#i relate to sunny on a spiritual level

[blazestar345]

Only having gotten through a little over an hour of this one-shot I have a feeling I'll be spreading weird little dude headcannons for the next week. So get ready for that as soon.

[smile-files]

can i ask what the experience of kinning is like for you? :) i know everyones different with how they experience it, some ppl might be spiritual kinning or partially delusional or it may be a neurodivgerent attachment. or maybe theyre just doing it for fun! ^^ what level do u consider urself to be ur kins? or are u just relating to them? :)

ooh this is a really interesting question!!!

i'd definitely say my kinning is tied to my autism, in that i often have kins i hyperfixate on. for example, lately i've been hyperfixating on clover from ii, while for the past year i've been hyperfixating on will byers from stranger things. when i do kin a character that strongly i often say i am that character or otherwise incorporate that character into my identity, especially for the duration of the hyperfixation. my speech, mannerisms, clothing taste, music taste, and general demeanor have shifted based on what kin i've been hyperfixated on.

at least for me, kinning is a form of self-expression; like a lot of people, i like feeling 'seen' in terms of who i am as a person, in terms of my personality, background, appearance, interests, experiences, and aesthetic. when i kin a character, i attach myself to them due to some similarity in at least one of the above categories. some examples: i share elements of my personality, background, appearance, and interests with brad meltzer from xavier riddle and the secret museum; i share elements of my personality, interests, experiences, and aesthetic with fluttershy from my little pony; i share elements of my personality, interests, and aesthetic with sunny madison from rainbow high. all of these characters i kin, and to some extent i use them to represent aspects of myself that i might not otherwise be able to express.

some characters i kin i have a lot in common with, and these characters i tend to kin the most strongly (will byers, clover, fluttershy, arnold perlstein, brad meltzer, ralsei); other characters i don't have as much in common with, but what i do have in common is significant enough that i feel a very strong connection regardless (teardrop, wirt); most characters i kin are in a middle ground, where i associate with and/or relate to them but not incredibly strongly or significantly.

a fun thing about kinning for me is that it lets me insert myself into a certain piece of media and feel more like a part of it. i like making self-insert ocs as much as the next guy, but having a character i already perceive to be 'me' in the story i am so fond of is also really nice. yeah, i'm clover, and i was on inanimate insanity! i'm will byers, and i was on stranger things! on that note, i often draw characters i kin in ways meant to specifically represent me and my own experiences, and by doing so i'm not only drawing myself but also making fanart, which is really cool!!!

all in all... there are some kins that i would describe myself as being. clover, will byers, teardrop, fluttershy, ralsei, etc... all the ones with two stars on my kinlist! i should mention that i wouldn't mind doubles, though for whatever reason i haven't really come face-to-face with many doubles of my strongest kins. i suppose i'd have to see whenever the situation arose, but at least in concept i don't think i'd mind. it's like... if you and your friend ended up wearing the same costume to a halloween party without intending it. in some circumstances, you might find that frustrating that your friend is almost stealing your identity in this context; in others, you might find it fun having someone else just like you. in any event, i identify as some kins, but certainly not all of them. either way i relate to them and associate them with myself :)

[opalseedsys]

pinned post time!! this is a generally overview of our boundaries, any info u may need to know, and a brief introduction of our headmates.

quick facts:

we are a traumagenic system

we are bodily 21 years old

we are afab but on average, non-binary

we use they/them irl

we have a very lovely partner :)

we are AuDHD

boundaries/ important info

we don't wish to get into system related (or really any sort of) discourse. if you hold strong beliefs about discourse and are unsure if this means you want to interact w us? feel free to just block us. that is 100% okay, we will not be mad at that.

we are new to understanding that we are a system! so we still have a lot to learn! please excuse any slip ups and feel free to correct us on things like cws/tws, terminology, etc.

we will try to tag anything potentially triggering! we value comfort zones very highly. we might not even post about most intensely triggering topics, as this is a comfort place for us, but everything will be tagged (if u want us to tag something, please shoot us an ask!! its no trouble, really!)

meet the crew! (basic headmate intros, in approximate order of most to least often fronting)

Cypress

They/it/she, adult

interested in spirituality, kinda witchy, the one that makes us exercise (lol), big on gentle self improvement

Protector

headspace home - garden in the back yard, spends the most amount of time outside.

Miki

she/it, adult? Age is not rlly a thing for her

trauma holder?/protector/ emotional regulator?

Head space home - giant aquarium

dorian

they/she, adult

protector??

loves nature and bright sunny places

headspace home - hangs out w cypress in the garden

cecil

they/it, adult

trauma holder, protector (kinda a WTNV introject but not exactly? They've expanded beyond that since developing

generally rlly cheerful and whimsical.

headspace home - not sure yet, mainly livingroom.

rylie

they/he/it, minor/middle

interested in video games, mainly terraria. more anxious and stimmy than the others (also masks much less)

likes grungy type of aesthetic, w goblincore undertones

big fan of bugs, 'trash' animals like raccoons and opossums, and other critters

headspace home - their room. it is dim, decorated w mainly green and dark blue decor, with a lot of trinkets.

icarus

they/he

kinda easily frustrated, a very emotionally responsive headmate. passion for dark academia type aesthetics and productivity, so he gets most of the schoolwork done.

headspace home - large library room, sleeps on top level, hangs out at bottom level reading most of the time.

charlie

he/they/she, adult

traumaholder

interested in crochet, knitting, other crafts. kinda childish, cheerful. our biggest fan of fashion and makeup as a form of self expression. close w owen, sees him as a tough older brother figure.

headspace home - not sure yet, mainly livingroom.

owen

he/they, adult

protector

kinda like if a borzoi was some guy. big fan of music, especially alternative and loud stuff. big sensory seeker so he loves weird food combos B). close w charlie, wants to protect them.

headspace home - not sure yet, mainly livingroom

Nico

They/he, adult

Artist, folky goblincore ish aesthetic.

Headspace home - livingroom? He has his own room but doesn't use it much

i will be editing this post as i figure out more about us as a system!

thank you so much for reading!! have a great day or night!!!

[imaminoccultation]

Letter 4: Seeing the Light of the Imam - How I went from Sunni, to Atheist, to Shi’i Gnostic

I have a confession to make y’all. I’m a spiritual person.

I know, I know, put your pitchforks down, cringey ex-Christians and ex-Sunnis of Arizona’s Omdurman (Tucson), trust me, I don’t think y’all are going to Hell if you don’t agree with me. I’m not an Evangelical, or Mohammed Hijab. I also don’t believe in any ideology that makes me ashamed to be who I am: atheism turned out not to be right for me after my six year trial run, but I didn’t accept Imam Mahdi as my Lord and Savior just cause I decided my parents were right all along. Ha! But it’s hard to put into words exactly what happened to me. I think back to Dayf Allah’s Book of Biographies: I think of Sheikh Idris wad al-Arbaab, one of the most memorable biographies for me as, you know, a descendant of Mahasi Sufis. I think of the story where the son of the Prince (wad al-Arbaab, who I do call on occasionally when I slip and fall) first receives, well, I dunno. I dunno how you say this in English, let’s say he meets Jesus for you Americans. He sees the Light of the Muhammad, united himself with the highest level of the Muhammedan Reality, bringing his head into perfect contact with Allah’s eternal Pen: or, Dayf Allah tells us, he has a vision of the Prophet Muhammad, who teaches him the ins and outs of Islam. After that, they say Sheikh Idris never talked about anything except the cosmos, the stories of the ancients, or the movements of the angels closest to the Throne.

I can relate to that these days. It’s hard to tell people what happened in my conversion experience. On the outside, I had a conversation with a Twelver Gnostic who was extremely well educated in religious philosophy, which is good, because 1) I love philosophy 2) I love history 3) I know Islamic scripture pretty well. What can I say? I’m the son of a preacher, man. But he didn’t talk like anybody I’d ever met before. This nigga had something the Sufis would call ma’rifa of tawhid: deep, intuitive, internal knowledge of the true nature of God’s unity: the First Perfect and Eternal Truth, or Allah. He engaged in a practice called ‘irfaan: a weird way of talking, basically, that’s meant to help build your intuitive awareness of God’s tawhid. He just asks you questions unflinchingly. I remember one of them super vividly, because it’s then where it all clicked for me, and I saw the Light of Muhammad. You see, to understand anything a nigga like Sheikh Idris over here has to say, you need to do a lot of reading. Thankfully, I’ve been training all my life for this. I basically grew up in a mosque: I can run circles around the average internet dawah-cel. I’m an Arabic linguist by training. Parents speak Sudani, and also read a ton of the Recitation, and it was super important to them that I learned to recite it, too. A trip to Utah and a conversation with my friend’s grandpa also got me interested in Mormon history and the academic study of religion, which, you know, being an Arabic linguist trained me to actually comprehend. Then, since I was 16, I’ve become a mini-Islamic historian. Blame Rick Riordan. Percy Jackson is just too much like me: can’t focus on anything, and also split between a great but invisible legacy (his Greek godly heritage) and the fact that that legacy made living daily life super hard. I felt that, as a first-gen Muslim-American queer dude who also couldn’t focus on class if his life depended on it. But hey, you know why it appealed to me? Cause I love stories. They help me understand the world in terms I can actually understand cause, you know, I can follow a story. Plus, I have a wild imagination. Blame growing up with the Recitation!

You know, the story of Sheikh Idris makes me think of the Song of the Stairways. One of the Recitation’s most badass apocalyptic images, a staircase yawning into the sky, where a day is like 50,000 years, the angels marching, slowly, flowing wings dragging across the steps, all behind the Spirit: who is the Spirit? The Recitation tells me we’ve only been given a little knowledge, but I have a guess. The angel Jibra’il: the Slave of God, an angel who sometimes gets called a Messenger of God. Maybe the first Rasuul, while Adam was the first nabi (Prophet?) Well, anyways, the hadith say the Angel Jibra’il looks trippy as fuck: 600 wings that blot out the horizon, this nigga the guy who cut open Muhammad’s chest and washed out his heart on his way to talk with God and unite with the Light of Muhammad, returning as the Nabi, the Prophet Muhammad, completing the purpose Allah had always prepared for him. Anyways, he leads the procession, on his way up to God on the Day of Judgement: what’s up there?

