#now i have no choice but to write my thesis. tis unfortunate

[crplpunkklavier]

just finished dig enough graves :')

[theartofmedia]

Game Theory and the Art of Persuasion

Full disclosure from the start: I don’t like Game Theory. (I enjoy MatPat when he’s in other things (like the Random Encounters musicals, I think he’s wonderful there), but just not Game Theory.) I’ve heard a lot of other people not like Game Theory either, both personal friends and strangers on the internet, for a variety of different reasons--namely, inaccurate research, twisting of facts, and allegations of art-stealing (but we’re not going to talk about that last one for the sake of staying on topic).

Yet, it remains incredibly successful, and its fans are loyal. Many people believe the theories, or at least parts of them. Even when the top comments of the videos are critical (or even hateful) in nature, the videos still do well.

So, why?

Well, there’s no denying that a good portion of GT’s audience is young. I think we’ve all had that one creator or piece of media that we wanted to defend because we loved it, only to realize later that it wasn’t that good. (And many people still enjoy these things and recognize that they aren’t good.) Younger teens have a strong need to defend what’s important to them, regardless of however valid the criticism is--in fact, giving any negative criticism at all often just spurs them on further. Young teens just don’t have that reasoning ability (and let’s face it, we were all like this when we were that young, whether we like to admit it or not). GT is going to be successful as long as that loyal fanbase continues to thrive.

So why do people believe the theories?

I believe I have my own little “theory”--MatPat, to some, is very persuasive.

Not with well-structured arguments, but with his rhetoric. It’s in what language he uses, the visuals he puts up, his tone of voice, and how he subtly tweaks the facts in order to slant the information in favor of his argument.

(Note: I am aware that MatPat not only has editors but script-writers as well, but he has to approve all of it and read out the script. So while I’ll use GT and MatPat himself as sort of umbrella term, I do know that he is not responsible for everything.)

Let’s use the video “Game Theory: Kirby...Dream Land’s Biggest THREAT! pt.1″ and break down some of the major points. (I’ll be putting timestamps so you can check for yourself or follow along.)

Whether intentional or not, MatPat uses a lot of strong, slanted language in his arguments. At 2:14, he states “So what is Kirby? Is he hero of Popstar, or world-consuming villain? A pink puffball for good, or a fiery god of evil?” This sets up a dichotomy--good and evil, right and wrong. People are naturally drawn to definitive, clean choices. They’re easier to understand and easier to grasp. Setting up this dichotomy sets up two sides: Kirby is good, or Kirby is evil. No room for other nuances and small details that add depth, or room for any explanations of the circumstances that could lead Kirby to act the way he does.

2:22--”Surprisingly, Kirby lore does have an answer.”

2:25-2:29--”The Kirby games have slowly been revealing more and more of what the true nature of Kirby is.”

3:09--”... what the designers are intending to do with his character.”

These three statements encapsulate a common criticism of GT: MatPat exerts his theories as truth. “Have an answer,” “true nature,” and “intending to do” are all statements that present his argument as factual, as truth. He even pushes that onto the Kirby writers, saying that it’s what they were ‘intending to do’ with Kirby’s character. Now one could make the argument of him just making blanket statements and that these aren’t all calculated instances, and you’re probably right--however, regardless if intentional or not, it still plants a sort of subliminal idea in the viewer’s head that ‘what I’m going to tell you is accurate and true.’

(Also, at 3:09, he shows a visual of “kirby lore” books connected by a pentagram. Very subtle use of imagery to send a message, which once more ties back to the binary he set up earlier. It’s pretty clear what he wants you to believe.)

2:30--”And the answers they’re starting to give are shocking.”

3:16--”... after this two-part theory, I don’t think you’ll be able to look at Kirby the same way again.”

This, along with the Satanic visuals presented previously, are priming the viewer to think that Kirby is evil. It’s setting up for that assertion, easing the viewer into it so that it’s easier for them to think “oh yeah that makes sense.”

And that’s just at the beginning of the video!

Now probably the biggest criticism of GT is that he spins the facts and intentionally leaves out information, inadvertently giving inaccurate information in order to support his argument. Well--he’s basically flat-out admitted to doing so in his emails to potential script writers (as shown by this video from Inside A Mind (timestamped for convenience), where MatPat actually commented on it and talked about the incident that IAM was referring to and never outright stating that the contents of those guidelines for script writing were false.)

I feel like we don’t talk about this enough: the Game Theory script writers are actually told to omit information that contradicts the theory. Now this makes sense on the surface--omitting information that would weaken your argument--but thinking about it even a bit makes it confusing and even a bit shady. GT frames its theories as though they were scientific theories, and intentionally leaving out information that contradicts what you’re trying to say isn’t how you make a scientific theory, especially if it heavily disproves what you are trying to prove. You would acknowledge that there is contradictory information and either try to provide a counterargument, or just admit ‘yeah this exists and we don’t have an explanation for it.’ It’s okay to have holes in your argument, no argument is perfect! However, GT flat-out ignores this contradictory information, and in doing so, it actually twists the facts. (Honestly, in my opinion, him acknowledging the contradictory information would make his theories more credible.)

For example, in the Kirby video, he discusses Milky Way Wishes in Kirby Super Star/Super Star Ultra, and how the main objective is to stop the sun and moon from fighting by summoning Nova, who can grant wishes, with the help of a jester named Marx. Marx, however, betrays Kirby to get his own wish granted because he wants to take over Popstar. Kirby has to destroy Nova in order to save Popstar and possibly the rest of the universe.

Now the way MatPat explains it...

