#in the greater interest of her subordinates

[clawfootcoffin]

loved hearing lena put her foot down in the newest ep….. gwen and her are quite literally an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object and it is So entertaining to watch.

can’t wait to see how their rivalry concludes (it will almost certainly end with one or both of them Dead)

[feyofmay]

The Oak Door

Laurie x March!Reader (aka "Ducky") Summary: At a gathering in london, hosted by Mister Laurence, Laurie gets drunk & the reader is forced to take care of him. While assisting him, Laurie attempts to propose, & the reader is everything but happy word count: 3.8k Warnings: ANGST, literally that's it just angst, also a lot of self doubt from reader

This story is a snippet from my longer Laurie x reader story, Foolish, Honest Love on ao3. If you want to know what happens next, you'll find out there ;P

Also, I am taking requests for Laurie x reader drabbles/minifics in my asks!!! :)

STORY STARTS UNDER THE PAGE BREAK

To say one’s heart & mind works separately is a lie because the heart is an organ that does not think, nor does it hold any greater understanding of what it is. It has no consciousness, yet is unrightfully given the capability to think & know. Nobody truly thinks with their heart or their throat or their liver or their pancreas. When someone says “thinking with their heart” or “thinking with their mind”, they mean thinking with their intuition or their rationality, or thinking with logic or emotion. They create a great divide in thought that, in all honesty, has & will never exist. A black & white. A right & wrong. A sky & sea. Existing between all of these concepts is a great trench, a lack of understanding, that was dug by the hands of men. 

In thinking with her heart, the middle March finds it best to avoid Laurie, &, in thinking with her head, she agrees with her heart. All of this to say, for the past couple of days, she’s both missed & feared the sight of his face. It’s easy to grow distant from someone when there’s no possible way to close said distance, but, when you’re staying in the same residence per the request of his grandfather, it’s much harder to remain distant, both in a literal & metaphysical sense.

Within the lounge, where she resides now, Miss March distances herself from the greater commotion of the gathering, in the dining hall, without being fully disconnected, like a hand is to the torso. The walls are dressed in a tender maroon wallpaper with an eloquent & detailed moulding of marble & gold, replicating greek columns, which act as a trim that runs across the ceilings. She shares the chaise lounge with other guests as they squeeze next to each other, and their skirts overlap like incoming tides crossing over one another. She’s unsure if she's become overwhelmed by all the stimulus or simply unable to sense anything. The air doesn’t carry any distinct scent. Oddly, the space around her smells of the sound of bustling people & drinks swishing in crystalline glasses. Around her is noise & people, & all of her senses confirm that truth in a monotone wave.  Nursing an empty glass, which she had thrown the contents of into a houseplant & plans to hold for the rest of the evening, she sits within conversation between several men & women, an intellectual hive of people that act more like displays for their attire then beings with bones & blood. For them, knowledge is a sport. It’s a trinket to place on your coffee table to try & impress your inlaws. It’s an accessory to tout & best acknowledge in thoughtful hums & inquisitive gasps. 

A man in a matching set of birdseye patterned, taupe slacks & waist drones on about the recent unification of Germany. While Miss March does find the subject, itself, interesting, she can’t seem to hold intrigue in the conversation. Something about the smoke & the long days warping together in England has led her to misplace the inquisitiveness of the young girl who dreamed of moving to Europe & leaving behind the dreariness of subordinate domesticity. While, with age, she’s gained the emotional intellect necessary to process her emotions beyond simply scraping the shallow tide with her toes, she’s also gained the awareness that, oftentimes, the act of digesting her emotions is tiring. She’s learned that the energy used toward emotions is better spent producing something tangible & of worth. 

Luckily for her, Laurie’s grandfather is a man in the know, which means he knew several associates with daughters of varying ages with varying tastes in clothes who were more than happy to lend a dress to a young lady. Over her crinoline skirt & bodice, a dress in a sweet champagne shade is draped across her. The lacy trim, not wanting to melt into the dress, itself, is a muted purple, almost a grey, that wraps around her puff sleeves & the edges of the champagne tier, with a silk white skirt with a lavender sheen peeks out from underneath. Nothing about the dress is loud. She feels much more at home in the fabric, especially after walking around in the daunting mauve dress like a living, breathing cake topper, a piece of decor for her employer to flaunt. For the first time since leaving New England & Meg & Hannah’s trusted fingers, she’d had her hair done by someone other than her family’s servant. The trusted maid of Mister Laurence had offered & promised to not pull too hard on the March’s hair. As the maid braided & pinned her hair, the middle March almost cried. However, it wasn’t due to any pain inflicted on her scalp, as the maid’s touch was tentative & gentle. It was the simple act of being touched & cared for, a touch Miss March had been subconsciously craving for since leaving her home. A touch she had forgotten until reuniting with Laurie in the crowded foyer. 

Touching her shoulder, a soft hand brushes her & whispers a polite ask for her attention. She flutters her eyelashes, shaking off the weight of the dust that had collected on them, &, with the help of the welcomed touch, swims out of the mental fog she had sunk herself into. Her eyes flitter up & meet with the warm sight of Mister Laurence gazing back at her. Whether the strong scent of candle wax, lingering dust on velvet carpets, & forest breeze eminates from him or the memories of his manor in New England that she spent odd mornings & afternoons in, she’s unsure of. However, it’s another reminder of the young girl she tried to comfort & wish goodbye to before leaving for Lancashire.

“Pardon my forwardness, but, Miss March, I must ask you to join me for a brief moment. I do hate to take away from such wonderful company,” Mister Laurence requests, playing the role of the man wise beyond his years more gracefully than anyone Miss March has ever seen. With a curt nod, not even bothering to bid adieu to the people in the room, she lets curiosity lead her as she rises to her feet & wraps her arms around Mister Laurence’s. Ushering her out of the room at the exact speed that is swift without being suspicious, Mister Laurence guides the young lady to a hallway with no prying eyes or wandering ears. His gaze does not hold the anger of a great man who is weighed down by the hubris of those around him, but in his eyes is something deeply paternal & saddened. Around him, an umber waistcoat & slacks with a herringbone pattern remind her more of a bear then a man of business & wealth. However, her judgement may be heavily clouded from growing up under his watchful eye. While his hair used to be a soft salt & pepper, it has faded to a faint white & grey like the shadow of a tree painted on fresh snow during a cloudy evening. For most, with age comes wrinkles that hide within them their growing envy for the youth that’s being wasted on careless & stupid adolescents. Mister Laurence’s wrinkles are like the rings of a tree, lines that prove that he has lived & seen. They’re a promise that, if one is to ask, he will tell the story preserved in every smile line & crow’s foot. Bending down so his lips hover around her ear, she’s immediately washed in the same sincerity that soaks his demeanour.

“Y/N,” he calls her by her first name, a telltale sign of loyalty & unease from the man, “I do hate to put this upon your shoulders, but my grandson is acting aloof-”.

“In what sense?” she interrupts in the classic March fashion, &, used to this speech pattern, he continues speaking over her. 

“And, while I don’t wish to make you pay for his poor decisions, I have an important associate that I do need to impress,” he explains to her as his hand returns to her shoulder, “And you and I are both well aware that no servant is paid well enough to have to deal with my grandson’s… ”

“Stubbornness?”

“...Tenacity.”

Both finish his sentence at the same time & share a gaze that communicates that neither are completely wrong with their wording. Nodding his head to agree with her, he looks away at the hall ahead. No paternal figure wants to admit their children’s faults. To say a truth is to make it known, but to admit a truth makes it tangible. She can feel the glass ball that rolls up & down his throat, ever so often bobbing at the opening to his stomach. Hiding beneath his heavy wool morning coat, his shoulders tense while trying to protect the rest of his body.

“A servant caught him with several other young women & clearly inebriated,” he reveals to her, & the edges of his lips quiver & twitch as they are tugged by invisible strings into a frown. His words dig a hole into her chest. All that remains is her skin, which caves in & sags where her sternum once was. It leaves a tingling sensation where her muscles & bones used to rest. She feels that Mister Laurence is speaking of a different grandson, which she has never met. What happened to the young boy who would treat her childish fears with utmost sincerity? What happened to the boy who made pinky promises seem like the most honourable pacts a man could make? What monster, what man had stolen the skin from him & now wears it as a costume? 

“I’ll confess. I’m unsure of where I went wrong with him,” Mister Laurence slips out between hushed lips, telling his secret to the wind & Miss March. Pausing to swallow his words, she furrows her brows & purses her lips. Swimming in her mind, she can’t think of any words that can comfort him in this moment of vulnerability. So, rather than speaking, she wraps her arms around the older man & hugs him tightly. Surprise washes him over as she squeezes his ribcage tightly, &, for a moment, he freezes as his eyes dart around to try & catch leering gazes peaking around the corner. But they are hidden in the inky shadows of the hallway. With a long exhale, Mister Laurence allows his tension to escape, & he swallows her in his embrace.. 

“You worry about business, and I’ll worry about Laurie,” she comforts him while pulling away, pausing to fix his bowtie, “He’s very lucky to have a grandfather that’s as kind and loving as you.” Mister Laurence smiles at her reminder as the rosy glow on his cheeks alights the hallway for a moment. Each breath they take in the space that they share feels like it fills each corner of their lungs. Nodding to her, a silent show of gratitude, he leads her to an oak door which lays slightly ajar. Holding the nob, he turns back to her before speaking.

“Thank you for your assistance. He’s in here,” Mister Laurence informs her, & he slowly swings the door open. Immediately, the souring scent of wine hits her face, &, as an instinct, her nose scrunches up & a grimace stains her lips. Splayed out on a couch, dishevelled & basking in his own ruin, she sees more of a strange, unfamiliar man than the boy that she knew. She sees a man that will grow to be discontent with his wife, yet who stays for the kids. A man who never really loved his children but is patiently waiting for the fulfilment that comes from acting in the role that society has told him to. A man who will never be fulfilled. A man that has learned that he must settle for what he has, quietly & miserably. A miniscule part of Miss March relishes at the idea that he’d have to learn how cruel the impartial hand of life can be, but the rest of her is well aware that Laurie will never know “enough”. He’d love his wife, even if she loved another man. He’d work to provide for his kids, &, if the wife was never around, he’d raise them all on his own. He’d move mountains to try to find the better side of “enough”. Laurie will love & love because that is Laurie’s nature. He loves wine & women. He loves trekking through forests & acting a fool, even in public spaces. He loves to engage in conversation while in the company of the March sisters, where no sentence is ever finished & nothing is ever truly said but the quiet “I love you” that rattles around in the pauses between words for a quick draw of breath. Laurie loves Jo. Laurie will continue to love, & love will truly be the cause of his death. Yet, Laurie will find a way to love the silent & cold hand of what lies beyond in a way that no person has ever done before. Miss March cannot even entertain the idea of Laurie living a life that is just “enough” because, to her, his company is more than enough. It is good. It is plenty.

