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cock-holliday · 21 hours

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I think something that keeps hurting antitransmasculinity conversations is the conflation (both by opponents and advocates of these talks) of the issue that 1. even men are harmed by patriarchy, with 2. Trans men exist as a gender minority

Like yes, it is true that even the most conforming cis man is hurt by patriarchy and should if for no other reason than selfish desire for freedom reject patriarchy. And YES, other minority men share this situation where their marginalization feeds into their denial of patriarchal gains and YES antimasculism is used to demonize groups of minority men AND

The discussions on the subjugation of trans men is hindered by only discussing them as minority men and not trans men.

Trans men are as harmed by (if not moreso) medical misogyny as cis women. Other classes of men don’t typically share that. Every aspect of “women’s health” battles affects trans men.

Trans men are as harmed by legal status misogyny (if not moreso) as any cis woman. Any discrimination when it comes to housing, employment, education, etc that hinges on that F on your legal documents impacts trans men. Other classes of men don’t typically share that.

Trans men all have a relationship of some kind to being perceived to be a girl/woman and experience(d) the social misogyny that goes along with it. Other classes of men don’t typically share that.

The only other class of men that overlaps this heavily in experience are intersex men, and even then it’s not a very full overlap depending on your experience.

Gender doesn’t work like other forms of discrimination due to its fluidity. Sex doesn’t work like other forms of discrimination due to its variation.

It is difficult to discuss things like privilege and antimasculism and misogyny without making trans people feel misgendered by the conversation, but it is simply not functional to portray trans men and trans women as opposites of each other, and it is not enough to frame conversations about trans men ONLY around maleness (or trans women’s around womanhood only)—gender discrimination is messier than that!

Identity is one part of it, gendering you in a way that hurts you is one part of it, how you are perceived is one part of it, your legal status is one part of it, your anatomy is one part of it.

In an effort to make trans men distinct from trans women, or even just women, it does a disservice to the lived realities of trans men—portraying them as MEN who happen to be trans, instead of TRANS people who are men.

Trans men who talk about this are accused of misgendering themselves, but we all fight their oppression with one hand tied behind our backs when we pretend that this isn’t the way their oppression (and of those adjacent to them) manifests.

It is very similar to how we fight transmisogyny with one hand behind our backs when we think we can adopt radfem politics for liberation when the demonization of men also affects trans women!

I know both these talks make people think we are flying too close to the misgendering sun, but we will never have a complete discussion about any trans person’s oppression without understanding what all is being weaponized.

[of course, these conversations are further hindered by conflating ‘transmasc’ with trans ‘man,’ and by putting all of us trans folks into the trans man or trans woman category, and by framing everyone as passing or nonpassing, and by pretending everyone is perisex, AND by treating the two “binary” genders as opposites of each other, AND AND AND always assuming the lived experiences of people rather than letting them talk about their experiences]

#the ‘trans women are violent predators’ narrative wouldn’t work without the concept of ‘MEN are sexually violent by NATURE’#but then trans women are also denied masculinity #(if they want it)#are required to perform a type of womanhood #LIKE women #being portrayed as incapable of making your own decisions is being policed like a woman #trans MEN are also treated like helpless waifs or violent testosterone monsters #because it doesn’t matter always how you ID #or even how you present #whatever method will hurt and control you is the go-to strategy #often that includes misgendering but sometimes it affirms your gender by weaponizing the other method #it doesn’t honor trans women to be sexually harassed as women #it doesn’t honor trans men to be labeled predators #the layers are more complicated than just being seen as men or women #snd those of us who are both or neither are in a losing game with cis folks AND trans folks who enforce this dichotomy

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handweavers · 1 month

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my mother has asked me to ask “that weaver friend of yours” lol — do you have experience dyeing linen? what does the process look like for natural vs synthetic dyes?