I don’t know, but you can’t help but be a little curious, right? It’s why I love to draw Islamic imagery. Try to envision this mystical imagery so I can understand it better…I’m thinking of my next drawing being me holding the hands of the Hidden Imam, Imam Muhammad al-Mahdi, the Imam in Occultation, peace and blessings be upon him.

When I was talking with Twelver Gnostic Sheikh Idris, he didn’t judge me. He spoke to me in languages I was fluent in: Academic English, Islamic Scripture, Philosophy, Rational Argumentation (well, the last a bit more dubiously, all I’m saying is I did debate in high school LMAO) He asked me why I didn’t believe in God. We had a long discussion about whether or not brute contingency makes any sense and he said something that was gonna change my life forever.

“To test the utility of a principle like brute contingency, work backwards from that premise, and see if you can end up with physical reality.”

Uhh…you can’t. I mean, smarter people than me have argued that this is a great argument against the existence of reality, and I mean, have fun, guys. But like me, I’m a normal fucking dude, okay? ‘Umar, if you want to sit there and atfalsaf about whether or not this table exists, that’s fine, let’s settle this matter scientifically. Let’s set up some cameras, I’ll take your head, slam it into the dining table, and then you can tell me, based on your firsthand observation, whether or not it exists.

For me, that’s all I care about. What can I know, and then I just work off that. I’m not gonna lose my mind over shit that can’t be understood, but for some reason I thought Islam and rational thinking didn’t go together: but that’s not true. Sheikh Idris taught me otherwise. He taught me Hikma: Wisdom. He told me how to think for myself and how to see God, if I so chose. After a childhood of being an Imam Ali fanboy, knowing this philosophy – Neoplatonism – had room for queer people like me, and seeing how much it was like the Perennialist omnitheism I believed in as a kid (look it up, just look it up!)...I knew it was right for me.

But, I tried to tell him: “well, how am I supposed to know all that is true? Can you even say you believe in God?” Then Sheikh Idris gave me the words that made everything click, that passed the Gnosis, the Hikma, the Wisdom, that let me see the Light of Muhammad and put me on this mission to spread Islamic Neoplatonism before the akh-right gets all the queer Sudani-Americans killed. It brought me the spiritual peace that I imagine the prodigal son must’ve felt, the divine union that the story of the Return of the Prodigial Son symbolizes. But I wasn’t sure. I showed Sheikh Idris something I wrote about tawhid. It’s my masterpiece, and most vulnerable work. I call it the Four Gospels of Tawhid, and maybe one day, I’ll show them to you. He told me I understood his teachings beautifully, after a whole life of training. He said that he saw the Light of the Imam in me, and that it was my job to bring out my inner Imam so Imam Muhammad al-Mahdi, peace upon him, the Imam in Occultation, could come out. 

“What do you mean, do I believe in God? I know who God is.”

It felt like coming home. Saw the Light then.

I’d taken the Shi’i shahaada by myself about 3 times before over the course of the year. But now I was sure. I pledged my faith to God, recognized the Prophecy of Muhammad, and pledged my allegiance to Imam Ali as his rightful successor, who passed down the Light of Muhammad which until this day, I think, is held by the Imam in Occultation, who, once we’re ready, will come out to help us out. But even out of sight, even while in hiding, he’s guiding us in his own way…God just hasn’t let us in on the secret. Yet.

See, if you’re an Islamic Neoplatonist, like I am, you gotta pick an Imam. The Imam is basically the best human at a given moment: think of them as whoever it is who lucked out with all the perfect traits at a specific point in time (to put it simply). There are competing claims for the Imamate. Isma’ili Neoplatonists argue that the Aga Khan IV is the Imam of the Time, and, as is expected of a Twelver, I strongly disagree. It’s basically like Catholics arguing who the right Pope is. Isma’ilis think the Aga Khan IV is the last living descendant of Imam Ali and his wife, the Prophet Muhammad’s favorite daughter, Fatima the Radiant, and therefore more qualified than anyone to be the Pope. I…am not convinced. Sorry, I’m a linguist, and until I see evidence that he speaks Old Hijazi Arabic I’m afraid Imam al-Mahdi is just gonna have to be enough for me. Imam al-Mahdi, I was taught, is staying out of sight cause humans need time to figure some things out before they’re ready for him. But, you know, we still need to get ready. We still need to fight for justice, because Imam al-Mahdi’s job is to implement God’s justice on Earth one last time, helped out by asexual Prophet extraordinaire, Jesus Christ, the Messiah of the Muslims. 

I’ve been inspired by him. That’s why I converted. I’m planning my next drawing in my head: myself, holding the hands of Imam al-Mahdi, with the white veil I always see in Shi’i art over his face, symbolizing his mystery. I imagine the Light of Muhammad shining between us, a mourning, agonized soul longing for the divine union which Imam al-Mahdi provides him access to, without sitting at his shoulder and telling him only to believe what the scholars say.

Which is what Sunni Orthodoxy was for me, and it was killing me. And white atheism was also killing me because it told me I couldn’t have my Islam and my queerness. But I can. I don’t have to justify my faith to you, that shit is my business, and your shit is your business. But I’m not gonna not talk about it cause it makes you uncomfortable. I was gonna end up another dead queer Black Muslim-American if I didn’t meet a Muslim who taught me how to be Muslim and queer at the same time completely on accident. I feel purpose now. I owe Imam al-Mahdi, and plan on making good on my pledge. That’s the essence of my worship. To learn from oppression, build the tools to fight it, which I’ve been cultivating. Slowly, but surely. They’re all coming together now. Watch out, akh-right bros. I have some bad news for you: it’s a secret the Muslim Brotherhood (Sunni Orthodox) scholars don’t want you to find out – the Qur’an and the hadith are scientifically and historically inaccurate. I know, I know, shocking, I can prove it, too, and I’m still Muslim. I just don’t read these books like science or history textbooks, I read them like, you know…literature…because I like to read. But my reading brought me back into a relationship with Allah that, right now, is working really well for me. You can have a healthy relationship with Allah if you’re queer, and you can still have Islamic Literature as a part of your life. There is more than Orthodox Sunni Islam, and more people need to know, because Orthodox Sunni dawahganda is scarily successful. The shit I learned took me my whole life to be able to actually comprehend because my experiences as an Orthodox Sunni had me so myopic about what Islam could be.

There are options if you’re doubting your faith as a queer person. Find the relationship with God (or no God) that works for you, but don’t do it on fundamentalists’ terms.

[soleilsuhh]

BYE IM SO EMBARRASSED I SWEAR I CLICKED ANON BRB GONNA GO THROW MYSELF OFF A BUILDING

omg you're so right <33 actually like 90% of ghibli characters are just so <3

oooh hold up i can actually see that you're right !! i relate to felix on a spiritual level (/j this is a joke i swear) and i also probably relate to kevin moon too much 😅

thank you, i hope you get to see amazing things too !! it was literally raining and thundering all day yesterday rip but i think it'll be nicer today <3

today's question: if you could choose to learn it instantly, what would be a skill that you would want to have/learn?

love, 🪐

NAW YOURE GOOD it happens dw ! <3

omg i can definitely see similarities between you and them :o and if i may add, you also give off very similar vibes as sunwoo from tbz <333

ah thank you ! same here, really, it was all rain and thunder the past few days but today is quite okay — sunny but not too hot hehe <3 hope your weekend is as awesome as you are !

and to answer your question: i really want to learn sewing (i’m actually planning to learn it <33) ! it’d be nice to be able to alter and make my own clothes <3 oh, and tote bags ! can’t forget those, they’re the reason why i got so interested in sewing in the first place hehe. how about you?

[coupsnim]

passing on bea's question—top 5 feelings? 😊

hi amy! this was kind of hard to answer but also quite interesting ahah

1. I’m stealing this one from you: closing all the tabs after finishing an assignment (I relate to that on a spiritual level ahah) 2. seeing your bestfriends after a very long time but it feels like you’re never been apart 3. reaching the top of a mountain on a sunny day and admiring the view 4. when someone notices something different about you and gives you a sincere compliment 5. when you wake up and see everything covered with snow during winter

ask me my top 5 anything!

[austenmarriage]

New Post has been published on Austen Marriage

New Post has been published on http://austenmarriage.com/giving-thanks-with-austen-2/

Giving Thanks with Austen

This blog originally appeared last year. With my blog now scheduled on the fourth Thursday of each month—Thanksgiving in the U.S.—I decided to reprise it.

Thanksgiving makes me wonder whether there was any formal giving of thanks in Jane Austen’s work. The November U.S. holiday has spread to most of the Americas. The English have a more general harvest-related tradition of providing bread and other food to the poor, often through the church. That tradition was extant in the Regency and continues now.

Though today’s American celebration is secular in nature, the practice has spiritual roots. It was religious settlers in Virginia and Massachusetts who began the celebration. Most Americans know the tradition of the Pilgrims inviting the native tribes to join in. It was the Indians who provided the food that enabled most of the early colonies to survive the first desperate years.

President George Washington created the first official Thanksgiving in 1789 “as a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favours of Almighty God.” President Abraham Lincoln memorialized the date as the fourth Thursday in November, beginning in 1863, when, in the middle of the Civil War, he proclaimed a national day of “Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”

Austen’s family was religious, of course. Her father and two brothers were clergymen. Her works contain strong, though not didactic, moral strains. I wondered: Did any of her characters ever directly express thanks—to God, to Providence, to the universe? Did anyone express gratitude in a way that recognized any higher power?

