" the name of the mother of his child, I get the feeling there's something more going on. Like I've [probably] said in the past, Jo genuinely sounds traumatized by the relationship as a whole. More than anything else he's been through, and he's been through a lot. It's often the case that CSA survivors who are also survivors of other trauma view it as worse than anything else that happened to them.

And that's not to implicate Ikumi at all, I don't think it's a case of COCSA--everything I've said holds just as true for her, and she had to suffer the additional trauma of an unwanted pregnancy and childbirth, at that. Rather, I think it would make sense for something like CSA, which often incontrovertibly reconfigures one's relationship with sex and love, to be a factor in why they rushed into a something physical before they were mature enough to handle it.

Some victims end up having perfectly healthy experiences, some victims end up avoiding them, some victims end up re-victimized, and some victims end up with a mixed bag--there's a lot of variation. But some victims do end up having relationships like this and making mistakes like this, because that's all they know, or because they want to heal but don't [or don't know how to] go about it in a healthy way, at a healthy pace. And I definitely think if you recognize that's what the basis of your relationship was, that it all comes back to something you'd rather forget, it'd make sense to want to forget the relationship as a whole.

To that end, it's possible to come away from a relationship traumatized even if no one did anything wrong. I've [probably] talked about how the way Jo comforts her at the station feels like he's doing it for her sake and pushing his own feelings down, but neither of them is really buying it. If that's a pattern in their relationship, perhaps he wouldn't have been able to communicate if maybe what they were doing was dredging up bad memories, if he wanted to stop but didn't think she did. So to go through with it, then get the news months later…

Either way, the fact Ikumi couldn't bring herself to tell him she was pregnant until nothing could be done would, for Jo, invariably cement the feeling he has no control over what happens around him. I think the sense of powerlessness he felt is why he blew up at her when she told him, because it's really the only time we see him lash out like that at her. At the park, he objects to going back for Masato, sure, but he's passive. And I think that unbroken pattern of powerlessness in his life [which CSA would only compound on] is why he's so reactionary, why he's so emotionally dysregulated, why he expresses his rage through what basically amounts to power-tripping.

But I do think Jo does have a great deal of awareness. A lot of his wording when he's telling Ichi about it borders on poetic, or at the very least candid and effective. That requires both prior reflection and a command of language. I think there's a lot he understands deep down, at least after sitting with it for long enough, but he isn't capable of voicing--or doesn't know how to voice--what's on his mind, most of the time.

So when he joins the Arakawa Family, when he rises the ranks and has that control back, his control has to be near-absolute. If it's undermined in any way--such as, for example, a certain someone failing to answer a call within two rings--he loses it. On the other side of the coin, I do feel a lot of why his devotion and gratitude towards Arakawa goes to the extent it does, why he's so comfortable with him, is because Arakawa gave him the safety of the Arakawa Family, gave him back his autonomy, gave him the environment--and treated him with enough humanity to give him the reason--to learn to regulate himself, to better himself.

And Arakawa /gets/ trauma. He really does. Aside from his own abusive background, literally the only time the word trauma comes out of any character's mouth in this series, it's Arakawa's. It comes back to Jo saying others who came from backgrounds like his own were all he had; that never changed, did it?

Lastly, For Funsies [<- LIE. COMPLETE LIE. TURN BACK NOW] I wanted to go through the items on this [CSA] Survivors' Aftereffects Checklist I could check off with near-certainty. 19/34, by the way, give or take. Now, as I said at the beginning, there are existing concrete reasons for why he has many of these experiences… but it's like the trans allegory with Masato, To Me… If I can check off over half the list based on a very limited backstory and an hour of screen time total, that's indicative of a notable overlap… TO ME…

Note that the book this list is from was published in 1990 and focuses on women's experiences. It was a huge step forward in giving survivors a voice back when a lot of existing research indicated CSA had neutral or even positive effects on children, but it's definitely a product of its time. With that out of the way…

Wearing a lot of clothing, even in summer […]

To be fair, most male characters in RGG are fully-covered and have near-unchanging designs, and it's winter in both 2000/2001 and presumably 2019, but… when it comes to Jo, it feels a little different.

He does have Some Heavage in his twenties [although the necklace takes the attention off of his actual chest], but as time goes on, he shows less and less skin and adds more and more layers. When he has the gloves on, it leaves no skin exposed at all, and there's this direct symbolic correlation with secrecy that isn't there for other characters. And if you're wearing three layers of leather [or even one], you can neither feel what you're touching nor feel anything touch you.

Pure Speculation, but I just can't really see him underdressed for any occasion… That's why his fit in Day with the Sun is funny as hell but also… yeah…

As a behavior, if it's rooted in anything, it's probably rooted in having to hide signs of physical abuse, of course--but then he kind of already had an excuse, with how he was constantly getting into fights. I guess it depends on the specifics, but I think it's interesting to consider this as one way CSA victims attempt to regain control of their bodies, avoiding emotional discomfort at the cost of physical discomfort.

Self-destructiveness

It's nothing super overt, but I see this most clearly represented in his second boss fight in particular; his willingness to wield a blade bare-handed while using enough force he could very well render his hand useless. I think it's potentially also evident in how he has severe cataracts he chooses to ignore and allow to worsen, despite having the reasons and resources to undergo surgery to restore his vision. In doing so, he literally and figuratively blinds himself to so much.

I also kind of think the assassination of Hoshino/the anonymous call and The Eye Scene are examples of self-sabotage. I mean, he literally was sabotaging himself in the former, but it's also the specific way he feels the need to be physically taken down in order to be stopped--possibly a holdover from RGGJo, who's only too happy to be beaten into a coma.

I don't know… It's hard to pinpoint, but I feel like he would be averse to most of the more "obvious" self-destructive behaviors--especially when he has people in his life who might notice and worry, like Ikumi and Arakawa. That and because many of them are addictive. He's seen what that's done to his father, and he's also developed this incredibly rigid sense of discipline he can't maintain if he doesn't have a clear head.

