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#if I were ever to make another chart for a different Gen it would probably be the kiddads but just how I interpret the ships between them
macksartblock · 2 months
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Could you explain the Homestuck chart please?
Yes I can but it will be a long one so buckle in lol
So explaining the makeup of this chart for those who have never learned about the quadrants or maybe need a refresher.
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First it’s important to note that A) the quadrants are from a violent alien society and are meant to reflect/balance that out B) the line between quadrants can often blur.
So if some things seem weird that’s probably why.
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Red rom focus on positive emotions while black rom focuses on the negative. Along with that, concupiscent quadrants prioritize passion/attraction while conciliatory quadrants prioritize soothing/comforting.
Matespritship (♥️) is the closest to a typical human romantic relationship. This is the lovey dovey corner. The one that’s all about passion and dates and affection yada yada. It’s also the one I am least interested in bc it’s the most familiar.
Kismesitude (♠️) is the opposing romance to Matespritship. It focuses on feelings of hatred and attraction, but for it to be a true pitch relationship, there must also be respect. Think of it as an intense rivalry. A kismesis is someone who pushes your buttons. Someone who constantly challenges you forward. They are the person you trust to vent your aggression out towards.
It is incredibly important to know that neither member will ever want their partner to be grievously hurt or killed. They genuinely care for one another.
Moirailigance (♦️) is a frequently misinterpreted relationship. Many people see it as the BFF corner, but it is much deeper than that. Think more similar to a queer platonic relationship. Moirails are each others safeguard. They care deeply for each others physical, mental, and emotional well-being.
This is the person you go to when you’re having a horrible day. This is the person who will drop everything to take care of you when sick. This is the person who’d lay their life down for you if someone threatened you.
It’s also often moirails will show affection through physical means (ex: hugging, holding hands, cuddling, chaste kisses in some dynamics).
Auspisticism (♣️) is often the most neglected romance. Despite this it is incredibly important. This quadrant involves three members. Typically a feuding pair and a mediator - known as the auspistice. This third party is the person who provides advice when the couple are struggling in their dynamic.
They will deescalate feuds that may be going to far. They will step in to prevent serious injury. They will calm the pair down, provide them with new perspectives on whatever’s troubling them.
TLDR: hearts are for lovers — spades are for rivals that kiss — diamonds are for soulmates who aren’t quite lovers and they prefer it that way — clubs are mediators.
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guillotinna · 1 year
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I keep seeing these Gen z is task force 141 and I wanna join
Anytime you use a computer, you do that stupid movie hacker trope of exaggerated typing and say "I'm in"
Saying "POV" in front of sentences
In the group chat saying "1 like and I'll kms", liking your own message and then saying "damn guess I gotta"
I see a lot of these posts were Gaz and Soap would understand y/n....bffr, no those geezers would not
No one knows what the gen z kid is saying they just know it's probably not good
"You're telling me a shrimp fried this rice?"
You have a small photo you keep tucked in your chest pocket and after enough times seeing you looking lovingly at it, one of the guys asks who it is. Is it a s/o from back home? 😏😏
You say no and pull out a photo card of your fave singer and they're like ??? Really
One time during a particularly physical scuffle with the enemy, you get thrown to the ground and huff out "one hop this time" only to promptly tackle tf outta your assailant while saying "take it back now yall"
Reads everyone's zodiac charts except ghost bc he won't tell his birthday let alone the time he was born so you just make one up
Price calls a 6 am meeting to which you say "double it and give to the next person"
*Alexa, play teenagers by MCR*
If you had time describe the base, you'd say it smells like ball sweat, blood and war crimes which everyone took offense to for different reasons
Would absolutely get soaps doodles tattooed
Actually speaking of which, imagine getting caught giving yourself stick and pokes with a pen and being banned from using pens period
You'd be in a meeting with a #2 pencil
Ofc a gen z member would be absolutely feral which very little regard for their own safety much to the dismay of the others
Quoting "Oh these aren't homemade, they were made in a factory....a bomb factory......they're bombs." All the time around soap even though he has no idea what you're talking about
You don't spent too much alone time with ghost bc he likes quiet and you can't be alone with your thoughts which is why you lean more towards spending time with soap or gaz
I just like puns so I'm gonna add this but gen z love borgs (a customized gallon jug of alcohol that is usually given a name) and yours is appropriately named taskforce 1-borg-1
this is mainly for my americans but i know pretty much the whole world got beef with engl*nd: before you met Soap, you thought the entire 141 was en*lish so when you finally did meet him, you said "oh thank god" with a sigh
americans 🤝 scotts
making fun of english "people"
"Pull up in the monster, automobile gangsta With a bad bitch that came fr-" "....sergeant, comms off please"
you show Ghost WAP and he has to take a walk
*price yelling at gaz and soap*: KYLE GARRICK AND JOHN MACTAVISH GET IN HERE- Y/n: oop not the government name
Another for my US baddies: if your'e ever arguing with any of the guys, the nail in the coffin would be "and it's called soccer"
"one more like and i'll-" "enough!"
you call Price "ms. girl" and he could not be more confused
someone asks "do you serve?" and u reply "yah, serve cunt"
when asked why you decided to join the military you said something like: "well i didnt think i'd live past 18 so when I did, i ended up here".....crickets from the rest of the team
"good thing we only have showers on base because i would have already taken a toaster bath by now"
ask Gaz "no bitches?🤨" one more time see what happens
price: the enemies have taken civvies hostage and blocked off all exits and entrances to the town-" y/n: "omg tea"
Also calling price "capt. Save-a-hoe"....I wanna be saaaavvveddd ;)
If you took a shot every time you said "rest in peace to all the soldiers that died in the service, I dive in her cervix", you'd be dead lmao
When asked if they like the military they'd say "it was either this or the psych ward so yah, I'll take it"
Quoting MPGIS constantly and no one even sort of knows what that is ("Crack. Is that what you smoke? You smoke crack?")
Some detainee being interrogated is spilling some nonsense, so you hit them with "oh brother this guy stinks!" And then with the butt of your gun
"Little bad trini bitch but she mixed with China, real thick vagina, smuggle bricks to-" "SARGENT ENOUGH"
Falling asleep on team mates (minus ghost's) shoulders mostly because the most peace they get is when you're unconscious
*when y/n hears any slightly suggestive/dirty phrase*: what are we talking about 😏 (iykyk)
Same energy as: " born next to a nuclear power plant, has an IQ of 2 and was hit in the head with several Rocks as a child"
Vine quotes out the wazoo, it's just awful for the rest of the team lmao
Replying to everything with "on god?"
soap: "what are you 6?" y/n: "yah 6 inches deep in your mom".....you did not walk away from that unscathed to say the least...worth it tho
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Thoughts on everyone in the realms?
"Short Answer; I made a chart. Not a well drawn chart, mind you, but a chart. Sometimes you don't wanna put effort into drawing 50 something faces"
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"Long answer, uh....well lemme go down the list"
Claudette: My Starflower~!! She's so sweet and kind and amazing in trials and every time I see her I swoon a little- I love her so much~ Dwight: He's cute- And he's a good leader, despite his nervous personality, he knows how to bring a group together. Final guy potential. Ash: ....Don't...Tell him I said this? But uh....Evil Dead was one of my biggest comfort series, the thing that got me through losing both my parents....the thing that helped me transition, pick my name, and fueled my FX hobby. And I'm still attached, even realizing he's a real person and all- But...it's weird to just, be upfront with something like that, so I'm just...burying it as best as I can. David: He's a little rough around the edges but he’s good to have in a trial, plus when you can get past the walls, he’s nice to talk to. Kate: Her music by the campfire is calming and she’s such a sweetheart. If we were in a better situation I’d love to learn Guitar from her, but, it’s hard when you’re a moment away from a trial at any given time. Amalthea (@askthewidowstars OC): She judged my entire vibe but jokes on her I’m the one who snagged a cutie for life- Meg: If I had a dollar for every time she left me for dead I would have enough money to paint the entire campfire in solid gold. The only time we’ve ever properly talked was about SAW traps and 90% of it was her admitting she could beat every single trap because she was ‘built different’  Jeff: He’s a sweetheart and really nice to be around. Sometimes when we’re by the campfire in our downtimes I’ll let him draw on my arm. it kinda makes me want a tattoo, honestly. If we ever get out of here, I might get one. Steve: Bros!! We kinda make up team ‘Altruistic Himbo’, Plus the ‘Babysitter/Brother’ Vibes mesh really well. I kinda wanna re-style his hair though, mostly because it looks fluffy, and nice to play with.  Quentin: Bros!! We’re gonna make matching T-Shirts about committing Arson on Freddy in particular. He’s fun to hang around in our downtime, and I hope there’s a chance he can get some actual rest, even in here. He deserves it. Adam: If Dwight wasn’t the leader I feel like he’d take over the Reigns. I feel like he’s the calm type that doesn’t handle energetic types well though. Which, y’know, makes things hard.  Nea: Anytime I see her she’s either sneaking around the map and watching everyone get killed, or doing something stupid to get herself killed. I’d get grey hair if We were actually friends.  Feng: Gamer bros- I got to find out we actually played a lotta the same stuff before we were taken by the Entity. We get a chance to nerd out in between trials- Laurie: Best Final Girl hands down. I kinda hope she can teach me Decisive Strike one day- I feel like its also just a little awkward since again, still a fan of Myers Nancy: She doesn’t agree that Demo’s a good boy, which makes sense, but we but heads over it. Also I’m pretty sure she wants me dead for touching the bones around the map one too many times. They’re just too tempting.... Jake: He’s pretty quiet, but he’s helpful in trials. I heard he’s been to a convention a few times, but I don’t think he’s actually into it as much as I thought...Which kinda sucks. I’d love more cosplay buddies y’know? Yui: Kinda makes me want a motorbike. We don’t talk but she seems really cool. A little too cool to me around if that makes sense.  Yun-Jin: She benefits off of throwing everyone else under the bus. And 90% of the time she will throw everyone under the bus. Even if she needs actual help to escape the trial.  Cheryl: Cheryylll!!  She’s really cool and honestly would add her to the ‘Can kill god if she was not nerfed’ Squad. Especially since y’know, she has- I bet if we got enough of the kids together we could just beat the Entity’s ass. I know she could.  Tapp: Always been a fan of Tapp before I was taken, although I feel like he’d wanna arrest me if we weren’t in the Entity’s Realm. I might be a little too excited for my own good about Kramer’s work. I don’t think he’d believe the fact its a movie either.  Ace: He’s kinda like the Uncle of the group around the campfire, but, coming into trials, He’s still for saving his own skin- You can also only stand dad jokes for so long. Especially in an eternity like this.  Leon: He’s cool!!! I got so excited first realizing He and Jill were here, and I wanna get a chance to talk to him about everything that went down, but Haven’t got the chance. He’s nice inside of Trials though, usually doesn’t leave anyone behind. Not a fan of getting blinded though.  Jill: She knows how to lead the trials well, and I look up to her a lot. She’s always been such a badass!!  Bill: If Bill gets his hands on a weapon the entire Realm would be fucked. Badass as hell and Kinda scary. Another one on the list of ‘Entity needed to Nerf’ Felix: You’d think a Childless Father and a Fatherless son would be able to bond a bit more, but, I think we each kinda get the same vibe of homesickness from one another. He’s kind though, and it’s neat to see his work whenever we’re by the campfire.  Elodie: She’s better at helping out than most of the others, but she’s still in a survival of the fittest mindset. I loved hearing about her studies from before she was taken though. I feel like if we had more time we could dig deeper into this whole world and what its about. But we don’t get that- Zarina: We just don’t really click as much, honestly. I’d love to get to know her better but I think she’s more into digging into the killers and what she can find out about this place. Which y’know, could be better done with a team. Sage (@askthewidowstars OC): HUSBAND!!! My husband. I love him to the Moon and back. He’s amazing and I miss him even when we’re five feet apart-  ...I need a hug now-  Amanda: Best girl hands down!! We vibed a lot in between Trials talking about her traps and old designs, she was impressed by my knowledge, and we hang out in Gideon sometimes!   Ghostface: He’s pretty cute- Also fun to be around, even if he’s kind of a dick when he’s actually at work, it’s better when you’re outside of a Trial. It’s also neat to see he’s not just two idiots in a halloween costume and his own person, as much as I love the Scream Series, too-  Leatherface: Bubba!!! Honestly I’d handle being chainsawed. Fuckin Love Bubba-  Huntress: I wanna learn how to throw hatchets but I know I never will. She’s kinda scary, but also I feel like if she could adopt some of the others in the Realms, she totally would.  Oni: The only times I’ve ever really seen him is just before my skull gets bashed in. All I really have associated to him is the splitting headache.  Twins: I’m gonna punt Victor into the sun. I haven’t been good around kids beforehand and this tiny gremlin motherfucker just makes it worse.  Pinhead: I was so excited to see him!! He’s one of the few that talks more often than not in a trial, and he’s always had this air of elegance about him which makes it so much cooler! I’d be tempted to grab the box to solve it, but, at the same time Dwight’s already been hunted. I just...want to see how it works, really. Maybe if I ask nicely? Nah, probably not.  Pyramid Head: He’s so fucking COOL!!! He’s always just been really fucking cool and I still get stars in my eyes. I wanna re-create his weapon one day.  Joey: Joey’s one of the chill killers to be around, probably my favorite amongst the legion. Also Cosplay gang?? Hello? Susie: She’s cute!! I like her vibes whenever there’s not violence involved. I wonder if she’d ever get into costume making, she has the artistic eye for it. I also wonder if she’d ever dye other people’s hair...I’d kinda want green tips one day- Frank: Still wanna throw a palette at him. He’s one of the more serious of the Legion, and usually the one you’d find with a Mori. Not as Serious as Julie but only because he has the cocky god complex to go with it.  Julie:  She’s definitely the most serious out of the Legion. There’s no real rest whenever we’re in a trial against her. Scary as hell and less of a bastard than the other three.  Hillbilly: I know he deserved a lot better than this, especially after hearing more about him. I...Haven’t gotten to see much than the end of his chainsaw though.  Blight: This dude’s singlehandedly bringing back my fear of needles and I thought I lost that with HRT- Also like, dude spits up orange fuckin everywhere.  Michael: My Mans!! I always get a little excited knowing we’re up against him. It’s habit- It’s kinda weird to see him easily affected by like, palettes or flashlights though.  Spirit: She seems like she could be nice when there’s some downtime. I’m also one of the few that can understand her well enough, which probably makes things easier. I found out she’s basically my age when I survived a trial by myself. I’d hope to hang out more sometime. Nemesis: God he’s so fucking tall. Kinda surprised it was Nemesis out of everyone that could’ve been brought, and also, kinda terrified? Still am kinda terrified. I’m surprised he hasn’t just torn up an entire map yet. His zombie minions are also annoying. Wraith: All this motherfucker does is roll up to pull me off Gens and Exist as a problem. I don’t see much of him outside of a Trial. Trapper: Motherfucker Incarnate. If the Entity lets us throw hands I’m fighting him first.  Freddy: ....Gross. I liked the Nightmare on Elm Street series a lot, but...Freddy as a person? Ew. Especially this iteration.  Demogorgon: Demopuppy!! He’s a good boy and he deserves to get treats. Even if the Treats are flesh....I wonder if he likes candy though. Trickster: Pretty!! He also Gives me DIO vibes because of the Jacket and the Knife throwing...Imagine if a killer could stop time...that’d be terrifying. Deathslinger: I wanna sit down and look at his gun more but I also feel like if I ask I’d just get shot on sight. Intimidating as hell but also cool. Mary: ....Still on the very complicated ‘Ex Girlfriend that murdered me’ State. It’s hard to avoid her though. Especially since she wants to get back together since we’re stuck here. Nurse: She does not help my fear of Hospitals, honestly. While she’s easy to go up against, it’s still eugh. Plague: I really, really hate her power. The Sickness and the Vomit is just- Eughhhhh- It just hits every bad sensory issue at once.  Clown: ...I get killers are Killers and aren’t supposed to be good people but also like....Disgusting. Please Remove from the Realm. He’s just- ...Ew.  Doctor: NOPE. NO. NEVER. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.
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quakerjoe · 5 years
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"Why are people so hostile towards President Donald Trump?"
Chris O'Leary:
Before you pass my answer off as “Another Liberal Snowflake” consider that 1.) I'm an independent centrist who has voted Republican way more often in my life than Democrat, and 2.) If you want to call someone who spent the entire decade of his 20’s serving in the Marine Corps a snowflake, I’d be ready to answer the question what did you do with your 20’s?
Why Liberals (And not-so liberals) are against President Trump.
A.) He lies. A LOT. Politifact rates 69% of the words he speaks as “Mostly False or worse” Only 17% of the things he says get a “Mostly True” or better rating. That is an absolutely unbelievable number. How he doesn’t speak more truth by mistake is beyond me. To put it in context, Obama’s rating was 26% mostly false or worse, and I had a problem with that. Many of Trump’s former business associates report that he has always been a compulsive liar, but now he’s the President of the United States, and that’s a problem. And this is a man who expects you to believe him when he points at other people and says “They’re lying”
B.) He’s an authoritarian populist, not a conservative. He advances regressive social policy while proposing to expand federal spending and federalist authority over states, both of which conservatives are supposed to hate.
C.) He pretends at Christianity to court the Religious Right but fails to live anything resembling a Christ-Like Life.
D.) His nationalist “America First” message effectively alienates us and removes us from our place as leaders in the international community.
E.) His ideas on “Keeping us safe” are all thinly veiled ideas to remove our freedoms, he is, after all, an authoritarian first. They also are simply bad ideas.
F.) He couldn’t pass a 3rd-grade civics exam. He doesn't’ know what he’s doing. He doesn't understand how international relations work, he doesn’t understand how federal state or local governments work, and every time someone tries to “Run it like a business” it’s a spectacular failure. See Colorado Springs’ recent history as an example. The Short, Unhappy Life of a Libertarian Paradise And that was a businessman with a MUCH better business track record than Trump. We are talking about a man who lost money owning a freaking gambling casino.
G.) He behaves unethicaly and always has. As a businessman, he constantly left in his wake unpaid contractors and invoices, litigation, broken promises, whatever he could get away with.
