#like. in the sense of. your individual actions matter so much that youre morally obligated to do this thing if you care

[novlr]

i'm writing a character who is a serial killer but not willingly if that makes sense. like, she kills once she finds that she finds herself in a murder or be murdered type of situation.

like in one scene, her mother's ex boyfriend comes back to try and get back together with her, but finds her daughter instead so he tries to s/a her but she stabs him and he bleeds out.

then in another scene she get's jumped by two guys and she stabs them both to death as well.

so i'm just wondering if you have any tips for writing such a complex character who kills but feels bad about it before, during and after the fact.

she doesn't enjoy the act of murder. she doesn't get off on it. she simply on kills so she can survive.

thanks so much!

This is a topic very close to my heart! I have a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and a master’s degree in forensic psychology, both from accredited U.S. institutions. No fictional murder best-sellers under my belt, but it’s a topic I know a lot about. 

Sometimes, people kill for reasons that aren’t nefarious. There’s the cut-and-dry self defense (“it’s me or them”), the culmination of years of abuse, or sometimes it’s completely an accident (which is called “involuntary manslaughter”). 

Murder mysteries and thrillers are top-notch reads and go hand-in-hand with pop culture’s fascination with true crime. But what goes into writing an accidental serial killer, or one that’s more upstanding than you’d think? 

Define your morals

In order to establish morally gray, you’ve got to set the good and evil boundaries within the world you’re writing. Is it a modern-day story, where a cold-blooded killer is the evil one and a person defending themselves against an attacker is the good one? Or is it a more intricate fantasy or science fiction setting, where the laws and morals aren’t quite the same? 

The important part of writing a morally gray character, in general, is establishing the normal bounds of morality in your story world and then placing the character’s values somewhere in the middle. They’re not looking to hunt other people for fun, but the act also wasn’t a noble defense or socially acceptable resolution to the problem. I think that’s the hardest part, building enough plausibility and setting up empathy for the character’s actions while still writing them as a ‘villain’.

The vigilante

The easiest example of a morally gray killer is the vigilante. Typically, their motive comes from a righteous or judicial point of view, and they’re killing the “evil” ones. These types are taking out drug dealers, abusers, or anyone committing what they consider to be egregious or immoral acts. They perform bad actions to do good. 

Doing bad things for good reasons is often considered “lawful evil”, wherein a character is still following rules but they’re doing so in a ‘bad’ way. That circles us back to the beginning; there should still be a compelling reason for their actions. That’s what pushes their assigned morality back from ‘black’ into the ‘gray zone’. 

Crossing the lines

Consider what factors or events‌ would persuade a character to act in a worse or better way as a one-off circumstance, or a trigger that sways their actions. Perhaps they won’t kill parents, no matter what brought them into that position; maybe violence against women will often trigger a violent episode. 

Gray, on the moral scale, has the obligation to be interesting — so don’t think too hard about staying within neutral territory. Swing one way or the other occasionally with good narrative build-up and support to really bring out the character’s individuality. 

What if it’s always an accident?

Maybe your character is frequently caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, but they always manage to come out on top. What do you do then?

It’s first necessary to define a serial killer. Definitionally, a serial killer is a person that commits multiple murders. Murder being the key word — it must be on purpose for the act to fall on that definition. Otherwise it’s manslaughter (which is an incidental death where even if harm was meant, death was not). I can’t stress this enough: by definition, you can’t have a serial killer whose only kills were in self-defense or accidental. Your character must progress to proactive murder on more than one occasion for them to be considered a serial killer. 

Of course, that’s not to say you can’t have other characters (or even their inner monologue) refer to them as a serial killer. Social knowledge rarely sees eye-to-eye with legal or academic terms and definitions. I just caution you against using ‘serial killer’ in marketing material or descriptive collateral, if this is the case. It is a technically inaccurate descriptor, and someone waiting for that switch from accidental to purposeful is going to be sorely disappointed when it never happens. 

It could, however, be a great plot device to start there and explore the character’s evolution from unfortunate events to intentional murder. Maybe they were targeted for multiple violent crimes, and one day decided to be proactive and preemptively solve their problem (via murder, of course). 

Avoid the Angel of Death

While a vigilante may be a good character type for the morally gray serial killer, the Angel of Death is not. This type of killer is looking for personal gratification by taking someone’s life into their own hands. More often than not, the Angel of Death is looking to make themselves a hero by saving the day, and the deaths are secondary (and a sign of their failure). I’ll admit that the line between “personal gratification” and “justice” can be a thin one.

 The important distinction to keep in mind here are the moral definitions you’ve created: I can’t argue that an Angel of Death is serving any higher purpose than their own desire to cause situations where they might be a hero. It’s like hiring a hitman to take out a target, but intercepting the hitman just in time to save the target. The entire situation is at the mercy of the character; there’s no justice in the actions, no redeeming qualities. They don’t feel bad for sending the hitman — the outcome was planned from the start. And if they can’t beat the hitman? Oh well, better luck next time. 

Convincing the reader that the protagonist has a good (“enough”) reason for their actions is key to achieving the moral middle ground. A reasonable, morally upstanding person probably won’t resort to the character’s actions, but they understand how the thought process could bring them where they are. The Angel of Death is fabricating the entire situation; a morally gray killer should be working towards a goal, or acting on a strong reason. 

The morally gray serial killer isn’t looking to win anyone over, or get a standing ovation for their good deeds. They’re killing for a reason — a reason that wouldn’t normally drive someone to kill, but the reader can see how they got from point A to point B in the thought process. 

written by S.K. Eleteon

[whistleloves]

HONKAI IMPACT MATCHUP FOR MY DEAREST, @drxgonspine

(I’m putting all this here because if I write this in an ask I’m gonna probably fuck it up.)

SMART PEOPLE:

Dan Heng

Romantic

Dan Heng is that really quiet guy in the back of your history class who always does exceptionally well on every test. If you were to peak over his shoulder and look into his notebook, everything would be color coded and catalogued with the skill of someone far older than he appears. He’s smart as all get out and would much rather spend his time adding to the Data bank than trifling with silly matters. He fits the bill of an incredibly smart individual decently well, and his stoic demeanor eerily remind me of Albedo at times. He’s certainly not above teasing though, and will sometimes make a remark towards those he considers a good friend. I could see you two discussing whatever topics you’re currently enthralled in with each other. He would listen to you prattle on about chemistry will diligently writing down any information that’s new to him.

Aventurine

Platonic

Aventurine is a peculiar man with a dashing sense of style and an incredibly self destructive nature. He’s quick to bet with his life and it usually works out for him. He’s blessed with a mysterious string of luck, and a horrific life. He’s a peacock incarnate and truly shows with how he carries himself. Though he may at first seem like an arrogant, self serving, conniving individual, he harbors just as much fear as anyone else. I can see a relationship with him being either romantic and platonic, though I’m leaning more platonic. Having his favor would likely mean he’d lavish you greatly with anything he could provide. He knows poverty, and he doesn’t seem to have any intention of experiencing it again. He’s witty, sarcastic, and would easily keep up with any banter you throw at him. Though of course, he’s lost so much that was dear to him, he’d be incredibly protective. As a friend (a true one at least, sometimes he says friend and means pawn.) he would cherish the bond deeply. Though he wouldn’t dare let you too close at first, he might slowly open up. This man is sneaky and strategic, and his boss fight killed my husband a few times before I did actually beat him. So I’m mad at his ass rn >:(

Kafka

Romantic

Kafka is the kind of woman who would tell you to sit down and a whole legion of people would salute and oblige. She is honestly terrifying, and off the charts smart. The way she speaks makes even ME, one of the straightest women on the planet, think “Mommy?” Her plans extend far past what the average mind can conceive, but she somehow carries herself with a sense of humor. She balances out the severity of her actions and words with a strange lack of seriousness at times. She would let you vent to her about a bad day and by the need you’d feel leagues better than before, and she’d give you some great advice to boot. She too can keep up with witty banter easily, though she may just surpass you a bit too easily. She scares me quite frankly.

THE DUMB PERSON:

Sampo Koski

Romantic/Platonic

Sampo is kinda just Sampo honestly. There’s not too much behind that goofy demeanor but a lot of well meaning scheming. He’s never an antagonist, but he certainly isn’t the most morally correct all the time. He’s goofy, well meaning, and a bit slippery. He probably gives fantastic hugs while mumbling about whatever shenanigans he got up to that day specifically.

[gay-artificer]

i always thought artificer was irredeemable - even with everything from this world being able to come back from the dead it still attempted genocide of the scavengers. and sure, i'm not saying that others can't like arti (in fact i do like them and their story) or write a redemption arc, they can have their fun that way. but i don't want to be guilted into thinking otherwise

I don't like to terms like 'irredeemable' on animals, even more sentient/intelligent (and fake) ones. Artificer is absolutely expressing unchecked hostility, but ultimately its still in the form of a creature reacting to its own trauma with aggression and, as a more intelligent being, with spite. Slugcats (and scavengers) are at their core not meant to be stand-ins for humans, and I think that there is a tendency for fandom (and humans with other 'smart animals') to correlate intelligence/sentience with at least somewhat of an obligation to conform to human morals. As a biologist who's a fan of wasps, I know how much people tend to project a need for human reasoning and morals onto creatures who literally could not comprehend it nor would want to. Hell, on an individual basis, even humans disagree on where things like that do and don't apply.

Do I think Artificer is good? Hell no, I said myself that I think they're something so violently consumed by their own grief and anger that on a literally spiritual level they have damaged themselves beyond reasonable repair. I think you need to be pretty uniquely fucked up and far gone to achieve that in such a level that it's literally scarred your own karma. I guess I think they are irredeemable in that sense, but mostly on a more meta level referring to their actual ability to recover vs. a moral one. The narrative of the story certainly condemns their actions pretty heavily in what is, effectively, a form of divine punishment- a complete and total inability to find peace in the form of proper ascension no matter what they do now. I feel that even if they threw away their grievances and just lived with Five Pebbles forever they would be unhappy and restless, just stuck with a permanent stain they wish they could ignore because it was an itch they scratched entirely through violence. But in that same sense I don't think the scavengers are uniquely, humanly evil for killing a slugpup for stealing just because they are also an intelligent creature with the capacity for culture and understanding. I believe the scavengers fully understood they were attacking the equivalent of a slugcat child, and they did not care. That did not matter to them, because they are just naturally very selfish unless they have reason to believe youre on their side already, and even then they aren't above violence due to personal grievance. They killed Artificer's pup because it violated a rule it couldn't have known was a rule, and its unfair that it died for it, but I don't think it makes the scavengers evil for it in the same way I don't fault a lion for attacking the weak or young of a herd, or a bee for stinging. I mean hell, even the scavengers themselves do it- They attack anything they perceive as threats, and will send squads to eliminate ones they think are particularly significant, even going out of their way to track them down. Sure, this is the a result of the creature already harming them- but Artificer was harmed. They were originally fleeing in their dreams. You could say it's different because Scavengers only target the one, but they already have a natural hostility to some slugcats and slugcats are generally independent (although its worth noting that slugpups pay for their parents' crimes by sharing reputation)- scavengers are not. They're all animals, they do what they perceive to be in their best interests, even if they perceive their best interest to be going out of their way to fight. The Ancients are the closest we have to a society with established morals in Rain World, and their favorite pastime was advanced genetic modification and disrupting ecosystems. It seems a little silly (to me) to be hung up on if any of these things are 'good' in that sense.

[horce-divorce]

Yes, YES!!! this Twitter thread is such a poignant summary of issues with dems, and why this attitude of "but supporting dems is harm reduction, you HAVE to vote!!" is just pissing so many of us off more. Very well said. I especially appreciate the connection between the supposed cruciality of voting as harm reduction vs rugged american individualism, wow. What an angle.

[funkymbtifiction]

Please, help me understand Fi more.

Hello! I hope you are enjoying your day!

I was hoping that could help me understand xSFP types and Fi types in general better, because as an ENFJ most of them seem reckless, annoying and egotistical to me. It’s easy to resonate with some of their fears and desires, however, I don’t really get them.

E.g.: in ‘Shadow and Bone’ Alina Starkov’s whole personality is a huge red flag. It is quite difficult to understand how one can think only about herself (and Mal sometimes) when there are much stronger forces at work and you can feel that historical events are literally at your doorstep. It’s quite surprising to see Alina not making any effort(she doesn’t really want to know other Grisha or train or even think about what is going to happen). She gets a chance to feel normal, to fit in, to have a kind of family with other mages, and yet…

As you have probably guessed, I have no problem understanding Kirigan’s intentions, but I would like to understand Fi a bit better, as there a lot of main characters with Fi.

Thanks in advance.

I am enjoying my day, thanks. I got done with work early, and realized I’m exhausted, though, so I doubt I’ll get much more ‘productivity’ done today.

SFP / SP types “live in the moment” and focus on what is immediately in front of them; they don’t see or look for the big picture, and whatever Ni flashes of insight they have are rational “sequence of order” premonitions. For that reason, you cannot judge them from an NF big-picture perspective, because their focus is here and now. Sometimes, they are reckless; other times, they are “on point” and skilled at seeing what is coming and doing something about it (either being part of it, or getting the hell out of Dodge).

I had a conversation with a friend one time about Marie Antoinette, as we debated whether she was ESFP or ISFP, and she pointed out that Marie could not have been ESFP, or she would have had a quicker sense of the reality of her situation. One of her ladies in waiting, an ESFP, saw what was happening and the way the trend was moving toward beheading aristocrats and left France. Marie was swept up in it all, and a casualty of it, because her feelings (subjectivity) outweighed her Se objectivity.

That is, in a nutshell, what is happening with Alina. Her personal feelings are directing every decision she makes. You have to “get” her not only from an ISFP perspective, but a 6 perspective, and factor in that she’s a social-blind Enneagram type. Her feelings are all that matter to her. Her feelings dictate her actions. Who she cares about influences her choices. She is a Fi-dom. Fi-doms have barometers that are in flux between “I love this,” “I hate this,” and “I don’t care.” For love, they love a lot. For hate, they loathe. And for the “I don’t care,” there’s no middle ground, and no need to think about it further, because they really do not care. Fi weighs everything according to itself – what its ethical judgment is about this thing, person, situation, belief, etc. How *I* judge it.

Alina is an orphan who has only ever had her best friend, and she is ripped away from him without any choice in the matter, and forced to attend a magical school where the only other person who seems to care about her, and offer her protection and guidance (the same thing Mal did) is the general. She’s an sx-user – if she doesn’t have fire with someone, she doesn’t “bond” with them. She’s an sp-user, she wants to feel safe and keep herself “okay.” She has no social instinct, which means friends aren’t to be made for “casual reasons.” (To be honest, that baffles me to; I have strong soc and not to make friends, take an interest in the other girls at the school, and think about what my role is would never occur to me.) She is a Se user, so she’s thinking about what is immediate and what she wants rather than seeing the bigger picture. It takes her time to start doing that, to start breaking down things and trusting her Ni, and by the end, she has a sense of her place of “belonging” in the world, but it’s still… about the person she cares about the most. It will always be that way.