happy to be that weaver friend of yours 🥰❤️ dyeing linen is basically the same as dyeing cotton or any other cellulose fiber, so any synthetic dye that works for cotton will also work for linen. a professional grade fiber reactive dye like procion mx or dharma's procion (here) dyes cellulose fiber without heat, and the process is quick and painless. it just involves a large bucket, water, the dye powder and the cloth you wish to dye. i have little experience with rit dye so i'm not sure if you'd need heat for that, but procion dye is higher quality, comes in a lot more colours than rit, and a 2oz container is like $2 usd and goes a long way

the natural dye process for linen takes a lot longer than the procion dye process and requires several steps. cellulose fibers really don't like to take dyes so you basically have to do a bunch of alchemy to convince it to do what you want (compared to protein fibers like wool and silk which love dyes and only need some gentle nudges)

naturally dyeing linen depends on the dye you'd wish to use, but the process is essentially: scouring, mordanting, and dyeing. it's really important that you scour linen especially because it contains a lot of pectins that prevent dye from penetrating the fiber, so a harsh scouring is best (ie. washing it with hot water and ph neutral soap, even to the point of boiling the cloth. linen can take a lot of heat and is better for it, cotton is more sensitive) you'll probably have to do this before dyeing it with the synthetic dye too for best results

most natural dyes require that you mordant the cloth before dyeing. some dyes don't require a mordant (indigo is the big one, but if you're working with onion skins or other materials that contain tannins this is also true. however mordanting the cloth before dyeing with tannins or even mordanting with tannins is still recommended for better colour performance long-term unless you're working with indigo in which case using a mordant can actually cause problems) but if you're unsure, assume that you need to apply a mordant. you essentially have to simmer the cloth in a hot pot with either a material that contains tannins (tannic acid), a natural bio-accumulator of aluminum (symplocos), or use a metal salt (alum acetate is best for cellulose, but iron and copper salts can also be used. the metal salts route requires more safety precautions esp if you use copper salt, you can't dump that down the drain) your choice of mordant impacts the final colour with different mordants shifting the chemical reaction that happens in the cloth when you dye it

with cotton and linen, after you use the mordant you need to use either a chalk or wheat bran bath to remove excess mordant from the cloth, esp if you use alum acetate, otherwise it can leave a whitish cast over the cloth and also impede dyeing lol. wheat bran baths tend to cause a warmer tone to the final dyed cloth, chalk baths cause a cooler tone. i only use wheat bran baths bc i prefer the warmth and i get the bran cheaply at my local punjabi grocer

only then can you dye the cloth, again unless you're working with a dye like coffee or tea or onion skins OR indigo. linen really doesn't like to take natural dyes unless you do all the above steps, it's stubborn. the dye process itself depends on what dye you use and you can do stuff like solar dyeing if you don't want to simmer it in a pot on a stove. if you plan to go the natural dye route lmk and i can send you some scans of a book i have that contains precise instructions for preparing linen for dyeing

#fun fact the word for mordant in bahasa (both msia and indonesia) is mordan lol #i love when stuff like that happens. like computer in bahasa msia being komputer #as a caveat these are the western steps for natural dyeing there are other approaches that include the same chemical processes #but dif techniques like ex. in malaysia/indonesia mordants and dye baths are fermented for several weeks to months #and the fermentation makes it so they can be used cold and you only have to dip them in the baths rather than simmer #but that takes even longer than the western methods and is less documented in an instructional sense so the western approach is easier

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tomwambsganshater · 1 year

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Vinland saga gets a lot of criticism for being unrealistic and too naive in its pacifism but I feel like that's a fundamental misunderstanding of thorfinn's character. His ideology isn't supposed to be universal, he develops it because of his circumstances, he's killed too many people and inflicted too much misery to be able to stomach any more of it, to the point that defending himself disgusts him. It's not a method to live your life or to change the world, it's his specific emotional reaction to his experiences. He's not even preachy about it either, when he meets Canute he admits that he knows he can't change the world that way, and that he can't judge whether Canute's way is right or wrong. His vinland plan is an attempt to create a society from scratch based on his radical pacifism in hopes that it'll meaningfully stick and become a value for the next generations, and thus create a society where it's the norm, but as we can see in the story and just history, it's going to fail. I don't know how exactly it's going to end, but I'm pretty sure it's not going to be by telling the reader that "You should be a pacifist all the time and violence is never justified". The story's always been nuanced, Thorfinn himself is just incapable of stomaching it.

#vinland saga #and i mean i dont think hes a bad character or anything his ideology is reasonable given his circumstances #just like canute's impossibility to not try to change the world through violent methods is understandable with his disillusion for #christianity and pacifism in general #or even thorkell! he's a lot less justifiable given he doesnt have noble goals but his ideology is coherent #war is inevitable and the goal of life is to enter valhalla + hes naturally super strong so he fits perfectly in that culture #yukimuta obviously tends towards pacifism but the story is more interested in showing different perspectives and how characters developped #them than claiming theres an absolutely right one

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ultfan · 17 days

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me when tumblr recommends me someone defending dr3 in the tags and i read through the entire thing and get mad bc they don't understand what brainwashing really is.