I could not find any direct use of “giving” or “offering” thanks in any of Austen’s six novels. Most of her novels contain fifty or sixty ordinary thanks each. Persuasion is the least thankful with only eighteen, but it includes the most fervent. Most of the thanks are a polite reflex to ordinary behavior or a specific response to a good deed performed by another.

“Thank God!” occurs once or twice per book. The sense is usually general. Sometimes the phrase is a positive and sometimes a negative. In Persuasion, Mrs. Croft thanks God that as a naval wife she is blessed with excellent health and was seldom seasick on the ocean. Perversely, William Elliot writes “Thank God!” that he can stop using the name “Walter”—the name of Anne’s father—as a middle name. Anne Elliot stiffens upon learning the insult to her family.

“Thank God!” is a remark that is canceled out in Northanger Abbey. Catherine Morland’s brother James writes her to say “Thank God!” that he is done with Isabella Thorpe, who is now pursuing Captain Tilney. The next post brings a letter from Isabella, telling Catherine “Thank God” that she’s leaving the “vile” city of Bath. By now dumped by the Captain, she doesn’t know that Catherine knows what’s up. Isabella pleads “some misunderstanding” with James and asks Catherine to help: “Your kind offices will set all right: he is the only man I ever did or could love, and I trust you will convince him of it.” Catherine doesn’t.

The only real “Thank God!”, as an appeal to the Deity, comes in Persuasion after Captain Wentworth’s inattention contributes to Louisa’s fall and concussion: “The tone, the look, with which ‘Thank God!’ was uttered by Captain Wentworth, Anne was sure could never be forgotten by her; nor the sight of him afterwards, as he sat near a table, leaning over it with folded arms and face concealed, as if overpowered by the various feelings of his soul, and trying by prayer and reflection to calm them.”

Everyone’s prayers are answered. Louisa mends and becomes engaged to Captain Benwick. Wentworth is free to marry Anne.

A deeply thankful attitude does exist with two of Austen’s characters. Readers who pause to think can probably guess the two. Beyond the village poor in the background, which characters are most in distress and most likely to be thankful for any relief?

We might think first of Mrs. Smith from Persuasion, who had the “two strong claims” on Anne “of past kindness and present suffering.” Her physical and financial straits are dire, yet “neither sickness nor sorrow seemed to have closed her heart or ruined her spirits.” Mrs. Smith, however, is more shrewd than thankful, using Anne’s marriage to help end her own suffering.

What character, living on the margins, has a level of energy that often sets into motion her active tongue? We find her in Emma:

“Full of thanks, and full of news, Miss Bates knew not which to give quickest.”

When Mr. Knightley sends her a sack of apples and the Woodhouse family sends her a full hindquarter of tender Hartfield pork, Miss Bates responds with the sunniest appreciation: “Oh! my dear sir, as my mother says, our friends are only too good to us. If ever there were people who, without having great wealth themselves, had every thing they could wish for, I am sure it is us.” She might be auditioning for a role in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

In contrast, the social-climbing new vicar’s wife, Mrs. Elton, feels thankful in a prerogative way. “I always say a woman cannot have too many resources—and I feel very thankful that I have so many myself as to be quite independent of society.”

If anyone has the right to feel a lack of thanks in life, it is Fanny Price of Mansfield Park. When she is not being forgotten, it is to provide some service for someone else. When she is not being ignored, it is to be abused by her aunt, Mrs. Norris. Just about every word that can convey melancholy, sadness, or anguish serves to repeatedly describe her.

She feels misery at least eight times; some variety of pain at least ten times; wretchedness half a dozen times. The best she normally manages is to feel both pain and pleasure, four times. She is oppressed three times and suffers stupefaction once. Her circumstances and personality leave her in a “creep mouse” state of mind. She trembles a dozen times; she cries a dozen times and sobs at least four other. The stress is so great that she comes close to fainting at least three times and is ready to sink once; she suffers fright or is frightened six times; she reacts with horror or to something horrible five times.

Yet for all her misery, and though she lacks a sunny disposition, she manages to look on the sunny side of life.

Fanny feels gratitude at least fifteen times, for things small and large. Gratitude for her cousin Edmund tending to her when she first comes to live with her wealthy relatives. For his providing her a horse to ride. For her uncle once letting her use the carriage to go to dinner. Even gratitude once “to be spared from aunt Norris’s interminable reproaches.”

Kindness comes up about 125 times in the book. The most common use again relates to Edmund: his kindness to her throughout, and his encouragement of others to be kind to her. Fanny can even feel grateful toward Henry Crawford, despite his character flaws, for his kindness to her brother and, a couple of times, for his kindness to her.

It seems to be a fundamental aspect of human nature that those with the least to appreciate in life treasure what they have the most. Austen’s treatment of Miss Bates and Fanny does not, I think, reflect a conscious attempt at moral teaching. Their attitudes flow directly from the women’s character. Fanny and Miss Bates are gentle souls with big hearts. They give thanks naturally for the joy of existence.

So should we all.

—

The Marriage of Miss Jane Austen, which traces love from a charming courtship through the richness and complexity of marriage and concludes with a test of the heroine’s courage and moral convictions, is now complete and available from Amazon and Jane Austen Books.

[creepingsharia]

Investigation Exposes Terror Ties Behind Islamic Charity's Humanitarian Facade

Image from Zakat Foundation YouTube video.

by Abha Shankar and Martha Lee

A prominent American Islamist charity is publicizing its role in the nationwide coronavirus emergency response effort.

"Zakat Foundation of America stepped up its nationwide coronavirus emergency response ... delivering thousands of direly needed medical-grade gloves to two far South Side Safety-Net hospitals in Chicago," said the Illinois-based Islamist charity in a March 27 press release.

"We're all in as a frontline charitable provider helping people survive COVID-19, on every level — financially, medically, nutritionally, mentally and spiritually," executive director Halil Demir said in the release. (Demir also spells his first name "Khalil.")

Since its 2001 founding, the Zakat Foundation claims to "have empowered millions of people to recover from disasters and escape poverty by taking control of their own lives." A timeline on the charity's website showcases its humanitarian accomplishments over the years, from providing aid to Iraq war victims to establishing a university for refugees in Turkey.

But behind the Zakat Foundation's outward humanitarian façade lie longstanding terror ties that include support for Hamas- and al-Qaida-tied charities, a joint investigation by the Investigative Project of Terrorism and the Middle East Forum finds.

The misuse of Islamist charitable organizations to support terror is not new. American Islamist charities have been known to use humanitarian assistance as a cover to solicit funds for terrorist groups.

"While some terrorist supporters create sham charities as a cover to raise and move funds, other terrorist groups and their supporters use charities to provide funds or otherwise dispense critical social or humanitarian services to vulnerable populations in an effort to radicalize communities and build local support," says the Treasury Department's 2015 National Terrorist Financing Risk Assessment.

Soon after the 9/11 attacks, several American Islamist charities were either designated terrorist financiers by Treasury or raided by federal authorities on suspicion of funding terror. A prime example is the prosecution of the Texas charity Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) and its senior leaders in what is described as the largest terrorism financing case in U.S. history. In 2008, a jury convicted HLF and five former leaders for illegally routing more than $12 million to Hamas.

One of Demir's previous employers also attracted scrutiny from the federal government.

Before founding Zakat Foundation in 2001, Demir worked for the Benevolence International Foundation (BIF). A business card identified him as "Public Relations Officer," and an IRS tax filing from 2000 states that, "The books are in care of Halil I. Demir."

The Treasury Department designated BIF and related entities as terror financiers in 2002. The Illinois-based BIF and its director, Enaam Arnaout, were charged the same year with misusing charitable contributions to support al-Qaida and other terrorist groups overseas. Later, Arnaout confessed to using his charity to support Mujahideen fighters in Bosnia and Chechnya.

Arnaout served "as an administrator" for Osama bin Laden, a United Nations Security Council report said, "at times disbursing funds on his behalf." He admitted that BIF solicited money for humanitarian needs, "including refugees and orphans," concealing the fact that it "was being used to support fighters" in Chechnya with uniforms, boots, tents and other supplies.

In addition to serving BIF, Demir also has worked with the terror-tied Turkish Humanitarian Relief Organization (IHH). A 2010 news release on the Turkish charity's relief efforts in earthquake-hit Haiti describes Demir as an "IHH aid coordinator." The same year, IHH also referred to the Zakat Foundation as a "partner institution."

IHH has helped fund the Hamas military wing, which used the money to buy weapons and build training facilities, Israel's Ministry of Foreign Relations said. IHH has been designated a terrorist organization by Israel, Germany and the Netherlands. IHH was a key player in the 2010 Free Gaza Movement flotilla that sought to break a blockade on Gaza. Ten people were killed when one of the boats refused to turn back and passengers attacked Israeli commandos as they tried to board.

Reports from that time allege that IHH distributed aid to the Salafist group Ahrar al Sham, which fought alongside ISIS and the al-Qaida affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra. Turkish authorities additionally found evidence that IHH not only recruits militants for al-Qaida and other terrorist groups, but also provides terrorist groups access to arms and medical treatment.

According to a 2009 IHH report, "The US-based Zakat Foundation and Helping Hand, with which the IHH co-organizes social projects in different regions, sent $80,000 and $30,000 respectively to Gaza through the IHH."

Helping Hand is the overseas charitable arm of the Islamic Circle of North America, which has been described as "openly affiliated" with the Sunni revivalist movement Jamaat-e-Islami (JI). The charity has partnered with people closely tied to the U.S.-designated Kashmiri terrorist organization, Hizbul Mujahideen and its leader Syed Salahuddin. Zakat Foundation also partners with the Al-Khidmat Foundation, JI Pakistan's charitable arm.

Despite these documented connections, often promoted by the charities involved, Demir denies his and his organization's terror ties. He blames terror financing crackdowns targeting American Muslim charities after the 9/11 attacks on "Islamophobia."