H.) He is damaging our relationships with our best international friends while kissing up to nations that do not have our best interests in mind. To his question “Wouldn't’ it be great to have better relations with Russia?” The answer is Yes. But it is RUSSIA who needs to earn that, who must stop doing the things that are damaging to that relationship, or we are simply weaker for it.
I.) He has never seen a shortcut he didn't like, and you can’t take shortcuts in government. “Nuclear Option, Remove the Filibuster, I’ll change the Constitution by Executive Order…Don…what happens when you remove the filibuster and the other side retakes the majority in the Senate? Suddenly want that filibuster back? What happens if you manage to change the Constitution by Executive Order and an Anti-2A President wins the next election?
J.) He behaves and has always behaved as an unabashed racist. Yes, I’ve seen your favorite meme that claims he was never accused of racism before the Democrats…Absolutely false. Donald Trump’s long history of racism, from the 1970s to 2019 See the Central Park 5, the lawsuits and fines resulting from his refusal to lease to black tenants, the 1992 lost appeal trying to overturn penalties for removing black dealers from tables, his remarks to the house native American affairs subcommittee in 1993. The man sees and treats racial groups of people as monoliths.
K.) He is systematically steamrolling regulations specifically designed to keep a disaster like the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis from happening again.
L.) He speaks and acts like a demagogue. He sees the Legislative and Judicial branches of government as inconveniences, blows up at criticism no matter how deserved and actively tries to countermand constitutional processes, not to mention attempts to blackmail and coerce people who are saying negative things about him
M.) His choices for top positions, with the exception of Gen. Mattis, who is a gem, have been horrendous. A secretary of Education without a resume that would get her hired as a small town grammar school principal, A secretary of Energy who didn't know the Department of Energy was responsible for nuclear reserves, an EPA head whose biggest accomplishments to date had been suing the EPA on multiple occasions, an FCC head who while working for Verizon actively lobbied to kill net neutrality, and an Attorney General who thinks pot is “nearly as bad as heroin” and asked Congress for permission to go after legal pot businesses in states where it is legal. (There goes that great Republican States rights rally cry again, right? *Crickets*) An Interim AG after Firing his First AG who’s appointment is probably unconstitutional.
N.) He denies scientific fact. Ever notice that the only people you hear denying climate change are politicians and lobbyists? 99% of actual scientists studying the issue agree that it’s real, man-made and caused by greenhouse gasses. Ever notice that every big disaster movie starts with a bunch of politicians in a room ignoring a scientist's warning?
0.) He does not have the temperament to lead this nation. He is Thin Skinned, childish, and a bully, never mind misogynistic, boorish, rude, and incapable of civil discourse.
P.) He still does not understand that the words he speaks, or tweets, are the official position of 1/3 of the US government, and so does not govern his words. He still thinks when he speaks it’s good ol’ Donald Trump. It’s not. It’s the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. You have probably spread a meme or two around talking about how no president’s every word has ever been dissected before…YES, THEY ALWAYS HAVE. It’s just that every other president in our lifetime has understood the importance of his words and took great care to govern his speech. Trump blurts out whatever comes to his mind then complains when people talk about what a dumb thing that was to say.
Q.) He’s unqualified. If you owned a small business and were looking for someone to manage it, and an unnamed resume came across your desk and you saw 6 bankruptcies, showing a man who had failed to make money running CASINOS, would you hire him? He is a very poor businessman. This is a man it has been estimated would have been worth $10 BILLION more if he’d just taken what his father had given him, invested it in Index Funds and left it alone.
R.) He is President. But he refuses to take a leadership position and understand that he is everyone’s President. Conservatives complain about liberals chanting “Not my President” while Trump himself behaves as if no one but his supporters matter.
S.) He’s a blatant hypocrite. He spent 8 years bitching Obama out for his family trips, or golfing, or any time he took for himself, and what does he do? He was already on his 20th golf outing in APRIL of his 1st year in office. He constantly rants about respect for the military, yet can’t be bothered to attend the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day because of a little rain. (And that excuse about Marine One not being able to fly in the rain is HILARIOUS.)
T.) He’s a misogynist. It's not really ok in this day and age to be a misogynist, but it’s not a huge deal if you’re a private citizen. It’s a pretty big deal if you hate half the people you’re elected to lead. The disdain for women seeps out of his …whatever…. and he just can’t hide it.
U.) Face it. In any other election “Grab Em’ By the Pussy” would have been the end of that candidate’s chances. Back in the 90’s I used to marvel about how Teflon Bill Clinton was. I no longer do. The fact that he managed to slip by on that is as much a statement about how much people hate Hillary Clinton as it is about what is wrong with politics in this country right now.
V.) He has one response to a differing opinion. Attack. A good leader listens to criticism, to different points of view, is capable of self-reflection, tries to guide people to his point of view, and when necessary stands his ground and defends his convictions. Any of that sound like Trump? His default is not to Lead, its’ to attack. Scorched Earth. The Jim Acosta reaction is a good example. There was no defense of his convictions when Acosta was asking him repeated questions about his rhetoric on the caravan. His response was to attack Acosta.
W.) He takes credit for everything positive while deflecting blame for everything negative. Look at him with the Stock Market. He’s been bragging about it since day one, and to give credit where credit is due, speculation on coming deregulation early in his presidency did fuel some rapid growth, but to pretend that it’s all him, that we’re not in the 9th year of the longest bull market in history and THEN, when the standard market volatility that deregulation inevitably brings about starts to show up? Yeah. Look at yesterday. Hey! Stock Markets losing because the Democrats won! Do I need to bring out the Stock market chart for the last 10 Years again?
X.) He emboldens the worst among us. Counter-protesters are slammed into by a car while countering actual Nazi rally, and the response is there’s fault on “Both Sides” The media is at fault for a nut job sending them and Donald’s favorite targets pipe bombs. The truth is not all Republicans, not all Trump Supporters are racist, fascist lunatics. Many are just taken in by the bombastic personality and are living in an information bubble made worse by the fact that they unfollow anyone and ignore any source of information that makes them feel uncomfortable. People on the left do that too. The Biggest problem the right has right now is that the worst of the Right is the loudest and the most in your face, and the actual right, especially the Freaking PRESIDENT needs to be standing up and saying No. Those are not our values.
Y.) He seems to think the Constitution of The United States, the document that IS who we are, the document he took an oath to support and defend is some sort of inconvenience. He demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of Constitution, from believing he can alter the 14th through executive order, to thinking The free exercise clause in the first amendment somehow supersedes the establishment clause (not that he really understands either) or that the free exercise clause only applies to Christians. Or his attacks on freedom of expression and the press. He repeatedly makes it clear that if he’s read them, he does not understand Articles 1–3, and that’s something he really should have before he took the job, because they’re not going away.
Z.) I’ll use Z for something I do blame him for, but the rest of us have to carry the blame too. Polarization. This country is more politically polarized than I can remember in my lifetime. Some of you who are a few years older than I may remember how it was in the late 60’s when construction workers in New York were being applauded for beating up hippies, I think it’s pretty close to that right now, but that was before my time. And he is the cause of much of the current level polarization, but also the result. It didn't’ start with Trump. We’ve been going down this road I think since the eruption of the Tea Party in the early years of the Obama Administration. I do hope the tide turns before it gets much worse because the thing that scares me more than anything is what if that keeps going the way it has been? "
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changeling-rin · 4 years
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Oh boy! Asking time! Which Elder Scrolls races would The Boys be if they were in that world? Also love your work btw.
Upon realizing that I don’t actually know all the races for the Elder Scrolls and promptly falling down a rabbit hole of research to fix that, I now present the following:
Gen is a Bosmer, because I can’t find another good reason for him to have a giant bird as a companion.  There is also, sadly, no good equivalent for living in the sky so you know what we’re gonna roll with it.  Also, their resistance to poison and disease seems like a good prerequisite for a healer to have, you know?
Speck is a Khajiit, and he’s so good at stealth that it’s like he’s not even there.  He can make himself shrink into the shadows until you’d have a better chance of noticing a mouse than him, and sadly this is the best I can do without an actual shrinking spell.
The Four are Bretons, who had an accident with a magic spell and ended up binding themselves together - but they’ve long since stopped caring about that, don’t worry.  They have, however, stopped messing around with magic.  It’s a bit of an odd choice, given their peoples’ natural affinity for it, but given what happened the last time it’s been decided that they should probably leave well enough alone.
Mask and Ocarina are Nords, though I did consider this for Wind because of the nautical factor.  But they seem to be rounded, jack-of-all-trade types rather than specializing like a lot of the other races do, and I like how that works with the Hero(es) of Time’s characters.
Dusk is also a Bosmer, he is an absolute master with a bow.  Plus he’s got this wolf that follows him around and would do anything he says even without Command Animals.
RGBV are Redguards, and they basically specialize in fighting as a unit.  They each focus on a slightly different weapon/style and use it to cover each others’ weaknesses.  They’re a bit odd for Redguards in that they actively choose to be a unit, but whoever said they had to follow the norm?
Lore is an Imperial, which I’m choosing specifically for their Voice of the Emperor ability.  Using your words to distract and calm your enemy sounds a whole lot like Lore’s Distraction Tactics, doesn’t it?
Sketch is an Argonian, because stealth.  He and Speck are the absolute best at what they do, even if Sketch’s brand of it is a bit different.  Where Speck relies on nobody knowing he was ever there, Sketch utilizes a ‘wallflower’ approach.  Sure, you see him, but why bother paying attention?  He’s just about as interesting as that painting he’s standing next to.
Realm is an Altmer, because they have magic for days and so does he.  Now if only it would stop acting up and depositing him in random dragon’s nests.
Wind is also a Breton, because I like how their mixed ancestry plays into his mixed ancestry of being a surviving Hylian of the flood.  Also, their magecraft is off the charts and hello, weather mage here.
Steam is an Orsimer because they’re the craftsman race.  He builds his own Train, modifies it to account for any terrain, and then plows people over with it.  I am honestly relieved that there is a craftsman race because I really wasn’t sure how to categorize Steam without that.  He’s just such a tinkerer, you know?
Shadow is a Dunmer.  Gray skin, red eyes, dark elf, are you kidding me?  I couldn’t have made a better match if I’d tried.  Also they specialize in Destruction Magic and if that doesn’t sound like a house-sized bomb I don’t know what does.
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A person asked the question, "Why are people so hostile towards President Donald Trump?"
Chris O'Leary:
Before you pass my answer off as “Another Liberal Snowflake” consider that 1.) I'm an independent centrist who has voted Republican way more often in my life than Democrat, and 2.) If you want to call someone who spent the entire decade of his 20’s serving in the Marine Corps a snowflake, I’d be ready to answer the question what did you do with your 20’s?
Why Liberals (And not-so liberals) are against President Trump.
A.) He lies. A LOT. Politifact rates 69% of the words he speaks as “Mostly False or worse” Only 17% of the things he says get a “Mostly True” or better rating. That is an absolutely unbelievable number. How he doesn’t speak more truth by mistake is beyond me. To put it in context, Obama’s rating was 26% mostly false or worse, and I had a problem with that. Many of Trump’s former business associates report that he has always been a compulsive liar, but now he’s the President of the United States, and that’s a problem. And this is a man who expects you to believe him when he points at other people and says “They’re lying”
B.) He’s an authoritarian populist, not a conservative. He advances regressive social policy while proposing to expand federal spending and federalist authority over states, both of which conservatives are supposed to hate.
C.) He pretends at Christianity to court the Religious Right but fails to live anything resembling a Christ-Like Life.
D.) His nationalist “America First” message effectively alienates us and removes us from our place as leaders in the international community.
E.) His ideas on “Keeping us safe” are all thinly veiled ideas to remove our freedoms, he is, after all, an authoritarian first. They also are simply bad ideas.
F.) He couldn’t pass a 3rd-grade civics exam. He doesn't’ know what he’s doing. He doesn't understand how international relations work, he doesn’t understand how federal state or local governments work, and every time someone tries to “Run it like a business” it’s a spectacular failure. See Colorado Springs’ recent history as an example. The Short, Unhappy Life of a Libertarian Paradise And that was a businessman with a MUCH better business track record than Trump. We are talking about a man who lost money owning a freaking gambling casino.
G.) He behaves unethicaly and always has. As a businessman, he constantly left in his wake unpaid contractors and invoices, litigation, broken promises, whatever he could get away with.
H.) He is damaging our relationships with our best international friends while kissing up to nations that do not have our best interests in mind. To his question “Wouldn't’ it be great to have better relations with Russia?” The answer is Yes. But it is RUSSIA who needs to earn that, who must stop doing the things that are damaging to that relationship, or we are simply weaker for it.
I.) He has never seen a shortcut he didn't like, and you can’t take shortcuts in government. “Nuclear Option, Remove the Filibuster, I’ll change the Constitution by Executive Order…Don…what happens when you remove the filibuster and the other side retakes the majority in the Senate? Suddenly want that filibuster back? What happens if you manage to change the Constitution by Executive Order and an Anti-2A President wins the next election?
J.) He behaves and has always behaved as an unabashed racist. Yes, I’ve seen your favorite meme that claims he was never accused of racism before the Democrats…Absolutely false. Donald Trump’s long history of racism, from the 1970s to 2019 See the Central Park 5, the lawsuits and fines resulting from his refusal to lease to black tenants, the 1992 lost appeal trying to overturn penalties for removing black dealers from tables, his remarks to the house native American affairs subcommittee in 1993. The man sees and treats racial groups of people as monoliths.
K.) He is systematically steamrolling regulations specifically designed to keep a disaster like the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis from happening again.
L.) He speaks and acts like a demagogue. He sees the Legislative and Judicial branches of government as inconveniences, blows up at criticism no matter how deserved and actively tries to countermand constitutional processes, not to mention attempts to blackmail and coerce people who are saying negative things about him
M.) His choices for top positions, with the exception of Gen. Mattis, who is a gem, have been horrendous. A secretary of Education without a resume that would get her hired as a small town grammar school principal, A secretary of Energy who didn't know the Department of Energy was responsible for nuclear reserves, an EPA head whose biggest accomplishments to date had been suing the EPA on multiple occasions, an FCC head who while working for Verizon actively lobbied to kill net neutrality, and an Attorney General who thinks pot is “nearly as bad as heroin” and asked Congress for permission to go after legal pot businesses in states where it is legal. (There goes that great Republican States rights rally cry again, right? *Crickets*) An Interim AG after Firing his First AG who’s appointment is probably unconstitutional.
N.) He denies scientific fact. Ever notice that the only people you hear denying climate change are politicians and lobbyists? 99% of actual scientists studying the issue agree that it’s real, man-made and caused by greenhouse gasses. Ever notice that every big disaster movie starts with a bunch of politicians in a room ignoring a scientist's warning?
0.) He does not have the temperament to lead this nation. He is Thin Skinned, childish, and a bully, never mind misogynistic, boorish, rude, and incapable of civil discourse.
P.) He still does not understand that the words he speaks, or tweets, are the official position of 1/3 of the US government, and so does not govern his words. He still thinks when he speaks it’s good ol’ Donald Trump. It’s not. It’s the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. You have probably spread a meme or two around talking about how no president’s every word has ever been dissected before…YES, THEY ALWAYS HAVE. It’s just that every other president in our lifetime has understood the importance of his words and took great care to govern his speech. Trump blurts out whatever comes to his mind then complains when people talk about what a dumb thing that was to say.
Q.) He’s unqualified. If you owned a small business and were looking for someone to manage it, and an unnamed resume came across your desk and you saw 6 bankruptcies, showing a man who had failed to make money running CASINOS, would you hire him? He is a very poor businessman. This is a man it has been estimated would have been worth $10 BILLION more if he’d just taken what his father had given him, invested it in Index Funds and left it alone.
R.) He is President. But he refuses to take a leadership position and understand that he is everyone’s President. Conservatives complain about liberals chanting “Not my President” while Trump himself behaves as if no one but his supporters matter.
S.) He’s a blatant hypocrite. He spent 8 years bitching Obama out for his family trips, or golfing, or any time he took for himself, and what does he do? He was already on his 20th golf outing in APRIL of his 1st year in office. He constantly rants about respect for the military, yet can’t be bothered to attend the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day because of a little rain. (And that excuse about Marine One not being able to fly in the rain is HILARIOUS.)
T.) He’s a misogynist. It's not really ok in this day and age to be a misogynist, but it’s not a huge deal if you’re a private citizen. It’s a pretty big deal if you hate half the people you’re elected to lead. The disdain for women seeps out of his …whatever…. and he just can’t hide it.
U.) Face it. In any other election “Grab Em’ By the Pussy” would have been the end of that candidate’s chances. Back in the 90’s I used to marvel about how Teflon Bill Clinton was. I no longer do. The fact that he managed to slip by on that is as much a statement about how much people hate Hillary Clinton as it is about what is wrong with politics in this country right now.
V.) He has one response to a differing opinion. Attack. A good leader listens to criticism, to different points of view, is capable of self-reflection, tries to guide people to his point of view, and when necessary stands his ground and defends his convictions. Any of that sound like Trump? His default is not to Lead, its’ to attack. Scorched Earth. The Jim Acosta reaction is a good example. There was no defense of his convictions when Acosta was asking him repeated questions about his rhetoric on the caravan. His response was to attack Acosta.
W.) He takes credit for everything positive while deflecting blame for everything negative. Look at him with the Stock Market. He’s been bragging about it since day one, and to give credit where credit is due, speculation on coming deregulation early in his presidency did fuel some rapid growth, but to pretend that it’s all him, that we’re not in the 9th year of the longest bull market in history and THEN, when the standard market volatility that deregulation inevitably brings about starts to show up? Yeah. Look at yesterday. Hey! Stock Markets losing because the Democrats won! Do I need to bring out the Stock market chart for the last 10 Years again?
X.) He emboldens the worst among us. Counter-protesters are slammed into by a car while countering actual Nazi rally, and the response is there’s fault on “Both Sides” The media is at fault for a nut job sending them and Donald’s favorite targets pipe bombs. The truth is not all Republicans, not all Trump Supporters are racist, fascist lunatics. Many are just taken in by the bombastic personality and are living in an information bubble made worse by the fact that they unfollow anyone and ignore any source of information that makes them feel uncomfortable. People on the left do that too. The Biggest problem the right has right now is that the worst of the Right is the loudest and the most in your face, and the actual right, especially the Freaking PRESIDENT needs to be standing up and saying No. Those are not our values.
