#progressivism

[philosophicalconservatism]

I saw someone comment online that the reason people believe that their side is more tolerant than their political opponent's side is because they never experience what happens when they disagree with their own side.

Children's author JK Rowling however obviously knows exactly what it's like to disagree with her own side. 1970's Feminist icon Germaine Greer also knows what it is like to disagree with her own side. The price is to be pilloried and ostracized; to be excluded from your own media events, and to have honorary doctorates withdrawn .

But Conservatives also know what it is like to disagree with their fellow Conservatives. Conservative commentator Tomi Lahren, for example, is pro choice but is accepted by the Conservative movement. We don't flagellate people who agree with us on most issues because they disagree with us on one issue. The modern Left however tolerates no breaking of ranks. Everyone must fall in line with the ideological orthodoxy on every major point or be exiled.

[magnetothemagnificent]

There's something concerning about so many progressive, liberal, even leftist people being seemingly incapable or recognizing, or maybe just excusing, conservativism and puritanical ideology when it's not coming from a WASP.

[crumblinggothicarchitecture]

if you ever did an in-depth post about ‘you need to calm down’ i would love to see it because that is my most-hated taylor swift song. like why are you comparing your beef with katy perry to homophobia 😭😭😭

As a lesbian- I have a lot of feelings pent up about "You Need to Calm Down" and all of them are negative.

At the songs core- Swift is showing herself to be horribly ignorant. Are we really all going to accept her propping up the idea that homophobia is the same as having a public disagreement with another celebrity? Not only is she negating the power dynamics that often exist within the propagation of homophobia, by insinuating that homophobia is the same as a disagreement between equals in society, but she is also trivializing it down to a simple disagreement over career related bullshit.

Not to mention that she is NOT an ally- I cannot stand the people who think she is a left-leaning, feminist, LGBT advocate. It's like they have created a fanfiction concept of Taylor Swift in their heads.

She profits off the LGBT community when it is most beneficial- but when legitimate rights are being stripped away, she is silent.

Taylor Swift is really good at commodifying social trends without actually risking anything. She waits until it is safe- then pretends to speak up for people's rights, when, in reality, she is just finally able to turn the social trend into part of her brand. Therefore, she gave a stupid line in the song "Welcome to New York" (2014) about how New York City is somehow a utopia of gay freedom (not true but whatever), and then in "You Need to Calm Down" she was profiting off the excess of emotion and democratic enterprising seeping off the US Election cycle.

Her first use of this profit-first tacit happened in 2014- what happened in 2015? The US supreme court legalized same-sex marriage. Swift simply saw the social trend- and captialized off a topic about which the youth were passionate.

The second time, in "You Need to Calm Down" she published this song in 2019- firmly within her faux activist era, and well-aware that the youth were interested in politics. This was right before the 2020 US election- she once again saw the increase of young people paying attention to the ideological split within the country- bearing in mind her target audience skews young, progressive, and American, she pounced on the opportunity to capitalize off their impulse towards supporting ideological-progressive media. As we all geared up to vote down the conservative-leaning Donald Trump, who aligned himself with right-wing religious ideologies standing to threaten the previous supreme court decision on Same-Sex rights, Swift swoops in with a silly pop-beat and a fake country accent to pretend she is the savior of the young and gay.

If it wasn't so shady- it would be a brillant use of rhetorical analysis to sell product. Capitalism has made a cynic of me- I fear.

Swift saw the fear of young LGBT people- during an election cycle-and decided to profit off that fear not through distancing herself from them, but by pretending to care. Notice, again, how she only mentioned gay rights during these very specific cultural conditions which allow her to somehow make a profit off ideologically aligning herself with one side of an issue or another.

Personally, I find fake care even more heinous than outright hatred.

Once again- in this current year she is using the endorsement of a US presidential candidate to further her own brand and try to re-affirm her place within the general rhetorical circles of "progressive and therefore morally upstanding individual" to the youth.

It's all a calculated move to shake-off whatever negative press she got through her associations with right-wing Footballers and keep her prime audience of young Americans.

I have much more to say on this topic- but for now, this is where I leave you. I have to go eat lunch.

[dn-838]

Genocide bad

[melisssg99]

I'm so done with the divide.

Left, Right, Moderate,

Far Left, Far Right, Center,

Liberal, Traditional,

Progressive, Conservative,

Pro Life, Pro Choice,

Religious, Secular,

Queer, Straight,

Pro This, Pro That,

Anti This, Anti That,

"You can't follow this person, you can't be friends with that person, if you even just share a space with a person from "the wrong side" you are part of the problem"

I'm done

I'm a human who cares about humans

I'm a human who feels sick and tired of these labels that truly tell you nothing about a person.