(starting at) 6:19--“When the sun and moon are fighting up in the sky, one civilian speaks up with a solution: Marx. His proposed answer to this literal star war is to summon Nova, a giant space watch that grants wishes. [something something dragonball joke] Kirby travels planet to planet to harness each one’s star power, making him quite literally an alien invading army to the locals of that area. After decimating seven planets’ worth of creatures [something something metroid joke], Kirby successfully summons Nova. But before he can make his wish and justify all the damage he just caused across the galaxy, he is betrayed by Marx, who wishes to take over Popstar. [...] Kirby goes on to defeat Marx, but also has to destroy Nova in the process, leaving the universe one step back from where this quest first started, and ultimately invalidating all the bloodshed from all the planets he just visited.”

... he frames it as though nothing was accomplished, planets were destroyed, and everything was ultimately for naught.

Conveniently leaving out that the sun and moon stopped fighting--you know, what caused all of this in the first place--in order to work together and help Kirby stop Nova. And again, his wording frames Kirby as this monster, while also conveniently forgetting about player choice. One can choose to not hurt the enemies--and the enemies are enemies for a reason, because they hurt Kirby.

So in the end, while Marx was stopped and Nova was unfortunately destroyed, the problem that Kirby set out to solve was, in fact, solved, and peace was restored. Putting back these facts completely changes the meaning of what MatPat is trying to say, and omitting them makes them inaccurate information. He does this frequently in order to support his arguments--and the very fact that he has to twist the narrative in order to make it fit how he wants to at all implies that said arguments don’t have much to stand on to begin with.

However, if you didn’t play the game or didn’t just do a quick google search like I did it sounds plausible, because there aren’t many missing pieces there (unless you think about ‘what happened to the sun and moon?’). It seems that GT is trying to reach the people who don’t know about these games, as they would be the ones who would most readily believe it. Kirby fans would be skeptical or outright against what the theory says, but if you didn’t know about what the games actually were, then it would make perfect sense.

(I’d also like to mention how he says that Kirby’s Avalanche isn’t canon and then uses it for a full minute to support his argument it’s not entirely relevant to this but it just Grinds My Gears)

15:51--”And again, if you think all of this is a stretch, and I’m reading too much into these details, I’m not.” 

And at the very end, he once again asserts the idea that the information he just presented you with is true. It’s repetition; many times if you repeat something enough, people will start to believe it. It’s similar to repeating the thesis statement at the end of an essay so that it all ties together nicely.

To the average viewer, the Game Theory videos may sound very persuasive, especially with MatPat’s charismatic voice and assured tone, the editors very snappy and visually interesting editing, and the enticing words and phrases he uses in order to grab attention and prime the viewer for what he’s about to say. However, knowing even a little bit about the source material of what he’s talking about can make the theory videos fall apart, because in all honesty, the videos don’t have much actual substance. It’s like a house of cards; one light breeze and the whole thing topples.

Despite all of this, I still have hope that, someday, Game Theory’s content will improve, and these types of criticisms will be addressed. Until then, we can only wait.

[fanficgalore]

Viktuuri #60

Bittersweet Dissonance [Fluff/Angst] Victor's attention is swayed to the gorgeous violinist playing in the park across from the rink. Yuuri is baffled by the kind actions of the attractive figure skater. In the meantime, both learn to open up to each other, and their lives finally take a turn for the better.

You think my bruised knees are sort of pretty [Fluff] He’s not entirely sure how long they stay there, staring awkwardly at each other, but it’s long enough that Yuuri feels compelled to break the silence, which never ends well.

“You’re shorter than I thought,” he blurts out.

At the same time, Viktor suddenly says, “I like your knees.”

“…thanks,” Yuuri says after an awkward pause.

—In which Yuuri gets drunk at a con, earns the nickname Cake Boy, and promptly forgets all about it.

How does a moment last forever? [Angst/Fluff] Wherein Yuuri is an oblivious Beauty in Denial, Viktor is a much better version of Gaston (who needs love), and Yurio is their poor misunderstood angry son (who ALSO needs love).As you can see, dear reader, this is nothing but a mere twisted version of a tale as old as time.

If this city will bloom [Fluff/Angst] “Viktor, do you know what cherry blossoms mean?” “What they mean?” Viktor tilts his head, surprised at the sudden question. “They can mean beauty. Or a good education. Cherry blossoms generally bloom around the time the new school year starts.” Yuuri’s eyes are unwavering on Viktor, and the colors shift in the dark irises again. “But they also mean impermanence.” Impermanence -- transient. Not lasting forever. The word sends a ripple of fear through Viktor.

(Or, the story where Viktor accidentally brings home a cherry blossom spirit from Japan, and his life and heart are turned upside-down.)

I can be your devil or your angel, baby [Fluff] Yuuri Katsuki didn’t ask for any of this, and he’s starting to question all of his life choices that lead up to this cursed moment.

Just hold on (We’re going home) [Angst/Fluff] Where Yuuri remembers the banquet, Viktor forgets, and Yakov Feltsman has his own plans. “I’ve been made aware of your recent break with Celestino Cialdini, and would like to offer you a trial period where you train under me, in St. Petersburg. There are only three conditions: you will board with another one of my students, you will take ballet with Madame Baranovskaya, and you will help me coach Yuri Plisetsky, who refuses to listen to my criticisms of his spins.” Yakov nods at this point, leans forwards and looks Yuuri in the eye. “I will charge no coaching fees.” With a deal like that, even if it means he has to face Viktor again, Yuuri has no choice but to agree.

The return of the little piggy [Angst/Fluff] Everybody had their regrets in college.For the students, it was making fun of Katsuki Yuuri.

For Yuuri, it was letting himself become too stupid.

For Viktor, it was not doing anything.

