#one cannot be objective when stating or declaring the morality of these characters

[snakeguy999]

Do u think they play around with their disproportions

[twsttheory]

⚠️Chapter 5 spoilers⚠️ Chapter Recaps and Predictions for Future Dormitory Chapters.

Pardon me for being a little slow but I have just realized a trend? Aside from the fact that Twisted Wonderland seems to be a very “Screw society” game, the take-away of every Twisted Wonderland arc reflects the morals the of their respective Disney classic, except the villains are the ones experiencing it. 

Heartslabyul: 

Just like Alice in Wonderland, the first plot of the first Chapter centres around the idea that rules are not always meant to be followed. However, as I have mentioned in a previous post, many have theorized that the story of Alice in Wonderland is the journey of a child towards adulthood, during which they begin to realize their individual personalities. The Queen of Heart’s tyranny thus represents societal rules and expectations. In the first chapter, this is not illustrated by Riddle’s strictness. Instead, it is illustrated by the expectations and rules that Riddle’s mother has imposed on him. Riddle will then learn that not everything his mother said is correct, and will grow to have his own opinions. We even see him screwing up the mont-blanc. His mistake is very... um... him though. 

Savanaclaw:

Following the Heartslabyul arc is the Savanaclaw arc. Again, the plot is similar to that of The Lion King. Both Leona and Scar are the second-born, and the fact that their brothers have a son makes it impossible for them to become kings. This has lead to Leona’s somewhat inferiority complex. The lazy lion proceeds to come up with a plan to overthrow the more powerful Malleus in the Magift competition, but fails because of the Heartslabyul gang. No matter what he does, not everything goes according to plan. This is where “Hakuna Matata” becomes important. In the Lion King, it is taught to Simba, the protagonist, but in Twisted Wonderland, it has become a lesson that Leona has learnt. Life is not fair, but instead of choosing to dwell on that concept and suffer, you could choose to be happy instead. Despite not being able to become King, Leona is still very intelligent and very much capable, earning the respect of his dorm members and many more people. 

Octavinelle:

Fish arc covers the topic of bullying, which many of us have experienced. In this chapter, Azul strives to become more powerful as a result of bullying, and has thus grown to become a very talented mage. His collection of contracts is similar to both Ariel’s collection of human objects and Ursula’s collections of those who failed to pay their debt. All these collections are but material collections, and in Azul’s eyes, his collection is a measure of his worth, as seen from when he declares that he will be useless if Leona were to destroy the contracts. What both Ariel and Azul were missing was as a matter of fact not their material collection. Instead, it was love for Ariel, and friendship for Azul. Jade and Floyd gave him friendship, which he did not have as a victim of bullying, and I’m pretty sure that he realizes that both their presences are more valuable than mere material contracts. I am also certain that Jade and Floyd think so too, although they say otherwise. 

Scarabia:

Scarabia arc’s overblot goes to Jamil, you poor boy. Because of his position as the Asim family’s servant, he believes that as long as he is in the presence of Kalim, he will never be able to be who he really is. Aladdin also thinks that he cannot be with Jasmine if he isn’t royalty. However, we all know that Jamil has more to offer as an individual. He is intelligent and powerful, and will remain intelligent and powerful despite his position as a servant. Aladdin is loved by Jasmine despite being a non-royal. Scarabia’s chapter centres around the idea that an individual’s potential and worth is not defined or limited by their status or position, as Jamil has surely proven to us. 

Pomefiore:

The recent Pomefiore arc is also very relatable and nothing less than outstanding, highlighting the importance of “beauty” in more than one way. This chapter straight up tells us that ballet is not restricted to girls, and it has already earned my respect. What’s more outstanding is its emphasis of effort. Vil is shown to be frustrated because of being in Neige’s shadow. GIVE HIM THE LICENSE TO BE FRUSTRATED HE WORKED SO HARD! Despite his hard work, he is less popular than the cheery and pretty Neige. In the VDC, Neige’s cover of a children song grabbed more attention than the song he poured his sweat, blood and tears over. No one cares about the effort behind the scenes, and all the praise goes to the final product. In Snow White, the Evil Queen will never be the most beautiful, because she is ugly inside. This could apply to this chapter. Despite being more successful, Neige, unless stated otherwise, lacks the diligence and hard work that Vil has put into his craft.

Ignihyde:

All right folks this is where the predictions starts. The recurring theme of this game is conflict against society. From this, I will predict that Idia and Hercules will share a common theme. People call them monsters. Hercules is called a monster because of his inhuman strength, while Idia’s case will most likely be because of Ortho. Idia is undoubtedly a genius engineer, and since Ortho is a cyborg, there are chances that he was once a human but died, and is turned into a cyborg by his brother. Idia creating him from scratch is not likely because he already mentioned a “previous Ortho”. Because of this, Idia is feared by many people as well. However, if this theory were to be correct, it would mean that the story will follow the moral in Hercules that underlines the importance of staying true to oneself and that people will love you for who you are. Hercules definitely stayed true to himself, and in the end, instead of being labelled a monster, he became loved by many. I’m sure that it will be the same way with Idia, although I am not sure about the situation that will help incite this. 

From how he encouraged Riddle to break away from his mother’s rules in the first chapter,, it is highly possible that Ace would play a role in helping Idia express his mad scientist vibes. If Ace does not help Idia, he will probably still play a big role alongside Ortho, as they are both younger siblings. From ghost marriage, we can also see Ortho’s ability to call Ace out on his bullshit. Ace is a child full of lies, and his true personality may also not be what he displays every day. With Ortho’s advance “Your body sayin you lyin boy” technology, I think that we could finally see a change in our dumb ginger boy’s personality, as well as gain some juicy insight into the Trappola household. Epel is also a plausible factor, seeing that he has embraced his cute and wild side in Chapter 5. However, if the story were to follow the same pattern as in Chapter 3 with Jack and Octavinelle, Epel will most likely only help the main character, and Vil would help with the dorm leader in question. But we’ll see about that.

Diasomnia

Sleeping beauty is a story where love is a powerful force. In the dorm that is very family orientated, there is no doubt that love will be a common theme in this story arc. However, just like Pomefiore, the first year also has to play an important role in the story. Sebek, unlike waka sama, is probably mortal. Another theme in sleeping beauty is that growing up presents all sorts of existential crisis. I am pretty certain that Sebek’s existential crisis would come in the form of fey vs human. Power vs mortality. How will Malleus overblot then? Following the pattern, it would likely be because of a problem that contrasts to their first year. As Sebek gets to know the idiot combo, he will gain more friends, and Malleus might find his most loyal guard taken away from him, or it may come in the form of Sebek or Silver, or both, objecting him in some way. If both happen to be proven wrong, it is still likely that he will overblot because of something that involves his loneliness or lack of understanding of mortality. It could even be caused by seeing Sebek and Silver grow up, and suddenly be hit with the realization that they both may one day leave his side or pass away, and that the main character, who does not fear him at all, will also one day return to their world or die, leaving him behind once again. 

The conflict will probably then be resolved by the understanding that despite all this, he has friends. Lilia, Sebek, Silver, the main character, and perhaps even Ace and Deuce, and Idia and Ortho for good measure, are people precious to him, and it is important for him to treasure the time that he has with them.

That’s all for today! These are probably not accurate, and I’m sure that Yana Toboso is at least 10 dimensions away from me when playing chess, but it is fun to compare the storyline with their respective classic film. Either ways, only time will tell how the story progresses. So I’ll keep an eye out for any previews! Thank you for reading!

[hunterartemis]

Vishakhatantra Headcanon #3: Classifications of Magical Creatures and Objects

Wizarding worlds has it’s fair share of things, both living and non-living that serve their daily purpose. In Indian wizarding society, each and every magical object is categorized under two types: Gana (tribe) and Guna (quality). The purpose of such classification helps the Magical authority to distinguish harmless things from dark and cursed magical objects or living things.

Gana (tribe)

Ganas correspond to the energy of one of the three worlds: Heaven, Earth and Underworld. The classification of Gana or tribe is usually used for magizoological creatures which are non-human and near human species. These categorization was done under the MPSA (Mayavi Prani Sangrakshan Ain, or Magizoological Creature Protection Act) in 1245 to preserve the diverse species of wizarding world.

The Idea of “Gana” is derived from the energy of 27 astrological constellations, and each Gana has 9 constellations under it’s type. However this classification of Gana uses rank 1 to 9 to denote the strength of each animal within the Gana.

Deva Gana (Divine type)

A creature that falls under the Deva gana is harmless, often vulnerable, of good temperament, benefic and with exceptionally powerful magical qualities. Many of the creatures falling under this category have many coveted skills or powers that humans seek to posses in both magical and non-magical realm. In India, all the magical creatures under the Deva Gana classification are protected by the law of the land and have special sanctuaries made for them for their protection. coming in contact with them, possessing them, domesticating them without permit is a criminal offence and slaying or harming them is enough to land one a death sentence.

Since many of the Deva Gana creatures yield powerful wand cores, they are extremely coveted by Wandmakers. In such cases, special license and non-slaying agreement to the Indian Wizarding Government must be acquired to be in contact with them. Currently India has Three sanctuaries for Deva Gana Creatures: Shambala (or Shangri-La) in the Himalayas, Dandaka Forest in Central India, and Laccadweep in the western sea: suitable for cold, humid and marine area magical creatures.

Some of the Deva gana creatures protected by Indian Wizarding government are:

Occamy (Paksinaga): grade 1 (Dandaka)

Pegasus (Pakshiraj): grade 7 (Shambala)

Phoenix (Agnipakshi): grade 5 (shambala)

Unicorn (Ekshringa): grade 3 (Dandaka)

Capricorn (Makara): grade 2 (Laccadweep)

Runespoor (Ahirbudhanya): grade 9 (Laccadweep)

Manushya Gana (Human type)

These creatures are graded as safe to cohabit with humans and creatures. These are harmless to medium harmful, but they have mastered the ability to live alongside humans. Some of them are capable of human speech and enjoys human company. Manushya Gana species are categorised according to how close their physical appearance is to the human ones, the closer the appearance, the high the grade.

Lower grade type can be approached, while higher types must be respected as individuals with free will. Higher grade Human tribe species are more physically and mentally powerful than human wizards. Such creatures are allowed to study magic if they are categorised as possessing 60% of human qualities and agree on to swear to harm no human or creature unlawfully in Non-Violence Perpetuity Contract of 768.

Humans cannot establish marital, Romantic or sexual relationships with lower grade creatures of this tribe (or vice versa).The offspring of such union will be slain by the state as a Violation of MPSA act, and the parties involved will be sentenced to death; in case of force or coercion the guilty party would be put to death. Such relationship with Higher grade is it valid with mutual consent. Friendships and other platonic relationship is valid for all grade creatures of this kind.

Some of the Manushya Gana creatures are:

Grade 1-3 (Creatures, Can be approached as benign animals): Mooncalves, Golden swan, Demiguise, Salamander, Niffler etc.

Grade 4-6 (Individuals, Sexual/romantic/marital relationship forbidden, cannot be domesticated): Asvini (Indian Centaurs), Hayagriva (Horse Head, Human body), Vanara (Humanoid Apes), Sarpa (Snake humans) etc, Garuda (Head of eagle, body of man, can fly), Matsyamanav (Merpeople), Daitya (Giants),

Grade 7-9 (individuals; romantic, sexual or marital relationship is legal): Gandharva (human looking male enchanters), Kinnar (Hermaphroditic celestial creatures), Apsara (female gandharva), Naga (humans who can transform into great snakes), Yaksha (humanoid natural spirits), Asura (Demigods)

Rakshasa Gana (Demonic Type)

As the name says, creatures under this category are classified as dangerous and unfit to cohabit within civilized atmosphere and must live away from humans in a secluded place. A colony of such creatures must not have any Deva or Manushya type population within 10 km radius.

The only race that ever ascended from Rakshasa gana to Manushya Gana is the Asuras. The Royal Edict of King Bali was issued when he surrendered his sins as Asura to Buddha and ordered for all Asura kind to cohabit with the humans ever so peacefully. Other such creatures did not agree on this and they declared enmity towards the Human and Divine type creatures. A treaty was signed where the Wizarding laws won’t be applicable to the Demonic types as long as they are on their designated colonies. Once they cross their territory and come to Wizarding soil, they would be subjected to the laws of wizards.

The grades 1-9 is used for these categories: corporeality, size, resembling human form, intelligence and danger level. Some of these creatures are still coveted for wandmaking, mnemonic magic and potion making. In such cases skilled aurors shall accompany wandmakers and ingredient hunters with high-confidentiality permit. Since wizarding laws don’t apply on them, they need to be extra careful. Some of these creatures are:

Grade 1-3 (mild malignant, unable to hold corporal body): Bhoot (ghost), Atma (non corporeal departed spirits), Mohini (white enchantress of the night), Jogini (powerful spirit of a female witch, who died during rituals)

Grade 4-6: (able to hold corporal body, can inflict considerable harm) Pishach (Indian vampires), Aghori (corpse eaters), Preta (Hungry, vengeful ghosts) Bramharakshash (Malignant Spirit of a Dead Scholar), Khokhosh (Small pygmy like creatures), Takshak (Snakes with feet), Betaal (Vengeful natural spirit)

Grade 7-9: (has colossal corporal body, very strong, intelligent, very dangerous): Dragons (western), Rakshash (Demons with human shapes), Danava (demons with non-human shapes), Kalkeya (Dark demonlike creatures that can change from corporal to non-corporal), Daini (Dark witch who turned a demoness), Damor (Indian Incubus), Damri (Indian Succubus)

Guna (quality)

In Tantra or High Philosophy, all things are made of essentially three essences or qualities. These qualities determine the nature of things and keep the balance of nature. These three gunas are used in Indian Wizarding world to signify branches of magic, magical activity, place and energy under the Wizarding Law of India.

Satva Guna (Quality of Preservation)

“Satva” is granted as the essence of living being, the soul and the power that preserves. Dominance of Satva in a magic makes it peaceful, healing, balancing, pleasant to the mind and body and enhances mental agility in such a state. Satva is the essential quality of the Deva Gana creatures and lower branches of Manusya gana creatures. This quality rejects anything dark, defiled or corrupt and thus such existence must always be present in the service of the Good. such as Law enforcement, Jury, etc.

Although Satva guna is called the Best quality of the Three, it lacks greatly in drive and creativity and it is very passive in nature. Healing magic, Charms, Spirit Fire, Patronus, Corporeal magic, History of Magic, Ayurveda (Indian Herbology), Care of Magical Creatures, Mnemonic magic, some branches of Legillimency are considered Satvik (possessing the quality of Satva) in Indian Magic. People who mostly practice Satvik magic has the same temperament in their characters: they are calm, affectionate of all, peace and justice loving, forgiving, believer of truth and morality and they make great teachers, healers, diplomats, scholars and researchers. These qualities are also imparted in some wand woods and cores which are also marked as Satvik.

Rajas Guna (Quality of Creation and taking action)

“Rajas“ is granted as the life force of living being, the will to live and the power that creates, initiates actions and acts. Dominance of Rajas in a magic makes them simulating, exciting, that induces creativity, emotional discharges and motivates the wizards to take action. Rajas is the essential guna of all the creature because it is the passion, hunger, sexual impulses and emotional responses that makes their life meaningful in the Earth.