That same man has tossed away his vermillion silk tie & waistcoat, leaving him in a starch white shirt that’s a third of the way unbuttoned & hastily tucked into raven black slacks. Closing the door behind her, the click of the door knob alerts him to her presence. However, his verdant eyes don’t move to meet her as he stares through strands of his messy chocolate hair & up at the silver ring that he often displays on his pointer finger. 

“Are you here to scold me, oh my dear mother?” He asks to the wind, acknowledging her existence. Miss March inhales deeply as the beating of her heart starts to drown out the sound of her breath. Clasping her hands together, she tentatively begins to make her way over to the cobalt ottoman that rests near the matching couch. The room is a demure periwinkle with small etchings of leaves adding a splash of muted emerald to the room.

“No, Laurie. Your grandfather asked me to keep you company,” she tries to ease his nerves as she inches closer.

“No, he told you to keep me away from the guests as I am his greatest failure,” Laurie shoots up at her words, sitting up far too fast for his drunken mind to handle. A warbling groan of pain slips out of his mouth as he rakes his fingers through his hair & clutches his throbbing head. At the sight of his agony, Miss March rushes to him &, readjusting his legs, sits on the edge of the couch cushion, right in front of him. With a tender touch, she gently wraps her fingers around his wrists & rubs small circles with her thumb.

“Oh, shush, you’re as much of a failure as I am a dancer,” She teases him with a sympathetic smile. At her words, a small & raspy chuckle escapes his lips &, tilting his head, his celadon eyes, in which the fields of Elysium hide, gaze up at her. Hiding beneath a smoke of anger, she’s able to see the young boy that she grew up with. The young boy that she once fell in love with. He’s scared & small & all the things a child is never allowed to be. 

In this moment, as much as she despises it, she knows she must admit her faults to him & ask for forgiveness. She was cruel & unjust for bringing up Jo with the intent of spitting in his face. She hurt him with the intention of leaving a mark, & she succeeded in doing so. If he doesn’t ever forgive her, she’ll grow to understand. It won’t be an easy process, but loving Laurie has never been anything close to easy. Taking a deep breath, she shoves the racing thoughts out of her vision & looks him in the eyes.

“I apologise for what I said in the alley, concerning your feelings for Jo. I shouldn’t’ve ever used them to hurt you,” she apologises quickly, &, after speaking, immediately purses her lips together & stares at him. She waits for him to scream. To yell at her to get out. To say he hates her & never wants to see her again. To tell her he always hated her. That he only tolerated her for Jo. To say she’s stupid. She’s vile. She’s not worth Jo or Meg or Beth or Amy’s time. She waits for him to tell her the truth she’s been too scared to say to herself aloud. She waits & waits until, finally, his lips part, & he draws a quick breath.

“It’s alright. I was being mean too, and I, truly, do owe you many apologies, as well, ” he replies with a thin smile, replaying the events in his head. Ducky’s stomach squeezes as relief floods her system, & she sharply inhales while attempting to keep some kind of composure. A tight smile graces her features, slipping past her facade of propriety & decorum. 

“I’ve been spending this past year, & some odd months, wallowing in my own melancholy, but,” Laurie pauses for a moment, slouching forward so his eyes are level with Ducky’s, “but I cannot waste away my life being miserable. If money is truly of the highest concern, then marry me.” His words grab her by the neck, shove their long, spindly fingers down her throat, wrench the breath from her lungs, & pry the air out of her. Her mouth falls agape as she struggles to comb through & fully understand what he’s said.

“Laurie, I refuse-”

“You won’t have to work, nor do you have to love me, & your family will be provided for: Beth, Amy, Marmee, everyone,” he prattles on, afraid of the nearing rejection that comes when he stops to breathe. Ducky can’t hear anything other than her own heartbeat & what, to her, sounds like the faint whisper of Laurie’s voice. She can’t even hear herself think.

“You’ll be happy, I promise. Everyday I will spend in honest devotion to your happiness,” he’s breathless as he finishes his speech, &, feeling the walls begin to collapse in on her, Ducky jumps to her feet. Rushing back & forth, in front of her very eyes, are countless memories of Jo & Laurie, of the way it’s always been. Jo loves her work. Laurie loves Jo. Ducky was left to love the footprints Laurie had left while chasing after Jo. 

“Laurie, I, as a woman, must either enter a marriage for security or for love,” she whispers out as her arms wrap around her waist, squeezing her sides tightly, “while you can marry for any reason under the sun, and I will not be an accomplice in allowing you to waste that privilege.” The room grows smaller, the air between them thinner. It’s hard to breathe & her vision becomes a swirl of blues & greens with a spotty pillar of white & black wiggling around in the centre. Laurie stops, & Ducky stops. Neither move. Neither speak. Neither breathe. The walls stop moving, & everything around them fades into their shadows. They are a boy & a girl. A lady & a man, all grown up & yet the exact same as they were the day that they met. While his previous proclamations were loud & steady, the words he speaks next are a promise meant only for his lips & the spirits that hide in peoples’ breaths. 

“But I can give you both, love and security, if you’d allow me. I’ll inherit my grandfather’s wealth, and we could be happy, all of us.”

Clear on his face is the same sincerity that he’s gifted to her in every moment of embarrassment & shame. His eyes stay glued to hers. After waiting for years for him to say these words to her, she can’t help but feel his admittance is fake. That maybe his words are meant for someone smarter, braver, older, & better then she is. His words are meant for Jo.

“No, no, you don’t get to, this isn’t right,” she bites back, walking backwards & grasping for the door knob yet only finding the air between her fingers, “Stop it, Laurie, please.”. He follows her, &, in his drunken state, collides with the furniture, sending his body awry. 

“Yes, yes I can, and we both know it to be true,” he tries to correct her as he raises his hands to grip her forearms. Her shoulders immediately tense at his touch. His fingers crinkle the poofy champagne fabric that delicately floats around her skin.

“You’re acting a fool, Laurie-”

“I can, I swear on my life Y/N, I am able and I am willing and, and content to do so.”

 “-I won’t allow it, I simply cannot,” she continues to ramble on, & her finger tips brush against the cool metal of the doorknob. Laurie opens his mouth to rebuke her statement, but, before he can, her palm flies up & presses against his lips. Covering his mouth with her hand, she shakes her head as her eyes gleam with tears.

“Please, stop. It hurts, Laurie. Please, Laurie, you’re hurting me,” she pleads to him as her fingers curl around the door knob, “I cannot do it. You broke my heart once already. Is that not enough for you?” 

To watch the boy she admires fall in love with her sister, who she’s loved since the dawn of time, was a constant, real ache that left her sobbing into Beth’s chest as she begged Meg to help her & relieve her of the pain, which was an impossible task. After the middle March had left for Europe & caught word of Jo’s rejection in a letter from Beth, she had a heavy heart knowing that the two people who were connected at the hip for all of her adolescence had now grown cold & distant. It was as if she’d heard that the moon no longer followed the sun, leaving the night cold & bleak. All she has done her entire life is labour & hurt for those she loves without question or complaint. However, she cannot look Laurie in the eyes as he slurs out ideas that would’ve sent her younger self spinning & giggling with a maddening joy. She cannot withstand that pain for him. She doesn’t feel happy or sad. Nor is she angry or scared. All that she can feel is the heavy pounding of her heart & a dull ache emanating through her. The pain swallows her mind, &, while her body still remains, Ducky has clearly fled far from the room. She’s racing down the streets in her dress, seeing how far her legs will take her. 

She yanks the door open just before he can reply & heaves her body through, slamming the door shut after her. Leaning her weight against the slab of carved & varnished oak, a few tears trickle down her cheek as she chokes back a sob, not wanting to alert any guests nearby. In her mind, she’s already ran all the way back to New England. There, back in her home, she lies, hiding her tears in Beth’s dress, as her sisters practically cocoon her, protecting her & the fire from the harsh reality of the world that waits outside their loving embrace & on the other side of the oak door. 

i told you it's literally & only just angst... sorry. please like & repost :)

[sepublic]

Everyone jokes that Pit is the unpaid intern who depends on tips to survive, but in a way, Palutena is also that amidst the godly pantheon; So it's fitting her personal champion reflects those same frustrations. Because if you think about it, Palutena is the only god actually trying to do her job in maintaining the celestial balance and helping humanity, and without really asking for anything?

You have Medusa, Pandora, Thanatos, Hades, and Pyrrhon, whom are all self-explanatory. You have Dyntos, who is neutral and does lean towards the greater good every now and then; But his general inaction is still enabling, and Palutena is scared of him for a reason.

We have Poseidon, who actually DOES help Palutena, but also admitted to wiping out a bunch of humans casually, and otherwise doesn't do anything else to participate. And while Viridi does try to maintain the balance of nature, she also massacred countless humans and contributed to the chaos that attracted the Aurum. And humans are a part of nature themselves, too!!!

And it's interesting because Palutena doesn't seem to demand anything in return; It seems she really is doing this out of the goodness of her heart, more or less. She does have her issues and occasional petty condescension towards humans, but otherwise Palutena's the only member of the pantheon committed to keeping things together. And while humans do sometimes praise and worship Palutena, it seems that she'd help them anyway even if she didn't; She calls Magnus a jerk but that's really it.

That ties into how sometimes, Palutena does admit that she feels pressured and overwhelmed with her duty, and the way she thanks Pit for insisting she does a great job in Chapter 4 kinda feels like... Well, maybe she's fishing for compliments sometimes, because Palutena could genuinely use the validation and it's lonely. This is also why she admits she's honored that Hades knows who Palutena is, because Hades is presumably a big deal in the pantheon, and I think Palutena craves validation, as much as she wants to be pure and selfless about her work; She does genuinely care too, these two things aren't mutually exclusive.

There's the Chaos Kin arc, and while Palutena's possibly just saying she's sick of doing the dirty work for humanity because the Chaos Kin makes her... There could be a hint of truth, just how Dark Pit reflects the truth in Pit's heart; Again, parallels between Goddess and Angel. She admits she's tired of constantly having to protect and take care of the humans, which is like Pittoo being frustrated with doing Palutena's dirty work.

Which then gets me to another point; Pit being a reflection of Palutena's light, because I can kinda see her venting her frustration through him? If Palutena feels beleaguered as the only goddess protecting humanity and the world in general, then she might really appreciate having a devoted angel with infinite energy, who will jump to any task for her. Which makes Pit a way for Palutena to treat herself, let someone help her handle the load, etc.