#'brainwashing has been a staple of the series for a long time' they say (mostly talking about mind control)#mind control in the fictional sense not the real world sense btw #magical/technological means of instantly controlling ones thoughts #the video in dr0? yeah. brainwashing. they were watching it ON FUCKING LOOP over and over to the point of desensitizing themselves #they were already vulnerable to start with as well. it was fucking conditioning them. not controlling them directly – brainwashing them #the monokuma kids? DIRECT MIND CONTROL #THEY ARE WEARING FUCKING HELMETS ON THEIR HEADS AND HAVE NO CONTROL OVER THEMSELVES OR THEIR AUTONOMY #THAT IS NOT BRAINWASHING!! THAT IS FUCKING!! PUPPETEERING THEM #they brought up smthn in the togami book. never read that but apparently there's a book that spreads despair disease #(info gotten from unreliable source in the book)#tbh it's probably propaganda to help despair spread better #it doesn't have to be fucking literal #also despair disease... if it is anything like dr2... IS NOT BRAINWASHING #IT JUST FUCKIN TAKES OVER THEIR BODY/OVERRIDES THEIR PERSONALITY AUTOMATICALLY #IT'S A MIND ALTERING ILLNESS???#NOT!! BRAINWASHING!!#and then of course saying brainwashing in dr3 is the natural conclusion and that it doesn't retcon anything #AND I AGREE BRAINWASHING IS THE NATURAL CONCLUSION. BUT DR3 DIDN'T DO THAT #it just fucking... made them flip a switch out of nowhere?#MIKAN SAID SHE BECAME THE WAY SHE DID DUE TO HER RELATIONSHIPS WITH OTHERS #NOT BC SHE WATCHED SILLY DESPAIR VIDEO #to use magic subliminal messaging to INSTANTLY change the way someone thinks isn't brainwashing in your typical sense. that's mind control #let's define brainwashing shall we?#a method for systematically changing attitudes or altering beliefs #originated in totalitarian countries #especially through the use of torture— drugs— or psychological-stress techniques #or perhaps this one:#any method of controlled systematic indoctrination especially one based on repetition and confusion #REPEATED TORTURE. REPEATED WATCHING OF THINGS #**REPETITION IS KEY**

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lunasapphire · 5 months

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Thank you universe for all that I have.

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artheresy · 7 months

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Yingxing Appreciation 🎉🎉

hi, hello, it's Yingxing appreciation time and I'm dragging you into it bc he is my baby and I need more ppl to talk about him

Y'know I see a lot of people like in awe and hyping up DF and just giving him tons of appreciation while analyzing him specifically as an individual which is all so so valid, DF is amazing and very intriguing as a character and I love him sm, but I sadly don't see the same for Yingxing despite him I think also being so interesting. I also see him more so dismissed in the "literally God and some guy" kind of fashion sometimes

So I'm here to rant just a little bit about Yingxing, why I love him, why he's epic and why he ruins my day every single time I think about him! This is for any of my fellow Yingxing lovers who are also starved of any content of him

Firstly, this man is a genuine genius, like lest we forget this is from Baiheng's travelogue in which she met a young Yingxing who was still a child by this point.

He was a young boy but had already become a craftsman, a sign of his ability to learn exceedingly quick under Huaiyans tutelage. And his ability to work and progress incredible fast continues into his time as a young man on the Luofu.

We know he arrived probably somewhere around 18-21 (in my personal estimate) and by the time he saw Jingliu again (which itself was likely early into his stay on the Luofu given HCQ ages and timing), he had already impressed the Master Craftsmen of the Luofu's Artisanship Commission and earned himself a title.

There are also multiple things in game that emphasize his achievements and creations he crafted, some offhandedly mentioned in a readable or item while others are emphasized with importance.

Casually mentioned in the Discarded Ingenium Parts is his feat in the Great Trial of the Furnace (perhaps that trial is for gaining the furnace master title? Once again signifying an earlier achievement in his legacy) where it took him only a day and night to create a whole mechanical lion that moved and looked just like a real live lion from a bunch of defective parts and waste.