Not who a person really truly is.

I'm a human who would like to live in peace.

I'm just a human

[badempanadaofpatmos]

It's not a true socialist utopia until americans are hunted for sport

[quidditism]

Quidditism

Quidditism is an ideology and a movement that seeks to take peaceful action to push the world towards an accepting, tolerant and fully free future, where everyone can thrive without fear.

Why quidditism?

The word 'quiddity' has 2 major definitions. The first one being "whatever makes something what is is, the essence". The movement seeks to establish a world where everyone is allowed to fully embrace themselves and who they truly are. In other words we wish for people to embrace their essence. The second definition of the world 'quiddity' is "deviation from an established pattern or norm, eccentricity". The quidditism movement focuses on marginalised identities such as LGBTQIA+ identities or paraphilias as these people are not allowed, in today's society, to flourish as themselves without fear. In other words, the liberation and normalisation of people considered eccentric, whether it be by their gender presentation, attraction or neurodiversity, is central to our goal.

Emoji Code -🪷💫

Quidditism's core values

Now, let's go over quidditism`s beliefs and summarize them.

Radical Inclusion

Radical inclusion is the first of the values we'll go over. Being a radical inclusionist means accepting all 'good-faith' identities. But what even is a 'good-faith' identity?

There are 2 main criteria for an identity to be of 'good-faith'. The first one being that the identity is genuine, and not taken up to prove a point, to grift, or to be generally disingenuous. In other words, if you genuinely identify with it, this box is checked. The second criteria is the one where controversy arises, It is generally defined as being harmless. However, what is considered harmless may vary from individual to individual. Quidditists generally consider that as long as it doesn't do any real world harm (like taking up limited resources, although it is rare a simple identity can achieve this) and tries it's best to be non-offensive and non-bigoted, the identity is good faith. In other words, identifying as a transvestite because it feels right to you, and while having read up on the terms history is completely good faith, however identifying as the same thing to try and mock trans people isn't.

So, quidditists are radically inclusive: they support any genuine identity that does its best to be harmless.

Paraphilias & Contact

Now, we talked about paraphilias above. A paraphilia is defined as an unconventional sexual attraction. In our day & age, homosexuality isn't considered one, however back when the fight for the LGBTQIA+ community was far less advanced, it was considered a paraphilic disorder.

Wait a second, what even is the difference between a paraphilia and a paraphilic disorder? Nothing except the "disorder' part, aka the factor of "is it causing harm or distress to you or people around you".

However, paraphilias are never inherently considered disorders in quidditism. 

Having said that, we consider them the same way as we do kinks and fetishes. They are cousins after all: kink regroups all use of unconventional sexual practises or fantasies while fetishes are a form of sexual desire strongly linked to a particular thing or activity. They overlap a whole lot, don't you think? 

In general, we will use these terms interchangeably.

You could summarise quidditism's contact beliefs by "if it is consensual, it's fine", but you would need to define consent for this. So what is consent?

Consent, as a noun, is defined as the permission for something to happen or the agreement to do something. As a verb, it is defined as giving permission for something to happen or to do something.

Additionally, anyone who consents must be able to back out and change their minds at any point before, during or after what they initially consented to without fear of repercussions. They should also feel free to give (or not) their consent in the first place, and not be forced to do so.

There are a few points that we will examine further here.

Firstly, consenting to sex in itself is a complex thing and not just the act of understanding and agreeing, so there must be both a technical understanding of sex along with an emotional understanding of sex for consent to truly be possible.

Secondly, anyone of age and not under the influence can consent before regression, use of substance, sleep or death.

Thirdly, only older teens (16& up) should consent to adults, with proper harm reduction of course.

The thoughts on younger people are still being worked on.

And lastly, animals cannot consent to sexual acts due to not having the cognitive ability and speech for it. Additionally, just because an animal's body enjoys an act does not mean they consented to it, as consent is a clear agreement and acknowledgement, not body language or what you perceive.

Total bodily autonomy

Bodily autonomy is defined as the right to make decisions about your own body, life and future, without coercion or violence. When we say total bodily autonomy, it isn't trivial. In today's world, abortion access and rights are threatened more and more, women are still subject to genitalia mutilation at a very young age in multiple countries, and trans people need to jump through hoops to get gender affirming care. But to us, it doesn't stop there. We want to fight so that everyone has the right to make informed choices on what they do with their body and life, whether that's extreme body modification, gender affirming care, abortion, or just a tattoo.