She’s a Fi-dom, she has sx, and she’s a 6 – she NEEDS Mal. The story is all about a 6 learning to trust herself and do things for herself, rather than relying on other people all the time; like the Darkling’s mother said, you can’t always be using “amplifiers” (other people), you need to do it yourself. Every 6 must learn this. She’s about her connection to Mal (and later, the Darkling) and protecting that person; that is the central focus and drive of her life: I need you and me to be safe, and to be together. Other ISFPs aren’t like this. Harry Potter is one, and he takes on plenty of things that are “not his problem” because his Fi says, “Wait a damn minute here… this is WRONG. I MUST ACT.” SFPs act on what they feel is right – you see it in Harry Potter, in Buffy Summers, in Legolas Greenleaf, in Thomas from the Maze Runner. Feelings lead to action.

Fe/Fi conflicts a lot, and it’s not hard to see why, because it’s going in opposite directions. FJs want to be situationally-appropriate, FPs want to live their truth. FJs feel like they are obligated to society, to put themselves aside and work for a greater good; FPs feel like society is made up of individuals who should make their own choices, and not be “forced” to do anything. For an FP, it’s a choice of “*I* am going to do this, because it’s the RIGHT thing to do.” Consider Frodo in LotR. He didn’t have to take the ring, and throw his entire life into the toilet in the process, but he decided, with his Fi, it is the Right and Moral thing to do, and that the task should be his. The Ring came to him. It’s his responsibility.

Alina was not given a choice; she was revealed to have magic, and forced away from the man she cared about, her entire life uprooted – and it was not her choice. IFPs just want to live their life free of outside interference and for others to be able to do the same. Some of them are selfish, some are generous. Some of them would make friends, others would not. Some of them would say, “I have a responsibility to society to do X,” others would say “X is not my problem.” It’s all dependent on the individual. That’s what you need to remember about Fi: it’s all subjective. Everything for a Fi is subjective. You won’t find two Fi’s who are exactly alike in terms of what they think is right, if they feel responsible for what happens, or what should happen. They live in a world of a continuous testing of the outer world, to see where their barometer arrow swings. Do I care? If so, what am I going to do about it? If not, then what?

Ironically, an INFP introduced me to this show. As it turns out, her Fi only cares about the trio of Crows, so she watched it focused on them and sometimes felt angry about the changes to the book / their characters; she didn’t care about anything else, so she didn’t absorb it (or even necessarily watch other scenes). I watched it, absorbed everything, but only cared about the Darkling’s arc, as I found him the most interesting. As a result, we have nothing to talk about after seeing the show, since she only cares about the Crows and I don’t care about the Crows. For both of us, the viewing process was a process of looking for something to care about, something that means something to us as individuals, and devaluing everything else. That’s how Fi works: if I care, I care a lot. And this matters more to me than that does. It comes with a subtle tone of dismissal at times -- I don’t care about that -- but it’s really a process of what draws Fi.

That is just the tip of the iceberg about Fi; you can read a lot more about them and all the types in my upcoming MBTI book. ;)

[goldenmist]

"May I have kissing and making out headcanons for Nagito and Kokichi separately including first kiss please?"

My pleasure. However I did combine the two topics, because I saw it as most suitable. If you don't enjoy my writing, you are welcome to resend the submission. But I truly hope that you will like it!

Nagito Komaeda

•The male is quite subtle and untrusting of his own capabilities. He can't process the thought of you even wanting to accept intimate contact from a low-life such as him. Therefore for quite a while, kissing would be a questionable topic.

•Komaeda has trouble falling asleep at night, just imagining how pleasant it would be to glide across your lips. But there is no way he would allow himself a thought of initiating such an act.

•The prohibition he set on his own actions is an unbearable weight to carry. But he is willing to hide his lewd desires for as long as possible, just keep you pure of his intentions. And unless you are willing to break the walls he was constructing, the relationship would not progress to the next level.

•Undoubtedly, helping Nagito achieve even a gram of self-confidence is back breaking labor. But you are prepared to go through that fight for the person you treasure. And no matter his disbelief in your true objective, brick by brick his walls started to go down.

•The blonde male would not incenerate the intimate gesture, you perfectly realized that. So instead of waiting for him to strike a move, you were determined to take matter in your own hands.

•Casually sitting on the couch by your partner's side one day, you blantly questioned. "Can I kiss you Nagito?". The sudden change of his expression was priceless. Komaeda's eyes were about to pop out of their sockets, from the sole force of incredulity.

•He leisurely reached for the remote, to pause the current movie you two were watching. The only thought lingering in Nagito's mind was that he hasn't heard you correctly. But he didn't have the courage to repeat the supposed question.

•An awkwardly dense silence filled the room. Both of you attending to your own thoughts, until you heavily sighed. Maybe you were wrong about your accusations, and in fact the male wasn't interested in kissing you at all. How stupid of you.

•But before you could excuse yourself due to embarrassment, Komaeda laid his palm atop your tensed up shoulder. You were forced to avert your gaze towards him, and in the brink of moment you saw all the emotions he was trying to hide. The endless affection for you poured out of his soul, allowing you to read the male as If an open book.

•The moment you suspected the dam of your partner's insecurities cracking, you reached for his face. You have heard the same tale over and over again like a broken record. So you just needed to make sure he wouldn't get a reason to start another endless rant.

• Timidly holding your figure, ready to break the contact at any sign of discomfort, Nagito responded to your touch almost momentarily. Trying his hardest to keep the raging desire of having you all to himself concealed beneath lenient touches.

•He let's you get ahold the steering wheel. Somehow managing to make everything about you, letting his lover take full control. You are free to stop or continue for as long as you oblige, he will never express any reluctance whatsoever.

•The male has learned where your comfortable spots are, due to thoughtful observations. Always trying to highlight the change of your reaction, whenever he placed his hands on your waist or back. As a result, he knows exactly where to keep his touch not going anywhere beyond your comfort zone.

•As soon as you recede to catch your breath, a pair of glistening eyes will be sure to meet your gaze. Komaeda brushes your features with his glance, wondering how you found the heart to grant trash like him such contentment.

•Your partner will start rambling about non-existent imperfections of his, which were caused by your confident demeanor. Somewhere in the corner of his mind, Nagito convinced himself that he is no more than an accessory to you. A quite worthless one in fact.

•The male will not hesitate to name himself litter in multiple variations, right in front of you. His words truly tug at your heart strings, therefore you wrap your arms around the male. Causing his head to slump onto your warm chest, reassuring him with the phrases you re-use almost every day. Proving to Komaeda, that you are not in any way disgusted by him. And no matter how much the blond will try to keep the thought away, forcing it down the drain of his mind. He likes it.

•The fact that you haven't turned away from him, and kept going no matter what he stated. He is on the verge of conflict with himself and his own morals. And that stressful state causes burning liquid to stream down his face. No one has ever accepted him for the way he is, treating him like an average human being.

•Beneath apologies for staining your skin with his filthy tears, lies beautiful gratitude. Nagito doesn't fully realize it, but he is thankful to you like no other. For staying with him, for touching his body, for reciprocating his feelings. Not necessarily towards your ultimate, but you as an individual.

Kokichi Oma

•In correlation to the boy's spontaneous nature, your first kiss was at an unexpected time in an unexpected place. In fact you haven't even been planning on revealing your affection towards him any time soon.

•Followed by a raging storm of curses, the leader was getting chased by you inside his residence. Apparently he stole an item of great importance to you, and you were not about to tolerate this behavior.

•Sometimes you questioned the relationship between you and the male. You weren't exactly sure what you felt towards the prankster, but you convinced yourself that he would not be the type of person to reciprocate. Therefore your only shot was staying his companion, with a certain status of a lab rat for the boy's tricks.

•"Give it back you brat!" Echoing across the hall, you threatened the purple haired. But the response to your desperate calls was a thunderous laughter, disappearing behind the nearest corner.

•As you were about to keep on trailing behind the jokester, the same individual jumped in front of you making a screeching sound. To say that you were annoyed with his carefree demeanor and childish pranks was an understatement. In spite of pure vexation, you pinned the lanky figure between you and the opposing wall, attempting to get ahold of your treasured item.

•"I never thought you were this straightforward S/O" Kokichi teased you, struggling to catch his breath and keep you away from the possession. Reflexively rolling your eyes at the inappropriate comment, you tried capturing his hand over and over again. However Oma had no intention of giving up on the battle just yet.

•No matter how much the purple haired strived to lure you into a puzzled state, his words didn't seem to affect you in any way. You were too fixated on the item to pay any attention to his babbling. And eventually you were able to return your possesion back, yanking it from the male's grip.

•The leader was truly frustrated, his only wish at the moment was achieving victory over you. Estimating a way out of the situation, he finally understood what to do with the close proximity between you two. He knew exactly how to use that to his advantage, and recieve a double prize. The item and a hilarious reaction that would surely amuse him.

•Kokichi grasped your shoulder and before having any chance to resist, you were pulled into a forceful kiss. With every fibre in your body you could sense the boy smirking through the gesture. However you were completely paralyzed, stumped by the sudden burning impact against your lips.

•His hand followed up and tugged on you locks, sending chilling shivers down your spine. On the contrary his other palm at the moment was steadily traveling to your knuckles. Aiming to relax your solid hold.

•Just as the intrusive tongue, many thought swirled in your mind, blocking out any perception of reality you had left. And the male used that to his benefit, swiftly pulling the desired item out of your limp grip. Too busy processing the current situation, you didn't detect your possession being taken.

•As soon as Oma got back the craved ownership, he pulled away from your frozen figure, licking his lips in satisfaction. "Later, S/O" and with that he started off as If nothing out of place just occurred a few moments ago.

•Even after Kokichi was long gone, you stood on on place examining your lips with the tips of your fingers. The flaming contact was still present, and the rising dizziness in your head didn't help the situation.

•Why has the male done this? You didn't have the answer to that question. And you wouldn't unless you caught the little prankster and throughly interrogated him. So you dashed off the spot you stood on, now chasing not just for the valuable item but also for the truth from a chronical liar.

[alagaesia-headcanons]

Sorry I snatched this screenshot from a different post, but this drives me insane and I don’t want to derail that post

*adds this to the list of reasons I would throw hands with chris*

Inheritance is the titular theme of the Inheritance Cycle, yet Paolini seems so incredibly inconsistent about what he wants to say about it. On one hand, the series has so many examples of how circumstances can frequently push children into the roles their parents once had, either willingly or forcefully. A lot of the growth of the characters and themes comes from the idea that such fates aren’t binding and these people can leave behind the roles of their parents by growing beyond them and making something entirely their own or by rejecting the role entirely and carving a new path outright. It’s a theme that means a lot to me and think is very valuable to consider for the truth it carries and the beauty of the idea that our lives are our own to shape.

And then he turns around and says shit like this that undermines all of that.

The idea that Eragon inherited his determination and his “deep seated sense of what’s right and wrong” from Selena makes me so mad. Morals are not inherited. Remember, Selena didn’t raise Eragon at all. She left right after he was born. She had no influence on his upbringing. To declare that she passed on such complex moral characteristics by merit of having conceived and given birth to him is so reductive.

This does a disservice to the people that actually interacted with Eragon as he grew up. If anyone had a formative affect on Eragon’s personality, it would likely be Garrow and Marian first and foremost. And after that, Roran growing up along side him and the rest of the villagers he interacted with frequently. These people around him are the ones who could pass on their knowledge, their experience, and their beliefs.

But far more important than that, enough to make that close to irrelevant, it that this does and incredible disservice to Eragon himself. Despite the influence of the people who were actually around him, it is still up to him to decide how he wants to live and what he considers important. Throughout the series we see as Eragon fights with himself to figure out how to use the power suddenly thrust upon him, for example, when he makes the choice to prioritize his service to the Varden and subsequent training with the elves out of his devotion to the peoples of Alagaesia as a whole over his quest to slay the Ra’zac out of a sense of loyalty to his family. He has to examine himself to understand why that desire to fight for (what he sees as) the greater good of the public is the most important to him and what he is willing to do to achieve that.

We see him struggle when presented with people who have moral systems different than his own, such as Murtagh, who feels no obligation towards a large group or a ideological cause, but has an incredibly loyalty and devotion to the individuals he loves. And Roran, who, in the end, fights for the same cause as Eragon does, but for wildly different reasons based on the wellbeing of a smaller group and the immediate, tangible things they need to be cared for, like housing, food, and safety from military threats.

Eragon’s sense of right or wrong, is not inherited because it’s not innate. I wouldn’t even say it’s deep seated. It changes. It’s something he learned as he grew and then had to personally refine as it wavered and strengthened and shifted in response to the far reaching dilemmas he found himself in. It was a journey Eragon had to personally take when formerly abstract ideas of what is good and what is evil became much more tangible when he became a Dragon Rider with incredibly influence. It’s not a journey anyone did or could have taken for him.

How Paolini managed to write all that and then just say he got his moral compass from his absent mom is beyond me. It’s a condemnation.

This idea degrades a persons autonomy. It declares that even something as deeply personal as morality is subject to an outside force, to someone else, and not something built and shaped by our own actions. This idea binds people to the character of their parents, which seems benign and inoffensive enough when talking about positive characteristics, but it implies vile things about those with bad parents.

Sorry for being a prick and quoting myself, but I touched on something similar to this in another post about Murtagh and said, what does it mean to say, “Oh, you aren’t like your father, so you’re not damned to follow his path; you’re like your mother instead!”

I think the temptation is to attribute good characteristics of children to parents as something those children can then depend upon as something innate that they don’t have to struggle for and something that won’t fail them. It makes things nice and simple. But that’s not true, it never is, and the idea falls apart when considering the possible inheritance of negative traits. Using Murtagh as an example, cherry picking positive traits from Selena that he has in common to negate the idea that he got negative traits from Morzan is still damning him to the exact same idea that he is solely a product of his parents and that his actions don’t truly belong to him. Murtagh literally states that his frustration in being compared to Morzan isn’t because he’s being compared to someone who did horrible things, it’s that he isn’t being regarded as an individual who can make his own choices independent of someone else’s influence. He longs to be seen as his own person, not a continuation of someone else.

Attributing Murtagh’s qualities to Selena, or Eragon’s, or any other character’s qualities to their parent is continuing the exact same problem, no matter how complimentary the comparison may seem at first glance. Morals are not inherited, they are learned through the world and our experiences as we go through it. The books do a great job of showing this in many places which makes me even more angry and sad to see the author himself say things like this. I think it demands a critical eye not just in the way that we view these characters, but how it relates to the way we see real people.

These are just my thoughts for consideration if you want them.