From how he talks about himself [as having lost his humanity and lived a half-assed life], I definitely think he's at the very least unkind to himself, but I also think he does externalize it by provoking others to harm him [in the case of physical fights] and reject him. Like he needs some kind of proxy perpetrator. For some abuse victims, this specific manifestation of self-destructive behavior is a way to regain control--whether or not you "deserved it" back then, you do now, as a direct, logical result of your actions.

Need to be invisible, perfect, or perfectly bad

I think each of these needs manifests in different ways for Jo. The need to be invisible can be seen with authority figures (mainly Aoki, but also Arakawa in The Yubitsume Scene, a little; how drastically he pulls back and tries to act "normal")--this relates to what you were talking about with being reluctant to intrude or take up space. If you fall under the radar, maybe you won't get hurt.

The need to be perfect can be seen in his seemingly "impossible" standards, I would say. Of course, because we see things from Ichiban's perspective, we tend to see them as unfair and often arbitrary demands. But they aren't arbitrary to Jo, are they? They're standards he holds himself to through and through. If you're good, maybe you won't get hurt.

The need to be perfectly bad can be seen in and relates to much of what I discussed under self-destructiveness [The Eye Scene and the way he antagonizes Ichiban specifically by making himself out to be worse than he is]. If you must get hurt, it can at least "make sense"--be "deserved."

Suicidal thoughts, attempts, obsession (including "passive suicide")

Obviously he's not like… Mine Levels Of Overtly And Consistently Suicidal, and he doesn't attempt suicide himself, but at the same time, I have to note his total ambivalence towards Aoki seeing him as a "bullet" (a kind of hitman sent on suicide missions). He agreed to what he himself viewed as a suicide mission and he didn't care what would happen to him afterward, as he says to Joon-gi, Zhao, and Adachi.

Aside from that, I certainly feel he's at least had passive thoughts like wanting to disappear or wishing he'd never been born. Y'know. Nothing concrete, but reflective of his mental state, and just as detrimental to dwell on long-term.

I think there's a sort of childishness [for lack of a better word] to thoughts like these [in that they're impossible], but also a level of maturity in that it probably doesn't escalate to something more actionable because he understands he has responsibilities he can't abandon. I think if he was ever seriously suicidal, it would be at the points of his life where he really didn't have any responsibility to anyone, like between Ikumi leaving and him joining the family, or after he was arrested.

Depression (sometimes paralyzing) […]

I'm trying not to over explain going forward because I Have BEEN Overexplaining It Is SUCH A Disaster… he's depressed If You Have Eyes And/Or Ears… I'll leave it at that…

Anger issues; inability to recognize, own, or express anger; constant anger […]

Lol

Rigid control of one's thought process; humorlessness or extreme solemnity

Relates back to what I was saying about how disciplined he is [and expects everyone else to be], but in general, he's incredibly, incredibly serious and focused. I don't think he's /entirely/ humorless [but then again, very few people are]; I just think his specific sense of humor is. Like. What Is Your Problem [I Know What Your Problem Is I Have Been Discussing It In EXCRUCIATING Detail But What The Fuck Is Your Problem]

Trust issues; inability to trust (trust is not safe); total trust; trusting indiscriminately

That's why he was planning on taking his secret to the grave, isn't it? It was only when faced with the realization it would soon be too late to say anything that he was able to tell Ichiban. He could've trusted Arakawa, should've been able to, but… in his mind he never could.

This book [and this checklist] is about "incest" actually, but it redefines "incest" to mean any instance of CSA perpetrated by any individual the victim trusts or has an expectation of being able to implicitly trust. Which… is most CSA as we understand it today, so I've edited some parts to just say that.

Anyway, I've never given much thought to the specifics of what Jo might've experienced--who did it, what happened, how long it went on, etc.--so there's no conclusion I can draw here [and elsewhere, I'm sure]… but even without that, to grow up unable to trust the one person who should be in his corner, his father, and to have his trust betrayed by Ikumi, it's no surprise Jo ended up like this either way. So… I'm happy he had the courage to tell Ichi, in the end.

High risk taking ("daring the fates"); inability to take risks

I think these are supposed to be mutually exclusive, but to me, Hoshino's assassination and Arakawa's assassination represent both sides of the coin, although they're not the only examples. There are risks Jo won't think twice about taking and risks that paralyze him.

Boundary issues; control, power, territoriality issues; fear of losing control; obsessive/compulsive behaviors (attempts to control things that don't matter, just to control something)

Lol…

Guilt, shame; low self-esteem, feeling worthless; high appreciation of small favors by others

Lmao Even…

Feeling demand to "produce and be loved"; instinctively knowing and doing what the other person needs or wants; relationships mean big tradeoffs (love was taken, not given)

I actually think this encapsulates a lot of what I've been saying about his work ethic, his ideas of discipline, and his relationship with Ikumi, but I also think it's why Masato took a liking to him. His attentiveness. It ties back into wanting to be perfect; when you're abused--especially long-term--you become attuned to observing and responding to any shifts in mood or tone. This is another area where I can't draw any conclusions relevant to my point, but it does certainly relate to his father's abuse, at any rate.

Abandonment issues

Kind of contentious… The anticipation of being abandoned by or losing someone he cares about appears to be worse than the actual experience. He's fine with Ikumi leaving him, and he's… not Fine With, but able to come to terms with Arakawa's death and Aoki's abandonment of him. At the same time, he really does try to make Ikumi's stay in his life comfortable, and he spends almost forty years doing his damnedest to keep his family together, whatever the cost. If I were to extrapolate from RGGJo, though, /he/ does have an obsessive, unhealthy attachment to Arakawa.