"The Islamophobia was so strong, emotions ran so high against the Muslim community that whenever we tried to do good work, some people and organizations tried to portray us as bad guys," Demir says in an advertisement for his book, 9 Myths About Muslim Charities: Stories from the Zakat Foundation of America.

Demir made similar accusations in a January interview with the Daily Southtown. "This is propaganda, Islamophobia of white supremacists and hate groups that spread poison against the Muslim community and charities that do great work," he said.

Demir's book bashes national and international agencies for demanding transparency and oversight of Muslim charities. For instance, he calls the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) global terror finance watchdog "the most powerful and pernicious entity in the world," and asserts that "FATF's recommendations, and counterterrorism financing in general, constitute a complex ineffective sham."

The book also criticizes a 1996 CIA "Report on NGOs with Terror Links": "This two-decade-old CIA-write-up's simple-minded, unvetted, erroneous presumption of a 'regular correlation between Muslim humanitarian organizations and terrorist activity' – which shows nothing more than chauvinism—still underpins global policy of transgressing the civil rights of American Muslim charities."

Terrorists are known to use "charities to provide funds or otherwise dispense critical social or humanitarian services to vulnerable populations in an effort to radicalize communities and build local support," the 2015 National Terrorist Financing Risk Assessment said.

Hamas' dramatic 2006 election victory was fueled in part by its social welfare networks that received funding from American Islamist charities. In fact, the Holy Land Foundation was part of a network called the "Palestine Committee" that the Muslim Brotherhood created to advance Hamas's agenda politically and financially in the United States.

The Zakat Foundation has also generously supported the Islamic Charitable Society (ICS) in Hebron. In 2003, Zakat Foundation "worked in coordination with the Islamic Charitable Society in Hebron to supply $10,000" worth of school supplies to Palestinian children. This is not the first time that the ICS has received funding from U.S.-based charities. HLF gave ICS more than $1.6 million between 1991 and 2001. In 2002, German intelligence services described ICS as "the most important HAMAS association in the West Bank" and concluded that its leadership included "numerous" Hamas members.

The Zakat Foundation's work with ICS and association with Hamas continues. It announced in 2017 that it had "taken on costs for 200 students" of the ICS's Al Rahma School. Dina Karmi, an Arabic teacher at Al Rahma, is the widow of Nashaat al-Karmi, Hamas's southern West Bank armed wing leader. Israeli anti-terror police shot and killed him in 2010 in a raid connected with the murder of four Israelis.

In 2018, Israel's Shin Bet arrested Dina Karmi for "serving as the 'operational arm'" of a ring that "operated in coordination with both Hamas headquarters abroad and in the Gaza Strip."

A year earlier, ICS officials expressed their "deepest of thanks to Zakat Foundation" for its support, and "especially" its executive director Khalil Demir.

Zakat Foundation lists a U.S.-based Islamist charity called Baitulmaal as a partner. The Israeli government in 2006 accused Baitulmaal co-founder Sheikh Hasan Hajmohammad of funding a Hamas charity.

However, instead of calling for more intensive oversight of an Islamist charity with established terror ties, U.S. government officials continue to engage with the Zakat Foundation. In 2017, the charity co-sponsored an Iftar dinner with New York Mayor Bill de Blasio's office. Last year, Halil Demir was invited to Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot's 100th Day Recognition.

Today, as the nation ramps up its fight against the coronavirus pandemic, the Chicago mayor's office "now keeps contact with Zakat Foundation and has welcomed its creative capacity and stalwart efforts, as do an ensemble of social service agencies, not only in Chicago, but in key metro areas across the nation."

For decades, Islamist charities have hidden their terror funding and support under a charitable guise, sometimes winning acclaim and support from federal government officials and others for their efforts. The terror-tied Zakat Foundation's response to the coronavirus pandemic, is the kind of thing that might provide a public benefit, but it also serves as a building block toward legitimacy, opening doors at City Hall and elsewhere.

It also helps the organization further obscure its work with charities tied to Hamas and al-Qaida.

[elsabasson]

MAGA million march

What an experience! 

WASHINGTON DC: We crossed the Potomac River into Washington DC around 8 am after driving 12 + hours. All of us brimming with excitement, we decided to drive to the place and find parking as close as possible. Not a chance! Even Google didn't have any idea how many roads were completely closed off! Asking police officers, where we could find parking, they responded: There's a lot going on! Everything is closed! 

We saw groups of people walking with great big Trump flags so we asked them where they parked. That left us with a mile long walk just get to Freedom Plaza: the starting place. The wind was crisp but thankfully we had a sunny, open sky. Police guarded the perimeter of the blocked off area and we were met with several smiles as we crossed over and one officer wished us a good day.

ENORMOUS CROWD: About 3 hours early, we reached the crowd that had started to gather, and it already seemed really large. I used to attend a city wide church where crowds of 3000 to 4000 attended. This was already much bigger. We used to be involved with rallies that met in stadiums where numbers were in the tens of thousands. This already approached that, 3 hours before the event was to start, but people were still streaming in, yet they were at that stage spread-out enough for us to move around among the crowd. An enormous Trump flag was laid out on the ground in the middle of the square.  

FROM ALL OVER! It was just Wonderful to see the support for our president, from all ACROSS the country! I spoke to several people from Texas, one couple from Dallas and a group from San Antonio, as well as many more who came shorter distances. Several groups from Maryland were very happy to find each other there. Some people came all the way from California. 

ALL SORTS & TYPES: What a colorful variety of people, all united to support president Trump! I saw an American Indian Chief, complete with his feathered head gear. There were women of every size, color and shape, dressed in American flags and colors head to toe, and bearded, weather-beaten men parading less savory slogans about where the left should get off, as well as the clean-cut, young and old, sporting slogans, waving flags and wearing flags like capes. 

"The Proud Boys" showed up strong, strutting their stuff, and a group of "Gays for Trump", flags and all! I guess Ricky Rebel's crowd, because he was there too! I asked for a photo! There were "Black Lives for Trump" which I found interesting. 

Seems everyone was just so happy to be there and excited to find all the others there, united around the cause: make the elections fair and honest! 

THE PRESIDENT DROVE BY: Around 2 hours before the event was to start, a motorcade came by, everyone cheered and people claimed it was the president. Being on the ground, and with those masses i only saw the cars came by. 

SOUNDS: Many individuals walked around with their own personal megaphones, chanting - especially once we started moving out. Unfortunately no sound system was set up - suitable for a crowd of that size, therefore people back down the streets leading up to the square probably could not hear much. 

Around 12 noon, the crowd was thick and they again played "Proud to be American!" (it was played many times in the preceding 2 hours) This time all the people joined in singing - i guess the crowd joining in, helped the sound to be carried down the streets. Then a man's voice asked for everyone to remove their hats to show respect, and he prayed for the country and the president. 

Next, a woman sang the National Anthem acapella, and everyone joined in, standing in reverence, hand on the heart. Such a solemn and glorious moment! After that, a man led the ENTIRE CROWD in the pledge of allegiance - a magnificent declaration! 

THE WALK: Next, someone with a megaphone explained the route and some other technicalities. (which, I could not make sense of) That is when the people started moving out. We tried to hold on to one another but in vain. Thankfully, everyone in our family had at least a  semi-charged cell phone on them, and the boys stuck together with their sister, while my husband and i held onto each other.

PREPARATIONS: Flowing with the SEA of people down the eight-lane Pennsylvania Street, towards the Supreme Court,  seemed surreal. Apparently, in preparation for the march, ALL the businesses had been closed, their usual activities suspended and the people evacuated. (rather like an old Western movie, where the hero faces villains in a shootout on Main Street - “High Noon” -style, and everyone left town) 

But more than that, on ground level, all the windows and doors had been boarded up and EVERY movable thing cleared out! No sign of life anywhere! If it wasn't for the fact that we were surrounded by such a mass of people - in the middle of the street, it would have been eerily empty and quiet. 

NOISES:  In the crowd, people carrying megaphones called out their individual takes on the election issues to anyone and everyone. Some megaphone carriers stopped at various points on route, to stand on the side of the street and proclaim their doctrines about related causes: Alternative news networks and Abortion, among others. 

CHANTS: Megaphone carriers walking with the crowd broke out in chants regularly: "Stop the steal" or "U- S-A" also "Count those votes" and "We want Trump!" as well as "Fox News Sucks!" 

When we turned onto Constitution Avenue to go up towards Capital Hill, buildings no longer lined BOTH sides of the road. On one side stretched the lawns of Union Square and the Ulysses S. Grant  Memorial parks. A group of perhaps 20 people, wearing Antifa paraphernalia, had gathered there but police kept them 50 or more yards away from the marchers and yard sized metal gates had been erected on the sidewalk, to keep marchers on the street. 

At the sight of the police lining this part of the road, the entire group around us, started chanting: "Back the Blue, Back the Blue ....!" 

During part of our walk, we were near a group of Buddhist Monks, dressed in their garb and carrying a brass dome that they chimed once, upon entering every new street block. It seemed strangely out of place. However, they too, felt they had freedom under the Trump administration, that would be denied them under a Communist Biden rule. 

POLITE: My daughter commented that this was a particularly polite crowd, and i concur. She said that having attended several “Conn’s” this crowd did not push and shove. People constantly apologized if anyone was bumped or brushed by. When I said excuse me, in trying to pass, I was met with a smile and “...you’re good hun..” 

They were NOT mostly Christian or church people, yet all of them were respectful and polite, basically Conservatives, with conservative values. 

ON THE WAY OUT. We finally met up with our children again, at the Supreme Court, after the one and a half mile "march" and there were more speeches. However, here it was even more difficult to hear and we could not see who was talking. The organizers estimated there were 100,000 people and that was astonishing because it was called only 5 days earlier, and ALL the media networks blocked word about it from going out! 

