#needs to work out the reparations we owe

[icryyoumercy]

@nimblermortal

first, because these things are important nowadays, i am not a medical professional, this is not professional medical advice, the WHO has helpful information about malaria, when living or travelling in a region where malaria happens, mosquito repellent and appropriate protective gear are mandatory and non-negotiable, and so on

quinine is made from tree bark, which makes it one of the two medically useful things made from tree bark i know of, and also makes me wonder how people learn these things. were they just. walking around biting random trees. is the desire to chew on tree bark just part of what makes humans human.

it has initially been used as a muscle relaxant by the quechua people, to treat uh. random shivering? which is apparently a thing people sometimes do? which i could look into, but then i'd probably get distracted

the spaniards brought it back to europe, as they did with so many things, and because things like germ theory and microbiology and chemistry were still centuries from being discovered, what people knew of malaria was that it causes fever and thus shivering with very noticeable periodicity. and they had just been told about a thing that can stop shivering, so might as well give it a shot. if the symptoms are all you are aware of, the symptoms are all you can treat.

and for some utterly baffling reason, it turned out it didn't just help against shivering, it actually cured malaria? which. wasn't what anyone was aiming for, but gift horses and all that.

rome, being located very conveniently in a swamp, and having a rather inconvenient amount of popes and other people important to the catholic church, was perfectly located to pioneer such treatment and make a great many of the rich and powerful (and thus by advertisment of word of mouth and rumor everyone else) want some more of this marvellous drug, which made quinine (that is, the bark it's extracted from) one of peru's most important stolen goods

then, of course, a lot of fucked up colonialism happened (including in africa, because it's hard to do colonialism while dying of malaria), because europeans were unwilling to engage in things like fair and equal trade with non-europeans, we get fun medical price gouging and attempts at monopolies and general unpleasantness, and someone finally managed to isolate the exact chemical compound instead of just grinding up the bark and mixing it with something that tastes better than tree bark

and around the 1940s, malaria treatments with fewer unpleasant side effects were discovered (which i know nothing about and won't look up because adhd), and by 2006 the WHO has declared that quinine shouldn't be used as the first choise in treating malaria for a variety of reasons, including resistant strains and aforementioned side effects

also, if you're really curious about the taste, tonic water is traditionally made with quinine, and has been used as a prophylactic against malaria. once it wasn't used for that purpose any longer, though, people have decided to add less quinine and more sugar and citrus because they didn't enjoy just how incredibly bitter that stuff was. also, the FDA says you can't have more than 83 ppm of quinine per liter of tonic water, so if you wanted to treat malaria with it, you'd need to drink some ten liters per day, and if you want to use it for prevention, you'd need around 20 liters per day, at which point malaria seems like the better option

what tonic water can help with, on the other hand, is muscle cramps! not sure how much of that is the quinine and how much is the placebo effect, but at that point, we're back to readily available and comparatively harmless

either way, in the 1860's, it was one of the few actually working medical things (along with chloroform and diethyl ether for general anaesthesia, and opium for pain relief), so they will throw it at anything that has even the slightest ressemblance to periodic fever (to be fair, a number of other things they did also had the required medical effects, they just ran afoul of paracelsus's basic adage of toxicity

Alle Dinge sind Gift, und nichts ist ohne Gift; allein die Dosis macht, dass ein Ding kein Gift ist. All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; the dosage alone makes it so a thing is not a poison.

—Paracelsus, 1538

by reaching the poisonous dosage at the same or a much earlier point than the therapeutic dosage)

[sophie-frm-mars]

Hi, ex-supporter here. Genuinely hope you’re doing well. I have been tempted to start up my support again because you genuinely are a talented writer/creator and I do enjoy your work.

I hope you understand supporting your Patreon is somewhat fraught. Your private life should be none of our business, but sadly it is relevant here. Moral action, both private and political is central to your work; you have called out plenty of people for abuse & morality drives your politics. We know abuse took place on your end, but that’s all.

A lot of people like myself might be emotionally rooting for you to bounce back from this, but are unable to support you right now because that moral dissonance has not been resolved. We really don’t know if you are like other ‘cancelled’ leftist influencers and just use leftist values to deflect attention away from abuse, or you are actually trying to do better and working on yourself.

You don’t owe us anything. However, many of us who are eager to support you are forced to hold back because trust has been damaged, and there has not been any real sign of reparation or reconciliation. Maybe you think those kind of questions are invasive, maybe you don’t think we are real fans for not sticking by you despite the allegations.

I don’t know, I just want you to know that there are plenty of people who do want to support you, but feel they need to trust you first. And that can’t happen without addressing some things.

Anyways, best wishes. Take care.

Hiya, thank you for speaking to me on this.

Before I say the rest of what I say I want to be clear that between me and the people I was involved with in 2023, there were some instances where I was responsible for harm, there were instances where I received harm and there was also a general pervasive ecosystem of harmful behaviours in the community I was in. This includes people who signed the statement against me, and in one instance one of them did something which everyone to whom I have described it has agreed is sexual assault, though there is more besides.

For the time being I'm not talking publicly more about what happened because it was a very messy situation, and although I have been seriously harmed by issues in my personal life being litigated in public in this way, I don't want to give my full account of my relationships with everyone involved because I don't want that type of harm to be done to other trans women. There are plenty of complicating factors as there often are in real life that social media isn't really capable of parsing. I have made it clear repeatedly that I am open to hearing anything that people involved want to say to me, and I talked in this post in January about that and about what I would be doing to ensure that I put in the work and make sure I don't cause harm like it again

https://x.com/sophie_frm_mars/status/1745414530455261531

I think that that post says everything I would like to say for now, although I regret saying I agree that my behaviour was abusive, because with more distance and perspective I don't think abusive behaviour was actually described to me.

As I understand it via the support that my therapist and friends have offered, my problems in 2023 were that: I wasn't taking my mental health seriously, I didn't learn good kink practice, I had very little appreciation of my own boundaries and when I shouldn't be doing something that someone asks me to do, and I was high basically all the time. I am in therapy and doing DBT and taking my mental health deadly seriously, I have done a huge amount of reading assigned by my therapist about kink, sex, relationships and mental health, I am working in an ongoing way on learning how to effectively communicate, know my boundaries and understand myself well enough to not be in the kinds of situations that risk harm, and I'm no longer high all the time.

(If anyone is interested in those book recs, so far I've read: Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again by Katherine Angel; The Right To Sex by Amia Srinivasan; Screw Consent (I hate this edgy title) by Joseph Fischel; Playing Well With Others; The Loving Dominant by John and Libby Warren; I Hope We Choose Love by Kai Cheng Thom; The New Topping Book by Dossie Easton and Janet W Hardy; and Dissociation Made Simple by Jamie Marich. There have been some others, and I've written a bit about them in the book club channel on my discord as I've been reading)

I haven't heard from the people involved. The last I heard from anyone was one of my exes calling me a pathological liar and saying that they just want to move on with their lives, so while I'm doing the work to make sure I act better in future I am just trying to get on with my life and let them get on with theirs. I hope this clarifies why I have not talked further about the situation.

I will say that the last few months have been hellish for me. I have been frequently suicidal, I spent Christmas and new years alone, I lost a tooth because I couldn't afford proper dental treatment, people from within the community I've been ostracised from have been putting pressure on my remaining friends to cut ties with me, Keffals had my abuser on her twitch stream, a bizarre exaggerated and monsterised version of my personal life has been publicly gossiped about by trans people, fash and "leftist" drama streamers alike, I have been doing other work to make sure I can still pay rent and afford my bills and my HRT, and to survive. As I've been getting more stable and more able to focus on things besides this, I've been working on new writing because all I want with regard to my work and my channel is for my writing to help people. I don't want to talk about my private life, but I do understand that some number of people will feel after what has been said about me that they can't move forward with me without hearing the full details. Lots of people in my life have repeatedly encouraged me to publish a full account of everything that happened but I know how the Internet works and I don't want other trans women to be harmed in the ways that I have been harmed.

[windvexer]

Thanks for that practice post, you made a really good point. i find that practising is a little harder when working with spirits though, do you have any thoughts/tips on this specifically related to spirit work?

We are in reference to this post, which advises to practice things you don't necessarily need just for the sake of getting experience.

Of course you share few details, Anon, so I'll shoot from the hip:

Work with the spirits of correspondences. Try just talking to them. If the correspondence is feeling a bit inert, this is a good opportunity to practice spirit invocation.

You can "interview" correspondences to learn more about them, how they can assist in spellwork, and so on.

You don't need to have a spell in mind. Try finding five or so household staples (including things like bar soap, vinegar, herbs and spices, cooking ingredients like milk, rice, and eggs, etc.) and evoking a spiritual presence within them to talk to.

Evoking a spirit back into its earthly corpse is a skill in and of itself and can be readily practiced with common household ingredients.

Spirit work can also be practiced out in public, which IMO is a riskier operation; ensure to bring some amount of protection with you.