Edit: got the source of the screenshot just bc I wanted it here

[bookwyrminspiration]

(pyro here! this is very ramble-y so no obligation to read through, but im constantly thinking about the council and cant help myself)

im not sure how to start this, but there's a phrase from a song i like that i feel really describes the council, in a way? said phrase is "now, sympathy has no place in a righteous heart" and i feel like that just...really fits with the council as a whole, kinda?

im sorry for being a broken record at this point, but i find it endlessly fascinating how the council is more and more divorced from what you'd imagine them to be (in the earlier books you'd expect them to be good and kind bc Good Government but they're actually pretty horrible, and then in legacy they're actually working with the crew and are very much people, and then the oralie reveal that just sets you right back and the whole thing with kenric. just. yeah.)

like, they seem to think they're in the right, since because they're working to make their world better, but they definitely don't care about the fine details as long as everything is running smoothly on the surface (like how exillium and banishment is a thing that happens to children.) even if some are hurt by what they do, the council are still duty-bound to do what's needed to keep their people safe, and if they have to sacrifice a minority for what they think is the correct course of action, they won't be afraid to take it.

i think it's a neat detail. like, i dont think SM did it on purpose, but it's still cool to think about!

also the lyric is from the song comfort zone by ferry. sorry for the really rable-y ask with zero point to it though :|

pyro you need to stop apologizing for talking about the things that interest you /srs. You aren’t bothering me, it’s not too much. I genuinely love receiving your asks, and I love reading rambles /g (all of this is /nm and gentle btw)

you’re absolutely right, when you first start reading the books there’s this idea of ah yes, everything is perfect. Everything is working well. Including the government. They’re kind, benevolent, righteous leaders whose goodness spreads to the people and world and make it better. And then you look a little closer and see wait a minute, it’s all an illusion.

they make decisions that negatively affect the main character, they have no qualms with leaving a few out of the group to fend for themselves (exillium) for the sake of maintaining this illusion of perfection and protecting others. Good of the group is greater than that of the individual.

then Sophie starts working with them more closely and you see they’re really…human. (As in real people. I know they’re elves). They debate their decisions, they talk them out and consult others. They put things to a vote. They delegate tasks. Which in a way, can make it more horrifying because those decisions they made were intentional. It wasn’t just a backhanded “uh maybe do that and it’ll help,” it was a deliberate, conscious, agreed upon choice.

And maybe it reveals a skewed sense of right and wrong. They think they’re helping but really they’re just covering up problems that will fester beneath the surface. Or maybe the morality of their decisions is the further thing from their mind. They just want certain results and do whatever it takes to get them regardless of the implications. Sophie’s ability restrictor might be a good example of that. Locking away her powers and badly affecting the functioning of her body (with headaches and nausea) doesn’t matter to them. It’s not ideal, but not a dealbreaker. It got her to stop using her powers as long as she was wearing it, so it was worth it and the right decision to most of them. It fixed some of their interspecies problems too.

it probably wasn’t intentional, but it fascinating to think about the elven government. All the little details and things that were probably never even meant to be thought about but provide so much depth.

it’s a really interesting topic of conversation, so thank you for bringing it up!! I’m always down to talk about the council /g

[xxtha-blog]

The Validity of Dream and Ink's Falling Out

Dream's not great at keeping friends. As I've discussed before, he rarely makes proper bonds with people, is afraid staying near someone too long with make them grow attached to him, and is constantly trying to help everyone he can meaning he doesn't have the time or ability to care more for a friend than everyone else.

Recently re-released was the info Ink and Dream are no longer friends after Dream goes out into the multiverse. This was first talked about in 2017 but has now been restated for reminders/new people to the story.

And with said release, a multitude of massive leaps in logic conclusions have been made by others, so I'm here to explain why Dream and Ink's falling out makes perfect sense for their characters and is not out of character, ableist, or makes Dream (or even Ink for that matter) a bad person in any way shape or form.

To begin, it should be made very obvious when it is said Dream is no longer Ink's friend it simply means he no longer trusts Ink. He no longer believes Ink will stand behind him or be a proper friend in return. This does not mean Dream hates him, or Dream wouldn't protect/help him. Dream is still an altruistic person and will help even those he doesn't consider his 'friend'. He's still friendly to everyone. Friend just means someone in which you have a mutual bond of affection with, and as I'm about to explain, that's clearly not the case here.

So why isn't Ink Dream's friend anymore? To put it simply, Ink's moral values are in direct opposition to Dream's. Ink believes in the integrity of stories and does not care if the characters of worlds get hurt simply because it is part of the story, as this keeps creativity going. This does not mean that Ink is a bad person, nor means Dream thinks he's a bad person. It simply means Ink has a different outlook on the multiverse, and unfortunately one that actively gets in the way of Dream's ultimate goal and core moral beliefs. This likely causes Dream to feels discouraged or untrusting of Ink to help him to achieve Dream's goal for obvious reasons, and because Dream would rather help everyone than just one person, he's not ever going to sacrifice his beliefs simply to appease Ink. Ink is against what Dream does. Dream does not have the obligation to try to be friends with him, no matter the reason for those beliefs Ink holds.

This isn't out of character for Dream either. As stated, he's not good with genuine friendships in the first place. While he might still try to convince Ink he should care about the literal lives of people (and no, that's not a bad thing to do whether or not you headcanon Ink as neurodivergent. Just because you think he doesn't care because he's neurodivergent does not change the fact that these are genuine people to Dream, and Ink often doesn't take actions to protect them, meaning Dream, a highly empathic person, though potentially understanding why Ink feels that way, can say he still should protect them, or allow Dream to protect them without interference, without Dream being ableist or a bad, uncaring person. Just because Ink doesn't care does not change the fact that it is wrong to let people, which to Dream these very much are, die for the belief it's just part of the story) Ink, as we know, wont care about Dream's concerns. Eventually, even if Dream tried over and over again, after enough trying there's no point in wasting your energy trying to convince a person to take what you see as the morally proper actions. This, on top of the fact Ink is likely disparaging of Dream's work, whether he thinks Dream is naive or wrong, means Dream shouldn't have to keep trying to be Ink's friend, and it is healthy for him to distance himself from that kind of relationship. Sometimes, a friendship isn't worth the effort if you're giving all the compassion and the other person is either doing nothing or actively against things you do or believe in, and considering Ink is against one of Dream's fundamental beliefs, it is in Dream's best interest not to try to continue that friendship.

Again, this doesn't mean he's 'given up on Ink'. Ink's not a bad guy and Dream's not a therapist. There's nothing he's obligated to help with in the first place, and thus can't really give up on anything by distancing himself. It just means, Dream is choosing to follow his own path rather than rely on a support Ink is clearly not there to give.

This is an okay thing to do. This is a healthy thing to do. It doesn't mean Ink's bad person or even that his beliefs are inherently wrong (because we know this genuinely is a story). It just means Dream, someone existing with a very different outlook to this life than Ink, who sees everyone around him as real genuine people and feels their pain and suffering where Ink just sees planned events, doesn't have to be 'friends' with him. And that's okay.

And honestly, because we know this happens later in Dream's story, this is a good example of how he has matured. He's not just going to give up on what he believes in. He's not naive enough to think staying in this friendship is likely to make Ink change his mind. Ink is steadfast in his beliefs and Dream can't change that, and he likely doesn't want to make Ink irritated by constantly trying. This decrease in trust is perfectly in line for both their characters, and it shows the vast spectrum of 'good' itself. Ink has a bigger picture to goodness and sustainability, Dream is focused on the here and now, the individuals, making things better in the moment. They don't have to be friends to both be good people doing good things. That is why I firmly believe their falling out is entirely in character. And that is what I find so interesting about their characters in general.

All of this is why their falling out is an interesting, character driven moment, that I look forward to seeing more of in the future. And really, there's not much more it could do better than that.

[rosemary-is-in-pesterquest]

ooh! I have thoughts on Eridan!

okay so, to me, Eridan ties into this thing that homestuck has going on with a lot of its more morally grey characters... the question of how responsible young people are for their negative qualities and actions, and where the age threshold for personal responsibility is.

the characters in homestuck all straddle this line between being young enough to consider them victims of the forces that influence them, while also old enough to understand what they're doing and how it affects others... especially because a lot of these kids come off as really smart for their age, and very precocious. we've all been through phases in our lives that make us cringe, not because we're ashamed of something harmless, but because we recognize that we had absorbed something harmful, and took longer than we wish we had to unlearn it. it could be as simple as being kind of a jerk in a misguided attempt to seem cool, or as dramatic as actually hurting someone in an attempt to remedy one's own insecurities by putting down others to seem better by comparison... but how far can you push that before people aren't willing to forgive? before people abandon the notion that better guidance and more appropriate role models could reform someone? and it's especially interesting when you consider how old homestuck's core audience might've been when they first encountered this story, and how it affected their perception of the characters if they saw them as peers, rather than as children from an adult's perspective.

so to talk about Eridan, I wanna frame this in terms of his classpect, because it actually goes a long way towards contextualizing his behavior. Eridan is a prince of hope, meaning that he destroys hope or uses hope to destroy... and this can be seen in practically every conversation he has. if Eridan is contacting someone, it is because he expects something of them. advice, or consolation, or a solution to a problem he's having... it's always something. when he contacts Kanaya, he wants her to auspistize between him and Vriska. when he contacts Feferi, he wants her to give him encouragement, and maybe date him when he asks. and in every case, the way he demands these things by being rude, whiny, or self pitying, makes people reluctant or unwilling to give him what he expects. he destroys what he hopes to obtain.

it goes deeper than that though. Eridan has absorbed this ideology of sea dweller superiority from living on Alternia... and he actually takes it way farther than it even makes sense to. the aristocracy on Alternia use the lower class for all sorts of menial work that they feel entitled not to have to do themselves. they might have the ability to freely cull individual low bloods for any reason, but eradicating all land dwelling trolls would leave a lot of unpleasant yet necessary tasks with no one to do them. I don't think Eridan actually wants to live in a reality where sea dwellers have to pick up the slack of doing things like sanitation work, or construction or something... but another concept that is heavily tied to the hope aspect is delusion. Eridan is exaggerating. he's trying to agree with Alternia's ruthless class structure so hard that it's actually kind of absurd. but Feferi calls him on that... she says she thinks that he self sabotages on purpose. because he knows, at least in some capacity, that the consequences of getting what he "wants" would actually be really uncomfortable to live with.

so not only is Eridan's goal to destroy... it is also a false goal that he constantly undermines. and all of his waffling between grandstanding and self pity destroys his romantic prospects, which are what he actually seems to want the most.

if you look at the way Eridan pursues relationships, he actually makes a lot of logical sense, but not a lot of emotional sense. he's idealized the act of perfectly filling the relationship requirements of each quadrant. he wants Feferi to be his matesprit, which is purely based on the fact that she's high enough on the hemospectrum to be an appropriate match in terms of status. he wants Vriska to be his kismesis, and Kanaya to be their auspistice, and there are hints that Karkat might've been someone he was considering for moiraillegience, though it wasn't emphasized as much. and there you go! his goal is specific, but it's based more on ideals than on the actual needs and feelings of the people involved, and it's totally self centered... he always wants them to cater to his own needs. the reason why he gets as nihilistic as he does on the meteor, is because all of his endeavors to achieve these relationships are falling through. he feels like he has no hope of mending his existing connections, because he still only sees them in terms of people either giving him, or not giving him, what he wants. but the rest of their race is dead. as the last twelve trolls in existence, they only have each other as romantic options. and as Eridan gets more and more desperate, he gets more and more demanding, which is the exact quality that drives everyone away from him to begin with, and it culminates in him having a "if I can't have what I want then nobody can have any of their hopes either" meltdown.

to backtrack a bit, I wanna reconsider questions such as, when is a kid old enough to be held responsible for their own negative qualities? like... when are you comfortable with ceasing to blame environmental factors? when are they just a bad person? is it after they've refused a certain number of chances to make better choices? when do they reach an age, or level of bad behavior, that makes you think they can't be helped to reform from these negative qualities? where does an adult lose their patience for the idea that a kid is just a victim of their upbringing?

obviously Feferi is Eridan's peer, but these are basically the questions she grapples with when she talks to Eridan. it's like growing up next door to a kid whose parents have some aggressively wrong-headed political stances. as you grow, that kid might mirror their parents' way of thinking... and by the time the two of you are in your teens, it's hard to ignore how much of a jerk that kid is becoming. but you've seen them at every step of their development. you know where it comes from. maybe theirs is the dominant political belief in the community, even if your own parents aren't like that. maybe you wonder if you would've agreed with them if you grew up under their circumstances. you've felt the pressure, but you haven't lived in it like they have, and maybe if they just had the chance to grow up under different conditions, they wouldn't be this way. and you are aware that you could be an influence on them... maybe they need you to help them see another perspective. you always got along so well as kids. when did things even change? and that's kind of where I imagine Feferi is at when we're introduced to her and Eridan. it's a crossroads between believing that you might still matter enough to them to change their outlook, and the persistence of their ingrained beliefs. it's tiring to do that kind of work, over a long period of time, to minimal results. when is the appropriate time to give up? in this way, Feferi's own hopes for Eridan fade over time. she says at one point that she was mainly acting as his moirail so he wouldn't try to underfeed her lusus and kill the land dwellers that way. she's not sure how serious he is, and she can't take that risk. deep down, I'm pretty sure Eridan knew he was never actually going to commit a genocide... but his need to grandstand, and legitimate belief in his caste superiority, had convinced Feferi enough that she still felt obligated to manage him as though he was a real threat.

these characters are thirteen years old. they're right at the edge of childhood and adolescence... right at the age where children aren't quite so innocent. they want to assert themselves. they aren't mature, so there's a lot of responsibility that they still shouldn't be trusted with yet, but they've become aware enough to feel like that's demeaning, and to want to be taken seriously. in an effort to make people acknowledge them without looking down on them, they'll try just about anything. they don't have the experience to know what they're doing yet, so it doesn't always work in their favor, and that's frustrating. you can see bits and pieces of this in homestuck's characters. like with the way they try to paint themselves as an authority on something, or shit talk each other in order to emphasize their own strengths. it's a really interesting theme, because homestuck pushes some of these young characters really far in terms of how bad the things they've done can be, or how much their lived experiences have taught them that what they're doing is acceptable. they can be really self aware in some ways, and come off as really childish in others. it's hard to know what you'd do about them in real life... and your answer changes depending on your own age and perspective. it's a really cool gray area to poke around in, and homestuck is excellent at it.

wtf I like Eridan now

[theanimeview]

What Makes a King? - A Concept Overview & Analysis

By: Peggy Sue Wood | @peggyseditorial​​

Above is my favorite scene from the manhwa King’s Maker (from Season 1 Episode/chapter 14). 