Anti-psychiatry

Anti-psychiatry is the view that psychiatric treatment can often be more damaging than helpful. Do not the often in the above sentence. So, what does that mean in practise? A few things.

Psychiatric care should be entirely optional. Whether you want to recover with psychiatric help, by yourself or even not al all, you should be given all the necessary information to make that choice for yourself. This ties back in with the last point, total bodily autonomy, and with the next one.

Chosen Recovery

We've spoken about informed total bodily autonomy and what that would mean in psychiatry: the option to seek recovery or not. Here, we are extending this beyond psychiatry. We believe that no matter what you might have that could be recovered from, you should get to choose whether you want to or not. First, we believe that that is your right, and second, we are horrifically aware of the fail rates of forcing someone into recovery: as a general rule of thumb, if someone doesn't want recovery, they won't recover, no matter what you try. That doesn't mean you can't bring the option to their attention, just that ultimately, it is their choice, and theirs alone.

Transhumanism

Following up on all the bodily autonomy related beliefs, we have transhumanism. It is a movement that advocates the enhancements of the human body and condition by developing and making widely available new and future technologies that can greatly enhance longevity, cognition, and well-being. That would include wing or animal ears implants for transspecies folks, to only cite one of many examples.

Realmism

Realmism is an ideology based around the belief in magic and the multiverse. It promotes all faiths and religions, as well as the practise of reality shifting and the right to outlandish, weird, and uncommon beliefs, with an emphasis on being pro-delusion. If you wish to learn more, the entry on transid.org goes into more details.

Existentialism

Existentialism is the philosophical belief we are each responsible for creating purpose or meaning in our own lives. It isn't given to us by an authority. Whether you choose to seek it in faith, the arts, social causes or just your own happiness, it is entirely yours to craft.

Pacifism

Pacifism is a commitment to peace and an oppositioin to violence, war in particular. The quidditism movement believes that unless strictly necessary, violence should never be used, defining it as a last resort. How do we achieve our goals then? Educating.

Punk

Quidditism follows a very punk-ish ethos. The punk ethos is primarily made up of beliefs such as non-conformity, anti-capitalism, anti-authoritarianism, anti-corporatism, a do-it-yourself ethic, anti-consumerist, anti-greed, direct action, and not selling out".

Resources

🪷 Discord Server

💫 Blog

[alpaca-clouds]

How to convince right-wingers to vote left

Alright, folks. In Germany we have a new election coming up - and this is also something that other people in other places can absolutely use. I want to talk to you about something, that I think a lot of left wingers do wrong. And don't get me wrong: I absolutely get why you do it this way. I want to do that way, too. But I realize that it just does not work.

See, most right wingers are not raging Nazis. There are some raging Nazis, sure, but those are by far the minority. Most people voting for right wing parties are just tag-alongs. A lot of them people who are not doing that well economically, and who kinda like the fact that the right wing offers them an easy solution: "You are doing bad economically because of the immigrants stealing your jobs, and because of the evil DEI rules!" And so the average right-wing voter will note to himself and think: "Yeah, because it is not my own fault."

And here is the thing: In a lot of cases it is not their fault. It is simply capitalism doing its thing. They are doing badly because of capitalism. However, here is the problem: The average right-wing voter has also consumed tons and tons of propaganda that told them about how evil communism and socialism are, and how evil and crazy and criminal any minority of your choosing is. Yes, including those minorities they are themselves part of. You know, good old "I never thought the face-eating leopard party was going to eat my face."

Which is where the mistake comes in that us lefties tend to do: We want to engage them directly on a) progressive thought and b) capitalism as a system.

You know, when they are raging about the immigrants or the trans people or the queers or the homeless or whatever, you really want to correct them on that. Heck, maybe you are part of one of those groups and you will go: "Well, do you want me to die/be imprisoned?" (Especially when it is family members espousing this kinda thought.) But the thing is: I am sorry, but you will not convince them with this. Again, chances are they are themselves part of some group whose face will be eaten. They will not see it. Worst case: They might indeed think that you should be cishet again and that it would be for your own good. Best case: They cannot fathom that it would apply to you, but just those "evil queers" (to take queerness as an example, as it will apply to most people on this hellsite). You can show them quotes of their right wing politicians that do not differentiate, and they will still stand firm that it most certainly will not apply to you or anyone they know. For them it is just against a nebulous other group of [minority X], who are actually criminal. They have heard so much about that group online!