More recently in 1.5, they released a readable, the Ten-Lords Criminal Directory, which mentions an imprisonment method designed by Yingxing that keeps “Mirage” in a perpetual state trapped within a hallucination of their own making. Utilizing it’s own powers in order to keep it imprisoned. Something that with proper maintenance seems to have lasted for around 700 years so far.

And of course, how can we forget his most famous creations

The beautifully crafted weapons of the High Cloud Quintet, from Jingliu’s incredibly heavy sword remarked as being as heavy as three thousand catties, to Dan Feng’s Cloud Piercer with the ability to even cut through dragon scales, and the Devastator Glaive as well as Baiheng’s recurve bow. Each impressive in their own ways and seemingly crafted pretty early as well into his time on the Luofu with the HCQ given the distinction of Jing Yuan who (even if he likely was more a teen than a boy) still wasn’t an exact adult yet. So once again, let me emphasize this man’s skill here. With how many things he managed to do so so early into his time on the Luofu. A genius craftsman who deserved all of the praise he had garnered with his works.

Additionally, I know they keep harping about “ugh arrogant craftsman, ugh he’s so full of himself” but every single time we’ve seen his personality, he just seems like a genuine joy to be around. Bright, charismatic, sure he’s cocky but he also gives the impression of being incredibly fun and a bit silly if you ask me.

His behavior as mirrored by the mirage echo in Scalegorge Waterscape is distinctly playful even in what might be a more tense situation, lightly bantering with Dan Feng and even chuckling in certain languages.

In Jingliu’s character stories, it even furthers this bright, playful attitude he gives off with his distinct cheekiness shining through especially with that “toothy grin” of his. And if you listen to Jingliu’s (at least her English) voice lines during Clouds Leave No Trace when she speaks about Yingxing before getting into his transformation, there is a distinct fondness or amusement in her voice as she speaks of him especially that cocky nature of his despite her distaste for it at first.

While Baiheng is hailed as this kind figure in the High Cloud Quintet, perhaps their sun even casting light upon them, it doesn’t seem too far off to say Yingxing was a shining star among them in his own right. His easy going nature with them bringing about a bubbly playfulness similar to Baiheng given their closeness from when he was young. I could go into way more especially in regards to the casualness at which Yingxing seems to speak and treat others allowing for a more equal formation of relationships especially with Dan Feng but I’m saving that for another rant.

And all of this about him especially how expressive he seems at certain points he’s been mentioned, really just makes me so incredibly sad when thinking about Blade now. How severely separated he is from this identity. A division that exists from not only his death but from the way his mental state has been severely warped from his time with Jingliu and being affected afterwards by the mara.

The sheer dehumanization and lack of a personal identity in place of seeing himself as a solely a weapon when put next to Yingxing, with such a clear bold individual identity, really makes the transformation of one into the other all the more jarring and tragic. Especially with the emphasis on how Yingxing hated the abominations of Abundance only to become one himself, something that is still implied to have not been by his own hand. Blade is an immensely tragic character, but that tragedy only holds weight because of the life and identity Yingxing had. It is only with Yingxing’s light which shined despite the circumstances of his life that his descent into darkness hits harder, and it makes me so sad that I haven’t found many others talking or expanding upon this despite my searches because he really is such a well written character with so many details in his story that are both interesting and utterly heartbreaking.

And additionally, I want to say that I think there is a lost potential in examining the Xianzhou through Yingxing. Specifically in the way he is treated as a short life species. We know how the relationship between the Vidyadhara and the Natives, especially as it’s changed after Dan Feng, but there is a very interesting relationship to be explored between the Xianzhou and the Short Life Species the end up there, especially through Yingxing’s relationship to the different Artisans guilds whether on the Luofu or the Zhuming.

In the end, it becomes another sad element to Yingxing’s story. Yingxing managed to change his attitude regarding how the Zhuming masters treated him and even grew more of a confidence, but even in the Luofu's Artisanship Commission, he can never truly get as far as he deserves. Just as Jingliu says

Even with his work impressing the master craftsmen of the Luofu, even after more than showing his skill and earning the title of Furnace Master for that skill, he still would be denied higher positions and could only prove his true worth by the High Cloud Quintet.