In High Philosophy or Tantra, Magic itself is a Rajasic existence, because it forces mundane human beings to be creative with higher power. Despite that, there are specific magical branches that are more rajasik than others. Battle Magic, Spell seals, Sacred Mathematics, Alchemy, all are considered “Rajasik” (Possessing the quality of Rajas). People who mostly practice Rajasic Magic are lively tempered, easily excited, creative, impulsive, original, go-getters and followers of principles and they always make great politicians, aurors, entrepreneurs, magical artists or architects even experimental practitioners. These qualities are also imparted in some wand wood and cores which are also marked as Rajasik.

Tama Guna (Quality of restriction, destruction and Transformation)

“Tama“ is granted as the force that destroys, restricts and transforms. Tama is limitation, destructive force and power to change one form of energy to the other. Dominance of Tama in a magic makes it destructive, illusion-inducing, transmuting, restricting and fear inducing. Tama is the quality that enables the creatures to rest, to fear the danger and die in order to survive in their lifetime.

Tama is often misinterpreted as something “Dark” or “Defiled”. Although Tama is the essential quality in Dark Magic, but it is also prevalent in Light Magic. It is said that western Magic is More Tamasic and Eastern Magic is More Rajasic in Nature. Thus many of the Western Magical Branches: Defence Against the dark arts, Transfiguration, Potion making, are considered Tamasic in Nature. People who practice Tamasic Magic (on the side of Light Magic) are very restrictive, rule following, inflexible, practical individuals, who would rather follow textbook rules than doing anything original. People who practice Dark Tamasic Magic are violent, ruthless, uncouth and often manipulating in nature. Tamasic qualities when harnessed positively makes one great soldier, wizard lawyers, Unspeakables and other job-holders that require restriction and secrecy. There are wand cores and wand woods that are also marked as Tamasik.

Tags (because “inbox’s empty, no notes, enthusiasm gone” :D)

@decadentdeputyturkeyfan  @yeoldguccislides  @silencespeaks10 @beyzaarikan @hopingtoleave @debranjansinha @astrologyreadings @astrologyreadingsforlife-blog @seanromerovaldezblack @queenphoenixfire @atomiccrystalsblog @solare19 @jollyfarmweaseldonkey @theauthor97 @emmavalley @ibuprofenforthesoul @detectivepeeks @lemonfields12234 @ravenclaw-nonsense @ice-princess555 @ghastedpoetic @nivzzz @amara-airgid @thehorcruxstolemysoul @cartoon-lover101 @yellowbadger07 @thisisallicouldthinkof @constantly-in-limerence @adam-papa @amiaslytherinoramijustasnake @alliedolls00 @mothenarwhal @tattooedkermit @king-hsssy @n-a-romanovaa @bunchofdrabbles @rverfades @hallu-cin-ations​

[chillyravenart]

since people were asking u for ur opinions, what is ur opinion on androw and elissa farman? im so conflicted over them both bc i love rhaena but at the same time, at least in elissas case i kinda see why she did what she did :// grrm is truly great with morally grey characters

Let me start by saying, I ADORE Rhaena Targaryen with every fibre of my being. I love that badass, she never put a foot wrong in her life and oh how I wish her life could have been easier on her... but alas, George loves kicking you when you’re down lmao. If I'm going to be completely honest, the Farmans really f*cked Rhaena over in the long run lmao but I shall try and explore a little bit deeper into Rhaena’s relationships with both of them: Androw the neglected husband and Elissa, the adventurous lover. It’s fairly simple to examine both their motives, they did what they did because of personal ambition as well as revenge, but as we know, it wasn’t as straightforward as that. I shall add a cut below because this post might be long and rambling as usual, so I beg forgiveness in advance!

I will preface this however by saying that I’m really glad Rhaena was able to find love with Elissa Farman after a period of turmoil and unhappiness in her life. Androw unfortunately was just a cover, and younger than Rhaena too so it’s understandable that he may have been entranced and besotted with the idea of marrying a Targaryen princess as reputable as Rhaena. Androw was unassuming and wasn’t the typical martial lord like his father or brother,

at his own father’s court there were those who scorned him as “half a girl” himself, for he was soft of speech and gentle of nature...

We all know the type of person Rhaena was however, she was firm and stern, had lost her brother/husband Aegon to Maegor, been married to Maegor and  had her daughters taken from her, had escaped him and had generally endured a great deal up until then.

Later, when asked why she had chosen such an unpromising spouse, Rhaena Targaryen replied, “He was kind to me.”

It’s completely understandable why Rhaena should seek comfort and solace outside of the royal court and King’s Landing in general. Similarly, Rhaena had always found the company of her female companions much more desirable and is largely implied to lesbian-coded. She had enjoyed the company of Melony Piper and Samantha Stokeworth as a girl, and found the same affinity for Elissa.

“The queen found her true love on Fair Isle,” Maester Smike wrote to the Citadel, “not with Androw, but with his sister, Lady Elissa.”

Elissa on the other hand was vivacious and outgoing, fond of dogs, horses, and sailing. She dreamed of sailing beyond the Sunset Sea and had ended both her betrothals too. Rhaena was similar in spirit, she too had been fond of animals and enjoyed flying her dragon Dreamfyre.

In Rhaena Targaryen, however, she found a like-minded companion, and in her the queen found a new confidant.

Going back to Androw, he was never really included amongst Rhaena’s circle, despite being her husband as stated in Fire and Blood

Androw Farman, Rhaena’s new husband, was admitted to their circle from time to time, but never so often as to be taken for a fifth head. Most tellingly, Queen Rhaena never took him flying with her on the back of her dragon, Dreamfyre, an adventure she shared frequently with the ladies Elissa, Alayne, and Sam...

I’m going to try and condense the next few years as concisely as possible for fear of rambling too much, but in the long run, Androw was never taken seriously as Rhaena’s husband and was ridiculed by lords and ladies alike. People doubted the fact that his marriage to Rhaena had been consummated at all. Back on Dragonstone, 

His wife was still a queen, but no one mistook Androw for a king, or even a lord consort.

Meanwhile, Rhaena held her court at Dragonstone as the Queen in the East and remained in the company of her own companions, as well as new ones from the surrounding regions. Her cousin Lianna Velaryon soon became a favourite too, and her story soon became intertwined with the fall of Androw Farman (pun intended lmao) but let’s focus on Elissa for a while.

Lady Elissa was no happier on Dragonstone than Aerea herself, however; she missed her wide western seas and spoke often of returning to them.

Elissa, true to spirit, wasn’t going to sit around at court her whole life, and desired adventure and travel as she always had done.

Denied any part of the incomes of Fair Isle by her brother Lord Franklyn, Elissa asked the Dowager Queen for gold sufficient to build a new ship in the shipyards of Driftmark, a large, swift vessel meant to sail the Sunset Sea. Rhaena denied her request. “I could not bear for you to leave me,” she said, but Lady Elissa heard only, “No.”

Already, the cracks were appearing and the discord was sowed. Elissa took her leave of Rhaena, 

She had heard the sea calling, she told Queen Rhaena; it was time for her to take her leave. Never one to make a show of her emotions, the Queen in the East received the news stone-faced. “I have asked you to stay,” she said. “I will not beg. If you would go, go.”

Rhaena was proud but I cannot deny that losing her lover would have been an immense blow to her, especially since her life of privacy and companionship was about to be taken apart at the seams in the aftermath of Elissa’s departure. This is when the dragon eggs went missing, and it became very clear that Elissa had made off with them to fund her voyage.

If this betrayal by one she had loved wounded Rhaena Targaryen she hid it well, but there was no hiding her fury...

This would have been a huge betrayal for Rhaena. She had placed her trust and love with someone who had clearly desired a different path, which is fine, but to have that paired with the theft of a priceless and potentially dangerous object would have been an added blow. Dragon eggs were strictly a Targaryen possession, something personal and almost sacred to the them. They had been coveted by Lyman Lannister during her stay with him at Casterly Rock, and despite his support and the refuge he had given her, dragon eggs were off the cards. Notwithstanding the fact that the theft by someone Rhaena had loved and the potential for those eggs to reach the wrong hands... This situation only made the relationship between Rhaena and Androw worse.

She even went so far as to summon her husband, Androw Farman, demanding to know if he had been complicit in his sister’s crime. His denials only goaded her to more rage, until their shouts could be heard echoing through the halls of Dragonstone.

Androw himself was affected by his sister’s departure, not to mention the fact that Rhaena’s fury made him a culprit in her eyes too.

Androw Farman’s discontent on Dragonstone only grew worse after his sister’s departure. Lady Elissa had been his closest friend, mayhaps his only friend, Culiper observed, and despite his tearful denials, Rhaena found it hard to accept that he had played no role in the matter of her dragon eggs.

Their relationship deteriorated further and further at this point. When Rhaena meant to fly to Storm’s End, Androw was excluded from the trip.

As her husband, he said, his place was at Rhaena’s side, to give her comfort. The queen had refused him, however, and not gently. A loud argument had preceded her departure, and Her Grace was heard to say, “The wrong Farman ran away.” Her marriage, never passionate, had become a mummer’s farce by 54 AC. “And not an entertaining one,” Lady Alayne Royce observed.

Again after Elissa’s departure, Rhaena disassociated from Androw further, particularly when it came to dealing with the matter of the stolen eggs. She clearly did not want him around, nor did she care for his input.

When Rhaena flew to King’s Landing to inform King Jaehaerys of the theft, Androw had offered to accompany her. His wife refused him scornfully. “What would that serve? What could you possibly do but fall off the dragon?”

When her mother, Queen Alyssa died in childbed, Rhaena’s fury was famously unleashed upon Rogar Baratheon (it’s what he deserved too lmao). 

By the time Rhaena returned from her mother’s deathbed, he was well past any desire to comfort her. Sullen and cold, he sat silent at meals and avoided the queen’s company elsewise. If Rhaena Targaryen was troubled by his sulks, she gave little sign of it. She found consolation in her ladies instead, in old friends like Samantha Stokeworth and Alayne Royce, and newer companions like her cousin Lianna Velaryon, Lord Staunton’s pretty daughter Cassella, and young Septa Maryam.

Androw at this point, began concocting his revenge and the mysterious “sickness” that took Rhaena’s companions proved to be poison. Alayne Royce, Septa Maryam and even Samantha Stokeworth all died in quick succession leaving Rhaena bereft. Lianna Velaryon, Rhaena’s cousin also perished in Rhaena’s arms as she wept bitterly.

“You weep for her,” Androw Farman said when he saw the tears on his wife’s face, “but would you weep for me?” His words woke a fury in the queen. Lashing him across the face, Rhaena commanded him to leave her, declaring that she wanted to be alone. “You shall be,” Androw said. “She was the last of them.”

When it was discovered that poison was the reason behind all the deaths, Rhaena realised who the culprit was and had her men search for Androw.

He made no attempt to deny the poisonings. Instead he boasted. “I brought them cups of wine, and they drank. They thanked me, and they drank. Why not? A cupbearer, a serving man, that’s how they saw me. Androw the sweet. Androw the jape. What could I do, but fall off the dragon? Well, I could have done a lot of things. I could have been a lord. I could have made laws and been wise and given you counsel. I could have killed your enemies, as easily as I killed your friends. I could have given you children.”

His motives were very clear and to a degree, understandable, but seriously, what a PUNK move. tired of being ridiculed and ignored, Androw had taken his fury out on Rhaena’s friend instead of confronting her or dealing with her directly and that, in my eyes, is a bitch move indeed. I can totally see his side in this, but Rhaena had faced so much adversity in her life, the loss of her daughter Aerea, her mother, her lover had just culminated into a deep pit of heartbreak and Androw’s “revenge” was just the cherry on top. When Rhaena commanded his execution, Androw took matters into his own hands one last time.

And so saying, he slashed ineffectually at the nearest man, backed to the window behind him, and leapt out. His flight was a short one: downward, to his death. Afterward Rhaena Targaryen had his body hacked to pieces and fed to her dragons.

I mean, it’s what he deserved. 

The remainder of Rhaena’s life ended up being a lonely affair. Losing everyone she loved, particularly Aerea was the last straw for her I guess, and she withdrew from the public eye even further, and left Dragonstone too.

It was a melancholy time. Dragonstone was still hers if she wanted it, Jaehaerys told his sister, but Rhaena refused that as well. “There is nothing there for me now but grief and ghosts.”

It just makes me so heartbroken for her. I’m not going to pull a PooR BaBy a la Tumblr and call her a tragic and downtrodden woman in the conventional sense lol but her life was a very tough one, and would have broken a weaker person. Rhaena Targaryen was STRONG. As she said so herself, she was much like Visenya and doesn’t need our pity, but there’s no denying that Rhaena really got the short end of the stick. She absolutely did not deserve those betrayals. You’re absolutely right in calling Elissa and Androw grey characters, which they are in various degrees. I think they create the conflict and heartbreak very well in the life of Rhaena Targaryen, love, loss blood and betrayal all woven in expertly by George as always. I really wish Rhaena could have found love and peace with Elissa, and lived out her life amongst her beloved friends but alas, that was not to be. Anyway, these were my opinions on both Elissa and Androw, I hope this answer was somewhat helpful! 

[basicsofislam]

BASICS OF ISLAM : Allah ( God Almighty ) :Which angel delivered the Qur’an to the Prophet?

As far as the Revelation of the Qur’an is concerned, the Prophet served as an envoy between the people and the angel, while the angel fulfilled the same role between God and the Prophet.

The Messenger, who had a sensitive but reliant character, was one who was equipped with an extraordinary mission to save humankind from lethargy and from immoral tendencies, bringing them to a higher level of consciousness from which they would clearly recognize God as God and Satan as Satan.

As a result of God’s mercy He sent Prophets to humankind so that they could find the true path and worship only God Almighty.

For the most part the Prophets were sent to humankind in times of moral crisis or decline. The aspects that are the hardest to control and which are the most dangerous are the moral aspects of human behavior. The Prophets who were sent for this purpose received Revelations from God. In the Qur’an it is stated that the angel who delivered the Revelation to Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, was Archangel Gabriel:

Say (O Messenger): “(The Lord of the worlds, my and your Lord, declares:) ‘Whoever is an enemy to Gabriel (should know that) it is he who brings down the Qur’an on your heart by the leave of God, (not of his own accord), confirming (the Divine origin of and the truths still contained in) the Revelations prior to it, and (serving as) guidance and glad tidings for the believers.’” (Baqara 2:97)

Some members of the Jewish community in Medina came to the Prophet and asked him a number of questions. He answered all their questions. They found no fault with his answers and later asked him about who delivered the Revelation to him. When the Prophet told them that Archangel Gabriel delivered the Revelations to him, they said:

“He brings earthquake, disaster, violence, war and death. So, he is our enemy. But Michael is our friend. Thus, we would have believed in you if it had been Michael who had brought you the Revelation.”

God Almighty states that the Qur’an is not the word of Gabriel, but rather that it is the Word of God; the verse goes on to state that Gabriel comes to the Prophet only with God’s permission and that he brings the Revelation from God to the Prophet.

In another verse, the name of the Angel of Revelation is given as the Trustworthy Spirit ( Ruh al-Amin):

This (Qur’an) is indeed the Book of the Lord of the worlds being sent down by Him (in parts). The Trustworthy Spirit brings it down on your heart, so that you may be one of the warners (entrusted with the Divine Revelation). (Shuara 26:192-194)

God Almighty calls Gabriel “the Trustworthy Spirit” as he serves to save all of humankind in religious matters. He is called the Trustworthy ( Amin) because he has been entrusted with a mission to deliver certain things to the Prophets and to others.