Y.) He seems to think the Constitution of The United States, the document that IS who we are, the document he took an oath to support and defend is some sort of inconvenience. He demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of Constitution, from believing he can alter the 14th through executive order, to thinking The free exercise clause in the first amendment somehow supersedes the establishment clause (not that he really understands either) or that the free exercise clause only applies to Christians. Or his attacks on freedom of expression and the press. He repeatedly makes it clear that if he’s read them, he does not understand Articles 1–3, and that’s something he really should have before he took the job, because they’re not going away.
Z.) I’ll use Z for something I do blame him for, but the rest of us have to carry the blame too. Polarization. This country is more politically polarized than I can remember in my lifetime. Some of you who are a few years older than I may remember how it was in the late 60’s when construction workers in New York were being applauded for beating up hippies, I think it’s pretty close to that right now, but that was before my time. And he is the cause of much of the current level polarization, but also the result. It didn't’ start with Trump. We’ve been going down this road I think since the eruption of the Tea Party in the early years of the Obama Administration. I do hope the tide turns before it gets much worse because the thing that scares me more than anything is what if that keeps going the way it has been? "
//Meanwhile, I’m not a Liberal either, and I’m a veteran of 20 years with 13 deployments to combat zones.//
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kpoptimeout · 4 years
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Top 20 Most Underrated K-Pop Songs of the Decade (2010-2019) PART 2
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The 2010s has come and gone before we knew it.  
Continuing with the K-Pop Timeout Tradition (see 2018 Ver) of listing the Top 10 Most Underrated K-Pop Songs because all the other sites are just bothered with the Top 10 that pretty much everyone will have heard of/have fan wars over, below we have created a list of the Top 20 Most Underrated K-Pop Songs of the Decade because 10 spots is not enough to cover the amount of talent slept on.
For these reasons, we have listed 10 of them here in PART 1 and will list an additional 10 in here. This is in alphabetic order NOT in the order of awesomeness because all of them are awesome. Also, all MVs are linked in the song titles because Tumblr won’t let me share that many videos in one post.
Rainbow “Sweet Dream” (2011)
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The younger sister group of DSP Media’s highly successful 2nd gen girl group KARA, Rainbow never received much attention at all in comparison, never having received any music show wins since their debut in 2009. While this may be a result of DSP’s mismanagement (e.g. changing the girls’ concept from edgy to cute all of a sudden mid-way in their career and chucking them to promote in Japan before they have a solid domestic fanbase), it was never because of the quality of Rainbow’s music. Even K-Pop critics would agree that their 2011 comeback “A” is an all-time K-Pop classic. However, we would like to bring attention to “Sweet Dream”, because it is one of the best Rainbow songs ever and even more underrated than most of the songs in Rainbow’s already highly underrated repertoire. Following powerful poppy tracks like “A” and “Mach”, Rainbow appeared to be developing a style completely unique of their own in “To Me” and it reached fruition in “Sweet Dream”. It was not just poppy and powerful but showed emotional depth and the beautiful harmonies of the girls. While the girls have all left DSP Media, the girls are super close and they have chosen not to disband, thus becoming the only 2nd gen girl group still active with the full original lineup. The members even self-funded their 10th-anniversary comeback this year. If you love to support beautiful music and an even more beautiful friendship, listen to “Sweet Dream”!
RANIA “Just Go” (2013)
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Newer K-Pop fans would probably just know RANIA for Alex’s brief stint in the group and making it the only girl group to ever had a Black member on its lineup. But even before Alex joining the group, RANIA had been known for breaking barriers in the conservative K-Pop industry. Their debut song “DR Feel Good”, which was originally written for Lady Gaga, was seen as too sexy by the Korean public when all they did was wear leather, get low and hair flip a lot. Their later songs continue to be powerful and amazing but it appeared that the public just chose to always label them as the “too sexy” group. “Just Go” is an example of their brilliance that the K-Pop industry was just not ready for at the time. “Just Go” is a party track carried by extremely song vocals and creative choreo where the girls interact a lot with the back dancers. The girls also wore lace full-body suits, leather jackets and actual pantsuits in different scenes throughout the MV. The song exudes so much BDE before BDE even existed as a term. If you want a confident girl group power anthem, “Just Go” is the song for you.
The SEE YA “Be With You” ft. SPEED’s Taewoon (2012)
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The SEE YA was MBK Entertainment’s (formerly Core Contents Media) first ballad group after the highly successful Davichi. While Davichi is more of a pop ballad group, The SEE YA being technically a reboot of the RnB group SeeYa went for a darker sound. Their typical sound is encapsulated in their debut song “Be With You” ft. SPEED’s Taewoon, which had lovely harmonisation and also piercing high notes. The vibe of the song simply tugs at your heartstrings like a beautiful melodrama OST. Even the MV itself is a melodrama. MBK really should have promoted the group’s own music more instead of doing lots of cross-group collaborations so more people recognised The SEE YA’s own unique sound. While The SEE YA has disbanded in 2015, their music lives on as extremely underrated masterpieces. If you love dramatic ballads and K-Drama OSTS, you should check out “Be With You”!
SPEED “That’s My Fault” ft. Davichi’s Minkyung (2013)
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Another talented group that unfortunately disbanded in 2016 due to MBK Entertainment’s poor management, SPEED is an exceptionally talented group that deserved so much better. Some K-Pop fans may know SPEED for their crazy choreography on heelys, but not as many know them for their vocal and rap talent. SPEED’s debut song “That’s My Fault” ft. Davichi’s Kang Minkyung is one of the rare male idol debuts that was super melodramatic and also pays homage to real historical events. The MV depicts teen love that slowly blossoms in the backdrop of the 1980s Gwangju Democratization Movement of South Korea which ended up with 144 civilian deaths, featuring the acting of Ji Changwook, Park Boyoung, A PINK’s Naeun and Ha Seokjin. For a rookie group to have the skill and emotional depth to convey such a song is rare and there are not even that many veterans groups that have made songs honouring historical events and tragedies. These qualities make it one of the most underrated songs of the decade. If you like songs that pay homage to historical events, you should check out SPEED’s “That’s My Fault”!
SPICA “Russian Roulette” (2012)
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When discussing extremely talented but underrated K-Pop girl groups, SPICA would definitely be brought up in such a conversation. The members are all amazing and powerful vocalists with a lot of attitude. Even the visual member, Jiwon, was hitting the whistle register. It is unfortunate that the group was consistently slept on and disbanded in 2017 (although member Bohyung has teased at a possible reunion). It is not an overstatement to say powerful vocal girl groups like SPICA walked so groups like MAMAMOO today can run. “Russian Roulette” is their debut song but it is already K-Pop gold - it showcases every member’s vocal skills and different ranges. The whistle loop in the chorus is also super addictive and memorable. So if you love vocal-heavy girl groups and their songs, you would love SPICA’s “Russian Roulette”!
Stellar “Crying” (2016)
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Mainly known for their controversial and sexual MVs, Stellar actually was a very talented group whose talent was often overlooked by controversy due to management by a company that just wanted views when their initial cute debut song “Study” did not generate enough attention. When the group disbanded in 2018, members revealed in interviews that they were uncomfortable with the concepts they had to do and would not have been an idol if they knew it would be like this. And really the company should have allowed the girls more opportunities to do concepts they enjoyed and to showcase their abilities. “Crying” is an example of Stellar’s actual stellar talents - it includes beautiful vocals and harmonies as well as some fun laid-back rap. This addictive summer track would have dominated charts if it was sung by less controversial and already established acts like Son Dambi, After School, AOA or SISTAR. If you love a good summer bop, this is the song for you!
Sunnyhill “Midnight Circus” (2011)
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How often do you see a K-Pop song critiquing the harsh realities of the K-Pop industry? Rarely. And Sunnyhill’s “Midnight Circus” is one such song. With the co-ed group donning the concept of a being a dark circus troupe, the song compares the K-Pop industry to that of a circus, where people are forced to perform in dangerous conditions often against their will or in ways they are not interested in. Such insights still ring true today with idols being constantly hurt in poor working conditions or suffering immense and often fatal amounts of stress from public scrutiny. The song itself also draws heavily from instrumentals one would associate with a circus - accordion riffs, heavy usage of the fiddle and also brass instruments. The singing is also very experimental and artsy - at times the members sing like they are speaking dramatically on stage, at times they are whispering ominously. The choreography is also creative and often has the members and back dancers moving like puppets controlled by the circus *cough* K-Pop industry *cough*. The fact that the remaining members of Sunnyhill are currently wallowing in obscurity and do not even have a changing room for their group’s music show comeback stage speaks volumes of how underrated they are. If you love insightful and well-executed concepts, you would be obsessed with “Midnight Circus”!
TRAX/TraxX “Escape” (2018)
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In the early 2000s, SM wanted to produce the best solo artist, the best boy band, the best boy band and the best rock band. While they achieve the first two through BoA and TVXQ, SM struggled to make CSJH and TRAX as successful. TRAX has gone through multiple concept changes over the years - from glam metal to pop-rock to ballad now in 2018, the group transitioned to EDM with the addition of DJ Ginjo and rebranding themselves as “TraxX”. A possible reason for previous failures to make TRAX succeed is how their previous styles never fully show the abilities of all members. The glam metal aspect may have helped show Jungmo’s guitar playing abilities but its unique way of singing prevents the mainstream from appreciating Jay’s vocal abilities. While pop-rock and ballad allowed more people to hear Jay’s vocal colour and wide range, it also limited Jungmo’s ability to show his guitar skills. This 2018 comeback is phenomenal and SM should have really promoted “Escape” better - finally with EDM Jay’s godly vocals and Jungmo’s rock guitar skills are unleashed in a way never seen before in K-Pop. While there has been an increase in EDM use in K-Pop this decade, no other K-Pop song has incorporated the genre into K-Pop as well as this song, which also throws in rock. If you love an amazing genre-blender, “Escape” is the song for you!
TOPPDOGG “TOPDOG” (2014)
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After BLOCK B’s exit from Stardom Entertainment, the label invested heavily in TOPPDOGG, aiming to make it the Super Junior of Hip-Hop. Honestly, the company should have just marketed TOPPDOGG as the group with the hardest and most diverse rap line in K-Pop because up to this day there is still not a group with as many different and talented rappers. The group had 5 amazing rappers. They also did not lack in vocal talent at all. However, the group never took off and members started to leave to pursue careers elsewhere and the 5 remaining members have rebranded themselves as XENO-T in 2018. “TOPDOG” should have been the song that made TOPPDOGG a household name but somehow it did not. The song was powerful but not a regular powerful boy band track. Sampling Mozart's “Symphony No. 25 in G Minor”, which Mozart wrote when he was only 17, the group hoped to portray the abilities of genius youth and they really did by adding their own electronic and hip-hop flair to the orchestra piece. Even the choreography and MV goes hard and would look futuristic even today with the top-notch CGI. It is definitely one of the best K-Pop tracks of this decade that has yet to be replicated. If you are a fan of dramatic boy band bops, “TOPDOG” is the song for you!
ZE:A “Ghost of the Wind” (2013)
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ZE:A, like Nine Muses, never reached their full potential under the management of Star Empire Entertainment, a label which only seems to be able to make 1-3 members of a group into superstars while keeping the whole group itself in nugudom. ZE:A had many amazing tracks but “Ghost of the Wind” is arguably the best of ZE:A and also one of the best K-Pop songs of the decade. The orchestral strings provide the song with a grand and classy atmosphere that also has a sense of urgency. This is complemented well by the theatrical choreography that the members all nailed and the belting of high notes by not one but three members. Yet somehow this song charted poorly when it was promoted and the group is now currently in an indefinite hiatus while members are all pursuing solo careers in different industries from music to even mixed martial arts. If you love an orchestral and grand boy band song, check out “Ghost of the Wind”!
Which K-Pop songs do you think were underrated throughout the decade? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below and let the song sharing begin!!!
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myworld50 · 5 years
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A person asked the question, "Why are people so hostile towards President Donald Trump?"
Chris O'Leary:
Before you pass my answer off as “Another Liberal Snowflake” consider that
1.) I'm an independent centrist who has voted Republican way more often in my life than Democrat, and
2.) If you want to call someone who spent the entire decade of his 20’s serving in the Marine Corps a snowflake, I’d be ready to answer the question what did you do with your 20’s?
Why Liberals (And not-so liberals) are against President Trump.
A.) He lies. A LOT. Politifact rates 69% of the words he speaks as “Mostly False or worse” Only 17% of the things he says get a “Mostly True” or better rating. That is an absolutely unbelievable number. How he doesn’t speak more truth by mistake is beyond me. To put it in context, Obama’s rating was 26% mostly false or worse, and I had a problem with that. Many of Trump’s former business associates report that he has always been a compulsive liar, but now he’s the President of the United States, and that’s a problem. And this is a man who expects you to believe him when he points at other people and says “They’re lying”
B.) He’s an authoritarian populist, not a conservative. He advances regressive social policy while proposing to expand federal spending and federalist authority over states, both of which conservatives are supposed to hate.
C.) He pretends at Christianity to court the Religious Right but fails to live anything resembling a Christ-Like Life.
D.) His nationalist “America First” message effectively alienates us and removes us from our place as leaders in the international community.
E.) His ideas on “Keeping us safe” are all thinly veiled ideas to remove our freedoms, he is, after all, an authoritarian first. They also are simply bad ideas.
F.) He couldn’t pass a 3rd-grade civics exam. He doesn't’ know what he’s doing. He doesn't understand how international relations work, he doesn’t understand how federal state or local governments work, and every time someone tries to “Run it like a business” it’s a spectacular failure. See Colorado Springs’ recent history as an example. The Short, Unhappy Life of a Libertarian Paradise And that was a businessman with a MUCH better business track record than Trump. We are talking about a man who lost money owning a freaking gambling casino.
G.) He behaves unethicaly and always has. As a businessman, he constantly left in his wake unpaid contractors and invoices, litigation, broken promises, whatever he could get away with.
H.) He is damaging our relationships with our best international friends while kissing up to nations that do not have our best interests in mind. To his question “Wouldn't’ it be great to have better relations with Russia?” The answer is Yes. But it is RUSSIA who needs to earn that, who must stop doing the things that are damaging to that relationship, or we are simply weaker for it.
I.) He has never seen a shortcut he didn't like, and you can’t take shortcuts in government. “Nuclear Option, Remove the Filibuster, I’ll change the Constitution by Executive Order…Don…what happens when you remove the filibuster and the other side retakes the majority in the Senate? Suddenly want that filibuster back? What happens if you manage to change the Constitution by Executive Order and an Anti-2A President wins the next election?
J.) He behaves and has always behaved as an unabashed racist. Yes, I’ve seen your favorite meme that claims he was never accused of racism before the Democrats…Absolutely false. Donald Trump’s long history of racism, from the 1970s to 2019 See the Central Park 5, the lawsuits and fines resulting from his refusal to lease to black tenants, the 1992 lost appeal trying to overturn penalties for removing black dealers from tables, his remarks to the house native American affairs subcommittee in 1993. The man sees and treats racial groups of people as monoliths.
K.) He is systematically steamrolling regulations specifically designed to keep a disaster like the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis from happening again.
L.) He speaks and acts like a demagogue. He sees the Legislative and Judicial branches of government as inconveniences, blows up at criticism no matter how deserved and actively tries to countermand constitutional processes, not to mention attempts to blackmail and coerce people who are saying negative things about him
M.) His choices for top positions, with the exception of Gen. Mattis, who is a gem, have been horrendous. A secretary of Education without a resume that would get her hired as a small town grammar school principal, A secretary of Energy who didn't know the Department of Energy was responsible for nuclear reserves, an EPA head whose biggest accomplishments to date had been suing the EPA on multiple occasions, an FCC head who while working for Verizon actively lobbied to kill net neutrality, and an Attorney General who thinks pot is “nearly as bad as heroin” and asked Congress for permission to go after legal pot businesses in states where it is legal. (There goes that great Republican States rights rally cry again, right? *Crickets*) An Interim AG after Firing his First AG who’s appointment is probably unconstitutional.
N.) He denies scientific fact. Ever notice that the only people you hear denying climate change are politicians and lobbyists? 99% of actual scientists studying the issue agree that it’s real, man-made and caused by greenhouse gasses. Ever notice that every big disaster movie starts with a bunch of politicians in a room ignoring a scientist's warning?
0.) He does not have the temperament to lead this nation. He is Thin Skinned, childish, and a bully, never mind misogynistic, boorish, rude, and incapable of civil discourse.
P.) He still does not understand that the words he speaks, or tweets, are the official position of 1/3 of the US government, and so does not govern his words. He still thinks when he speaks it’s good ol’ Donald Trump. It’s not. It’s the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. You have probably spread a meme or two around talking about how no president’s every word has ever been dissected before…YES, THEY ALWAYS HAVE. It’s just that every other president in our lifetime has understood the importance of his words and took great care to govern his speech. Trump blurts out whatever comes to his mind then complains when people talk about what a dumb thing that was to say.
Q.) He’s unqualified. If you owned a small business and were looking for someone to manage it, and an unnamed resume came across your desk and you saw 6 bankruptcies, showing a man who had failed to make money running CASINOS, would you hire him? He is a very poor businessman. This is a man it has been estimated would have been worth $10 BILLION more if he’d just taken what his father had given him, invested it in Index Funds and left it alone.
R.) He is President. But he refuses to take a leadership position and understand that he is everyone’s President. Conservatives complain about liberals chanting “Not my President” while Trump himself behaves as if no one but his supporters matter.
S.) He’s a blatant hypocrite. He spent 8 years bitching Obama out for his family trips, or golfing, or any time he took for himself, and what does he do? He was already on his 20th golf outing in APRIL of his 1st year in office. He constantly rants about respect for the military, yet can’t be bothered to attend the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day because of a little rain. (And that excuse about Marine One not being able to fly in the rain is HILARIOUS.)
T.) He’s a misogynist. It's not really ok in this day and age to be a misogynist, but it’s not a huge deal if you’re a private citizen. It’s a pretty big deal if you hate half the people you’re elected to lead. The disdain for women seeps out of his …whatever…. and he just can’t hide it.