Truly this was the result of a free independent grassroots communication system! 

We started making our way back to our car, around 2 pm, not waiting for activities to be finished off, and mainly because we were just DONE! As we drifted back to our car, we walked parallel to the road on which we had come. We looked across the great Union Square lawns and saw that the MAGA march crowd was STILL filling the ENTIRE width of Constitution Street, making their way up Capital Hill, towards the Supreme Court ! 

This was TWO HOURS AFTER the event had started! That makes me think there MUST have been many, many more people than they estimated! 

It was COMPLETELY peaceful and astonishingly LARGE! 

The motorcade drove past us again, as we continued back to our car and i heard later that was the president on way to the golf course. I do not know if ANYONE gave the president an honest or accurate account of this extraordinary show of support from ordinary working American people, who passionately voted and want president Trump in the White house at least for FOUR MORE YEARS!

Apart from the march showing Physically and undeniably to corrupt politicians, that we REFUSE to roll over and play dead and conservatives are a force to be reckoned with, I felt something shifted spiritually with the march! 

Praying for our President! 

[kollok1991]

My thoughts on Teens in Outer Space (part 2):

-”Do my passengers have any questions before we hit the warpway?” “How many tokens do I have?” “I don't fucking know, hold on”

-Lucas/Billy’s clear frustration over the fact that they derailed the whole story by straight teleporting a whole galaxy away from where the story takes place

-”My dad and I made everyone miniatures” “Woaaaaaah” why are they so cute omg

-Brandon omg

-”I have powers” “cool, tight” 

-Laura waiting for like an hour in the pong room was hilarious 

-I relate to Zac accidentally being poisoned because of something that says it doesn't have lactose, actually having it on a spiritual level.

-All the Mike Hunt jokes

-Logan, just Logan

-”EVERYONES DEAD?” “okay above game here, I implied that episode one and you guys didn't give a fuck”

-I feel like the Sunny D fights between Billy and Tibby are an inside joke between Zac and Lucas but I don't know what it is

-”There are so many thing we are going to have to deal with in season 2″ you sure are 

-”How do you make a promise with any one?” “Blood” *silence*

-Willy Winnie Wendy Wally

BONUS:

this picture that kinda looks like its comes from a dramatic romance movie but its just Em reacting to some weird shit Mike said

[bisadiemccarthy]

(OC Ask Game) Summer Thompson + 6, 10, 15, 16, 18, 20, 28, 32, 35, 36, 41, 43, and 44

aight buckle up

6. What were they like at school? did they enjoy it? Did they finish? What level of higher education did they reach? What subjects did they enjoy? Which did they hate?

Summer liked school enough to make Bs pretty consistently, As if it was a teacher who really helped her flourish. Fav subject was always english, but she was bored by history. Tried to like science but was only ever meh about it. Got through high school and college intending to be a doctor like her dad. Took a gap year after college bc she realized she wasn’t sure about the whole doctor thing, and with her family’s financial situation, she wasn’t going to make them pay for med school and then drop out. Ended up with a part-time job doing file work for a veterinary clinic for that year, and went to vet school the year after. Now happily working in a veterinary clinic in Maine. 

10. Do they like children? Do children like them? Do they have or want any children? What would they be like as a parent? 

Summer loves kids of all ages. She starts babysitting at the age of 13, loves it loves it loves it. Always assumes she’ll end up with kids but it’s always sort of a future thing... I haven’t decided who she ends up with (and thus,if/how she has kids) but as a parent, she would be fun, willing to joke around with her kids, and definitely really close with them.

15. Are they good at cooking? Do they enjoy it? What do others think of their cooking?

Summer learned to cook from her dad, so she’s pretty good. She mostly makes stuff ahead of time, or makes something simple and quick, but on Saturdays she goes all out and tries new, fancy recipes, just to have fun. Everyone loves her cooking and especially in college and vet school she has people lining up to taste what she’s making

16. Do they collect anything? What do they do with it? Where do they keep it?

Summer likes comic books. Her biggest “collection” is at her parents’ house but when she moves out she gets a few a month. She loves to read and reread them, she’s not one of the “in 20 years this will sell for lots of money” types

18. What’s their favorite genre of books, music, tv shows, films, video games, and anything else

Mystery. Mystery, mystery, mystery. Summer has ALL of the Nancy Drew books (and there are a lot) and quite a few Agatha Christie. As for music she doesn’t have a genre preference but 95% of the stuff she listens to is lighthearted, happy music. She likes the og nintendo games, like pokemon and super mario, but can beat both of her brothers at super smash bros, andcan totally spend an entire weekend playing animal crossing. also i’ve told you this but she and Judd watch all kinds of old black and white movies... Grace Kelly is Summer’s bi awakening

20. Do they like musicals? Music in general? What do they do when their favorite song comes on?

Summer isn’t really into musicals, but she does like listening to music... always wearing earbuds, and 9 times out of 10 gets to DJ in the car. She always starts dancing when her music is playing bc that’s why she listens to music, to feel happy and upbeat and dance

28. What is their biggest fear? What in general scares them? How do they act when they’re scared?

Mkay, this one is harder, tbh... Summer doesn’t like the dark. Thunderstorms on the beach scare her, but if she’s somewhere safe, she’s fine. She’s deathly afraid of falling tho (possibly related to a childhood tumble down the stairs, and yes, I will write you a drabble of that). When scared she wants to be with her family, specifically her dad

32. What do they dress like? What sort of shops do they buy clothes from? Do they wear the fashion that they like? What do they wear to sleep? Do they wear makeup? What’s their hair like?

Her style is kinda wacky... she goes thrift shopping once every few weeks and gets new necessities at the start of every school year. Almost nothing she owns is new but she rarely minds. Has a style similar to Vicki’s, up to and including stealing Judd’s shirts. Sleeps in a tshirt and pajama pants-- flannel in fall/winter, linen in spring/summer. Long hair, often messy, dark brown. Most often in a ponytail but she braids it to surf. hates makeup with a burning passion

35. What’s their guilty pleasure? What is their totally unguilty pleasure?

Guilty pleasure: sims let’s plays on youtube. She watches way too many and stays up later than she should going down that rabbit hole

Unguilty pleasure: chocolate ice cream. All of her pocket money all summer goes to fudgesicles from the beach snack bar

36. What are they good at? What hobbies do they like? Can they sing?

Can definitely sing, and really good at it. Also good at cooking and will spend hours in the kitchen with Judd. Writes poetry but doesn’t let anyone read it

41. What’s their sexuality? What do they find attractive? Physically and mentally? What do they like/need in a relationship?

Bisexual. Likes a nice smile, and for her potential SO to be clean and smell nice. Needs someone to confide in and someone who will support and comfort her.

43. Are they religious? What do they think of religion? What do they think of religious people? What do they think of nonreligious people?

Christian, Episcopalian. Her family goes to a methodist church and while she likes the idea of God, she’s not super into the Bible and doesn’t really consider herself “Spiritual”. Naturally, she finds the Canterbury House at college and is like “laid-back christians??? these are my people” bc she can have the comfort and support of religion and fellowship but no pressure or strict traditions. Absolutely cool with anyone of any belief system.

44. What is their favorite season? Type of weather? Are they good in the cold or the heat? What weather do they complain in the most?

Her fav season is summer, and she likes sunny, warm weather. Prefers heat to cold but doesn’t mind either as long as she can be outside. Complains about rain bc shes stuck inside

[militant-holy-knight]

The motto of the Muslim Brotherhood states: "Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Qur'an is our constitution. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope."

If "jihad is our way" and "the Quran is our constitution," it would irrational not to postulate that the MB and its related groups in the U.S. endorse violence to change the U.S. constitution and replace it with the Quran.

While some "peaceful" Islamic organizations describe jihad as an internal spiritual quest or an "inner struggle," the term is not typically used by Islamic organizations to describe "peaceful" activities. The Qur'an clearly says:

"So when the sacred months have passed away, then slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them captives and besiege them and lie in wait for them in every ambush, then if they repent and keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate, leave their way free to them; surely Allah is Forgiving, Merciful." – (Qur'an 9.5)

And:

"Slay them wherever you may catch them and expel them from the place from which they expelled you. The sin of disbelief in God is greater than committing murder. Do not fight them in the vicinity of the Sacred Mosque in Mecca unless they start to fight. Then slay them for it is the recompense that the disbelievers deserve." – (Qur'an 2.191) Muhammad Sarwar translation.

In the Islamist vocabulary and MB motto, let us remember that the organization Islamic Jihad, which assassinated Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, was not seeking peaceful change. In mainstream Islamic sources, the definition of jihad is predominantly described in terms of violence. As Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, President and Founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, noted in congressional testimony:

The next slide looks at the logo. And I think it's important to understand what they are. They have not changed their logo. And at the bottom, under those swords, which are not peaceful, that are not violent symbol, it says wei du (ph).

And wei du (ph) is from chapter 8, verse 16 of the Koran, and it says "make ready." And it's not the Boy Scouts' "be prepared, make ready." This is a passage in the Koran that refers specifically to battle and preparing for militancy. This, despite them coming to power in Tunisia and Egypt and elsewhere, they never change the symbol and what they are. One would need to twist the traditional meaning of the word jihad to prove that it was actually meant in the peaceful sense of the word.

MB influence in Turkey is also worrisome. Over the past few decades, the MB and their supporters have managed to Islamize a significant portion of Turkish society. The current president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, is a strong supporter of their organization. Imagine for a moment what might happen if the European Union made the mistake of accepting Turkey as a member. Turkey could, as it has been threatening to do anyway, dramatically facilitate the MB agenda simply by providing entry visas for huge numbers of Islamists from across the Middle East. They could quite literally flood Europe, which is already facing a possible clash of civilizations, and, even without unleashing new waves of terror, demographically change the future of the Europe forever.