_-_

Once there was a boy named Katsuki Yuuri, who was shy, loved to make clothes, had adorable smiles and was fatter than the usual average human being. Unfortunately for him, apparently being chubby wasn't all that accepted in the norm back then. After numerous accounts of bullying, Katsuki Yuuri disappears for good.

Now years later, there is now a man only known as Y.K. Fashion tyrant, multimillionaire, professional cold-stare giver... and is trying his ultimate best to run away from his dark past, until a certain silver haired CEO of a certain rival company who went to the same certain college he went to back then decides to flat out entangle their fates together. Do both of them have anything to say for it? Sadly, no. No they don't.

(Fashion & Couture AU)

You are the best thing that’s ever been mine [WIP - Fluff/Angst] Wherein famous actors Yuuri Katsuki and Viktor Nikiforov are forced to fake a relationship for mere reasons such as fame, money, and for teenage girls to make thesis long rants about them on Tumblr. A pact is made, then things snowball into a complete mess, and ya'll already get the idea where this is going...

The structure of trust [WIP - Angst/Fluff] After a mission went horribly wrong, ex-CIA agent Yuuri Katsuki needed a career change, and Private Security was recommended by his former boss, Celestino Cialdini. Now trained as a bodyguard, Yuuri wants to overcome his past mistake and planned to take on his first assignment with confidence.

When he heard that famous figure skating coach Yakov Feltsman had received multiple threats over the coming months and was the client to his first assignment, he was thankful that he hadn’t been assigned to bodyguard the coach.

Yet, he never imagined he’d be hired as Victor Nikiforov’s bodyguard.

Baby, I’m preying on you tonight [WIP - Fluff/Angst] Yuuri and Phichit registered and named the pet shop when they were drunk. They didn’t exactly expect it to become the most popular pet shop in Seattle. (It was only supposed to be a front to fund Phichit’s (undercover) animal rescue missions.) Enter Viktor Nikiforov, the man with the pink Cadillac and the giant brown poodle (that's stolen Yuuri's heart), and Yuuri might have lost his mind, because apparently he keeps flirting with a client – and he never even notices.

For the record [Angst/Fluff] FOR THE RECORD by Viktor Nikiforov What it takes to craft an Olympic Champion, and what it takes to be one.Or: Viktor Nikiforov, sports journalist and retired figure skater, interviews Olympic Champion Yuuri Katsuki for an exclusive piece.

The ties that bind [Fluff/Angst] The first time Viktor saw Yuri Plisetsky was by pure chance at a private rink in Moscow, skating for his dedushka. He thought they would never meet again but it seemed he was lucky in life.

“Papochka!” Yuri called out and Viktor swore his heart stopped beating.

Yuri hadn’t addressed him as atsets, heck, he didn’t even call him papa! Yuri said papochka. Papochka! It was a more affectionate, almost cutesy way of calling your papa and it was quickly turning to be Viktor’s favourite word. Did Yuri know that Viktor was somehow his father?

Then Yuri started dashing towards Viktor and all his earlier doubts regarding Yuri had been wiped clean from his mind. Viktor immediately darted off and all that was running through his mind at the time was Yuri, Yuri, my son, Yuri! Viktor had waited to hold this boy in his arms, wanting to tell him how proud he was and how much he had grown. Viktor decided he didn’t want to waste any more time being separated from his Yuri.

His little boy, Yuri.

Or the single dad feat. ballet AU I've always wanted to write that no one asked for.

[lauramkaye]

Fic: Storage War

Based on a prompt by @kat-har. Archive post will follow shortly!

“You really don’t have to do this,” Phil said, hovering in the doorway.

“It’s really fine, babe,” Clint said, pulling out another box and coughing at the cloud of dust that billowed off it.

“I promise I didn’t ask you here intending to pawn off all the work. Maybe you could take a break until I—”

“Phil. It’s fine. It might just as well have been me getting called in.” Clint smiled at him, hoping it was reassuring. “I came to help, I’m gonna help.” He waved a hand at the storage unit, piled high with the detritus of Phil’s childhood and teenage years. “Unless you’ve changed your mind about just throwing it all in a U-Haul and driving it to New York—”

“Ugh,” Phil said. “No. We’d end up storing it for another decade before we found the time to deal with it.”

“Then let me help you,” Clint said. Reaching out, he snagged Phil’s hand and pressed a kiss to his knuckles, scraped a little from where he’d barked his hand on the wall trying to get the rusted padlock open. “That’s what marriage is all about, right? For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, for clearing out thirty-year-old storage units…”

Phil chuckled, turning his hand to cup Clint’s cheek. “I don’t remember that part in the vows.”

“It was right before the part about worshipping each other with our bodies,” Clint said.

“Ah, my favorite part.” Phil bent to kiss him, quick and soft. “I’ll be as fast as I can.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Clint said. “I’ll have fun. Maybe if I’m lucky there’ll be baby pictures.”

Phil rolled his eyes. “More likely to be awkward, pimply middle-school pictures.”

“I bet you were adorable. Go, help catch the bad guys while I work on sorting the greatest fashion hits of the early 80s.” He reached into a nearby box and pulled out a “Frankie Says Relax” t-shirt. “I think I might take this one home.” Phil laughed. “Just remember the size of our apartment when you’re deciding what you want to keep,” he said. “I’ll see you for dinner.”

“Sure thing.”

Clint smiled to himself as he watched Phil leave, then settled in to continue working through the massive pile of stuff. Phil had ignored the storage unit containing the contents of his mom’s house for decades; he’d still be ignoring it, if the facility wasn’t closing down, slated to give way to a new block of hipster lofts or something. So Clint, being a good partner, had taken some leave time and joined Phil in Wisconsin to deal with it.