Do not engage. Do not! I understand that you want to. But you will not be able to deprogram them quickly. Like, deprogramming is possible, but it takes time. And if you try to get them to vote for your rights in the upcoming election, you will not win on this.

Next thing especially a lot of folks like me will wanna do is just go full on out there and rage against capitalism. Because yes, pretty much everything whatever person will tell you about their misery can mostly be traced back to capitalism. And you would right. I would be right. But again: You are going to go up against years and years of brainwashing. In this case even against brainwashing that has started DURING THEIR SCHOOL TIME. We all get taught how amazing capitalism is, and how evil communism. You will not undo that in a twenty-minutes discussion - and not in a weekend either.

No. What you want to do is the thing that EVERYTHING INSIDE YOU will scream against: Listen. Listen to the concrete issues they bring up. Chances are, that the right wing party they are wanting to vote for would make this worse.

They struggle to make ends meet even though their job for a long time was enough to make those ends meet?

Great, show how the left wing party actually has a strong policy on a proper minimum wage, and how they might also want to push for more help for smaller companies and more worker protections.

If they argue on that, show also how actually the right party actually is trying to remove those protections, and how it would affect them personally. Make a point out of it. If they try to steer the conversation on some minorities they want to blame, do not engage. Again, you want to talk about their specific problem, and how voting for the left wing party is better for them.

They recently lost a job, struggle to survive on whatever handouts your country might give out, while also struggling to find a new job?

Again: Put emphasis on how the left wing party has stronger policies on worker protection, allows people to live more easily from whatever handouts there would be, and also usually want to invest more in ways for people to get new jobs and so on.

An argument you will get on this often is: "But what is with those who do not wanna work?" Something like this. Generally speaking though, this is one of the arguments that is not as deeply held of a believe. If there are official statistics of how few people are shown to not want to work (usually it is less than 2% of the jobless people, often even less than 1%), this actually will work. Otherwise just focus on: "Yeah, but do you personally not deserve more money, after having worked so hard for XY years? Do you want those others to not have money strongly enough that you are willing to starve for it?"

They struggle to pay for necessities? (Be it food, be it electricity and water, be it heating, or rent.)

Again: Show how the left wing party has more concrete plans to tackle this. Because chances are: Even if your supposed left wing party is center right, they will have more concrete plans on how to tackle this issue. They might have some plans to substitute electricity, water and heating. They might have plans to guarantee certain prices for the most important groceries. They might also have plans for rent freezes.

Again, if they try to evade this by going on again some minority, refocus the conversation on the actual problem - the inflation.

They might here also go against renewable energies. But again, this is usually something that is not a core belief, so you will have chances to just show them graphs how renewables are much cheaper. Do not even engage on whether or not climate change is real. It does not matter. It literally does not matter. Renewables ARE cheaper. So just argue on that front: "Why would you want to pay more for a less effective way of sourcing energy?"

Again: The important bit is, that you cannot deprogram someone in a short conversation. Deprogramming people is something that will take months to do. And if you are going to try this, it is going to be exhausting.

But convincing people to vote in a way that will help you? That is actually fairly easy. Because chances are: If they are not a billionaire, the same party who will be in favor of your minority rights will probably be the only party, that will also ACTUALLY address their issues.

Do not discuss minority rights with them. Do not discuss the issues with capitalism with them. It will not work. Arguing with them about their own rights though? That works actually really well.

[undergroundusa]

How Far Out Of Touch Are Harris & The Radical Left?

"The more Harris articulates her belief system – once she gets past the word salad – the more she exposes herself as a far-Left, San Francisco Bay neo-Marxist masquerading as a Democrat..."

ORIGINAL CONTENT:

READ, SUBSCRIBE, SHARE & EDUCATE

[anim-ttrpgs]

Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy, and Themes of Disability, Mental Illness, and Criminality.

Back Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy on kickstarter before May 10th if you want to help a disabled person with limited ability to work pay his bills.

Verisimilitude, What Would a Person Do?

To understand Eureka’s themes regarding disability, mental illness, and criminality, you first have to understand its verisimilitude.

“Verisimilitude” is defined as “the appearance of being true or real,” and it is a big part of the core design ethos behind Eureka. It is a very realistic game.