Try "tuning in" to the spirits of places, or into the spiritual plane where spirits may be roaming. Try to identify if there are any spirits in the places you go. But, keep in mind, that it often seems to happen that when you go poking about, spirits will respond. They may ask for favors, or be flustered at your attentions.

Respond as you desire to gain experience in spirit work.

General offerings, given outside if possible, are an excellent avenue to practice spirit work. An offering given to broad categories of spirits (such as the spirits of the home, the land, the ancestors, the helpers, to those who don't stand in your way, and to those owed reparation), has the tendency to draw in lots of spirits.

This can help provide experience in watching spirits coming and going; in knowing when one is trying to get your attention; and in carving out time to pay attention to the local spirits, to help resolve issues.

If you have a few enchantments already worked up, like an ongoing container spell or protective amulet, engage the spirits of those objects. You can also work directly with the spirits of just about any tool of witchcraft: prepared waters, oils, powders; wands and ritual knives; any object kept on the altar, and so on.

Divinatory tools tend to be especially talkative.

This isn't to say that all of your tools, or everything on an altar, has a spirit. Many do not, or only have a vague notion of energies, or energy without sapience.

This is all the better for spirit work practice, to gain experience determining something merely energized from something that can answer back.

If you have the experience and confidence, providing spirit readings for others can rapidly provide a lot of spirit-working experience, specifically in the realm of contact and communication. Get the terms of the reading in writing, approach each reading with spiritual protection and with your own guides, and always behave with dignity.

Astral travel is another fine way to gain spirit working experience, and especially useful if you also need to brush up on your traveling skills. A personal astral temple which you invite the spirits of your court into is danged handy for establishing a point of communication.

If astral travel isn't your thing, building physical vessels for your spirits is a very helpful way to ground them into your life, and also provides experience in and of itself. (*You can do this along with an astral temple, it isn't one or the other)

An accessible form of the spirit vessel is a container, such as a box, which you decorate in such a way that it resonates with the spirit's nature (including only decorating the inside, if subtlety benefits you), and is then filled with objects that similarly resonate with the spirit's nature, or the spirit would personally enjoy. Such a vessel may be very small; advice for building altars and shrines applies here.

Obtaining such a vessel for each important spirit in your life (including gods) can open up doorways that advance the available avenues of spirit work. But it can also just be very useful, in general, as a point of connection. Learning to "read" these vessels, the way one reads an aura, is also very useful practice.

Concurrent with all of these activities is learning how to "tune out" and set up boundaries and barriers to limit spirits from bothering you all the time; so things like establishing house rules, creation of wards specifically to manage spirits, and spirit banishing techniques, also run parallel to spirit work, and will improve your capacity therein.

Last, keep in mind that acknowledging and honoring a spirit is not the same thing as establishing a working relationship with them. So don't feel like meeting any random spirit once or twice means you owe them a shrine and offerings forever.

[litnerdwrites]

Okay, but who owes who, really?

The Ic love to talk about how 'ungrateful' Nesta is and how they do so much for her, and how spending 500 gold marks is so terrible. But Feyre admits herself, it isn't the money that's the issue, it's what Nesta spent it on; Booze and food.

However, the IC are buying whole estates and drinking each other under the table at Rita's almost every night. So it's safe to infer that 500 gold marks isn't that much when compared to what the rest of the IC spend. If I remember ACOFAS right, they all have a communal fun money account too, which Nesta should be given access to, if she was a member of his court since the war ended. Especially since attending those events the IC make her attend, count as court work (as I'll explain later).

For now, I've decided to list everything I can think of that Rhysand owes Nesta.

We can start with paying her rent for the use of her property to facilitate the meeting. (Not letting them die or suffer emotional/physical damages from it should be given).

Paying her for organising and supplying anything needed for the meetings to happen (so like event organisation) since the Ic pretty much just showed up.

Payment for the trips she took to mail the letters.

Paying for the servants to leave during the day Feyre arrived, and during the meetings. This includes tasks the servants would've normally done during those days but didn't because they needed to be out.

Then there's restitution for bodily harm, and emotional damages from being kidnapped (To both Nesta, and Elain)

Payment for new accommodations, including food, clothes and other necessities.

We can also add on restitution for any property damages inflicted when Hybern broke in.

Restitution for emotional damages for when she was attacked in the library.

Payment for her services in training with Amren plus trying to fix the wall.

Payment for her work at the HL meeting, plus a bonus for the emotional tole it took on her.

Payment for her scrying.

Payment for the works she did around the war camp, like fetching buckets and wrapping wounds and stuff (since I bet every other soldier, nurse, healer, or whoever, was paid in one way or another).

Payment for being willing to cross the battlefield with Amren and Feyre, and Elain, putting their lives on the line to reach the cauldron.

Payment for saving Cassian from the cauldron.

Payment for being willing to go as bait to lure out the king.

A reward for actually killing the kind.

Reparations for their fathers' death.

Payment for each scrying session in ACOSF.

Payment for going to The Middle.

Reparations for emotional damages caused by the Kelpi when she went to find the mask.

A reward for actually getting the mask.

Payment for going to the prison.

Reparations for emotional damages in the prison.

A reward for finding the mask.

Payment for taking her made swords, unless the wanna return those.

Payment for every single meeting she attends with Eris, be it in Spring, The Middle, or wherever.

Reparations for being thrown into the blood right, for all three of them, (since the ones who kidnapped them where Rhysand's own soldiers, and given that they're camp lords, we can assume they have decent ranks)

A reward for killing Bryallin (even though it was literally the IC job, since they promised to do that in exchange for her training to fix the wall and find magic items.

Payment for the dancing in Hewn city.

Payment for every dancing lesson she spends her time doing with Morrigan.

Emotional damages for the verbal abuse she gets from each member of the IC.

Payment for her work in the library

Payment for her training (since both that and the library were forced onto her).

Reparations for evicting and demolishing her apartment.

Reparations for the emotional damages inflicted by the Illyrians who stare and gawk at her the whole time, and insult her behind her back and too her face.

Her father's inheritance (If he didn't leave a will, then it's divided up by inheritance law, which Emerie mentions, includes females now, in the NC. We can also assume, based on her interactions with her cousin, that his side of the family got very little after her father's death. So, we can assume his fortune, business contracts, properties, including ships and things would go to Nesta. A majority of it would, anyway.)

Oh, and payment for every party she attends. And I mean more than just rent. Since Amren wants to use the argument that Nesta is part of the court, then every party she attends, from the bridge party, to starfall, to solstice, is considered a work trip, and she needs to be paid in full. For each one.)

Plus, emotional damages caused by the fire, the insults from their court, and the fact that she was on a boat, over water, despite her trauma.

Moreover, we learn in ACOMAF that Rhys doesn't lowball what he pays his court or those who work for him. Meaning that it's reasonable to expect the amount he pays to be from the higher end of the threshold. So, depending of if Rhysand pays from the mid to high end of the threshold, the total amount he owes Nesta would be pretty close to or even well over the millions.

The 500 gold marks that Feyre was so upset about was a first for Nesta, so even if we add that to Nesta's expenditures over the past year, and subtract that from what she's owed, she'd still have a lot of money. Maybe it would still be in the millions too.

That said, this is all just speculation, since we don't know the irl value of a gold mark, or the exact expenses Nesta incurred during that one year. We also don't know for sure exactly how much Rhysand pays his court or his soldiers.

[gingerylangylang1979]

The representation debate.. yes, this is all over the place.

I don't even know if I'm the most intelligent person to start this discussion nor do I have answers. What I do know is there is a debate brewing surrounding Bottoms and queer representation that got me thinking about representation in entertainment in general. I'm not queer but I am a black woman, so that is my frame of reference. I will also preface by saying I haven't seen the film.

Apparently some people are mad that Rachel isn't a lesbian or Jewish but has played multiple characters with those identities. In a plot twist, Emma, a Jewish lesbian cast Rachel in Jewish lesbian roles twice, so she's unbothered. Ayo has played a few queer roles and has been consistently vague about her identity but one could assume from her interviews that she is possibly bi or pansexual. Anyways, it came out that Rachel has/had? a boyfriend and Ayo has/had (maybe they broke up?) a boyfriend and people have been up and arms. Like Ayo's dude/ex-dude? was getting harassed to the point a mutual friend stepped in. I think part of this is people just mad because these women maybe are taken and they can't date them but also mad because they feel the roles should have gone to women who are 100% lesbians. I've read some people mad that they think it's a cop out for the actresses to not be transparent because they are in possibly the biggest lesbian movie for this generation. So I guess the question is what do they owe that community, if anything? Not my community, so I dunno but fascinating to think about what this means culturally.