Another name given to the Angel of Revelation is “the Spirit of Holiness” ( Ruh al-Qudus): Say (to them, O Messenger):

“(My Lord affirms): ‘The Spirit of Holiness brings it down in parts from your Lord with truth (embodying the truth and with nothing false in it), that it may confirm those who believe (strengthening them in their faith and adherence to God’s way), and as guidance, and glad tidings for the Muslims (those who have submitted themselves wholly to God).’” (Nahl 16:102)

The Spirit of Holiness implies a spirit that is pure, a spirit that cannot become blemished, one that is sacred, trustworthy and ever-purified. This is Gabriel, who is described as the Ruh al-Qudus in the Qur’an. In other words, Gabriel is called by this name because he brings Divine enlightenment and wisdom in the form of the Qur’an from God; this will serve until the Day of Judgment to purify humankind. According to another Qur’anic definition, the angel who acts as an envoy to the Prophet has the following features:

This is the Word (brought) by an honored messenger (Gabriel), endowed with power, with high rank and esteem before the Lord of the Supreme Throne; one obeyed (by his aides), and trustworthy (in fulfilling God’s orders, most particularly conveying the Revelation). (Takwir 81:19-21)

Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, the Messenger of God, saw and communicated with Archangel Gabriel, who is also an envoy of God, and received the Revelation from the angel on different occasions. When the Prophet stated that he was receiving the Revelation from Gabriel, the polytheists of Mecca protested. The verse,

“Indeed he saw him (Gabriel) on the clear horizon” (Takwir 81:23)

was revealed in connection with this objection of the polytheists. It can be clearly understood that there is an angel who delivered the Revelation from God to the Prophets.

This angel is Gabriel, who is entrusted with the Revelations and who is sincere in this mission.

[things2mustdo]

As you probably have heard in the news, earlier in August a Pennsylvania grand jury handed down a 1,356-page account of sexual abuse which involved around 1,000 kids and 300 priests during a period of approximately 70 years. It is another pedophilia scandal within the Catholic Church that adds up to their collection of countless other ones reported in recent years.

The commie pope—while on his two-day visit to Ireland—begged for forgiveness again, just the way he did in Chile back in January of this year.

You can notice how quick and scathing the mainstream media is to denounce these recurring events, after all we know who owns the MSM and the (real) Church has a long, well-known history of “anti-semitism” and resistance against the tentacles of globalism. I wish the media had the same commitment to inform the existence of other pedophile rings full of high-ranking people as well.

Is the problem of the church’s innumerous sexual abuse allegations really pedophilia? To me there is a deeper explanation for it, and that explanation is: homosexualism. 81% of the alleged victims are male and three-fourths of them are post-pubescent. As you guys are certainly aware of, the Church has a very big issue with homosexualism among its clergymen.

I have a theory for the high presence of gay men inside priesthood: until not long ago being gay was definitely not ok, homosexuals were not accepted as they are now, so they became priests.

The developed Western world of today encourages people to become gay, it applauds individuals for their gayness, but it wasn’t always like that. Now, try to imagine a closeted homosexual man living in the 50s, for example. What a better place to go than the Catholic seminary? People wouldn’t look you down, you wouldn’t have to get married, the place was filled with other young men (potential sexual partners) and that’s how the Church got corrupted by perverts.

Pedophilia x Homosexualism

One normie could argue “how homosexualism relates to pedophilia?” Any red-pilled person who has ever wondered what causes someone to become gay will notice that there is an undeniable link between pedophilia and homosexualism.

Let’s remember the occasion of Milo Yiannopolous’ resignation from Breitbart over comments which seemed to endorse sex between “younger men” and older men. Something that is—as he pointed out—extremely common among gay men. A 2009 report revealed that 74 percent of bisexuals had been sexually abused as children, I am pretty sure homosexuals follow the same numbers.

I won’t say homosexual behavior is exclusively caused by pedophilia because human (or animal) sexuality is a very complex topic which can certainly involve many variables. I just don’t buy that “born this way” hype, until this day not a single reliable proof of the existence of a gay gene or anything like it was discovered.

The Vatican once bought a £21 million apartment block above ‘Europe’s largest gay sauna’.

Pope Francis, a champion of the left-leaning agenda inside the Church, has been accused of covering up former Cardinal McCarrick’s abuse allegations (one of the many cases in Pennsylvania). The accusations were made by Carlo Vigano, a former Vatican ambassador to the US, and if it proves to be true–I am positive it is—that should result in pope Francis’ resignation. As a traditionalist Catholic myself I would be delighted with such an event.

Francis has already been complacent with other pedos before. One good example is the 2015 ‘Synod on the Family’ when the pope invited Godfried Danneels, a Belgium Cardinal convicted of covering up pedophiles in the 90s, to attend the meeting. Danneels is a hard-left priest that tries to push the Church ” liberal reformation” and admitted that he was part of a plot against (right-leaning) Pope Benedict and in favor of the election of leftie Francis.

To affirm that the Church’s gay/pedos are exclusively part of the left-wing priesthood would be too Manichean. I am sure there are tons of sick people who lean right also. But it can’t be denied that the liberals make up the vast majority of these issues involving sexual misconduct.

“Religious progressives”

For those who don’t know, the Catholic Church, just as any other political institution, is divided in factions that tend to be more liberal or orthodox. The liberation theology, for instance, is a movement created inside the Catholic Church (and some Protestant denominations) which aims to mix Christianity and Marxism.

Even if you are an agnostic don’t underestimate the influence they played in various regions such as Europe, Latin America and even New England. Brazilian Workers’ Party attributed their success to this movement and Unions.

Be wary of any religious leader that tries to push a liberalization of dogmas and traditions. Because all religions are intrinsically conservative according to their respective contexts, they establish doctrines that dictate sets of rules that must be followed properly in order to attain their objectives (whether is Salvation in Christianity or Nirvana in Buddhism). There are no (real) religions without their traditions.

Whenever you see liberal religious men doubt their characters. There is a good chance they don’t even bother with religion or spirituality, perhaps they are closeted atheist. What they do care about is the religious platform, which can offer various benefits such as large audiences, political influence, money and even sex.

Estimates of the number of gays in the priesthood are all over the lot, from 20 percent to 60 percent, although a Los Angeles Times poll in 2002 found only 15 percent of priests saying they were homosexual or “somewhere in between but more on the homosexual side.”

Every time pedo priests’ cases pop up in the MSM, secular people are very quick to point fingers and show their moral superiority, but they “forget” the existence of secular institutions that are way more sexually perverted than the “gayish” modern Church, such as Hollywood, the political and corporate world.

Real Church x Sissy Church

It is also important to notice that the Church was emasculated, an emasculation that took place during the process of secularization and establishment of liberal democracies across the Western world (e.g. French Revolution).

The Church had to be softened, becoming an institution that barely resembles the once powerful and great Church of the Crusades or the Inquisitions. This same phenom of emasculation can also happen in other secular institutions too, the Military, mainstream Music, Politics, Sports and even Boys Scouts. And it will only get worse as liberal-democratic globalism advances, so secular people: watch out!

St. Basil the Great, a 4th century bishop and Doctor of the Church, defended that gay/pedo priests should be publicly flogged. That was the (real) Church, not this sissy catholicism created after the Second Vatican Council (a modernist reform imposed in the Church from 1962 to 1965). A lot of things got bad in the 60s.

The (real) Church has a very important and vigorous story in the construction of the West. Always being a target to the globalists and that breed who rules the world, a clear obstacle to their goals.

Examples are many: Gabriel García Moreno, Catholic Equatorian president, who made a terrific job in a Confessional Equator and was killed by the Freemasons; Saint José Sanchez del Rio, who was killed by Mexican secular, freemason and leftist government with the support of the US, for refusing to abbandon his faith.

Inconvenient truths are ignored

The media only goes after what is convenient to their narrative, don’t expect them to expose Hollywood pedos nor the obvious link between pedo priests and homosexualism. The left has already pushed the normalization of pedophilia many times and I didn’t see the indignation of the MSM.

Late Vatican’s Chief Exorcist Gabriele Amorth once said, “The Devil resides in the Vatican and you can see the consequences”.

“The floor of hell is paved with the skulls of bishops”. – St. Athanasius

Read More: The Vatican Has Disgraced True Catholic Values

I have noticed that many people have been falsely conflating what comes out of the Vatican as Catholic. Thus it is my duty to present to the esteemed readers of this fine site the true teachings of the Church which stand, ever more so today, in stark opposition to the rot of cultural Marxism and the effeminacy of the Papal pretenders in Rome.

Vicar of Christ?

Church authorities are not legitimate

It is a dogma of the Catholic faith that the Church cannot substantially change. This means that the church cannot contradict nor change her teaching from what has always been universally taught or has been solemnly defined. Any one who claims to be Catholic and knowingly professes a faith which contradicts a teaching of the Church is considered to be a heretic and is considered to have a removed himself from the Church.

As St. Thomas states: “[one] who disbelieves [even] one article of faith does not have faith, either formed or unformed.” This is known as the unity of faith which means that all Catholics profess the same faith. Likewise it means that heretics cannot hold a clerical office in the Church. Thus if a heretic were to be elected even to the Papacy they could not be considered a legitimate Pontiff because a heretic has separated himself from the Church (source).

Would a real Pope bow to a religion declared false by the Church?

Simply put, you have to be Catholic to be Pope, and the absurdity of a heretic claiming the See of Peter is where we find ourselves today. For just as the institutions in the West have been infiltrated and seized by the enemy, likewise have the institutions of the Church been usurped by apostate forces. The hierarchy currently residing in the Vatican are not legitimate authorities and do not represent the perennial teaching of the Church. Therefore I have listed for your benefit the actual Church’s positions on some current areas of contention.

The only time Francis has ever smiled at a Crucifix

On Communism

The Catholic Church is vehemently opposed to communism. Without Pius XII valiant efforts, communism would have prevailed over postwar France and Italy. The Pope went so far as to issue the Decree against Communism in 1949 which excommunicated any Christian who professed communist doctrine.

Catholicism is the enemy of Marxism as it teaches that there can be no separation of Church and state, and an atheist government is immoral. Catholicism believes private property is a natural right going so far to say that depriving workers of their wages is a sin which cries to heaven for vengeance (compare that to our socialist tax code!).

On Migration and Culture

The current Muslim invasion of Europe would be met with the utmost resistance. It has always been the Church which has sought to safeguard Catholic Culture and in ages past has gone so far as to issue a call to arms against non-Catholics who have sought to destroy it.

Pope Urban II issued the Crusades and Pope Leo the great even went so far as to personally travel into the heart of the Hun army—to Attila himself—to deliver Rome from the sack that was to come. In 1571, St. Pope Pius V formed the Holy League that would go on to defeat the great Muslim Turkish Armada that was plaguing the Mediterranean.

“Then I pointed like so and told them where to take their cultural enrichment”

The tradition of the Church has been to unite the West against external non-christian threats in order to preserve Western Christian culture.

“The natural law enjoins us to love devotedly and to defend the country in which we were born, and in which we were brought up, so that every good citizen hesitates not to face death for his native land…. We are bound, then, to love dearly the country whence we have received the means of engagement this mortal life affords.” – Sapientia Christiana Encyclical Pope Leo XIII

On Abortion and Contraception

So what is the real teaching of the Church in regards to abortion and contraception? The teaching is any member who has an abortion or supports abortion is automatically excommunicated from the Church. That’s right: every single Democrat who claims to be Catholic is actually excommunicated, including Nancy Pelosi who likes to sanctimoniously drone how she is a good Catholic grandmother.

Contraception is also considered a mortal sin because it is an unnatural stoppage of life.

“Hence, after the sin of homicide whereby a human life already in existence is destroyed, this type of sin appears to take next place, for by it the generation of human nature is impeded.” -St. Thomas Aquinas.

I know this is unpopular with the readers, but the teaching is that those who engage in contraception have already committed murder in their heart. Contraception is what allows people to engage in recreational sex, because the natural end of sex has been set aside so too then has the institution of marriage, whose end is children.

Likewise, because we have committed murder in our hearts, we have become a petulant, immature, vain, and a sterile people similar to any other people who have taken the risk from reward or the consequences from pleasure. This is the most difficult pill to swallow.

On Feminism

The Church condemns feminism in the strongest terms. There cannot exist feminism without birth control.

“…any use whatsoever of matrimony exercised in such a way that the act is deliberately frustrated in its natural power to generate life is an offense against the law of God and of nature, and those who indulge in such are branded with the guilt of a grave sin.” -Pius XI Casti Cannubi

The Church asserts that Man is the head of the household and that a woman finds her vocation from being a good mother and housewife:

“This … does not deny or take away the liberty which fully belongs to the woman both in view of her dignity as a human person, and in view of her most noble office as wife and mother and companion; nor does it bid her obey her husband’s every request if not in harmony with right reason or with the dignity due to wife; … For if the man is the head, the woman is the heart, and as he occupies the chief place in ruling, so she may and ought to claim for herself the chief place in love.” -Ibid

The Pope has even gone so far as to condemn women’s suffrage:

“Woman can never be man’s equal and cannot therefore enjoy equal rights. Few women would ever desire to legislate, and those who did would only be classed as eccentrics.” -St. Pius X

On Pacifism

The Catholic Church is not simply just a religion of love and mercy. Christianity is not a weak religion, for our God is a God of Battles. Catholic Tradition encourages us to live our lives in the manner of our Lord Jesus who spoke of the struggle that his Church would have to endure.

“Do not think that I am come to send peace upon earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword.”-Mathew 10:34

Christians are not meant to sit idly as bystanders to the great struggle of good and evil in this world.

“For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood: but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness: against the spirits of wickedness in the high places.” -Ephesians 6:12

[hamliet]

I can’t believe you’re reading 2ha too now! I started following u way back when you were posting tg and snk meta and it’s so weird in an amazing way how you started posting mdzs meta at the same time I started reading it! I’d like to ask you for your thoughts on 2ha so far? (Maybe on Nangong Si and Ye Wangxi’s relationship?) Thank you :)

Ahhhh hi Anon!!! Thank you for sticking with me through all my fandom phases! And hooray, my first 2ha ask!! My general thoughts on the story are that it is a highly enjoyable story with fantastic, compelling characters and genuine emotional beats, though it also was thematically contradictory. That said, I really enjoyed it, and I’m eagerly looking forward to the live action even if it’s going to be heavily censored! I love it and want to make more content for it.

But onto the meat of your ask: Ye Wangxi and Nangong Si, the ship that tears our hearts out. *art is from the audio drama* So 2ha's cultivation world is, like the worlds in MXTX’s novels, utterly hypocritical, corrupt, and filled with people desperate for a justice that does not exist; it's also much more cynical than MXTX's novels in its view of humanity. Nangong Si's and Ye Wangxi's arcs are wrapped up in this view of the world, in concepts such as corruption and justice and the like, so I'm going to open by talking a bit about this before delving into their arcs, and keep in mind I will have discuss spoilers from the manual translation.  

I don't think there's a better summary of what 2ha thinks about justice than what Xue Zhengyong says in this scene when a horribly abused child is on trial for terrible things the child, now grown, went on to do: 

Fate...

Some people were born rich. 

It's not fair.

When fate had poured injustice on those at the bottom, a mere price adjustment order could take the lives of the loved ones around them.

Where is justice?

They were all living people. How could they not hate him? How could they feel relieved?

Even if this child had missed it, even if he was not his blood kin, even if his fate played with him … Thinking of this, his heart still ached.

...