We aren’t necessarily of the opinion that “realism” is a better design choice than stylization overall for RPGs, but it is a better design choice for Eureka, because we want the PCs to be very normal, believable people who make believable, organic decisions in extraordinary situations. No matter what anyone says, the mechanics of a TTRPG strongly influence what kind of stories are told with it, and what characters do in those stories. So if we want characters to make realistic decisions, the world they inhabit and interact with must be constructed of realistic rules.

Even though there is a small chance that they may be a supernatural creature, PCs in Eureka are still not fearless action heroes, chosen ones, or anything of the sort. They’re normal people with jobs, friends, and families who get mixed up in mysterious and/or dangerous situations, often against their will. They are fragile, vulnerable, imperfect, and they, largely, know it.

“Composure” is a mechanic that helps you know it too. I’ve given a deeper explanation of the Composure mechanic in the post linked here, but I’ll give a very very very condensed version in this post. Composure can sort of be thought of as “emotional/fatigue HP,” (and no, it is NOT “sanity”) it acts as a guideline for how well your character is handling the situation, and when it gets low enough, it starts to have serious mechanical effects as well, because a character’s stat modifier can never be higher than their current Composure level. Fear, hunger, and fatigue all lower Composure, and eating, sleeping, and bonding with one’s fellow investigators can all restore it, at least for normal people. More on that further down. All you really need to know for now is that when Composure gets below zero it starts eating into HP, so characters can even pass out or die from loss of Composure, and also one single bullet is enough to permanently cripple a character, and the rate of Composure loss during combat reflects how serious that is for the characters.

Grievous Wounds

It isn’t too uncommon for RPGs to have some sort of “flaw” system, whereby in character creation you can give your PC “flaws” or some kind of penalty, and usually get that balanced out by being able to add extra bonuses elsewhere, and these “flaws” may take the form of disabilities.

Critical Role’s Candela Obscura, the whole document of which is one of the most egregious examples of liberalism and toxic positivity I’ve ever seen in the TTRPG space, takes this beyond just character creation, and makes it so that if a PC receives a “scar” in combat that reduces their physical stats, their mental stats automatically go up by an equivalent amount, and proudly asserts that to make any mechanic which functions otherwise is ableist. I think you can probably tell what I think of that from this sentence alone and I don’t need to elaborate. Getting bogged down in all the failures, mechanical and moral, of Candela Obscura would make this post three times as long.

I actually do think that as long as you aren’t moralizing and patting yourself on the back this hard about it, “flaw” systems in character creation are a pretty good idea in most cases, it allows for more varied options during character creation, while preserving game balance between the PCs.

But in real life, people aren’t balanced. The events that left me injured and disabled didn’t make me smarter or better at anything—if anything, they probably made me stupider, considering the severity of the concussion! Some things happened to me, and now I’m worse. There’s no upside, I just have to keep going by trying harder with a less efficient body, and rely more on others in situations where I am no longer capable of perfect self-sufficiency.

Denying that a disabled person is, by definition, less capable of doing important tasks than the average person is to deny that they need help, and to deny that they need help is to enable a refusal to help.

This is the perspective from which Eureka’s Grievous Wounds mechanic was written.

When a character is reduced to 1 HP, which by design can result from a single hit from most weapons, they may become incapacitated, or they may take a Grievous Wound, which is a permanent injury with no stat benefits. Think twice before getting into a shootout.

Grievous Wounds don’t have to result from combat, they can also be given to a character during character creation, but not as a trade-off for an extra bonus.

“But then doesn’t my character just have worse stats than the rest of the party?” Yes, didn’t you read the above section? There is no benefit, except for the opportunity to play a disabled character in an TTRPG, and this character will probably have to be more reliant on the rest of the party to get by in various situations. Is that a bad thing?

Monsters

Just like mundane people in Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy, monsters are playable, because they are regular people. I’ve gone over this in other posts and also you can just read about it in Chapter 8 of the Eureka rulebook, but the setting of Eureka doesn’t have a conspiracy or “masquerade” hiding or separating supernatural people from normal society. They exist within normal society, and a lot of them eat people.

Most RPGs consider monsters to just be evil, they do evil for evil’s sake. RPGs that seek to subvert this expectation often instead make monsters misunderstood and wrongfully persecuted, but harmless. Eureka takes a wholly different approach.

There are five playable types of monsters in the rulebook right now, and it’ll be seven if we hit all the stretch goals, but for simplicity’s sake this post will just focus on the vampire. Despite them applying in different ways, the same overall themes apply to nearly every monster, so if you get the themes for the vampire, you’ll get the gist of what Eureka is doing with monsters in general.