I love this scene because it perfectly embodies the ideal of what it takes to be a just or good leader in the fictional world of this particular story (not just seen as one publicly, but actually being one). It's an idea that relies heavily on the concept of noblesse oblige, which tends to pop-up in stories featuring nobles, royalty, or something similar. While also expanding on this idea of the necessity for chivalry that draws its definition and history from stories of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round. In modern-day stories, I would argue that much of our current interpretations and ideas of knightly/chivalric qualities come from Geoffrey of Monmouth’s stories of the king and his knights as well as the tales’ later retellings. [For those that don’t know noblesse oblige is the idea of inferred responsibility from privileged people to act with generosity and nobility toward those less privileged and chivalry is defined as a knightly system with its religious, moral, and social code. Geoffrey of Monmouth is the author of the first narrative account of King Arthur's life that we know of.]

You see, as someone who has studied literature in school, particularly Classical Antiquity and where we've gone from since, I've always been really interested in this idea of what makes a King, particularly in stories where we see a fight for the throne because it's hard to maintain these ideal qualities in what is often a bloody battle for power among people who have little to no qualms about committing vile acts to maintain what they have or gain more power, money, etc. This question of what makes a King? is a one I find myself asking often when I read fantasy stories that involve any question of a throne or it’s inheritance. However, I use the term "king" loosely to encompass the concept of a rightful ruler as defined by the set up an author gives in their individual stories.  

In popular works like Game of Thrones, in which we see much of the darker sides to knighthood, oaths, nobility, royalty, and so on--we see the grim reality of Geoffrey of Monmouth's time. In fact, some argue that Geoffrey's account and the focus on the knighthood and Arthur's reign amid war and beyond was a subversive aim to inspire real change among the dark abuses of power that many members of the knightly class, nobility, and above, held. In a movie like The Knight's Tale, we see this too in which it is the common man that depicts the embodiment of a true knight's spirit--one that is loyal, protective, chivalrous, deserving of love and admiration, and so on--rather than the majority of the knights born to their status. Shakespeare, who features many noble and royal families in his tales, also marks some of these qualities--showing audiences both redeeming features and cruelty among the classes (a rare depiction that landed him, at times, in the hot seat). 

These stories draw me in, as they do many others, and I think we can draw a conclusion on the trials a good or just king, knight, noble, or other must embody to achieve their "throne" by the end--one that is a bit more clear than The King Maker's summary above. 

Each potential "king" must succeed in a trail depicting one or more of the seven knightly virtues (defined here: http://marktoci.weebly.com/7-knightly-virtues.html), those being: 

“Courage.  More than bravado or bluster, a knight must have the courage of the heart necessary to undertake tasks which are difficult, tedious or unglamorous, and to graciously accept the sacrifices involved.

Justice.  A knight holds him- or herself to the highest standard of behavior, and knows that “fudging” on the little rules weakens the fabric of society for everyone.

Mercy.  Words and attitudes can be painful weapons, which is why a knight exercises mercy in his or her dealings with others, creating a sense of peace and community, rather than engendering hostility and antagonism.

Generosity.  Sharing what’s valuable in life means not just giving away material goods, but also time, attention, wisdom and energy - the things that create a strong, rich and diverse community.

Faith.  In the code of chivalry, “faith” means trust and integrity, and a knight is always faithful to his or her promises, no matter how big or small they may be.

Nobility.  Although this word is sometimes confused with “entitlement” or “snobbishness,” in the code of chivalry it conveys the importance of upholding one’s convictions at all times, especially when no one else is watching.

Hope.  More than just a safety net in times of tragedy, hope is present every day in a knight’s positive outlook and cheerful demeanor - the ‘shining armor’ that shields him or her, and inspires people all around.”

Suppose one were to look to the code of chivalry defined in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. In that case, those virtuous qualities might instead be represented as friendship, generosity, chastity, courtesy, and piety/humility. 

Failing to pass such trails, the potential "king" would instead display a knightly sin (defined here: https://chivalrytoday.com/knightly-sins/), and often, if not always, in a story suffers karma for such actions. 

The idea of a Hero's Journey, a story form I'm sure everyone has heard defined many times before, includes these trails even though they are rarely explicitly spelled out in a summary of the form. This may be because many heroes rising, of which these "kings" are, already embody these virtues and only struggle with or require a trial against one of them.

As it stands, we can often see in advance a potential king's tragedy by understanding this idea. For example, we know that Wolfgang Goldenleonard, the prince seen above in The King's Maker excerpt I’ve provided, is going to be the King, birth order be damned. Will there be trails? Of course. And he passes them securing his crown at the end of Season 1; and continues to pass them thus maintaining his throne, which we can see currently in Season 2.

By extension, we can see the character's whose stories will end in failure based on how long it takes them to pass the knightly trails, if they even can pass them. For example, Richard III in Requiem of the Rose King, which is sure to end in tragedy--not simply because the Shakespearean plays the work draws on tend to end that way but because Richard’s character has changed from the loyal son/brother. 

King, in this sense, could probably easily be replaced by the word hero or knight... but the idea stands that to make them worthy of their title they seem to need one or more of these qualities.

So as you read the next chapter of your favorite knight's tale, or a battle for the throne, or a rise to power--consider whether or not your hero/protagonist is capable of achieving these virtues. You will probably find that even the characters that seem villainous, like the self-ish Seo Joo-Heon from Tomb Raider King or Naofumi Iwatani from The Rising of The Shield Hero, pass the test we've defined here.

[sortinghatchats]

The Sorting Hat Chats

“The Basics”

The basic structure of the sortinghatchats system is that you aren’t just sorted into one House, but into two tiers of Houses: Primary and Secondary. 

Your Primary House defines WHY you do things. 

Your Secondary defines HOW. 

To build this system, we’ve drawn on the Sorting Hat’s songs, general HP canon, extracanonical data (ex. interviews with JKR)… and then extrapolated.

People are complex– for joy or for utility, due to social pressure or careless recreation, people often use the reasoning or methods of Houses that aren’t their Primary or Secondary. We call this “modeling” or “performing” a house and we will explain it in greater detail later. These additional layers help us capture some complexities in characters that we couldn’t get using Primary and Secondary alone. People can vary hugely in how they embody their Houses; in this system, Aang, the heroic pacifist protagonist from Avatar the Last Airbender, shares most of his Houses with HP’s Lord Voldemort.

The way you decide which Houses are yours is not necessarily by looking at what you do, but at what would make you proudest and most content if you were strong enough to do it. Your sorting is what you want to be and what you believe you should do, whether or not you actually live up to it. That’s how people like Peter Pettigrew can end up in Gryffindor.

PRIMARIES

Your Primary is your why. It’s your motivations, your values, and the way you frame the world around you. It’s how and what you prioritize, and what you weigh most heavily when making your decisions. People often also assume that others share those priorities. A common response to our system is “but you must oversort into Gryffindor/Slytherin/Ravenclaw/Hufflepuff–everyone has that type of morality, deep down!”

Gryffindor Primaries trust their moral intuitions and have a need and a drive to live by them. They feel what’s right in their gut, and that matters and guides them. If they don’t listen to and act on that, it feels immoral.

We call Gryffindor morality “felt” but that doesn’t mean they’re all impetuous, emotional hellions. Gryffindors can still be intelligent, deliberate creatures who weigh their decisions and moralities carefully. Reasoning, intellectualizing and debate can be support for a Gryffindor’s felt morality– but those things can never make a fully satisfying morality in themselves. Some things are just wrong, no matter what pretty words you use to explain them.

Ravenclaw Primaries have a constructed system that they test their decisions against before they feel comfortable calling something right. This system might be constructed by them, or it might have been taught to them as children, or it might have been discovered by them some point later in life. But it gives them a way to frame the world and a confidence in their ability to interact with it morally.

Ravenclaws do not lack an intuitive sense of morality or gut feeling about things, but they distrust those instincts and have a need to ignore or to dig down deep and dissect those internal moral impulses. Living within their built moral system is as important to a Ravenclaw as to a Gryffindor; it’s the source of the morality that differs between them–what they trust.

Hufflepuff Primaries value people–all people. They value community, they bond to groups (rather than solely individuals), and they make their decisions off of who is in the most need and who is the most vulnerable and who they can help. They value fairness because every person is a person and feel best when they give everyone that fair chance. Even directly wronged, a Hufflepuff will often give someone a second (or fifth) chance.

This doesn’t mean all Hufflepuffs are inherently tolerant human beings, any more than all Gryffindors are inherently good, moral creatures. Hufflepuffs tend to believe that all people deserve some type of kindness, decency, or consideration from them–but they can define “person” however they want, excluding individuals or even whole groups.

Slytherin Primaries are fiercely loyal to the people they care for most. Slytherin is the place where “you’ll make your real friends”– they prioritize individual loyalties and find their moral core in protecting and caring for the people they are closest to.

Slytherin’s reputation for ambition comes from the visibility of this promotion of the self and their important people– ambition is something you can find in all four Houses; Slytherin’s is just the one that looks most obviously selfish.

Because their morality system of “me and mine first” is fairly narrow in scope, Slytherins often construct a secondary morality system to deal with situations that are not addressed by their loyalty system.

SECONDARIES

Your Secondary is your how. It’s how you approach the world as a person interacting with it, and how you make your way. It’s how you problem-solve. It’s not necessarily what you’re best at, or even what’s the most useful to you, but about what skills and methods you value as being intrinsic to you. Do you improvise, do you plan? Do you work on something a little bit every day? Do you charge into the fray and tell people exactly what’s on your mind? What do you do? How would you describe the way you meet the world?

Note: the term “Secondary” is not meant to imply that how you do things is any less important than why (the Primary House). It’s simply the way our terminology fell out and we’re too lazy to change it. The importance of motivations v. methods is a personal sliding scale– it’s perfectly valid for a person to identify with their Secondary House over their Primary. (When drawing from canonical sources, we assumed each character likely was in a House that matched to either their Primary or their Secondary. For instance, Harry is in Gryffindor for his heroic Gryffindor Primary, but Ginny Weasley is there for her brash and bold Gryffindor Secondary.)

Gryffindor Secondaries charge. They meet the world head-on and challenge it to do its worst. Gryffindor Secondaries are honest, brash, and bold in pursuit of things they care about. Known for their bravery, it is almost a moral matter to stay true to themselves in any situation that they’re in.

Ravenclaw Secondaries plan. They collect information, they strategize. They have tools. They run hypotheticals and try to plan ahead for things that might come up. They build things (of varying degrees of practicality and actual usefulness) that they can use later– whether that’s an emergency supply pack, a vast knowledge of Renaissance artistic techniques and supplies, or a series of lists and contingency plans. They feel less at home in improvisation and more comfortable planning ahead and taking the time to be prepared.

Hufflepuff Secondaries toil. Their strength comes from their consistency and the integrity of their method. They’re our hard workers. They build habits and systems for themselves and accomplish things by keeping at them. They have a steadiness that can make them the lynchpin (though not usually the leader) of a community. While stereotyped as liking people and being kind (and this version is perhaps a common reality), a Hufflepuff secondary can also easily be a caustic, introverted misanthrope who runs on hard work alone.

Slytherin Secondaries improvise. They are the most adaptive secondary, finding their strength in responding quickly to whatever a situation throws at them. They improvise differently than the Gryffindor Secondary, far more likely to try coming at situations from different angles than to try strong-arming them. They might describe themselves as having different “faces” for different people and different situations, dropping them and being just themselves only when they’re relaxing or feel safe.

But the Journey Continues…

These four basic Primary and Secondary houses are summarized starting places that we use as a basis for further discussion. What are some ways this gets complicated?

A Gryffindor Primary values morality and action, yes– but the moralities of individual Gryffindors vary intensely. They can range from selfless service to dictatorial world domination to confident self-interest.

Hufflepuff Primaries can be cruel, considering only a sparse few to be included in their definition of “people”; or terrifyingly condescending, deciding that they “know best” and are obligated to enforce that best on others.

“Cold, calculating, logical” Ravenclaw Primaries can build systems that are warm and empathetic, or creative and artistic, or fiercely passionate.

Slytherin Primaries, selfish and small, can become loyal to so many people they look like a kindly Hufflepuff; or, so long as their people are safe, a Slytherin might bury themselves in selfless outward moralities, crusading for a cause.

The Secondaries have their own range of possibilities outside the traditional “stereotypes.” A Gryffindor Secondary can be shy, quiet, and reserved– but their stubbornness (however quiet it is) and their devotion to honesty and forthrightness still earns them a place in that sorting.

A Ravenclaw secondary might hate school, learning, and reading, preferring to gather physical and practical knowledge and excelling that way. You can have Ravenclaw secondaries with learning disorders, memory problems, scatterbrained tendencies– the important thing is that they value and find strength in the idea and act of preparation and gathering knowledge, skills, or tools in advance.

A Hufflepuff Secondary can hate people, scorn displays of kindness, and keep their nose tactiturnly to the grindstone– a different Hufflepuff Secondary might be a warm and gregarious friend, offering smiles to strangers. It is consistency, fairness, and hard work that make the House, not their reputation for niceness. Hard work comes in many forms.

Here are a few ways a Slytherin Secondary can appear to others: obviously slimy; so clumsy that their maneuverings just come out cute; sharp as an axe but so much easier to conceal; bluntly honest until backed up against a wall, when they turn into smoke and vanish; adaptable in ways that put everyone in a room at ease; a tireless trickster who delights in playing (or toying) with people. At the end of the day, a Slytherin Secondary defines themselves by their reactivity, creativity, and ability to change– it doesn’t matter what they are changing to, or from, or why.

BURNT PRIMARIES

In addition to the diversity within each Primary, we also have something we call “burning.” A burned House happens when one of the four Primaries loses something intrinsically stabilizing to their system without losing their feeling of how important their original priorities are. This can come from trauma, disillusionment, exhaustion, or just… life. To a “burned” Primary, unburned members of the same House often look childish, naive, or just annoying.

Burned Gryffindor Primaries are Gryffindors who have lost their faith in their internal moral compass. Doing what is right is still just as important, but they don’t know how to know what’s right. To an outside observer, burned Gryffindor Primaries often look more stable and calm than unburned Gryffindors, but this is a deeply unsettling thing to be on the inside of. Many burned Gryffs will find a new system to adopt and live by–but this new system is never as comfortable, satisfying, and natural as their original system.

Corie Halsing from Summers at Castle Auburn, Peggy Carter (who latches onto her somewhat glorified idea of Steve’s “better” Gryffindor Primary) from Agent Carter, and Zoe and Shepherd Book from Firefly are all examples of Burned Gryffindors.

Burned Ravenclaw Primaries have not lost their belief in their morality system– reviewing, discounting, and changing their moral system is often a common and casual Ravenclaw activity. Burned Ravenclaws have lost faith in their ability to build or find a system of truth. Sent into a spiral by realizations of the impossibility of objectivity, or by finding an irresolvable contradiction in their current system, they “fall.” This is the least sustainable of the Burned Primaries, and Burned Ravenclaws don’t tend to stay Burned for long, usually finding a new system.