Blocking out some period of early years (especially 1–12); or a specific person or place

Ikumiiiiii that's what I'm SAYINGGGG

Feeling of carrying an awful secret; urge to tell, fear of its being revealed; certainty no one will listen; being generally secretive […]

Rofl Perhaps…

Denial; […] repression of memories; pretending; minimizing ("it wasn't that bad") […]

He admits to it himself. Not much else to say. Though I don't think he necessarily minimizes what he's been through by dismissing how bad it was; rather, he tends to overestimate his ability to move past it.

Pattern of ambivalent or intensely conflictive relationships (intimacy is a problem; also focus shifted from [CSA] issues)

Also kind of contentious… we don't see a pattern of romantic relationships, as I assume the author meant here, but at the same time, the romantic relationship and non-romantic relationships we do see fit this pattern. I guess I'd say I definitely think intimacy /would/ be a problem, and he /wouldn't/ be ready to address his issues.

Limited tolerance for happiness; active withdrawal from happiness, reluctance to trust happiness ("ice=thin")

The quote that prompted this ask in the first place. It's sort of connected to the point about humorlessness and extreme solemnity; if that was the "what," this is the "why." He doesn't know how to relax ["holidays don't exist" and all], he doesn't have much to be happy about, but even rarer is the occasion where he doesn't feel too conflicted in the moment to be able to enjoy himself. That's just how I see him.

[…] verbal hypervigilance (careful monitoring of one's words); quiet-voiced, especially when needing to be heard

EXACTLY what I was talking about in this ask, so I'm leaving that one up to past me…

......

... That's It That's The Essay I'm going to hibernate until Infinite Wealth comes out and somehow refutes my points but UNTIL THEN. Farewell, take care, and once more, don't worry too much about matching my energy… Like I Said if I were the one receiving this ask I'd just delete my blog, so… I'll just be happy to know you read it :] If That lmao

ok i read it :) 👁️👁️ READMYTAGSTHERESMORETHEREIPROMISE

[dnickels]

Julian Fellowes writing steelworkers is a hilarious idea to start with, but I've been trying to put my finger on what feels slightly 'off' about the storyline. Putting aside the usual amount of Fellowesian nonsense, at least some of the dissonance is in how the demands are phrased. 'Bourgeois' isn't quite the word here but "I just want to spend more time with my family" is calibrated to be palatable to a certain audience, and that is not an audience of basement dynamite IWW radicals. It may be that that was deliberate in-universe, because its the argument that would reach known wife guy and superdad George Russell, but it serves to defang the movement. Frankly, when the titans of industry were waxing hysterical about the blood-dimmed tide loosed upon the world over a few dollars' wage increase, they weren't wrong! A strong, organized workforce that can advocate for workplace democracy is the end of their world entirely. It is radical! It's revolutionary! These weren't guys who wanted a few concessions (pwease Mr. Carnegie, more rails around the molten steel vats) they were dreaming about fundamentally changing the course of history. "The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of working people, and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life," as contemporaries very famously declared. The triumph of the union is the end of Newport cottages. As history it's nonsensical but it's a Fellowes joint, we're letting him have that, but as television making he's missing a powerful engine of conflict.

I had a thought "Fellowes writes the steelworkers like a guy who's never had a reason to be mad at his boss", which on the one hand feels true, and yet we have seen him write about workers trapped in untenable positions-- its just that the best examples are all lady's maids. It's very funny to me that that rough and ready, heavily armed steelworkers are somehow less furious and threatening than O'Brien, who attempted to harm and almost killed her employer through an act of workplace sabotage! He must on some level understand the rage and desperation of her position. He understands the total power an employer can have-- Agnes was obviously in the right morally when she moved to correct Armstrong's behavior and make her understand the consequences would be severe, but for whatever reason Racist Armstrong makes a much more heartfelt case for the precarity of her life than the steelworkers who have presumably seen guys die on the shop floor. We know Fellowes is aware of how dangerous work in the trades is at this time, multiple comments have been made about workers dying building the Brooklyn Bridge. You think that might come up in the strike storyline but they're oddly separate.

I don't particularly want to watch his netflix soccer show again, but I feel like I'm pulling on a vital thread when I think about how flat the team dynamics fell on that show and how the steelworker's union feels very two-dimensional here. For whatever reason (and I am putting my already shredded credibility on the line here to say so) Julian Fellowes has an extraordinary insight into the (historical) lives of women and gay men, but seems uncomfortable or even shy when asked to write about male camaraderie (see: the war season of DA with extremely very little war in it). The only male characters I can think of who are 1. of a similar age 2. in equivalent positions of power 3. not related to each other in his work are Church and Bannister, who are waging Butler War from across the street. I don't know what explicit conclusion I would draw here, but its fascinating to me to watch him fumble through this storyline at this moment of renewed labor militancy, reconfiguration of interpersonal workplace norms, unconstrained power of the individual capitalist, and male loneliness. It's not like I think this 74 year old relic (it's not because he's old, its because he believes in philosophies that lost most of their adherents on the first day of the Somme) has his finger on the pulse, but DA clearly spoke to people. Will Gilded Age push the same buttons?

(the only theme more common in Fellowes' writing than sad trapped debutantes is Powerful Benevolent Rich Dad but that one seems self-explanatory (Dr. Freud to the lobby please) in a way we'll quietly ignore for the sake of everyone's dignity)

[emmashouldbewriting]

I don’t really like Camilla or Charles but it’s weird to see people hate Camilla for being a mistress when her marriage was over by the point her affair was started. Moreover people don’t hold Charles accountable as much as they do her. Not to mention Diana, nobody talks about her being a ‘mistress’ when she herself had affairs with married men. I’m not saying Camilla and Charles are saints or anything, I find cheating deplorable but it’s been like 3 decades, holding that shit over their head isn’t the way imo. Moreover the whole ‘she needs to be humble because she was a mistress’ is weird and frankly misogynistic. It’s one thing not to like the jewellery she’s wearing but another thing entirely to say she basically should only wear the less noticeable pieces because she and Charles had an affair 30 years ago.