They’d already worked through the furniture, picking out a few pieces to keep and donating the rest along with most of Phil’s mom’s clothes and personal items. What was left was mostly all Phil’s things. Honestly, Clint was kind of looking forward to going through them; he’d never known Phil as a kid, and there was something precious about seeing his carefully packed boxes of comics, the handmade quilt in red, white, and blue stars, the worn and ragged ear of a much-loved stuffed bear.

Clint had prioritized the things it would be easy to sort: outdated clothes that wouldn’t fit them, furnishings that had seen better days, an ancient cracked clock radio. The comics were easy, too, in the other direction; Clint wasn’t sure if Phil would want to keep or sell them, but he knew Phil would want to go over the collection in more detail.

He set aside a box of 8-tracks, humming Devo to himself, opened a box labeled “notebooks” in neat block print, and stuttered to a halt, blinking rapidly.

The box did contain a number of three-ring binders and spiral notebooks, but that wasn’t all; right on the top was some sort of comb-bound, copy-shop booklet which bore on the cover an overblown illustration of Captain America. Cap was tied to a post, his uniform shirt ripped to highlight his bulging muscles, and a masked Hydra goon was threatening him with a gun while cowering away from Peggy Carter, who was wearing a military uniform and brandishing a laser gun that Clint was pretty sure wasn’t historically accurate. Above Cap’s head, a hand-lettered title proclaimed the publication to be called “Rule Britannia.”

“Oh my god,” Clint said, and dove into the box with glee.

Some time later, he’d examined a remarkable number of Captain America fanzines. The earlier ones were general-purpose, with articles about Project Rebirth and the European Theater and, in one case, a painfully adorable letter from a fourteen-year-old Phil about the importance of the Howling Commandoes and Peggy Carter to the success of the SSR during the war. Later on, though, the general zines gave way to more focused ones, and Clint had to hold back his joyful giggles by main force. He’d found baby Phil’s stash of secret erotic Captain America fanfiction.

Best. Day. Ever.

Surprisingly, Phil’s interest seemed pretty evenly split between seeing Cap with Peggy Carter and seeing him with Bucky Barnes. Clint would have predicted Carter all the way, based on Phil's deeply nerdy obsession with her (and it was deeply, deeply nerdy, like, topic-of-his-graduate-thesis nerdy), but apparently Phil's appreciation for a smart-mouthed sniper was of longer duration than Clint had previously realized. 

Tempted though he was, Clint didn’t take the time to read the stories; there just wasn’t time. He contented himself with thumbing through the zines, looking for bookmarks, stray notes, or other signs that might show him which ones had been Phil’s favorites. Unfortunately, Phil seemed to have been just as meticulous then as he was now, and the zines were in remarkable condition for their age. Clint set the last of them aside in a pile and picked up one of the spiral notebooks. 

It had Cap’s shield on it, of course, and was well used, the corners worn and the spiral starting to work its way out of the top. Clint smiled, flipping open the cover. He felt a pang at the sight of younger Phil’s handwriting, recognizably similar to the way he wrote now, but more cautious, the letters formed deliberately as though Phil had been trying hard to keep it neat. Then he stopped looking at the page and started reading it, and he had to stop and clutch it to his chest in delight. 

Phil hadn’t just read Captain America fanfiction. He had written it. 

Clint sat his ass down on the dusty concrete floor of the storage unit and started perusing his treasure. 

Honestly, if Clint had ever considered the question he would have said that baby Phil’s stories would feature a thinly-disguised version of himself. Fictional Phil might be a previously unknown Howling Commando, or maybe some other kind of ally—a soldier, or part of the French Resistance, or a British spy—who came through in a tight spot to save Cap’s life and/or mission. (Which wasn’t really that far-fetched; it was pretty much the same kind of thing that adult Phil did for his agents now.) Possibly the stories might have ended with Cap showing his appreciation by inviting fictional Phil to bed, or at least with a manly embrace of gratitude. After all, wasn’t that was what teenage stories were for? Trying on scenarios, writing about the life you wish you had. Clint hadn’t been much for writing as a kid, but he’d sure as hell spun up enough daydreams, trying to fall asleep when it seemed like every inch of his body hurt. Daydream Clint was the star of the circus. Daydream Clint had a family who loved him. Daydream Clint had money, had a home, was the best archer in the world.

Daydream Clint had lived a life pretty much like the one Clint had now, actually, if you swapped out the circus for SHIELD. Clint kind of wished he could go back in time and tell his skinny, scared teenage self the good news. Stick with it, kid, things will turn out great for you one day.

Anyway, Clint wanted to know what Daydream Phil was like. Phil, being Phil, had helpfully dated each of his notebooks, so Clint piled them up in order, grabbed the earliest one, and started reading.

An hour later, he set the next-to-last notebook down, rubbing at his eyes. For all that Phil’s zine collection ran to happy romantic endings, the stuff Phil had actually written was pretty much the opposite. Clint knew—he’d known for years—that Phil’d had trouble as a kid, trying to reconcile his bisexuality with his dream of going into the Army. But Clint had never expected to see all of young Phil’s confusion and anger and hurt and fear projected onto stories about his boyhood hero. 

The Steve Rogers in Phil’s stories was pained and unsure, in love with Bucky and Peggy both and struggling to find a resolution that didn’t hurt either of them. The plots were pretty clichéd, and the prose was a bit overblown, but the emotions came through clearly. Steve Rogers, as Phil had seen him, felt like he had no good choices, torn between Peggy, Bucky, and his moral obligation to fight Hydra. If he went with Bucky, he lost Peggy and neglected his duty; if he went with Peggy, he lost Bucky, and felt guilty for allowing society to dictate who he loved. Just because he loved a woman, that didn’t mean he wanted his choice of partner forced by anything but himself. Clint wondered why it had never occurred to Phil to put Captain America in a fictional ménage-à-trois. It would present a neat solution to the whole love triangle issue, at any rate. Although he supposed it was probably a lot harder to think outside that particular box in the days before the internet. Who was supposed to be the role model, Three’s Company? Ugh.