And just let me say it again, him being a short life species allows for such an interesting examination of the world and people around him based upon that. While we don't know exactly how they met, we do know that Yingxing was Huaiyan's personal disciple and the only one he mentions of the celestial masters to treat him with respect and believe in his capabilities despite knowing he's a short life species. Through his treatment of Yingxing, we learn quite a bit about him. Through Baiheng's treatment of him as well, we learn a lot about her, more than anywhere else.

He's just UGH I need more exploration from Yingxing's perspective, the lack of it feels as if I'm being starved. He's so interesting, he's so fun, he's incredibly tragic, and he makes me cry every single time he crosses my mind. Please do yourselves a favor and think more about his character so you'll end up as sad about him as me. Or don't maybe. I dunno. All I know for sure is that you absolutely need to read Views of the Universe From a Starskiff: The Zhuming if you haven't. Anyways bye, thanks for listening to this rant, I gotta go cry over him.

Peep the tags also for a rant about my own characterization of YX if you wish to witness my insanity

#Let me rant about my own personal characterization of Yingxing based on this and its OVER #It's OVER #Firsy off We need to acknowledge before we get into anything that YX is severely traumatized #Before becoming a teen (we don't know exactly how long he was at the Zhuming before he met BH so he could have been p young)#He had already lost his entirely family in an incredibly brutal fashion to the Borisin #His home planet was conquered destroyed and turned into a weapons nursery for the Borisin #And he ended up somehow on the Zhuming (it's my hc that Huaiyan himself found him but we don't know the canon details)#And on top of that seemingly only Huaiyan his master was kind to him as the rest of the celestial masters on Zhuming degraded him for being #A shortlife species to the point he A CHILD tells BH he doesn't know if he'll live to see his parents avenged #So yeah he's gone through some shit #And we know his arrogance begins after Baiheng says kind words to him but ngl I don't think he switched up so fast from a few kind gestures #I think that arrogance of his begins as a coping method inspired by her especially given the exaggerated nature of it as jingliu describes #When he was a child #Kind of a fake it til you make it #And by the time he ends up on the Luofu I think it's half genuine confident half fake it til you make it #Specifically in that he does really see the people around him as equals no matter their status or species including someone like HE IL #And in that he's probably pretty judgemental all things considered #But I think the more exaggerated parts especially his outward declarations are played up a bit by him to give off a certain facade or image #In order to garner respect when paired with his actual genuine skill and talent #That's just a reduced summary of my characterization of him tho with his relationship to his confidence I have more to say but #ALSO YINGXING WITH SURVIVORS GUILT #WHERE IS MY YX WITH SURVIVORS GUILT CONTENT *bangs my fist against the floor*#That 100% plays into my personal characterization of his relationship with his confidence #Also I view YX as being AuDHD for so many reasons but esp with what we know in canon of his obsession with crafting and his #Overworking himself tendencies regarding it #Yingxing #Hsr blade #Hsr #Honkai star rail #Don't let me mention how this affects his relationships I'll be even more annoying than I already am

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icewindandboringhorror · 2 months

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More misc. daily life pictures and such

#image commentary in tags once again since they don't allow captions anymore and I feel weird using the alt text for that --#1 & 2 - Very bright pretty looking sky !#2. HUGE icicle that looked like you could kill someone with it or something.. Pulled from near a gutter on the side of a building #3. & 4 & 5 - various images from a silly party I had where I pretended to be some elf king turning like 204 years old lol (also not like #a REAL party. Only my roommates were there really and we're all in the same household bubble.#just to clarify. I would never dare have a large party anyway given #my hermitous nature but on top of that.. didn't want there to be some implication that I'm having a Party while covid is still ongoing lol.#NEVER.. But I do love dressing up as some fantasy character so much.. The only thing that could ever bring a true hermit wizard #to engage with others socially is the prospect of connecting it somehow to fantasy worlds and costumes lol. One must simply dress up #as a silly 200 year old man from time to time and pretend you've never seen a balloon before in your life. etc.#6. bapy boye... feets #7. The main food that I made for the elderly elf man 'party'. which was a Deconstructed Beef Wellington (kind of as ajoke since I watch s #o many silly cooking competition shows and they always make stuff 'deconstructed' at the last minute when under time limits or whatever.)#I've wanted to make beef wellington a few times but Ithink to do it well I'd need like..an actual kitchen and a lot of time and #an oven that fully works to bake things and etc. etc. So I thought this would be an easier method. A thick steak cut round to kind of mimi #c the round tenderloin or whatever it is in a wellington. instead of the puff pastry being wrapped around - I just did star shaped cut outs #of pastry and baked them and put them on top (to go with the star theme). instead of mushroom duxelles being wrapped around in pastry #its in a little circle under the steak. and instead of mustard being brushed onto the meat I made a mustard gravy sauce type of thing #Then of course asparagus on the side.. my favorite... Though I know some wellington #also has a layer of prosciutto I think. or I saw one person use crepes. I didn't feel it was necessary to incorporate that too lol #8. bapy son helping me do a giant puzzle that took me hours and I had no idea it was actually that large of a puzzle #until I started putting it together and for some reason it made me stressed by the end instead of relaxed lol.. puzzle fatigue #photo diary