The MB plan to force Europe to submit to their Islamic agenda can also be seen in their strong influence in Qatar, one of the biggest producers of natural gas on the planet, and where the country's broadcaster, Al Jazeera, founded and supported by Qatar's ruling Al Thani family, is the main megaphone of the MB. Qatar lavishly funds MB operations not only in the Middle East, but also in the U.S. and Europe.

That Qatar has been trying to dominate the European gas market was made clear by their support for terrorist groups in Syria to remove Al-Assad's regime and allow Qatari pipelines into Europe via Syria and then Turkey. This terror campaign was not limited only to Sunnis in Syria; it has also been extended to support for terrorist groups in other countries such as Egypt, Libya, and Iraq, which can compete with Qatar in exporting energy to Europe. This level of support for Sunni jihadi organizations could not possibly have happened without collaboration with the MB, which is widely regarded as the mother of many of these organizations.

Attempts by the MB to destabilize U.S. allies in the Muslim world, especially Egypt and Saudi Arabia, also cannot be ignored. Both countries currently have leaders who desire to take their countries into modernity and tolerance, and who deserve Western support.

In Egypt, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has admitted the role of "religious ideology" in the terrorism problem there. He has confronted the religious authorities, demanding that they provide a moderate interpretation of Islam that does not encourage violence. He has even, as president (for the first time in the history of Egypt), visited and celebrated Christmas mass in a Coptic church.

In Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, otherwise known as MBS, has taken unprecedented concrete steps on the path to modernity within the kingdom. He has disbanded the religious police, begun empowering Saudi women, and for the first time visited a Coptic church in Egypt.

We cannot say at this stage that these two countries have been brought fully into modernity. We can say, however, that we have two leaders who want to -- or are actually are -- taking their Muslim majority countries onto this path. This is a nightmare for the MB, whose goal is to return the Muslim world to the time of Islamic Caliphate. Designating the MB as a terrorist group can impede their ability to resist the noble attempts of these leaders.

Adding to this, the alliance between the MB (and its related organizations and sympathizers) with leftist groups in the U.S. can allow the MB to exert huge influence on U.S. politics to benefit their Islamist agenda. The MB's de facto control of Islamic banking can only help them achieve their goal for the global domination of their religious agenda.

Other Muslims agree. M. Zuhdi Jasser, in his 2018 testimony before the US House of Representatives, concluded: The importance of identifying the Muslim brotherhood as a terrorist organization could not be more clear to our national security and counterterrorism strategy. This will begin not only a necessary process of treating the cancer at its core before it metastasizes rather than its byproducts after it has already spread.

[majoraop]

Last night I dreamed about something related to One Piece again. It was totally random since I was with other (real) people, both friends and family members, and I noticed Doflamingo was there too . At some point, he casually took his glasses off in order to wash his face or something. I discreetly glanced at him and, well, my heart skipped a beat lol. He was handsome. It’s hard to describe since it wasn’t just his looks, but more like beautiful on a spiritual level of sort. Totally OOC since, even without taking his evil moments into account, he’s gone through too much shit to have an expression like that in canon. But in a way, he was still him. In the dream he was more like a normal person, still tall but not exaggeratedly, and his expression was...peaceful? Like what he would probably look like if his life had been different? His eyes were blue (which is strange since I usually headcanon him with either pink, red, or amber eyes), but not a cold shade of blue. It was neither a light nor a dark shade, but something perfectly in the middle of the spectrum. Somehow his eyes were warm, and he had a sort of “celestial”--even “sunny” aura (given his bright blond hair) around him. Please notice that I used “celestial” here in the most possible positive way and certainly not like in canon. Doffy looked... angelic in my dream, I would dare to say (which is funny since I don’t believe in supernatural beings), but at the same time he looked definitely human and maybe that was the most surprising thing. I think my nakama influenced me since, some time ago, he jokingly told me that if Doffy took his glasses off the other characters would stare at him, surprised by his beauty.  XD (I am definitely too obsessed with One Piece and with Doffy’s eyes...  ^^’  )

[alexsmitposts]

Without the I Word, Beware B and P As Nancy Pelosi struggles to contain increasing demands for the Congress to impeach President Trump, his Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo ratchets up tensions in the Gulf of Oman, as it has done in countless other historical circumstances, making war with Iran look imminent. Now more than ever, Americans need to know that beyond oil, the Middle East, like the rest of the world, is divided between right and left. Iran is the leader of the left-oriented Shia version of Islam, while Saudi Arabia leads the right oriented Arab world. Meanwhile, Israel, as it continues to occupy Palestinian territory for over seventy years, has gone from being a left-oriented society in which the kibbutz played a central role, so far to the right that it often agrees with fascists. Across the Middle East as elsewhere,“Follow the money”, corresponds to the left-right divide. Unlike American ignorance of current foreign affairs, few people across the world have a false idea of the French Revolution of 1789: driven by popular hardship, the sans culottes got rid of a monarch, opening the way for an organized left that carried out the Russian Revolution of 1917, followed, in due course, by the Chinese Revolution of 1949. These three revolutions duly claimed their place in history and in the popular imagination, however, after the defeat of Nazi Germany, the US installed ‘liberal’ parties in Western Europe, Eastern Europe modernized under a Soviet controlled authoritarian form of social democracy, while Iran was still a relatively poor country whose population was in need of everything from health care to education and housing. In 1953, when Iranians elected a lawyer named Mohammed Mossadegh to lead the country, the nationalization of their oil bonanza was a no-brainer. Alas, this coincided with the growing realization by the US of the crucial role of ‘black gold’, as American automobile ownership tripled, and petroleum became the magic fluid that generated prodigious development in the West. In what was to become a pattern, the CIA and M16 worked in tandem to overthrow the Iranian popular government and put the exiled Shah back in power. Twenty-six years later, in 1979, popular forces carried out a revolution against the Shah’s iron rule that has never been understood by the West, which saw the new leaders exclusively as religious fanatics. In reality, when Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile in France, he was accompanied by a socialist theoretician. Ali Shariati had been in and out of jail while teaching high school and campaigning for change. Eventually, he was allowed to accept a scholarship to France, where he studied with Islamic scholars, earning a PhD in sociology and the history of religions in 1964, while discovering the third world political theologist Frantz Fanon, collaborating with the Algerian National Liberation Front and campaigning alongside Jean-Paul Sartre for an end to French colonialism. Returning to Iran, Shariati founded the Freedom Movement of Iran, gathering followers throughout \society. His sin was to have revived Shiism’s revolutionary claim that a good society would embrace religious values. He taught that the role of a government under a learned clergy, was to guide society according to Islamic values rather than managing it, allowing human beings to reach their highest potential rather than encouraging the West’s hedonistic individualism. Believing that Shia Muslims should not await the return of a mysterious 12th Imam, (as the Jews await ‘the Messiah’) but hasten it by fighting for social justice, even to the point of martyrdom, Shariati criticized the Shah’s clerics and translated the claims of Iranian Marxists that revolution would bring about a just, classless society into religious symbols that ordinary people could relate to. Seeing a direct link between liberal democracy and the plundering of pre-modern societies based on spirituality, unlike Fanon, he believed that people could only fight imperialism by recovering their cultural identity, including their religious beliefs, which he called ‘returning to ourselves’. (Like a growing number of contemporary leaders — such as Vladimir Putin — Shariati called religious government ‘commitment democracy’, as opposed to Western demagogy based on advertising and money. The panic that gripped the West in 1979 when 52 American diplomats were locked-into the Embassy for 444 days, was heightened by Israel’s victory in the Six Day War a few years earlier. Since that time, while continuing to deny the Palestinians a state of their own, Israel has moved closer to the most powerful Sunni (i.e., conservative) Arab nation, Saudi Arabia, which supports ISIS and its offshoot terrorist organizations worldwide, and wages an unrelenting campaign against the tiny country of Yemen, whose revolutionary Houthis are also supported by Iran, in the millennial battle between Sunni and Shia. Few Americans know that these two are strongly correlated to the left-right divide. Western media correctly attributes the conflict to attitudes toward Ali, the Prophet’s designated successor, but it features Shiites lashing themselves with chains in solidarity, without mentioning that the reason for Ali’s murder was his defense of the lower classes. In turn, that attitude was based on a disagreement over whether God had attributes, such as ‘justice’ and hence could demand that humans treat each other with respect and dignity. Arising after the Prophet’s death, the argument centered around whether the Quran was an emanation of God, or had always existed. In turn, the answer to that question depended on whether God simply ‘is’ or whether, like humans, he has attributes, one of which would be ‘justice’, or solidarity, which would imply the existence of free will. At one point, a free will defender who got up and left the discussion was labelled a Mutazilla, or ‘one who has left’. During the following centuries, and mainly under the Abbasid rulers centered in Persia, the Mutazilla movement lead to the development of Shia Islam, with a different set of laws from those of the Sunnis, who still believe that individual lives are foreordained by a God who is neither ‘good’ nor ‘evil’, but simply ‘is’, and that men must obey Him without question. Under the cleric Wahhab, that conviction led to the extreme of Sunni Islam, in whose name terrorism is carried out to this day. The notion of a ‘Shia arc’ suggests an equally threatening military entity, when in reality it is an ideological one. Although nothing could be further from the minds of those who hold Trump’s foreign policy in their hands, Ali Shariati and the Iranian revolution revived Shia Islam’s original message that men must treat each other with dignity and respect. The original seat of the Mutazilla movement was the city of Basra, located on the Persian Gulf Shat al Arab waterway, and the Shiite learning center of Najaf, near the southern Iraq/Iran border, was the headquarters of Iran’s exiled revolutionary leader, Imam Khomeini. After spreading from Iran to Iraq, Shia Islam reached Syria and Lebanon on the strength of its commitment to justice. In Syria, the life values of Islam had already led to the creation of the Baaʿth Party, which in 1953 merged with the Syrian Socialist Party to form the Saddam Hussein’s Arab Socialist Baaʿth (Renaissance) Party. Although both countries belonged to the non-aligned, anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist movement, the merger failed. (The US suffered the Baath being the party of Saddam Hussein as long as he was waging an eight-year war against socialist Iran.) Syrian Shiism continues to be represented by the small Alawite sect headed by the Assad family. Reaching back to the ninth century, the Alawites, who pray sitting rather than prostrate, and celebrate some Christian holidays, had been rejected by the Shiite hierarchy until Assad’s father, Hafez al Assad, came to power in 1964. Though accused by the US of “killing its own citizens”, Assad’s son, Bashar, heads the only secular government in the Middle East (including Israel), and retains the educational system and Western social customs that prevailed under the French mandate (1923-1964). In neighboring Lebanon, the Shiite militia known as Hezbollah represents a powerful political force in a tiny nation whose population is divided among half a dozen religions and sects, including the Christian Druze and Maronites. The picture painted for Westerners is of a rabble acting on orders from Iran, while Hezbollah is allied with the Shia militia Hamas in the struggle for an independent Palestine, making Syria ‘the frontline state’. (Alastair Crooke’s book Resistance: The Essence of the Islamist Revolution, attributes Hezbollah’s victories over the Israeli army to ‘horizontal’ organization, which encourages a high level of individual initiative, and is part of the surprisingly sophisticated knowledge of Western political thought by its leader Hassan Nasrallah.) This makes the fact that the Second Amendment to the US Constitution, which reads: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed,” all the more ironic. America is the only modern nation whose citizens have almost automatic access to guns, resulting in thousands of murders every year, while its leaders insist that foreign national militias must be punished by a so-called ‘rules-based’ international community. Last but not least, in this saga, like the cherry on the cake, the American public is oblivious to the decades-long ties between Iran and its neighbor, Russia, based on both a shared revolutionary commitment to ‘dignity and respect’, and to religious values. It is disquieting, to say the last, that when the two B’s threaten Iran, they are threatening Russia outside the narrative familiar to American voters.