Honestly, the whole thing was a shitshow, and nobody who criticises Camilla points out Diana behaved the same in other marriages, like you said. I think that's what gets me--it's wrong, but that standard must apply to everyone, and there is no excuse for unhappiness. If Diana was unhappy, leave. If Charles was unhappy, leave. If someone in a marriage did wrong, if that marriage was untenable, if it could no longer continue, then leave.

Nobody here is perfect. Everyone made mistakes, and thus nobody is worse than the other. Charles and Diana split a long time ago, literally my entire lifetime ago!! Maybe that's why I see it like this, I wasn't exposed to any of the PR/whatever and I've been able to research and form opinions over time from many places, I don't know.

As far as I'm concerned, if their families can move on, then so can everyone else. It's not healthy to be so upset over something that happened to strangers thirty years ago.

[masterofthez]

“Someone aside from Game Freak should make Pokémon. Scarlet and Violet are just too buggy”

So I’ve seen criticism like that before, and I think it kind of misses the point of why these games came out in the state that they did. Because when comments like that are made, they always seem to be in bad faith. They in large seem to argue that the developers were lazy or didn’t know how to do their jobs. And while that is certainly possible, I highly doubt that. If only because people passed all of the slow down and occasionally wonky looks, I think Scarlett and Violet are legitimately very fun games. I honestly think this is more of a matter of a lack of polish. If the game could have been in development for another year, then I don’t think people who be complaining nearly as much (they would of course be complaining because Pokémon fans are never happy [which is a much longer conversation and I plan to eat dinner at some point today]). But I think that hits on what I see as the major problem. Time. 

Game Freak has said before that Gen IX started development right after Sword and Shield came out in 2019. So a three year development time. Not an impossible development time and Game Freak have always been very good at scope management. But that’s far less manageable if you look at it more holistically. I wasn’t able to find like an average development time for Open World Games, but looking at the two other big open world games the Switch has to offer, The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild and Xenoblade Chronicles 3, does give us some kind of idea. BotW had a 6 year development period. Xenoblade had a smaller one in 4 years. Both games had longer to cook the Scarlet and Violet did. Even the other Open World Pokemon game that came out this year, Pokémon Legends Arceus, had 4 years of development time. And I think that’s speaks to the other time problem. 

BotW And Xenoblade had the benefit of only having the one game to work on. Development for Gen IX started after Sword and Shield came out in 2019. And what came out after that game? The DLC Packs and Legends Arcus. So not only does this game have a larger scope, but it also had to be developed in a company that was working on other games during the COVID Pandemic. You can tell just how stressful and exhausting all of that is just by the nature that the Gen IV remakes I didn’t mention earlier in games Game Freak were making. That’s because it was developed by another company. The first mainline Pokémon game made by another company because they were already working on two other games at the time. 1 of which would have to be released with less time devoted to it. 

Now, I suggested earlier that they should have delayed the game by a year to keep working on it, but I don’t think that would have been possible. And that’s because of the Pokémon Company which manages the multimedia aspect of the series. If Gen IX is delayed then it’s not just a game that’s delayed. It’s a card game. A manga. An anime. A number of toys, and tie in products. If the developers looked at all they still had left to do at the start of 2022 and said ‘we can’t do this by November’ then I doubt they would have been able to convince the people in charge to delay it. And bringing in new people to basically work overtime on these sort of stuff in hazardous in a lot of ways save for moments where it’s slow enough to actually train new people. And given the pandemic and multiple overlapping development cycles going on, I imagine most new people wouldn’t be able to really pitch in. 

I think to solution here isn’t to give Pokémon to a new developer or to double the size of the company. It’s to let the developers at game freak have the time to actually make a game. Because the system and conditions they currently have seem untenable. After all, the cracks are already beginning to show.

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Hi, I don't usually do this because I don't like to cause problems or make people feel uncomfortable, but I truly felt like I needed to say something on the matter. I understand where your coming from on the whole Noah situation. While as a black man, I also did feel a bit uncomfortable seeing him handcuffed, I however, didn't find it racist at all. Honestly, your statement that Alfonso shouldn't have been casted due to the direction of the storyline was a bit disheartening.

Hey Nonnie

I've had a few other asks about this in my inbox, I won't reply to all of them as I'll just be rehashing the same thing over and over - I'd rather explain myself in one answer - so to the other Nonnie's who sent me asks around this same topic - I hope you see this.

Firstly Thank you for feeling you could come to my inbox and say what you've said in such a respectful tone - it means a lot to me that you have messaged me in the way you have - courteously - rather than being rude and disrespectful towards me for something I've said - all of you who have messaged me have shown the same respect and I hope that this response is taken in the same way.

I'm grateful that you have done so because my second point is to apologise - to anyone who felt what I said was insensitive or disheartening in any way - it was not my intention to offend anyone. I'm not making excuses, but it was 3/4 am in the morning and I was definitely not at my most coherent or articulate and so I think perhaps what I was trying to say didn't come across well at all.

I'd like to explain in a bit more detail what I meant by what I said in the hope that you will see that I truly didn't mean it in the way it appears to have come across.

I in no way meant to imply that Alfonso shouldn't have been cast as Noah - he appears to be a talented young actor who hopefully has a bright future ahead of him. My feelings towards the Noah storyline stem more from the way it was written and directed - to me the storyline was poorly written - it would have benefited from having more time given to it so it could be better fleshed out and allowed to breathe, rather than what we were given, for example - we know the show is able to make us care about characters and their plight - and we got that to a certain extent here - I felt for Noah and the position he'd been put into - through no fault of his own - but that was far more down to Alfonso's acting than it was to the script which was clunky.

The other thing about it was the way this plot line was written played out in the same way that other aspects of the 911 writing has done before - I've complained about the misogynistic use of Lucy as a character who was simply there to further the storyline of a white male character - this felt similar to me in that it felt like they used a black character to further the story arc of a white woman and as a white woman myself, that doesn't sit comfortably with me - but a better script in particular (it becomes increasingly evident that Nadia, while good at writing for dispatch when they're on the phones etc, is lacking in the skills as a writer to bring nuance and depth to other scenes) and better directing would have eliminated this as a problem.