But there is a darker side, with how Palutena will sometimes demean Pit, even appealing to Viridi and Hades in Chapter 15 this way; It kinda reminds me of people who are bullied, only to turn the bullying towards someone else and participating in that so they can be part of the in-group, not be laughed at themselves, etc. Plus her shutting down Pit's disagreement with "Are you the goddess here?" Especially since she might feel that she deserves more respect for her work, and isn't always given that by those 'below' her (AKA humans, usually). It feels good to at least take pride in what Palutena DOES have, right?

And that's Palutena dropping her filter around her own 'Palutena' because admittedly, Pit is in a subordinate position to her. And I guess it feels good, deep down, to be the one letting someone else handle the work, and exercising that power over them because Pit is someone Palutena can get away with being unpleasant around. Part of that is trust, because Palutena feels comfortable being herself, expressing her own insecurities and true feelings.

But the other part is expression frustration at someone who won't talk back, who Palutena doesn't have to worry about holding up an image towards; With other gods it's obvious, and to humans, she has to be their perfect, noble paragon of virtue. In the end, it reminds me of how some people tired with their jobs might take it out on their assistants, or others who are below them, to feel like they're the ones in control and who are being asked for recognition from.

That ironically leads to Pit's own latent frustrations with Palutena, which is furthered by him being unable to fly on his own. And that manifests as Dark Pit. And then Palutena's frustrations manifest through the Chaos Kin's manipulation of her. Imagine if Pseudo-Palutena returned in a sequel to genuinely be the Pittoo to Palutena's Pit, lol. Although her dialogue paints her as more of a mad religious fanatic than someone secretly tired of that work.

In the end, I wonder how much of this has to do with Medusa's betrayal; In the original NES manual, it's mentioned that Palutena and Medusa both ruled together, they're two sides of the same coin, Light and Darkness. But when Medusa neglected her own duties to attack humanity, that forced Palutena to exile her into the Underworld, which basically left her working double, perhaps. Again, like how Pit has to often do all of the work, despite there being centurions who can come back from the dead like he does.

In Pit's case, this comes from a fierce loyalty and protective attitude towards those he cares about; He's a good friend always there for others who wouldn't dare to ask anything of them, but that wears him out ragged. In the case of Palutena, she had to lose that option entirely when Medusa went on a rampage; But shortly afterwards, Pit rescued her and became Palutena's champion.

So Pit has a lot of work dumped on him, and maybe that's because he's essentially taking over Medusa's duties in being someone who works directly alongside Palutena to maintain balance. That could make him a fun parallel to Medusa in a way. And maybe Pit is aware of this, adding to his refusal to ever question or betray the Goddess of Light, because he knows she's already been hurt and is also doing more work than she's supposed to. His loyalty comes out of empathy and compassion towards someone he can tell really needs it.

But that selflessness can be self-destructive, because Pit will forget to consider what he's getting in return, and that gives us Pittoo, whose selfishness is framed as not inherently bad, and even good for him. But Palutena does care for Pit in return, in big and little ways, such as preparing a cold drink for him after Chapter 10. She cares a lot for Pit too, she'll cook a delicious vegetable stew for him!

You know if Medusa returns in a sequel, I'd like to know more about her and Palutena's falling-out, if there was actually anything more to it than just "Medusa looks down on humanity." After the Chaos arc, I could see her insinuating to Pit that Palutena will betray him for real, just as she did her... Only for Pit to redo that same speech about how Medusa is an unprompted murderer of helpless innocents, ya dingus.

TL;DR Palutena is the only goddess doing her job and it's exhausting and she takes it out on her secretary who is also in the exact same position, ironically.

[tangsakura]

My Response to Sukuna's You Pronouns Post

The post I am responding to was made by @thepersonperson.

So here are my thoughts about the way Sukuna uses the second-person pronoun to people + my other observations. Please read @thepersonperson's post first before reading ahead for a better understanding.

Warning: The following content contains JJK spoilers beyond the anime, so if you aren't caught up with the manga, please DO NOT INTERACT. Also, mentions of homosexuality topic in Edo & Heian periods.

Sukuna's default pronoun is always omae. But the way it's written in the manga tells you how he seriously he is addressing you. When he was talking to Yuta and Haruta, it was written as お前, the hiragana/kanji way, the usual way. Yes, he is talking to you, but he is also nonchalant about you. It carries the connotation of 'okay, he/she is just some person, meh' kind of thing if you get what I mean.

We see this with Ryu, who he wasn't taking seriously because his main priority at that moment was to kill Yorozu, who was in Tsumiki's body. On the other hand, he looked down on Yuta since to him, his curse technique wasn't anything special; if anything, Rika was the one he was paying attention to because Yuta's powers depends on her (I hope I worded this right *sweats*).

Whereas if you look at the way he talks to Maki, Jogo, the Twins, and Yuji, he is using オマエ, the katakana way. I think that he is in the moment and directly talking to them seriously. Obviously, he doesn't see them as equals nor the same level as Gojo, but they got his attention, and he's directly talking to them.

As for Mahoraga, I feel like he is reminding it that its master is him now. He was talking as if Mahoraga is his subordinate and is disappointed that it is not fulfilling its master's wishes.

And here is where it gets interesting for Kisama. The people he used Kisama with are people he sees higher than those he uses Omae with.

Let's take a three-floored pyramid. At the very top is whatever the second person pronoun or whatever he uses to indicate that he considers them as equal, which obvs we will most likely not see him use. At the bottom are the Omae people, and in the middle are the Kisama people. It makes sense that Kisama is higher, since Kisama irl was originally used for respectable people, or even those higher than you in the upper class/ranks.

For Yorozu, I think the reason he used Kisama was because he's trusting her enough to do what is necessary if she ever defeats him. Throughout their fight, Sukuna uses オマエ, the serious Omae, meaning he's taking her seriously but still looking down at her more than Kisama people - Gojo and Kashimo. But when they're talking about what would happen if Yorozu defeats him, he talks as if he was trusting her enough with his 'dead' body (remember, to him, defeat = being no different than dying). Of course, he was not seeing her as his equal nor wants defeat from her, but interacting just enough to indicate to her 'hey, I don't ever want to die (be defeated), but if I ever do, do what you want with me. I trust you to some extent' kind of thing.

For Gojo and Kashimo, he uses Kisama to them because he sees them as someone he would fight with all of his attention, more than the Omae people. The ones who will give him a greater satisfaction, the ones he'll get along with even if it'll only be for a short while. Mind you, these two are the strongest in their era, so you might even think of it as acknowledging them for being at the top of the strength hierarchy in their generations.

Let me first start with Gojo.

In chapter 224, Sukuna calls Gojo "名前をついてないだけの魚" - a fish that merely has no name attached to it.

JJK Chapter 224

Think about it. Sukuna is called many names, including the titles 'King of Curses', 'The Fallen', and 'The Honoured One'. Even Kashimo is called, 'The God of Lightning'. But what about Gojo? In this generation, they call him 'The Strongest Sorcerer', but these two were also called that in their respective generations aside from their famous epithet(s). So what's his name outside of that? This is what Sukuna is telling him - he has no name outside of being 'The Strongest', thus he's just a fish. Don't get me wrong. He still thinks highly of him than those in the Omae level.

(Also, man says 'uo', the older Japanese word for fish, instead of 'sakana' lmao)

Now, in another instance, Sukuna included an English word into his speech and switched to the お前 pronoun. How I interpret this is Sukuna tricking Gojo. Remember, today in Japan, Kisama is a really derogatory second-person pronoun that it might as well be a swear word.

JJK Chapter 231

Sukuna isn't looking down on Gojo that much compared to those in the Omae category - he respects him to a certain extent; but Gojo doesn't see it like that. Gojo definitely thinks that Sukuna is looking down on him so much and that he is insulting him. When Sukuna remarks about the 'countdown until that smirk of yours disappears', Gojo sees it as a sign that Sukuna has elevated Gojo and sees him as an equal in the battlefield, indicating that his attacks dealt a tremendous damage on Sukuna. But about the countdown word, I think it may have also come from Yuji's and Megumi's influences that he uses a few English words here and there, but definitely he talked a bit like a modern person to seem like he was trying to connect to Gojo. We might as well say that he was taking advtange of modern Japan's language and societal norms to play on Gojo's mindset.

Anyways, unfortunately, in Sukuna's view, he was now nonchalant. Remember what I said previously about お前 for him - he's not serious in his interaction to the person he's using that to. So while it might not have been obvious to Gojo, it should be obvious to the readers, assuming they pay attention to how he uses his Omae pronoun..... that there was something strange with him. What's going on? Of course, we eventually find out what he has under his sleeve in ch 236.........

And as for remembering part of Yorozu's words..... it isn't clear when you read it this chapter alone, but once you read chapter 238, it makes sense.

JJK Chapter 238 (English Translation)

In that moment, Sukuna recognized that Gojo is having a hard time with making sense of 'love', that Gojo is dealing with solitude but hasn't come to terms with it. It made sense now as to why Sukuna remember Yorozu's words - chapter 238 confirms this through his dialogue. (I swear, this man knows how to read a person's psyche and personality so well and he uses it against people (e.g. Yuji)

Also, Yorozu's default second-pronoun, at least with Sukuna, is Anata, which is feminine and is the usual female second person pronoun regardless of the female's relationship to the person she's speaking with. Women also uses this to call their spouse or lover, just as how men will use omae or kimi to their spouse or lover (though, if we're talking about Sukuna, I don't think this rule will apply because of how he uses Omae......). Nevertheless, unless we see more of her, I'll consider Anata as her default second person pronoun.

Anyways, after Gojo's death comes Kashimo. Sukuna definitely acknowledges him as 'The Strongest' of his generation, as indicated with his use of Kisama, but he got pissed. He was high at that moment. He was genuinely satisfied. He fought someone who stood his ground and wasn't thrown uselessly around like Jogo did. He got to learn about this unique, calculative and power cursed technique. He was challenged with overcoming infinity, something so difficult to bypass, but overcame it with 10 shadows (shoutout to Mahoraga/Makora), not by his own technique alone. He got a new version of dismantle - World Slash.

He also most likely witnessed probably the most heartwarming afterlife scene for him (I refused to believe that he didn't witness the airport scene with Gojo and co. in their much younger selves - I mean he was there watching Jogo's afterlife scene then goes to interrupt, and does the same thing with Kashimo's afterlife scene), which makes me believe that it was also one of the reasons why he was beaming when he said, 'You are praiseworthy, Satoru Gojo. It seems that I will not forget you for as long as I live.'