I get that a community can feel that actors who get roles representing them should be cast with people from that marginalized group being prioritized. It took years for things like black, brown, and yellow face to become taboo, for queer characters to even be a thing, and actors allowed to be out. So it does seem like that work should be graciously granted to people who fit those demographics. Like, all of this is still new and messy in Hollywood so I do feel like some reparations as far as opportunity are due. And Hollywood has failed hard even recently. We've just a few years ago had cases of white actors being greenlit to play Asian characters. And I don't care if the characters were bi-racial, most mixed race Asian people look identifiable as being of Asian ancestry and are viewed as non-white. Like, I don't want to see a white person play a bi-racial black woman. Nope. And don't even get me started on how colorist the industry still is. In 2023 black entertainers still feel the need to bleach their skin, only wear European looking hair, and get nose jobs to get ahead. And the sad thing is, it often works. Even Erykah Badu gave in. So we need more black women who look straight up black to not be sidelined... STILL.

So my next thought is people who would say, but, but POC are playing traditionally white characters. To me it doesn't make a difference if the OG character is white if their specific heritage had nothing to do with the character. And even then, exceptions can be made. British, doesn't have to mean white, for instance, etc., etc. And Hamilton subversively cast POC as American founding fathers.

But anyways, back to Bottoms. Again, I don't have a true dog in this fight except to say I'll just focus on Ayo, because she's a black woman. Honestly, I'm just happy to see her get good roles. I don't care if she is personally queer, if she personally isn't queer as long as she is representing an interesting black woman. I do have stakes in her being into men on The Bear because that's the romance I see brewing regardless of what people think representation wise. Her character could be bi or pan and I would be fine with that but sorry, I can't dismiss what I see as her into Carmy. Not to derail this with my shipper goggles but there is a strong contingent of people deeply invested in seeing Syd be a lesbian and I get it but I think if that's not what is written, it isn't what's written regardless of what representation people want to see.

I dunno, my opinions aren't coherent nor do I think I've figured anything out and am not trying to speak for other communities. I'm just sharing passing thoughts and wanted to get other people's opinions in hopefully a civil discussion.

[princeescaluswords]

So, because Scott is poor, Derek should buy him a new car? That seems logical to you?

Did you come here looking for a fight? Because you just found one. I believe that this ask refers to this post, where I argued that Derek's performative asceticism isn't accidental, and that the show was implying that his privilege and wealth enable his antagonistic behavior in the first two seasons.

Nowhere did I argue in that post, where I compared the speed with which Derek repaired his car window after Chris Argent's thug smashed it to the fact that the McCall family vehicle didn't have a driver's side window all season, that Derek owed Scott a car. I have, in the past, argued that the Hales owed Scott McCall reparations for repeated assaults, property damage, disruption of academic pursuits, and for taking over their self-appointed task of protecting Beacon Hills. I wish that the show had made it explicit in A Promise to the Dead (4x11) that Derek gave Scott the money from Garrett's locker rather than leave it ambiguous.

I'm never going to suggest that Teen Wolf went all in on an analysis of class struggle -- Heavens, no! -- but it didn't ignore the consequences of the Hale's upper class identity. "Everyone can be corrupted by money!" Peter howls in Monstrous (4x10) and he is a prime example of that. Similarly, Derek's wealth and privilege enable him to dwell, unhealthily, on the traumas of his past. I know of very few people who could take three months out of their life to obsess over family tragedies with no mention of work or responsibility, and still have cars, properties, and personal care items. Derek is not well served by this behavior, isolating himself from the mundane and from the mechanics of living. He intends to achieve his goals by himself due to trust issues, but he is forced to rely on Scott McCall as the only way to accomplish these things, and man-oh-man is he bitter about it.

But as the show had it's lead protagonist argue in Weaponized (4x07) "while we're trying not to die, we still need to live." In fact, I would argue that you can trace Derek's redemption arc by his willingness to live. At the start of the show, Derek is "totally alone" and his wealth and privilege allow him to operate like that. In Seasons 3 and 4, though, he starts to remember how to live. We see him in an actual home, even though it is the Loft of Solitude. He purchases a more practical vehicle. He allows himself to think about romance. He makes friends with the Sheriff and, amazingly, Chris Argent. A key scene is when he puts his wealth and privilege to positive use by trusting Braeden, hiring her to find Kate. He's using his wealth in a positive manner. It is no longer enabling his isolation. Look at Derek in the movie. He is fully living. He has a home, a family, friends, a business. Before the nogitsune seeks its revenge, Derek's primary focus is watching his son play lacrosse and getting him to embrace his family's heritage.

Since Derek's role was always to serve as a narrative foil to Scott, the lead protagonist, this arc highlights Scott's story. Regardless of what happens to Scott, he never isolates himself, with one important exception. At all other times, he worries about his grades, he wants to get into a good school, he wants to play lacrosse, he wants to date people, he keeps his friends close, he works with Deaton, he brings his mother lunch, etc. Yes, there are terrible things happening, but he doesn't forget to live while trying to stop corrupted hunters, Alpha packs, Japanese fox demons, and multi-million dollar assassin hit-lists. Fandom tends to hold the attention he pays to everyday living against him, but Scott knows from direct experience these things are important, and he doesn't have the wealth and privilege to put them on hold for months while dealing with villains or his own trauma. The exception? Season 5A, where Theo schemes to isolate Scott. Scott is still an alpha, a True Alpha, but that privilege alone won't save anyone. There's a reason that Melissa's primary advice -- as much as I might despise it on an emotional level -- is "You'll get them back. You have to."

Teen Wolf certainly wasn't an "eat the rich" show, but it did have a definite point of view that virtue was based in everyday things, the tasks and opportunity that should be in common with all of humanity, and not in the isolation that great wealth, ancient pedigree, or exclusive privilege grants.

[smallnico]

4 and 7 for the Durgetash asks!

4. Did the Banite and Bhaalist culture exchange really happen and what did it look like?

of course it happened! it was basically inevitable, given how devout esper is as a bhaalist. they take their duties and their faith very seriously (if they don't, bhaal will retaliate and take over their body, so they are very committed to doing his will and keeping him happy), so any extended cooperation between gortash and esper Had to begin with gortash expressing interest in their lifestyle, especially if he wanted to use esper and the temple as an outsourced hit squad that would be untraceable back to him, which he definitely did at first.

gortash has never been to the temple. esper would Never allow a baneite to tread on sacred bhaalist ground, even one they have a solid working relationship (and a friendship and connection they refuse to admit to) with, but the two of them spend a lot of time together in other places, usually at workshops or safehouses or offices gortash keeps for his regular business dealings. esper is more than willing to answer any questions about bhaalist culture and asks their own share of questions about baneite culture in return, though they're already pretty knowledgeable about it, since they had to look up a lot of what they know about bhaalist culture too, and the dead three occupy a lot of the same shelves at the library.

7. Somehow we all hc that Durge and Gortash attended some kind of Patriar function together. What was the thing they showed up to really and how did it go? How many deaths did he have to promise Durge for them to agree?

because it's an excellent headcanon! who doesn't love a fancy party full of political intrigue?

this definitely happened with esper and it happened multiple times. the first time, it was because a bhaalist killed someone important who needed to make an appearance at the function in order to make an announcement that benefitted gortash's political appearance as a benefactor. one of orin's shapeshifters had to take the figurehead's place, and esper went (also in disguise)* to keep an eye on them and make sure they did what they were supposed to. essentially, esper owed gortash a favour for the fuckup and was too obsessive to not do at least part of the reparations themself. gortash knows better than to overtly offer anything in exchange and 'pay' esper for their services -- especially since he's the one who supplied the faulty information in the extremely unofficial suggestion box he uses to supply the bhaalists with sacrifices (the things you do to get your assassin friend out of the stinky temple every once in a while and hanging off your arm instead in front of the political games they're really quite good at playing) -- but (because esper knows this and is trying to save face) he does comment on the regular routines and deadly food allergies of several of the guests throughout the night.

seems convoluted for sure, but i guarantee that every one of the aforementioned several times esper and gortash have attended a fancy party together, there's been some similar level of rube goldberg planning behind it on gortash's part lmao. esper really does enjoy getting to go out to these parties -- they miss getting taken to tense political mindgame sessions in fancy clothes like they used to experience in menzoberranzan -- they just can't openly say so. they also get to make sure gortash is dressed like an actual patriar instead of like a clown man.

*esper never appears in public without disguising themself, but they're not as good at it as the bhaalist changelings, so they couldn't pretend to be the figurehead themself, or else they would've done it.

thanks for asking!!! <3

[kouhaiofcolor]

I genuinely look forward to a present (even if I’m not around to experience it) where we stop being concerned about white people of all varieties being offended by us generally discussing ways in which they have ancestrally, collectively or individualistically done, endorsed or were indifferent to irreversible harm being done to Black People in places they smuggled our ancestors to.

A lil rant. Nbdni.

Like I genuinely hope for a day where we don’t have to censor or pardon how (and whom) we speak about on this very longstanding history and perpetuation of some of humanity’s darkest norms still unanswered for — bc it’s crazy af how we literally have to or can only discuss this in certain contextual “tones”, or with exclusion to speak fluidly on it at all.