U.) Face it. In any other election “Grab Em’ By the Pussy” would have been the end of that candidate’s chances. Back in the 90’s I used to marvel about how Teflon Bill Clinton was. I no longer do. The fact that he managed to slip by on that is as much a statement about how much people hate Hillary Clinton as it is about what is wrong with politics in this country right now.
V.) He has one response to a differing opinion. Attack. A good leader listens to criticism, to different points of view, is capable of self-reflection, tries to guide people to his point of view, and when necessary stands his ground and defends his convictions. Any of that sound like Trump? His default is not to Lead, its’ to attack. Scorched Earth. The Jim Acosta reaction is a good example. There was no defense of his convictions when Acosta was asking him repeated questions about his rhetoric on the caravan. His response was to attack Acosta.
W.) He takes credit for everything positive while deflecting blame for everything negative. Look at him with the Stock Market. He’s been bragging about it since day one, and to give credit where credit is due, speculation on coming deregulation early in his presidency did fuel some rapid growth, but to pretend that it’s all him, that we’re not in the 9th year of the longest bull market in history and THEN, when the standard market volatility that deregulation inevitably brings about starts to show up? Yeah. Look at yesterday. Hey! Stock Markets losing because the Democrats won! Do I need to bring out the Stock market chart for the last 10 Years again?
X.) He emboldens the worst among us. Counter-protesters are slammed into by a car while countering actual Nazi rally, and the response is there’s fault on “Both Sides” The media is at fault for a nut job sending them and Donald’s favorite targets pipe bombs. The truth is not all Republicans, not all Trump Supporters are racist, fascist lunatics. Many are just taken in by the bombastic personality and are living in an information bubble made worse by the fact that they unfollow anyone and ignore any source of information that makes them feel uncomfortable. People on the left do that too. The Biggest problem the right has right now is that the worst of the Right is the loudest and the most in your face, and the actual right, especially the Freaking PRESIDENT needs to be standing up and saying No. Those are not our values.
Y.) He seems to think the Constitution of The United States, the document that IS who we are, the document he took an oath to support and defend is some sort of inconvenience. He demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of Constitution, from believing he can alter the 14th through executive order, to thinking The free exercise clause in the first amendment somehow supersedes the establishment clause (not that he really understands either) or that the free exercise clause only applies to Christians. Or his attacks on freedom of expression and the press. He repeatedly makes it clear that if he’s read them, he does not understand Articles 1–3, and that’s something he really should have before he took the job, because they’re not going away.
Z.) I’ll use Z for something I do blame him for, but the rest of us have to carry the blame too. Polarization. This country is more politically polarized than I can remember in my lifetime. Some of you who are a few years older than I may remember how it was in the late 60’s when construction workers in New York were being applauded for beating up hippies, I think it’s pretty close to that right now, but that was before my time. And he is the cause of much of the current level polarization, but also the result. It didn't’ start with Trump. We’ve been going down this road I think since the eruption of the Tea Party in the early years of the Obama Administration. I do hope the tide turns before it gets much worse because the thing that scares me more than anything is what if that keeps going the way it has been? "
*snagged from a friends wall:
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lemonbombsfjl · 5 years
Text
Text:
A person asked the question, "Why are people so hostile towards President Donald Trump?"
Chris O'Leary:
Before you pass my answer off as “Another Liberal Snowflake” consider that
1.) I'm an independent centrist who has voted Republican way more often in my life than Democrat, and
2.) If you want to call someone who spent the entire decade of his 20’s serving in the Marine Corps a snowflake, I’d be ready to answer the question what did you do with your 20’s?
Why Liberals (And not-so liberals) are against President Trump.
A.) He lies. A LOT. Politifact rates 69% of the words he speaks as “Mostly False or worse” Only 17% of the things he says get a “Mostly True” or better rating. That is an absolutely unbelievable number. How he doesn’t speak more truth by mistake is beyond me. To put it in context, Obama’s rating was 26% mostly false or worse, and I had a problem with that. Many of Trump’s former business associates report that he has always been a compulsive liar, but now he’s the President of the United States, and that’s a problem. And this is a man who expects you to believe him when he points at other people and says “They’re lying”
B.) He’s an authoritarian populist, not a conservative. He advances regressive social policy while proposing to expand federal spending and federalist authority over states, both of which conservatives are supposed to hate.
C.) He pretends at Christianity to court the Religious Right but fails to live anything resembling a Christ-Like Life.
D.) His nationalist “America First” message effectively alienates us and removes us from our place as leaders in the international community.
E.) His ideas on “Keeping us safe” are all thinly veiled ideas to remove our freedoms, he is, after all, an authoritarian first. They also are simply bad ideas.
F.) He couldn’t pass a 3rd-grade civics exam. He doesn't’ know what he’s doing. He doesn't understand how international relations work, he doesn’t understand how federal state or local governments work, and every time someone tries to “Run it like a business” it’s a spectacular failure. See Colorado Springs’ recent history as an example. The Short, Unhappy Life of a Libertarian Paradise And that was a businessman with a MUCH better business track record than Trump. We are talking about a man who lost money owning a freaking gambling casino.
G.) He behaves unethicaly and always has. As a businessman, he constantly left in his wake unpaid contractors and invoices, litigation, broken promises, whatever he could get away with.
H.) He is damaging our relationships with our best international friends while kissing up to nations that do not have our best interests in mind. To his question “Wouldn't’ it be great to have better relations with Russia?” The answer is Yes. But it is RUSSIA who needs to earn that, who must stop doing the things that are damaging to that relationship, or we are simply weaker for it.
I.) He has never seen a shortcut he didn't like, and you can’t take shortcuts in government. “Nuclear Option, Remove the Filibuster, I’ll change the Constitution by Executive Order…Don…what happens when you remove the filibuster and the other side retakes the majority in the Senate? Suddenly want that filibuster back? What happens if you manage to change the Constitution by Executive Order and an Anti-2A President wins the next election?
J.) He behaves and has always behaved as an unabashed racist. Yes, I’ve seen your favorite meme that claims he was never accused of racism before the Democrats…Absolutely false. Donald Trump’s long history of racism, from the 1970s to 2019 See the Central Park 5, the lawsuits and fines resulting from his refusal to lease to black tenants, the 1992 lost appeal trying to overturn penalties for removing black dealers from tables, his remarks to the house native American affairs subcommittee in 1993. The man sees and treats racial groups of people as monoliths.
K.) He is systematically steamrolling regulations specifically designed to keep a disaster like the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis from happening again.
L.) He speaks and acts like a demagogue. He sees the Legislative and Judicial branches of government as inconveniences, blows up at criticism no matter how deserved and actively tries to countermand constitutional processes, not to mention attempts to blackmail and coerce people who are saying negative things about him
M.) His choices for top positions, with the exception of Gen. Mattis, who is a gem, have been horrendous. A secretary of Education without a resume that would get her hired as a small town grammar school principal, A secretary of Energy who didn't know the Department of Energy was responsible for nuclear reserves, an EPA head whose biggest accomplishments to date had been suing the EPA on multiple occasions, an FCC head who while working for Verizon actively lobbied to kill net neutrality, and an Attorney General who thinks pot is “nearly as bad as heroin” and asked Congress for permission to go after legal pot businesses in states where it is legal. (There goes that great Republican States rights rally cry again, right? *Crickets*) An Interim AG after Firing his First AG who’s appointment is probably unconstitutional.
N.) He denies scientific fact. Ever notice that the only people you hear denying climate change are politicians and lobbyists? 99% of actual scientists studying the issue agree that it’s real, man-made and caused by greenhouse gasses. Ever notice that every big disaster movie starts with a bunch of politicians in a room ignoring a scientist's warning?
0.) He does not have the temperament to lead this nation. He is Thin Skinned, childish, and a bully, never mind misogynistic, boorish, rude, and incapable of civil discourse.
P.) He still does not understand that the words he speaks, or tweets, are the official position of 1/3 of the US government, and so does not govern his words. He still thinks when he speaks it’s good ol’ Donald Trump. It’s not. It’s the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. You have probably spread a meme or two around talking about how no president’s every word has ever been dissected before…YES, THEY ALWAYS HAVE. It’s just that every other president in our lifetime has understood the importance of his words and took great care to govern his speech. Trump blurts out whatever comes to his mind then complains when people talk about what a dumb thing that was to say.
Q.) He’s unqualified. If you owned a small business and were looking for someone to manage it, and an unnamed resume came across your desk and you saw 6 bankruptcies, showing a man who had failed to make money running CASINOS, would you hire him? He is a very poor businessman. This is a man it has been estimated would have been worth $10 BILLION more if he’d just taken what his father had given him, invested it in Index Funds and left it alone.
R.) He is President. But he refuses to take a leadership position and understand that he is everyone’s President. Conservatives complain about liberals chanting “Not my President” while Trump himself behaves as if no one but his supporters matter.
S.) He’s a blatant hypocrite. He spent 8 years bitching Obama out for his family trips, or golfing, or any time he took for himself, and what does he do? He was already on his 20th golf outing in APRIL of his 1st year in office. He constantly rants about respect for the military, yet can’t be bothered to attend the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day because of a little rain. (And that excuse about Marine One not being able to fly in the rain is HILARIOUS.)
T.) He’s a misogynist. It's not really ok in this day and age to be a misogynist, but it’s not a huge deal if you’re a private citizen. It’s a pretty big deal if you hate half the people you’re elected to lead. The disdain for women seeps out of his …whatever…. and he just can’t hide it.
U.) Face it. In any other election “Grab Em’ By the Pussy” would have been the end of that candidate’s chances. Back in the 90’s I used to marvel about how Teflon Bill Clinton was. I no longer do. The fact that he managed to slip by on that is as much a statement about how much people hate Hillary Clinton as it is about what is wrong with politics in this country right now.
V.) He has one response to a differing opinion. Attack. A good leader listens to criticism, to different points of view, is capable of self-reflection, tries to guide people to his point of view, and when necessary stands his ground and defends his convictions. Any of that sound like Trump? His default is not to Lead, its’ to attack. Scorched Earth. The Jim Acosta reaction is a good example. There was no defense of his convictions when Acosta was asking him repeated questions about his rhetoric on the caravan. His response was to attack Acosta.
W.) He takes credit for everything positive while deflecting blame for everything negative. Look at him with the Stock Market. He’s been bragging about it since day one, and to give credit where credit is due, speculation on coming deregulation early in his presidency did fuel some rapid growth, but to pretend that it’s all him, that we’re not in the 9th year of the longest bull market in history and THEN, when the standard market volatility that deregulation inevitably brings about starts to show up? Yeah. Look at yesterday. Hey! Stock Markets losing because the Democrats won! Do I need to bring out the Stock market chart for the last 10 Years again?
X.) He emboldens the worst among us. Counter-protesters are slammed into by a car while countering actual Nazi rally, and the response is there’s fault on “Both Sides” The media is at fault for a nut job sending them and Donald’s favorite targets pipe bombs. The truth is not all Republicans, not all Trump Supporters are racist, fascist lunatics. Many are just taken in by the bombastic personality and are living in an information bubble made worse by the fact that they unfollow anyone and ignore any source of information that makes them feel uncomfortable. People on the left do that too. The Biggest problem the right has right now is that the worst of the Right is the loudest and the most in your face, and the actual right, especially the Freaking PRESIDENT needs to be standing up and saying No. Those are not our values.
Y.) He seems to think the Constitution of The United States, the document that IS who we are, the document he took an oath to support and defend is some sort of inconvenience. He demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of Constitution, from believing he can alter the 14th through executive order, to thinking The free exercise clause in the first amendment somehow supersedes the establishment clause (not that he really understands either) or that the free exercise clause only applies to Christians. Or his attacks on freedom of expression and the press. He repeatedly makes it clear that if he’s read them, he does not understand Articles 1–3, and that’s something he really should have before he took the job, because they’re not going away.
Z.) I’ll use Z for something I do blame him for, but the rest of us have to carry the blame too. Polarization. This country is more politically polarized than I can remember in my lifetime. Some of you who are a few years older than I may remember how it was in the late 60’s when construction workers in New York were being applauded for beating up hippies, I think it’s pretty close to that right now, but that was before my time. And he is the cause of much of the current level polarization, but also the result. It didn't’ start with Trump. We’ve been going down this road I think since the eruption of the Tea Party in the early years of the Obama Administration. I do hope the tide turns before it gets much worse because the thing that scares me more than anything is what if that keeps going the way it has been? "
*snagged from a friends wall:
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serenephenix · 6 years
Text
... To help you
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3
…To help you
[Fandom]:Voltron: Legendary Defender
[Rating]: Gen/ Gen
[Genre]: Family, Hurt/Comfort, centers around Veronica, Marco & Lance
[Warning]: mention of very protective but ultimately supporting siblings
[Word count]:  4.800
[Status]: completed
Post season 7 – related to this post I made
[Omg help me I’m back on my shit again. After months of having been unable to write I can’t seem to stop. Have fun guys. This is suuuuuuper self-indulgent by the way. Kudos to anyone who makes it to the end.]
[Important PSA after the first comments on Ao3: No bashing the team, be it in the tags or in a reblog. Lance is not a prize to be won by either side]
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
 Once might have counted as nothing more than a fluke. A second time she might play off as a coincidence maybe. By the third time, Veronica had a sinking feeling plaguing her. After the fifth time, she had stopped counting and instead started to consider that this had to be more than a mere “fluke”.
Far be it from her to hold grudges or make hasty decisions, but the more time Veronica spent around team Voltron, the angrier she became almost every instance.
Honestly, the fact that her ire had grown enough to be noticeable even to her family was admirable in itself – there were few people that could pride themselves in having disturbed Veronica’s inner peace so profoundly that she was falling back into bad habits.
“You’re chewing on your pencil.”
She startled, taken aback by Marco’s nonchalance. She cleared her throat and demonstratively put the poor, abused tool down to recline in the uncomfortable chair they had stolen from another room down the hall so that at meals everyone had a chance to sit at the relatively small workbench that served as their table and “office” outside of office.
But the last one only truly concerned Veronica herself.
Marco was idly scrolling through something on a datapad, finger lazily dragging along the surface. Judging by his expression it had to be pictures from before the war had broken out – small glimpses of the past he had managed to take with himself on an even smaller chip he had guarded with his life. It was incredible he had ever thought of taking them with him, much less having stored them there in the first place.
The original chip still hung around his neck, attached to a sturdy necklace and protected by a plastic casing that had seen better days already. A testament to the trials and losses the journey from Cuba had brought with it.
She caught a glimpse of a picture –fairly old, since she caught her nine year old herself in the left-hand corner – and she felt something in her chest tighten as she caught sight of Abuela smiling up from an angle. Such a sweet smile, unsuspecting of all the terrible things that were to come.
There was no way that Marco had not noticed her taking off her glasses to wipe at the corners of her eyes, but he had the grace to not further comment on it.
“I miss her.”
“Me too.”
She wished she could have seen her at least one more time. Once the Galra had arrived she had not managed anything more than to text her family in a group chat, telling them to run and hide.
After communications had been cut by the invaders, there had been many nights where Veronica had lain awake, wondering, worrying, sometimes crying in the privacy of her small bathroom.
So, when she had reunited with them months later after the missions in the tunnels, the joy had blinded her to the terrible truth for a few minutes.
Knowing that her family was mostly safe and unharmed was a blessing, but as her parents sat her down and told her in soft whispers that their Abuela had suffered a stroke or heart attack during their crossing, Veronica could not stop herself from thinking that it was unfair.
One more time. What she wouldn’t give to tell her one more time that she loved her.
But it was too late, and as she rationalized (as much as it hurt), she was so much luckier than many of her friends and comrades. Many of them had no more family to return to outside of this building.
The gurgling and hiss of the faucet had Veronica looking up, watching with a small smile as Marco came back with a glass of water she accepted gladly.
“Thanks.”
Marco shrugged, corner of his mouth twitching upward a little.
He had been the one to try CPR on Abuela when it had happened. Of course he would, seeing how he had been a lifeguard at Varadero beach for a few years now. Still, it had not worked. Veronica hoped that Marco did not guilt himself over it.
Likely sensing she might ask first if he did not intervene, he pointed to her pencil, her gnawing having left clear indents in the smooth plastic: “What’s up with that?”
Veronica took a large gulp of water first, deciding if she should answer honestly.
Her mind was made-up instantly.
“Lance has been considering staying with us.”
Marco blinked at her in clear shock. His flat palm came to slap at his forehead before it started smoothing his hair back.
“Oooooh… so that’s what the whole morning crying was about.”
Veronica nodded. Neither she nor Lance had explained themselves to the rest of their family and so far she had respected that, even if Maria, Luis, Mama and Papa had needled her. They were worried and Veronica understood it all too well, but Lance was the one who needed to decide for himself when to open up about his impending choice. Today though had put a few things into perspective for her and she needed a second opinion for that, and out of all of their other family members, Marco was one of the more discrete ones. He’d know not to blab.
“I personally think he should stay.”
Marco did give her a questioning look at that but waved his hand for her to go on.
“A team should be about respect and trust. And there is nothing against teasing each other or making jokes. Even our MFE fighter pilots tend to do it,” she smiled fondly at that. One might not be able to tell, but those kids were masters of banter in their own right. According to Veronica’s own tally chart Leifsdottir and Kinkade were tied for first place, not by the amount of shots fired but by the accuracy and truthfulness of them. Griffin and Rizavi, even as a united force, stood no chance.
Veronica’s smile vanished though, as she remembered the interactions she had been privy to over the past week, where she had taken over for a communications officer that had fallen ill.
It was probably due to their late night conversation and the endless praise Lance would wax about his teammates, but what Veronica had seen and heard instantly made that cold yet blazing protectiveness resurge.
As she had concluded, team Voltron was indeed made up of wonderful individuals, unique and incredible in their own ways.
When one gave it a bit of thought, having former cadet Keith Kogane work almost seamlessly with a team felt like a fever dream. While Veronica had never personally interacted with the defiant youth back in the day, she had heard complaints from all of the staff forced to deal with him. The calm leader giving instructions over the comms was almost unrecognizable. Captain Shirogane always seemed to swell with quiet pride whenever it was pointed out.
Veronica could understand him all too well – if anyone were to talk that same way about Lance, she would likely not react any differently.