Some examples of Burned Ravenclaws who stay fallen are Javert from Les Mis (who commits suicide once he Falls) and Bruce Banner from the Avengers (first movie). Jemma from Agents of SHIELD is a Ravenclaw Primary who does find a new system, but spends a good portion of the second season Burned– once a curiosity-driven scientist, the deaths of her friends drive her toward a new system of fear and xenophobic caution.

Burned Hufflepuff Primaries have decided that it’s too hard, impractical, or ultimately futile to care about everyone, and so they have shrunk their circle by changing it from a system that defaults with “I care about you” to a system that says “I cannot care about everyone, so I only care about my people.” It has switched from a basically inclusionary system to a basically exclusionary system.

Burned Puffs look a lot like Slytherin Primaries in this way except that a Burned Puff wants to care about the whole world. They wish they could, but they just can’t. This exclusion of others feels wrong and even evil (burned Houses often consider themselves “bad people”), but the world is an unjust place and you have to try to live in it.

Mal from Firefly and Dean Winchester from Supernatural are both examples of Burned Puff Primaries.

Burned Slytherin Primaries have gone from an inner circle of a few to an inner circle of one (their own self). They have decided that having any people is no longer an option. They’re worried about those people getting hurt or they’re worried about losing those people and being hurt themselves. This character type is often the Ice Queen or portrayed as ruthless, chilly, apathetic, or selfish. With no driving moral forces but their own needs and desires, these people are often cast as villains. Sometimes, Burned Slytherins even burn so far as to kick themselves out of their inner circle, and then don’t even have their own ambitions to guide them.

Jeff Winger from Community, a Burned Slytherin of the first type, struggles to attach to even the friends he makes in the study group. Many of his character plot-lines focus on his fears of abandonment and exclusion, and self-interest is what he’s always able to fall back on.

Can Secondaries Burn?

Secondaries “burn” differently than Primaries. While with a Primary (see above) each House burns in a different way, fully burned Secondaries all look fairly similar. (When they’re still in the process of or partially “burnt,” you can still see hints of the original Secondary to give you a clue).

Secondaries are about methods; a burned Secondary happens when the methods stop mattering. An exhausted or extremely disillusioned person might stop having a preference toward their methods and just do whatever seems the most likely to finish things quickly or effectively. A person with a burned Secondary will use any tactics, from any Secondary, and find joy and comfort in none of them. It might be because their old methods began to seem useless and flawed, or because they somehow lost the strength and confidence to use those old tactics.

When we first meet Bucky Barnes in The Winter Soldier, his brainwashing and intense mission focus has burned his Secondary. He doesn’t care how he gets the job done so long as the job gets done. Helena from Orphan Black, another brainwashed killer, also displays the burned Secondary.

Nico di Angelo, the put-upon son of Hades in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians and Heroes of Olympus novels, burns his Secondary over the course of the books. His Hufflepuff Primary survives grief, betrayal, loneliness, kidnapping, starvation, and mistrust– his Primary still drives him to help those in need. It is his Secondary that takes the damage as Nico rapidly loses any preference to method and just exhaustedly gets the job done. (His interactions with Reyna in the final book suggest Nico, with the help of friends, might be able to recuperate his burned Secondary into something more capable of joy.)

Even though from the outside most Burned Secondaries will look the same to a reader or outside observer, it’s important to note that from the inside, the experience will be fairly different. A Burned Hufflepuff Secondary is going to wish for, want, and grate at different things than a Burned Gryffindor Secondary. Even though both will tend to do “whatever it takes” to survive or achieve their goals, different things are going to bother them more, satisfy them more, or bring them hope. 

A note: 

Our system is based on the Harry Potter canonical sorting system, especially in the way that it is defined by choice. You can go up to the Hat and sit down and hear it say that you would do well in Slytherin, but if you would rather be in Gryffindor, then you’re a Gryffindor. That’s something we very intentionally keep as a defining point of our system because of how much respect we have for it, both as a facet of life and as a defining motif of Harry Potter. If someone is a Hufflepuff Primary, Ravenclaw Secondary, but identifies as a Slytherin– then, as far as we’re concerned, they’re a Slytherin.

Another Way of Looking at Things

Above we’ve given you a set of brief descriptions of each Primary and Secondary (burned and unburned). Here we’re going to talk about a few ways we group and differentiate between each House. We’ve found looking at the system this way helps when trying to understand where a person or character might fall on it.

Splitting Up the Primaries

Idealist v. Loyalist

Ravenclaw and Gryffindor Primaries are the Idealists; Hufflepuff and Slytherin Primaries are the Loyalists.

Idealists focus on concepts and truths and what is right and what is good. They are big picture thinkers and have moral drives that closest to what we think of when we think of typical moral drives: this is right because the most people benefit, this is wrong because people get hurt, this is gray so we have to look at the specifics. There is a system of rights and wrongs and in betweens and those things all matter.

Loyalists care about people. Whether it’s a few people or a whole world of people, at the center of their moral system is to do what is best for those people.

Decided v. Intuitive

Hufflepuff and Gryffindor are our Intuitive houses; Ravenclaw and Slytherin are our Decided houses.

Here, the Intuitive houses place an importance on the gut instinct. People are people and that matters, they might say. When asked why, they’re most likely to respond “because of course it does.” The Intuitive houses are united by the moral fire and righteous passion of characters like Mal from Firefly, Steve Rogers, Katara, and Harry Potter.

Intuitive Houses are perfectly capable of questioning, doubting, defying, and changing their beliefs– but they are at their most content and joyous when they are in a situation where they feel able to act on what they think is right without wavering or hesitating.

Decided houses still have gut instincts toward morality, but have constructed systems that they use outside that first intuition.

Ravenclaws are likely to step back and question their gut and, most importantly, place more value on the answer they get from questioning it than on the gut instinct itself. The feeling that drives “of course people matter” is valid, but it’s not enough for a Ravenclaw Primary. Ravenclaws will build their system and test it against examples and logic; or adopt a trusted ally, culture, or religion’s system wholesale and trust that above their own heart. Going with their gut against their reason makes them feel guilty the same way a Gryffindor going against their gut to do the “smart” thing would feel like a sell-out.

A Slytherin’s base morality (roughly: “me and mine first”) is a very Intuitive thing, so why do we call them Decided? That basic morality of their people mattering leaves a lot of gaps in interacting with the world. Different Slytherins deal with those gaps in different ways– sometimes by ignoring them and sometimes by constructing them. Sometimes a Slytherin will adopt a system that looks like one of the other Primaries, living by that other morality unless something threatens one of their people. Because this external system is an important part of how many Slytherins interact with the world, they are included as a “Decided” House.

Also, Slytherin Primaries “choose” their prioritized loved ones in a way that Hufflepuffs don’t. While that Slytherin loyalty is often very passionate, it’s also something that is decided on.

There are some hard corner cases in drawing all these lines (for example, what happens when an idealist’s “right” is a loyalist’s people-first system?) and we will talk more about how to differentiate those in the individual Primary posts.

Internal v. External 

Gryffindor Primaries and Slytherin Primaries are the Internal Primaries. Their morality derives from inside themselves-- from a Gryffindor’s “gut” or moral compass, or from a Slytherin Primary’s love and valuing of their self and closest people. External influence won’t sway them when they know they’re right. These can be really valuable and powerful primaries when you’re up against gaslighting, corrupt authorities, or external pressures. 

Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff are the External Primaries. When what they FEEL contradicts with their external moral inputs (things they’ve learned, things they see in front of them, input from trusted advisers or communities), then they feel obligated to ignore that “little voice inside” for the sake of what’s actually good and true. Being moral isn’t about making the choice that makes you feel good. It’s about making the choice that’s good. 

Splitting the Secondaries

Builders v. Improvisers

In the Secondaries, Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw are the Builders; Slytherin and Gryffindor Secondaries are the Improvisers.

Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws build. Pushed into hard situations, it is what they already have achieved and brought with them that helps them most. Ravenclaw secondaries make tools to do the things they need, to do the things that delight them, to defend against the things they fear. Hufflepuff Secondaries make themselves into people who can do the things they need, to do the things that delight them, and to defend against the things they fear.

Hufflepuffs toil and work hard at what they want to accomplish and build up a system that is powerful because it is built on sturdy integrity. People trust them to show up, because they always do. They move along at a steady pace: the tortoise to the improviser’s hare. This can look like community building, being the reliable friend who’s always there when you need someone. It can also look like the hard-working student who studies hard and gets all of their work done thoroughly. If a Hufflepuff Secondary cuts a corner then it’s because the corner shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

Ravenclaws data-collect. They build systems and hypotheticals and plan out contingency plans for their plans. They like knowing what they’re getting into before they go into a situation, and while they might still be good at improvising, they don’t prefer it.

You can get Ravenclaw Secondaries who look like Hermione, who studies and can tell you the important (and less important) details from Hogwarts: A History, but you can also have creative Ravenclaw Secondaries who thrive on allowing themselves room for flexibility. You can have painters who, when they studied color, studied all of color until they understood not just which colors work well together, but why they work well together; gardeners for whom looking up how to care for the individual plants in their garden isn’t enough, so they dive head-first into plant biology and soak up all the information they can. When a problem comes up later in painting, in gardening, in life– they can pull something pre-made or pre-learned out of their mental (or physical) pockets and put it to use.

As Improvisers, Slytherin and Gryffindor Secondaries feel best prepared for something when they jump into the middle of it and start reacting to the situation. Going in with a plan can sometimes mess them up.

Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games is a great example of a Gryffindor Secondary who needs to improvise: when they gave her scripts to make her inspiring, they fell flat. Her heart wasn’t in them because they felt contrived and disingenuous. When she stepped up lead, when she did inspire, it was spurred on from her gut, taken from the moment, and filled with real feeling. She couldn’t fake it and she couldn’t plan or predict it.

Likewise, a Slytherin Secondary dodges and maneuvers, not charging like a Gryffindor Secondary but changing. They read things moment to moment and meet opportunities head-on. If a Slytherin Secondary goes in with a plan, they might miss an opening that they would have been able to grab ahold of and use to make their point. Remove their ability to be flexible in the moment and they’ll sometimes go so far as to stare blankly at you. Jeff Winger from Community is a good example of this: given time to plan something out he won’t, because he knows that he’s most likely to get what he wants if he just jumps into the action and gives an inspiring (and manipulative) speech at the last moment.

Situational v. Inspirational

Gryffindor and Hufflepuff Secondaries are the Inspirational Secondaries. Their greatest strengths often lie in the effects they have on others. This is not always true nor is it the sole truth of these Houses– but it’s a common and useful tendency between them.

To a degree this is best summed up by the idea of trustworthiness. The forthright presence of a Gryffindor Secondary, sure, secure, and living on their sleeve, tends to inspire in others a desire to follow or believe in them. When they plow forward with their charging improvisational Secondary, Gryffindors often find people following behind them or opening doors in front of them. There can be something so inherently honest about a Gryffindor Secondary that inspires trust.

Gryffindor Secondaries have a tendency to sway even unwilling others to their goals. As leaders by example, or excellent and often unaware speech givers, the certainty with which a Gryffindor Secondary moves can inspire others to believe what they believe. Katniss Everdeen’s unasked for and powerful status as the Mockingjay, a symbol of social change and revolution, is an example of this; so are the unasked-for armies that form around Keladry of Mindelan in the Protector of the Small books. Gryffindor Secondaries are often unaware of the changes they are causing in the hearts and lives around them, though some learn to turn it to their (or the world’s) advantage.

Hufflepuff Secondaries, too, fall into this phenomenon of trustworthiness. There is less of a tendency to follow them to death and mayhem, but more of a tendency to believe them when they speak or ask for favors. Gryffindor Secondaries tend to light people up and make them want to be better– Hufflepuff Secondaries, often background characters even in their own lives, tend to make people feel safe. They’re likely to get secrets, to be allowed places they shouldn’t be, and to thoughtlessly be handed responsibility, powers, and favors. This is a very quiet power and one that can be used for either good or evil.

Even the taciturn misanthrope Hufflepuff Secondary we keep bringing up (they exist!) can have this effect–they are less likely to have powerful loyal communities form around them in quiet support, but they’re likely to be someone who everyone just knows you can rely on. Even unlikeable Hufflepuff Secondaries tend to be relied upon heavily, trusted to get things done– even if their quiet contributions are being overlooked and belittled by people who only understand flashy kinds of power.

Slytherin and Ravenclaw Secondaries are the Situational Secondaries. Situational secondaries tend to excel inside of certain types of situations, rather than succeeding because of an ability to call for aid or inspire those around them. They are at their best in situations that are suited to their skill sets, and are less affected by the larger context the situation takes place in. They would have similar levels of competence in a room filled with their peers as they would in a room filled with strangers.

A Ravenclaw’s core strength of drawing on previous knowledge and a Slytherin’s of adapting to situations both rely on that individual’s skillset. While they can draw on support from the people around them, that’s not where most of their advantage in a situation is going to come from. Support from the people around them is unlikely to be the deciding factor in most everyday situations because that support would not add compatibility to a single person’s adaptation skills, or to a Ravenclaw’s knowledge base.

And while the “inspirational” Hufflepuff Secondary builds things through consistency, creating communities and influential reputations, a Ravenclaw Secondary builds things internally– lists and knowledge and well-vetted strategies. These things only grow more complicated and more likely to prompt disagreement when the thoughts and plans of other people are added into the mix.

Similarly, a Slytherin Secondary has neither the benefits of community that the Hufflepuff Secondary has, nor the ability to inspire that the Gryffindor Secondary has. They are more likely to look like lone wolves, whether because they intentionally present as competent and confident enough to not need help, or because it’s hard for the people around them (especially those who aren’t Slytherin Secondaries themselves) to keep up with their quick shifts and flexible, ever-changing methods.

One of the few places where you do get a Slytherin Secondary who is helped by the people around them is when you have two skilled Slytherin Secondaries who either already know each other or who have compatible methods. That can result in a kind of double-teaming of the situation, with quips layered with information and nudges toward strategy that can leave the people around them both unsure of exactly what’s going on, and swayed toward certain plans of action without being altogether sure why.

Solid v Fluid 

Hufflepuff and Slytherin Secondary are our fluid secondaries. They will become whatever is needed to fit the space they are in-- to keep the peace, to win their goal, to stay safe they will change who they are and how they act. 

Hufflepuff Secondaries have to “feel it” “all the way down” for this transformation to work for them. This ability may come from empathy, altering their mind and point of view to “see through” the eyes of whoever they’re interacting with. It’s genuine-- in the moment-- but it’s flexible and dependent on context. 