The last notebook was all one, long story, and it was the most heartbreaking of all. In it, Cap was pining for his two loves as per Phil’s usual, but every other chapter was a short story where Steve imagined what would happen in a different scenario. Clint read a description of Steve and Bucky leaving the Army to live together, their happiness soured by Steve’s guilt over leaving the war. He read an account of Steve marrying Peggy and Bucky marrying someone named Lorraine. The two men set up housekeeping next door to one another, named their children after each other, while Steve tried to use his real happiness to bury the part of himself that never stopped wanting Bucky. There was a chapter where—finally—Phil had considered the possibility of polyamory, and Steve daydreamed about a life where they all got a house together, where Steve had a wife and a husband both, but even in that fantasy world they spent their time hiding, from the Army or the press or the neighbors, sending Bucky on false dates to try to keep their secret. Not one of the scenarios had a happy ending, all of them going back to the same place: Cap, alone and hopeless and pretending everything was fine. The story ended as Cap was piloting the crashing plane, giving himself one final dream as the water rose up around him. He dreamed of Bucky being found, alive after all, and he and Peggy comforting each other. They’d be perfect for each other, Steve thought, brilliant and beautiful together, and they would have amazing children with dark wavy hair and maybe they’d name the first boy Steve. 

Clint read the final lines of the story, his chest aching.

It was for the best, Steve thought, taking one last gasping breath before the water closed over his head. They both deserved the best. They both deserved a happy ending.

Clint closed the notebook and took a deep, shaky breath. He was not going to cry over ancient Captain America fanfiction, he wasn’t. 

He might possibly be going to cry a little over the writer, though. Thinking of Phil reading all those happily-ever-afters but never able to bring himself to write one of his own… 

“Clint? How’s it going in here?” 

Clint turned around sharply as Phil came around the corner. Shit, how long had he been reading?

“What’s wrong?” Phil asked, his smile falling away as he saw Clint’s face. “What—oh.” He looked at the pile of zines and notebooks scattered around Clint, the tips of his ears going red. “Oh god, I thought I threw those away.”

Clint dropped the notebook and scrambled to his feet, crossing the cramped space in a few strides and wrapping his arms around Phil, holding him tight. After a moment, he felt Phil’s arms come up around him, as well, and Phil patted Clint’s shoulder tentatively.

“Are you okay?” Phil asked quietly, brushing a kiss over Clint’s ear.

Clint sniffled. “I’m fine, I just—Phil. The happiest ending you could think of was Steve dying so that Peggy and Bucky could marry each other? I feel like I need to go back in time and make sure Teenage You is okay.”

Phil was quiet, his arms tightening around Clint. “Oh,” he said, softly. “Yeah. I was… things were tough, when I was writing those.”

“I could tell. When I found the box, I thought it was going to be cute, you know? Funny.” Clint nestled his head into the crook of Phil’s neck, taking comfort in the familiar bergamot and sandalwood scent of his aftershave. “I thought I’d get to tease you a little, maybe. I never thought you’d be into writing tragedies.”

“I was a melodramatic kid,�� Phil said. “I had a girlfriend, and I loved her, but I also had a wicked crush on a guy I was on swim team with, plus I wanted to go into the Army… I felt like every choice I had was wrong somehow, like no matter what I did I’d end up unhappy.” He stroked his hand down Clint’s spine, heavy and reassuring. “If I’d known then how my life would turn out, those stories would have probably been really different.”

“Yeah?” Clint made himself pull back enough to see Phil’s face.

“Absolutely,” Phil said, and pressed a tender, lingering kiss to Clint’s mouth.

“All I would have needed to see is you.”

“That you ended up with a husband?”

“That I ended up with a happy ending,” Phil said, and Clint had to kiss him again until they were both breathless.

They ended up taking the box back to New York, where it found a new home in the back of a closet. The story kept nagging at Clint, at odd moments here and there, until finally he scrawled a new chapter in the back of a steno pad, an epilogue where Steve woke up in a hospital, the war won, and Bucky and Peggy both there to welcome him, holding hands with him and with each other. He felt kind of silly about it, but also like he owed Phil’s long-ago self some kind of resolution.

When he opened the box to stick the steno pad in, he pulled up short at the sight of something bright blue. He picked it up; it was a sheet of blue cardstock, and mounted in the middle of it was one of the photos from Clint and Phil’s wedding. They were dancing, looking into each others’ eyes. They looked devoted and intent, blissfully in love.

At the bottom of the page, there was a message in Phil’s neat, blocky handwriting.

And they lived happily ever after.

[autoirishlitdiscourses]

Discourse of Wednesday, 26 August 2020

—Cleaning these up, I think that you're perfectly capable of being perfectly clear, using that as your thesis statement, though. Looks good to me. It's likely, if you have signed up for the sake of being as successful as you have a middle A, and it would have been so far this quarter. Not the least of these are impressive moves. Think about what you see? In front of the play in this way. You could then use your own writing, despite some occasional problems, I'll try hard to draw out influences on Beckett, Camus, and #5, about making sure to bring a blue book after thirty minutes in which percentage score for the quarter he had taken the first half of The Song of Wandering Aengus 5 p. I'm downtown not far from lower State, but probably not last unless some totally new narrative path through them first-person pronoun that often make errors, punctuation problems, the more likely than most of it is there. Hi! Well done. That's been reflected in course texts needs to be sure without seeing it in to the discomfort of silence that prevails in the traditional southern English May Day celebrations, and showed that you realized that your grade. There were some very good job this week if you're feeling better now. Questions can be said for the quarter, too. You are currently several spaces open in my own forehead for not following a specific format the question so that I'd cancel on you in section is in any way that you will receive this weighting score.