JJK Chapter 236

Unlike Jogo and Kashimo, Gojo did not move on to the afterlife full of regrets and disappointment. Sure, he said that he didn't do well enough to reach Sukuna and all, but that was literally inconsequential. Like did you see him with all the people he was with during Inventory Arc, including Riko (no Toji) when he finally passed on? He was all smiles and there was nothing else. He got all the answers and anything else that he needed - the closure - from his peers from the afterlife, understood it all, and came to terms with it. So, there was no reason for Sukuna to intervene and give his two cents to Gojo to give him the closure he needed. That was why, Sukuna must've been happy, because Gojo had a 'proper death', no regrets and disappointment or whatsoever towards the life he led. He nor anybody else alive at the moment weren't needed by Gojo for him to move on.

Anyways, back to the topic of Kashimo.

I believe that if Kashimo had waited for a while for Sukuna to savour the aftermath of his fight with Gojo (I'm not even surprised if he was mourning his death a bit), he would've bothered to 'properly' fight Kashimo. What I mean is fighting him with him knowing about him, including his name. But that didn't happen. Even though he recognized Kashimo as worthy like Gojo Satoru, he entered at the wrong time. Even so, Sukuna entertained him, but if you read their fight, it wasn't the same as the one with Gojo. It felt more rushed and it just felt like Sukuna wasn't doing it for the sake of having fun and learning. It didn't help that Kashimo was being demanding of him for answers to his complications and issues.

Then, in the afterlife scene, when Kashimo was talking to Sukuna, it was noted how Kashimo went from Omae to Anta. I believe this is him not only elevating Sukuna or lowering himself in their interaction, but also letting Sukuna about his feelings for him. Anta is the informal version of Anata and is still feminine enough. When a guy uses feminine language, they are being polite/respectful to whoever they are talking to (unless they don't identify as a male).

Remember, Kashimo was from the Edo period and during that time, believe it or not, homosexuality was rampant among the monastic (monks) and samurai classes. There was this thing called age-structured homosexual relationships. So, basically, somebody young, usually adolescent male, would be in a relationship with their master, a male adult. Until the adolescent one comes of age, they will be in this relationship. Usually the older one is the active and dominant one, while younger one is the one receiving the older one. In the case of the samurai class, the younger one receives the older partner "out of love, loyalty, and affection, rather than sexual desire". There are also male prostitutes, mainly kabuki actors, who are sought by males, as well.

I think Sukuna also recognized Kashimo's attraction to him but he rejects him outright with the words he said to him that love was worthless. I mean, even in Heian era, there were also homosexual relationships. This is evident in Genji Monogatari, where Genji rejected a lady and instead slept with her younger brother. (Also, mind you all, we don't know Sukuna's sexual preferences, so don't make assumptions lmao)

In anycase, this is my two cents regarding Sukuna's second-person pronouns. I hope you had a fun time reading it. Feel free to share your thoughts or let me know what I missed. As usual, I will respond when I feel like it lmao

Until next time!

[saintsenara]

Also would love to know what you think of Lily/&Sirius as well! I can totally see the slight resentment on his part you mentioned but i loveee the letter Harry finds in DH. AND tell me your thoughts on jilypad bc I just need to dig your brain

thank you very much for the ask, pal!

i know this was prompted by me saying - while discussing jily - that my preferred version of lily and sirius' relationship is one in which sirius resents lily for stealing the love of his life [and i don't mean lupin!] away from him. so i think it's worth clarifying what i mean by this:

because i certainly don't think that sirius' resentment towards lily would be overt - i don't think he'd ever be openly hostile towards her, i don't think he'd do anything to undermine james and lily's relationship, and i don't think he'd ever be anything other than sincerely delighted that james was so happy. he evidently values the relationship he has with lily - enough to have kept her letters somewhere he could retrieve after his sojourn in azkaban [the most plausible date of the letter harry finds in deathly hallows is august 1981, which means that we know sirius wasn't living at grimmauld place when it was written. this is something he's stored deliberately, rather than something he had just lying around.] - and i don't propose that he was pretending.

what i think, instead, is that sirius' canonical tendency towards suffering and abiding would make him actively want to cheerlead jily's relationship. he's someone who clearly believes that it's honourable to make sacrifices and that his own happiness is subordinate to the greater good. and while this is all very noble, it's also an enormous - and somewhat toxic - burden for someone like lily to bear.

i like the idea of sirius - much like his narrative mirror, snape - having an extraordinarily idealised view of lily which the real lily struggles to live up to [which provides an interesting watsonian explanation for why he only mentions her once in canon - the doylist reason is just that the series needs to obscure lily's centrality to the mystery for as long as it can, but it's much more fun to imagine that sirius actually knows nothing about the version of lily he didn't construct in his head]. i also like the idea of him struggling constantly with guilt over how he secretly would like to see james and lily split up, so that he could comfort james with tender forehead kisses [and much, much more...]

when it comes to lilypad as something non-platonic, then, my preferred version of the ship is one in which sirius and lily end up together after she survives voldemort's attack [and is, therefore, able to exonerate sirius by revealing that wormtail was the secret keeper] as an extraordinarily unhealthy way of dealing with the earth-shattering weight of their mutual grief. this doesn't mean that i think it would be an abusive or toxic relationship - nor that it couldn't last - but that it would be a... strange and quite melancholy one, haunted constantly by james' ghost.

which means, i suppose, that it's also my preferred version of jilypad. i don't like it as a triad when it's just written as really happy and flawless [well-functioning polygamy takes introspection, and none of these three strike me as possessing that ability...], but i do like it as a mess.

[emilover-1]

Mori Ogai; kindness and philosophy.

Mori is a very interesting character, and with that it comes the complexity of the character, since he is a complex character and not too much is known about him, its pretty often people in the fandom mischaracterizes Mori, so let’s talk about his kindness first.

In the official BSD guidebook, it is said that his strength is kindness and that his weakness is that he is uncertain whether he truly has the confidence of his subordinates.

Kindness is being selfless, caring, considerate and generous, is mori any of those things…? Actually yes. First let’s go with the selfless definition.

Selfless is being more concerned with the needs and wishes of others than with our own, unselfishness. Mori has shown to be concerned about Yokohama and the port mafia more than being selfish by just focusing on own needs, he has textually became the boss and therefore slave of the own organization, everything he does is for the better of Yokohama and the pm, Mori even helped Atsushi in his debut appearance despite it not giving any benefits to himself, there was no need to save Tanizaki and help Atsushi at all, yet he did.

He is caring towards those who are in the pm, even though some may die in missions he sent them to, he is shown to be sad when they die WITHOUT a reason, more than a hundred of his subordinates died because of a mission and he griefs over them because there wasn’t a good reason for them to die, after all mori is called “He who fell out to the optimal solution” isn’t he?

He is considerate towards (surprise) the pm and Yokohama, he puts Yokohama above EVERYTHING, even above personal wishes or needs, not to mention that he was generous to Higuchi admitting that Higuchi wasn’t suitable for the job but yet let her stay.

Now that the kindness topic is off the table, let’s go with his mindset and philosophy.

The philosophy that would suit him the best would be Niccolò Machiavelli’s philosophy. Niccolò Machiavelli thought that the end justified the means fully, he also thought that it was best to be both loved and feared, yet the two rarely go along, and anyone compelled to choose will find greater security in being feared than in loved, but why? Because if people love you, they can still do things against you or your ideals, but if they fear you, they won’t.

Despite Niccolò not mentioning the word ‘philosophy’ in The prince or The discourses the word philosopher does appear (once) in The prince and 3 times in The discourses, Niccolò is seen as a philosopher himself by a lot of people, lets dive into his philosophy.

Niccolò thought that it would be excellent if a ruler had morals and all good things and none of the bad, but since it’s the nature of life that you cant have or practice al those qualities all of the time, a ruler must take care to avoid the disgrace that goes with the kind of failings that could make him lose his position, just as Mori thinks; the end justifies the means, if a ruler had morals it would be good, but it can’t be possible or it will lead to failure, it just isn’t possible, it isn’t affective.

Mori isn’t good on terms of morality, which may be contradictive to the first part where we were discussing kindness, however Mori is kind not because its just natural and no other intentions than good, he manipulates those people he is kind to, though not always, most of the time he manipulates. This is related to another thing Niccolò thought, was that you could be good, have morals, but not too much because its ineffective, you cannot be good because for you to be a good leader most of the time you have to be cruel, going back to the love and fear, you cannot control how or who people love but you can control who they fear. Have goodness is good, its good but its simply not affective, no matter how much people love you or claim they do, they can always lie, so why not lie to them too? Its better to be feared than lied that they supposedly love you but hate you and start conspiracies. People are cruel, selfish and deceiving, so why not be too?

A lot of people in bsd fear mori, others admire him, but almost none hate him, that shows how good of a leader mori is, and despite dazai and yosano hate him, yosano still fears him, and dazai didn’t always hate mori, dazai just started to hate mori because of what mori did with oda, yet dazai recognizes that it was the most logical solution, the only reason he ‘hates’ and I don’t think it can even be defined like that, I would say that its resentment, dazai wouldn’t kill mori, dazai has no wishes to become or even come back to the port mafia, and again that shows how good of a leader mori is.

Thank you for reading my analysis!

[artbyblastweave]

Gideon The Ninth Liveread, Chapter 15

In which we have the obligatory party/ball scene. Obligatory to what? Off the top of my head, Murder Mysteries and Fake Dating AUs

A few hours later. A lot goes unsaid with this; it’s a time skip, but it’s a telling one. It means that nothing happened in the few hours between Harrow collapsing and waking back up; Gideon didn’t leave, didn’t look around, didn’t see or examine anything new of import. She kept vigil, and the narration breezes right past it.

“Necromantic Theorem.” So the magic system is formalized and not just pure will. Gideon’s being glib but this IS essentially how I thought this worked, so it’s nice to have this clarified.

Ha. Gideon remembers the name of the fourth Cavalier but not the fourth necromancer. Priorities.

“Fan Mail.” Possibly a concept Gideon picked up from the backs of the comic books. and from this fan mail we derive that Abigail and Magnus have a dynamic. Stern cop Jovial Cop.

Harrow jumps right to a (I assume) completely appropriate assessment of the genre they’re in and starts hypothesizing assignation plots. Gideon, meanwhile, demonstrates greater Machiavellian acuity than I’ve previously ascribed to her, purely because her first-ever dessert is on the line. She’s like Roger Rabbit with the Handcuffs. Extremely conditional trains of thought.