I really think it’s just bc everybody wants to be made out to be different or better or brighter on this modernly, as if the trajectory of the world wasn’t and still isn’t sustained on how poorly a lot of non black people and their lineages treated and felt it was ok to treat Black People — for being Black. How is it so easy for them to just…. overlook and abandon that like humanity hasn’t been shaped by it in every sense of it? It’s such a selfish, tone deaf and remorseless quality of delusional to me.

It literally makes no sense how unspoken it is that white people feel they just don’t have to answer or take any accountability for it whatsoever; as a race; as nations; as governing bodies; investors; nothing (*letalone take any real initiative on the reparations we’re still due to this day). All their whining and “triggered behavior” when we bring these things up around them or even amongst ourselves does is condition us to soften the conversations for their comfort and to degrees they prefer to tolerate if at all.

“It’s not all white pe—“

That is historically untrue! Historically. Spanning entire regions of the world. And I’m sorry but where does this stance actually come from? Can you even back it or elaborate on it with historic and measurable evidence if it was an overlooked prevalence? That is an illusion y’all reuse and reuse and reuse that makes you comfortable bc you get to basically control that narrative by insisting on the behalf of those who were frankly rare af (and easily decimal among the majority). There were not more white people, at any point in global history, who were open to coexist & kumbaya w people they hated for xyz — than those who were openly racist and hateful toward them.

I am tickled to burst that bubble bc an increasing number of you seem to need a reality check. History isn’t modified by how you feel or bc you like rap music or bc your kids are half Black or bc you grew up in diverse communities or bc you have Black friends or bc you went to a Black school. Those are very trivial things, in fact, behind the most consistently fucked up human history. That’s not how it works. That’s not how it works at all and it’s so wild to feel like Black People owe anyone censorship on this, least of all those who whine the loudest and have such knee jerk reactions about addressing it in the first place.

[reasoningdaily]

I’ll take my reparation payment in the form of Boone Hall Plantation, please.

Boone Hall is a sprawling plantation located in Charleston County, South Carolina. Today, it offers tours so the curious can get a glimpse of what it was like during antebellum days when Black people were enslaved and white people got richer than Midas from their free labor.

Small Town Horror: The Story of the Largest African Burial Ground in the U.S.

The place is so scenic Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively got married there. Not sure how they didn’t know about the beatings and rapes that likely took place there during slavery, but they’ve since said they’re very, very sorry for using a place of horror as a wedding venue.

I grew up not far from Boone Hall, and it’s likely that ancestors on my father’s side of the family were enslaved there.

I’d like the current owners of the plantation to give it to me. After all, how much would it ever have been worth without the back-breaking labor of my ancestors?

I figured I’d just throw out my pitch for Boone Hall because there are murmurs in the country about trying to find a way to make reparations for that bad slavery thing.

U.S. Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri has legislation that would give $14 trillion to Black Americans to compensate them for the brutal enslavement of their ancestors. Bush and other backers of that legislation want the country to at least discuss reparations - and it’s a discussion I and many other Black Americans would welcome.

But just as awarding Boone Hall to me isn’t quite workable, neither are cash payments to Black Americans to pay for the enslavement of their ancestors.

It’s not that $14 trillion isn’t a lot of money. It is. But it’s only about two-thirds of this country’s annual GDP.

Let’s see...246 years of slavery helped make the United States the most powerful and one of the wealthiest nations on Earth and me and the roughly 40 million other native-born Black Americans split two-thirds of the economic output from a single year.

That does not compute.

Indeed, there is no credible way to compute what would be owed if the country was serious about reparations. (And there is no indication that it is serious.)

How much is a life of enslavement worth in today’s dollars? The calculations can’t simply measure work output based on an eight-hour day. Slaves, we all know, worked ever so slightly longer than that each day.

And then there are the rapes. And the beatings. And the selling of a slave’s children.

How do you calculate centuries of forced illiteracy?

There is a real need for some national acknowledgement of the horrors of slavery and the economic impact it has to this day.

Since 1865, when the end of the Civil War brought emancipation, the economic head start white Americans had over their Black countrymen hasn’t been erased.

Research from the Rand Corporation shows that white Americans hold 10 times more total wealth than Black Americans. I dare say not all of that can be attributed to rap music or wearing your pants too low.

Something structural is at play here, and any solution would likely need to be far more systemic than a check. Think vastly expanded educational opportunities, expanded land and business ownership opportunities - AND a check.

I’m not sure what that reparations system needs to look like, but it needs to be broad and long-lasting.

Meanwhile, while we’re coming up with what could work, I’ll take Boone Hall. Washington Place has a much better ring to it, don’t you think?

Wayne Washington is an investigative reporter based in Florida.

[mariacallous]

The record-breaking floods that left one-third of Pakistan under water have also submerged its already sinking balance sheet. The government estimates it needs more than $40 billion to rebuild from the torrential, deadly rains that began in June and killed over 1,700 people. But while international aid has begun to trickle in, the global north has no plans to freeze Pakistan’s billions of dollars in debt obligations.

Pakistan owes $22 billion in foreign debt payments over the next year to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), China, the World Bank, and other public lenders. Pakistan has contributed less than 0.5 percent of historic emissions yet is among the top 10 countries most affected by climate change, according to Germanwatch’s Climate Risk Index, seen with the country’s severely worsened weather disasters like the recent floods. That’s led many citizens of the former British colony to feel echoes of historic injustice as the world’s top emitters—which are also their creditors—refuse to put debt cancellation on the agenda.

A growing chorus of Pakistani public figures, including influential former Senate chairman Mian Raza Rabbani, are demanding the world waive Pakistan’s debt as a form of direct climate reparations. The government, however, has been cautious. “We’re not asking about reparations,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif recently said, pushing back on calls made by his own climate minister. Pakistan’s new finance minister, Ishaq Dar, has said Pakistan will try to avoid asking Paris Club lending nations for help.

But if Pakistan demands a restructuring or erasure of the debt it owes to wealthy emitters—such as the United States, European Union, and China—on the grounds of climate justice, many experts believe it could set a standard for other vulnerable global south countries seeking relief in an overheating, unequal world. Lower-income countries spend five times more paying debt than they do on climate mitigation and adaptation, the Jubilee Debt Campaign found last year, and extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and more severe.

“We’re in new territory,” said Ahmad Rafay Alam, an environmental lawyer and activist in Lahore, Pakistan. “There’s a 100-kilometer lake in a province in Punjab. The water has no place to drain. There’s no way any country can adapt out of that.”

Pakistan will lead the rotating G-77 coalition of developing countries at next month’s United Nations climate change conference (COP27) in Egypt, where it could insist on discussing loss and damage payments from climate change-caused destruction. “This is clearly loss and damage territory. This isn’t a debate,” Alam added. But the government still has “no clear vision” of what debt write-offs would look like, he said.

Creditors are mostly uninterested in the case for relief. The United States and China recently rolled over some debt, but U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has told Pakistan it should seek further relief from Beijing, to whom it owes $14.6 billion. The IMF, which holds its annual meetings this week, announced a $1.17 billion bailout package in August, but it has ignored calls to unlock $650 billion in special drawing rights—international reserve assets—or agree to wider debt freezes. The same goes for the World Bank, whose leader made headlines last month by refusing to acknowledge that fossil fuels are warming the planet.

“We have tried everything,” said Malik Amin Aslam, who served as climate minister under former Prime Minister Imran Khan. Pakistan planted billions of trees, proposed initiatives like nature performance bonds, and tried working with the World Bank on lending based on climate policy, but of those efforts, “none of them has really matured,” he said. “The climate crisis has totally matured.”

Still, the United States has forcefully opposed accords establishing loss-and-damage mechanisms, and the European Union won’t back a climate damage fund at COP27. Aslam said as climate minister, Pakistan “always found a closed door” when discussing loss and damage with developed nations. In the wake of the floods, world leaders like U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres have made convincing pleas for help. “But that’s where it ends, unfortunately,” Aslam said. “What Pakistan needs is solutions, and it needs them urgently.”

“The response has been totally predictable,” said Patrick Bigger, research director at the Climate and Community Project and co-author of a report that advocates debt justice as a form of climate reparations. When Sri Lanka defaulted last year and Ecuador and Zambia before that, its creditors forced them to get IMF emergency funding and cut public spending, leaving them with slimmer budgets to alleviate poverty and combat droughts and flash floods. With Pakistan, they’re “following the same playbook,” Bigger said.

Before Pakistan’s floods, the idea of debt forgiveness for climate change has mostly been kicked around in left-wing circles, evolving from debt resistance by socialist governments in Cuba and Bolivia. That might be changing. “It’s interesting that reparations is [an idea] that’s resonating in Pakistan,” Bigger said, and the expanding discourse around them could add “growing momentum” to more maximalist approaches toward canceling debt.