Pidge, or rather Katie Holt, was indeed just as smart as Lance had emphasized. Not that there had been any doubt about it during the briefings and strategy talks leading up to their final stand, the young woman coming up with a multitude of scenarios whenever a new element and detail was added to their plans. Veronica was all too curious about finding out just how she was processing things so quickly even without a computer handy. In regards to snark, she and Rizavi would get along wonderfully.
Hunk was the main reason they had managed to salvage many of their vehicles in the aftermath of the fight. She had yet to taste any of his cooking (which Lance reminded her daily was to die for), but what she could say was that he was a creative engineer. Just the other day, she had listened to him chatter with his friends all the while helping one of their engineering groups restarting an emergency generator for a medical facility. In the end, he and the other engineers had ended up building it from scratch, Hunk throwing in suggestion to get the most out of it. Some of these adjustment sounded downright alien - which they most likely were.
Princess Allura herself was one of the most regal and beautiful women Veronica had ever had the pleasure to meet. Which may be why she was rooting for her brother and, subsequently, liked flustering Lance with comments and remarks regarding Allura’s interest in him. But as much as Allura was a princess, she was also a kind and devoted person, one of the first to rise to coordinate the actions for reconstruction and the last to leave in the evening.
Amazing people in their own rights and yet…
“I do not think staying with team Voltron as it currently is will do Lance a lot of good in the long run.”
She looked at Marco over the rim of her glasses.
Her earnestness must have hit a nerve, since slowly Marco’s surprised expression shifted from disbelief to concern, his brow furrowing and mouth pinched.
“What makes you say that? Lance seems to like them. Can’t be that bad then, can they?”
Veronica let those words settle a little.
No, the members of team Voltron were not bad people, not by a long shot. But just as any other individuals with agency, they had their faults and made mistakes.
Allura, as Veronica had noticed, could be somewhat stubborn if she saw herself in the right.
Hunk could be dismissive of others when under pressure.
Pidge had a tendency to be unrelenting, be it in her very scientific explanations or tasks she had set herself.
Keith seemed to not always think things through entirely, sometimes getting blindsided by details that had not been discussed prior, ultimately tripping him up.
But all of these, in Veronica’s opinion, were excusable.
She needed to take a deep breath, indignation rising inside her like bile. It was not helpful or necessary at the moment. She needed to keep a clear head. Marco’s judgement need not be clouded by her feelings.
“Did you know that when you are in a relationship long enough, you become deaf to certain things being repeatedly said, both parties no longer noticing it even happens?”
Marco gave a cough that soon turned into full-blown laughter.
“Tell me about it. Marta would never shut up about me messing with her nifty system for all of our clothes,” his expression lost a bit of its mirth. Veronica could only guess that he was mentally revisiting the rooms of a house that was probably destroyed like much else on Earth, “After a while, it just became a running gag. Heh, even the kids were getting a laugh out of it.”
“Exactly.”
He started at her sudden interjection, at the harshness in her voice as she gripped the glass she was still holding with a little more force.
She took another deep breath as Marco slowly came closer, taking with him his chair with protesting screeches from chair legs dragging across the floor.
Once sitting, he leaned forward, crossed arms resting on the table’s surface, face grim.
“What’s going on?”
Veronica raised her left hand, elbow still on the table and started massaging her temple with her thumb. The pain when she pressed just the right spot was distracting enough to calm her.
“I’ve been dealing with communications for a while now, to help with coordinating the reconstruction efforts. Ever since Lance told me about wanting to quit, I might have paid more attention to him and his team, however subconsciously,” her lips twitched but there was nothing funny about all of it, “And this past week, since taking over for officer Anatoly, I’ve been in charge of communicating them their tasks. For that, I’m on the comms constantly and I hear everything that’s going on.”
She took off her glasses, putting them in front of her, wiping at her tired eyes. The screens were doing them little good.
Marco was kind enough to wait, even went to refill her glass and Veronica thanked him for it.
“I cannot tell you how many times Lance has been treated as ‘dumb’ in this one week alone.”
Marco’s stared at her open-mouthed, indignation making his shoulders hunch and his brow furrow so deeply that Veronica was almost afraid the resulting wrinkles would be permanent.
His mouth closed with an audible clack that had both of them wincing, but it did obviously not quell Marco’s anger.
“All of them?” He merely asked, and suddenly Veronica was no longer sure this had been such a good idea.
She put a firm hand on his shoulder, felt him tremor slightly under it.
“Not all of them.”
It still did not seem to appease him.
“What about his commanding officer? Shouldn’t he intervene?”
Veronica resisted the urge to suck in her lips, thinking back to all of the instances where Captain Shirogane had indeed intervened when the team’s discussions went too far off topic for them to still be entirely concentrated on their tasks.
Her heart felt heavy.
When words failed her, she merely shook her head.
“Just as I said: you become deaf at some point.”
The chair went crashing down as Marco surged to his feet, stomping towards the door, and it took all of Veronica’s strength and weight to stop him as she latched onto his wrist with both her hands.
He turned on her sharply, his eyes ablaze with fury and Veronica was so, so glad that she was not at the receiving end of that raw fury.
“This solves nothing,” she reminded him, her voice calm while everything inside her was anything but.
Marco tried to unlatch her, but if he thought her training was for nothing then he was sorely mistaken.
“MY BROTHER DID NOT GO TO WAR TO BE CALLED DUMB!”
His voice boomed through the confined space and Veronica was beyond thankful that right now everyone else was still gone, that luckily it was just them here.
Marco gave another shot at throwing her off, but just as with the first time, Veronica stood her ground, digging the heels of her shoes into the floor.
“I agree with you, I do,” she amended, voice growing louder at the last few words as Marco still resisted, “But antagonizing the people he looks up to and loves is not going to help him!”
Because her brother had told her as much. Shortly after their heart-to-heart, Lance had repeatedly come to her when he could not sleep. As far as Veronica could guess, the impending decision was robbing Lance of sleep. As if recurring nightmares he refused talking about were not already doing a fine job of it. On one of those nights, as Lance had heavily leaned into her side with drooping eyes, he had whispered about the time he had spent hunting coins in a mall’s fountain to get Pidge some retro console from Earth. He had fondly whispered of Keith’s cluelessness about simple cheers, mentioned Hunk and Pidge’s reprogrammed Paladude, a gaming session with Coran and their team leader (and Lance still refused to tell her why he had suddenly been crying at that one), or how Allura had helped him train with a cool sword he had yet to show Veronica.
Lance, undoubtedly, loved his team just as much as he loved them. And Veronica did not doubt that if she asked the team, they would likely call Lance their friend. That did not mean however, that they were properly showing their appreciation.
Veronica would be lying if she said that none of their own family had never called Lance a ‘brat’ or a ‘dumbass’ on occasion. Because Lance, for all of his helpfulness and sweetness, could be a pain to be around. Still, at the end of the end of the day and after every sibling squabble, there never had been any doubt that they loved and supported him.
And as she had observed recently, Lance had very much mellowed out and matured during his stay in space.
Which was why she agreed with Marco’s statement but could not allow her very loyal older brother to hunt down any perceived offenders on Lance’s behalf.
Lance did not need added conflict in his life, and Veronica would not forgive herself if she were to become the source of it.
Marco gave a huff but remained still, face turned to the closed door leading to the hall.
Veronica seized her chance.
“I want Lance to be happy. I promised him that I would respect his decision no matter what. And there might be a chance that Lance does want to go back out there. You’ve noticed as well, right?”
The way Lance would sometimes look out at the night sky, tiny dots of light reflected in his eyes as he gazed out with a longing that was far beyond any of their understanding. It was the core of Lance’s conflict.
He had seen space and its wonders, was enticed by it like those old sailors by the sirens’ calls, but just like the legendary Odysseus, her brother was tired and weary just like most of his friends.
And if Veronica had to guess, there was a good amount of loyalty involved in Lance’s indecisiveness.
Loyalty to his friends.
Loyalty to his duty as a defender of the universe.
Loyalty to their family.
Marco was growing less tense under her touch, allowing Veronica to let go with one hand to cover her eyes.
“If Lance wants to go back out there, I will let him,” her voice dropped to almost a whisper, “but I do not want him to be stuck with people that will inevitably bring him down.”
There was pressure building behind her eyes.
“I don’t want to lose him too.”
Barely a minute ago, she had held onto her brother to stop him from leaving, and the next she found herself enveloped in a bone crushing hug.
They held onto each other for a long time, Marco drawing back first as he gave her an apologetic smile.
“Is there any way to fix this mess?”
Veronica had given it some thought over the past few days. The conclusion she had come to was daunting.
“I think the first thing that needs to be done is addressing the issue. At this point, I’m afraid that Lance will try to rationalize it.”
When they had been younger, Lance tended to do that a lot. He might grow angry if someone treated him unfairly, but in the end he would always find a way to explain it away. Usually the common nominator was Lance himself. In an educational environment, it had sometimes saved Lance’s behind, since he’d end up applying himself more for upcoming tests.
But this was not school, and this was not merely tests they were talking about.
Veronica loathed to think what conclusions her might already have or might come to in the future, should a mission go wrong.
Marco gave a groan next to her, knowing all too well what his sister was referring to.
“What’s more is that Lance is not doing himself any favors. I’m talking about dismissing input that is too complex for him and shutting down attempts to simplify it.”
Because she had heard it herself. Usually it was Pidge, sometimes the Altean advisor that Lance would shut down the moment they went to explain a given topic in depth. At this point, it also no longer mattered whether this behavior was the origin or the result of the team’s perception of Lance.
“You called?”
Marco froze at the voice sounding from the door they had not heard opening, and Veronica felt any hope of formulating a plan of attack fly out of the window.
Marco turning around allowed them to look at Lance who stood in the entrance, head cocked to the side and holding out a generic white plastic bag.
Lance’s eyebrow was drawn up, giving both of them a very questioning look.
His expression was enough to tell them he had undoubtedly heard that last part.
This was not how she wanted this conversation to happen, but if they did not tackle this at once it would only lead to misunderstandings.
Marco was ready to stammer his way through a lie, she could practically hear the gears turning frantically inside his skull, and she decided to intervene at once.
“Actually, yes,” she gestured at the table with a placating smile, faltering a little when she noticed the chair still lying on the ground. That detail did not escape Lance’s notice and he frowned all the harder for it.
This was not going as planned.
Lance needed to be as relaxed as possible. She needed a distraction.
“What do you have there?” She asked, glancing at the plastic bag still dangling from Lance’s wrist. He appeared taken aback by her sudden interest, but a genuine, excited smile spread on his face.
“Oh! Yeah, this is from Hunk. I asked him if he could cook something for you guys, since none of you believe me he’s a good cook.”
He was bouncing over to the area where the plastic plates and cutlery were stored and Veronica watched a little helplessly as Lance set the table for the three of them while Marco quietly put the chair back in its place.
He looked so happy, pouring water into an electric kettle while dumping a few spoonful of a powder substituting coffee into three mugs.
She wanted this to last. She wanted for Lance to smile like this more often, to be happy and not worry about leaving people behind.
Once everything was set for the three of them, Lance saying he hoped the others would come soon, he finally wrangled out an inconspicuous hot pink bowl out of the bag. The moment he removed the lid, Veronica could feel her mouth water.
“Are those...,” Marco started, voice almost an awed whisper.
Lance’s grin was almost reaching his ears: “Yep!”
There was no mistaking it. Veronica would recognize one of her favorites from a mile away.
She knew she was gaping in a very undignified way but…
“How?” she breathed, taking one of the looped pastries between her fingers, inspecting it with wonderment.
“Don’t ask me. I have no idea how Hunk still managed to cook half of the stuff we ate on our trip back and still make it look like Earth food,” his expression momentarily turned into a grimace before easing into something less disgusted, “Sometimes you really don’t wanna know though.“
He shuddered a little while Marco was already biting off half of his buñuelo, slapping the table with the flat of his palm.
“This is so good,” he finally said, looking close to tears.
They laughed good-naturedly as Marco reached for a second, when his first one was still held in his other hand.
It looked and smelled a lot like the pastry they had baked back at home on special occasions. Hunk had even taken care of covering it with thin streaks of dark caramel. It was every bit as soft and tasty as it looked when she took her first bite, and she now understood Marco’s sudden outburst.
It was one of the few pieces of home she’d had in a few years.
“It’s really good,” she said, actually sniffling, making Lance laugh again.
“I know.”
They ate in silence, Lance closing the lid once they each had two (“So there is some for the others!” he had reprimanded Marco), and each taking a sip from their coffee.
Marco had been won over, obvious in how he kept pestering Lance with questions.
“Where did your friend even get all of the ingredients? Do they have a secret stash of cassava here on the base?”
“Once again: don’t ask me, ask Hunk. He can tell you.”
That had Veronica looking up, still cleaning her glasses with the hem of her shirt. Under the automated evening lights, Lance looked a little washed out. Now wonder, his day had been longer than hers, even without actually having spent that much of it outside of the base.
Now or never. She put her glasses back on, turning to Lance fully and garnering his attention at once.
“On that same matter, Lance,” and she almost did not say it, not when this would instantly break this small reprieve from their everyday lives, “you get along with your teammates, don’t you?”
For a few tense seconds it looked like she had broken Lance with her question.
His chuckles were filled with confusion and discomfort.
“What are you talking about? Of course we get along, we’re team Voltron after all.”
She could feel Marco’s nervousness as if it were her own. This was not going to be a nice conversation.
“I’m not merely asking about your cohesiveness as a team, I’m asking about your solidarity as a group of friends.”
Lance was already reclining back into his chair, his eyebrows going up as he stared at her in incomprehension, hands bracing against the edge of the table.
“Veronica, I’m really sorry, but I don’t know what you’re trying to get at.”
She was ready to retort, when Marco beat her to it.
“Are you really okay with your friends calling you dumb?”
She could not believe him. Veronica threw him a glare she hoped would melt his head off but Marco just returned hers without any remorse.
Their attention was drawn back to Lance as he waved his hands around.
“Woah, woah, hold on a tick! What’s this about? And what’s up with you anyway!” He addressed Marco directly, irritation palpable in his voice.
“This is not some kind of joke Lance,” Veronica interjected, giving her younger brother a stern look that threw him off, “You know I’ve been listening to you for a while over your channels, and I admit that I… do not entirely approve of what I’ve heard so far.”
It was more than just “not merely approving” but there was no need to rile Lance up further. If he was any bit as protective of team Voltron as he was of them, there would be no getting through to him by accusing them of anything.
Still, Lance’s eyes moved from her to Marco quickly, obviously not understanding or accepting what was happening right now.
Finally, and sadly, he leaned back with his arms crossed. She wanted to hit Marco for his blunder. This was now going to be harder than ever.
“My relationship with my team is great. What do you even mean by the stuff you heard?”
Band-aid it was then. Quick and painful.
“I am not okay with my brother being repeatedly told and treated as an idiot.”
Hurt flashed across Lance’s face at that but what really caught Veronica’s attention was a flicker of recognition in his eyes. So he was not as unaware as he pretended to be.
He swallowed dryly, hunching in on himself, his eyes shielded by his brown locks with how much he’d lowered his head.
His words were so low she almost did not catch them.
“Doesn’t matter.”
She was ready to explode from tension alone at this point.
“It does, Lance. It matters to me and everyone else!”
She had not meant to shout but this was just too much. Both Lance and Marco jerked in their seats at her outburst. The defiance he had previously shown was quickly bleeding out of Lance, as he made himself even smaller. He suddenly looked like he’d aged at least a decade.
Still, he said nothing, not in his defense nor of his friends. Just sat here with them; a tense silence consuming them all.
Marco was careful in pushing his chair away as he got up. Veronica was unsure what he wanted to do, knowing Marco he might either stay or leave to fight this battle another day.
Relief flooded her when instead of going to the door, Marco circled the table and before Lance could even react, had their brother enveloped in a tight hug. It was a little awkward, Marco having bent down his bulk to embrace Lance while the latter’s arms hovered in the air a little uselessly, blinking back at Veronica in confusion.
Marco was not really a man of words, and Veronica not someone who sprung into action easily. But maybe, with their forces combined, they might be able to get through to him.
“Lance,” she said quietly, her calm voice having her brother glance at her with his still bewildered expression, “I know you really love your friends, but that is no excuse for them to walk all over you when they hurt you. Even if they do it unintentionally.”
He was enraptured by her face, not even caring about the tears undoubtedly clouding his vision.
Time to put her cards on the table.
“I would feel better knowing that, if you go back up there again, you do it with people that respect you and your boundaries.”
There was no more holding back the tears. Lance’s entire face crumbled, one of many small sobs bursting out of him as he kept staring at Veronica pleadingly, his arms at once clinging to Marco so tightly he might leave bruises.
Not that Marco minded, Veronica could see Lance’s jacket straining a little with how tightly he was winding his arms around him.
Veronica settled with smiling at them fondly.
One step at a time while the clock kept on ticking.