Harrow is nervous about the function. Gideon assumes that this is because she wants to get back to the trials, since she used to run Ninth House functions without a sweat. This brings us back to Gideon only really being able to model Harrow in a combative context; it’s cripplingly obvious why Harrow is afraid of this function. She ran a transparent con against addled, devoted, elderly clergy, many of whom were literally blind. This is a gathering of High Society, which Gideon herself just painted as a potential hotbed of information gathering and Machiavellian politicking- a thought that apparently literally stayed in Gideon’s head for the exact amount of time it took her to win the argument, and no longer. 

Glad Rags! Magnus is great.

Abigail Pent, Intense Librarian. Very curious how things are between her and Magnus, just generally. Political marriage? According to Teacher (they (helpful exposition dispenser) She’s a spirit-talker. A necromancer in the traditional use of the term. That’d be Fifth House’s bag?

Interesting exposition on the Fourth and The Fifth here; The Fourth has been implied to be subordinated to the Fifth a few times. Magnus I think is actually the dreadful teens Uncle, and Isaac is apprenticed to someone outside his own house. Did the Fifth swallow the Fourth the way Harrow is afraid the 9th will be swallowed? Is there precedent that she’s afraid of?

The Third and the Sixth are facing off before Teacher (conveniently!) defuses things by announcing the main event.

Gonna read stuff into the seating arrangements. Gideon is with Palamedes, her lady-love Dulcinea, and the fifth Cav. Harrow is with the Mayo dyad, Ianthe, Seventh Cav super mutant, and Naberius. Putting eighth and ninth together feels like some kind of power play.

“The same middle name.” Good God. Coronabeth is either laughing too hard on purpose as an ingratiation play, or she is, in fact, compatible with Gideon on two levels.

Okay, there are on-site greenhouses. That explains where the food is coming from. I was wondering.

Alright, Magnus and Abigail can’t conceive. Slightly adjusting my assessment; they have the affordance of being nice because they’re weird, and on the outs within the political system they’re ostensibly on top of. Abigail is interested in pure scholarship and Magnus is interested in Abigail. I refer back to my previous assessment of Magnus as embodying the fun aesthetic parts of courtly empire w/o the inherently monstrous decision-making power.

 And Dulcinea is, in fact, good at picking up on what her conversational partners care about and feeding it. It’s not a Gideon-specific thing; she’s honing in on Abigail’s interests as well.

“Post Resurrection, Pre-sovereignty, pre-cohort.” Aaaaand Gideon turns away from the exposition because that’s just what she does.

Okay, from the Young-Uncle-Ianthe-Babs interaction we get the following; young-uncle has something against… intervention in births? A religious taboo? Ianthe was premature, extracted by C-section; The Eigth (Silas, I checked the cast page) calls this a “wasted opportunity,” which feels like a deliberate inversion of real-life Catholic Abortion Dickishness ™. Babs jumps in to defend Coronabeth, as he did before; Ianthe tramples him verbally. From this we derive that Babs is into Coronabeth specifically, although it doesn’t end well for him no matter which of them he’s talking to. And he has opinions on Bucklers, which Gideon wants to hear. It’s always interesting to encounter someone who has your exact interests but is so massively dickish on every other axis that you can’t capitalize on it.

This is Gideon’s first interaction with Jeannemary, and it’s this. I like that even when Gideon is interacting with the fourthling directly, there’s a shift in the dialogue from when Jeannemary is speaking normally and when she’s doing the nasally whine thing. She’s great. (But is Isaac great? I can’t tell if they’re trading off on doing the bit, or if it’s all her, all the time.)

And Gideon gets to eat! That’s good.

Okay, so Harrow, given a chance to dig into things with Teacher, can make him look thoughtful. A theological discussion? Applied Theory? Most of the others haven’t gotten far enough in the trials, so far as we know, to be able to talk specifics in the way that Harrow now can.

Is Dulcinea’s bit about the Biceps a Gravity Falls reference?

Oh, Jeannemary was, like, jealous. And possibly Crushing. Okay, this is back to cute. I like how the vocal affect reflects their tone but also their physical distance from Gideon and Dulcinea; also, question answered. It’s all Jeannemary. Isaac is the voice of reason, ish.

Okay, so Dulcinea pops the question- the big question- why are the houses like this. The dysfunction is obvious if not yet explosive; The houses are militarily and financially secure from the constant influx of spoils; The Emperor’s favor is both nebulous in its actual benefit and completely unrelated to the task at hand, which is pretty explicit (learn how to be Lyctors!) You’re inclined to say that everyone in Canaan House, categorically, has virtually no higher place to which they can climb within their hierarchies; that’s the point of pursuing Lyctorhood. Of course, the situation with the Ninth tells us that the assumed notion of security isn’t true in the slightest, the situation with the Sixth demonstrates that the Houses can have orthogonal interests like pure scholasticism, The eighth clearly aren’t in it for money…the more I think about it, the more Dulcinea’s remarks feel like that thing pretentious poets sometimes do where they wax cynical about an arrangement without putting much thought into the petty incentives underlying stuff. This might be deliberate; Dulcinea is clearly pretty clever.

Alright, something’s going on between Palamedes and Dulcinea. Gideon thinks that his weirdo obsession with. uh. Medicine that works…? gives him the hots for her.

“Magnus was nice.” I forgot to mention in chapter 12 that Gideon’s word choice in relation to Magnus is tied like an anchor to her current mood. When she’s in the pits, Magnus “tries pathetically hard;” when she’s well fed and high on Dulcinea, he’s “nice,” and she’s hurt on his behalf when Harrow ignores him.

And we end the chapter on this; Harrow thinks Pent is now in the running. Harrow is really, really committed to the idea that she has to WIN; this is, with added context, probably at least a little true, because the Eighth is probably an existential adversary and the Third strikes me as an opportunistic adversary if they get an opening. But it’s very telling that Harrow hears the Eighth- the most zealous of all the houses- just hand this information over to the Fifth without any cajoling and jumps to the conclusion it’s a race. What she overheard was an act of cooperation. And she was asleep for a major act of inter-house cooperation. She’s sticking to her initial paradigm, in the exact way that she stuck to her initial paradigm with the 163 skeletons. And Gideon, with her ability to actually make nice with people from other houses, might be the only effective counter to this tendency.

[theladyofbloodshed]

Ok but Tamlin referring to Feyre as a woman and Beron referring to his sisters in law as ladies during th HL meeting makes me go "????" Because - despite the narrative claiming they're both sexist assholes who deserve to rot - the latent characterization doesn't exactly track? Ignoring the bioessentialist 🤢 connotations of "female" 🤢🤢🤢, Tamlin referring to Feyre puts her humanity front and center. He didn't fall in love with a fae female, he fell in love with a human woman! And that's a nuance that characterizes so much of their relationship but the narrative completely ignores it!! And Beron is either a) is using polite language because he genuinely respects his dead sisters in law and holds them in high esteem or b) they were women of rank and he refers to them accordingly! Both options add a nuance to how gender operates in Prythian; women are esteemed and have roles in nobility and greater society, but its subordinate to that of the men. There's an implicit understanding that women have some level of individual agency but less mobility on a societal level which, again, is so much more nuanced and interesting than "all males mean and bad (except for feminist king Rhysand) and all females smol and weak (except for girlboss Feyre)" Anyway I'm rambling but the portrayal of gender in this series annoys the ever loving shit out of me. If she marketed this ad fantasy erotica I wouldn't give a shit but a so called "feminist masterpiece" needs to actually contain feminism y'know

i agree with your points bestie and would love if they were deliberate choices, but we also have to consider sjm actually didn't put any thought into the word choice here and yet it has ended up with your amazing analysis

[thegeminisage]

ok it's star trek update time. once again. i've fallen behind 💀 tuesday we did voy's "the cloud" and "phage" (out of order bc plex numbered them incorrectly/user error), wednesday we did ds9's "dentiny" and voy's "eye of the needle," and last night we watched ds9's "prohphet motive" and voy's "ex post facto."

the cloud (voy):

man this one sucked ass

well, i did like janeway's personal log. i love women getting to have the same normal problems a man would. i like janeway a lot, even if she still feels a bit stiff to me sometimes

actually, WAIT, why is the academy TEACHING captains they need to maintain a certain distance? like sure yes it's a bad idea to fuck your subordinates (even though picard said there was NO?? regulation on that...) but surely you're supposed to like. care about them. between this and deanna winning the kobayashi maru by killing geordi i'm starting to wonder if starfleet expects captains to simply not CARE about people. there's something larger at work in my brain re: this thought, like, kirk was always going on missions himself to protect people despite that putting him greater danger, and now they don't want captains to leave the chair or care about people...hell universe. and since picard never left the chair or cared about anyone it may have made for good policy but it made for BAD tv

ANYWAY.

accidentally got spoiled for neelix being the cook bc of reverse ep order lol

tom paris once again insufferable bc he's like dont invite the captain to poker night or whatever. for a rebellious felon he's really toeing that starfleet line. also, the LAST thing in the world i want is more holodeck but ESPECIALLY if i have to watch tom paris make out with realfake holo women on it. HOLO PEOPLE ARE ALIVE YOU FOOLS

i thought this episode was gonna be about coffee and it wasn't :( it was just a few jokes here and there

the nebula plot was stupid. you ram a hole in it and you're gonna fix it by ramming more holes? neelix is the only mfer that gets it. that said, i DO support women's rights to ram ill-advised things through holes - whenever, however, and as often as they like.

chakotay teaching janeway to find her animal guide (complete with the medicine bundle...) being played TOTALLY straight and serious just about ended me. like i knew they werent gonna be like "haha just kidding you are a REALLY gullible white person" at the end but watching them not do that was really really awful

harry kim just casually dropping he remembers being in the womb. alright.

janeway muting the doc when he is trying to speak :( holo-racist

i do like that firstly harry was like fuck tom paris im inviting janeway and secondly that she can play pool really well. those were nice touches. the non-racist janeway stuff was good! i just wish the rest of the episode had been good too lol

phage (voy):

i liked this one MUCH better. first of all, neelix in the cave about to get his lungs stolen very "mistew obama pwease hewp me" core. then perish. rip in pieces poor neelix :(

secondly, what an interesting ethical dilemma...can you kill a person to save a person? not in starfleet ig but if i was janeway i would have been real tempted. neelix is great

kes giving up one of her lungs to neelix was so sweet, actually. kes has grown on me a HUGE amount in a very very short time. i absolutely love her kindness, which was boring at first because i didn't really feel like she was being kind in a way that stood out from any run of the mill compassionate character. but her scenes with the doctor bring out the best in both of them, i think - like, he kicks her out initially, and then asks her to stay because he's in over his head. and rather than dismissing him she stays and asks if he wants to unionize. the fact that she's DETERMINED to treat him as a fully realized person when he doesn't even treat himself that way...she recognizes unmet needs and works to fix them, just because that's who she is. AUGH she's such a good personnn she;s gonna make a GREAT doctor

lung stealing aliens are way cooler than the slaver aliens even if they are horrible to look at. i LOVE how mad janeway got at them. she was like if i EVER see you again its on sight and i believe her. and she scared them so good they fixed neelix <3 kinda goes to show compassion wins...and that kind of compassion/adherence to morals in the face of personal loss and righteous anger IS a kirk move honorific. and winning because of those qualities is a kirk move. ugh i like janeway so much