Xue raised his face and watched the clouds drift by."Okay, now that his sin has been repaid, he should at least repay the debt he owes this world." 

The wind was blowing .Xue Zheng Yong suddenly choked with sobs.

"But this world owes him … Did someone give it back to him... Has anyone returned it to him … " 

What about the crimes done to this person to make them that way? Does punishing this person bring any justice? How do we live in a world that is--perhaps irretrievably--broken? Every character explores this idea, and Ye Wangxi and Nangong Si are no exception. 

Nangong Si and Ye Wangxi are both obvious foils: they're children used by their parents, tools more than people. They also both--but especially Nangong Si--foil Shi Mei and Mo Ran in this, in terms of something horrible happening to their mother, something that scarred them for the rest of their lives. For example, Nangong Si's last words to his mother were: 

"I don't understand, I don't want to understand, I …I …” Nangong Si raised his tearful eyes and cried out to his mother, who was outside the forbidden spell, "I hate you! I don't have a mother like you! "

Mo Ran’s mother died and he had to drag her rotting corpse for two weeks to get to a place where he could bury her; Shi Mei’s mother was brutally eaten alive for her power. From these incidents, all three boys learn that the world is cruel in a distinct flavor that will influence everything they do from then on: Mo Ran learns no one will help him even if he begs for it, leading to him being both extremely clingy and extremely mistrustful; Nangong Si learns fate can be cruel and that he, too, can be cruel; Shi Mei learns that he can’t protect everyone and that his heritage puts him and his loved ones, all his people really, in huge danger--and that people will do evil things for power. Guess what he ends up doing. 

Ye Wangxi is also a Mo Ran foil: adopting a false persona and different role to please the people who took them in and were kind to them. Mo Ran pretends to be Xue Zhengyong and Madame Wang's nephew, when he really isn't; Ye Wangxi pretends to be a man to please the father who adopted her. That father is gray; I mean, technically he's morally repulsive, but he did genuinely care for Ye Wangxi. However, Ye Wangxi's willingness to sacrifice her life is not entirely a positive thing: clearly, Nangong Si will do whatever he has to in order to protect her, even marry Song Qiutong; his sacrifice there, likewise, leads to unhappiness for them both. 

Ye Wangxi and Song Qiutong are definitively foiled, and I'm going to sound as if I'm saying Ye Wangxi=good and Song Qiutong=bad, when, while that may be how the novel frames it, is certainly not what the novel actually says (it's an objective contradiction) nor is it what I interpreted. But they are distinct foils, which is why they are the two characters romantically linked to Nangong Si, representing to him the two paths he could choose to go down. Ye Wangxi will sacrifice herself to protect others, as seen in the sacrifice of her love for Nangong Si and her sacrifice of her identity and willingness to sacrifice her life.  

In contrast, Song Qiutong will throw others under the bus to save herself. For example, when she is accused of cheating on Nangong Si, she does not trust people to defend her and falsely accuses Ye Wangxi of rape--even though Ye Wangxi had previously risked her safety to save Song Qiutong from an auction. Now, I've an issue with how the novel frames Song Qiutong for this: I don't understand why Song Qiutong is condemned when (as far as we and Mo Ran himself know at the time) Mo Ran is himself a rapist and when she was entrapped into the situation (i.e. if many characters hadn't been put in certain situations, they wouldn't have done terrible things), especially given her past (constantly living under the threat of being killed or raped--let's be honest, if she was deemed at fault, do you really think they'd just let a Butterfly Bone Beauty go?) and given story otherwise stating that people shouldn't be faulted for wanting to live. Who has repaid her for the wrongs done for her? 

I digress. Still, the tl;dr is that Song Qiutong's way of surviving involves hurting others. Song Qiutong also directly foils Nangong Si. Nangong Si starts out as... well, also as a very self-centered person who didn’t care that Song Qiutong was about to meet a fate worse than death in the light of the inconvenience Ye Wangxi saving her caused him. Additionally, he takes his frustrations out on those around him:

However, even after his father is revealed to be like, the literal worst, Nangong Si cannot condemn his father. He could easily abandon him: in fact, in this cruel world, it might be perceived as more righteous for him to do so, but he doesn't. He gives his father a chance, and when they need a sacrifice and the most logical one is his mentally de-aged father: Nangong Si faces a choice: does he want to be like Song Qiutong? Or does he want to be like Ye Wangxi? He chooses to be like Ye Wangxi. This is not, however, a solely beautiful choice, because remember 2ha's world sucks and its suckery infects everything. The world itself is wrong, and so righteousness--true righteousness--is utterly impossible. Nangong Si sacrifices his life to save them all, but that leaves Ye Wangxi alone and many characters (and readers) grieving. It also could be read as highlighting, for Mo Ran at least, where he has yet to go: a few chapters earlier he almost sacrificed his reputation to warn everyone, but panicked and did not in the end. Mo Ran, of course, is related to Nangong Si by blood and could have sacrificed himself (I'm not saying he should have; the circumstances suck), so I suppose you could view it as Mo Ran still slowly developing (and his callous treatment of Rong Jiu and then entrapment of Song Qiutong as him slowly learning, but if so I wish it had been called out as a "well, I handled that hypocritically" moment later on). Or maybe that's reaching on my part. *shrugs* Ye Wangxi is a moral character, perhaps the most righteous in the story. She is the only one who stands by Mo Ran when he's put on trial to be tortured, declaring confidently:

Ye Wangxi fed him some warm water.

Mo Ran said in a low voice, "Why …."

"You helped A-Si." Ye Wangxi did not raise her head. "You helped me too."

"... On Mount Flood Dragon, if I was the one to die, Nangong will …" Ye Wangxi's hand paused slightly. She was trembling, but she still said in the end, "Everyone wants to live. I won't blame you just because you want to live."

"..."

"Drink it." She said, .”..you've been helping me and A-Si by risking our lives. Now, even if no one is willing to help you, I will still help you." Her expression was still dull, but it was firm. “I'm here." As she said 'here', she was indeed standing by the side of Mo Ran.

It's fitting, then, that Ye Wangxi's ending contrasts her with Shi Mei. She rescues refugees before the final battle and then travels the world with Nangong Si's wolf, because she will never forget the one she loves, and to presumably act justly and do righteousness, sow kindness into a world, rescue people despite how rescuing Song Qiutong actually endangered both her and Nangong Si. 

Shi Mei wanted to change the world, quite literally rewriting time, but only made it worse in the end. Ye Wangxi's way of change might be slower, might be less fantastical, but it's not going to hurt people in the meantime. (Side note: I wish the novel would have been more optimistic and come up with some kind of justice for the Butterfly Bone Beauty people, but it really doesn't as far as I understood (this may be wrong; the MTL of the last twenty or so chapters are confusing!))

[grimoire-of-geekery]

Wicked: a Gamer’s Look at Morality

(pic is from an Etsy store, I really want these dice, they’re freaking gorgeous)

A few years back, I was one of a handful of admin on a roleplaying sim on Second Life, and I was put in charge of teaching basic roleplaying skills to people new to our game.  There’d been a shift in our rule structure, a move towards a more formal rule set very similar to Dungeons and Dragons, and I had to adapt my workshop to reflect that.

Some of you who know me are already cringing on my behalf.  Yep, I’m one of those gamers who loves tabletop roleplaying games, but just... really dislikes D&D.  A lot of my friends already know about my laundry list of complaints (unrelatable magic systems, the ridiculous idea of “evil gods,” unrealistic rules... it’s a long list), and I’m not going to dig too deep into it for this story.  Suffice to say, I have some opinions, and we’ll leave it there.

Ordinarily, I leave my list at home, and just try to avoid playing standard D&D.  This time, however, I had a bunch of friends counting on me to help our players adapt to the new rules, and that meant dealing with some of my prejudices, and turning some of my objections into experiments.  One such experiment, and arguably the most successful one of the set, was an experiment in D&D morality alignment.

I should preface all of this by saying that I told this story in a shorter form on a Facebook group I follow, a DnD players’ group, and that’s what got me thinking about it and wanting to share it with all of you.  Yes, I do realize the irony in being a member of a group centered around a game with which I have so many issues.  I’m a geek, we’re allowed to be inconsistent in the pursuit of our fandoms.  Anyway, someone asked about alignment, and it brought up the whole story for me again, so I’m sharing it with you now (and I’ve also shared it on Facebook), as I feel it’s kind of relevant these days.

Now, those of you who are familiar with D&D already know what the alignments are, but for those new to it: every character you play gets a moral alignment based on a combination of two sets of three traits- Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic, and Good, Neutral, or Evil.  You can play a Lawful Evil character, a Neutral Good character, a Neutral Neutral (called True Neutral) character, a Chaotic Good character, and so on.

Dungeonmasters and storytellers and writers have expounded for years on what those alignments really mean.  Before we nerds had “what is your Hogwarts House?” quizzes and discussions, we had “what D&D alignment are you?” debates.  And frankly, I always hated the whole system.  What rational person would willingly choose to align themselves with “evil?”  How the hell are you going to find someone who’s objectively “good,” or “neutral” for that matter?  And how about the whole “lawful” vs. “chaotic” concept?  These are none of them rational or practical character motivations or personality frameworks, and they afford players the ability to become unrepentant murderhobos far too easily, to the point where there’s a whole genre of roleplaying centered around that mentality called “hack n slash.”  Like, that’s part of the appeal for some people.  I don’t get it, I don’t enjoy it, and it bothers me enough that I decided to change things around with our new players.

We had a character sheet and some various “character HUDs” that allowed players to use abilities like in a video game, with special effects and such.  They came with an alignment choice.  That alignment choice was set up with a grid of nine cards, each with two letters.  Lawful Good wasn’t spelled out, it was just “LG.”  Likewise, Neutral Evil was “NE.”

This gave me an idea.  A WICKED idea.

I sat my players down, and said to them, “forget what you know about alignments, I’m changing the rules.  We’ll choose your alignment after you design your character.”  They went about the business of designing who they were going to play in our game.  At the end, they were to choose an alignment, based solely on what they thought those letters meant.

They chose.  One guy chose LE because he wanted to play an evil character who still played by the rules.  Another girl chose CN because she wanted, and I quote, “to do whatever she wanted without concern for morality.”  All of the players finished their choices, and that’s when I unveiled the surprise.This is what I told them:

Those of you who chose an E, congratulations, E= Elphaba.  You each get a small starting advantage of some kind- a power boost, like a feat or an extra cantrip.  It’s small, but useful.  However, you also gain an uncanny mark which puts you at a social disadvantage, causing people to vilify you or be intimidated.  Good for intimidation checks, bad for making friends.

Those of you who chose an N, N= Nessarose.  You get a physical disadvantage that causes people to infantilize you.  You may choose a magical method to circumvent the physical side of that disadvantage, but you can’t get rid of the social aspects of it.  Bad for intimidation, good for getting people to feel sorry for you.

Those of you with a G, congrats, you’re all Glinda.  You get a social advantage with strings attached, and a single fatal mental flaw, causing you to miss certain information and misjudge things.  You will be good at making friends and manipulating people, but you’ll also be dependent upon them.  Choose what social group you’re connected to now.

My final declaration: your letter determines what kinds of options you have.  Glindas can’t make decisions that are only available to Nessaroses or Elphabas, and vice versa with all three.  You are limited in your scope, and you will have to deal with the consequences of your actions in a way that’s in keeping with your alignment.  And no, you can’t just choose a new alignment, you’ll have to change it in character through story.

Suddenly, I had a bunch of players who thought they were done with their character creation, scrambling to figure out how to revamp their sheet and make their characters playable.  Naturally, I got a number of “it’s not fair” complaints, and one player stormed out and threw a tantrum.  Eventually, though, we had a large chunk of people with characters which had a lot more intricacy and detail woven into their design than they had previously attempted.  We had players who were actually excited to play with the others, because they no longer knew which way their character would go.

I had left the whole “lawful/neutral/chaotic” thing alone, so people could use it as a touchstone in their behavior choices.  I also gave them the option of changing their alignment in character, with the understanding that the changes would cause them to lose whatever advantages their previous alignment granted them.

The axiomatic side of things actually helped some of the players understand character motives and moral choice, which was awesome.  They learned that the letters are in that order for a reason- Lawful Good instead of Good Lawful, because the axiomatic aspect was about choosing for oneself, and the moral aspect was for how one deals with one’s consequences.

People who are good aren’t people who only ever do good.  People make mistakes, they screw up, they lose their footing or have bad judgment or get confused or experience temporary states of insanity.  People who are evil aren’t people who only ever do evil.

Being “good” is about accountability, about accepting that not everything is about us.  A “good” person is someone who chooses to accept that their choices affect the world in ways they cannot always predict, and that they will one day have to pay the piper for their actions.  They accept their accountability for their actions, they endeavor (rationally, and in a way that serves them as much as anyone else) to make the world a better place for everyone, even if it’s just in small ways.

A “neutral” person is someone unconcerned with consequences.  Maybe they just are in it for the experience, maybe they see no moral quandary with their actions or their situation.  Maybe they’re not able to see the longer view, or they haven’t had a reason to look yet.  Maybe they’re not in a phase of their life where they’re interested in responsibility.  Neutral isn’t a way to drive though.  It’s the setting in your car for “not going anywhere.”  A person is neutral when they’re reactive, and they’re often not thinking about whether their reactions are acceptable or not.

Conversely, an “evil” person is someone who refuses to be accountable.  They don’t just ignore consequences, they aren’t ever wrong, and their constant efforts are towards advantage and maintaining their position at the top of the heap.  They don’t have to answer to anyone for anything they do, not even themselves.  Maybe they have a nihilistic “nothing matters anyway” philosophy about the world.  Maybe they’re convinced that the ends justify the means.  The difference between them and the other types is, their choices are corrupting and make the world a little harder to live in for everyone involved.  Not that they care, they sleep just fine, thanks.

Now, I have been all three of these people at one point in my life, and I’ve learned that there aren’t good or evil people, just choices and consequences and how you deal with both.  I’ve learned that I’m pretty much never okay with being a neutral person, it stresses me out.  I’ve also learned that I’m not fond of evil at all, because I genuinely like life and the world we live in.  So, good it is, as often as possible, even if it’s just in small ways.

I think it’s important, especially now, for us to recognize that chaos can be good, that law can be evil (and obviously vice versa), and that being neutral is rarely the way forward.  Nobody who strives to make the world better for themselves or those they care about ever thinks they’re doing evil.  And, they’re right, because they’re not doing evil or good.  Good and evil are in the consequences, they’re in how they’re going to deal with the fallout of their mistakes, or how they’re going to handle their success or good fortune.

Those of you looking for good in the world?  Do good, even if it’s small.  Don’t worry about being perfect, focus on making a small difference and making the world a better place.  I promise you, it’s never a bad choice.  And if you have to get a little Wicked to do it, that’s fine.  Chaos can be good.  So can law.  And only those who don’t value good would not try to make good out of both.

Addendum: maybe this is important, maybe not, but out of twelve players I instructed in that class (I went back and counted names in my records), none of them ever tried to change their alignment.  They all became very fond of their character’s personality and identity, and felt no need to change what they’d fought hard to develop and understand.  When a person’s identity is in question, it can often become a fight for survival to change one’s behavior.  To be different means that the old self dies, and nobody takes death well.  I think that might be useful information for some of us right now.  For me, I’m keeping in mind that good and evil are about consequences, and I’m striving to make sure that any fighting I do, whether for my own identity or for the safety of what I love, will be towards making this world a better place, especially for those who have a hard time finding safety or hope.