The fact that we only got to see Noah being handcuffed, and lead out of his place of work, but not the two white male perpetrators - who were far more dangerous as they had guns and had previously shot a man - I would have felt more comfortable if we had been shown either them being handcuffed or them in cuffs being put into the back of a police car - as it was to the viewer it reads that white men with guns are far less dangerous than a black kid who was put into an untenable situation - something which doesn't sit comfortably with me.

I hope this makes sense to you - and you can see what I so poorly was trying to say last night. I want to reiterate that I truly didn't mean to imply that I don't think Alfonso should have been cast - the opposite - I would have liked for him to be given more of an opportunity to show his talent and to have been given better material to work with over a longer period of time (I can only hope that his story arc gets picked back up again because it doesn't feel finished).

Also please don't worry about making me feel uncomfortable - it is only by being made to feel uncomfortable that we can learn and grow - and I value the opportunity to do so. Please feel free to comeback to me if you want to - my inbox is always open and I'd love to hear more about your feelings and opinions on this.

Kym 💜💜💜

[werepunkk]

So some drama happened and long story short my neighbor decided he can't take care of his dog anymore and gave her to my boyfriend.

Long vent about this under the cut

She's a pitb*ll (name censored to keep it out of the main tag) and she's extremely sweet and loving with people.

But. She has already shown signs of being reactive to other dogs and having a high prey drive, and she is a very powerful dog.

She would be a great dog for experienced dog owners with no small animals. But we are not that. We are 3 dudes who haven't had dogs since we were kids, and we have two cats, one of which has already shown she has more courage than brains when it comes to dogs.

We let her see the braver cat, while she was on a harness of course, and the results were not encouraging.

My boyfriend wants to continue to try to acclimate the dog to the cats, but it seems very obvious to me that this dog is not a good fit for our home and we should start looking for somewhere better for her.

My boyfriend has said "just say the word and we'll stop trying and work on re-homing her" but I can't help but feel it's unfair to put me in that position. I don't want to be the bad guy making their boyfriend get rid of his dog

He buys into the nanny dog myth, so I think he's viewing everything she does through rose colored glasses. When we let them see each other, she actively tried to lunge at my cat and it was only the harness that stopped her. But he insisted it went well and we should keep going despite the huge red flags.

I'm so frustrated that this guy, who usually acts like he's the smartest, most rational person in the room, can't see all the signs that this situation is untenable.

l have been in a constant state of anxiety since this dog got here. I have had multiple panic attacks, can't sleep, and have frequent intrusive and graphic mental images of what could happen to my cats if this goes wrong. I have communicated all this to him, and while he does comfort me, he doesn't want to do the only thing that would make this anxiety stop.

Because I will never be fully comfortable with this dog around my cats, not ever. Not after seeing her snarling and lunging at one of them. And I think he knows that deep down, but he wants to keep this dog so much that he's willing to downplay how badly it's affecting me.

My roommate also really likes the dog. And I like her too, and I'll be really sad to see her go.

I feel incredibly guilty because I know that as a p*t bull her odds of finding a home are not good. My roommate does have a family member who loves dogs and hates cats and might be willing to take her-- but if that doesn't work out, she'll have to go to a rescue or shelter. And she's just being a dog, she doesn't deserve to be bounced around or to be euthanized because there's too many of her breed.

But my cats don't deserve to be killed or confined for life, and I don't deserve to feel constant anxiety for the next 10-15 years.

This whole experience has opened my eyes to how little the world actually cares about cats. The city shelter doesn't even accept cats, it's dogs only. And often when I mention my pets to new people, the first thing they tell me is how much they hate cats.

Even my boyfriend and roommate, the two people closest to me who I thought loved Max and Punzie, are so enamored with the dog that they're downplaying the risk she poses.

I feel like I'm the only one who cares about Max and Punzie, so I'm going to be the one who looks out for them. I'm going to put my foot down and get this dog to a new home even if it means I'm an asshole

[edwad]

Hey edwad, hope you're having a good day. I remember a few years back you had a reading list divided into different 'levels' (beginner, intermediate, advanced) for understanding Marxism; I also remember that you don't rate this list very highly any more. I was wondering if, amongst your reading lists, you have a reading list you'd particularly recommend for "beginners"? Maybe like a top 10 list of books by Marx and other people building on him? Thanks in advance for your help if you have time to answer this & thank you for the work you share with us here!

ive been sitting on this ask for a while sorta frustrated bc ive released tons of reading lists over the course of several years but they're often not very good (like that one you mention lol) or my ideas have changed so much that earlier attempts at offering a particular pathway to approaching marx and the literature around him becomes untenable (probably almost everything i posted until 2016 or so id say). this isn't perfect by any means but here's a kind of rough outline for now of things that ive found useful with some amount of consistency as ive grown more comfortable in my reading of marx.

1. the worldly philosophers - robert heilbroner

doesn't actually have to be heilbroner necessarily, but i think having a decent overview of the history of economic thought before marx in your head will do a lot for you (rubin's is great too, if you're looking to do a deep dive). in heilbroner's case, it's probably fine to stop at the marx chapter (which is bad) if that's all you're working toward. optionally, if you feel like you ought to read some intellectual-biographical information on marx and how he relates to political economy, you can probably get away with ernest mandel's the formation of the economic thought of karl marx or (even better imo, but less beginner friendly) allen oakley's the making of marxs critical theory. and of course eventually heinrich's marx bio once he gets further in. all that being said, i wouldn't really dissuade you from reading all of heilbroner (or whatever other history of econ you might read) either, especially since the history of economic thought doesn't end with marx!