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discordiansamba · 6 months

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Keith's the one who has to teach Hunk bending first.

It goes... not well at first. Hunk doesn't have a strong base comparability with fire, and his willingness to learn can only take him so far. Keith's also never taught anyone before- he doesn't know what he's doing. He can't even really draw on how his father taught him, because his dad died when he was eight, and so much of what he knows is instinctive anyways.

He's just always been able to firebend. It comes naturally to him. He's never given it any thought.

(Lance rolls his eyes at that. How can you just know?

Allura understands a little better.)

If he's being honest, it's driving Keith kind of insane. He doesn't understand how Hunk can't just get it- even at the same time, he kind of does? It's not Hunk's fault he's bad at this. He's just not a very good teacher. Maybe they can find someone else. Someone better.

But the someone better teaches Hunk to be afraid of fire, and somehow, Keith knows that's not the way. You should respect fire. It can be dangerous. But you shouldn't fear it- the fire can be your steadfast companion if you let it be. And he thinks... he thinks that's the kind of firebender Hunk would want to be. Like a campfire in the dark, a steadfast companion in the night.

Maybe he can help teach him.

#atla au #i'm not 100% certain who would be the jeong-jeong parallel but you know that keith throws down with him #pov: the half-feral desert firebender who is traveling with the avatar has just insulted your teaching methods to your face #even though HE'S the one who was failing to teach the Avatar #(it's only after fighting him that you realize it wasn't because Keith lacked the skill. it's because the fire is in his veins)#(how do you teach something to another when it's part of your very nature?)

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mixelation · 1 year

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Reborn!au Kushina trying to gossip with other jounin sensei and she’s like “yeah i taught my genin tree walking in like half an hour. No just the one the other two already knew. yeah my team is SO smart and my influence on them is amazing. Get on my level” meanwhile it takes the average genin weeks to be able to do this*

*manga implies it took roughly this amount of time for Naruto and Sasuke to get it, while this was their only priority. I assume they both learn faster than normal, and also the regular training method would schedule this around other missions/tasks

#reborn au #im going back and forth on how good Tori is with chakra #I don’t think she’ll ever learn to manipulate her own in plasticity but she also like #has absorbed a LOT of theory #so i want her direction to be like #she’s largely self-taught so sometimes she does things that WORK but are infinitely more difficult that the regular method #so she e de up like. very good even with average ‘natural’ talent

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wonder-worker · 7 months

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"Mancini, an Italian visitor to England, was concerned for (Edward V and Richard of Shrewsbury's) fate as early as mid July. Well before he left England in that month, the princes, he later wrote, 'were withdrawn into the inner apartments of the Tower and were seen more and more rarely behind the bars and windows, till at length they ceased to appear at all'. Rumours of the princes' deaths were already circulating by the year's end. George Cely reported that he had heard that Edward V might be dead not long after 13 June, and certainly before his uncle claimed the throne. The Crowland chronicler, writing in about 1486, recalled how the rumour arose in September 1483 that 'the princes, by some unknown manner of destruction, had met their fate'. Some early reports went further, stating quite categorically that the princes were no longer alive. Robert Ricart, recorder of Bristol, entered in his Kalendar under the year ending 15 September 1483 that 'in this year the two sons of King Edward were put to silence in the Tower of London'. Shortly after 1485 the anonymous compiler of a genealogy of English kings concluded his work by accusing Richard, with his accomplice Buckingham, of murdering the princes. A London citizen, in some historical notes written before the end of 1488, noted that 'they were put to death in the Tower of London' in the mayoral year ending November 1483. John Rous, writing in 1489, reported that Richard killed the princes within three months of welcoming Edward V at Stony Stratford on 30 April; Richard, he wrote, 'received his lord king Edward V blandly with embraces and kisses, and within three months or a little more he killed him with his brother'. Rumours to similar effect reached France. In a speech to the estates general in 1484 the chancellor of France, Guillaume de Rochefort, reminded his audience how Edward IV s sons had been murdered and the crown seized by the murderer."