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dailytechnologynews · 6 years
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GloFo 7nm: A Lost Hope
So as you may know GloFo 7nm was recently cancelled, in this article im going to analyze all of what this implies in a lot of levels but mostly on the technical one, both in short and long term
before beginning please have in mind:
1) im Spanish and my english writing might be poor, also this is by far the longest article ive ever wrote and it took me 2 and a half Hours to complete, there can be mistakes but don't be harsh pls
2) i currently own a bit of AMD stock, this means I focus on them more, but as you will see this doesn't affect my thinking
3) i link various articles in this one, i recommend you reading them for better comprehension
4) this article contains A LOT of estimates, they are based on public knowledge, if some of that knowledge turns out to be false or inaccurate the estimates based on it do the same, however they are the best that I can do, if I had more hard data I will use it. in particular, my estimates about TSMC 7nm are… weak and early, please don't complain about them, its the best I can do without more hard data
9001) WARNING: this article is LONG, the character count its literally OVER 9000!!!!
with that said lets begin
The first important question is WHY? Why did GloFo cancel their 7nm node? the answer is simple: MONEY, this quote from anandtech sums things up:
So, the key takeaway here is that while the 7LP platform was a bit behind TSMC’s CLN7FF when it comes to HVM – and GlobalFoundries has never been first to market with leading edge bulk manufacturing technologies anyway – there were no issues with the fabrication process itself. Rather there were deeper economic reasons behind the decision.
the full article is here: https://www.anandtech.com/show/13277/globalfoundries-stops-all-7nm-development
The second question is: how does GloFo 7nm compare to TSMC 7nm, because if glofo’s node was worse than TSMC's then the only loss here would be the competition, well this is absolutely not the case, GloFo 7nm was superior than TSMC 7nm, maybe by a wide margin, but this depends literally of thousands of factors, so the best that i can do is to approximate the final answer basing on all that we know first we have to know the specifics of GloFo 7nm, here is an excellent article containing them and more: https://fuse.wikichip.org/news/641/iedm-2017-globalfoundries-7nm-process-cobalt-euv/ if you read the article and understand most of it, you have my respect, but lets list the facts that we care about:
1) 55% power reduction at the same frequency
2) 40% frequency improvement at the same power
3) extremely tuned fin profiles
4) cobalt for some critical layers, improving interconnect speed and drastically reducing electromitigation, this is very important as the wall to reaching high clocks is interconnect speed
this looks extremely nice, but how does this translate into real world max clocks? Well if you assume the GloFo chart was linear then the results are very good, here is a calibration based in real data, done in the anandtech forums by /u/catmerc (thanks!): https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/next-gen-zen-2-3-starship-and-derivatives.2511914/page-3#post-39322122 you watched right: 4,6 GHz at the same power you would get 3,3 GHz on 14nm, WOW, this means that (again if the chart was linear) 5 GHz wouldn't be far fetched at all, this is probably too good and my estimations are that GloFo 7nm was a bit worse than what this chart implies, still I think 5 GHz would have been doable, but only for single core turbo, just in case: im referring to the SoC version, clocks on 7HPC would have been ludicrous
now we have to analyze how good TSMC 7nm is, this is harder to know and there is less data about this but lets do it anyway. first we have to get the advertised numbers, and those are 60% power reduction at the same frequency or 30% frequency improvement at the same power, source: https://www.anandtech.com/show/12677/TSMC-kicks-off-volume-production-of-7nm-chips, this is starting to look worse than GloFo from the first moment, however there is a big issue here: the bases are different, GloFo bases their 7nm numbers on their 14nm, and TSMC does it over their 16nm+ this makes comparison hard, I remember that TSMC 16nm clocked higher than Samsung 14nm which is the same as GloFo 14nm, but consumed a bit more and was less dense, I cant source those claims but if you look at the numbers they make sense, anyway this approach failed as a solid comparison point so lets move on, how about taking the words of their clients? Spoiler alert: worse than GloFo
Speed gains of 16% at 10 nm may dry up at 7 nm due to resistance in metal lines. Power savings will shrink from 30% at 10 nm to 10–25% at 7 nm, and area shrinks may decline from 37% at 10 nm to 20–30% at 7 nm, said Paul Penzes, a senior director of engineering on Qualcomm’s design technology team. source: https://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1333109
Arm claims that the latest 7-nm nodes will only deliver 2% to 3% more speed than the 16-nm node. “There hasn’t been much frequency benefit at all since 16 nm … wire speed hasn’t scaled for some time,” said Peter Greenhalgh, an Arm fellow and vice president of technology. source: https://www.eetasia.com/news/article/18060102-arm-announces-high-performance-laptop-cpu
so basically two clients of TSMC are saying that there are close to none clock gains on 7nm (compared to 10nm, this is important) and I know they mean TSMC and not GloFo because they both say the problem is interconnect speed which if you remember from above is one of the things GloFo 7nm improved a lot thanks to cobalt and other things, also GloFo is a much smaller fab, it was going to get into HVM later and most people were going to use TSMC anyway. So now we know TSMC 7nm isn't as good as GloFo 7nm was, but by how much? Well a little time ago I made a prediction of how Ryzen 3000 would clock on both nodes, I recently updated it to reflect that AMD will use the HPC variant: https://www.reddit.com/r/aceshardware/comments/923t76/ryzen_3000_clock_predictions/ so there is your answer, a not at all laughable 300 MHz loss, but I think you also want to know how did I get to that concussion, well… it is a bit tricky and fail prone also it has a 100mhz or higher margin of error, anyway here it goes: the base is Ryzen 7 1800X which turbos up to 4 GHz on GloFo 14LPP TSMC 16nm+ clocks higher than GloFo 14lpp but lower than 12LP, 4,2GHz is my best estimate, TSMC 10nm should give about 5% of a boost to max clocks (remember max clocks ALWAYS increase less than “performance” for high end CPUs) that gets us to >4,4 GHz, going from 10nm to 7nm should give a negligible boost of around 2% but this is just enough to put that number on 4,5 GHz, this is the number for the mobile variant, but as i discovered during the writing of this article, AMD is going to use the HPC variant which features a 7.5 track library instead of the 6 track one found in the mobile variant it also should use fater interconnects, finding how much will this variant boost clocks is again as there is EVEN LESS data on it, the only numbers that I could find are +13% perf over the mobile variant and up to 4,4 GHz speed for the sram(L* cache), cache usually is a bit slower than the CPU itself so this doesnt mean the limit is 4,4 GHz. with all of this my estimation for 7nm HPC is 4,7 GHz which is still lower than the GloFo 7nm SoC version, have in mind im being a bit cautious with this one 4,8 GHz is possible , just for laughs if we compared max clocks of GloFo 7nm HPC(IBM only) vs TSMC 7nm HPC the difference will be ~0,8GHz, LOL just LOL (the number is serious tough) as you can see this is tricky as is based on estimates over estimates, however there are some limits to how good or how bad it can clock, so while my number might (and possibly will) fail, it cant fail by much The third question is: who this affects and how does it? The answer is AMD, IBM, Intel, TSMC and maybe Samsung, so lets analyze how it affects everyone on that list
AMD: Negatively
after the previous paragraph you can see why: 300-200mhz loss its not good, but this is just the tip of the iceberg, even if GloFo continued with 7nm AMD might have chosen TSMC 7nm for ryzen 3000 because of time constraints, the really bad thing about this is that the clocks of TSMC nodes are expected to be flat until 3nm which will mean a tech change from finfet to gaafet, this means Intel has 3-4 years of wide and increasing clock leadership so the only way AMD can beat Intel’s performance in the desktop market is through big IPC increases, which are unlikely to be big enough,still AMD should be able to beat Intel in value (perf/price) by a very good margin, server and laptop market are a VERY different story and I expect AMD to do very well on those. another HUGE concern for AMD should be prices, with near zero competition TSMC can increase prices both on the short and the long term, similar to the DRAM market, this means either smaller margins for AMD or higher final product prices.
for those all reasons I did cut my personal stock price target for AMD by a BIG 20%, yes you heard right: the day before the announcement I thought AMD was going to reach a 25% (because percentages work that way) higher price than today, im not going to say what my exact price targets are but I believe AMD is going to go up from the current price, just much less than before
IBM: Negatively, VERY negatively
well.. this guys really take the worst part, basically they have no node suitable for their high-end CPUs for the foreseeable future, glofo spun off an ASIC group which is said to help port costumer designs to other nodes, the problem is that there is no high performance 7nm class node apart from intel 10nm (if they fix it)
Intel: Positively
a lot of what I said for AMD applies here in reverse, Intel basically has an assured performance lead in the desktop market over AMD, but still they will have to compete to a denser, cheaper to produce 7nm chip lineup with their 14nm one, their server market share is still posed to get lower maybe by a bog amount
TSMC: Positively, VERY positively
on the short term they get more volume and therefore revenue, and in a now 2-player game (3 if intel opens its fabs) they get the ability to increase or even pact prices
Samsung: Positively
Samsung on the short term will probably see no gains, but on the long term they might win some designs, however the big win for them is the lack of competency driving prices an therefore margins up
YOU, the consumer: Negatively
as per the points stated above you might get more expensive chips, and maybe even worse ones, cutting-edge node development is mindblowingly expensive and that maybe is an understatement, with less competition tsmc and samsung might opt to do less aggressive jumps to save a huge amount of money on RD, this remains to be seen, it may not happen, but the possibility is out there and I wont dismiss it
to end I would like to quote an excellent comment from /u/nagromo which summarizes perfectly some of my thoughts:
I was hopeful that IBM research working with them meant it would be more like "IBM 7nm, manufactured by GloFo", similar to how they've done well with Samsung 14nm. I still think there's a decent chance it really was on track, and they're telling the truth and just think they can be more profitable using their successful 12/14nm technologies instead of investing $10B+ into 7nm. I'm really disappointed to hear this. I thought it was a reasonable hope that the IBM research team would be able to achieve or approach their 40% performance, 55% power numbers. There's rumors about poor performance from TSMC 7nm. My hopes for Ryzen 3 aren't nearly as high as they were yesterday.
this article was originally wrote by me to /r/aceshardware
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aion-rsa · 3 years
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Why the PS2’s Sales Record Will Never Be Beaten
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As the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S set incredible sales paces in the midst of strange times, and the Nintendo Switch continues to exceed all sales expectations, many fans find themselves wondering whether or not any of those consoles can eventually dethrone the best-selling video game console of all-time: the PlayStation 2. 
Well, as you probably guessed based on this article’s headline, my answer to that question is “No.” The PlayStation 2’s position atop the best-selling console chart isn’t an accident and it’s not a record meant to be taken lightly. It’s arguably the one video game sales record that will never be beaten.
Here are just some of the reasons why the PS2’s astonishing 155 million unit sales record likely isn’t in danger of falling anytime soon.
PlayStation 2’s Release Date Gave It One of the Most Notable Head Starts in Console Gaming History
By November 30, 2000, gamers in Japan, North America, Europe, and Australia were able to get their hands on a PS2. The PS2’s only real competition at the time of its global release was the struggling Dreamcast (as well as previous-gen consoles), and the Xbox and GameCube wouldn’t be available worldwide until 2002. 
By the time that the Xbox and GameCube were finally released worldwide, all-time great games like Grand Theft Auto 3, Silent Hill 2, Final Fantasy X, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3, Gran Turismo 3, and Devil May Cry were already available on the PS2. What was already seen by industry insiders at the time as an incredible head start is now viewed as the kind of head start that will likely never happen again. 
PlayStation 2’s Price Set the Industry Pace
The PlayStation 2’s U.S. launch price of $299 was reasonable enough at the time ($100 more than the Dreamcast and the GameCube and the same launch price as the Xbox), but what pretty much guaranteed the PS2’s victory was Sony’s decision to drop the price of the PS2 to $199 in May 2002. 
Microsoft and Nintendo immediately responded to that price cut by dropping the prices of the Xbox and GameCube to $199 and $149, respectively. It was bad enough (for them, at least) that those price cuts came just as those consoles were properly entering the global market, but they sent a clear message to consumers everywhere that the PS2 was setting the pace of the console race. 
PlayStation 2’s DVD Player Advantage Will Never Be Replicated
It’s no secret that the PS2’s built-in DVD player was a big part of the reason why the console was so successful in those early months and years. DVD players at that time were expensive, scarce, and, rapidly becoming the must-have accessory for anyone trying to keep up with the Joneses. The PS2 simply offered one of the best ways to get one.
Years later, I’m convinced that there will never be another multimedia accessory a future console could theoretically include at launch that would have as much of an impact as the PS2’s DVD player. The technological world is just different these days, and most people just don’t have to rely on a console to get the multimedia entertainment they’re looking for. Just look at the Nintendo Switch. It’s breaking sales records and doesn’t even officially support the Netflix app.
PlayStation 2’s Backward Compatibility Was an Early “Secret Weapon”
It’s easy enough to overlook now, but anyone who owned a PS2 at launch (or around thereof) knows that the console’s backward compatibility features were almost as big of an early selling point as its DVD player. Indeed, I don’t know if the PS2 would have gotten the full advantage out of its year-long head start that it ultimately did if it weren’t for this feature. 
You never really heard anyone talk about the PS2’s mostly dry early game lineup largely because those who owned a PS2 at that time were having more than enough fun watching DVDs and playing upscaled versions of PS1 games they hadn’t yet gotten to. Of course, it wasn’t long before those great next-gen games started rolling in…
PlayStation 2’s Game Library Was One of the Most Diverse Ever
I was originally going to write one entry for the PS2’s library of games and call it a day, but when you’re talking about one of the greatest video game libraries ever assembled, it’s worth spending a little more time on what exactly made it so special. 
So far as that goes, the word I keep coming back to when describing the PS2’s lineup is “diversity.” Yes, the PS2’s popularity among Japanese developers gave it a distinct advantage (more on that later), but the PS2’s final library includes all-time great action, open-world, RPG, and horror games from developers across the world. 
When a list of the most underrated PS2 games is more impressive than a list of the best games for many other consoles, it’s hard not to argue that the PS2’s success will never be equaled or surpassed
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15 Hardest PlayStation 2 Games of All-Time
By Matthew Byrd
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15 Hardest PlayStation One Games of All-Time
By Matthew Byrd
The PS2 Was the Home of Numerous New Franchises
Every year, it felt like there was either an incredible new franchise launching on the PS2 (Devil May Cry, God of War, Kingdom Hearts, etc.) or a franchise that was using the platform’s power/popularity to firmly establish itself as one of the biggest in the industry (Grand Theft Auto, Metal Gear Solid, Silent Hill). The excitement surrounding new PS2 games wasn’t always focused on sequels but rather what kind of new experiences we were going to get next from often surprising places.
I think most gamers are still open to such new experiences, but the industry has just shifted in a way that makes it incredibly difficult for any console to boast such a consistent onslaught of truly new experiences.
PlayStation 2 Quickly Established Itself As The Ideal Third-Party Console
The PS2’s true exclusives certainly put it over the top, but the thing that impresses me most all these years later is just how much popular the platform was for most of the major third-party, multiplatform titles. Obviously, timed exclusives like the GTA games were pretty much soft PS2 exclusives in the minds of many, but even franchises like Madden sold significantly more units on the PS2 than anywhere else. 
This is one element of the PS2’s success Sony has certainly tried to replicate over the years. They understand that once you get that momentum going and convince people that your console is the best place to go for games they could technically get elsewhere, then you’ve most likely got a hit on your hands. 
The PlayStation 2 Had Little True Competition
Before you go running to the comments section, let me make it clear that I actually love the Xbox, GameCube, and Dreamcast. I think that’s one of the best console generations ever from a pure software quality perspective, and, in a perfect world, you would have owned every console and a great gaming PC as well. 
Yet, the PS2’s immediate competition just couldn’t replicate (or offer a consistently viable alternative to) what Sony’s console brought to the table. Microsoft had almost no Japanese developer support, Nintendo alienated so many third-party companies, the Dreamcast died out, and PS2 owners ultimately ended up with exclusive (or early) access to many of the generation’s best games. The PS2 just offered a little bit of everything. 
The PlayStation 2’s Longevity Was Stunning
Even if you tell yourself that the PS2 “died” when the PS3 was released in November 2006, that still means that the console enjoyed an incredible run of six strong years. However, most people know the PS2 didn’t really go anywhere until much later than that. 
The PS3’s weak launch, the novelty of the Wii, and the Xbox 360’s hardware issues meant that a lot of people didn’t abandon their PS2s quite so easily. If anything, the PS2 enjoyed a second life when Sony released a new PS3 model that no longer supported native PS2 backward compatibility. To this day, the PS2 still commands a surprisingly high resale price. 
The PlayStation 2’s Biggest Flaws Never Really Caught Up With It
The PS2 was not a perfect console. Its launch lineup was relatively weak, its DVD player was quickly replaced with better options, it wasn’t especially durable (and suffered from disc read errors in the long-term), its online options were generally terrible, and the console’s initial shortages were some of the worst the industry has ever seen. 
cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });
Yet, none of that really mattered in the end. All those little things that should have strengthened the PS2’s competition turned out to be just that. Little things. Sony never really derailed the PS2’s success, and no major console of its generation was able to capitalize on the console’s most notable flaws.
The post Why the PS2’s Sales Record Will Never Be Beaten appeared first on Den of Geek.
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kira-the-cat · 6 years
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So now that I’m feeling better after last night, lets talk about why I and a lot of other people are not happy with Pokemon Lets Go. Full disclosure, if you’re happy and excited that’s fine. Please respect that people aren’t. Don’t go yelling at people who aren’t. Same applies to people that aren’t happy about it. Don’t blast people that are. This got long while I was typing so its going under a cut.
With that out of the way the main reason I’m not personally happy about it is that its once again Kanto. I understand that this is a test game, however there were numerous other ways to test the Switch’s power with Pokemon. Even if they wouldn’t have been Sinnoh remakes we still haven’t gotten a new Mystery Dungeon game since Super (which I find a missed opporotunity since we could have had Ultra Mystery Dungeon to keep with the themes from USuMo and getting to pick some Gen 7 mons would have been neat), there’s the neglected Ranger series, since the game is less battle oriented than usual we could have gotten our first actual Contest themed game, there’s the highly neglected Orre region, etc. What I’m saying is there were a lot of ways to do this that weren’t just Gen 1 again.
That brings me to my next point; the fact that we are once again restricted to just the first 151 Pokemon (I’m not counting whatever the new one is because I’m of the opinion that its probably just Zeraora since it was never legitimately released for Gen 7 despite having code in USuMo) plus a handful of their Alolan forms to even the type chart out. I have absolutely no idea why they were doing this when it was completely hated in FRLG. And while I’m aware that Gen 5 essentially did the same thing the difference is that Gen 5 was all Unova Pokemon. You had to adjust to new Pokemon and moves and abilities instead of relying on the ones you knew how to work with. And then once you finished the main story you had the option to mix your party up besides the Unova mons. Everyone knows how good/bad the Gen 1 mons are. All this does is lead to people with the exact same teams because there’s barely any variety. There’s also the fact that PoGo has up to Gen 3 so there’s zero reason for such an arbitrary restriction except to pander to nostalgia.
This feels suspiciously like what happened with Sonic Forces and Sonic Mania and I already see the issues that those two games caused popping up in the main tag. Let’s Go is basically Mania in that its designed to mostly pander to the nostalgic crowd and “casual” PoGo players who either have no interest or find the newer games overwhelming. The 2019 game is Forces. A game with a lot of hyped up potential and very little information right now. Pretty much rumored to be designed with the more solid fanbase in mind. Now at first glance this doesn’t seem to be an issue, GF/Sega is playing to both sides, trying to keep everyone happy. On the surface that’s a great idea. In reality all it does is create a shit ton of tension between the people who are, justifiably, sick of all the spotlight treatment Gen 1/Classic Sonic gets especially in recent years and the people who think that that much spotlight focus is no big deal.