2. an introduction to the three volumes of karl marxs capital - michael heinrich

no surprise here, this is the standard for bringing people into the fold. it gripped me when i first read it back in ~2017 and i haven't let go since. as i have typically said, to me it reads more like an intervention rather than an introduction, so some familiarity with the secondary literature would benefit you (if only to know what heinrich is talking about/arguing against when he's going on about worldview marxism and substantialism). i feel like alex callinicos' the revolutionary ideas of karl marx is an incredibly good primer for this purpose, ie a book which makes the classical case for the incredibly stubborn kinds of things that marxists often believe. so in a sense, if you don't know what heinrich and others are talking about, read some callinicos and you'll have a better idea of what heinrich is pushing back against. but don't confuse this with an endorsement for callinicos lol he sucks and his book is bad.

3. value - frederick harry pitts

this is part of a series on political economy and this particular book is meant to be an overview of theories of value and what they try to do, but at its core is an argument about the ambivalence of the theory of value at the heart of marx's critique of political economy and what its implications are. pitts does a great job of making the case for a relational/field theory of value in marx contra the substantialist/conservation theory of value which is also in marx but is a lingering artifact from his failure to completely break with the political economists before him. heinrich gets cited a bunch so it's a pretty natural transition out of his capital intro, but it really hones in on this particular element and teases some things out that aren't in heinrich while still basically being a kind of popular political economy book. once heinrich's science of value comes out in english, it'll offer the fuller argument for those wanting to know more about this stuff.

4. there's no such thing as the economy - sam chambers

putting the heilbroner aside for a moment, this and the 2 books before it constitute a kind of holy trinity for me in terms of introducing people to this particular kind of reading of marx and what it means. chambers' tiny book is made up of 3 chapters, the first being a pretty concrete (almost journalistic) telling of the evils of wells fargo but the last 2 are ultimately concerned with marx as a kind of genealogist of classical political economy and making a case for a particular kind of reading which describes what it does as "value form theory", in a specific sense while offering a brief history about what that means and who it draws from as influences (heinrich's work, yes, but also rubin's essays on marxs theory of value and pashukanis' law & marxism: a general theory, which could both easily be on this list as well!). this book, and the lecture which led me to it (on "the labor theory of value as a capitalist fairy tale" which is on youtube), has had a pretty massive impact on me and ive since been encouraging everyone on earth to read it, which is made easier by the fact that the publisher (punctum books) offers the ebook for free online. i'll also be doing a panel with him and soren mau (author of mute compulsion) next month for red may so by the time you (or anyone else reading this) decides to check it out, there might be a video online of me talking to him about the book! which is exciting.

5. marx's inferno - william clare roberts

this is an extremely frustrating book for me because i think the primary marxological thrust of the book (that marxs exposition in v1 of capital is deliberately structured after dante's inferno) is ridiculous. i also think that the political case that WCR wants to make (that marx was a heterodox owenite/radical republican) is interesting, and probably even correct, but doesn't really convince me to care or share that exact political vision. what the book does INSANELY well though is to contextualize marx's capital in the debates of the socialist literature at the time and especially to hammer out marxs relationship to proudhon. in the meantime, the inferno stuff makes for entertaining and even sometimes illuminating literary dress, but can be neatly separated from the rest without any harm. the republican stuff, again, is probably fine marxology on its own, but can also be read negatively as a critique of domination (ie, as having some particular political implications) without it necessarily meaning we all ought to copy marx's specific political vision simply because he held one. WCR, as a kind of crypto-althusserian, also has the benefit of wanting to avoid some of the typical hegel-ese one might usually encounter in a book like this so instead he is forced to make his arguments in a much clearer way (more or less beginner friendly), if sometimes a little awkward for those of us that know there are perfectly good words he's deliberately trying to avoid. anyway, i let the inferno stuff put me off to this book for too long but when i read it i was mad at myself because of how good it really is.

so this is i guess like a "top 5" of sorts (with plenty of optional/follow-up reading thrown in lol), but the unifying principle is getting the most out of marx's critique of political economy so none of this really stands as a replacement to the real thing. ultimately i recommend reading capital, especially alongside heinrich's new how to read marx's capital which was published last year and generated a lot of good discussion for my own reading group when we used it in the fall/winter.

if i wanted to, i could add more that are increasingly beginner unfriendly (postone's time labor and social domination immediately comes to mind) as well as several books that i love to recommend but maybe don't contribute as much toward orienting yourself to a particular reading of marx (geoff mann's in the long run we are all dead is a long-time favorite of mine on keynesianism from a marxy perspective that i think everyone even remotely politically serious should read, if i can indulge just a little), however the list would lose its coherence and probably quickly turn into something way more demanding than anyone could (or would want to) read.

so there you have it, hope this is useful

[therealvinelle]

Bella is doomed

Kind of a continuation of my previous post.

By the end of Breaking Dawn, Bella is wonderfully happy with her life. Edward, Renesmée, Cullens, material wealth, vampirism, she has it all. Unfortunately I don’t think she has any idea what she signed up for, and it’s not just because this girl thinks being a vampire means being a sparkly princess.

So, when it comes to being a Cullen, Bella signed up for this really specific type of lifestyle that can’t last forever. Even if living among humans while keeping the secret in the 21st century was sustainable (and it isn’t - facial recognition, social media, and our tech overlords mean that the Cullens are playing with fire), human society will still change. The day will inevitably come where Bella looks around herself and doesn’t recognize the world she’s living in. And I think that will be a very real problem for her.

Bella is by no means poor, but she is a lower middle class girl who has been working on the side since she was fifteen so she can get into college. When she meets the Cullens, she very much notices their material wealth. She notices their cars, their clothes, their house. She’s mortified by Edward’s ostentatious gifts, but she clearly covets that wealth. And she very badly does not want to be that kind of person. She is every bit the romantic who wants true love and the whole shebang, so for her to ever admit that Edward’s wealth is a perk she enjoys, something about him that she’s attracted to, would be up there with aborting Renesmée on the list of things Bella is never, ever, doing. I digress.