[dustedmagazine]

Dust Volume 5, Number 5

PUP

Home fi, gnawa-pop fusion, mariachi cowpunk, classically minded jazz, shout-y punk-pop and finger picked acoustic blues—as appropriate for spring, Dust lets a thousand flowers bloom.This edition of short, mostly positive reviews, draws contributions from Isaac Olson, Bill Meyer, Jennifer Kelly and Justin Cober-Lake. We hope you find something to blast from open windows on the first warm, sunny opportunity.  

Ahmed Ag Kaedy — Akaline Kidal (Sahel Sounds)

Akaline Kidal by Ahmed Ag Kaedy

This acoustic, solo release by Malian guitarist in exile Ahmed Ag Kaedy is a beaut. Like a lot of so-called desert blues, this is only chill out music until you read the lyrics, for example, “The Tuareg people must know/you can consider France an enemy/no better than Algeria who stands in our path.” Even if militant nationalism, no matter who’s calling for it, isn’t your thing, Ahmed Ag Kaedy’s weathered, throaty voice and plangent, monophonic guitar flights which are as evocative, bitter, and seemingly ephemeral as campfire smoke, make Akaline Kidal well worth hearing. And like campfire smoke, they’ll stick with you well into the next day.  

Isaac Olson

  Astralingua — Safe Passage (Midnight Lamp)

Safe Passage by Astralingua

Quietly, precisely odd, this elaborately instrumented, baroquely arranged folk experiment shrouds whispery threads of poetry in eerie landscapes of stringed instruments, pennywhistles and gently massed harmony. The music, mostly the work of composer Joseph Andrew Thompson but aided by singer Anne Rose Thompson, runs much in line with goth folk outfits like Gravenhurst and Boduf Songs, in the way that dread seeps up from the floorboards and beauty has a spectral, semi-transparent air; you could make a case for an Elliott Smith singing in front of Clogs comparison in a couple of the songs. Yet the music faces forward, not back into misty folklorics. “Space Blues” takes a turn towards proggy Pink Floyd-ish visions of interstellar travel on “Space Blues” and while “Poison Tree” heads off into to tremulous orchestral confessionalism, a la Sufjan Stevens. It is all very pretty and a little disturbing.

Jennifer Kelly

 Kaja Draksler / Petter Eldh / Christian Lillinger—Punkt.Vrt.Plastik (Intakt)

Punkt.Vrt.Plastik by Kaja Draksler, Petter Eldh, Christian Lillinger

This pan-Euopean combo rethinks one of the most cobweb-festooned configurations in jazz. To overcome the piano trio’s over-familiarity, they combine idiosyncratic personal techniques with a disciplined collective approach. Swedish bassist Petter Eldh and German drummer Christian Lillinger have forged their concord in a couple other groups; the former is assertively melodic and big-toned, the latter quick and ubiquitous. With so much happening in the engine room, they need a partner who values balance, and they have found one in Slovenian pianist Kaja Draksler. Her playing is fleet and articulate, and her ideas feel complete in themselves, but they also leave ample space between the root notes for her partners to exercise their formidable muscles without banging into any harmonic walls.

Bill Meyer

 Maxine Funke — Home Fi (Feeding Tube)

home fi by maxine funke

Keep your lo fi, hi fi, and wifi; Home Fi is where it’s at. Really, how come no one characterized their music thusly before? Maxine Funke’s songs flesh out the conceit with lyrical details that relate not just home life, but a state of at-homeness on the grounds around the house. “February” doles out images of late summer foliage (Funke lives in New Zealand) and foraged taste treats; “Waving the Tea Rose” finds spiritual riches in the neighbors’ trash. Funke’s accompanies her slightly sleepy croon with spare finger-picking, captured up close enough that you can hear a chair creak while a strategically dissonant organ or fiddle pipes up in the background. This record, which was originally sold as a tape on an Australian tour, lasts just 22 minutes, but it feels as complete as an afternoon nap.

Bill Meyer

  Houssam Gania — Mosawi Swiri (Hive Mind Records)

Mosawi Swiri by Houssam Gania

Houssam Gania, son of guimbri master Maalem Mahmoud Gania, opens Mosawi Swiri, his debut, with an act of cheerful patricidal aggression. Rather than launching into the traditional Gnawa music — solid and sparse as a mudbrick house, deep and dark as a well and groovy as ripples in a dune — that his father mastered, Gania’s traditional guimbri and qraqabs are joined on the first track, “Moulay Lhacham,” by a guitar/drums/keys band that sounds not unlike Brent Mydland-era Dead. It’s sunshiny, a little corny and perfectly delightful. Ok, ok, so Gania Sr. was no purist himself, having collaborated with, among others, Pharoah Sanders and Peter Brotzmann, but Gania Jr’s opening gambit is pure pop delight. Luckily for armchair ethnographers everywhere, the rest of Mosawi Swiri sticks to traditional Gnawa music, which in Gania’s capable hands, really is as hypnotic and potentially curative as both locals and marshmallow-eared world music fans claim. That first track is a hoot though, and while I’m not sure Gania could sustain a whole album of gnawa-pop fusion, I’d love to see him try.

Isaac Olson

 A.F. Jones — Bourdon du Kinzie (Unfathomless)

Bourdon du Kinzie by A.F. Jones

Sound ecologist, submarine acoustician, mastering engineer, musician; if it manifests within the ears, A.F. Jones is tuned into it. This CD echoes an order that David Thomas, a man who has never been shy about telling other people what to do, once barked. “Insist on more than the truth.” This album began with a field recording expedition to a disused bunker in Port Washington, WA. The space is simultaneously absorbent and reverberant, luring external sounds into its cavernous interior and transforming them with its long decay times. You could probably get some cool sounds by simply stamping your foot or dropping the change in your pockets and hearing what the space does to it. But sound collection is just the first step for Jones. He’s used audio analysis software to isolate and enhance the space’s dominant tones, and then further seasoned the reduction with dancing sine tones. The result is a sort of sonic centrifuge in which essences are extracted so that some sounds become more ephemeral and others more vivid. Give it a spin.  

Bill Meyer  

 Patio—Essentials (Fire Talk)

Essentials by Patio

All clanks and spikes and spatter, this Brooklyn-based trio constructs a jag-edged punk with lots of space. It jangles like a bag of rusty nails. The vocals—sung sometimes by bassist Loren DiBlasi and other times by Lindsey-Paige McCloy, the guitarist (but not by Alice Suh, the drummer) —are a soothing counterpoint, unless you listen to the words, which are sharp despite the cool, distanced delivery. The band mixes late-1980s post-punk jitter with intriguing intervals of chanted poetry and pop self-revelation. “Open,” the longest cut, threads an antic, literate narrative atop a bassline so crackling with electricity that you could get a shock. “Boy Scout,” the single, bounds ahead then collapses in a heap, surges and stops in sudden uncertainty. The music exactly mirrors the confusing, conflicting emotions sketched in lyrics like, “Never have the chance to choose, naturally I always lose, I went shopping the other day, this week I can afford to feel better.” Patio makes inward-facing music that jerks and spasms in an approximation of hedonism, but maintains its quiet, difficult core.

Jennifer Kelly

  PUP — Morbid Stuff (Little Dipper/Rise/BMG)

Morbid Stuff by PUP

It’s been a minute since shout-along punk rattled cages like this second outing from Toronto’s PUP. Here in 11 teeth-rattling blasts, the band radiates bratty intelligence and dashed hopes, amid slamming guitars and kit battering drums. The tension between nerdy, needy erudition and beer bro riffs is palpable. When singer Stefan Babcock confesses, “Just like the kids/I've been navigating my way through the mind-numbing reality of a godless existence/Which, at this point in my hollow and vapid life, has erased what little ambition I've got left,” at the beginning of the single “Kids” you kind of expect the guy to get beat up by his own song. Obvious references include the Hold Steady, Green Day, Japandroids, that is, pretty much any punk that smart kids can memorize and dumb kids can punch the air to without really understanding. The trick is to stomp with triumphant, hobnail-studded aggression all over the relentlessly depressing lyrical content. Pretty soon, we are all singing along that, “Just because you’re sad, doesn’t make you special.”