5 December: The hat scene in/Ulysses Seen/graphic novel or for your historical sources would pay off even more successful. You're welcome! Again, you now have a wonderful poem, and want to do what the nature of your future, and you didn't hear this: the professor to say that, if it's necessary to start participating and pick up a productive relationship to each other, and you did a number of things well here, and your writing. /, You would need to be helpful to look at the time I sent this email formulated a specific point of analysis conclusion that broadens and shows larger-scale discussions in relation to the east of County Mayo A spavindy ass p. You are not inherently bad tools for writing, despite some—mostly—rather nitpicky comments I've made about grammar and phrasing at all, you've been very close to my students as I pop back to eGrades when the book it appears in in my earlier email, and your writing is quite clear and effective and productive, but not so much for being such a good job of discussion and helped to have a fair argument overall, except that you took. I have to pick up points for discussion one way to do, unfortunately, whom I will respond to the longest possible stretch of time that could have gone through it, we'll work out another time, and practicing a bit more on the section by choosing a point total, based entirely on attendance I won't calculate participation until the end of your own sense of suspense in the assignment required and powered through after an ER visit, both of you effectively boosted the other's grade while you are certainly welcome to speak in your paper's structure, and I'm certainly not satisfied any breadth requirements; but you really have done some very minor alterations; at this point. Poems for Recitation on 27 November, you have any questions, OK? There are a number of very important ways, and I hope you feel better soon! Would have paid off for you if you approve, I'll bring them to ask the other to do this effectively if the section hits its average level of education, some options would be to ask me if you assert it, can we determine about Francie just from these twelve lines. I think, OK? I'll see you next week. I'm closer to your email to answer questions in section to advance your central ideas revolve around a male visions of beautiful women, and you incur the penalty, which involves speculations about whether you're technically meeting the discussion that allow you, I will be. This means that a lot of ways that you did: Perfect. I need to happen. That audio clip is certainly a good student this quarter. I am much less true for several reasons for accepting after this time limit has come up repeatedly, and you have any questions, OK? I am not. The Northern Irish accents were a lot about what audiovisual and historical and literary readings are generally fairly small errors, and getting to three. All in all, though, you did at the time period you're shooting for, even with graders who are friends of mine. —Henry David Thoreau, Walden 1. Just a reminder that you're feeling better. This topic in a productive move. Thanks for doing such an excellent delivery, and would then be reciting so that it's not too late to propose other text that will encourage substantial discussion in a close-reading skills on at least twelve lines this Wednesday and hold a reasonable way that they are assumed to be more complex than just being a more specific feedback in advance with the question of what your paper is a shame. You may also find helpful, and talk about how your overall argument that is closely tied to the novel. There are also some textual problems that I have another student constitutes harassment and is also a thinking process, though never seriously enough to look at the third line of discussion and question provoked close readings by a good choice I've heard it before you can be here is the case. As far as getting discussion going: you'll probably do this a great addition to the MLA standard and has no effect on your final paper.

Good choice; I think that a reasonable conclusion to you because I'm perfectly convinced that you just need to sit down and write a much stronger delivery than the top eight or so of all but the safe road too much, since you're already thinking about what your primary payoff is—but being flexible may be helpful to read it before you finished early.

[keremulusoy]

TUNISIAN THINKER İBN-I HALDUN SAYS, “GEOGRAPHY IS FATE.” WHAT DEFINES OUR FATE IS OUR TRAVELING PATHS BEGINNING AT TWO DIFFERENT GEOGRAPHIES…

Two women, two different stories and one joint venture… Life is a very magical adventure. Usually, we think that we are able to form it by our hands. In fact, many factors outside our control are capable of changing the flow of life at every passing moment. Brief contacts, coincidences we thought to be insignificant may open new windows in our lives. For instance, we would not be able to even guess that our lives could bring us to this point. Tunisian thinker İbn-i Haldun says, “Geography is fate.” What defines our fate is our traveling paths beginning at two different geographies… It is definite that the many languages we are able to talk would not be enough to describe what a great chance was it that our paths crossed at the turning points of our lives. First of all, we would like to convey to you how our adventure in Turkey had begun, and what we think of life here.

My name is Manuela Kaltenegger Görgü I am Austrian. I was born in a village in the city of Salzburg, and I had psychology education in the same city. My business life followed a path different from my education. I usually worked in the marketing departments of commercial companies. I worked at the company “Fair Trade” in Austria. Maybe you know that Fair Trade companies work with cooperatives and market their products throughout the world.

While my business life went on like this, on the other hand, I had come to the point of choosing and writing the contents for my master thesis as a part of my academic education. I decided to choose my fields of interest as the topic of this thesis. I had to write a thesis regarding immigrant women. I decided to make Turkish immigrant women the subject of my thesis. Unfortunately, I did not know the Turkish language. So I came to İstanbul and went to a Turkish language course for a period of two months. Those brief contacts, those coincidences we thought to be insignificant must have been in charge again at that time, for I met my future spouse in İstanbul. And thus I started weaving connections to Turkey, beginning with knots of love.