Bella’s happiness in Breaking Dawn is built on three things, there’s 1. Edward, 2. Renesmée, and 3. the Cullen family package. And the Cullen family package is the people in the family, the family dynamic, and their lifestyle.

So, the lifestyle is doomed. This is just a fact of life. Environmental change alone means things will change.

Then there’s the fact that the Cullens are a very dysfunctional, and quite young, coven. Edward and Rosalie don’t get on at all, he consistently believes the absolute worst of her, that she’s out to get him (in this outtake he thinks she’s lying about Bella being dead because it’s Rosalie, she’s the worst), and the nicest thing he’ll say about her is that she’s too headstrong and proud to eat people. Just… this guy despises her on every level. Alice and Rosalie are not close either, they seem to be civil enough around each other when times are good, but Alice jumps on Bella with far too much zeal. Rosalie herself reflects (x) that Alice seems to prefer Bella over her. Then we have Jasper and Edward, who also don’t seem close at all, in Midnight Sun Edward has so little faith in Jasper’s ability to learn control that he wonders why the guy even burdens everyone else by trying. In every way he seems to hold Jasper in very low regard, and they don’t seem to be at all close.

You also have Rosalie and Emmett eloping every now and then, you have Edward leaving for years at a time, you have New Moon where the whole family scatters.

I don’t think the Cullens staying together forever is a given at all, in fact I believe a split is inevitable.

Just - Bella signed up for this wholesome, stable family, but she doesn’t know who these people are at all. In Eclipse she’s shocked to learn Jasper and Rosalie have personalities. She also very much see them as a nuclear family of father, mother, and children, but do Carlisle and Jasper have a father/son dynamic? Esme and Alice a mother/daughter dynamic? They love each other like family or believe they all do anyway but the nuclear family is just the cover story they need to blend in.

The point I’m trying to get at here, is that Bella signed up for a lifestyle that won’t last, with a family filled with people far more complicated than she realizes and that most likely will break apart down the line as the cracks become chasms.

I also think that Edward is not such a certainty in her life as Bella thinks, I think he fell for the human and that their marriage only survives in Breaking Dawn because Bella’s amazing control lets her remain human in so many ways, and even that survival is untenable. But that’s for another post.

Bella wanted vampirism because she wanted this happy ending she didn’t fully understand, and as that happy ending starts falling apart she’ll come to resent vampirism.

Basically, by the end of Breaking Dawn I’m just left feeling bad for Bella. She has no idea what vampires are or what she signed up for, she signed up for a very specific type of lifestyle that won't last forever. America won't last forever, society will turn like a kaleidoscope, and a time will come when the world she's living in is one that isn't hers any more than the 21st century is Carlisle's. And this is all even assuming the Cullens last forever, when this is a very young coven who have serious, deep-running internal strifes and dysfunctions.

[simplepotatofarmer]

Loyal, I'm back for my post lore ask, would you give me your thoughts? 🙏 - 💡

yes, of course! i love giving my thoughts <3 thank you for asking! <3

first and foremost, let's address the two elephants in the room: cc!techno's tone and style of RPing and the fact that c!techno referred to c!tubbo as a dictator.

as to the first point, again cc!techno has said he's uncomfortable with overly serious things and constant angst is untenable. it'll create burnout in your audience and honestly just isn't good storytelling. luckily they know this! that's why techno is the one who is there with c!dream now. he brings the exact tone shift that's needed.

to the second point, as far as c!techno knows, c!tubbo is a dictator. the two main things that techno knows about tubbo is that he exiled tommy - which techno thought was a bad thing - and not only put techno's best friend, phil, under house arrest but tried to execute techno without a trial. however, techno still expressed that while he's a little suspicious, he thinks snowchester is fine.

now onto the rest! i absolutely loved this stream, cc!techno consistently gives great lore streams, honestly some of the best, if you like that sort of tone.

one of the main takeaways here, is that c!techno is actually scary good at getting information from people in a manner that isn't completely obvious. i've seen people liken him to a cartoon villain and not only do i think that is missing the nuance of his character but i feel it downplays just how competent he is. because he is. he got information from c!dream while giving up next to nothing of value himself; he spoke about tubbo's nukes but never once mentioned phil or niki and even avoided talking about how he knows ranboo. dream was also taking a similar approach and i have no doubt that he's good at it but his disadvantage here is the devastating toll that isolation takes on someone.

but just look at what techno has done for dream already.

we've seen dream and the state he was in prior to this. it was honestly hard to watch, to hear the way his voice cracked, the way he pleaded and cowered. because why wouldn't he? who could blame him?

then techno comes in and one of the first things he does is calm dream down and this stream was truly a continuation of that! yes, he made light of some of it (and one day i'll finally write my post on c!techno and minimization) but he also validated so much of dream's feelings and pain. which is so important! we've never gotten to really see dream's pain nor focused on his feelings. and the few times we have seen it, it's been dismissed. not just by the characters but honestly by a large part of the fandom. techno not only acknowledged what dream has gone through but pointed out a lot of what's happened isn't right. that's needed! that's important! the prison arc is about dream and dream alone, really, and techno is there to reinforce that, not just to the audience but to dream himself, who has spent so long dehumanizing himself in a very 'you want a villain, i'll show you a villain' way.

techno, on the other hand, treats dream in a very human way. he teases him, he hugs him, he makes jokes, he calls dream his friend. he stops dream from self-harming and points out that it's not healthy. he says yes, this isn't okay and yes, you deserve better. but he does so in a way that's light-hearted because that's what dream needs. the prison is dark and heavy and it's been crushing dream. techno, with all his teasing and laughter, manages to take some of that burden.

and it works! dream laughs! he says 'oh my god' in that exasperated way he does when he's trying to hide his amusement and fondness. he's better. not perfect. not healed. but better.

let's also take a moment to appreciate that techno said he and the hypothetical clones could act as a 'meat shield' for dream if they came to torture him again.