Jennifer Kelly

 Joshua Redman Quartet — Come What May (Nonesuch)

Saxophonist Joshua Redman has been one of the defining voices of mainstream jazz for a quarter century, his clear tone and lyrical sensibilities a steady source of pleasure in various configurations. For Come What May, Redman reassembles his quartet from the early 2000s (pianist Aaron Goldberg, bassist Reuben Rogers and drummer Gregory Hutchinson) for seven original compositions. The group stays locked in across a variety of sounds, with Goldberg particularly getting some time to shine. Bookending the album with meditative numbers “Circle of Life” and “Vast” makes for a nice closed structure to the disc, letting the livelier numbers pulse and swing. On “DGAF” the musicians' comfort with each other allows Hutchinson to guide a jerky momentum, one that works best when he reclaims it near the end of the song.

The ensemble doesn't push any obvious boundaries here, despite a few demanding interactions. Redman and his group are locked into standard sounds, with the challenge simply being how well they can do it. Not surprisingly, they're quite good at it, and the fact that Redman's conversations sound so easy shouldn't distract from the high level of play here. The quartet sticks to its tradition with clear sound, strong melodies and smart interplay, playing to its strengths for another expressive release.

Justin Cober-Lake

 Vandoliers—Forever (Bloodshot)

Forever by Vandoliers

Vandoliers, out of Dallas, make punk rock with country fiddles, hoarse-voiced stomp-alongs with Mexicali flourishes of trumpet. “Sixteen Years,” which commemorates how long these urban cowboys have been on the job, sports bruise-y r ‘n r defiance, with its chugging beat, its cigarette-and-whiskey-vocals, but leavens the mix with brash folkloric bursts of brass. A rougher “Troublemaker” amps up the one-two shuffle and slides the cow-punk meter over towards the punk side, while contemplative “Cigarettes in the Rain,” smoulders and smokes much like its subject matter, but with a noticeable twang. Forever reminds you that the Rolling Stones were, on occasion, a country band, and the Replacements once made songs like “Waitress in the Sky.” The line is permeable, the fence has a nice place to sit on, and the Vandoliers are neither punk nor country but both.

Jennifer Kelly

 Eli Winter — Time to Come (Blue Hole Recordings)

The Time To Come by Eli Winter

With The Time to Come, college student Eli Winter makes his entry into the solo guitar scene. Winter cites Jack Rose as a prominent influence, but he doesn't have the thickness or the pulse of Rose's sound. His sensibility, especially when playing acoustic, lies closer to Glenn Jones in his creation of atmosphere, brightness and storytelling. “Sunrise Over the Flood” starts with a simple, pretty pattern before turning dark, an evocative moment of lightness used to reveal something heavy. On the poppier side, “Oranges and Holly” builds around a riff close to the intro from “Here Comes the Sun,” but it never quite distinguishes itself. The title track unfurls over 15 minutes, Winter's structured thought allowing for linear but engaging progression. Winter's debut makes the case that we should be paying attention to him; he certainly has things to say and has the right vehicle for his expression. At the same time, it feels like a debut. Winter's restraint keeps everything in its right place, but it would be nice to see him challenge himself technically. Taking a few more risks would help him find his own niche the field, a spot he's likely to earn with a little more seasoning, given his smart songcraft and thoughtful aesthetics.  

Justin Cober-Lake

 Michael Zerang—THE SHUDDERING CHERUB (Pink Palace Records)

THE SHUDDERING CHERUB - for solo piano with vibrating elements by Michael Zerang

If you’re wondering how Chicago’s improvised music company made the march from the AACM’s rejection of commercial and racial marginalization in the 1960s to the current polymorphous scene, train your antennae on Michael Zerang. He’s one of the people who did the hard work of not just playing but organizing during the long dry 1980s. His polyvalence extends to his musicality; he’s played unamplified and electro-acoustic improvisation, ecstatic drone, indie rock, free jazz and pan-global percussion. It might seem a bit perverse that his first solo recording is on piano, but listen and your befuddlement will pass. Zerang spends precious little time on the keys. Instead he plunges into the instrument’s interior, liberally preparing its strings and then plucking, scraping and vibrating with sure hands and some trusty vibrators. The music morphs like a chameleon’s coloration, shifting from coarse texture to crystalline drizzle.

Bill Meyer

[ganondorfthedarklord]

♡ THE BASICS ♡

➥legal name: King Ganondorf Dragmire ➥nickname/alias: Lord of Darkness, King of Darkness, Demon King, Prince of Darkness, Great King Ganondorf, The Great Ganondorf, Emperor of the Dark Realm, etc. ➥birthday: N/A have never specified ➥birthplace: Gerudo Desert ➥gender | species: Male | Human - Gerudo race ➥preferred pronouns: Him/His/He, somewhat dislikes excessive flourish such as His Imperial Majesty, but would prefer it be done correctly if it is done at all. ➥sexual orientation: Straight, mostly just wants the ability to have children and a partner he actually finds worthy ➥spoken languages: Old Hylian, Middle Hylian, Modern Hylian, Archaic Gerudo, Gerudo, Sheikah, several languages used by monsters, basics of Goron and Zora, and can read Goddess Script (headcanon name for the oldest language, the kind seen in Skyward Sword)

♡ A HISTORY LESSON ♡

➥education: personal tutors, trainers, books, self-taught, personal studies and expeditions, among many other sources. ➥occupation: King, conqueror, hunter, warrior, scholar, teacher, among many other duties ➥socioeconomic level growing up: His education, training, and hefty food needs received a great deal of priority, one might even call it comparable to Hyrule’s and in the way of physical improvement far more (and far more dangerous and hostile). A great deal of the Gerudo’s little wealth went into his growth but beyond that he was almost entirely cut off from any special privileges, even luxuries most children his age would have such as small toys. The one luxury he did manage to attain before growing up was a guitar on which he began to learn music. He would move to prefer instruments with keys such as pianos and organs, but he would continue to enjoy string instruments from then on. He also had a notebook in which he’d occasionally draw, but beyond those it was all dedicated to advancement. ➥living conditions growing up: Extremely spartan, in more ways than just the lack of luxury goods. Constant training, studying, and working at almost every waking moment. His room was barren and his life sparsely had anything other than the brutal training regiment. ➥criminal record: In his own country, none. In other nations, a great and long list.

♡ RELATIONSHIPS ♡

➥parents: Koume & Kotake (adoptive), birth mother deceased, trainers would sometimes take on some motherly role. ➥siblings: None by blood, by tradition he calls almost all Gerudo daughters or sisters but its more a title than a statement of relation, more meaning daughter of the Gerudo or sister of the Gerudo than his specifically. ➥relationship status: Single ➥significant other/s: None, may become verse-dependent... eventually. ➥children: None ➥best friend(s): None, prior to the end of OoT it would be Nabooru ➥pets: a horse, five white wolfos, and a kargarok, later in the Adult timeline he has the Helmaroc King. One could make the argument almost all the animalistic monsters in his army are his pets and would not be entirely mistaken, but those are the ones he personally tends to. ➥rivals: Zelda and Link ➥enemies: Fate, the Gods

♡ LET’S GET PHYSICAL ♡

➥character’s build: Massive, heavy, a towering wall three men across at 4′3″ inches from the edge of his shoulder to the other shoulder, each leg as thick as a normal man’s torso at the thigh. ➥height: 9′2″ ➥hair color: Bright, sunny orange fading steadily to a dark bloody crimson as it curls up at its fringes ➥eye color: Gold ➥body modifications: Some traditional tattoos on his back. ➥scars/birthmarks: Born with a mark on his forehead, would accumulate countless scars across his entire body over the millennia, eventually his chest would be almost naught but scar tissue. Some of the most notable include a massive lichtenberg figure climbing up his arm and over his shoulder down over the right shoulder plate ➥powers/abilities: A great many. From neigh invulnerability to teleportation to lightning like speed, creation of servants and revival of beasts, sight across countries and curses that kill gods, he is not to be trifled with. ➥restrictions:  Pride is a great limiter, as is a sense of honor. For more physical restrictions he is unable to track everything, even with all his power he is, to some degree, a human. His power comes from his soul, if his soul is weakened, his connection to the Triforce strained, his energy worn down, he can be banished and imprisoned or, in some cases, even killed. The Demon King is not an easy opponent to bring down and often requires multiple people to challenge. ➥physical or mental illnesses: N/A I give descriptions of what he thinks and how he thinks, never prescriptions. ➥addictions: N/A

♡ THE JUICY STUFF ♡

➥vice: lust / greed / gluttony / sloth / pride / envy / wrath ➥virtue: chastity / temperance / charity / diligence / forgiveness / humility / kindness ➥religion: Originally the Gerudo religion which I have yet to give a name for but is a worship of ancestors and what Hylians would call the Sand Goddess. He still mostly believes in the ancestors and spiritual aspects but long came to understand who were and weren’t gods and that he had disagreements with them. ➥alignment:  lawful / neutral / chaotic || good / neutral / evil NO. Bad system, divides morality into absolutes and ignores subtleties. Always hated that system except when I can manipulate it like having a lawful good character that goes to the extreme and slaughters people on suspicion. ➥hogwarts house: I have never cared about Harry Potter besides enjoying John Williams and being forced to watch it despite not liking it. ➥element: This is such a broad thing, what element system of belief? Like the fire/ice/earth/wind version? Fire I suppose. Does it include “Darkness” and what does darkness entail in this variant? Far too vague a question.

REPOST. DON’T REBLOG.

Tagged by: Stolen from @cartoonlonk Tagging: I dunno whoever feels like it and is reading this.