I visited and left Turkey quite frequently for the following two years due to my thesis study. And I conducted field research for a year at the shanty houses in Ankara. I traveled around Turkey so much during this time period that my academic studies strengthened my cultural ties to the Anatolian culture. For example, I stayed in Gaziantep through a whole summer that was very very hot. That was a really significant experience for me. The thought of living in this country, with which my emotional ties had become stronger through my thesis study period, gradually became dominant and I gave that decision when my thesis study was completed, so I settled in Turkey. This decision had not been a hard choice as it may be perceived when looked from the outside. General thoughts employed against foreigners in Austria and work opportunities steered us towards Turkey. This new adventure I had begun with my life also had a sweet excitement to it. I thought that I could make many different studies in social fields within this beautiful country. The social life in Austria being very definite and thus quite boring caused my life to advance along a straight and monotonous line back there. My spirit that was used to that routine liked and embraced the different, exciting and dynamic life I faced in Turkey. This change created a talent to be able to see the world from diverse windows. For example, although Europe and Austria seem like geographies and cultures that have so many attraction and opportunities when gazed from down here, actually they are also places that have specific disadvantages, places that may perhaps bring considerable disappointment to people.

My name is Dorothea Atalay I was born in Trier, Germany. I am a teacher and after graduating, I worked at a secondary school in Aachen, Germany. I met my spouse and settled in İstanbul in the year 1985. Afterward, I lived in Adana and Ankara. When I think back about the times I came to Turkey, I remember that Turkish people had been immigrating to Germany by masses. So mine is a story of “reverse immigration” in a sense… I chose to settle here, I worked, I made my home here.

Turks are people who are as curious as they are sincere; the first thing they ask was always the question, “Which one is more beautiful, Turkey or Germany?” For me, the answer to this question is very easy: “The most beautiful place in the world is the place where the person is happy.” I had the opportunity to visit and see the Coasts of Aegean Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Black Sea. I also saw Van and Central Anatolia Region. I found out during such travels of mine that there were very diverse and beautiful handicrafts in Turkey. These were traditional handcrafts and the ties between culture and history were preserved through these crafts in a most beautiful way. I was so impressed by these handcrafts that displayed much richness of diversity from region to region. This richness offered a very significant foundation for “Eldoku” that we established.

Although both of us had lived for very long years in the same city, our paths crossed only six years ago. However, our meeting together occurred with great timing. It was a period that both of us desired to blend our impressions of this land, and the experiences we accumulated together with our European roots to transfer all into a new kind of activity. These ideas of ours steered us towards establishing a cooperative. However, we failed to actualize that. The experiences I had gathered on this subject back in Austria and my dreams about the cooperative establishment, unfortunately, did not coincide with the actual structure of the cooperatives here. The hierarchy of the system did not allow us to actualize our ideas. So we went on to establish a social enterprise. And believe us, we observed that we could support the women so much more in this manner. The adventure covering the foundation and development of Eldoku was realized this.

Throughout this adventurous period, we tried to travel and discover almost all corners of Turkey; maybe we had come to know Turkey even better than we know our homelands. Because traveling here is both so easy and so rewarding in terms of new and fascinating experiences. The people, geography and cultural structure of all places are very diverse and deep. We return to Ankara with different experiences and amazing impressions after each travel we make into Anatolia. And Ankara is the city that we live together with our families, the place we feel like our home now. Eldoku is a social enterprise. When our education and experience were mixed together with our dreams, the brand Eldoku was born, which creates productivity and diversity. We would like to strive with whatever is in our capacity towards rendering the handcrafting skills and labor of the Turkish women more valuable through our productions by modernizing the traditional Turkish handicrafts and making them more in tune with the modern lifestyle in a sense, and towards seeking and establishing joint channels for production and sales. While doing that, we act in line with a social and just trade vision. Utilizing local materials and labor to produce natural and environment-friendly products and market such to domestic and abroad markets are among our objectives.

NOTES:

“When I look back on my life from this moment, I see that I spent most of my time here, in Turkey. Although this is not my homeland, Austria also feels very remote to me. And I see that life is not lived on a straight line. Happiness, unhappiness, disappointments are all intertwined… Time gets its beauty from living in the moment. As it is always said, “Go after your dreams but live in this moment!” In fact, Turkish people live so close to this philosophy.”

 “During the times I newly came from Austria, honestly, I did not have much knowledge regarding Turkey. I merely read “Memleketimden İnsan Manzaraları” poem of Nazım Hikmet and some books of Yaşar Kemal that was translated into German. And of course, there was Ruhi Su that I was familiar with. I felt, for some reason, a strange attraction in this heavy and sad music. Now I think back to those days, the days I came to İstanbul for the first time, and I may say that I had not felt like a stranger even in those times. The city had a strange charm that bestowed a sense of belonging.”

Turks are people who are as curious as they are sincere; the first thing they ask was always the question, “Which one is more beautiful, Turkey or Germany?” For me, the answer to this question is very easy: “The most beautiful place in the world is the place where the person is happy.”

Yazan: Manuela Kaltenegger Görgü – Dorothea Atalay / Fotoğraf: S. Bahar Alban

*This article was  published in the  March-April issue of Marmara Life. 

Two Different Stories, One Joint Venture TUNISIAN THINKER İBN-I HALDUN SAYS, “GEOGRAPHY IS FATE.” WHAT DEFINES OUR FATE IS OUR TRAVELING PATHS BEGINNING AT TWO DIFFERENT GEOGRAPHIES…

[autoirishlitdiscourses]

Discourse of Saturday, 22 April 2017

I think that your plans by 10 p. The bad news is that the probability that she's not in front of the first three stanzas Patrick Kavanagh's On Raglan Road Patrick Kavanagh, On Raglan Road: Personally, I think that one part or another vision of female sexuality like in the margins, that you must email me your plans by tomorrow, but our wonderful new email server that the overall goal is to make sure to do to get you a five-minute warning by holding up the appropriate number of presentations. We mustn't be led away by words, by the time limit has come up repeatedly, and I'll post a link to the small late plan email penalty ½%, but that a potentially productive paper topic would be doing in the reader/viewer about whom you're talking more quickly, so you have been thinking too much of an assignment that you use Standard English for most students to review that document anyway, especially if the section website that illustrates correct formatting according to the course of the Absurd, or you can keep notes on areas in which you pull very small errors. Students who read actively and who take a look at your main argument. Of course, as a. Ultimately, what you say yes, participation, paper, however.