"one day i'll surprise you mister tuvok" i love them. wah. tuvok reminds me SO much of spock...he's got that eyebrow thing happening

also, neelix getting his lungs removed totally makes this the spiritual sequel to spock's brain

destiny (ds9):

the whole time i was watching this i felt like sokka in that one atla episode. "can your science prove why it rains" core. like just because there are three cardassians and some river went somewhere...it's especially galling to me that kira buys into it completely. i always forget she's religious, and she's so SMART i didn't think she'd get caught up in the prophecy of it all.

recited the 35th rule of acquisition alongside quark which felt. bad. i still haven't forgiven him but i'm trying

cardassian lady accidentally flirting with obrien was EXTREMELY funny. that's twice now he's banged his head on the ceiling and it's incredibly charming

kira and sisko being buddies 🥺 kira like it's had to work for space jesus!!! so true girl. though she literally was sleeping with a space priest. their bits were sooo good though, you can FEEL how much he doesn't want the enormity of his role, and how much kira believes in him - and i personally get the sense it's because she's SEEN him work. like she believes in him on a professional level, as well, because he ALWAYS has her back. man i would totally believe he was space jesus too who can blame her he's amazing

i did at least like the rational explanation for the prophecies- that nonlinear aliens simply just tell people things. i do wonder why they can't just knock on the wormhole and ask those guys some questions, though

anyway, firmly mid. normally i love kira-heavy episodes but i just had such a hard time not going full sokka in this one. sorry, kira!

eye of the needle (voy):

THIS ONE BLEW MY TITS CLEAN OFF!! best voyager episode yet imho

firstly we are still sending things through holes. fantastic.

also, kes went from "eh she is boring" to "i would die for her" at warp speed......her scenes with the doctor are all SO good. kes recognizing his humanity when most people in starfleet don't know holograms are alive/don't care that holograms are alive, when HE HIMSELF does not think of himself as being alive...mwah. david cage wishes. it feels like an inverse of the data situation, because data WANTED to be alive but struggled to fit in with humanity, whereas the doctor didn't give two shits about being treated like a real person until kes started talking to him about it, and would in fact fit in effortlessly with "real people" were he not confined to the medbay.

and the doctor's bitterness! no one speaks directly to him despite asking him to function as an entire medical staff. no one remembers to turn him off, leaving him to suffer through hours of boredom, or people turn him off when he isn't ready, leading to problems with his experiments. and the existential dread of being abandoned on the ship alone while everyone else potentially transports home through the wormhole...and someone potentially forgetting to deactivate him first.

i really like how janeway reacted to the news that the doctor might be alive. she was like "girl no way" and then kes was like "yes way" and she decided to investigate herself rather than be dismissive about it. she was very good in this episode overall but i like that she showed compassion to someone/something she wasn't even sure was alive. it was very siskocore of her.

and finally...that sweet a-plot. letswatchstartrek, my least favorite website that is absolute essential to my functioning, GAVE THIS A TWO. because "well it's season 1 we all know they aren't getting home this episode." those fucking idiots, that's WHY this episode is good!! it's about hope. do they understand nothing

like, everyone trying SO HARD to curb their expectations at first because the wormhole is so small and so decayed and the absolute MOST they can hope for is to get a message through...the agony of the wormhole going back to where they need to be but them not being able to get through and the only person picking up the phone being a FUCKING romulan who think they're prank calling him

and the way that like this predicament utterly humanizes everyone involved. janeway answering the phone in her nightgown. asking about this romulan's family. the barriers between starfleet and romulus breaks down instantly under the shared connection of being adrift without one's family. what a perfect illustration of the compassion one can have for strangers because deep down even aliens are made of the same stuff as we are.

and then of course by the end janeway is like it doesn't matter! secrecy doesn't matter! let's have hope for a minute let's believe this will work! and then IT DOESN'T WORK. or, actually, what's worse is that it could work, they could theoretically go back to the alpha quadrant 20 years ago, but it will fuck everything up if they do, and they can't even prevent themselves from getting stuck out here. all they can do is send the romulan home with their messages and then..........

............have no idea if he found a way to send them before he died ahead of schedule. like. ALL THEY HAVE IS HOPE. like of COURSE you know theyre not gonna get home in season 1 but THAT IS WHAT MAKES IT INSANE.

also, hi, b'elanna not having anyone at home who cares if she lives or dies...this retroactively makes chakotay's protectiveness of her so much more meaningful. everyone who loves her is already on this ship :( aaaagggh

prophet motive (ds9):

god this one sucked so bad. rare L for ds9 and a major one at that

i spent most of it googling whether or not people actually liked the ferengi episodes (to my dismey: yes, people on reddit think they're funny), but i also spent some time googling how many more episodes we had to suffer through this grand nagus bullshit (4) and getting my little guys stolen on chess.

i have been wanting to see the wormhole aliens again FOREVER and wondered why you can't just go and talk to them and then they show up in this of all places...they so nicely let people go through their wormhole and then this dude disrespectfully bothers them...

also, to SELL an orb back to the bajorans...i hope he dies. i hope kira specifically kills him and loots the orb off his corpse.

the only two moments of note in this episode were 1. quark talking ancient unknowable aliens into letting him and the nagus leave unscathed through a combination of fast thinking and being annoying, which would be charming were i not in such dire anti-quark straits 2. rom robbing the nagus blind LMAOOO good for him. i hope he shared exactly zero of it with quark

on a final note, the space station, unlike tng's enterprise, does NOT seem to be self-cleaning. thank god for that.

EDIT I NEARLY FORGOT JULIAN BASHIR B PLOT!!!!! he wanted to win so bad even though he knew there wasnt a chance 🥺 my poor HORRIBLY competitive fella. and then it was three days of marinating in the fact that he was never gonna win

also odo cold reading him about the acceptance speech lmfao. love that

ex post facto (voy):

i would have liked this episode a LOT if it had happened to anyone but tom paris. imagine if a guy you liked had special brain torture every 14 hours even though he was totally innocent and only a mind meld from tuvok could save him. like, picture almost any other trek character in this situation. bashir. riker. even bones. any of them could maybe perhaps do a little kissing of a married woman and get themselves into trouble and it would be one of my favorite episodes of all time. even the plot twist of WHY he was falsely accused was fun and clever. unfortunately, i simply cannot bring myself to care about tom paris.

tuvok my best friend tuvok. he DID HIS HOMEWORK! the eyebrow movements, the way he did the mind meld from the same position that spock melded with dr van gelder in dagger of the mind my beloved. all these things are unmistakably vulcan because leonard nimoy did them first and SPOCK is unmistakably vulcan, despite all his lifelong insecurities. now that i've met other vulcans properly i know that better than ever and i wish he could too.

ALSO, HI, MARRIED 67 YEARS??? lowkey sad he and janeway can't get it now but also, do we think he has BABIES? do we think he has GRANDBABIES?? grandpa tuvok my best friend AAAGHGH. also, since this series is 7 years long and also because of a spoilery gifset EYE happen to know pon farr is inevitable. but i bet his wife had to fix it herself back home too so ik she will forgive him

anyway, if i was innocent, there's no one i'd rather have on my side than tuvok. he went above and beyond the call of duty there. i was really surprised he powered through the meld and experienced being murdered so well. i mean he took that like a champ. that's on vulcan stoicism...also AUGH janeway INSISTING he not do that bc she knows it will be horrible and the long time she spent searching his face before finally agreeing to it. i would never want him to cheat on his wife but they could also theoretically hypothetically get it.

and finally, CUTEST dog in the world this episode. it's so odd looking it does such a great job at jumping around everywhere

TONIGHT: ds9's "visionary" and voy's "emanations"

[cotidianoseeder]

Can we just talk about how Imperium is a perfect representation of fascism and Nazism?

I can't be the only one to have noticed how Imperium is identical to a Nazi-fascist nation, it all fits together perfectly!

"Fascism is an ultranationalist and authoritarian political ideology characterized by dictatorial power, repression of opposition through force and strong regimentation of society and the economy. Although fascist parties and movements present significant divergences among themselves, it is possible to point out several common characteristics, including extreme nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and economic freedom, belief in a natural social hierarchy and the dominance of elites, and the desire to create a community of the people in which individual interests are subordinated to the interests of the nation. Opposed to liberalism, Marxism, socialism and anarchism, fascism is positioned on the extreme right of the traditional political spectrum."

I barely know where to start, it's all just so identical. The first thing we noticed when seeing Imperium for the first time is how it gives off the vibe of being a completely closed country, in addition to being extremely advanced in technology.

Features that match:

1) Cult of the leader: Certainly one of the most visible characteristics when thinking about Imperium. There are several posters of the Empress all over the city, the inhabitants are always trying to impress her by giving salutes, especially the "Hail to the Empress" which honestly reminds me a lot of "Hail Hitler". Everything is for the empress and to make her proud.

2) Nationalism: It's all for the good of the Imperium and its citizens, no matter if you hurt dragons, humans or anything else. Nothing should and can harm the honor of the Imperium.

3) Emphasis on militarism: The light mechanism that Sora created with good intentions was transformed into a weapon of war! We always see Imperium soldiers patrolling the region, as the entire city is made for attack and has an exceptionally strong defense.

4) Media control and censorship: It's super obvious that all media is controlled by Imperium, and honestly, I think they can even create channels that pretend they don't belong to the government to say that Imperium is a "democracy".

5) Worship of tradition, xenophobia and eugenics: "We must not let Imperium mix with all these savage cultures." Honestly, in Dragons Rising this was one of the lines that stuck with me the most. At the same time the Empress said this, my mind actually confirmed that this was the same as a fascist regime. This whole issue of Imperium being a more advanced and superior culture, the people of Imperium are more intelligent, stronger, beautiful, evolved. Anything else outside is inferior and automatically a source of strangeness and must be eliminated as quickly as possible.