two other things stood out to me:

techno bringing up how often betrayal occurs was brilliant because not only was it a self-aware joke about how overplayed that particular plotline/trope is but because techno counts dream as one of the only people who hasn't betrayed him. they might not trust each other at the moment but i have hopes that will change.

c!dream pretty clearly has PTSD. i say this as someone who has PTSD. we've seen signs of it before, with the way he was acting. the self-harm, the outbursts of anger, etc. but now we know he's suffering from poor memory which is another symptom.

also:

PUSSBOY MATTERED TO DREAM AND HIS DEATH AFFECTED DREAM IN A NEGATIVE WAY SUCK IT PEOPLE WHO THOUGHT IT DIDN'T

[melias-cimitiere]

Careful with Interpretations

All of us walk about with our own mental operating system; this OS is not the same for all, surprisingly enough. You may already be aware of this when you’re trying to speak to someone, and they come across with a totally different interpretation of events. And I’m not talking about conspiracy theories here. Much more mundane things, explained away differently due to different educational, sociocultural backgrounds. Take for example someone trained as a sociologist, or psychologist. They see the world through “borrowed lenses” of those institutions that trained them, and over time, they make them their own.

So far, there’s no problem with that. It’s bound to happen, naturally. As long as we remember that there are multiple interpretations of these same events, it’s all good. Remember how in the past, medical doctors and psychiatrists used their own science in a most arrogant way to determine what is a human being, almost excluding the person in the process? To them, nerves were like cables, and the body was simply a machine. Modern medicine acknowledges a more holistic approach, having enough evidence of the effect of psychology and spirituality on certain conditions. Also, advances in science have shown the nerve cells to actually move and interface with others, making extremely complex processes in the way; so much more than “cables”. With these examples in mind, we should consider other disciplines, like history or archaeology. Like physicists, these types of scientists have also fallen prey to modern tactics of trying to appeal to common sentiment and using trivial expressions to reach out to the general public. In past decades, the effort was to educate the general public, instead of trying to reach out in this way; it only creates trivializing and shallowness, making it look like bad science. I still remember a documentary saying, “black holes are simply gravity gone mad”… what?!

Anyway, back to my point. I’ve seen plenty of examples of historians and archaeologists falling for these tactics. There is a problem here; whereas most people are unaware or uninterested in black holes, superstrings etc, when it comes to history and archaeology, there is a different mindset, because they supposedly show the historical Truth, based on empirical evidence. So far so good. But we have to remember that this empirical evidence is constantly updated and reevaluated, so some of what was originally thought as canon is later proved to be wrong. Remember that even in the 80s and the 90s (not to mention earlier years), the Mayans were considered to be ignorant of the Wheel? Until they discovered a child’s toy in a tomb, which was a horse with four wheels as legs…  They then said that there were no large roads or avenues in the Mayan civilization, and they tried to explain this on the fast-growing ecosystem that suffocate any such work. However, in recent years, the major discovery by modern scientific methods of the giant Mayan metropolis, along with two large roads, and a park, enrich our understanding. Similar things happen to Yonaguni monument in Japan, or the Sphinx in Egypt… I find it preposterous to say, even in the obvious evidence of examiners, that these monuments were sculpted by natural processes (two separate documentaries from “reputable sources” are out there in youtube; one showing the Yonaguni sculpted by sea and geological mineral processes… and the other showing the Sphinx sculpted by the…wind in the desert, and later customized by the Egyptians).

Why is it so difficult to embrace the fact that some ancient civilizations were extremely advanced? Sometimes we may not have an answer; I get that. But usually, when we have no answer, we end up lessening the impact, as if we are fearful to imply something mysterious or outside ordinary definitions. Why do we have to explain away the mystery in this manner? Honest scientists have confessed not knowing something; at least, at the time. There’s nothing wrong with not knowing something; it is part of the learning process, and it’s applied to everything. There are plenty of mysteries around; let me mention just a few. 

1.       Everyone knows that ziggurats were built by Mesopotamians, right? So what is that ziggurat doing inside a lake in China? Obviously, somebody with the know-how built it, or the Mesopotamians stretched much further (or migrated) than commonly thought possible.

2.       Who built the unusual ancient city in Siberia? It bears some semblance to some temples in Indonesia… but it’s thousands of miles away.

3.       The stone avenues found near Cuban waters, and in some parts of the Eastern Coast in America… someone was building roads with stone, at a time that everyone else in surrounding places were using wood only.

4.       The mysterious city in Asia Minor, currently excavated by German archaeologists, featuring strange pillars chiseled with animals facing downwards, towards the earth (each pillar has an animal). It is rather unique and it bears no connection to the well-established civilizations in the vicinity (Greeks, Egyptians, Phoenicians, and Hittites etc). It is rather inverted, almost as if it’s built to hold something…down.

5.       A plethora of Indian temples, one of which being Kailasa temple, hewn out of rock with such precision and detail that confound even modern engineers.

6.       Two alphabets, bearing a striking similarity, almost identical – but there’s a problem. One is in the Indus Valley, and the other in the Easter Island; they are literally half a planet away.

7.       The Maltese Hypogeum (underground temple) Hal Saflieni acoustics, something that has got many world specialists interested due to its particular configuration.

8.       Let’s not forget our old-time favorite, the pyramid of Cheops (and others as well). As most engineers can testify, there’s no problem building temples up to a certain height, but after certain limits have been exceeded, the entire procedure becomes untenable. Many preposterous ideas have been proposed for the construction of these giant monuments, but all of them have flaws; a ramp that would require an entire forest to be chopped down, rising higher and higher (and while doing so, extending its base more and more). Or another structure using hydraulics, to move up heavy loads that would require thick base walls like a hydroelectricity dam, equally untenable. And so on.

There are plenty of other examples, if someone actually looks out for them, and keeps an open mind. Science, like spirituality, is done best keeping an open mind.