Slytherin Secondaries are more likely to just be “code switching,” changing up their mannerism and presentation to fit a new space. They don’t have a need to “mean it” or to feel the emotions they are expressing all the way down to their toes. They act, transform, change. 

Gryffindor and Ravenclaw are both more static and more stable. They don’t “transform” the way the fluid secondaries do. With Gryffindor Secondaries, this has to do with their need to be authentically themselves. They lose a lot of power -- and a lot of satisfaction and comfort -- by not allowing themselves to genuinely react and be. 

Ravenclaw Secondaries are strongest in areas they’ve already learned, prepared, studied, or experienced. As such, they may have a hard time being “flexible” in spaces where they don’t already know how to walk the walk and talk the talk. 

Models and Performances: More Layers?!

If you’re pulled toward multiple primaries or secondaries, it’s worth looking at whether or not you model some of them. A model is a place you can live. It’s not as intrinsic to you as your Primary or Secondary, but it can still be hugely important.

A model can be useful; it can make you happy; it can make you feel like a good person. It can further the goals of your Primary or help you be more effective in your Secondary. It can be what you want to spend all of your time working toward as long as your Primary isn’t being threatened. You can drop your model (or models! you can have multiple), but that doesn’t mean that you ever want to.

You can model a Primary OR a Secondary (or both!). Just saying “[character] models Slytherin” isn’t useful– though our older posts will often fall into this bad habit. For example: Gale from The Hunger Games models Slytherin Primary– it’s this ability to prioritize of the people he loves (and who Katniss loves) that allows actual Slytherin Primary Katniss to see him as a good friend and ally. However, Gale looks nothing like a Slytherin Secondary, modeled or otherwise. In contrast, Jemma Simmons from Agents of SHIELD is learning to model Slytherin Secondary– her powers of improvisation, deceit, and manipulation are growing in an awesomely terrifying manner as she’s put into harder and more complex situations– but she’s still often baffled by Fitz’s Slytherin Primary, herself having a solid Ravenclaw Primary.

A performance is a toolkit. If a model is a place you can live, then a performance is a way you can act. It doesn’t feel like it’s really you, not deep down, but it can still be important to you. For people who have consistent performances, this is the layer that often interacts most directly with the world around them. It’s the part that people see the most because it’s the part most on the surface. Someone who often finds themselves a host to parties but who doesn’t do that intuitively might develop a Hufflepuff Primary Performance in order to present themselves properly as a caring, empathetic host. A Gryffindor/Gryffindor passionate about science might develop a Ravenclaw Secondary Performance to “seem” more appropriate in that social context.

Models and performances can be taken on for reasons of delight, necessity, or utility. There is no unifying reason that people choose them. Shirley Bennett of Community uses her Hufflepuff Secondary Performance (sweet voiced endearments and smiles) sometimes for fun, sometimes for manipulation, and sometimes as a threat display.

Due to the strict gender roles of their culture, Katara of Avatar is expected to employ a performance of the often feminine-coded “motherly” Hufflepuff Secondary while her brother Sokka has to don the stereotypical “brave leader” performance of a Gryffindor Secondary. Over the course of the series, they dismantle and complicate these roles, learning to embrace the strengths they have rather than the ones they are supposed to have

Lorelei Gilmore of Gilmore Girls, who shares a Slytherin Secondary with her mother, has such an intense dislike of the manipulations and subtleties of her childhood house that she created herself a forthright Gryffindor Secondary model to use during emotional conflicts.

A note: 

One person might have just a Primary and Secondary House. Another person might have a Primary, a Secondary, two Primary models, a Secondary model, and a Primary and a Secondary Performance; another just a Primary, their Secondary House having been burned away. Neither of these options are more or less complete than other, and lacking models and performances doesn’t mean that you’re any less complex of a person.

The Quiz: 

If you’ve read all this way (or if you didn’t), you might be interested in our Sorting Hat Chats quiz, located here: https://ejadelomax.itch.io/sortinghatchats

The quiz can take anywhere from ten minutes to three hours, depending on how much you argue with it. You can argue with it! Remember, the wizard chooses the House... 

Want to learn more? Check out some of our further posts here: 

Gryffindor Primary

Ravenclaw Primary

Hufflepuff Primary

Slytherin Primary

Gryffindor Secondary

Ravenclaw Secondary

Hufflepuff Secondary

Slytherin Secondary

Our posts are also all archived on our blog: sortinghatchats.wordpress.com

[traumacatholic]

As a Christian, is it bad to read whump? My only hobby is reading, and I am only interested in psychological thrillers. I don’t read whump because I enjoy characters getting hurt, I see it more as an action scene. I also make sure not read anything inappropriate and s*xual. I am afraid it might seem like I enjoy seeing people hurt because I know many accounts say they enjoy hurting their characters. It’s a very common trope, and I see it everywhere in books and movies, but sometimes because of the meaning of whump and the fact the character gets hurt in, I’m afraid I might be sinning. I don’t enjoy watching fictional characters get hurt, I just see it as a plot and some action scene. I hope I wasn’t confusing

Thank you and God bless you

Okay so I actually had to look up what 'whump' means, so for the benefit of other people who don't read fanfiction / know what it means:

I would say that this likely falls under issues of personal conscience and the individual - there's not going to be one set answer, it's going to depend on the person reading the material, what the material is, how they're responding to it.

People are always going to make judgements and assessments of other people's nature through the media they consume - there's absolutely no way of getting out of this.

I'm going to bring in some commentary on film consumption, that you might find relevant:

In fact, Pope Pius XI in 1936, in his encyclical “On the Cinema,” commended the U.S. Bishops for holding, not only Hollywood, but Catholics to account with regard to watching objectionable movies. He wrote, “Your leadership called forth the prompt and devoted loyalty of your faithful people, and millions of American Catholics signed the pledge of the ‘Legion of Decency’ binding themselves not to attend any motion picture which was offensive to Catholic moral principles or proper standards of living.” It was even requested by the U.S. Bishops on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception in 1938 that the pledge be taken by the faithful. The pledge was administered on an annual basis for several years.

It reads as follows: “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. I condemn all indecent and immoral motion pictures, and those which glorify crime or criminals. I promise to do all that I can to strengthen public opinion against the production of indecent and immoral films, and to unite with all who protest against them. I acknowledge my obligation to form a right conscience about pictures that are dangerous to my moral life. I pledge myself to remain away from them. I promise, further, to stay away altogether from places of amusement which show them as a matter of policy.”

Pope Pius XI went on to say in his encyclical that it is the duty of the bishops of the entire Catholic world “to unite in vigilance over this universal and potent form of entertainment and instruction … combating whatever contributes to the lessening of the people's sense of decency and of honor.” Standing as a “sign of contradiction,” the Church was instrumental in tempering the lewd and violent content which would characterize movies in the latter part of the twentieth century. The leaders of the Church, including the Pope, found it necessary to take Hollywood to task when circumstances required it.

- https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/column/51665/the-church-and-the-cinema-what-used-to-be

You would most likely have a lot to gain through analysing each piece of media individually rather than a genre as a whole. Or rather, it would be clearer for yourself which media you feel good consuming. Stories of pain and overcoming trauma has the potential for reinforcing Catholic values just as much as it has the potential for promoting ideas contra to Catholic moral teachings.

The Index Librorum Prohibitorum ("List of Prohibited Books") was a list of publications deemed heretical or contrary to morality by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (a former Dicastery of the Roman Curia), and Catholics were forbidden to read them.

There were attempts to ban heretical books before the sixteenth century, notably in the ninth-century Decretum Glasianum; the Index of Prohibited Books of 1560 banned thousands of book titles and blacklisted publications, including the works of Europe's intellectual elites. The 20th and final edition of the index appeared in 1948, and the Index was formally abolished on 14 June 1966 by Pope Paul VI.

In 1966 it was abolished with the writing of doctrine of faith

To respond to the above-mentioned questions, this Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, after having asked the Holy Father, announces that the Index remains morally binding, in light of the demands of natural law, in so far as it admonishes the conscience of Christians to be on guard for those writings that can endanger faith and morals. But, at the same time, it no longer has the force of ecclesiastical law with the attached censure.

In this matter, the Church trusts in the mature conscience of the faithful, and especially the authors, the Catholic publishers, and those concerned with the education of the youth. The Church places its most firm hope in the vigilant care of the individual Ordinaries and of the Episcopal Conferences, who have both the right and the duty to examine and also to prevent the publication of harmful books and, when it may be the case, to rebuke the authors and to admonish them.

- https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19660614_de-indicis-libr-prohib_en.html

It seems that whilst they Church still believes you should consume media that doesn't go against the faith, the Church is opening this up to personal examinations rather than explicitly saying "read this" or "don't read this"

If in doubt, you would be best asking your Priest or reflecting on "Would I share this story with my Confessor or with my family?"

[mbti-notes]

infj. my head is in chaos regarding the topic of activism, especially in the current climate. i always try to keep myself knowledgeable and take action where i can. but right now, everything is chaos. its like no matter what you do, it will never be enough. i can’t look away or ignore injustice or pain. right now current events are filling my head up. on the other hand i feel like i’m concerned with messages about “be here now." (1)

[con’t: i’m not here in the sense that i’m with the political movement, what i’m reading online, etc. but every time i try to go about my day and focus on the “good” (like nature, or my blessings, etc.) it just feels wrong. like i’m lying to myself. because something is chipping away at me to still focus on the bad, or maybe to just focus on where i’m needed — activism. i’ve signed the petitions, made calls, donated. but an anxiety drives me to continue reading what’s happening and absorb it all i do feel driven to action. i think its natural for me to become consumed by this, these aren’t normal circumstances, and i care, but because of “mindfulness” philosophies and not wanting to be clouded by anger/judgement/fear, i’m starting to question how good it is to become all-consumed. a part of me thinks “i should post something related to this fight,” another thinks “post something unrelated” to show a sliver of happiness/hope in all the madness. i'm really broken up about this. i’m faced with the question: how much is enough? i’m bombarded with messages about “if you’re not posting about this you’re not caring enough!” now i’m too scared to post anything else, even if some people clearly need reprieve and maybe a small distraction in the midst of the pain. i’m scared i’ll be attacked for “not caring enough.” i know this is sort of a vent, but you seem like you might have guidance in this.]

IMO, it isn't a matter of doing "enough", at least that’s not a concept that I use to understand the problem. As long as injustice exists as a systemic problem in our society, then, as citizens in a democracy, we haven't done "enough", have we? In a perfect society, everyone should be treated as equal under the law. Perfection is, by definition, the highest standard, but it's not the standard that should be used to measure the actions of an individual when you’re talking about society at large. Privilege and power aren’t doled out equally in society. You don’t control the color of the skin that you’re born with nor the family that you’re born into. It’s unproductive to whip up guilt about things that you don’t control. It’s more productive to think about how to utilize whatever facets of privilege and power you possess in the wisest, most helpful way possible.

I think a better question to ask is whether you're doing all that you're reasonably able to do, given your moral duties and obligations as a member of society. Are you educating yourself in a way that allows you to be a positive rather than negative influence in society? If enough of us did that, a lot of harm would be prevented. Are you addressing how you might be contributing to systemic injustice in your life? If enough of us did that, we'd be much more mindful about who we reward, how we consume, and the candidates we vote for, which would create significant structural change. Are you able to do something to help support the victims of systemic injustice? If enough of us did that, there'd be enough resources available to root out the bad actors more quickly, which would significantly reduce future victimization. 

The only person you really have power over is yourself. As one person, you have limited time, energy, and resources to solve a problem that exists at the societal level. Your actions are only ever a drop in the bucket, perhaps a few drops if you have some social influence. Yet don't forget that every drop counts in the big picture of trying to fill up that bucket. It's easy to look at the enormity of the bucket and feel like it's impossible to fill (despair); it's hard to keep the drops flowing in at a steady pace (persistence). Generally speaking, long term goals are very difficult to achieve, both for individuals and especially for society, because it's easy to lose sight of an abstract future target when the present suffering is all too real and painful.

I’d say that you don’t understand the concept of “mindfulness” if you think that it’s meant to rid you of all your negativity. Injustice is quite sad to feel and angering to witness, is it not? Do you treat your negative feelings as legitimate? There'd be something wrong with you if you didn't feel anything upon witnessing inhumane treatment, if you didn't care about people getting hurt for no good reason. Negative feelings aren't problematic; it's what you do about your feelings that matters. Since you can’t handle your negative feelings very well, your thinking process is prone to being oversimplistic. People can care about more than one thing at a time, and caring about one thing a lot doesn’t mean you don’t care about other things. You also fail to recognize that the good and the bad are not mutually exclusive but inextricably intertwined. The existence of good doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be any bad; the existence of bad doesn’t suddenly negate all the good. Being able to envision a better possibility actually serves to make you feel unhappy, sad, or angry that it doesn’t already exist; feeling unhappy, sad, or angry about the negative state of affairs motivates you to create something more positive in the future. In other words, good and bad exist in relationship and should be understood from a bigger, more holistic perspective - it’s useless to try to pretend that one or the other doesn’t exist.  

It's not about suppressing your negative feelings (emotional dysfunction); it's about using them as a catalyst for positive transformation (emotional intelligence). It’s not about whether you have a right to be happy (misplaced guilt); it’s about whether your happiness comes largely at someone else’s expense (examine your complicity). It's not about whether you're doing "enough" (self-punishment); it's about whether you’re mindful of the consequences of what you do (self-awareness). It’s not about whether you should/shouldn’t post this or that online (performative identity); it’s about showing who you are through what you care about (authentic expression). 

If you're trying to stop whatever you do to perpetuate the problem (not always an easy task), educate and raise awareness of the problem (which requires time and energy), and help redirect resources to better tackle the problem (which requires self-sacrifice), that's all you can reasonably expect of yourself or anyone else. Are you being reasonable in your expectations? Your concern seems to be that your "best" isn't perfect and that "trying your best" is all-consuming. As NF, you must always be vigilant about the unhealthy/extreme perfectionism that comes from being far too unrealistic/idealistic. What do you imagine is your "best" and what is the reality of being "at your best"? Can you tell the difference between the self-inflicted ideal of what you want and the reality of what you are? Is devoting all of yourself, like a martyr, your "best"? In REALITY, are you at your best when your life is lived at emotional extremes, constantly exhausting all of your energy? NO. How can you be at your best when your mindset is steeped in self-destructive tendencies?

You are at your best when you are able to maintain a proper balance between your well-being and your devotion to service. Only then are you able to be most effective in helping others. As soon as you start punishing yourself for not being/doing "enough" and start feeling guilty for not suffering in tandem with others (as though creating more suffering helps), you're creating a new problem that’s about you (i.e. your perfectionism and lack of emotional boundaries), and then you're no longer able to contribute of yourself in positive ways. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Perhaps you need to reflect on what you consider to be your "best" and re-calibrate it to meet the reality of what it means to be a well-functioning and well-adjusted HUMAN BEING. 