The removal of wild battles in favor of overworld encounters. While this has been confirmed to not carry over to the 2019 game this still leaves a sour taste in a lot of people mouths especially when trainer battles are kept and Exp gain seems to be linked to catching Pokemon which is another thing bothering people because of catching being exclusively motion control related. Now whether they will or will not be optional is another story entirely but given how skewed the RNG is in PoGo I don’t have high hopes for it in this game. Also I understand that this doesn’t exist in the GameCube games, however there’s a plausible reason for that. This is just copying PoGo.
The weird state its in. Apparently its a main title according to Game Freak, albeit one for casual fans, yet it feels like a side game with the gimmicky feel of it. And that’s not to say gimmicks are bad, just that this feels a lot more like a side game than a main one.
Speaking of casual, the assumption that Pokemon is a hard series to grasp that it needs a game like this baffles me. Pokemon is far from a hard series, and this is from someone that plays games that tend to be unforgiving and has been playing games with limited lives for years. Especially recently Pokemon has gotten much easier, going as far as to railroad the player via cutscenes in Gen 7 and the implimentation of the Exp All which is on by default. Sure there’s been some difficult puzzles, most of which are optional, but the answer can be nowadays found on the internet so most of the challenge is removed there. Even still, the series has remained one of the easiest to play as well access. Every game in the series, from Gen 1 to 7 can be accessed and played. You can work your way up through the games to learn how they work. The claim that Lets Go is designed to make the series even easier makes me feel like people underestimate just how easy the games truly are.
And my ultimate gripe with the game is that they brought back the one mechanic I, and a lot of other people, have been asking for since Gen 4 and its so far restricted to Gen 1. Every single Pokemon thus far has a walk/run animation as revealed by Dataminers last year when USuMo came out. Hell that game was the one that so heavily teased it by having interactable Pokemon in the overworld, showing the Pokemon outside their Pokeballs in cutscenes to the point that Hau’s starter will always follow him outside of it. 
I don’t like the insinuation that they brought back a highly requested feature only to dangle it behind the ever obnoxious presence that is Kanto and Gen 1. Now if its in the 2019 game that’s something different, but considering they’re marketing this at “casual” players I feel like it won’t be in the other game because its apparently not what the so called “hardcore” crowd would want. It really sucks that the one feature about this game I desperately want is tied to a region I have grown to really loathe since Gen 6. It hurts, because I missed following Pokemon so much and when I saw that there were Pokemon I could play with in the overworld for USuMo I had high hopes that it was in the full game only it wasn’t. I’m really bitter over that fact because it hurts that it was teased so damn much only to result in this. 
Honestly when this is all said and done I don’t want to hear another peep about Kanto for at least the next three Gens. You got what you wanted, let the rest of the series be free of this.
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theeclecticfactory · 3 years
Text
The Whip of the 80s
My sister and I were baking banana loaf (they’re surprisingly easy to do) one Wednesday night. The kitchen is usually boring and silent at this time, so I decided to play some music. Almost every home architecture attributes the kitchen as a public area and, with my parents in the vicinity, I had to be very careful with my music choice. Being very thoughtful, I “hey Google”d Africa by TOTO, something that would be very much familiar to the Gen X parents. Spotify, by default, plays the Spotify Radio for a specific song when you request for it via Google Assistant. And so the 80s nostalgia train chugged on incessantly with songs like We Built this City, Every Breath You Take, Rosanna, and this iconic anthem of today's generation.
After accidentally rick-rolling myself in the most unfunny way possible, I remembered Estelle Caswell's great analysis of music from the 80s. There’s this artificial sound-processing technique artists of this decade used called gated reverb. And it’s eVERYWHERE. It’s that punchy, almost whip-like sound that you hear in nearly e v e r y song of the 80s. You’ll hear it on a-ha’s Take On Me, Tears for Tears’ Everybody Wants To Rule The World, and Deniece Williams’ Let’s Hear It for the Boy. Oh and literally all Michael Jackson songs.
So what is it with this sound, and why specifically this snappy whip sound?
I think we need to start with how the sound is made. Reverb, in the most basic way possible, is produced by playing an instrument in one side of a sound-reflective room and placing the recording device on the other side. It’s effectively that lingering sound, the sound that gets left behind when you scream in a tile-laden bathroom. It’s close to an echo, but not quite. This is achieved when the sound waves reach your ears at very v e r y small delays that you won’t perceive them as echoes but instead a lingering effect.
This recording technique has been around even before the 80s. Experimental rock bands like Pink Floyd have played around with reverb to heighten the aural atmosphere of their music. This is very prominent on all parts of Shine On You Crazy Diamond and you can hear it to great effect with that iconic guitar riff at the start of Part II.
But the key to understanding this 80s whip sound stems from the gated part of gated reverb, and it was only truly made possible around this time.
You see, gated reverb isn’t a sound that can be reproduced in the natural world. It’s artificial. That whipping, punchy sound is produced by cutting off the volume below a certain threshold and reverb then amplifying the resulting sound. The result of this is that immediate punch sound that whips, disappearing as fast as it cracks. Aurally, there’s no recognizable reverb in the traditional sense. The entire sound is the reverb. It all just sounds like one snapping whip sound because of the gating.
Gated Reverb Explained GIF from How a recording-studio mishap shaped '80s music'
The development of this sound was truly made possible by the great strides in technology brought forth by the turn of the decade. The 80s was prefaced by the digital revolution of the 70s which brought us technologies like integrated circuits (IC) which paved way to (relatively) inexpensive computers. Tech giants today in the names of Apple and Microsoft all trace their roots to this decade. By the 80s, this technological advance trickled to many real-world applications and music production is one of them.
Estelle Caswell of Vox presented this fact on her well-produced (as always) video, How a recording-studio mishap shaped ‘80s music. Back in the 70s, only the big, well-known bands had access to expensive equipment and studios to produce the sound they want for their music—reverb is one such sound. The first-ever application of the gated reverb in pop music was in 1981 when Phil Collins released In The Air Tonight. This is widely considered to be his greatest and most influential work and for good reason—this song paved the way for the decade’s musical character.
Tumblr media
In The Air Tonight by Phil Collins, the first pop song that used gated reverb
But the breakthrough really only happened with the release of a reverb unit named AMS RMX16 in 1982—the first of its kind to be powered by a microprocessor (yes, it's that chip that runs your computer). This shoebox-sized circuit wizardry allowed for musicians and sound engineers to put reverb on whatever sound they wish. There was no longer any need for renting out expensive studios and elaborate (often bulky) equipment. Suddenly everyone had access to these luxuries, and these luxuries were thoroughly made use of. Gated reverb cracked its whip across the charts. And by across the charts, I meant aCROSS THE CHARTS. Every year from 1983 to 1989 had AT LEAST a month where the chart-topper was a song with a gated reverb drum line. This sound became so quintessentially 80s that artists today (looking at you Bruno Mars) make use of gated reverb to infuse a throwback-ist vibe to their music.
The widespread use of gated reverb might suggest that there has been no resistance to making use of the whip. There was a 1985 cover of That's What Friends Are For by a powerhouse four-way that you'll forget gated reverb even existed. Dionne Warwick, Elton John, Stevie Wonder, and Gladys Knight sang the melodramatic song to the top of the 1986 charts. From radio stations to MTV specials and even in kitchens where your mother had probably sang the eponymous line, it's an instant classic. And there's no denying it of that achievement. But doesn't it seem like the song that just sticks out? When you think of 80s music, is it really the one that comes to mind?
Not only is there a gated reverb, but there's a particular mood to both songs. This mood permeates with other songs of the era.
A close listen to Bleachers' Don't Take The Money makes it instantly recognizable. Comparing it to another song of the same era, Everybody Wants To Rule The World by Tears For Tears, and there's a tangible connection. Not only is there a gated reverb, but there's a particular mood to both songs. This mood permeates with other songs of the era, only they're not from the same era. Don't Take The Money is from Jack Antonoff's side project Bleachers, from 2017. But the music footprint is so distinctly similar with that mood so very persistent that they just belong so much together. And, I don't know if I'm the only one who hears it, but doesn't a gated reverb snare sound close to people clapping in a concert?
The character is in the beat, the beat is in the drums, and the drums are in gated reverb. It's the punchy drums that whip your feet to the beat.
Arguably, the most iconic song of the decade has to be Every Breath You Take by The Police. Its sweet, simple guitar, bass and drum line accompanied with Sting's smooth vocals make for its deliciously captivating tone; you'll bob your head for days on end. It's the song that you'll gently glide and snap and clap your body to while you cook dinner. Qualitatively, it's not even a sweet song (it's actually about big-brother-esque surveillance) and the mellow bass line isn't really one to dance to, but you dance anyway. If you listen to the song without the drums, it's an entirely different song altogether. The character is in the beat, the beat is in the drums, and the drums are in gated reverb. It's the punchy drums that whip your feet to the beat.
Tumblr media
Sting in the music video of Every Breath You Take
Listening to other gated reverb classics like We Built This City, Karma Chameleon, and I Think We're Alone Now exemplifies the 80s mood perfectly. It's the enthusiasm, the tempo, the outpouring energy of these songs punctuated with the gated reverb drum line that make them irresistible to slide and pump and clap to. And that's not even a figure of speech, that gated reverb snare drum is the one you'll clap along to, along thousands of people listening independently like a concert that permeates through space and time. That sound is no coincidence. That pronounced snare drum claps very prominently throughout all those 80s songs. It's a Footloose in each and single one of them. (And yes, Footloose by Kenny Loggins has a gated reverb drum line). Even the mellow Every Breath You Take reeks of the energy. It's this transcendental vigor of energy and dance of most gated reverb songs that enveloped the music scene of the 80s. It's the natural evolution of the disco, albeit a much lively and more electronic evolution.
Going back to the AMS RMX16, there's really more to it than just gated reverb. For everything it is, it's actually a very revolutionary piece of tech.
Tumblr media
Another aspect of how 80s music came to be is exactly in HOW it came to be. Going back to the AMS RMX16, there's more to it than just gated reverb. For everything it is, it's actually a very revolutionary piece of tech. Functionally, it only really is a reverberation processor and the world was still long ways far from the studio-in-a-garage technology, but it marks the starting point. Its predecessor, the DMX15R, was the first-ever microprocessor-controlled digital reverberator, the keywords being microprocessor and digital. Before this, the norm was analog sound processing. Pink Floyd made use of the EMS VCS 3, an analog synthesizer for their most famous albums, The Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here.
EMS VCS 3 By The Standard Deviant - https://www.flickr.com/photos/15599859@N06/2285052142/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6359789
Tumblr media
This archaic technology looking the likes of early-WW2 air force equipment was released in 1969 and was extremely popular with progressive rock bands. It was a dainty piece of equipment, prone to tuning instabilities and incredibly difficult to use. It was so bad that bands avoided using it for producing the melodic tunes of their music, instead opting for producing electronic background effects and ambient sounds. In contrast, this is how the AMS RMX16 looks:
Tumblr media
Before this fantastic piece of music circuitry, really the only effective way to produce and manipulate reverb was through plate reverberation. In essence, sound is transmitted through a large plate of sheet metal from one side then picked up by contact microphones on the other. Reverb time (time before the sound completely fades away) is adjusted by moving framed acoustic tiles, called a damping pad, closer to the metal plate without touching it.
A DIY Plate Reverb Contraption, with man to scale
This hulking contraption is about the size of a large classroom chalkboard, including the wall it's hinged on. At least one person has to be dedicated to operating it as has large moving parts that need to be adjusted to get the much-wanted r e v e r b e r a t i o n w a v e s. With all the fuss in operating reverb machines there was no time for gated reverb to be accidentally created—you'd have had to be very specific in finding that sound if you wanted it.
Gated reverb only really happened by accident when Hugh Padgham, the sound engineer in Peter Gabriels' eponymous third solo album. The sound was picked up by an overhead studio mic that was used as an intercom for the band to communicate with the people in sound processing. It made use of a noise gate that cut off sound below a certain level and a sound compressor which modified the loud and quiet sounds to be closer to each other in level, resulting in that classic whip sound. When the AMS RMX16 came to the scene, it included gated reverb built-in. It made use of a microprocessor to do everything. Instead of having to turn knobs and move huge metal plates to manipulate the sound waves, a push of a button will command the microprocessor to do all that for you. The reverb processor comes built-in with multiple presets that would require significant effort and fine-tuning with previous technologies. No need for the overhead mic and a separate reverb processor; it's all in the box.
This paradigm shift in music production predicated an era of digitally-produced music.
Tumblr media
This digital (music) revolution allowed for everyone to achieve that sound in an easily-reproducible way, thus allowing for its proliferation throughout the airwaves and into the lives of everyone who had at least a radio. This paradigm shift in music production predicated an era of electronically-produced music, a wave that proved to be an unstoppable force of nature. Earth, Wind & Fire, a band that rode the disco scene to superstardom, incorporated the electronic sound in their 1981 album Raise! with the sound fully realized in the disco-synth hit in Let's Groove. While their disco roots was still prevalent, that heavily synthesized bassline and intro vocals is undeniably 80s; and the electronic shift that came with the era. It proved irresistible even to bands that were long-standing vanguards of their genre. Jefferson Airplane, a much-loved hardline rock band from the 60s which through its tumultuous history morphed into Jefferson Starship then finally Starship, with that final incarnation completely embracing the commercial, electronic wave of the era—much to the chagrin of their long-time fans. Even The Smiths, a band known for their rejection of synthesizers and dance-pop, couldn't resist the use of electronic wizardry. A listen to their best work, There Is a Light That Never Goes Out, and there's that recognizable whipping beat. The appeal was undeniable, and the soundscape forever changed.
Tumblr media
Earth, Wind & Fire
Tumblr media
Jefferson Airplane, shortly before they became Starship
The Smiths
At this point in time, the banana loaf we baked has long since been completed and consumed. And similarly, that 80s sound has also been widely consumed to the fullest extent of everyone's music palate, completely sickened by that repetitive whip sound that is gated reverb. But the music revolution persists. The culture of electronic music production and digitalized soundwaves lives on until today, and will continue to be alive into the future. So how do you like the taste of it? That banana loaf still lives rent-free in my head, and I'm not complaining at all.
0 notes
Text
The Whip of the 80s
My sister and I were baking banana loaf (they’re surprisingly easy to do) one Wednesday night. The kitchen is usually boring and silent at this time, so I decided to play some music. The kitchen being a public area and with my parents in the vicinity, I had to be very careful with my music choice. Being very thoughtful, I “hey Google”d Africa by TOTO, something that would be very much familiar to the Gen X parents. Spotify, by default, plays the Spotify Radio for a specific song when you request for it via Google Assistant. And so the 80s nostalgia train chugged on incessantly with songs like We Built this City, Every Breath You Take, Rosanna, and this iconic anthem of today's generation.
After accidentally rick-rolling myself in the most unfunny way possible, I remembered Estelle Caswell's great analysis of music from the 80s. There’s this artificial sound-processing technique artists of this decade used called gated reverb. And it’s eVERYWHERE. It’s that punchy, almost whip-like sound that you hear in nearly e v e r y song of the 80s. You’ll hear it on a-ha’s Take On Me, Tears for Tears’ Everybody Wants To Rule The World, and Deniece Williams’ Let’s Hear It for the Boy. Oh and literally all Michael Jackson songs.
So what is it with this sound, and why specifically this snappy whip sound?
I think we need to start with how the sound is made. Reverb, in the most basic way possible, is produced by playing an instrument in one side of a sound-reflective room and placing the recording device on the other side. It’s effectively that lingering sound, the sound that gets left behind when you scream in a tile-laden bathroom. It’s close to an echo, but not quite. This is achieved when the sound waves reach your ears at very v e r y small delays that you won’t perceive them as echoes but instead a lingering effect.
This recording technique has been around even before the 80s. Experimental rock bands like Pink Floyd have played around with reverb to heighten the aural atmosphere of their music. This is very prominent on all parts of Shine On You Crazy Diamond and you can hear it to great effect with that iconic guitar riff at the start of Part II.
But the key to understanding this 80s whip sound stems from the gated part of gated reverb, and it was only truly made possible around this time.
You see, gated reverb isn’t a sound that can be reproduced in the natural world. It’s artificial. That whipping, punchy sound is produced by cutting off the volume below a certain threshold and reverb then amplifying the resulting sound. The result of this is that immediate punch sound that whips, disappearing as fast as it cracks. Aurally, there’s no recognizable reverb in the traditional sense. The entire sound is the reverb. It all just sounds like one snapping whip sound because of the gating.
Gated Reverb Explained GIF from How a recording-studio mishap shaped '80s music'
The development of this sound was truly made possible by the great strides in technology brought forth by the turn of the decade. The 80s was prefaced by the digital revolution of the 70s which brought us technologies like integrated circuits (IC) which paved way to (relatively) inexpensive computers. Tech giants today in the names of Apple and Microsoft all trace their roots to this decade. By the 80s, this technological advance trickled to many real-world applications and music production is one of them.
Tumblr media
Estelle Caswell of Vox presented this fact on her well-produced (as always) video, How a recording-studio mishap shaped ‘80s music. Back in the 70s, only the big, well-known bands had access to expensive equipment and studios to produce the sound they want for their music—reverb is one such sound. The first-ever application of the gated reverb in pop music was in 1981 when Phil Collins released In The Air Tonight. This is widely considered to be his greatest and most influential work and for good reason—this song paved the way for the decade’s musical character.
In The Air Tonight by Phil Collins, the first pop song that used gated reverb
But the breakthrough really only happened with the release of a reverb unit named AMS RMX16 in 1982—the first of its kind to be powered by a microprocessor (yes, it's that chip that runs your computer). This shoebox-sized circuit wizardry allowed for musicians and sound engineers to put reverb on whatever sound they wish. There was no longer any need for renting out expensive studios and elaborate (often bulky) equipment. Suddenly everyone had access to these luxuries, and these luxuries were thoroughly made use of. Gated reverb cracked its whip across the charts. And by across the charts, I meant aCROSS THE CHARTS. Every year from 1983 to 1989 had AT LEAST a month where the chart-topper was a song with a gated reverb drum line. This sound became so quintessentially 80s that artists today (looking at you Bruno Mars) make use of gated reverb to infuse a throwback-ist vibe to their music.