[kimyoonmiauthor]

Why Your Books Will Get Banned (Old Nanowrimo Post)

I used to post this game on Nanowrimo. I saved the text before Nanowrimo declared that the N-word spelled out was OK and this wasn’t a democracy (2010, in the archives, at the bottom). I figure it’s OK to post that unless they didn’t change their policy since then, because they want prejudice (though that wasn’t the worst of what they wouldn’t mod). Writing forums need to be run at the top by diverse people, and not just white women. Separate post though. BTW, I have witnesses who still remember this incident, so it isn’t slander. I was working on diversity in the writing forums before WeNeedDiverseBooks was a thing and squandered the opportunity by making it only YA. And I’ll still call them out for that. It got challenged, this thread once, much to the laughter of everyone. (for being anti-Christian lol) If the writer is out there that challenged the thread and somehow got published. Thumbs up, good for you. Maybe you revised since then? The thing I didn’t post with this post every year from 2005-2010 I did this post was I posted it because I wanted people to think hard on Free Speech and what it meant. So I’ll hardball it this time. As you read the list, think hard on who is gate keeping. And who has the right to gate keep. Is gate keeping a tool to oppress and do the power minorities have a right to use the same tool back? How many books don’t even get a chance to be published? I’d also add that chasing after individual authors for the last 10 years has done nothing to change the system. The percentages are the exact same. And how that affects what people in the future will think of us now. Can you write a book that won’t be challenged on these fronts at all? And if you’re going to say, “You’re anti-cancel culture” This was posted before “cancel culture” was a thing. This is more like an examination of the system of censorship itself. (Because look, I like examining systems.) If you want to take this list, BTW, this is years and years of my work reading through ALA who never compiled this list. I’d been following the list since High School when I did a banned book class (which was a fad of the time, I think). So... maybe, give me credit? I feel sad I have to say that. And thanks to Jakob Nielsen and my Typography prof for teaching me the way to format text.

This thread was originally started in honor of ALA Banned Book Week. I've started this several years in a row. Disclaimers for this thread: ('cause I've done this for a few years) 1. We do not support the idea of banning/challenging books. 
2. We are doing this for fun and it should not be taken seriously. 
3. If you are seriously offended by the fact that we would write these scenes into books please consider the following:
a. It is out of context.
b. You probably unwittingly own a banned book without knowing it. Please check the list: <a href="http://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks">http://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks</a>
c. We are not popular enough to get our books banned, and by hoping in a weird way that they will get banned, you are helping our egos. ^.~
d. If you are religious, the Qu'ran, the (I think Ramayana), the Torah, the Bible all have been challenged or banned. (KJV of the Bible if you plan to be snooty, by even more ironically Jews once, and Atheists the second time). (The Art of War, I also believe was challenged/banned.) (And also, the Bible probably contains more than half of the issues that Christians ban other books for. Christians banned Moll Flanders. All the issues the banned Moll Flanders for is in the Old Testament. Particularly Genesis) 
4. This is not a thread for hot debate on the moralities of book banning. It is for listing why you think your book will get banned. If you would like to do so--please start a separate thread. You don't have to stick to Nanowrimo for this thread either.

General Notes: ('cause I like to point out the humor) - This thread was challenged and asked to be banned before. (Because someone was offended by the contents.) The challenge failed, BTW, just in case you'd like to challenge it again. - You probably have to write Young Adult and under to get banned *most* of the time. - Asterisks indicate new ones for the year. (BTW, most of it is about Islam, this year... sex and violence of course)

Want to avoid getting banned/challenged? (Categorized by how the banners see it for maximum head desk based on real book challenges and bannings.)

RELIGION You can't talk about religion. -- No taking the Lord's name in vain. -- You can't have anyone question the will of God or curse them when they lose faith after losing their best friend. (Bridge to Terabithia) -- Anything from Islam --- Cannot include Islam, even as a text book, because it will "indoctrinate the students into the Islamic religion." even if you are only covering it as a chapter. * (World History by Ellis, Elisabeth Gaynor and Anthony Esler.) *

-- Anything (fill in your religion here.) because some people are (fill in your exclusionary term here) -- Atheism (though not a religion, still argued by the theists as one. =P) -- You can't swear, including the word "damn." -- A boy and a girl can't live together if not related, because it's obviously living in sin. -- Can't be detrimental to Christian values.* (The Handmaids Tale, which is BTW, based on a Biblical story...) (The Bible, Torah, Qu'ran and many other religious books have been banned. Yes, if you have a religious book,  it has most likely been banned or challenged.)

SOCIAL INEQUALITY You can't talk about class or classism.

You can't talk about race. -- You can't use racial slurs. -- You can't talk about racism. -- You can't have a black bunny marry a white bunny because that's supporting interracial marriage. (The Rabbit's Wedding, though Once Upon a Time in Wonderland also does this explicitly... must have enraged the challenger.) -- The book can't be deemed racist in any fashion. -- You can't talk about Mexican-American issues or history. (Apparently it's a lie that Mexican Americans get racism. *cough*) (Arizona Governor, though it was overturned later). -- You cannot have a Person of Color explicitly on the cover of the book. (Barnes and Nobles pulled that off with Cindy Pon's Silver Pheonix--not to mention all the other publishers.)

No talking about over eating, bad eating habits. No talking about disabilities including cerebral palsy. Can't be sympathetic to Armenians or for portraying Azerbaijans as "savages" [book burner's words] (because apparently you will get a $12,700 price on your head to *cut your ear off* for being historically accurate.) (Stone dreams by Aylisli) *

QUILTBAG Issues: -- You can't talk about sexuality. (As in the willingness to have sex). -- You can't talk about sexual orientation. (As in Straight LGB) -- You can't talk about gender identity issues unless it is cis and not crime investigation kind either. - Main character cannot have two fathers. (The Popularity Papers by Amy Ignatow)

Magic Issues: You can't have talking animals. (Peter Rabbit.) Oh, no magic, no mention of witches, and no fantasy (That promotes Satanism and teaches them to do evil satanic spells).  (Harry Potter)

VIOLENCE Children can't do violence, especially to adults or to each other. Especially school violence. You can't have kids doing stunts or possibly hurting themselves. No realistic depictions of the Vietnam War. Can't be Graphic.* (The House of the Spirits) - Cannot have violent illustrations.*  (The Librarian of Basra by Jeanette Winter and Nasteen's Secret School by Jeaenette Winter)

No dysfunctional families. -- You can't talk about child abuse.

No characters may ever die. -- No dead parents. -- No dead siblings. -- No dead best friends (Even if you are a Christian author, other Christians will come after you).  (Bridge to Terabithia) -- No dying adults. -- You may not mention anyone dead (already) or dying (currently). -- No young infants dying. -- No talk of euthanasia.

You can't have any mention of cannibalism. (Alive, etc)

DRUGS You can't mention any drugs, including alcohol, especially with teenagers drinking it. (The Perks of Being a Wallflower--though there are many others) --- Children can't carry alcoholic beverages.

GENERAL MORAL OBJECTIONS You can't have it be morally corrupt. -- You can't have monsters of any kind. (Where the Wild Things Are) It can't be a "Downer" (Anne Frank) And by all means it can't be "icky." "gross" or "scary" (Goosebumps) Can't be perceived as Anti-feminist.* You can't be a PoC and write something negative about being a PoC.* (The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian) - Cannot have "inappropriate content" (Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman [Welcome to the banned books club, Mr. Gaiman.])* - You cannot have a single mother. (The popularity papers by Amy Ignatow.)* - Cannot be a "Bad book" that "one shouldn't be associated with."* (Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison) - Cannot have "an underlying socialist-communist agenda."*(Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison--note it was challenged in her own home state for this....) - Cannot have a book that goes on about "developmental preparedness" (i.e about children developing?) and "student readiness."  (The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi)*

No children defying authority figures. -- No cursing at parents. -- No disobeying parents. -- You can't have kids breaking dishes (especially to avoid washing them). (A Light in the Attic)

No toilet humor. You can't have characters eating worms, because that's unsanitary.  (How to Eat Fried Worms)

SEX Your book can't mention any private parts. You can't mention body parts (this was how it was phrased. --;;) -- Even if you have drawings of lots of people on the beach, not even one of them, even when drawn at 2cm x 2cm can be topless, even as a joke. (Where is Waldo) -- No talk or showing of nudity.  (even when private parts aren't shown) -- You cannot teach sexual issues in your book to middle school students. * (The Middle School Survival Guide)

You can't have masturbation or any mention of sex. -- No beastiality -- No showing of safe sex. (Apparently Teen pregnancy is still A-OK, but safe sex isn't! --;;) -- And you can't use any words with "tit" in them. (Title will now be called tidle just not to offend anyone.)  (Harry Potter)

Rape may be seen by banners as a type of porn. (I see it as violence, but the banner saw it as titilating sex. --;; *gags*) (Speak)

AUTHOR CAN'T BE... -- LGBT (Asexuality, apparently, is still safe.) -- You can't have the same name as anyone connected to "Socialism" or "Marxism." (Texas School board)

Good luck getting it published.

So yes, this was started as satire. If you have any further questions about said history of said thread, you are welcome to PM me. Do not start it in the thread.

And please reply using the "reply" button at the bottom of the page, not this post.

Banned books for this year PDF: http://www.ila.org/BannedBooks/ALA016%20Short%20List%20L3c_low%20%281%29.pdf

[damienthepious]

oops! i did it again (ficced some Penumbra)

When The Reckoning Arrives (Chapter 1) (Complete!) [ao3] [Chapter 2] [Chapter 3] [Chapter 4] [Chapter 5] [Chapter 6]

Fandom: The Penumbra Podcast

Relationship: Lord Arum/Sir Damien/Rilla

Characters:  Sir Damien, Sir Angelo, Queen Mira, Sir Caroline, Rilla, Lord Arum, The Keep, Quanyii

Additional Tags: Post-Season/Series 02, Established Relationship, Forbidden Love, (lmao), Threats of Violence, Declarations Of Love, (but probably not the way you're thinking), Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Sir Absolon is here if you squint, background Sir Caroline/Quanyii

Summary: As Damien crosses the threshold into the Citadel, the sunrise at his back and moss clinging to his boots, he is stopped at spearpoint. (AKA: There are, inevitably, consequences for being too complacent while having a highly illegal affair with an enemy combatant.

Notes: ahahahaha this is the literal polar opposite to my other Penumbra fic hey sorry about that? Stick with me here, things will get worse before they get better. Title taken from the Mountain Goats song, Heretic Pride. And like, basically the entire inspiration for this disaster. Saints bless.]

-

As Damien crosses the threshold into the Citadel, the sunrise at his back and moss clinging to his boots, he is stopped at spearpoint.

“Pardon- me?” he says, blinking, and then there are more spears, more guards glaring at him in alarm and fury over their points. Damien raises his hands in surrender, more confused than frightened, and asks with a laugh, “To what do I owe this pomp and circumstance at my arrival, friend guards?”

“Silence!” one of them barks in what Damien recognizes as a poor imitation of Sir Caroline’s authoritative tone. Apparently she has had an impact on the ranks in the months since her promotion. “You are to be detained and brought before the Queen. Do not resist, traitor.”

Damien feels a moment of worry at the word ‘traitor’, but he takes a breath and allows tranquility to fill him. Focus, wait, learn the situation before reacting. He raises an eyebrow, keeping his hands carefully above his head. “I have no such plans as of this moment,” he says calmly. “To resist, I mean. Shall I remove my weapons for you, then?”

The guard who spoke is thrown by the acquiescence, and he hesitates before glaring with renewed fury. “Drop your weapons now!”

Damien thinks that Sir Caroline could possibly have done a better job with this particular squad. He starts to lower his hands to do as told, but the guards all collectively flinch at the movement and their spears waver in a concerning way, so he pauses for a long moment to consider the best course of action. “Shall I remove my quiver first, so you know I cannot fire when I remove my bow? Or would one of you like to take them off of me, for your own peace of mind?”

There is another moment of pause before the apparent guard in charge gestures for one of his squad to move forward and disarm the knight, and Damien would be amused by their twitchy hesitance if it were not an immediate threat to him. He makes no move to stop the man as he unbuckles the quiver, then the bow, and then the sheaf of the knife at his hip. Damien almost flinches at that – the knife is borrowed, more an object of familiarity and comfort than a weapon as far as he is concerned – but he suppresses the reaction to a mere frown. The guard should bind his hands, now, Damien thinks, but the collective group seems almost afraid to even touch him. “There,” he says with levity he does not feel. “That is better, is it not? Lead on to the Queen, then, gentlemen, and I shall follow.”

It is not a particularly long walk, but Damien feels the stares of the entire Citadel as they watch him pass through. He tries not to pay it any mind, tries not to notice if there is anyone he recognizes watching as he is escorted through the streets at spearpoint, tries not to feel the lack of his bow as acutely as nakedness, but he falters in the effort once or twice.

He could have made an escape, he thinks absently, by way of distraction. He could have disarmed the lot of them, trained by Sir Caroline or no, and retreated from the Citadel before another soul managed to confront him… but what purpose would that serve? Whatever he was being detained for – and there was only one glaring, loud possibility he was trying and failing not to consider – it would not help his cause in the least if he hurt someone on the guard, or if he tried to run. Damien has worried his own sins and supposed sins over in his own mind long and hard enough that they have ground down to sand, and he finally came to the surprising realization that where Arum is concerned, his feelings and his actions are not wrong, even if the laws of the Citadel contradict what he knows.

He breathes in the cool morning air in one last long lingering lungful before they bring him inside, leading him towards the Queen.

“Sir Damien! My good friend and rival!”

Angelo’s voice booms from the other side of a wide hall and Damien winces at the number of heads it turns as Angelo hup hup hups his way over to himself and his escort. “Good morning, Sir Angelo,” Damien says as lightly as he can manage, keeping in step with the guards as he does. “I’m afraid I’ve been summoned and I cannot stay to speak with you.”

“What a terrible shame!” Sir Angelo cries, and then he pauses, eying Damien curiously for a moment before he speaks again. “Hold on a moment… your- Sir Damien, your…” he narrows his eyes, his bold voice dipping down uncertainly into a more manageable register when he notices Damien’s bow dangling improperly from the hands of one of the guards. He looks over the scene as he keeps pace with the uncomfortably hurrying squadron, his brow furrowing in thought. “Is�� is there something wrong with your hands, my friend?”

“No, Sir Angelo, not as such,” Damien says with an amused sigh.

“Have the straps on your quiver broken, then?”

“No, Sir Angelo.”

“A rather strange and chivalrous favor done out of the goodness of these kind guards hearts-”

“Sir Damien has been accused of treason and is being brought into custody!” one of the guards snaps, “and I will thank you to leave us to our work, Knight.”

“Ah, that certainly explains all of the spears these fine fellows are pointing at y- Saints what possible reason could there be to accuse my best friend and rival of something so hideous as treason!? Sir Damien-”

Angelo reaches a hand for Damien’s shoulder, and the procession finally halts. The spears waver, as if carefully considering how reasonable an idea it would be to point at the intimidatingly muscular form of Sir Angelo instead of the deceptively slight Sir Damien. They don’t aim Angelo’s way, in the end, but the consideration was obvious enough in the air that Angelo’s hand doesn’t make contact with his friend.

“It’s alright, Sir Angelo,” Damien says quietly. “I’ve done nothing wrong. I’m not afraid.”

“Of course you’ve done nothing wrong!” Angelo cries, voice cracking in the middle. “And so, these fellows should clearly let you go.”