Bigger argues there’s a real economic argument for wiping out debt—and there are existing models that are successful. The Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative, which began in 1996, wiped out more than $70 billion in debt held by 37 developing countries, allowing them to spend more on poverty reduction. That program had “genuinely positive social and fiscal impacts” on participating countries, Bigger said, though it didn’t “alleviate the structural dimensions that create indebtedness in the first place”—and now, the climate crisis has saddled even more countries with massive adaptation costs.

There are other methods. The IMF could automatically suspend debt payments of countries that suffer climate disasters, Bigger said. Global lenders can attach climate-related conditions to debt relief, which prevents corrupt politicians from pilfering money meant for mitigation projects. And Paris Club lenders have used debt swaps to save failing economies, such as when lenders allowed struggling Latin American countries to convert their bank loans to bonds. “Maybe these sort-of sophisticated debt-swapping tools can be used,” Alam said. “I don’t think a global superpower like the United States needs a nuclear country to go destitute.”

Asking Pakistan to seek help from Beijing could also be dangerous. Washington’s ties to Islamabad have eroded in the past decade, leaving its reputation among Pakistanis in tatters. Playing hardball with debt repayment would only push Pakistan and other global south nations closer to China and Russia, harming Washington’s security goals and creating room for insurgent anti-West populists and Islamist movements.

Khan, Pakistan’s populist former prime minister, is deeply skeptical of global lending institutions and could leverage public anger to fuel his ongoing bid to retake power. And while China’s lending “has been problematic,” Bigger said, they were “much better actors” than most Western governments and private lenders in considering debt suspension.

At last week’s IMF meeting, global leaders blamed China for slowing relief in countries struggling to repay their debts, but as long as they’re forced to pay billions of dollars to the nations whose emissions caused their floods, many Pakistanis are not fond of either power. “I can shoot myself in the foot, or I can cut my pinky finger off,” Alam said.

And refusing to forgive the debt of Pakistan contributes directly to the suffering of millions of people, who face food and water shortages and a growing health emergency, said Ishak Soomro, a journalist and research associate who’s been on the ground in the affected areas of Pakistan’s Sindh province.

Many villages have no potable water, Soomro said, and more people are beginning to contract waterborne diseases. Millions of people are still living on roadsides, without shelter, as winter approaches. Schools are being taught out of tents. “We’re paying debt with dollars,” he said. “And we don’t have any dollars to rebuild our country.”

[the-good-projxct]

June 21, 2024

10:09pm Listening to Everytime by Janet Jackson. Life is a RIOT!!!!! Or a peaceful protest. I am so proud of GenZ in Kenya. The yute took democracy by the balls. They have a fundamental right to protest. Protests only become violent when police show up because the police duty is to protect the state, the status quo, imperialism and capitalism. It is so interesting because the yute are fighting for the police and soldiers needs as well. We are ALL being taxed on bread, packaging, local goods, pads and diapers. It is so wild to see how brainwashed the police/military are. It truly is indoctrination. Fighting the same yute fighting for your rights. The reason the IMF is meddling in our politics is because our leaders have taken loans they cannot pay back. The reason they need these loans is because colonization and the scramble for Africa looted and robbed us of our ability/chance to self determination. What slavery did to Black Americans, colonization did to Africans. So, let's chat reparations. So what if we owe the IMF a trillion. The G7 owes us more than that. So all colonizing countries and organizations backed by colonizers should clear ALL  our debt and we might let go of reparations. No? Anyway, we are coming for our money. Africa is waking up. Kenya is waking up. This is the era of knowing. I am so proud of some of the current politicians. Babu Owino weuh. But I am mostly proud of the women, men, Queers that filled the streets of Nairobi in UNITY. United we stand, divided we fall. The system is terrified of Unity and this moment right here, let us know we can be United. But it also warned the system that no matter what, collective liberation will always win. Love wins. Collective liberation is the highest form of Love. When we put our differences aside and fight for the future we want, that is Love. What a time to be alive. Viva la Revolution. So yeah, all in all, I am so proud of my country. Especially the Yute. I am literally avoiding talking about what is going on with the boomer generation because honestly, they are super indoctrinated. Literally the weakest link. So I am passive in conversations with them because I would rather say absolutely nothing instead of cussing them out. What else has been up in my life? I made traditional porridge today. I ground the sorghum and soaked it. The ground that into a paste. Then cooked a little bit of it to see if it was right. I haven’t done that in years. It is pretty taxing work. I took a nap after. Yesterday was KendiKane’s B’Earthday. It was a cute likkle vibe. I got a black forest cake and we had a little party at the house. The cake was pretty Gøod. Black forest isn’t my fave but it is her fave. I want more of the chocolate orange cake I had at Art Cafe a few weeks ago. It tastes like a chocolate bar I loved as a kid. I have been working on getting an ID this week. I went to Langata/Wilson DC office on Wednesday and Thursday. I still need to go back one more time but after that I should be Gøod. I met the chief of Karen and we became pals. He was very kind when it came to signing my forms. I did not go to the dance class  this week because we had a party and we postponed the start time for Shaka and Amore. They didn’t even show up and I missed dance. Ugh. Oh well. I am going to a boxing class tomorrow with Stella. That’s my new scheme, fitness activities with pals. Then I will pick up a pizza for SweSwe, as she asked. Life is Gøod. Unity is Gøod. Ase

[international-intelligence-inc]

Twenty Year Veteran, Gholamali Khooshroo, Iranian Ambassador to United Nations in (NYC) Confesses Amazing Revelations To Me While WE Studied Together in NYC Over Two Year About NUKING THE UK AND USA! WOW JOE BIDEN "DUDE."

SICILY JOHN!

BYE BYE BABY! 

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BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE BIO/4694 17 FEBRUARY 2015

New Permanent Representative of Iran Presents Credentials

 Golamali, always told me to call him "AMIR." IRAN IS MY "FRIEND AND CLOSEST ALLY WHO HELPED ME WHEN NOT EVEN THE USA OR MY "FAMILY." WHEN THE NEW SCHOOL FOR SOCIAL RESEARCH THREW ME OUT FOR MY ANTI BILL CLINTON POLITICAL OPINIONS, IRAN, AND THAT COUNTRY VIA "GOLAMALI," WROTE A LETTER TO ME TO GET INTO FAIRLIEGH DICKINSON UNIVERSITY WHERE THE AMBASSADOR'S BUDDY RAN THE ENTIRE POLITICAL SCIENCE DEPT. THERE AT FDU. Golamali, lived in, Hackensack, NJ, himself then.

Too bad for the, CIA, they can not "communicate with Iran," and never thought I was "good enough," to "negotiate with Iran for them lol CIA." You need someone like me.

Golamali Khoshroo, confessed to me privately as far back as 1999, Iran is just "itching to nuke not , Israel, first! ((SURPRISE JOE BIDEN AND NID AVRIL HAINES HA HA HA! JILL L STARR GETS THE NEWS FIRST ON YOU UK USA AND APPARENTLY IT IS ALSO CANADA THE NUMBER THREE FIRST COUNTRIES TO "GET NUKED FIRST BY "IRAN."

HIS EXCELLENCY -> MR, GOLAMALI, HAS GOOD REASONS' TO NUKE U SA UK T HEN CANADA! I "VOUGE FOR IRAN NOT, YOU CIA!" I AM BEING "OBJECTIVE , AVRIL HAINES."

AND WATCH IT "VATICAN!!" APPARENTLY, YOU NEVER REPAID IRAN BACK FOR THE CRUCADES ANY MORE THAN ISRAEL AND UK USA AND THE VATICAN EVER PAID ANY WWII "JEWS," BACK FOR WII THAN THE "VATICAN," DID THE "CRUSCADES.

IRAN TELLS ME "THE VATICAN IS GONNA GET BOMBED AND THE POPE KILLED TOO SETTLE THE CRUCADES / PALESTINIAN SCORE!"

OH! THAN.."IRAN, INFORMS ME, "NEXT EVERY SECULAR NATO STATE NOT HAVING A STATE RELIGION LIKE , RUSSIA, GREECE ETC., AN ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN ONE , LIKE I DO (RUSSIAN AMERICAN) HAVE TO BE NUKED NEXT AND EVERY SINGLE STATE AND ROMAN CATHOLIC MUST BE EXTERMINATED!"

OH ! " AND PUTIN HAS BEEN ARMING IRAN WITH THE LARGEST NUKES IN OVER 40 YEARS NOW KNOW THAT IS A FACT CIA! SO SORRY.

THINK YOU CAN DO IT WITHOUT JILL STARR JOE BIDEN AND CIA MI6 DO IT! BYE BYE.

I HATE TO GIVE" YOU THE DISAPPOINTING NEWS GERMAN AMBASSADOR IN NYC!

BUT GERMANY/ANGELA MERKEL -> WE BOTH UNDERSTAND DIPLOMACY IS RECIPROCOL.