The widespread use of gated reverb might suggest that there has been no resistance to making use of the whip. There was a 1985 cover of That's What Friends Are For by a powerhouse four-way that you'll forget gated reverb even existed. Dionne Warwick, Elton John, Stevie Wonder, and Gladys Knight sang the melodramatic song to the top of the 1986 charts. From radio stations to MTV specials and even in kitchens where your mother had probably sang the eponymous line, it's an instant classic. And there's no denying it of that achievement. But doesn't it seem like the song that just sticks out? When you think of 80s music, is it really the one that comes to mind?
Not only is there a gated reverb, but there's a particular mood to both songs. This mood permeates with other songs of the era.
A close listen to Bleachers' Don't Take The Money makes it instantly recognizable. Comparing it to another song of the same era, Everybody Wants To Rule The World by Tears For Tears, and there's a tangible connection. Not only is there a gated reverb, but there's a particular mood to both songs. This mood permeates with other songs of the era, only they're not from the same era. Don't Take The Money is from Jack Antonoff's side project Bleachers, from 2017. But the music footprint is so distinctly similar with that mood so very persistent that they just belong so much together. And, I don't know if I'm the only one who hears it, but doesn't a gated reverb snare sound close to people clapping in a concert?
The character is in the beat, the beat is in the drums, and the drums are in gated reverb. It's the punchy drums that whip your feet to the beat.
Tumblr media
Arguably, the most iconic song of the decade has to be Every Breath You Take by The Police. Its sweet, simple guitar, bass and drum line accompanied with Sting's smooth vocals make for its deliciously captivating tone; you'll bob your head for days on end. It's the song that you'll gently glide and snap and clap your body to while you cook dinner. Qualitatively, it's not even a sweet song (it's actually about big-brother-esque surveillance) and the mellow bass line isn't really one to dance to, but you dance anyway. If you listen to the song without the drums, it's an entirely different song altogether. The character is in the beat, the beat is in the drums, and the drums are in gated reverb. It's the punchy drums that whip your feet to the beat.
Sting in the music video of Every Breath You Take
Listening to other gated reverb classics like We Built This City, Karma Chameleon, and I Think We're Alone Now exemplifies the 80s mood perfectly. It's the enthusiasm, the tempo, the outpouring energy of these songs punctuated with the gated reverb drum line that make them irresistible to slide and pump and clap to. And that's not even a figure of speech, that gated reverb snare drum is the one you'll clap along to, along thousands of people listening independently like a concert that permeates through space and time. That sound is no coincidence. That pronounced snare drum claps very prominently throughout all those 80s songs. It's a Footloose in each and single one of them. (And yes, Footloose by Kenny Loggins has a gated reverb drum line). Even the mellow Every Breath You Take reeks of the energy. It's this transcendental vigor of energy and dance of most gated reverb songs that enveloped the music scene of the 80s. It's the natural evolution of the disco, albeit a much lively and more electronic evolution.
Going back to the AMS RMX16, there's really more to it than just gated reverb. For everything it is, it's actually a very revolutionary piece of tech.
Another aspect of how 80s music came to be is exactly in HOW it came to be. Going back to the AMS RMX16, there's more to it than just gated reverb. For everything it is, it's actually a very revolutionary piece of tech. Functionally, it only really is a reverberation processor and the world was still long ways far from the studio-in-a-garage technology, but it marks the starting point. Its predecessor, the DMX15R, was the first-ever microprocessor-controlled digital reverberator, the keywords being microprocessor and digital. Before this, the norm was analog sound processing. Pink Floyd made use of the EMS VCS 3, an analog synthesizer for their most famous albums, The Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here.
Tumblr media
EMS VCS 3 By The Standard Deviant - https://www.flickr.com/photos/15599859@N06/2285052142/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6359789
This archaic technology looking the likes of early-WW2 air force equipment was released in 1969 and was extremely popular with progressive rock bands. It was a dainty piece of equipment, prone to tuning instabilities and incredibly difficult to use. It was so bad that bands avoided using it for producing the melodic tunes of their music, instead opting for producing electronic background effects and ambient sounds. In contrast, this is how the AMS RMX16 looks:
Tumblr media
Before this fantastic piece of music circuitry, really the only effective way to produce and manipulate reverb was through plate reverberation. In essence, sound is transmitted through a large plate of sheet metal from one side then picked up by contact microphones on the other. Reverb time (time before the sound completely fades away) is adjusted by moving framed acoustic tiles, called a damping pad, closer to the metal plate without touching it.
Tumblr media
A DIY Plate Reverb Contraption, with man to scale
This hulking contraption is about the size of a large classroom chalkboard, including the wall it's hinged on. At least one person has to be dedicated to operating it as has large moving parts that need to be adjusted to get the much-wanted r e v e r b e r a t i o n w a v e s. With all the fuss in operating reverb machines there was no time for gated reverb to be accidentally created—you'd have had to be very specific in finding that sound if you wanted it.
Gated reverb only really happened by accident when Hugh Padgham, the sound engineer in Peter Gabriels' eponymous third solo album. The sound was picked up by an overhead studio mic that was used as an intercom for the band to communicate with the people in sound processing. It made use of a noise gate that cut off sound below a certain level and a sound compressor which modified the loud and quiet sounds to be closer to each other in level, resulting in that classic whip sound. When the AMS RMX16 came to the scene, it included gated reverb built-in. It made use of a microprocessor to do everything. Instead of having to turn knobs and move huge metal plates to manipulate the sound waves, a push of a button will command the microprocessor to do all that for you. The reverb processor comes built-in with multiple presets that would require significant effort and fine-tuning with previous technologies. No need for the overhead mic and a separate reverb processor; it's all in the box.
This paradigm shift in music production established an era of digitally-produced music.
This digital (music) revolution allowed for everyone to achieve that sound in an easily-reproducible way, thus allowing for its proliferation throughout the airwaves and into the lives of everyone who had at least a radio. This paradigm shift in music production established an era of electronically-produced music, a wave that proved to be an unstoppable force of nature. Earth, Wind & Fire, a band that rode the disco scene to superstardom, incorporated the electronic sound in their 1981 album Raise! with the sound fully realized in the disco-synth hit in Let's Groove. While their disco roots was still prevalent, that heavily synthesized bassline and intro vocals is undeniably 80s; and the electronic shift that came with the era. It proved irresistible even to bands that were long-standing vanguards of their genre. Jefferson Airplane, a much-loved hardline rock band from the 60s which through its tumultuous history morphed into Jefferson Starship then finally Starship, with that final incarnation completely embracing the commercial, electronic wave of the era—much to the chagrin of their long-time fans. Even The Smiths, a band known for their rejection of synthesizers and dance-pop, couldn't resist the use of electronic wizardry. A listen to their best work, There Is a Light That Never Goes Out, and there's that recognizable whipping beat. The appeal was undeniable, and the soundscape forever changed.
Tumblr media
Earth, Wind & Fire
Tumblr media
Jefferson Airplane, shortly before they became Starship
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The Smiths
At this point in time, the banana loaf we baked has long since been completed and consumed. And similarly, that 80s sound has also been widely consumed to the fullest extent of everyone's music palate, completely sickened by that repetitive whip sound that is gated reverb. But the music revolution persists. The culture of electronic music production and digitalized soundwaves lives on until today, and will continue to be alive into the future. So how do you like the taste of it? That banana loaf still lives rent-free in my head, and I'm not complaining at all.
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greyliliy · 6 years
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You know what? It’s the end of the year. Let’s have a giant personal confessional I’ll probably regret later because I’m oversensitive and trying not to cry while reading this book.
But I haven’t been real with you guys in a while and I feel like getting it all out at once instead of putting it into a conversation with one person and burdening them with it, and who knows, maybe it’ll help someone younger who’s dealing with this stuff now.
So let’s get real & it’s under the cut if you wanna’ read it.
I’m reading a book called Torn by Justin Lee about being a gay christian growing up in the church and it’s sort of terrifying how easy it is to relate to (up to a point). Needless to say, it’s got me thinking about life, my own frustrations, and topics about sexuality that have been weighing particularly heavy on my mind this past year as I approach my mid 30′s.
The first part where he’s discussing that he realizes he’s not attracted to women and that fear that something’s broken in him, is a feeling I know that very, very well. And when he starts talking about how he started to notice guys instead, funny enough, that’s when I realized that I...didn’t experience that either, though I could still relate to his fear of admitting this to other people.
I can’t ever remember being sexually attracted to anyone, or at least I don’t think I have (it’s so hard to pinpoint what exactly sexual attraction is and the nightmare of figuring out if it’s happened or not--but then again, I feel like if I’d felt it, I probably wouldn’t be struggling to figure out if I had or not). I remember wanting to be around people, and to have relationships, but thinking back, I don’t think I experienced it the same way other teens did.
I mean, my first serious boyfriend dumped me because as he put it: "I think you just want to be friends.” Thinking back, I went out with him for a year and we never did anything more than hug, so I can see where he’s coming from.
At the time, I sure didn’t though. I really liked that boy. We went out on dates & did stuff for Valentines and I thought we were happy, but I never made any moves physically and neither did he  (at the time I was so happy we were on the same page, because I wasn’t ready, but I guess we weren’t as in sync as I thought) and well, I was informed later by a friend that getting dumped because I “just want to be friends” means “You didn’t put out, idiot, so he found a girl who would.” (They didn’t say the “idiot” part, but it was strongly implied by their tone).
I haven’t had a boyfriend since, because I realized that was part of dating and if I went out with boys they’d expect me to kiss and do things with them and I just...wasn’t ready for that. Dating became something I was terrified of; I couldn’t repeat that experience again. It wasn’t even until after college that I tried dating again, and I can count the number of them I’ve been on in my lifetime without using two hands.
I don’t think I realized it at the time, but I was a little repulsed by guys touching me. Girls were fine, boys not. I think it was a little switch in my brain going “Girl touches are platonic so they’re fine, boy ones have sexual meaning so it’s not.” that meant any time I boy touched me I panicked.
And then college hit.
I kinda knew people were having sex in high school but no one talked to me about it. There was this understanding that I had no clue about anything to do with that subject and they liked to keep it that way.
In hindsight, it hit me how much they teased me about it. I was that person who asked once at a friend’s house “How do lesbians have sex?” and they giggled “They scissor.” while miming the motion with their fingers - I didn’t get the joke and thought they were entirely serious and just accepted that answer and tried to picture how that would work. Imagine my face years later when I saw an episode of a certain show that that quote came from and I died a little inside because “Oh. They were making fun of me.”
(I also found out years later pretty much everyone I knew were all convinced I was a closeted lesbian and waiting for me to just come out already, which makes that confrontation all the worse, somehow.)
But if I wasn’t getting teased about how little I knew, they just didn’t talk about it at all.
College was an entirely different matter because I frankly couldn’t avoid the topic if I wanted to. It was in my health class (one of my gen ed. classes ended up being half Sex Ed.), it was in the free condoms they handed out, it was in my major classes (a film class I was in had a long segment that took up most of the semester titled “Sex in film” and I ended up seeing a lot of rated r films and sex scenes I had avoided in high school just because I tended to watch animated films & pg-13 ones more than anything), and well, college kids have a lot of sex, I discovered.
On my first day of  freshman introduction week I ended up in a guy’s dorm who already had a “women I’ve slept with” chart on the wall that already had tick marks on it (I was there for all of five seconds while the person I was visiting got his things and we got out; I never saw any of them again the rest of the year). 
Culture shock is an understatement.
And all of it made me uncomfortable. I didn’t get it. I didn’t get it in high school when people talked about wanting other people that way, and I sure as heck didn’t get it in college. But I had convinced myself one day I would. I kept thinking: “One day, I’m gonna meet that one guy that makes me feel all this sexual tension I keep hearing about and then we’ll date, and fall in love, and get married, and it’ll be great.” That’s what people kept telling me. “When you meet the one, you’ll know.”
(For the record, it still hasn’t happened, or if it did, it wasn’t over a boy and I’m in deep, soul crushing denial about it.)
I never did find that dating scene but instead, I discovered Boys Love (”Yaoi” at the time.) At first, it was a really guilty thing because I grew up Christian--and still am--(another relatable thing in this book I’m reading; the fear of your own church) and it was “Sinful” but...the stories and art were so good, and I felt bewitched. I remember reading FAKE and seeing how much they loved each other and I don’t know, it was just. Good.
And it was safe. I didn’t have to think about my sexuality when it was only boys on the page. I wasn’t an issue, or a topic, or had any part in it. I was reading about other people and it was fictional which meant it wasn’t real so I didn’t have to feel guilty trying to fantasize about real people (something that still makes me feel really skeevy.)
This went on for a few years and BL was pretty much the only thing I read/watched/did anything with. My roommates knew me as that obsessed BL fangirl and loved to tease me (but also encouraged it; my one male roommate in my senior year apartment expected my “couple of the day” picture posted to his door & bought me doujinshi as gifts. Thinking back, I’m blessed and grateful no one gave me a hard time about it).
I eventually discovered the more graphic, erotic side of BL and that was an experience, because I liked it.
A lot.
This is embarrassing to admit, but the first time reading a couple of those more graphic stories I felt different, and weird in my own skin, and kinda awkward (it freaked me out at the time). I described the exact symptoms to my friend in an IM because I was confused and she laughed at me: “You’re turned on, idiot.” (Again, the idiot was strongly implied but not straight out said. Not that I noticed at the time.)
It was like a bomb dropped. That was what people felt when they talked about getting hot and bothered. That’s what the people in high school and college were talking about when someone touched them. I had a point of reference.
And it hit me that thinking  about a living, breathing person had never made me feel that way. Not even close.
That was the first time I felt really broken.
And that was when I got desperate to fix it.
In 2007 all of those feelings exploded into an art project I called “Shout it Out.” (It is my one and only Daily Deviation to this day), and that project is the only reason I can share all of this with you right now. Because in 2007 I wrote down every guilty thought, every embarrassing fact, and every thing I was ashamed of & proud of and at this point, there’s not much I can tell you that can top it.
And maybe also, I read the description and realized I should follow my own advice: 
Someone told me once, that she believed we make life hard for ourselves by keeping things bottled up inside. Whether it be due to shame, embarrassment, fear, pride or some other emotion we don't share the things that are on our hearts like we should. We wallow in them and never realize that everyone else feels the same way. Our conflicts, our dreams, and the things that make us who we are should be free to be spoken out loud.
It was a big deal for me at the time, and sometimes I wonder where all that courage went. I don’t feel the same way as I did then on a lot of the topics, but at the time, that’s where my mind and heart were.
Over half of the text is related to sex. Reading it now, it sounds like I was a lustful, sex-crazed twenty-something who struggled to keep myself from jumping everyone (”I want to have sex so bad it hurts...” to quote one of the lines).
But the truth is, while I was obsessed with sex in media (manga, BL, romance novels, health sites,) learning everything I could, I’m learning more and more that how I experienced an obsession with sex wasn’t how many other people experience it.
I was obsessed with reading everything I could about sex because I was desperate to relate to some of it. I had fantasies about sex and myself because I kept thinking that maybe it’d click one day (and boy did I try thinking about a lot of different scenarios desperate to find myself attracted to anything). But many of those thoughts ended up forced or ineffective. I kept trying anyway.
I wanted to feel normal.
(Though that sort of failed too, since most of those fantasies ended up being about girls, and myself wasn’t necessarily involved in the picture.)
I remember desperately wanting to have sex because I thought if I did that then I’d suddenly have a light pop on in my brain that goes “This is why everyone else loves it! This is what I’m missing!” I’d have sex and then I’d be normal and feel attraction like everyone else does because I’d know what it feels like.
In the end, my strong conviction of “No sex until marriage” won out (For the record, I’m still basically of the philosophy that sex outside of committed relationships is a bad idea), but I kept reading smut.
So much in fact, that it became an addiction and it was all I looked at or did. It wasn’t a healthy place for me, and I’d rather not go into exact details, even if this has been a rather detailed sharing session. But I can say that it got so bad that I had to remove myself from the subject entirely at one point and pretty much cut myself off from the BL Community cold turkey. If it was digital, I deleted it. If it was a fanfic site, I stopped visiting. No anime. No manga. No doujinshi. No nothing. My physical media was shoved in the closet (that was a lot of money I wasn’t just going to throw out) and called it a day.
Heck, part of the reason I try to avoid a lot of erotica works is just because it reminds me of those bad times. (And the funny side effect that I read so much of it at one point that now it’s kinda boring because I’ve seen just about all of it).
But as I’m sure you’ve seen from my fanfiction and books, I slowly found a path of moderation. I’m re-reading my old BL books that I’m taking out of the closet and remembering why I loved these stories and art, and just coming to terms with myself in general that BL & straight romance novels might be the only way I’ll experience those sorts of feelings toward another person.
It’s probably why I like the genre so much, while I’m reading I can pretend, and that’s good enough for me. I can write romance without having experienced it and that’s a win in my book.
The truth is, I’m slowly coming to terms with the fact that while I’d love a spouse of some sort and who knows, maybe something still might happen yet if there’s someone out there willing to be patient and wait, I can admit that I just don’t experience attraction to other people.
If I could go back to a young me, I’d tell myself to learn more when I’m younger so I didn’t feel so stupid when I was older.
I’d tell myself that it’s okay that I didn’t like anybody and that I didn’t have to feel obligated to find a boyfriend.
I’d tell myself that even if I’ll be struggling with trying to figure out myself and my feelings for the rest of my life, that it’ll be okay.
I’d tell myself that I’m not broken.
So on this last day of 2017, before I go back to reading my book and the rest of things I was going to do to day, I’m going to find a little bit of that courage I used to have in 2007 and just say now what I wish I’d known ten years ago.
I do also get the irony that I’ve sort of indirectly been admitting to it for a while now, but this is me saying it:
I’m asexual.
See you all next year, and now if you don’t mind: I’ve got books to read, random things to reblog, and a comic to draw.
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