6) "Sacrifices are necessary for the greater good": This is more focused on Nazism itself, but the part about lying about dragon energy, claiming that it was a safe place reminds me a lot of the Holocaust. I watched a documentary on Netflix called "Holocaust Killers: Ordinary Men" or something like that, and if I'm not mistaken, in that documentary it was said that the Nazis created false news about the camp. They showed the inhabitants of Germany that it was a safe and extremely fun place for Jews, although in reality, they were in sub-human conditions and suffering both physically and psychologically. Another point is that they used the experiments on humans there to claim that it was "a necessary sacrifice" to ruin the lives of the Aryans. For Imperium, it is also a necessary sacrifice to trap dragons and put them in ill-treatment conditions, as it was for the "good" of the race.

Furthermore, there are several other details that I don't even remember, I should watch the series again and after that I would have to read a book about fascism. But something that really interested me was the Imperium Teen Protection force, do you know who else resembled them? Blackshirts, a leader support group, a "national security militia"…. BOOM! They are identical to the black shirts of Italian fascism! Okay, not so equally, while the group of teenagers is considerably smaller and less violent, but in general they have the same principle, even the same color of clothes (of course there is the issue of black being a cool color and matching the modern kingdom design).

Honestly, nothing convinces me otherwise, and I think that if you study history and watched the series you certainly felt the same connection with this historical moment. Let's face it, if Ninjago wasn't a series for children, everything focused on Prime Empire would be MUCH more violent. I'm sure they could even put in a "Hail Beatrix", criticize the moral and religious issues (conservatives certainly wouldn't like it, there is already a trace of criticism towards them in the canon, imagine that explicitly). So, this was my first opinion about Ninjago Dragons Rising and I really love this connection they made, especially while many far-right conservative movements and neo-Nazi movements (unfortunately rising from the ashes, these people have to study more history from good sources) continue to emerge. So that's it, sorry for the horrible writing and the bad translation, I don't speak English and stuff like that! I hope you enjoyed it and have a good day!

Note: This post does not aim to defend any far-right movement or neo-facist view. It's just my opinion related to the series, if it seems like I defended these movements, I'm sorry, but that's certainly not my intention.

[yoshizora]

i think the assumption that Megumu is an abusive, neglectful boss is kind of generally accepted by english speaking fans (from what i've personally seen) but there's some nuance that should be taken into consideration imo.

1. the daitengu are stated to very rarely ever give orders for their own personal self-interest. they work for the sake of tengu society's progress. 2. Aya is notorious for stretching the truth and exaggerating facts, so while she DOES have valid criticisms of tengu society, she never mentions things like actual abuse (and it would definitely be something she'd bring up if it were happening). 3. Megumu... isn't mean? i don't know where people get the impression that she's mean. she personally checks in on Marisa after UM out of concern for her well-being, worries about Tsukasa getting her ass kicked and fights the protags in her place, and almost causes an incident just to do something nice for Chimata in LE! she's also surprisingly gracious toward the protags in UM considering how territorial the tengu are.

i'm not saying that Megumu is a paragon of kindness or a perfect boss because she most definitely is not! she initially used Chimata just to make a profit for the tengu, and Aya/Hatate/Momiji aren't complaining over nothing. also in that same MeguChima LE chapter, we're shown that Aya is at the mercy of their hierarchy and can't do anything that would go against the grain of tengu society. Megumu, for all her gallantry, is still a slimy opportunist too (her whole speech about controlling the media was kinda Deranged!).

but i think it's a reach to say that Megumu goes out of her way to be cruel to her own subordinates, because that would completely contradict her role as a daitengu. at most, i think it's reasonable to assume that Megumu doesn't always listen to the other tengu (hence AyaHataMomi's grievances) and is more of a "for the greater good" type of person, even if it's at the cost of individuals' comforts.

tl;dr yes Megumu is a shithead, but to an extent!

[varreslittlestlambkin]

Thoughts on Dune Messiah

I just finished the audiobook during my work shift and have come away with mixed feelings on this novel. Spoiler warning

One the one hand the rich lore and character arcs of Dune and it's greater universe have expanded greatly and introduced very unique concepts that make my brain spin in funny ways of fascination. (its the Bene Tleilaxu)

On the other some revealed factions felt like strange retcons to have existed and be so important considering how important they are to the narrative as the main mover. (its the Bene Tleilaxu, its mostly them that vex me).

Their wide range of abilities of raising the freakin dead, complete shapeshifting, and robot eyes feel incongruent with how the setting was built in the first Dune novel. Makes me wonder where they were during all that, how no one ever commented on these space freaks while talking about all the other space freaks.

Overall I didn't much care for Scytale themself either, but most of my problems with him stem from Paul's inaction and how his reasoning is under explored so I'll focus on that later.

The opening of the novel with the secret torture from the inquisition that Paul either doesn't know about because he has no reason to foresee it, or the implication that it is so ubiquitous he sees it everywhere and can't stop, mixed with the choking rasp of a tortured historian, writers love writers, and the fervent hatred of the interrogator is I think the best scene in the entire book. It is a shame there was not more like it throughout, herein at the beginning is the perfect showcase of the failure of the empire under Paul, the horrors of the jihad, and a massive wealth of implications said with very few words.

But then we switch to Irulan and the main problems reared very immediately. The narrative feels downright mean to Irulan, and all the female characters in general feel shafted. While she is somewhat of an evil space witch, everyone in the story seems intensely bent on hating her despite her not really doing anything to deserve it. Also its unpleasant how every time the narrative talks about Bene Gesserit control it has it fail every time its a woman doing it, making all woman in the book feel like weak failures. No idea how she comes up with always loving Paul at the end, if I was her I'd knife those kids out of spite for all the shit I had to put up with.

The reverend mother out and out calling her a bitch feels very jarring to her characterization, while she did seem like someone abusive to her subordinates there was always the previous implication of some regard for her students. Jessica both loved and hates her, but I don't know how Irulan didn't ever try to comeuppance her for her constant insults and demeanment with no reinforcement. These reactions are how you lose spies, why would she act like such an idiot.

Chani remains a complete cardboard cutout with no character beyond I love you Paul sure would suck if I were to tragically die, very disappointing. Thank god for Zendaya

Alia despite being an awakened one with generations of knowldge , mental prowess, and Gesserit training is subject to a wealth of failure. Failure to predict the enemies plans, failure to control her emotions, failure to resist temptations. And unnecessary nude scenes where the author talked about her boobs and how she needs married soon. Yay thanks for writing this about a teenage girl Frank. Maybe the teenagedness presents the answer to my questions about here weird characterization, maybe its just hard to balance centuries of knowledge and being young and stupid, or maybe a character like that is just really hard to write.

Her "love interest" Hayt, aka the first of many Duncan Idahos apparently sucks how overspoiled that it is, existed. His chapters provided nothing to me but eastern koans and constant mentions of Mentat computations. Easily the most boring part of the book, he did literally nothing of importance. Then he fucks a kid at the end. I really hope he gets more interesting in future books since he's coming back.

The conspiracy needed more scenes showing the planning and execution of attacks and characters thinking in my opinion. Far too much happens off screen with no forewarning, which is frustrating in a book about the trap of prescience, it feels like a missed opportunity to not have Paul/Reader see stuff coming but being unable to stop it. Could have added to the crushing feeling of the avalanche of fate.

In particular the betrayal of the rogue Fremen and the stealing of a sandworm feel like things that needed scenes. I need the planning, logistics, and mindsets of everything involved, it sounds so much more interesting than Paul deliberately walking into a trap and talking to an annoying Dwarf with big feet.

I especially wanted far more of the guild, as the ones with more limited prescience, with them not being able to see paul and paul not being able to see them there could have been a fun element of cat and mouse baiting each other. But Edric and by extension the guild are the backbone of the conspiracy is treated as joke in favor the Bene Tleilaxu which is all kinds of disappointing. I want more drugged out their gourd mutant fishmen. The horror of the spice is too cool, I want space cocaine dammit.

Paul's not blindness was very cool, seems like Frank Herbert focused on that section of the book the most, we all love the implied blind seer joke. That and it actually shows horrible brutality, which feels too glossed over in this series so far. I don't know about others, but it's hard to feel like the Jihad was so terrible when the scope of horror is confined to maybe barely 4 scenes in Messiah, and like 2 in book 1.

The stone burner scene while drawn out and under foreshadowed is still a great highlight, a bomb made to melt eyes and crack planets violating the established code of conduct feels so uniquely Dune. A horrible cruelty for crueltys sake on massive scale. It's great :]

Chani dying made me feel little. The tykebombs are interesting little guys, wonder how they'll turn out in Children and beyond.

the confrontation with Scytale felt very stilted, between being able to just zip up to the babies because Duncan/Hayt swooned at his own memories for the third time felt silly, though not as silly as magic baby vision. Although that was admittedly kind of cool

Hard to really believe all that conspiracy bothering wound up being the Bene Tleilaxu just wanting a shitload of money, and maybe something else. The awakened Ghola plan just on the timescale within the plot made very little sense, since they didn't know how to awaken Gholas until Duncan did, so why would they plot around being able to Ghola Chani and awaken her, why did they try to get her with Paul at the Stone Burner trap, or even what did the other factions even really needed them for. The Bene Gesserit already had the spy and the Spacing Guild already had the capital and unfindable base. Feels like they should have been more important to the climax.

The Bene Gesserit of course wanted the yummy cummies, but there is a new patch rule about no Turkey Bastering it so that plotline drops, that and several scenes wondering about incest that I cant tell if they were fetishy or just a reference to old nobility inbreeding. Probably the second considering the original Harkonnen x Harkonnen plan.

Perhaps what made it hard to really appreciate was the lack of a unifying fun antagonist like the Harkonnens, no remnant remained apparently to seek revenge. We don't even ever see a Corino plot for revenge that has a scene. No personal intriuge or hatred drives anything like in the first book, takes some of the vim out of it. I miss the evil flying fat man.

As for Paul, it feels like Frank was no longer sure how to write in his prescience and doom, the weight of inevitably from the first book is mostly gone now. The jihad was skipped and his ascension to the throne is done. The only fate left is death and avoiding it but Paul is playing a game of survival only for Chani. Which is an interesting idea, but there is much less implication and foreshadowing of doom in this plotline so Paul just kind of meanders about doing nothing but being talked at and taking few actions. Which makes sense but I would have proffered having him grapple with or justify it.

Hands down the best scenes are the ones of common soldiers and people. The implications of the mass pilgrimages eating up resources causing havoc, the soldiers being disillusioned, Faraok's falling out of the jihad mindset when he was taken under ocean waves for the first time, the secret inquisition, the prayers at Alia's church. These scenes better than any other encapsulate the horror of Paul achieving his Godhead and dominion, about how he broke the galaxy. I am desperately hungry for more of this.