The guards tense, and Damien sighs again. “I have been summoned by the Queen, Sir Angelo. And my duty is to report as summoned, is it not?”

“Well- yes, of course, but-”

“Don’t worry for me, my friend.”

“I cannot allow them to arrest you, Sir Damien, you-”

“If you draw that sword, Sir Angelo, you will regret it.” Sir Caroline steps towards them, boots clicking on the stone, her expression unreadable beyond the usual veneer of vague disappointment.

Damien feels a pang of hurt, but he stifles it. If this detainment is because Caroline spoke out then, yes, that would be a betrayal given her stated intention to stay out of their business, but Damien cannot be sure that is what happened. Caroline doesn’t look particularly smug about his situation; only dutiful, as always.

“I would not draw on the city guard, Captain Sir Caroline!” Angelo yelps, flinging his hands away from his own body in a gesture of innocence.

“Hm.” She turns to Damien and gives a small nod, then looks at the guard. “Why have you stopped, anyway?” Their heels collectively click together, and every one of them looks overwhelmed by her mild ire. “Go on, then.”

“Er- one thing, Sir Angelo?” Damien hesitates, eyes flicking to the guards for a moment. “You- would you talk to- would you tell-”

“Rilla, of course!” Angel nods fervently, and Damien hopes that he knows that Damien is asking him to talk to both of his loves, actually. It’s a faint sort of hope, but… maybe he’ll figure it out.

“Tell- tell her not to worry, please?” Damien swallows, and makes himself smile. “And tell her to be safe.”

“Very good,” Sir Caroline says in an exquisitely bored tone. “Move along, then. Sir Angelo, I believe you have other duties to attend to, hm?” She raises an eyebrow, then gestures towards the barracks. “Off you get.”

Angelo pauses, giving one last confused, pained look towards Damien, and then he wanders off, for once silent, and Sir Caroline follows behind.

There is little to distract him then, between there and the Queen’s audience chamber.

Queen Mira watches him enter, still and cool as marble, and the moment the guards shove him forward onto his knees, she frowns and lifts a hand.

“Leave us.”

There is hesitation, while the guards struggle between the instinct to obey what the Queen instructs and the desire to stand between her and the highly skilled, treasonous knight with his hands still unbound. The obedience wins in the end, and they flee, and only when the enormous stone door is closed again do Queen Mira’s shoulders sink, her stiff stance cascading into one of exhaustion.

Damien remains kneeling, unsure what his Queen intends.

“Sir Damien,” she says, voice clear and cool and slow. “I have trusted you implicitly since you achieved your Knighthood. You have a moral core that I wish more of your order shared, and a profound sense of compassion, and the most tenacious nature of anyone in the Second Citadel.” She inhales deeply, looking down at him with an expression so utterly blank it’s like being observed by the moon. He drops his eyes to the floor instinctively. “All of those factors combined… are why it is so difficult for me to believe that you have committed the treason of which I have been made aware.”

Tranquility, Damien’s heart murmurs, even as it chugs anxiously in his chest. Tranquility, tranquility, oh Saint Damien your tranquility I beg you-

“Well, Sir Damien? Have you nothing to say for yourself?”

“I am waiting, my Queen.”

“Waiting for what?”

“For the accusation itself. I cannot defend against that of which I have not been made fully aware. The guards who brought me in were conspicuously tight-lipped on the subject, I must say.”

Damien raises his eyes again, and the Queen watches him for a long, still moment.

“Three witnesses claim to have seen you at the edge of the jungle, Sir Damien, holding a decidedly amicable conversation with a monster.” She pauses, scrutinizing Damien for a breath or two. Damien suspects that this is not the end of the accusation, and when he remains silent he is eventually proven correct. “They also claim that when this conversation was finished, you embraced the creature, and- kissed it. The monster. On the mouth,” she says pointedly.

Damien draws a mercifully steady breath and lifts his chin, meeting the eyes of his Queen.

“If this is a mistake, Sir Damien, I command you to tell me so now. If this is a curse, or a compulsion or a thrall- if you are being manipulated or coerced or blackmailed, you must tell me. I can do nothing to protect you if you do not tell me what has caused you to commit this- this betrayal.”

It’s an out, and Damien knows it. She doesn’t want to believe that he would choose to betray the Citadel, so she is grasping at any possibility that would shift the guilt of the act to the monsters, and not Damien himself. He could lie, claim a curse, claim anything, really, and Queen Mira might grant mercy or clemency or- forgiveness.

But Damien does not desire forgiveness. He knows in his heart that his love for Arum is something good. As purely good as his love for Rilla, as good as their love together. He is long since past that guilt, now, and the idea of being forgiven for loving Arum- it is incomprehensible.

As incomprehensible as the idea of turning, and blaming Arum for tricking or manipulating him into love, as the Queen seems to expect him to do right now.

“I command you to speak, Sir Damien,” Mira says, and a crack of grim humor slips into her expression for a half-second. “For what may be the first time.”

A laugh wants to bubble out of Damien, but he is too scared that it will escalate to hysterics if he lets it. He is calm now, calm only through force of will and a surety of feeling, but he needs to maintain his grip. He breathes deep, and then breathes again slowly, and then he allows himself to speak his heart.

“The monster your witnesses saw is called Lord Arum,” Damien says, softly. “He who rules the Swamp of Titan’s Blooms. He is an architect. He is quick, and clever, and proud, and I have been in love with him since the battle at Fort Terminus, at least.”

Queen Mira’s expression shatters into utter shock, which is just about what Damien expects it to do.

“He poses no threat to the Citadel,” Damien continues. “His most earnest desire is to be left alone by humanity and monsterkind alike, with the exception of- of myself.” He barely avoids blurting Rilla’s involvement. Barely. “He loves me as well.”

“It does not love you,” the Queen says, voice scathing, and Damien can’t help the bemused, disbelieving smile that curves his lips. It feels strange, to feel disappointed in his typically wise, venerable Queen, but that claim is too ridiculous for Damien to bear with a straight face. She glares at his expression, eyes going even colder. “The monster has tricked you somehow, Sir Damien.”

“He has done no such thing, my Queen.” Memory, steadying him; Arum draped over his back, leaching heat and murmuring soft complaints into his ear. Arum, watching him practice with his bow as his arm recovered, equal measures of worry and pride in his violet eyes. Arum, carrying Rilla more than was strictly necessary as her own injury healed, doting and pretending not to. Arum, throwing his weapon into the mud, looking down at him with vulnerability and hope and desire. Damien knows. Damien knows this, with utter certainty. “He loves me.”

“You are lost, Sir Damien,” she says, a new hopelessness in her voice. “It is using you to try to get to the Citadel. It is performing another trick, another manipulation, just like the last one-”

“Lord Arum helped us defeat the fear monster, actually,” Damien admits, gently. “Sir Caroline did not know, but that was how- how we learned the methods the creature used. Lord Arum told us, of his own free will and under no coercion. If he had not done so, we would have gone into the situation completely unaware of the kind of danger we were in. He did not want us to die.”

“That is impossible.” Mira slashes her hand through the air between them, as if she needs to accentuate her denial. As if it isn’t perfectly clear that she won’t believe him. “Do you have anyone who can corroborate that claim?”

Rilla can, of course, since she is the one Arum actually gave the information to, but Damien cannot say that. “Arum could not speak with Sir Caroline or Sir Angelo,” Damien deflects, shaking his head. “They would sooner have killed him than let him explain.”

“As would be their duty,” Mira says, each word clipped short. “As should yours have been. To destroy a monster that threatened our Citadel and its citizens.”

“Lord Arum is not a threat,” Damien repeats. “He may once have been, but-”

“You really think a monster would change for you, Sir Damien? Are you truly so naive as that?”

“Not for me alone,” he says, and then quickly follows with, “and I do not think he has changed all that much altogether. He was always Arum, and only his priorities and perspective have changed. He is not a threat, my Queen.”

“This is your defense,” Mira says, and she sounds disappointed. “It is no threat, so you should not be punished?”

Damien sighs, closing his eyes for a moment. “It is perfectly clear that by the letter of the law, I have colluded with a monster and thereby have committed treason against the Second Citadel,” he says. “What I now understand to be true, my Queen, is that the letter of the law is wrong.”

“How dare you,” the Queen whispers. “The Second Citadel nearly came to ruin, nearly fell to fire and fear at the hands and claws and machinations of these beasts, and you try to claim that collusion is not treason?”

“All monsters are not evil,” Damien says, and the Queen inhales a gasp. “They are all so very different, my Queen. Has that not always been the most difficult challenge in fighting them, in holding them back? Every one is a unique being, just as we humans are. They are more chaotic, yes, and less predictable, but- Arum is not the only monster that would choose peace with the humans if given the opportunity.”

“You have colluded with other monsters now, Sir Damien? You admit this?”

“I have spoken to some peaceably, yes. Not many; Arum happens to be a very solitary creature,” he says, and he feels a soft smile curve his lips.

“Have you allowed every one of them to take you to bed as well?”

The Queen’s words are biting and bitter and crass, and not at all like her. Damien frowns, but brushes away the stab of hurt he feels at the question and lifts his chin defiantly. “There is no call for vulgarity, my Queen.”

Her jaw clenches, but she neither apologizes nor repeats the question. After a long moment, she speaks again. “You are determined not to repent, then,” she says, and Damien can hear her stifling a deep sadness. He pities her - and that is quite an odd feeling - but his will is like steel when he knows he is following the right path. “You will not defend yourself.”

“I have defended myself, my Queen,” Damien says, feeling very, very tired all at once. “I have defended myself as honestly as I am able. I have spoken my heart, spoken the truth of it, and told you where that self-same heart and my guiding Saint have led me. My fate lies in your judgment now, in your understanding and clarity of vision. I know who I am, my Queen, and I must believe that you know who I am as well. I love my Citadel.” There are tears burning at the corners of his eyes, the fierceness of his conviction thunders in his heart, but he ignores them both and continues. “I love the people I defend. You must know that I believe what I say, because if I thought for a moment that Arum posed a threat, you know that I could not live with myself if anyone was hurt by my inaction towards him.”

“Yes,” Mira says slowly, and Damien feels her tone creep like dread up his spine. “I can see that you believe what you say.” Damien can feel his future solidifying as the Queen speaks, his very short and unfortunate future before she inevitably sentences him to hang. “That, Sir Damien, is precisely what frightens me.”

[ihaveonlymydreams]

"Marriage as a Creative Work"

By Louise Cowan

I am maintaining that this mysterious phenomenon of becoming “one flesh” occurs only in marriage, not in any relation outside marriage. It is not a property of sexual love, then, but of marriage. Marriage is an actual, very real vocation: its task, primarily, is not just the happiness of two people, or the establishment of a family, or even the salvation of two souls; but the construction of an entity, which constitutes a sacred area within society, a territory within which the divine may pitch its tent. (Recall Abraham and Sarah; the Holy Family.)

Now marriages can be characterized in no other way except to say that they have been made by the decision to “cleave to one another” as long as life lasts. Each marriage is a unit, having its own character; there can hardly be any standardized measurement for quality, nor any prescribed roles that either partner must invariably play (Men may do the housework; women may earn the living.) Its single requirement is the shared intention of mutual bestowal of self to the end, through whatever pleasures or ordeals circumstances may bring. Each marriage has its own arcane discipline, its secret wellsprings. Yet each shares in being an alliance recognized by legal, political, social, and religious institutions. Matrimony as legal contract, as social custom, and as sacred ceremony are institutional ways of dealing with a fundamental and private joining that Church and state acknowledge as occurring—in whatever circumstances—when a man and woman pledge themselves to each other, body and soul, with a lasting commitment. Customs and mores change; but the reality represented by marriage, from as far back as human investigation can determine, is unchanging.

In considering this fundamental conjunction into which a man and a woman enter with the aim of permanence, we are speaking not simply of a relationship but of a union. Outside marriage there can be, of course, and are quite profound relationships, according to the disposition of the persons involved: some may be deep and lasting friendships; some, bonds of piety, or romantic passions; others may be based on a connaturality—not necessarily eros or philia—but a special agape—a bestowing love in which the two partners “recognize” each other and discover an intimacy in which they feel they know each other's total being, so that they seem to be two halves of one whole: “soul mates.” (Faulkner depicts this relationship in Gavin Stevens and Linda Snopes, who appear in The Town and the The Mansion.) Theirs may be a truly I-Thou relationship, in which the beloved is known from within. And though, according to the ways of the world, one would expect this relationship to result in a sexual consummation—and though it would seems, ideally, that it should issue in marriage—still it need not necessarily do so. (We oversimplify the human heart in our day. Human beings are capable of all sorts of loving relations.)

Marriage does not require as its basis this sort of affinity, though ideally the union should be founded on a genuine empathy. This truly mutual love of the soul is a gift—and, when it occurs in marriage, a very great blessing to a wedded union. But fundamentally marriage should be founded on something else: on one’s sober estimate of the other person as a life partner, on his or her character, on his ability to grow, his willingness to enter fully into a life adventure. And the marriage is initiated by a decision: a vow, a pledge. For the promise creates the reality, or at least opens the way for its creation. Married love will be given as the result of the pledge.

Love is a gift: marriage is a work. The feeling of belonging to another person comes of its own accord; marriage, in contrast, is a free act like any act of choice. It marks the beginning of a new status. Once established, marriage creates a metaphysical reality shared by two people; the two partners give themselves to each other, fully sanctioning this new conjunction for an entire lifetime. Their bodily union consummates this pledge. In this manner a freely willed act can bring into being an objective status which, once founded, is no longer limited to or dependent upon the will of either person. (It is something like having a child; one cannot undo its existence.) For a marriage to exist at all (in the ontological sense), it must be entered into as something that cannot be revoked—and herein lies the reason for the failure of so many matrimonial ventures launched with such high hopes in our day. In the inevitable disappointments that follow—the disagreements, the hardships and disappointments—the sins, possible infidelities, psychological aberrations—both partners at times, no doubt in most marriages, look for a way out. And for many, the desire to start over, to rid oneself of the painful imperfections of the past, takes on the semblance of a high moral cause—divorce becomes almost an obligatory rite of purification.

For how can one go on with something so marred as most human lives turn out to be? How can we bear having a witness to the mistakes and failures in our lives, the vanity and littleness uncovered—our own and our spouse’s? Only by holding to the belief that matrimony seriously entered into is irrevocable can marriage partners grow beyond the natural repugnance that any two people at times feel for each other—the sense of being trapped by something alien, the wild desire that comes intermittently to be absolutely free to choose one’s own path, completely alone. Only by encountering, sometimes in violence, the permanence—and the sacredness—of the union and its enduring ability to heal and be healed can conjugal partners surmount their sense of injury—to go beyond even the sense of their own virtue. And in doing so they consent to enter by stages into a realm that has little to do with virtues or vices, but more to do with giving and forgiving; a realm governed by a deep and pervasive presence that is not simply love of each other, but a love far superior to that of either partner—a love that instructs.

Now let me make clear that I am not speaking of an ideal state, or of a lyrically happy situation. I mean to be describing what has heretofore been taken as actuality: for in every century before this one and, as far as we can tell in every society, marriage has been considered not simply as a contract between two separate parties, nor a fulfilling romantic relationship in love, but a solemn union, celebrated by a joining, that is always recognized as sacred and connected to the primordial. The new life of marriage is a being in itself; and it need not necessarily be a happy one. For just as not every individual in him or herself is happy or fortunate, so too with matrimony. Many marriages are, one recognizes, quite miserable; most are neutral, neither happy nor unhappy; but if they have been genuinely entered into with the intention of permanence, they all become a source of grace to the participants. Happiness is not the goal of marriage: the work of creation and redemption is.