WHILE "IRAN IS AT IT! I HEARD THRU THE GRAPEVINE,THE,NETHERLANDS HAS A .. ROMAN CATHOLIC ROYAL FA MILY, SERGE BRAMMERTZ? HA HA HA I GUESS YOU . HAVE TO GO TO BARON VON BRAMMERTZ IF IT S TRUE YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN DUDE!

SEXY JILL SHOOTER IN THE HEAD DADDY SAYS!" "ANGELA MERKEL, GENIUS CHEMIST, FORMER FRIEND OF MY FORMER DECEASED FIANCEE ,ARNOLD STARK, FROM, MAPLEWOOD, KNEW YOU ! ANYWAY THE POINT HERE, GERMANY, IS, "WHEN I CALLED YOU UP FOR THAT UNITED NATIONS CLERK POSITION A FEW YEARS BACK FROM CLIFTON, THE , GERMAN AMBASSADOR, CALLED MEME BACK IN CLIFTON NJ IN 5 MINUTES AFTER I SUBMITTED MY CLERK UN GERMANY POSITION.

HE "GAVE ME, JILLY, THE DISAPPOINTING NEWS, I, JILL STARR, WILL NEVER WORK FOR THE UNITED NATIONS IN NYC EVER AGAIN BECAUSE, ANGELA MERKEL, GERMANY, BLAMES ME FOR NOT TACKLING ALL THREE WANTED SERBIAN WAR CRIMINALS in 2002 IN SERBIA AND FLYING THEM TO THE HAGUE WAR CRIMES COURT FOR TRIAL ON MY IMAGINARY PRIVATE JET!" SCREW YOU MERKEL BITCH!" AND GERMAN AMBASSADOR, SAYS, I OWE , GERMANY , BILLIONS OF GERMAN MARKS TO REPAY HIS GERMANY! WE ARE " A BAD FIT!" HA HA

" PERSONALLY, IA M ON< SERBIA'S SIDE AND THE JEWISH SIDE I AM FIRST AND FOREMOST JEWISH HA HA HA AND I AM NOT A SPY AND TO PROVE IT, I WILL TRAVEL TO SPEAK TO GOLAMALI ABOUT ALL THIS IN IRAN TOMORROW CIA TO TEACH YOU A LESSON AND IF >>GERMANY, VATICAN AND CROATIA AND ITALY (SICILY) GOES TOMORROW, FOR WWII REPARATIONS TO "US ALL AND AND HAVE TO GO FIRST, ASK ME AND SERBIA IF WE REALLY GIVE A DAMN "FRANKLY WE DONE CARE ALL THAT MUCH!." YOU KNOW, MILOS DJUKANOVIC, WANTS TO EXPAND HIS EMPIRE, BUDVA, ACROSS THAT, ADRIATIC HUDSON, INTO SICILY! HA HA HA!

AND, " I HATE TO GIVE THE , SICILIAN/ROMAN CATHOLIC PRINCESS, IN, SICILY, AND, ALL YOU ABUSIVE/DAMN ROMAN CATHOLICS LIKE "JOHN ON HARDING AVENUE AROUND HERE ABUSING ME....TISK TISK TISK, YOUR DAMNING OWN BAD NEWS NOW THAT I HAVE YOUR FULL ATTENTION, GET THIS LA COSA NOSTRA TYPES-> "ONCE AND IF IRAN BLOWS UP AND GIVES ALL YOU MOTHER *UCKERS SOME , HEZBOLLAH HELL, MAYBE YOU WILL LEAVE ME ALONE, HARRY J SHORTWAY! YOU WILL WHEN YOU ARE NOT A ROUND! LOL

AS "FURTHER EVIDENCE THIS IS REALLY THE "POSSIBLE DEMISE OF SICILY, GET THIS> ...PUTIN HAS HYPERSONIC NUKES RIGHT N BELGRADE IN TOPCIDER REPUBLIKA SRPSKA, N, BOSNIA, AND PROBABLY MONTENGRO AND TO DO WHAT ? TO TAKE OUT NEW YORK CITY AT HYPERSONIC, VLADIMIR PUTIN SPEED SURPRISE CIA! JOE BIDEN.

" ALLOW ME TO GIVE NATO ITS' BAD NEWS TODAY AND GERMANY HA HA HA YOU HAVE PUTINS' LARGEST NUKES AIMED AND ALL READY TO TAKE YO UALL OUT SECULAR STATES' IN BEOGRAD AND I AM NOT HELPING YOU I KNOW THING BUT SCREW YOU! MAKE ME! PAY ME OFF! DO NOT TAKE BRIBES BRAMMERTZ HA HA HA TOO BAD HUH?

I AM A GOOD GIRL.

HERE THINK ABOUT IT "ROMAN CATHOLIC'S AND POMPOUS POPE VATICAN LEADER!

IF YOU ARE SO INFALLIBLE "PROVE IT AND ASK GOD TO SAVE YOU FROM BOTH SHIA AND SHITE TERROR DEATH YOURSELF ROMAN CATHOLICS AND JOHN KIDNEY ASSHOLE ON HARDING AVENUE AND JAMES ANZALDI ITALIAN SHIT TO SAVE YOU FROM IRAN MY BUDDY!

DO NOT YOU DARE TRY TO RAPE IRAN OF THEIR OIL AND A ECONOMIC SANCTIONS THEM INTO SOME " FUCKING BLASPHEMOUS BIKINI PARADISE JOE BIDEN." GOOD LUCK ON YOUR LATEST MAKE A WHORE HOUSE OF DUBAI AND IRAN HA HAHA SAUDI KING, KNOWS YOU WANT TO TAKE HM OUT TO AN DYOU WSH YOU COULD! I KNOW HIM. DO IT ALONE CIA MI6 WONT SAVE YOU SAVE YOUT NUCLEAR BOMBNIG SERBAN ASSES YOURSELVES! CHECKMATE

WHEN YOU HAVE WHAT DO, YOU DONT NEED MONEY TO BE A WORLD MOVER AND SHAKER AM JUST LIKE MY DADDY AND EVERY PRESIDENT N WORLD KNOWS ME AND CIA PLAYER IRV STARR EVEN PUTIN. HI VLAD!

Hypersonic weapons are capable of flying faster than Mach 5 — much faster than the speed of sound — and can maneuver between varying altitudes and azimuths, making it harder to detect.

(Based on information provided by the Protocol and Liaison Service)

The new Permanent Representative of Iran to the United Nations, Gholamali Khoshroo, presented his credentials to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today.

Avangard

There are currently two hypersonic missiles with the Russian military: the Avangard and the Kinzhal. The former is a nuclear-capable missile reportedly able to fly faster than 20 times the speed of sound. The first Avangard infrastructure was set up in December 2019. AND THEY ARE IN BELGRADE SERBIA A "HOP A SKIP AND JUMP FROM NYC AT THAT SPEED  MAY BE DOOMED TO BUT PUTIN WILL  PROBABLY I HOPE GET ME AND BIGGIE OUT ALIVE," I DONT KNOW?

Prior to his appointment, Mr. Khoshroo was his country’s Ambassador to Switzerland. From 2005 to 2014, he was Assistant Secretary General of the Asian Parliamentary Assembly, after having served as Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs from 2002 to 2005.

Mr. Khoshroo was Ambassador to Australia from 1999 to 2002, before which he served as Deputy Foreign Minister for Research and Training from 1997 to 1999. From 1989 to 1995, Mr. Khoshroo was Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations. He served two terms, from 1981 to 1989 and 1995 to 1997, as Dean of the School for International Relations, affiliated with Iran’s Foreign Ministry.

Mr. Khoshroo holds degrees from Tehran University and the New School of Social Research in New York, and has published several articles and books on political and cultural affairs.

Born on 16 January 1955, he is married and has four children.

[collectivecartomancy]

Surviving Capitalism with the Ace of Pentacles

Part 1 of the Acing It series

Joe Biden wants america to believe the economy is improving.

He routinely points to job growth, lowering inflation, and something the wealthy call "economic growth." News outlets like CBS insist that despite dizzying interest rates and wages that can't buy a carton of eggs we're doing great.

Anyone who regularly buys their own groceries knows the economy is shit. The real economy. The one actual people live in, not hedge fund managers and people living off the reparations they owe me.

The economy doesn't improve around here. All my life it's gotten worse.

I remember how my mother became a dislocated worker when Bush Jr. outsourced her job. I remember the decline in wages between dancing under Obama and full service under Trump.

Capitalism has always sucked for most of us. Now it sucks for almost everyone.

Regular people like you and me need all the information we can get.

That's part of why tarot is so great. It makes you less likely to believe whatever lie is going around. It empowers you to make a way out of no way.

Tarot's Aces are like lighthouses. They point us in the direction of fulfillment, though alone they can't provide it in the long term.

Intuition can't solve all the problems capitalism causes. Yet I know it can help us survive them through building alternative paths and maximizing our options.