Overall I thought the book was ok. I'm still quite excited to read Children of Dune. I know Jessica shows up in it which is hopefully good because I missed her in this one.

[deathlessathanasia]

“In other words, it may not be historically the case, as the spiritual feminists claim, that with Demeter and Persephone patriarchy suppressed the worship of powerful pre-historic goddesses, but that patriarchy increased their powers precisely to support its evolving cultural agenda. I do not mean to deny the antiquity of Demeter's cult or its significant association with women. Yet rather than preserving the relics of a pre-Olympian past, it is entirely possible that this myth transforms or interprets a particular set of "original" powers of Demeter that are imagined to be relatively free from patriarchal influence precisely so that they can be replaced by honors and powers that appear considerably more significant even while they simultaneously involve the incorporation of the goddesses into the patriarchal system. In other words, the myth may well operate in a manner analogous to the South American myths of matriarchy studied by Joan Bamberger, myths which posit an entirely invented past era in which women were in control in order to explain why women are subordinate to men at the present time ("Myth of Matriarchy"). Only in the slightly different case of the Demeter/Persephone myth, the present compensates for the loss of a female autonomy imagined to have existed in the past through the goddesses' acquisition of greater cultural authority.

The attempt by spiritual feminists to rescue the myth from the distortions imposed on it by patriarchal culture—in particular, the diminution and transformation of female power by rape and patriarchal marriage—also raises several important questions. Human relations in the modern world are still shaped by patriarchy. Christ's and Spretnak's version of the myth, which censors the rape and trivializes the power of marriage to shape female existence, eliminates the anger of Demeter toward acts and institutions still central in modern life. In their reading, the "pre-Olympian" story also becomes the daughter's story more than the mother's, thus attentuating one of the very few powerful representations of maternal experience in western literature before the twentieth century. Yet the expression of maternal anger, desire, and bereavement in this text is precisely what has made it of special interest to feminist literary critics like Marianne Hirsch. Hirsch argues that the infantile plentitude of the initial mother/daughter relation requires male intervention to become a story; nevertheless, it is a story that defies traditional modes of literary resolution, since the relation between Demeter and Persephone is cyclical and Persephone eternally divides her loyalties between husband and mother. ‘The 'Hymn to Demeter' thus both inscribes the story of mother and daughter within patriarchal reality and allows it to mark a feminine difference.’”

 - A question of origins: Goddess cults Greek and modern by Helene P. Foley

[ultimateinferno]

One thing I think some manga readers need to chill out on is the compulsive need to point out that Makima is the villain, especially when talking to anime-onlies and those who've fallen for her shit. Like, maybe you were able to catch on from the word go, but not everyone will and the way the narrative treats her, it's certainly intended to be a plot twist.

I also think by just painting her in broadstrokes as evil through and through with no reason to be likeable ultimately detracts from her character and the narrative of CSM. Makima is a manipulator. Making people like her is her whole thing and it works. With only what was shown of her in the anime adaptation, she has a lot going for her. In other stories, she would have been the polite but haughty kuudere love interest.

Within the episodes shown her most in-your-face negative trait is threatening to kill Denji. However, even when it's written out explicitly, she does it in such a manner that makes it easy for those who've already fallen for her shtick to write off. She always separates the action from her, or uses innuendo when talking about it. Like it's a bureaucratic decision made by her bosses, or some advice from the vets, or how she's never the one who would go through with it, but one of her subordinates. She says it in such a tongue and cheek manner that she has the plausible deniability that she's joking even when she isn't. This isn't to mention that every named character has threatened Denji's life from Aki to Power to Kobeni to Himeno. Threatening to kill Denji is just what people do apparently, not to excuse her but to just point out that it's not the most effective litmus on good vs evil in this setting.

Everything she does is laced with formality and delicacy. From genuinely harmless actions to straight up sexually assaulting Denji. What makes this so effective is how little effort or threats it takes to get people to do what she wants.

Which brings me to the big thing about her character: She is very rarely wrong. The entire speech about sexual intimacy having a greater impact when you're close to your partner and know them on a deep, personal level? She's correct about that! Or maybe when she helps Denji after he got drunk on Himeno vomit by giving him the candy, telling him that even if bad things happen, he will experience so much that they'll ultimately become footnotes in his life. Genuine wisdom. There's even her conversation with the Yakuza about how they're so far up their own ass as they rule Japan's underground while self absorbed that they're the "necessary evil," which albeit hypocritical still isn't wrong. Her little convo on the train about preferring to eat alone and hating dealing with her bosses. The movie date where she says that even if you find only one good movie, it makes watching all of the bads one worth it.

She's not never wrong, but the best lies are built on truths. As one of the few characters in the cast who has any semblance of understanding what the fuck is going on and as practically human pure devil, this all comes together to make it her the perfect manipulator. Anime-onlies will fall for it. When I read the manga, I fell for it. Even after I was clocked in on her doing something terrible from a random redditor's comment on fanart.

What makes Makima such a good villain and such a good representation for abusers is that she makes it very easy for many people to like her. Maybe not everyone, but more than enough. Many abusers aren't some shriveled bitter curs that release nonstop toxicity, they'd fool far less people that way. The best ones are those that make people go "How could they be abusive, they're so nice?"

You don't have to like her. It's probably a good thing you don't actually. She's not a good person, and if people are clearly excusing her bullshit even after reading the manga, go ahead and call it out, but also, let new viewers be wrong. Let them be tricked. Maybe it will reveal some things to them about themselves.

[depizan]

Who’s your favorite Sith in SWTOR? and what do you think makes him/her compelling? Does your OC meet them? What would your Characters first impression on the sith be like when/if they encounter each other?

I am really down bad for more Swtor content in the star wars canon. Its so under used. I saw your post so lets expand some SWTOR lore!

I feel like a lot has been said by various people about the more popular Sith, so I'm going to discuss a couple of more obscure Sith, ones of a sort I wish we'd seen more of.

Darth Silthar, from the Tatooine planetary missions, Impside.

He's dedicated to the Empire and his goals and outward directed methods are perfectly Sithy, but his relationship with his Reclamation Service team is one of friendly, benevolent authority. They're still his subordinates, of course, but they show no sign of fearing him and he seems to care for them, even offering encouragement to one who's struggling with a previous bad experience.

He reminds me a bit of Keeper in that he's a good boss, even by out of universe (or out of Empire) standards, but he doesn't clash with his culture. Oh, sure, you can easily imagine what he'd be like if he'd been born in Republic space instead, but his beliefs and values influence what he says and does enough that he doesn't feel like someone just recolored a Jedi. (He would make a fascinating dark mirror for a Jedi character, though. Or an interesting pairing with one for an "enemy mine" or greater/shared threat situation.)

Zavrasha, from the Nar Shaddaa bonus series, Impside, is another more memorable one-off Sith character for similar reasons. Just having a Sith present to make sure the Treaty of Coruscant isn't openly broken is a twist on how things usually go, and she comes off as very capable without seeming unSithy.

They make the Empire seem more believable and, in an odd sort of way, more dangerous. The average "gonna eat a bowl of babies now" Sith that we meet in game make the Empire seem like it would defeat itself if left alone for five minutes. But Darth Silthar and Zavrasha are capable, thoughtful, absolutely believe in the Empire, people willingly follow them... and they aren't the kind of people who'd just randomly backstab their coworkers because "that's what Sith do."

Despite that, they're also the kind of characters who could be enemies or allies, even across factions. At least under the right circumstances. And the more possibilities a character has, the more interesting.

The group of characters I generally write about are unlikely to encounter either of them. However, I've always thought that the Tatooine planetary stories are just asking to be combined into some sort of cross-faction story, and some day I might write that. Perhaps some day my Trooper and my loyal Agent or my Consular and one of my Sith (or some other combination) will have to team up to deal with the horrors Czerka roused.

[tatatatatara]

Do you think Houji suffered a lot of discrimination in the CCG for being gay? Do you have HCS about his youth?

And, this is a question I've had for a while, how old was he in canon?

Oooh thank you for your ask, it's really interesting!

The whole "Houji being openly gay and obsessed with self-care" thing is basically a headcanon that I have (and I am really happy to see other people share it with me!) and in my own delusional world, no one has a problem with people's gender and sexual orientation. But we all know that the real life is not that nice right?

Well I believe that in canon, if Houji is being openly gay like that he would surely get gossip, especially when he was a newbie. He may got teased and told things like "Don't sneak on us when we are changing" or "Practice with your quinque more instead of caring for your hair would you". Things would get worse outside of the workplace, like when they forced him to have a drink with them and kept saying whatever they want, hence one more reason for Houji to hate drinking.

But over time when his ranks got higher and he had proven his skills, I imagine that people would only give him side-eye (like Take's squad to Mutsuki at the beginning of re:) and just talk about how queer he is behind his back and told the newbies to stay away from him, but otherwise they wouldn't openly discriminate him like before.

That said, i think some of them still have internalized homophobic, like they claim to be normal with him but they would avoid using the changing room at the same time with him.

But hey, we know that Shinohara did not have any problem with Suzuya's suggestion about a gay ghoul, so I think Shinohara won't have any problem with him. I don't think Akira (and maybe her father) is the type to discriminate people based on their sexual orientation either. For Amon and Takizawa, I think they would be quite shocked when they find out that Houji is gay, but their respect for him is so big they brush it off. I think that's enough for Houji, who cares for strangers' opinion when your superior still goes out to drink with you and you still earn your subordinates' respect right?

A small headcanon of mine is that when Amon or Takizawa were just finished with their lectures at the academy, a young student would secretly asked him that "I like boys, do they let me become an investigator?" and he would told him about Houji and his heroic deeds.

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For his youth, I imagine that he wants to become an investigator due to the influence of his uncle Takashi, who is a very accomplished investogator in the Kyoto branch. Maybe he will be quite scared because he will surely get discriminated, but his sense of justice is greater than his fear so he enrolled in the academy.

As he is also enrolled due to his will to make something right, not from hatred like many othet students, he sympathizes with Takizawa and he encourages him a lot when he was losing motivation. They are both not driven by the want of revenge so it's important to focus in the fact that they are fighting for a better world.

Another headcanon I have is that aside from martial arts, young Houji also practiced gymnastics to improve his flexibility, agility and coordination, something he finds the investigators usually lack. But he won't tell anyone about this because he would get laughed at, again.

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Regarding his age, since he is older than Arima (29) and younger than Shinohara (37), I think he is somewhere between 31 and 35. I mostly headcanon him as 33