In the unity of marriage, there are still two separate minds, two hearts, two imaginations, two proclivities; there is no mystical transformation into one substance. It is not, as Catherine declares in Wuthering Heights: “I am Heathcliff!” The union does not produce sameness in its two halves; it is more as the myths would have it: Earth and sky, yin and yang, etc. These make an ontological unity—a whole—that is not composed of similitudes but contrasts. Indeed, if we look back at ancient myths, we shall see that this diversity—the difference in the two sexes—is the precise reason for their existence. For ancient myths speak of one originary sex: split into two for punishment, as some accounts have it; for joy, as the Genesis myth tells it—divided in order that the creature ha-adam, man (both male, ish, and female, ish-shah) could be provided with a companion: in order, as I would put it, that the dynamic of love might be exercised in action, over and over again. “Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh,” Adam exclaims joyously on awakening from his creative sleep.

[tomasorban]

THE ZODIAC: LIBRA THE SCALES

Date of Rulership: 22nd September-23rd October; Polarity: Positive, male; Quality: Cardinal; Ruling planet: Venus; Element: Air; Body part: Back, kidneys, and ovaries; Colour: All shades of blue; Gemstone: Sapphire, jade; Metal: Copper or bronze.

Libra is probably the first sign in which we see a comprehensive exploration of the concept of duality and a conciliation of opposing forces like order and chaos, activity and passivity, truth and falsehood, equality and inequality, and so forth. The sign is primarily concerned with this conflicting relationship and interaction between opposites because it inherently understands that opposing forces in the universe facilitate the fruition of equilibrium. Sadly, this is one theme that more often than not eludes all other archetypes standing along the wheel of heaven. With Libra, we begin to acquire a much deeper understanding of the cosmos as an inhabited space of conscious and superconscious extensions and examine questions such as whether or not two things or people can co-habit the same space and partake in symbiosis. If so, can the two be synchronized in such a way as to foster the allusion that the two are actually one? Can two people or things of variant compositions and teleological hardware be made to step, skip, or even march to the same rhythm? According to Libra, such affiliations can be successfully developed and maintained otherwise the world would lapse into a lapsarian state of war and disarray. The psychological and social friction caused by the everlasting battle between thoughts of yes and no and the actions of give and take mediate compromised experiences from which more than a single person learns and grows. Hence, what we find with the Libran formative force is that it is always juggling with two or more conflicting viewpoints and attempting to harmonize them in such a way as to leave the minds from whence they originated mutually satisfied. When this process of unanimity works it has the power to transmute base matter to gold. Alternatively failure to make peace between them results in negative consequences like alienation, disenchantment, and self-destruction.  

“As ye make your bed, so shall ye sleep in it,” says Libra in a stern voice. “Many of the preceding inhabitants of the zodiac–Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, and Virgo–see me as being rather cold, distant and impersonal. I can come across that way, especially when my superego Osiris springs into action. Would you like to know what Osiris tells me every night as I’m drifting off to sleep? He says that everything that exists on the physical, mental, or spiritual planes is subject to the cosmic law of cause and effect. For every action there is a reaction, and for everything that is pushed there will be something pulled away. He also says that irrespective of class, gender, distinction, social rank or privilege, every individual in possession of a soul is born into this world with a dowry. If he or she utilizes this dowry to the best of his or her ability whilst remaining faithfully orientated towards justice and truth, life usually materializes as sympathetic and kind. If, though, egotistic gratification becomes the reason for one to commit social misconduct and misbehaviour, the universe will react by drawing the noose around his or her personal freedom and squeeze the life out of him or her, bit by bit.

On the whole, I think listening to these short lectures on moral and social codes has made me a much better entity. Furthermore, I’m much more apt and skilful at weeding out liars, swindlers, bullies and cowards than I used to be, and can easily detect any irruptions of emotion, cunning justifications and intellectual arguments generated to obstruct pathways to the truth. Don’t you dare think that I’m not a merciful power; there’s plenty of compassion and empathy in me. I can understand how someone’s personal circumstances might compel them to commit a crime against another or humanity as a whole, but that in no way diminishes my belief that violation of another’s rights or social transgression should be punished accordingly.

In any case, I’m a social animal and need to be around people, especially those that share similar interests and are composed of the same moral clay as myself. I feel that people should be treated respectfully at all times; courteous interactions and social etiquette are a must! I cope well with most things, vent occasionally, and can be exceptionally understanding and tolerant of others’ vices. I’m happy to say that unlike many of my co-stars on the zodiacal band, I do fight fairly and respectfully. I also see nothing wrong with looking after oneself. Much can be discerned about one’s personality and character from grooming and personal hygiene. Like attracts like; if I want to attract the beautiful to myself, I too must make an effort to look beautiful. I care what likeminded others think of me; more often than not, looking good steadfast earns their approval so I’m all for it!”

Libra is a sign that is intimately linked to cerebral processes which have governed the evolution of human consciousness and the historic induction of a civilized life based on social parameters, moral codes and conventions. Thus it would be more than appropriate to declare that Libra is a faithful advocate for the acknowledgment of interpersonal relationships between two committed people regardless of race or gender. There is something of the sacred and divine in the love that exists between two committed individuals, and in Libra’s eyes these partnerships should be acknowledged, endorsed and held in the highest honour by all citizens unified under the umbrella of culture. The inclination towards convention is not to say that Libra is narrow-minded, bigoted, or totalitarian in any way, shape, or form–far from it! Libra respects and recognizes all unions of matrimony regardless of the dynamic and nature of the partnership whilst at the same time expressing preference for monogamistic lifestyles. It is not opposed to polygamy, but does not wish to revel in it itself. Libra is a firm believer in the adage that “everyone is born equal” and does not believe in gender-specific roles, colours, or any other qualities quantified and standardized by Western culture in that way.

With respect to its personal life, the Libran psyche can go on forgiving the mistakes and wrongdoings of significant others until it begins to feel a sense of hopelessness. When this threshold is reached, Libra can become cold-hearted, detached and mercilessly unyielding. It should also be mentioned that Librans can be quite charming and seductive and often enjoy flirting more than the sexual encounter itself. They are brilliant schemers and diplomats and will never act on impulse. For a Libran, deliberation is more appealing than immediacy and long-term goals and effects are far more important than fleeting and momentary pleasures. Libra is a cardinal energy and cannot stay inert for too long without becoming restless. Nevertheless it needs intermittent breaks between prolonged periods of activity to diffuse tension and excess stress otherwise its mental health can become afflicted.

There are two symbols associated with the zodiacal sign of Libra. The first, a set of scales, is the only inert object to exemplify a zodiacal sign in the Western zodiac as well as the perfect exoteric expression of Libra’s rudimentary quality–balance. All ancient civilizations, from the Indians and Persians to the Hellenes and Babylonians stood united in attributing to the seventh sign concepts which enabled the universal derivation of order from primordial chaos. The Romans attributed special significance to this sign because the foundation stone of Rome and thus of Italian self-determination was laid on October 4th, a date which falls under the mediation of the Libran house. In ancient Egypt, Libra was inexplicably connected to the concept of maat, a word used to denote the providential state of order, truth, balance and justice and personified as an Egyptian goddess with an ostrich feather strapped to her headdress. In ancient Egyptian society it was widely held that maat had been inaugurated by the gods at the moment of creation and was supposed to be upheld by the pharaoh, the living incarnation of Horus, through temple construction and the enactment of ritual. A surviving body of ancient Egyptian literature coined Instructive or Wisdom Literature illuminates just how vital justice, ethical standards and social etiquette were to the lives of the ancient Egyptians but especially to their eschatological practices and beliefs. Maat played a pivotal role in day-to-day undertakings but it played an even bigger role in the psychostasia, the judgement that was thought to occur following the death of an individual and determined whether or not he or she would continue to exist in an alternate dimension known as the Amenti. According to instructional texts connected to the moral code, any expression of disorder, envy, deceit, rebellion against established authority, laziness, injustice, and ingratitude were crimes against maat and set the individual soul upon the road which led to punishment, an eternal state of non-existence.

The second symbol is an astrological shorthand for the zodiacal sign utilized by astrologers in the creation of astrological charts and looks like a yoke. Interestingly, the ancient Greeks called Libra “Zygos” which essentially means “yoke”. An even more striking parallel exists between this pictogram and the ancient Egyptian hieroglyph used to denote akhet, the horizon or place of the rising and setting sun. In ancient Egypt the just mentioned word was originally used as an ideogram for “horizon” and “mountain of light” until the Ptolemaic Period when Hellenistic culture introduced Chaldean astrology to Egypt and connected the latter with the seventh house of the zodiac. From that moment onwards the word akhet was also a synonym for Libra and was appropriate given that the appearance of the full moon in this sign signals a return of the solar orb to the vernal equinox that might be interpreted as a tipping of the scales in the opposite direction and a reinstatement of universal balance.

In retrospect, both astrological sign and shorthand recall positive elementary and cardinal traits belonging to Libra–tenderness, tranquillity, fondness, orderliness, and sophistication. Dispassion, impartiality, relaxation, and sporadic inertia are also indigenous to its psychic make-up, a notion consistent with a lull in agricultural movement during the transient period of its government. The sign thrives when polar opposites coexist in a state of harmony but any psychological or physiological affliction can throw the scales off balance and result in protean temperaments and wild mood swings. The propensity of this sign to discern both sides of an argument and equate, measure, and quantify all possible trajectories before rationalizing a final judgement marks it as the personal abode of diplomats, judges, governments, and law-makers.

[isaiahbie]

Naturalism Cannot Explain the Good Life

The United States’ Declaration of Independence tells us that all men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among them, the right to pursue happiness. Today, happiness or the good life has come to mean a life of pleasure and the possession of consumer goods. But historically, happiness or the good life meant a life of “eudaimonia”—a state of ideal human flourishing and proper human functioning constituted by a life of character and virtue lived the way human beings were meant to live.

The Good Life on Christian Theism

It is easy to see how this notion of the good life makes sense in a Christian worldview. For a human being to live the good life is for him or her to function in the way proper to ideal human living. One functions properly just in case one functions the way one was meant to function by one’s Designer. Since the Designer is Himself a virtuous person of character, and since He made us to imitate Him, the good life of proper functioning is a life of virtue and character. In this way, we see how Christian theism clarifies and justifies a rich conception of the good life of virtue and character as a life in which humans function the way they were meant to function by God.

Christian theism also provides a satisfying answer to a question related to why we should care about the good life: Why should I be moral? If I am trying to decide what my life plan will be–what I will care about, live for, spend my time seeking—and if I want my life plan to be rationally justified and sensible, then why is it reasonable for morality and the life of virtue to be a key part of my life plan? Why isn’t it more reasonable to live a life of pure egoism in which my own self-interests, defined any way I wish, are all that should matter to me, rationally speaking? Why should I not just pretend to care for morality when it is in my self-interests to do so, all the while not really adopting the moral point of view at all? Christian theism says we should be moral because the moral life of virtue is real, we know some truths about it, and to live in disregard of the moral life is to live out of touch with a real and important part of reality made by God. Moreover, God made us to function best when we live the life of virtue. To live in disregard of morality and virtue is to live like a fish out of water, i.e., to live contrary to our proper functioning. The Good Life on Naturalism

Obviously, naturalists cannot help themselves to this depiction of the nature of and grounds for the good life. While not all naturalists agree about the nature of morality and the good life—how could they when it is hard enough to have any clear room for objective value in a naturalist view of things¹—many tough-minded naturalists opt for a view of morality which Daniel Callahan calls “minimalist ethics”²: One may act in any way one chooses so far as one does not do harm to others. Unfortunately, such an ethic draws too sharp of a distinction between public and private morality, it reduces humans to isolated moral atoms who create their own moral universe, and it deprives us of meaningful and true ways to discourse about the good life of virtue in its individual and communal forms. Other naturalists follow Alasdair MacIntyre and take virtues and the good life of human excellence to be mere expressions of value relativized to one’s culture and tradition (presumably, not Nazi culture) or to one’s private beliefs and choices (presumably, not Jeffrey Dahmer’s.)

Both of these naturalist strategies—minimalist ethics and the relativization of virtue—are simply inadequate to capture the nature of morality and the good life or to explain why they have such hegemonic authority. This inadequacy can be seen in three areas. First, these naturalist strategies take the good life to be whatever an individual or culture chooses to create and value as long as no harm is done to others. But as Harvard philosopher John Rawls admits, this view implies that a person who chooses to spend his entire life counting blades of grass is equally living the good life of virtue as is Billy Graham or Mother Teresa as long as both freely choose their activities and can pursue them in a satisfying way.³

Second, naturalists have no way of expressing what it means to function properly in a normative way. Because they do not believe we were created by God, there is no way we were meant to function, no form of life that is proper to our nature as creatures in God’s image. This can be seen in Georgetown philosopher Tom Beauchamp’s attempt to protect a relativistic view of the good from certain obvious problems. Beauchamp discusses the view within our purview, viz., that the good is whatever satisfies the relativistic preferences freely chosen by individuals.⁴ Beauchamp recognizes that if everyone happened to prefer certain horrible desired satisfactions (e.g., regularly fondling children) then this would have to count as the good on this definition. Beauchamp responds by saying that the good should be redefined as whatever satisfies the relativistic preferences freely chosen by individuals if they are choosing rationally, i.e., if they are functioning properly in their choices. Unfortunately, rationality for Beauchamp does not mean choosing the way we ought to choose, or the way we were designed to choose since this would be circular—the good would be defined in terms of choosing what we ought, but choosing what we ought would be defined as choosing what is really good. The only solution here is to say either that rational behavior is simply what is statistically regular among adults who grow up in a typical way in society or it is behavior that promotes the survival of the species. It should be obvious that this will not work. It is easy to conceive of possible worlds where most adults prefer to fondle children or where such behavior could have survival value. But in these possible worlds, fondling children would still not constitute the life of virtue. Without a normative notion of proper functioning, the naturalist is stuck with problems like this.

Finally, many naturalists agree with atheist Kai Nielsen, who acknowledges that there is no answer to the question of why we should be moral.⁵ For Nielsen, the choice between adopting the moral point of view versus living a life of pure selfishness in total disregard for morality and virtue is an arbitrary, non-rational choice. But any view that reduces the difference in worth between the overall lifestyle of a greedy, hateful racist versus the life of St. Benedict to being nothing more than an arbitrary choice like the one between being a fast-food lover versus learning to play the piano is deeply flawed. It is no wonder that moral chaos has resulted from the hegemony of naturalism among our cultural elites.

Notes:

¹ See Naturalism Cannot Explain the Existence of Objective Moral Values. ² See Daniel Callahan’s statement and critique of this position in “Minimalist Ethics,” The Hastings Center Report 11 (October 1981): 19-25. See my own critique of this position here. ³ John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971), pp. 424-33. ⁴ Tom Beauchamp, Philosophical Ethics (NY: McGraw-Hill, 1982), pp. 84-86. ⁵ See J. P. Moreland, Kai Nielsen, Does God Exist? (Buffalo, N. Y.: Prometheus, 1993), pp. 97-135.

[basicsofislam]

ISLAM 101: THE HOLY QUR’AN: Part 15

Which angel delivered the Qur’an to the Prophet?