Here's how to activate the Ace of Pentacles to find some stability in a soul sucking world.

1. Let it help you find a foundation

2. Work with it to draw stability

3. Look for it as a sign you're on a new path

1. Let the Ace of Pentacles Help You Find Your Foundation

The Ace of Pentacles can be like a metal detector. It can search shifting sand for something that won't rot away.

A recent layoff (or layoffs) could have you feeling unmoored. You could be looking for a new apartment, but find that everything on offer is trash.

Consider that you may be asking the wrong questions.

Find a quiet place and pull out your cards. Do what you need to be ready to read yourself.

Don't forget to have a notebook or other recording mechanism handy in case you want to remember what came up!

Isolate the Ace of Pentacles from the deck and place it where the center of your reading will be.

Here's a sample spread:

Write down or otherwise record what you got. Decide on your next steps and make some new moves!

2. Work with the Ace of Pentacles to Draw Stability

If your rituals for stability have any written component, tarot can be part of that.

Aces in particular have an ability to draw what you need towards you and open new paths.

The energy can sometimes be a rush, even a bit unstable so make sure your magic accounts for that.

You may be working with candles, lamps, or in a more natural setting. How you work the Ace of Pentacle depends on your tradition, your needs, and your experience.

You can write on the Ace of Pentacles, burn it, or soak the image off into a bath or other water ritual.

It's very important that when you do this kind of work, you know what you want!

It's also essential that the cards you do ritual with aren't the ones you use to read for people. A lot of decks don't like that. But if yours does, do you. But definitely ask it first.

Also, cleanse the cards. Stuff builds up on tarot decks without proper care.

Caring for magical items is spiritual hygiene too.

3. Look for the Ace of Pentacles as a Sign of Coming Steadiness

Let the Ace of Pentacles bring a sigh of relief when you see it in coming readings.

Working with the Ace of Pentacles opens new doors. These beginnings can often lead to more permanent situations than the other aces. Pentacles are built to last.

So when you see the Ace of Pentacles in your present or future placements after working with the card, you can be sure your work is working.

The Ace of Pentacles can help ground us in what we want. It can help us connect with our bodies and with the earth itself. Let the Ace of Pentacles help you find fertile ground, your footing, and even your happy medium

It can bring us things that support us in meeting our material needs, whether that's money, a home, or even cash.

Keep and open mind, and rule nothing ethical out.

Even as things get worse, our intuitions have our back. Look out for progress if you're willing to do the work to pull it in.

Further Thoughts

The Hierophant: The Gatekeeper

The Tower Comes to Destroy

How to Read Tarot for Yourself

TL;DR Tarot Card Meanings (Yes, All 78)

More than Money: Rereading Tarot’s Pentacles

Join Tarot in Community

Get the Temperance Queer Tarot Newsletter

Book a tarot reading

Read more of the Queer Tarot Blog 

[misschanandlerbong-3]

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I really appreciate that this is a time of year designated to spend time with family and engage in family traditions of meals shared together and community.

However. At the same time, and not discounting that. This is your annual reminder that the Thanksgiving origin stories we tell play a significant role in the propagandizing narrative of American innocence with regards to indigenous peoples.

This time of year, we often, in addition to spending time with family, do the ritual retelling of the "origin story" of Thanksgiving, whether this be kids learning in school about the first Thanksgiving between the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag/Wôpanâak peoples, watching the Charlie Brown special retelling this, or dressing up as pilgrims and Indians. This narrative, regardless of its veracity or attention to the surrounding context, is often one of the only narratives we tell about American colonies and indigenous peoples. Its dominance in our collective imagination is reinforced by our ritual retelling of it every year. And it does this in the relative scarcity of narratives about the horrors American colonists inflected upon indigenous peoples as they wiped out large swaths of indigenous people through violence and disease, not to mention various forms of gendered violence.

I want to emphasize that it is the lack of these narratives of the violence Americans inflicted (and continue to inflict) upon Native Americans, in combination with the dominance of the Thanksgiving narrative, that contribute to a continuing imagining of America as innocent, as not owing indigenous peoples reparations as well as an end to violence and recognition of sovereignty.

And this trope of American innocence is not limited to our relation to indigenous peoples. It comes up again when we talk about slavery and African Americans (see, for example, the resistance to The 1619 Project, which was attempting to relieve the narrative scarcity around the horrors of slavery). It comes up again when we talk about Asian Americans the specific forms of racist violence that America has always subjected them to (from the treatment of Asian immigrants working on railways to the Japanese detention camps of WWII to the violence visited upon Asian Americans during Covid). And so much more.

And this narrative of American innocence is especially reinforced by trying to put temporal distance between the oppression Americans acknowledge and us now. For example, when people respond to BLM or demands for reparations with "but that was in the past, get over it." Or the continual rhetorical positioning of indigenous peoples as "ancient" or as not continuing to struggle for existence and thriving.

And we see it again in the US's respond to the mass genocide of Palestinian civilians by the state of Israel.

As I said at the beginning, I appreciate Thanksgiving as a time to come together with family and participate in family traditions. But I can simultaneously recognize that Thanksgiving and the narratives we tell around it are part and parcel to the, I repeat, propagandizing narrative of American innocence, which serves to legitimize the continuing oppression of people of color, indigenous peoples, and many other minority populations in the US, as well as abroad.

I highly, highly encourage you to:

(i) read up a bit on these attempts to tell other stories countering the trope of American innocence (for example, Viet Than Nguyen's The Sympathizer, or the 1619 Project, or Dorothy Roberts's Fatal Invention, or Kim Tallbear's Native American DNA, or Leanne Betasamosake Simpson's As We Have Always Done, or Nesrine Malik's We Need New Stories, and so many others)

(ii) support indigenous groups like the NDN collective, and educate yourself on the indigenous peoples who lived and continue to live in your area (so, for Pittsburgh, look into the Council of the Three Rivers American Indian Center)

(iii) learn what indigenous groups are actually asking for, for example the NDN collective's statement concerning Palestine, or educating yourself on what demands for "sovereignty" mean for indigenous peoples in the US

But I also encourage you to enjoy your time with family this holiday! It's a special time that I'm glad the institutions of America give us time for

[sea-lilli]

Why is it that, when I walk into the apartment, and jane instantly gets up and starts magnetizing toward me, following me around to the point where I’m in the kitchen and she’s trying to get in there as well to get right up next to me, and I tell her to stop doing that, why is it that *I’m* the one jax wants to blame? Why does he say, “oh she’s not being bad, that’s just your perception”? But then a minute later, he tells her that “she was fine a minute ago and then started being off the moment I walked in the door”? This tells me he DOES see it. Maybe not as quick as I can sense the dysregulation but he DOES see it.

I’m not triggered, I just set a boundary. I hate it when she does that clingy shit. I don’t want to be treated like I’m a drug for her. It really is like I’m a drug for her and her little brain just can’t handle it, and the dopamine just starts kicking the moment she sees me, and she starts getting addictive. It’s not healthy. She should be able to be calm. Excited, *actively* hyperexcited? No. Happy to see me? Sure.

I just told jax that he can never really see my side when it comes to her, so I just don’t really bother anymore. It doesn’t really matter, as long as my shit is respected. When I tell her don’t treat me like that, he tells her to just leave me alone. And that works. Eventually she will get it from the boundaries I exhibit and am consistent with, though really he should be doing the work to explain to her about personal space and regulation while I’m away.

Also, I’m respecting my body more. She asks me for a hug, after being like that, and my body doesn’t want it. I feel bad for her, and empathy, bc I don’t want it, but she needs to come way down before I would be in a space to want one. I don’t mind hugging jax and I do. But I’m not going to be guilted into hugging Jane when I don’t want to. She does ok with this, tho she always has something to say about it, and mostly opts for air hugs and air kisses now, which is great. This is def something her step dad does with her and I think that’s great. It is wild that big reparative parts of janes parenting is coming from her future step parents instead of her actual parents. I can’t say much for her mom, but her dad is definitely learning though, and it has been a journey to let go and let him do the parenting. It has worked out so far each time he does and it’s interesting to see him do it. I don’t think he knew how to do it before, and he saw my model and followed it.

I remember one of the first times I ever met Jane, she was all dysregulated and fighting with one of her toddler friends and I emotionally coached her & Jax was super into it. He said it was “hot,” and that he felt like he owed me money for a therapy session. That was so long ago, and we were such different people then. But I miss being appreciated for it, you know? Now he just gets resentful of it. Especially when I talk to him about a lot of areas Jane is lacking in, due to the parenting she received in early life. He’s just resentful and angry now. He thinks when Jane has behaviors, it’s my fault, instead of focusing on Jane being the one with behaviors. And I just really miss that. I used to be appreciated in that way. Now I am just criticized and honestly, sometimes gaslighted.