Never forget that you are human, with real limitations that should be observed and respected. If you treat yourself with self-compassion - the compassion that you so easily extend to others - you would never think that making yourself miserable is a good way to help anyone or anything. You may not have the power to solve a social problem single-handedly, but you have the power to help influence positive change in your part of the world. And you won’t be able to exercise that power if you don’t practice proper self-care. 

[tinyshe]

Pure, Unalloyed Evil Masked as a Pandemic Analysis by Mike Whitney

“Hell is empty and all the devils are here.” William Shakespeare, The Tempest

Mike Yeadon is a soft-spoken microbiologist and a former vice-president of allergy and respiratory research at Pfizer. He spent 32 years working for large pharmaceutical companies and is a leading expert on viral respiratory infections.

He is also a man on a mission, and his mission is to inform as many people as possible about the elite powerbrokers that are using the pandemic as a smokescreen to conceal their real objectives. Here’s Yeadon in a recent interview:1

“If you wanted to depopulate a significant portion of the world, and to do it in a way that wouldn’t require destruction of the environment with nuclear weapons, or poisoning everyone with anthrax or something, and you wanted plausible deniability, whilst you had a multi-year infectious disease crisis; I don’t think you could come up with a better plan of work than what seems to be in front of me.

I can’t say that’s what they’re going to do, but I cannot think of a benign explanation for why they are doing it.”

“Depopulation?” Who said anything about depopulation? Isn’t it a bit of a stretch to go from a mass vaccination campaign to allegations of a conspiracy to “depopulate a significant portion of the world?” Indeed, it is, but Yeadon has done extensive research on the matter and provides compelling evidence that such a diabolical objective may, in fact, be the goal.

Humans Are Capable of Unimaginable Viciousness and Cruelty

Moreover, it is not for lack of proof that people are not persuaded that Yeadon is right, but something more fundamental; the inability to grasp that men are capable of almost-unimaginable viciousness and cruelty. Here’s Yeadon again:2

“It’s become absolutely clear to me, even when I talk to intelligent people, friends, acquaintances … and they can tell I’m telling them something important, but they get to the point [where I say] ‘your government is lying to you in a way that could lead to your death and that of your children,’ and they can’t begin to engage with it.

And I think maybe 10% of them understand what I said, and 90% of those blank their understanding of it because it is too difficult. And my concern is, we are going to lose this, because people will not deal with the possibility that anyone is so evil …

But I remind you of what happened in Russia in the 20th century, what happened in 1933 to 1945, what happened in, you know, Southeast Asia in some of the most awful times in the post-war era. And, what happened in China with Mao and so on … We’ve only got to look back two or three generations. All around us there are people who are as bad as the people doing this.

They’re all around us. So, I say to folks, the only thing that really marks this one out, is its scale. But actually, this is probably less bloody, it’s less personal, isn’t it? The people who are steering this … it’s going to be much easier for them. They don’t have to shoot anyone in the face.

They don’t have to beat someone to death with a baseball bat, or freeze them, starve them, make them work until they die. All of those things did happen two or three generations back … That’s how close we are. And all I’m saying is, some shifts like that are happening again, but now they are using molecular biology.”

People ‘Cannot Imagine Anything so Demonic’

He’s right, isn’t he? Whereas, a great many people know that the government, the media and the public health officials have been lying to them about everything from the efficacy of masks, social distancing and lockdowns, to the life-threatening dangers of experimental vaccines, they still refuse to believe that the people orchestrating this operation might be pushing them inexorably toward infertility or an early death.

They cannot imagine anything so demonic, so they stick their heads in the sand and pretend not to see what is going on right beneath their noses. It’s called “denial” and it is only strengthening the position of the puppet masters that are operating behind the scenes. Here’s more from Yeadon:3

“… In the last year I have realized that my government and its advisers are lying in the faces of the British people about everything to do with this coronavirus. Absolutely everything. It’s a fallacy this idea of asymptomatic transmission and that you don’t have symptoms, but you are a source of a virus.

That lockdowns work, that masks have a protective value obviously for you or someone else, and that variants are scary things and we even need to close international borders in case some of these nasty foreign variants get in.”

Many readers may have noticed that this interview appeared on a small Christian website called Lifesite News. Why is that? Shouldn’t the informed observations of a former Pfizer vice president appear on the front pages of The New York Times or The Washington Post? Wouldn’t you expect the big cable news channels to run a hot-button interview like this as their headline story?

Of course not. No one expects that, because everyone knows that the media honchos reflexively quash any story that doesn’t support the “official narrative,” that is, that COVID is the most contagious and lethal virus of all time, which requires a new authoritarian political structure and the wholesale evisceration of civil liberties.

No One Is Allowed to Refute the Official Propaganda

Isn’t that the underlying storyline of the last year? COVID skeptics and naysayers, like Yeadon, are not allowed to refute the official propaganda or debate the issue on a public forum. They’re effectively banned from the MSM and consigned to the outer reaches of the Internet where only a scattered few will read what they have to say. Here’s more:4

“Everything I have told you, every single one of those things is demonstrably false. But our entire national policy is based on these all being broadly right, but they are all wrong. But what I would like to do is talk about immune escape because I think that’s probably going to be the end game for this whole event, which I think is probably a conspiracy.

Last year I thought it was what I called ‘convergent opportunism.’ That is, a bunch of different stakeholder groups have managed to pounce on a world in chaos to push us in a particular direction. So, it looked like it was kind of linked, but I was prepared to say it was just convergence.

I [now] think that’s naïve. There is no question in my mind that very significant powerbrokers around the world have either planned to take advantage of the next pandemic or created the pandemic. One of those two things is true because the reason it must be true is that dozens and dozens of governments are all saying the same lies and doing the same inefficacious things that demonstrably cost lives.”

Let’s pause for a minute, and ask ourselves why a modest, self-effacing microbiologist who operated in the shadows for his entire professional career has thrust himself into the limelight when he knows, for certain, he will either be ridiculed, smeared, discredited, dragged through the mud or killed.

In fact, he openly admits that he fears for his safety and assumes that he could be “removed” (“assassinated”) by his enemies. So, why is he doing this? Why is he risking life and limb to get the word out about vaccines?

A Moral Obligation to Warn People

It’s because he feels a moral obligation to warn people about the danger they face. Yeadon is not an attention-seeking narcissist. In fact, he’d rather vanish from public life altogether.

But he’s not going to do that because he’s selflessly committed to doing his duty by sounding the alarm about a malign strategy that may well lead to the suffering and death of literally tens of millions of people. That’s why he’s doing it, because he’s an honorable man with a strong sense of decency. Remember decency? Here’s more:5

“You can see that I am desperately trying not to say that it is a conspiracy, because I have no direct evidence that it is a conspiracy. Personally, all my instincts are shouting that it’s a conspiracy as a human being, but as a scientist, I can’t point to the smoking gun that says they made this up on purpose.”

Many of us who have followed events closely for the last year and have searched the internet for alternate points of view are equally convinced that it is a conspiracy, just as Russiagate was a conspiracy. And while we might not have conclusive, rock-solid proof of criminal activity, there is voluminous circumstantial evidence to support the claim.

By definition, a “conspiracy” is “an evil, unlawful, treacherous, or surreptitious plan formulated in secret by two or more persons.”6 What is taking place presently across the western world meets that basic definition.

Just as the contents of this article meet the basic definition of a “conspiracy theory,” which is “an attempt to explain harmful or tragic events as the result of the actions of a small powerful group. Such explanations reject the accepted narrative surrounding those events; indeed, the official version may be seen as further proof of the conspiracy.”7

We make no attempt to deny that this is a conspiracy theory, any more than we deny that senior-level officials at the FBI, CIA, DOJ and U.S. State Department were involved in a covert operation aimed at convincing the American people that Donald Trump was a Russian agent.

That was a conspiracy theory that was later proven to be a fact. We expect that the facts about the COVID operation will eventually emerge, acquitting us on that account as well. Here’s more from Yeadon:8

“I think the end game is going to be, ‘everyone receives a vaccine’ … Everyone on the planet is going to find themselves persuaded, cajoled, not quite mandated, hemmed-in to take a jab.

When they do that every single individual on the planet will have a name, or unique digital ID and a health status flag which will be ‘vaccinated,’ or not … and whoever possesses that, sort of single database, operable centrally, applicable everywhere to control, to provide as it were, a privilege, you can either cross this particular threshold or conduct this particular transaction or not depending on [what] the controllers of that one human population database decide.

And I think that’s what this is all about because once you’ve got that, we become playthings and the world can be as the controllers of that database want it.”

Mass Vaccination a Pathway to Absolute Social Control

So mass vaccination is actually the pathway to absolute social control by technocratic elites accountable to no one? Are we there yet? Pretty close, I’d say. Here’s more:9

“And they are talking the same sort of future script which is, ‘We don’t want you to move around because of these pesky ‘variants’ — (but) ‘don’t worry, there will be ‘top-up’ vaccines that will cope with the potential escapees.’ They’re all saying this when it is obviously nonsense.”

Is he right? Is the variant hobgoblin now being invoked to prolong the restrictions, intensify the paranoia and pave the way for endless rounds of mass vaccination? Judge for yourself, but here’s a sampling of articles that appeared in recent news that will help you decide:

1. Reuters — South African Variant Can ‘Break Through’ Pfizer Vaccine, Israeli study says10

“The coronavirus variant discovered in South Africa can ‘break through’ Pfizer/BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine to some extent, a real-world data study in Israel found, though its prevalence in the country is low and the research has not been peer reviewed …

We found a disproportionately higher rate of the South African variant among people vaccinated with a second dose, compared to the unvaccinated group. This means that the South African variant is able, to some extent, to break through the vaccine’s protection,” said Tel Aviv University’s Adi Stern. (So, according to the article — the vaccine doesn’t work.)

2. The New York Times — Rise of Variants in Europe Shows How Dangerous the Virus Can Be11

“Europe, the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic last spring, has once again swelled with new cases, which are inundating some local hospitals and driving a worrisome global surge of Covid-19.

But this time, the threat is different: The rise in new cases is being propelled by a coronavirus variant first seen in Britain and known as B.1.1.7. The variant is not only more contagious than last year’s virus, but also deadlier.

The variant is now spreading in at least 114 countries. Nowhere, though, are its devastating effects as visible as in Europe, where thousands are dying each day and countries’ already-battered economies are once again being hit by new restrictions on daily life …

Vaccines will eventually defeat the variants, scientists say. [So, they don’t work now??] And stringent restrictions can drive down cases of B.1.1.7. [So, don’t leave your home.] …

‘We’ve seen in so many countries how quickly it can become dominant,’ said Lone Simonsen, a professor and director of the PandemiX Center at Roskilde University in Denmark.

‘And when it dominates, it takes so much more effort to maintain epidemic control than was needed with the old variant.’” [In other words, we are effectively dealing with a different pathogen that requires a different antidote. It’s an admission that the current crop of vaccines doesn’t work.]

3. Cell — SARS-CoV-2 Variants B.1.351 and P.1 Escape From Neutralizing Antibodies12

“… our findings indicate that the B.1.351 and P.1 variants might be able to spread in convalescent patients or BNT162b2-vaccinated individuals and thus constitute an elevated threat to human health.

Containment of these variants by non-pharmaceutic interventions is an important task.” [Note — In other words, the new vaccines don’t work against the new COVID strains, so we might need to preserve the onerous lockdown restrictions forever.]

How can people read this fearmongering bunkum and not see that it is designed to terrify and manipulate the masses into sheeplike compliance?

Variant Being Used to Fuel COVID Hysteria

There’s no denying that the variant is being used to fuel the COVID hysteria and perpetuate the repressive social restrictions. So, the question we should be asking ourselves is whether we can trust what we are being told by the media and the public health officials?

And the answer is “No,” we cannot trust them. They have repeatedly misled the public on all manner of topics including masks, asymptomatic transmission, immunity, infection fatality rate, social distancing and now variants. According to Sunetra Gupta, who is professor of theoretical epidemiology in the Department of Zoology at the University of Oxford, and a Royal Society Wolfson Research Fellow:13

“… some of these variants could be more transmissible, but the truth is … even with a marginal increase in transmissibility … that does not have much of a material effect or difference in how we deal with the virus. In other words, the surge of the virus cannot be ascribed to a new variant …

The other question is are these variants more virulent, and the truth is we don’t know, but it is unlikely because the data don’t seem to say so despite the scary headlines … Pathogens tend to evolve toward lower virulence … because that maximizes their transmissibility … It is much more probable that these strains will not be materially so different that we would have to alter our policies.”

So, according to Gupta, even if the new strains of COVID are more transmissible, it is highly unlikely that they are more lethal. Here’s more on the topic from diagnostic pathologist Dr. Clare Craig, who provides a more technical explanation:14

“SARS-CoV-2 genetic sequence has ~30,000 letters. Alterations in a handful of letters will not change it’s shape much — if it did it wouldn’t function properly anyway. Fear mongering about immune escape is not needed and is irresponsible especially when no evidence to support the claims.”

In essence, Craig is saying the same thing we said earlier, that the slight mutations to the infection will not impact the immune reaction of people who already had the virus. Thus, the current crop of “variants” should not be a cause for alarm. If you have already had COVID or if you already have prior immunity due to previous exposure to similar infections, (SARS, for example) the new strain should not be a problem.

It should also not be a problem if the new vaccines provide the type of broad-based immunity that one should expect of them. Again, the mutations represent only the slightest change in the composition of the pathogen (less than 1%), which means that — if the vaccines don’t work — they are, in effect, useless.

Media Misstating Science to Terrify the Public

Here’s a longer explanation that some readers might find overly technical and perhaps tedious, but it’s worth wading through in order to see that the media is deliberately misstating the science to terrify the public. This excerpt is from an article by Yeadon. Here’s what he said:15

“The idea is planted in people’s mind that this virus is mutating in such a way as to evade prior immunity. This is completely unfounded, certainly as regards immunity … (that is) gained naturally, after repelling the virus … It’s important to appreciate that upon infection, the human immune system cuts up an infectious agent into short pieces.

Each of these short pieces of protein are presented to other cells in the immune system, like an identity parade … These have a range of functions. Some make antibodies & others are programmed to kill cells infected by the virus, recognized by displaying on their surface signals that tell the body that they’ve been invaded.

In almost all cases … this smart adaptive system overcomes the infection. Crucially … this event leaves you with many different kinds of long-lived ‘memory’ cells which, if you’re infected again, rapidly wipe out any attempt at reinfection.

So, you won’t again be made ill by the same virus, and because the virus is simply not permitted to replicate, you are also no longer able to participate in transmission … The general ‘direction of travel’ (for viruses) is to become less injurious but easier to transmit, eventually joining the other 40 or so viruses which cause what we collectively term ‘the common cold.’