-Nigel Saul, "The Three Richards: Richard I, Richard II and Richard III"

*Just to add, Casper Weinrich of Danzig's chronicle at the end of 1483 also states that, "Richard, the King's brother, has put himself in power and crowned in England and he had his brother's children killed" and then in 1485 "King Richard of England, who had had his brother Edward’s children killed, was killed about St. Lawrence Day"

#r*chard iii #there were many more reports but I didn't want this post to drag #the thing is: contemporaries and immediate post-contemporaries were unanimously confident in their assertion that Richard III #murdered his nephews. But their reports are muddled and occasionally contradictory when it comes to the details #(the exact time and month; the method; etc)#and Ricardians seize those discrepancies to discredit all of them #but these minor differences are in fact entirely understandable and to be expected.#If the Princes had been murdered it would have been done secretly and would have been deliberately hidden #Richard never acknowledged or refuted any of the rumors against him and never displayed his nephews' bodies (dead or alive) to the public #So it's only natural that contemporaries were unsure about the specific details #But it's striking that despite these differences all contemporaries were unanimously certain about one thing:#that the Princes of the Tower were murdered and Richard III was their murderer #Their minor discrepancies make their main point MORE - not less - conspicuous

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booksandwitchery · 1 year

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Hydromancy and Scrying

So I tried scrying for the first time a few nights ago. My experience was compelling (????) so I am going to share it.

The first time I was introduced to scrying (outside of fiction) was last year when I read The Witch of the Forest's Guide to Natural Magick by Lindsay Squire. She introduces scrying as an exercise that, like other methods of divination, assists in revealing or seeing hidden information. I don't believe in supernatural scrying, like seeing the future or talking to spirits, but I firmly believe that divination can bring things to the surface of your mind from your subconscious. Many methods of scrying involve meditation upon a reflective surface, but Squire also discusses things like pyromancy and bibliomancy.

Instructions for scrying, as stated in her book, promote passive observance of the subject of divination (fire, water, deck of cards, flock of birds, etc). With scrying, as the images come and go in our mind we should attempt to interpret them.

Hydromancy, where the reflective surface for scrying is water, seemed the most appealing to me--but it took me a long time to find a scrying bowl that worked. It ended up being a shallow, circular, matte black ceramic bowl. At night, I lit a candle, turned all the lights off, bent my head over the bowl, and observed the water. Afterward, I wrote down my experience:

"I am in a dark room--spherical and all black with traces of white and blue creating hints of shadow and depth, solid but blurry in the water.

There seems to be a rodent to my right (or something like a rodent) looking over a wooden desk at me, talking. He's got a man's voice and he speaks English. He's very wise, but he's small. He's very blunt, too--not rude, but he doesn't waste time on sentimentality or getting too emotional about things. He's generally not very emotional, but he's smart and kind. He knows what he's talking about, and he's generally right about things.

To my left, light is shining through two separate doorways, one big and one small. They are doorways to other places but I don't know where they go. I'm having a hard time deciding whether I should focus on the wise rodent, or the other doorways. I decide that the doorways and the rodent are equally important.

Then my cat distracts me, and I decide that this was more than enough for a first scrying session. I blow the candle out."

I think I'll be chewing on this one for a while, honestly. What an interesting first-time experience. I'll say it's possible the animal that was speaking to me is some aspect of my higher self, or an aspect of myself that I am looking to for guidance right now. I felt extremely comforted by him, like I knew him very well. Y'all, I literally just imagined a rodent in a scrying bowl lit by a candle in the dark, but he feels like a very real aspect of myself that I want to get to know better.

TLDR; Based on my first impressions, scrying is really fun, is a great writing exercise and also returns those feelings of enchantment that I felt when I was a kid.

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