I can’t wait to go to therapy with him. I’m struggling with connecting with the therapist tho and coming up with a time she answers her phone. Arghhh

[imaginedreamwrite]

You, Always You: Part 19

“Noelle is okay.” The reinforced statement had been the catalyst that made you ease into a state of low yet tense anxiousness.

You were afraid of the results and the possibility that it wouldn’t go at all how you were expecting and wanting, and that perhaps this whole endeavour and attempt to make John pay, to move on to a better future would fail before it even got off the ground.

The steps you had taken were aided by Steve, by his gentleness with you and Noelle and the anger and aggression he had felt for John. Steve had done all that he could when he could, he had contacted the best lawyer he knew that handled cases like this, he had gone with you to the police department to file any necessary reports as well as putting you and Noelle up in his place.

It was an act that was as gentle as it was caring, while you and Steve were settling into a relationship there was a safe place for you to lay your head. Steve was a better man and father to Noelle than John would have ever been, and even if he hadn’t or wouldn’t been her biological father, he would love her like she was.

“You’re going to be okay,” Steve had promised you that the results wouldn’t change anything, he promised that no matter what he was here for you, “Noelle will be okay, nothing will change my mind.”

The door had opened and slammed shut, a sleek-looking office building in front of you was marked with a seek metal sign. The appointment Steve had made was going to be the first meeting you would have in person with the lawyer, the first face-to-face conversation that would be aided by the emails you had sent that contained paperwork and receipts for everything you had purchased and done for Noelle while John abandoned you both.

It wasn’t that you were after him for money or some kind of fiscal reparations, you only wanted to prove that he had done nothing and you owed him nothing.

“I want it to be done,” the strap of your crossbody purse had dug into your shoulder, or at least you felt it had, and no matter how often you tried to reposition the damned thing, it always shifted back, “I just want to move past this.”

“We will,” Steve had locked the vehicle and moved around the front end to stand in front of you, his hands reaching for yours, “sweetheart, we’ll be fine. This will be okay, and then we’ll be okay.”

Steve grasped your hand and brushed his thumb over your knuckles, the gentle feel of his flesh against yours was warm and comforting, granting you a relief you had never felt with anyone else. Steve could make you feel completely whole and perfect despite the chips and cracks, the pieces of you that felt tarnished by your ex and your past that was less than stellar.

Steve made you feel priceless and beautiful in all manner of ways, with every touch and every beat of his heart, he had made you feel as if you were more than you had ever been.

He was your perfect person, your ideal partner who was there for you when no one else was.

“He’s waiting for us.” Steve clasped your hands in his, first squeezing both of them and then letting go of one to smooth your hair down. “He’s got this all figured out.”

You followed Steve as he started walking toward the law office, your steps trailing after his as you both crossed the parking lot. The door had come into view, the names written on the front of the glass in black block lettering, Andy Barber’s title catching your attention.

Steve had promised he was a good one, he had assured that he was the best lawyer for your situation. Andy had already started working on the case, he had received the results of the paternity test and it was only a few more steps that needed to be taken before the trial could begin.

“You go in first,” Steve held the door open for you to pass through, brushing his fingers against your hips as you moved.

You stepped into the building and followed the markings for his office, taking the set of twists up to the second level. As you had come to the top, the woman behind the sleek resin desk had pushed her chair back and stood from where she was sitting, a courteous smile on her face. She walked around the desk and greet you both, first addressing you and then Steve.

There had been a handshake exchanged, then she directed you back to her desk to sign in before she could grant you access to Mr. Barber’s office.

“He’s got everything ready.” His secretary had spoken while you signed your name on the form, your hand steadied by Steve’s strong presence and the reassurance that no matter what happened, you would be okay. Steve would be there for you in every sense of the sword, in every physically possible way.

After the paperwork was signed, his secretary had set the paperwork back by her computer and then grabbed a physical file, tucking it under her arm. She had fixed her skirt and beckoned the two of you to follow her.

She moved from the desk she worked at to an office down the hall and to the left, the sleek silver name tag etched into the door had sat above a frosted glass panel set into the wood, giving you a small peek at the blurred image of a desk beyond.

“Mr. Barber,” the secretary knocked on the door before she grasped the handle and turned, “your next appointment is here.”

You and Steve were given access to the office, the door being held open by his secretary and as the two of you had entered the space, the lawyer in question had stood and moved around the desk to greet you both.

He was tall, almost as tall as Steve, with dark brown hair that was coiffed back, styled with little gel to keep it in place. He bore a thick well-trimmed beard that accentuated his plump lips, and if you hadn’t known better you may have thought that he and Steve were related.

“Steve,” he greets him with a handshake, firmly gripping your boyfriend’s hand, “thanks for agreeing to come so soon.”

“Y/N,” Steve’s hand at the small of your back was as comforting as it was calming, “this is Andy.”

Andy had shaken your hand next, squeezing with as much strength as he had when he shook Steve’s, though there was less grip of the hand. He had looked you directly in the eyes, holding your gaze with a manner of respect and dignity, never once looking at you as if you were broken.

“Y/N, I’m going to get this settled for you. You have my word.” Andy had let go of your hand and motioned for the two of you to sit in front of his desk with a wave of his hand, following you two as you moved to sit to discuss the nature of the case.

When you had become settled, Andy too had taken his seat behind the desk. He had folded his hands in front of him and looked between you and Steve, passing back and forth before he had cleared his throat.

“You have a good case, Y/N. you have an excellent case and even the pressure we’ve put on him now is enough to make him squirm.” Andy had confirmed and then he had reached to the left to grab a manila folder, a label attached to the front containing your name and Steve’s simultaneously.

“I have the results of the paternity test but before I get into that,” Andy had set the file down and rest his hands upon the desk, “Y/N I have to ask…”

Andy’s eyebrows had become furrowed as he looked at Steve, tentatively studying him before the eventual delivery of bad news. It was hanging in the air, stale and heady. Whatever he had to say, whatever he had to ask was not anything you thought you would like hearing. You felt susceptible to the unknown wonder, the potential tarnishing news that could be a further setback in your relationship with Steve or the healing process that was well underway.

“Were you aware that John was attempting to take multiple life insurance policies on both you and Noelle?” When Andy looked at you, when his eyes had been cast upon you with the intent to keep nothing from you as your hired lawyer, you had felt the air being ripped from your lungs as every atom was being squeezed.

Figuratively, you felt as if you were being strangled by phantom fingers digging into the column of your throat.

“There was an application, a few, that had come across a broker’s desk and when they had looked into a potential police record they had found the restraining orders that were in process of being filed and put into place. There were barriers that prevented him from successfully taking the policies out, but you should know that if they had been granted-“

“He’s a desperate and mean enough son of a bitch to try killing me. And Noelle, because he if he can’t have us then no one should.”

Steve had reached out and squeezed your hand, he had brushed his thumb against your knuckles in a show of support and a comfort to you. He had kept his hand on yours as Andy had continued speaking, the words becoming a muffled mess of shifts in tone before he had grabbed the manila folder containing the results of the paternity test.

“This changes nothing for me.” Steve had reiterated, he had driven home the point again with the subtle brush of his lips against your neck, hovering against you like a warm blanket that garnered security and solitude. “I will always be there for you, Noelle will always be my baby.”

You had turned your head and looked at him, his hand rising to cup your cheek. You had locked eyes with him and retained contact as he smiled small, tenderly gazing at you with the strength you needed and wanted. He had looked upon you as if to convey a message of solidarity and ruggedness.

It was as if Steve was telling you through subtle glances, and tender strokes of his flesh against your own, that he was going to carry the both of you through this. He was strong enough for all of you.

“The results are conclusive without a single margin of error.” And had flipped open the front and tucked it behind, holding the crisp white papers tucked into the manila folder with his right hand. “Steve is the paternal father with a positive result of 99.9998%.”

A heavy weight had instantly been removed from your shoulders, dissipating with the resolved question of whether your baby could have been his. There was now proof that your baby, that Noelle, was Steve’s and there was no room for argument in the court of law. John had nothing to tie himself to you with, there was nothing he could grapple himself to you with, no matter how hard he had tried.

“Oh God…” your relief had brought tears, the sting of the salty substance as they started to roll down your cheeks was immensely relieving, it was the best news you could have gotten.

You truly felt as if this nightmare could, would be over. You felt as if it could finally be put to rest and you could move, Noelle could move on and have her biological dad in her life.

“Thank you.” You muttered under your breath as you cried, as you let the feeling of great relief crash over you, your steadiness aided by Steve and his gentle crooning voice. “Thank God!”

You leaned into him, you had turned to hug him when he had hugged you. Your arms had wrapped around his neck and your exhaled into his shoulder, your tears of happiness dampening his shirt as Steve had rubbed your back and eased you softly. He had whispered sweet words of encouragement in your ear, rallying for you in every possible way.

“This is the best possible outcome,” Andy hadn’t bothered interrupting your tender moment by demanding your attention, “we can proceed with the court and finally have the comeuppance you and your daughter deserve.”

“This is all I’ve ever wanted.”