What generally doesn’t happen is for mutants to become more lethal to the hosts (us). But the key point I wanted to get across is just how large SARS-COV-2 is. I recall it’s of the order of 30,000 letters of genetic code which, when translated, make around 10,000 amino acids in several viral proteins.

Now you can see that the kinds of numbers of changes in the letters of the genetic code are truly tiny in comparison with the whole. 30 letter changes might be roughly 0.1% of the virus’s code. In other words, 99.9% of that code is not different from the so-called Wuhan strain.

Similarly, the changes in the protein translated from those letter code alterations are overwhelmed by the vast majority of the unchanged protein sequences. So your immune system, recognizing as it does perhaps dozens of short pieces … will not be fooled by a couple of small changes to a tiny fraction of these.

No: your immune system knows immediately that this is an invader it’s seen before, and has no difficulty whatsoever in dealing with it swiftly & without symptoms. So, it’s a scientifically invalid …

… even if mutations did change a couple of these, the majority of the pieces … of the mutated virus will still be unchanged & recognized by the vaccine-immune system or the virus-infected immune system & a prompt, vigorous response will still protect you.”

Why Are Public Health Officials and the Media Lying?

Let’s summarize: We have presented the informed views of three reputable scientists all of who explicitly refute the idea that the so called “variants:”

Are more lethal

Have the potential to reinfect people who have already had COVID

Have mutated enough to reinfect people who have already been vaccinated (unless, of course) the vaccine does not provide broad-based immunity to begin with (which is possible since Phase 3 long-term trials were never conducted).

So, why are the public health officials and the media lying about this matter, which is fairly clear-cut and uncontroversial? That is the question.

Yeadon concludes that there is something flagrantly diabolical about their denial. He thinks they are lying in order to dupe more people into getting injected with a substance that will either render them infertile, cause them great bodily harm or kill them outright. Take your pick. Here’s more:16

“The eugenicists have got hold of the levers of power and this is a really artful way of getting you to line-up and receive some unspecified thing that will damage you. I have no idea what it will actually be, but it won’t be a vaccine because you don’t need one. And it won’t kill you on the end of the needle because you would spot that.

It could be something that will produce normal pathology, it will be at various times between vaccination and the event, it will be plausibly deniable because there will be something else going on in the world at that time, in the context of which your demise, or that of your children will look normal.

That’s what I would do if I wanted to get rid of 90 or 95% of the world’s population. And I think that’s what they’re doing.”

“The eugenicists have got hold of the levers of power?” Has Yeadon gone mad?

Has the pressure of the global pandemic pushed him off the deep end or is he “on to something” big, something that no one even dares to even think about; a plan so dark and sinister that its implementation would constitute the most grievous and coldblooded crime against humanity of all time; the injection of billions of people with a toxic elixir whose spike protein dramatically compromises their immune systems clearing the way for agonizing widespread suffering followed by mountains of carnage?

There are others, however, who see a connection between the current vaccination campaign and “the eugenicists.” In fact, Dr. Joseph Mercola points to the link between the lead developer of the AstraZeneca vaccine, Adrian Hill, and the Eugenics movement. According to Mercola:

“Hill gave a lecture at the Galton Institute (which was known as the U.K. Eugenics Society) in 2008 for its 100-year anniversary. As noted in Webb’s article:17

‘Arguably most troubling of all is the direct link of the vaccine’s lead developers to the Wellcome Trust and, in the case of Adrian Hill, the Galton Institute, two groups with longstanding ties to the UK eugenics movement.

The latter organization, named for the ‘father of eugenics’ Francis Galton, is the renamed U.K. Eugenics Society, a group notorious for over a century for its promotion of racist pseudoscience and efforts to ‘improve racial stock’ by reducing the population of those deemed inferior.

The ties of Adrian Hill to the Galton Institute should raise obvious concerns given the push to make the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine he developed with [Sarah] Gilbert the vaccine of choice for the developing world, particularly countries in Latin America, South and Southeast Asia, and Africa, the very areas where the Galton Institute’s past members have called for reducing population growth …

Emeritus professor of molecular genetics at the Galton Institute and one of its officers is none other than David J. Galton, whose work includes ‘Eugenics: The Future of Human Life in the 21st Century.’

David Galton has written that the Human Genome Mapping Project… had ‘enormously increased … the scope for eugenics … because of the development of a very powerful technology for the manipulation of DNA.’

This new ‘wider definition of eugenics,’ Galton has said, ‘would cover methods of regulating population numbers as well as improving genome quality by selective artificial insemination by donor, gene therapy or gene manipulation of germ-line cells.’ In expanding on this new definition, Galton is neutral as to ‘whether some methods should be made compulsory by the state, or left entirely to the personal choice of the individual.

… The Wellcome Centre regularly cofunds the research and development of vaccines and birth control methods with … a foundation (name withheld) that actively and admittedly engages in population and reproductive control in Africa and South Asia by, among other things, prioritizing the widespread distribution of injectable long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARCs).

The Wellcome Trust has also directly funded studies that sought to develop methods to ‘improve uptake’ of LARCs in places such as rural Rwanda…’ LARCs afford women in the Global South ‘the least choice possible short of actual sterilization.’

Some LARCs can render women infertile for as long as five years, and, as Levich argues, they ‘leave far more control in the hands of providers, and less in the hands of women, than condoms, oral contraceptives, or traditional methods.’

… Slightly modified and rebranded as Jadelle, the dangerous drug was promoted in Africa … Formerly named the Sterilization League for Human Betterment, EngenderHealth’s original mission, inspired by racial eugenics, was to ‘improve the biological stock of the human race.’”

Does Eugenics Factor Into the mRNA Vaccine?

So, how does “eugenics” factor into the creation and distribution of the mRNA vaccine? Is there a link or are we grasping at straws? We can’t answer that question, but a recent article by Mathew Ehret at Off-Guardian provides a few interesting clues. Here’s what he said:18

“The fact that the organizations promoting the rise of this eugenics policy throughout Nazi Germany and North America included such powerhouses as the Rockefeller Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the Human Sterilization League for Human Betterment … which have all taken leading roles in the World Health Organization over recent decades is more than a little concerning.

The fact that these eugenics organizations simply re-branded themselves after WWII and are now implicated in modern RNA vaccine development alongside the Galton Institute (formerly British Eugenics Association), Oxford’s AstraZeneca, Pfizer and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation should give any serious thinker pause as we consider what patterns of history we are willing to tolerate repeating in our presently precarious age.”

We’ll end this piece with an excerpt from a 2010 article by Andrew Gavin Marshall at Global Research, who presciently noted that:19

“Eugenics is about the social organization and control of humanity … (particularly) population control …

The ideas of Malthus, and later Herbert Spencer and Charles Darwin were remolded into branding an elite ideology of ‘Social Darwinism,’ which was ‘the notion that in the struggle to survive in a harsh world, many humans were not only less worthy, many were actually destined to wither away as a rite of progress. To preserve the weak and the needy was, in essence, an unnatural act.’

This theory simply justified the immense wealth, power and domination of a small elite over the rest of humanity, as that elite saw themselves as the only truly intelligent beings worthy of holding such power and privilege.

Francis Galton later coined the term “eugenics” to describe this emerging field. His followers believed that the ‘genetically unfit’ ‘would have to be wiped away,’ using tactics such as ‘segregation, deportation, castration, marriage prohibition, compulsory sterilization, passive euthanasia — and ultimately extermination’ …

Sir Julian Huxley was also a life trustee of the British Eugenics Society from 1925, and its President from 1959-62 … ‘Huxley believed that eugenics would one day be seen as the way forward for the human race,’ and that, ‘A catastrophic event may be needed for evolution to move at an accelerated pace’ … It is much the same with ideas whose time has not yet come; they must survive periods when they are not generally welcome.

The 21st-century technologies are so powerful that they can spawn whole new classes of accidents and abuses. Most dangerously, for the first time, these accidents and abuses are widely within the reach of individuals or small groups.

They will not require large facilities or rare raw materials. Knowledge alone will enable the use of them … I think it is no exaggeration to say we are on the cusp of the further perfection of extreme evil, an evil whose possibility spreads well beyond that which weapons of mass destruction bequeathed to the nation-states, on to a surprising and terrible empowerment of extreme individuals.

… Due to improved techniques the elite will have greater control over the masses; and because human work will no longer be necessary the masses will be superfluous, a useless burden on the system.

If the elite is ruthless they may simply decide to exterminate the mass of humanity. If they are humane they may use propaganda or other psychological or biological techniques to reduce the birth rate until the mass of humanity becomes extinct, leaving the world to the elite …

A horrifying vision indeed; but one which builds upon the ideas of Huxley, Russell and Brzezinski, who envisioned a people who — through biological and psychological means – are made to love their own servitude. Huxley saw the emergence of a world in which humanity, still a wild animal, is domesticated; where only the elite remain wild and have freedom to make decisions, while the masses are domesticated like pets.

Huxley opined that, ‘Men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution. There seems to be no good reason why a thoroughly scientific dictatorship should ever be overthrown.’”

We must ask ourselves whether the current mass vaccination campaign is a science-based effort to relieve sickness and disease or a fast-track to a dark and frightening dystopia conjured up by evil men seeking to tighten their grip on all humanity?

SOURCE

[bookwyrminspiration]

(pyro here! i feel like this is...very ramble-y and i apologize if this doesn't make sense, and no obligation to post if it all feels like i'm just going in circles or for any other reason)

this could just be me, but i find keeper to be so interesting in so many ways but mostly because of how little actual good guys and bad guys there are, if that makes sense? it doesn't seem like it on the surface, and the story seems rather clear-cut if you don't think about it too hard, but there's no character or group in the series that's completely perfect and hasn't done anything wrong ever, iirc? like, the council is very obviously not too pressed over whether their actions are morally right and they're the government of a species that's supposedly all about being righteous, and neither are the black swan nor neverseen, which i find really interesting to look at, especially when the protagonists start to realize these things and question them, outwardly or inwardly.

and even any developed individual characters aren't clear-cut. yes, sophie is our protagonist, but she's also an arsonist that frequently breaks the laws of her world and has nearly started a war by breaking a treated because she was curios as to what was in an ogre king's mind. linh is- well, she's the token nice asian girl, but she also flooded an entire city, twice, and has most definitely killed people. dex may not have done anything really wrong, but he still created the ability restrictor, a device that put his best friend through days/weeks of torment, all because he was happy to recieve attention from the council. and that's just three of the main characters.

and i'm under the impression you really don't care about the council (which is fine and totally valid!) but it's still so interesting how the three important characters from there follow this as well. oralie was revealed to be sophie's mother meaning she committed treason and should probably be in exile, kenric was actively hiding important information from oralie (and knew about her being sophie's mother and therefor was a willing accomplice to treason and should also be in exile), and bronte has gotten...better(?) in the later books? maybe?

i suppose im wishing that shannon will deliver on this in the future, but im not really getting my hopes up. sophie is very interesting, but the books have always framed her actions as the right ones to take, no matter how terrible the consequences could've been, and they definitely frame the rest of the "good guys" as, well, good people who do good things, which isn't exactly true in most cases. i just...i guess i find it really interesting. i'd also be interested to hear your thoughts on this! on the surface, keeper really does seem like a rather basic series, but it's cool how if you dig even just a little deeper you start getting messy.

hello pyro !! nothing to apologize for, I love rambling! and you are in luck because I happen to have so many thoughts about everything all of the time.

and I agree with you! When you first think of keeper—or at least when I do—I seems very black and white, even bland at times in terms of the interest of the characters and the aspects of their world. Especially when you’re an older reader and have since read more adult books with more complex characters. Which is common. Because these are middle grade series and there’s more limitations of what topics authors can reasonably cover. They’re being careful. Because their audience are young and impressionable and despite their best efforts may be influenced subconsciously. So they have to lay things out more clearly, explaining that actions are bad when adult readers can put that together themselves.

(I know there are a lot of younger people in this fandom so let me clarify: I am not saying you are incapable of critical thought. However, thorough analysis becomes easier with experience, and adults and older readers will often have more experience with this than you. We’ve also had more time to figure out our own opinions and morals. This is not meant to put you down, just remind you that there are inevitable differences between us).

Back to what you were saying, pyro, despite its appearance, when you take a closer look there’s actually not a lot of black and white—or at least not as much as you’d think. I know there’s a canon line where Sophie says something like “the Black Swan were…the good guys?” (paraphrased from the first book). Which makes sense because at this point in time she’s twelve, where it makes sense for her to have that very black and white mindset. Good and bad. Pleasant and unpleasant. it’s a very all nothing mindset, which I know I also had at that age. But as she’s grown older in the series, she’s thinking about things from a more mixed perspective. She’s bargaining with herself and deciding what’s worth what and if the consequences are worth the risks, making decisions she likely would’ve condemned earlier in her life. Like setting the storehouse on fire. That’s a very loaded and controversial decision from her. It’s neither good nor bad. It accomplishes something she wants—sending the Neverseen scrambling and setting them back—and she decided that was worth the consequences—burning potential information and doing something that might’ve been previously against her morals. It’s not the “right” decision to make. It’s just the decision she makes.

We see this a lot with Black Swan too. I’m actually going to bring their oath into this: “I will do everything in my power to help my world.” It seems simple and straightforward at first, but thinking about it, there’s no qualifications for what “help” means. And there’s no limit on what they’ll do, just that they’ll do it if they’re capable. This leaves it open for a lot of morally questionable decisions, like creating Sophie. Did creating Sophie help their world? She’s already started to make positive changes (like at Exillium) and she’s not done yet, so you could say yes she’s helping. And they were capable of bringing her into existence. So they did. It was in their power and it helped, so they did. Despite using Emma’s body, despite forcing Sophie into this situation.

with the Neverseen, they seem more like misguided anti-heroes (if I’m using that term right), doing “bad” things for “good” reasons. Fintan is making these bold statements and undermining the council, actions viewed as negative, to try and highlight the unfair discrimination in their system and reform it—a motive one could consider reasonable and positive.

as for the council, the most notable event this applies to is Sophie’s ability restrictor in Everblaze. This was not supported by everyone else, actively hurting out main protagonist, but their reasoning was generally sound. Sophie had already broken several laws at this point as was causing unrest in their society, the one they’re supposed to govern. And she’d used her abilities yet again to go against those rules, this time with incredible serious consequences. So if she refuses to listen, what do you do? Take away those abilities. Keep her from hurting this society further. There are more specific examples of this, like Oralie and Kenric’s cache, but this is getting long so i can talk about those later if you’d like /g

part of what is intriguing about these characters is how they’re not so black and white on the surface despite the world seeming to be so easily divided into good and bad, so it’s fascinating to talk about how those parts are actually displayed. You brought up a lot of really good topics and I love talking about this!! /g

if you’d like me to expand on any specific part more or have more thoughts of your own to share, you’re more than welcome to send another ask <33