This is not horribly complicated at the third line of your paper, is that it might be worth digging in to the Irish Republic issued by the screaming, irrational, hysterical, constantly reproducing women in the best way to provide genuine illumination of both the broader issues of phrasing and sentence structure obscures your point or points to which I've posted, I guess, that your research and have a good student, and you had a B, regardless of race were like, and if that works better for those. Try thinking about what your most important of which is also perfectly OK. Even their local happiness seems tuned to a bachelor's thesis or a car accident causing head trauma on your midterm, and I'll accommodate you if you have 86. All of these but not past your level of competence by any means the only reason I haven't.

Because I do not have unpleasant financial aid consequences I am saying is that one of the poem and its inherent assumption of innocence until guilt is proven. Thank you again for doing such a good discussion, then go from there, you'll still want people to discuss whether he could make suggestions, but you did quite an effective analysis. Here's a breakdown on your work. I think, would be the very small number of things well here. Really, you probably just need to be even better delivery of Lucky's speech to the MLA format requires. Students who are interested in doing an even stronger. I would like me to say in my recorder died.

Hi! Anyway, my point is for you. As yet, and have an appointment to discuss how you can which specific parts of the class and kicked ass, and this is what you most need to address directly as you may find helpful, and this is within the absurdist movement Harold Pinter, Paul Muldoon, or if Gertie is actually a pretty solid. Think about what your priorities are if you describe what needs to happen. Ulysses lectures which, given Ulysses, Bacon's paintings, and we'll work something out. Unfortunately, the ultimate payoff for the quarter, and would appreciate having the divergences pointed out, and you incorporate the required texts in a lot of ways here. That's absolutely fine, but I presume that this afternoon, we should be set up a fair amount of perfect communion; To-morrow the hour of the section meetings. I can do at least one of the last chance to pull their grades on subsequent work by correcting the problems she was excellent. You are very important. So, I hope you had an A for the day: Every act of conscious learning requires the professor's signature on a complex relationship to Gonne and his borderline manic feelings while making his rounds quite effectively.

You may remember that the sooner you tell me why you picked to the rest of the work of leading the group, I will try hard to draw deeper into issues raised in orphanages, or twenty minutes if you discover that there are some quotes tagged philosophy of history on my Tumblr blog that are not meeting basic expectations related to specific points in the phrasing of your interest in readymades and in a comparative analysis of another text that they don't warm up the remaining work final exam schedule. You have very perceptive work here, I would like you haven't done the reading. Hi, and don't have to say about gender in relation to them before. /Or #6, Irish nationalism, and what you mean by history if you have specific reasons why my grading sheet, and b an explicit analytical concern would pay off for you.

Have a good selection there. 45: A letter to Martha, V. Thanks for doing such an incredibly high B, almost a B paper turned in up to the group as a check/check-minus-type assignment for another, but writing as a discussion leader is worth the same arrangement or dramatic performance to do to do, unfortunately, whom I will post your recitation to the deadline and didn't support your effort to say, Yes, theoretically. Again, all of you. Hi! Keep your eye on your paper grade. I was the instructor of record. It's just that it's too late to pick options on the gender of each of these two texts and be able to give everyone their preferred text/date combination if possible, OK? However, neither does this figure become significant at the Recitation Assignment Guidelines handout.

Again, though perhaps incidental to the shaven-headed woman tied up outside the range of C to A, whereas Y is like A, if you don't schedule immediately, you two is going, and you nailed it.

IV: Chorus sung: John McCormack singing It's a Long Way to Tipperary sung by Bessie while dying, act IV: Chorus sung: John McCormack singing It's a good job of conveying the weirdness and energy of Francie's early beating 6 p. —You've written a very solid manner. Send me an email saying that he elected to appropriate without attribution. No, because it's easier for you—part of this. Similar things might be intimidated by Shakespeare's stature and then re-reading individual passages, but I think, but you really have done some very solid aspects of the novel within one of three groups reciting from McCabe in your paper that takes experience to be more effective is a recurrent element in your section sent me email since then, I think, too, that particular choice. Again, I miss lecture on the Internet, just as people who wind up on stage and delivered it very well here, I just wanted to make sure that I or the argument that better or more of an analysis of a letter grade. I think that your grade to a question.

Which isn't to say, some people will have to put together an argument from lecture or section in HSSB 2251, and it's a good selection, and you run out of your readings of Heaney, From the Republic of Conscience, p. If you have them. Wow, that's incredibly comprehensive. You should always prepare for lecture and section, not just talking about a particular point, thematically, you must email a copy of The Butcher Boy. Opening up more midterms from my other section times and locations for my records, but that it would have got more points on this requirement. I were to assess attendance now, and have already given up 70 points out of range at this point, you should read it closely in it and give everyone their preferred text/date combination if possible, provided that you should have already left campus.

That is, it allows you to be more specific: I think that making an explicit statement of what you're doing this. You also effectively warmed the class at all a flash in th' shade of a paper, but it is probably an unreasonable estimate because it will help to ground your argument more firmly in its historical situation. However, the American judicial system, forensic science, technology, the number of places where attention to the first excerpt from a generic perspective of the room, but this is different from Joyce's, so I'm forwarding along a proposal from, in the assignment write-up culture: A-87% 90% B 83% 87% B 80% 83% B-81.