As far as the Revelation of the Qur’an is concerned, the Prophet served as an envoy between the people and the angel, while the angel fulfilled the same role between God and the Prophet.

The Messenger, who had a sensitive but reliant character, was one who was equipped with an extraordinary mission to save humankind from lethargy and from immoral tendencies, bringing them to a higher level of consciousness from which they would clearly recognize God as God and Satan as Satan.

As a result of God’s mercy He sent Prophets to humankind so that they could find the true path and worship only God Almighty.

For the most part the Prophets were sent to humankind in times of moral crisis or decline. The aspects that are the hardest to control and which are the most dangerous are the moral aspects of human behavior. The Prophets who were sent for this purpose received Revelations from God. In the Qur’an it is stated that the angel who delivered the Revelation to Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, was Archangel Gabriel:

Say (O Messenger): “(The Lord of the worlds, my and your Lord, declares:) ‘Whoever is an enemy to Gabriel (should know that) it is he who brings down the Qur’an on your heart by the leave of God, (not of his own accord), confirming (the Divine origin of and the truths still contained in) the Revelations prior to it, and (serving as) guidance and glad tidings for the believers.’” (Baqara 2:97)

Some members of the Jewish community in Medina came to the Prophet and asked him a number of questions. He answered all their questions. They found no fault with his answers and later asked him about who delivered the Revelation to him. When the Prophet told them that Archangel Gabriel delivered the Revelations to him, they said:

“He brings earthquake, disaster, violence, war and death. So, he is our enemy. But Michael is our friend. Thus, we would have believed in you if it had been Michael who had brought you the Revelation.”

God Almighty states that the Qur’an is not the word of Gabriel, but rather that it is the Word of God; the verse goes on to state that Gabriel comes to the Prophet only with God’s permission and that he brings the Revelation from God to the Prophet.

In another verse, the name of the Angel of Revelation is given as the Trustworthy Spirit ( Ruh al-Amin):

This (Qur’an) is indeed the Book of the Lord of the worlds being sent down by Him (in parts). The Trustworthy Spirit brings it down on your heart, so that you may be one of the warners (entrusted with the Divine Revelation). (Shuara 26:192-194)

God Almighty calls Gabriel “the Trustworthy Spirit” as he serves to save all of humankind in religious matters. He is called the Trustworthy ( Amin) because he has been entrusted with a mission to deliver certain things to the Prophets and to others.

Another name given to the Angel of Revelation is “the Spirit of Holiness” ( Ruh al-Qudus): Say (to them, O Messenger):

“(My Lord affirms): ‘The Spirit of Holiness brings it down in parts from your Lord with truth (embodying the truth and with nothing false in it), that it may confirm those who believe (strengthening them in their faith and adherence to God’s way), and as guidance, and glad tidings for the Muslims (those who have submitted themselves wholly to God).’” (Nahl 16:102)

The Spirit of Holiness implies a spirit that is pure, a spirit that cannot become blemished, one that is sacred, trustworthy and ever-purified. This is Gabriel, who is described as the Ruh al-Qudus in the Qur’an. In other words, Gabriel is called by this name because he brings Divine enlightenment and wisdom in the form of the Qur’an from God; this will serve until the Day of Judgment to purify humankind. According to another Qur’anic definition, the angel who acts as an envoy to the Prophet has the following features:

This is the Word (brought) by an honored messenger (Gabriel), endowed with power, with high rank and esteem before the Lord of the Supreme Throne; one obeyed (by his aides), and trustworthy (in fulfilling God’s orders, most particularly conveying the Revelation). (Takwir 81:19-21)

Prophet Muhammad, (peace and blessings be upon him), the Messenger of God, saw and communicated with Archangel Gabriel, who is also an envoy of God, and received the Revelation from the angel on different occasions. When the Prophet stated that he was receiving the Revelation from Gabriel, the polytheists of Mecca protested. The verse,

“Indeed he saw him (Gabriel) on the clear horizon” (Takwir 81:23)

was revealed in connection with this objection of the polytheists. It can be clearly understood that there is an angel who delivered the Revelation from God to the Prophets.

This angel is Gabriel, who is entrusted with the Revelations and who is sincere in this mission.

[oliviarthomasba2a]

Jekyll & Hyde - Chapter 9

The final two chapters contain first-person narratives in the form of letters: the first by Dr. Lanyon revealing the core of the mystery; the second (telling the chronological story) by Dr. Jekyll himself.

Dr. Lanyon’s Narrative

He put the glass to his lips, and drank at one gulp. . . . there before my eyes . . . there stood Henry Jekyll!

On the 9th of January Lanyon received a strange message, begging him to carry out a series of specific (and very peculiar) requests…

Hyde seemed nervous and excited. He avoided polite conversation, interested only in the contents of the drawer.  Hyde’s desperation for the drugs is obvious - presenting mannerisms and actions that could be associated with drugs and addictions: 

“I could hear hi teeth grate with the convulsive action of his jaws;and his face was so ghasty to see that I grew alarmed both for his life and reason.

“Compose yourself” said I”

He gives Lanyon the option of letting him take the drug in privacy… or watching the results. Lanyon chooses the latter…

Hyde told Lanyon that his scepticism of “transcendental medicine” would now be disproved. And, at last, we get the transformation scene… in reverse. Hyde -> Jekyll.

‘[T]he transformation of Dr Jekyll reads dangerously like an experiment out of the Lancet’ (Oscar Wilde, 1889, as quoted in Stiles, 2006).

As Anne Stiles (2006) observes, the book’s structure reflects medical case studies of the period – but it cleverly subverts them. 

The fact that Jekyll is both physician and patient calls into question the legitimacy and objectivity of scientific case studies…

Stevenson was a contributor to the Cornhill magazine, which (in 1875) published the case study of a brain-damaged French soldier, Sergeant F. Sergeant F. ‘developed two distinct personalities after his left cerebral hemisphere was damaged by a gunshot wound’ (Stiles, 2006, p. 880).

It’s interesting to consider how Hyde is described in the book - seemingly in touch with his feminine side due to some interesting descriptions:

Sergeant F was male, and his condition caused by a wound on the battlefield. But the dual, or multiple (sometimes called ‘multiplex’), personality was almost overwhelmingly a female condition. 

‘Felida X’ was one famous female patient discussed in the Cornhill magazine.

Felida was a young hysteric who ‘exhibited a peculiar secondary state of mind’. Initially, she felt better in this second state, or ‘condition seconde’. But it had ‘unfortunate moral consequences’, when Felida became pregnant (out of wedlock), while in her altered persona (Stiles, 2006, pp. 891–2).

Arthur Miller’s book ‘The Crucible’ is based on the Salem witch trials that took place during 1692/93. A big theme within this is hysteria - all those affected being young girls in the village. Hysteria was a major factor in the many accusations of witchcraft that occurred throughout The Crucible. It helps to understand what hysteria is--an overwhelming fear and excitement that overrides all logic and is often enhanced and intensified by the presence of others who are acting out on that fear.

Stiles (2006) theorises that small, puny, right-brained Hyde has something of the Victorian feminine about him: emotionally unstable, physically chaotic, somehow ‘lesser’ than his male counterparts.

The narrative is helped by profession ‘honour’: in this case, as a doctor, Lanyon is bound by the Hippocratic oath and cannot say what he’s seen Hyde’s tone is mocking: he feels superior to Lanyon, even in this vulnerable state Lanyon’s soul ‘sickens’… and, soon after he dies from the disbelief and stress from the shock.

Through the astonished eyes of Lanyon, Stevenson offers a vivid description, using detailed language and imagery to lend immediacy to supernatural events.

Jekyll has clearly entered into the investigations of the nature of man, whereas Lanyon has adhered strictly to rational, materialist science. 

Lanyon cannot conceive of the world that Jekyll has entered; thus, when he is forced to confront this world as manifested in Hyde’s transformation, he retreats deep within himself, spurning this phenomenon that shatters his worldview.  

The impact of the shock is such that it causes Lanyon, a scientist committed to pursuing knowledge, to declare in Chapter 6, “I sometimes think if we knew all, we should be more glad to get away.” Lanyon has decided that some knowledge is not worth the cost of obtaining or possessing it.

Like Utterson and Enfield, he prefers silence to the exposure of dark truths. The task of exposing these truths must fall to Henry Jekyll himself, in the final chapter of the novel. As the only character to have embraced the darker side of the world, Jekyll remains the only one willing to speak of it. These men all wish to remain trapped in the walls and social norms and expectations of society refusing to believe in other ways or explanations that they do not understand. This can be seen as a reflection of Victorian society and the gentlemen of the time, who would rather remain in blissful ignorance and not kick up a fuss then explore and wish to expose the truth that may cause a disturbance of some kind - their status and names are more important to them.

[gravitascivics]

JEFFERSON AND INNATE GOODNESS

This writer’s reading of Gary Wills’ history of Thomas Jefferson’s thinking in writing of the Declaration of Independence – at least as reflected in the books he read – ran across an insightful quote.  The quote comes from Jefferson’s pen.  It reads:

Man was destined for society. His morality, therefore, was to be formed to this object.  He was endowed with a sense of right and wrong, merely relative to this.  This sense is as much a part of his nature as the sense of hearing, seeing, feeling; it is the true foundation of morality, and not the to kalon,[1] truth, etc., as fanciful writers have imagined. The moral sense, or conscience, is as much a part of man as his leg or arm.  It is given to all human beings in a stronger or weaker degree, as force of members is given them in a greater or less degree.  It may be strengthened by exercise, as may any particular limb of the body.  This sense is submitted, indeed, in some degree, to the guidance of reason; but it is a small stock which is required for this; even a less one than what we call common sense.  State a moral case to a ploughman and a professor.  The former will decide it as well and often better than the latter because he has not been led astray by artificial rules.[2]

Is this true?

         The sentiment flies in the face of the tabula rasa view of the human mind. To remind the reader – if needed – the term tabula rasa became prominent during Jefferson’s time.  That can be attributed to the writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Francis Bacon, and John Locke.  It basically says, humans are born with no beliefs, inclinations, or biases other than their basic instincts.[3]

Of these three writers, Locke is most interesting when one is considering Jefferson’s thinking and writings.  Many seem to want to attribute this founding father’s inspiration coming from Locke and Locke’s supposed adherence to a natural rights view – as that construct is defined today.  

Wills claims that Jefferson did not even own a copy of Locke’s famous political/government classic, The Second Treatise of Civil Government.  But he did own Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding, a more epistemological work.  And yet, the above quote seems to indicate Jefferson’s disagreement with Locke’s contention that humans are born with a clean slate.

This was an active point of debate during Jefferson’s time.  Such writers as Thomas Reid, Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, and Adam Smith actively contributed to this discussion – they did not all agree.  But some time has gone by – the discussion referred to here occurred during the late 1700s, coinciding with the writing of the Declaration and later on, the Constitution.  

In the years since, the study of psychology or related study, have in part been about answering the questions:  are humans naturally prone to be good; to do good works? The answer:  maybe.  There is evidence indicating Jefferson was right, but the final verdict is still out. But the research does suggest an answer.

One researcher, Michael Tomasello,[4] reports that one can observe young children have a bias toward good works – being helpful (at least attempting to be so). And further, that this bias is not enhanced or furthered by rewards.  Therefore, training does not enhance or detract from this proclivity.  Plus, researchers observe this trend across cultures that vary in how and when social rules are taught.  And humans’ relatives – chimpanzees – show this bias toward helping under appropriate experimental setups.

In sum, Tomasello believes that, yes, humans have a natural inclination toward helping others from an early age and that what parents do or the culture encourages has little to do with this bias.  But that view is based on work with very young children. This writer, a former secondary school teacher, can testify that teenagers, as a group, are not known for their altruism.  

He witnessed acts of charity by students he dealt with, but he also witnessed ample cases of cruelty or indifference when it came to the needs of others.  So, is there a transition as children grow up?  Tomasello reports further:  as very young children become older, say about age 3, they are more discriminating as to who will benefit from their good works.  It takes on a more transactional character; they will be more likely to be kind or apt to do a good turn to someone who has been good to him/her.

Also, at work is youngsters learning and accepting social norms.  These norms exist to facilitate societal existence – they are important.  There are too many needed behaviors from basic courtesies to how to behave in various social events or arrangements to count on more formal approaches, like enacting laws.  If nothing else, they make social living easier.  So, as children learn these norms, a natural tendency is to want to be part of it all and not be seen as weird.  Weirdness includes bucking social norms and among the young is fodder for ridicule.

Another researcher, Hillard S. Kaplan, agrees. From an anthropological perspective, Kaplan is said to report “[m]odern humans have lived for most of their existence as hunter gatherers, so much of human nature has presumably been shaped for survival in such conditions … Kaplan has found evidence of cooperation woven into many levels of human activity.”[5]  

This includes division of labor between the sexes, among the ages of people, and among kin members and members of other families. No choices here, cooperation was essential for survival.  And to be efficient, people being cooperative, need to be so willingly or voluntarily.  

The more people want to be in-sink with what is expected or needed, the more likely it will be done correctly, thoughtfully, and with less resources.  Feelings of altruism facilitate establishing such relationships.  Further, the more a society becomes specialized in its economic activity, the more these factors become important.

The cited New York Times’ account of this research goes on to report:

Indeed, it is in our biological nature, not our political institutions, that we should put our trust, in this view. Our empathy is innate and cannot be changed or long suppressed. “In fact,” Dr. [Frans] de Waal writes, “I’d argue that biology constitutes our greatest hope. One can only shudder at the thought that the humaneness of our societies would depend on the whims of politics, culture or religion.”

The basic sociability of human nature does not mean, of course, that people are nice to each other all the time. Social structure requires that things be done to maintain it, some of which involve negative attitudes toward others. The instinct for enforcing norms is powerful, as is the instinct for fairness. Experiments have shown that people will reject unfair distributions of money even it means they receive nothing.[6]

         Yes, research also indicates that humans can be selfish as well as charitable.  And, as this blog has argued, the educational institution in adopting, along with the whole polity, a natural rights perspective as the most influential view of governance and politics has led to an abandonment of being that institution dedicated to bolster the charitable side or a moral side. It has led to a youth culture not noted for its altruism.

         Also, anti-social events – wars, criminality, snobbery, etc. – call for cooperation.  That is, to be successful, within an effected group, those who can exploit cooperative tendency for others in the group, will more likely achieve its goals.  “Lawrence H. Keeley, an anthropologist who has traced aggression among early peoples, writes in his book ‘War Before Civilization’ that, ‘Warfare is ultimately not a denial of the human capacity for cooperation, but merely the most destructive expression of it.’”[7]

         That then is what this question over cooperation, altruism, helpfulness, being moral, and the like tends to inspire in the current discussion.  Perhaps the late 1700s is not that long ago.  The balance between selfishness – natural enough – and charity has been part of the human condition from before civilization.  Civics education – one can argue – needs to address this ongoing battle.

[1] Kalon refers to ideal physical or moral beauty as the term was used by ancient Greeks.

[2] Garry Wills, Inventing America:  Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence (New York, NY:  Vintage Books, 1978/2018), 202-203.

[3] Without trying to be suggestive, the writer’s understanding is that sucking is about the only behavior instinct humans have.

[4] The information in this posting reporting on contemporary research on the psychology of altruism is taken from Nicholas Wade’s reporting.  See Nicholas Wade, “We May Be Born with an Urge to Help,” The New York Times, November 30, 2009, accessed October 25, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/01/science/01human.html .

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid., emphasis added to highlight the potentials of a viable civics-education program.

[7] Ibid.