I mentioned Composure above, and how it can normally be restored by eating food and sleeping. Well, vampires can not restore their Composure this way. They don’t sleep, and normal people food might be tasty as long as it isn’t too heavily seasoned for them, but it doesn’t do anything for them nutritionally. Their main way to restore Composure is fresh living human blood, straight from the source. To do what mundane PCs do normally by just eating and sleeping, vampires have to take from another, whether they’re happy with this arrangement or not. They do not, of course, literally have to, and a player is not forced to make their vampire PC drink blood, just like you don’t literally have to eat food, but they do and you do if you want to live in any degree of comfort or happiness, or else they’d eventually just sit at 0 Composure and not be able to effectively do anything.

There’s a reason that this is a numerical mechanic and not simply a rule that says something like “this character is a vampire and therefore they must drink blood once every session,” and that is to emphasize and demonstrate that the circumstances a person faces drive their behavior. In America, there is a tendency to think of criminality and harmfulness as resulting from something of an intrinsic evil, but in my experience and observation, people do not just wake up at like age 16 and decide “I think I’ll go down the criminal life path.” Through their life circumstances they have been barred from the opportunities that would have given them other options. People need food, food costs money, money requires work, work requires getting hired, but getting hired requires a nearby job opening, an education, an impressive resume, nice clean clothes, a charismatic attitude, consistent transportation, and so on. For people without, criminality is something they are funneled into, which becomes harder to avoid the longer they go without consistent access to their basic needs. The choice will be between taking money from others by force or trickery, or running completely out of money.

As the Composure counter ticks down, a vampire, or other playable monster, is going to encounter much the same dilemma. There is little to no “legal” or “harmless” way for them to get their needs met, even if they do have some money. Society just isn’t set up for that. And no your kink is not the solution to this, trying to suggest every vampire get into sex work is like one step removed from telling every girl she should just get an OnlyFans the minute she turns 18, or that women should just marry a man and be a housewife that gets taken care of if they want their needs met.

Playable monsters in Eureka are dangerous, harmful people. They were set up to be.

“Oh well then the vampire should just eat bad people!” You mean those same bad people i just described above? See this post for answers to all the other arguments people are going to make to try and absolve vampires of causing harm.

Society not being set up for that brings me to next reading/theme: Monstrousness as disability, and monsters as takers.

Mundane human characters restore 2 points of Composure per day just by eating food and sleeping, but vampires do not, they can’t. To restore their Composure they have to take from others a valuable resource that everyone needs to live and the extraction of which is excruciatingly painful and debilitating (blood). No one knows what happens to blood after a vampire drinks it, it’s just gone. Vampires are open wounds through which blood pours out of the universe.

This is a special need, something they have to take but cannot give back. Their special needs make them literally a drain on society and the world.

Even in so-called “progressive” spaces, there is a tendency to consider takers, people who take much more than they give back, such as disabled people, as something that needs to be pruned, with the mask over this being the aforementioned total denial of the fact that disabled people take more than they can give.

In this way, vampires and other playable monsters are, inarguably, “takers,” but in positioning them as protagonists right beside mundane protagonists, Eureka puts you in their shoes, and forces you to at least reckon with the circumstances that make them this way, as well as acknowledge their inner lives. You have to acknowledge two things: That they are dangerous, harmful people who take more than they can give, and that they are people. Because they are people, Eureka asserts that they have inherent value, a right to exist, and a right to do what they need to do to exist.

One final point is that of monstrousness as mental illness. Mental illness is a disability, one pretty comparable to physical disability in a lot of ways, so all of the above about disability can apply to this metaphor as well, but there are a few unique comparisons to make here.

It’s not the most efficient, but there are a couple of loopholes deliberately left in the rules that allow vampires to restore Composure without drinking blood. Eureka! moments can restore Composure, and Comfort checks from fellow investigators can restore Composure.

When I was writing the rules for how monsters regain Composure in accordance to these themes, I came to a dilemma where I wasn’t sure if it was thematically appropriate for them to be able to regain Composure in these ways, but ultimately I decided that yes, they can. It works with themes of mental illness, which is mental disability.

People with mental illnesses may have the potential to be harmful and dangerous, but study after study, including my own observation, has shown that mentally ill people with robust support structures and agency allowed to them to handle tasks are much less likely to enact harm, be that physical violence, relational violence, or violence against the self. So that’s why I kept that rule in for playable monsters. Being able to accomplish goals, and having friends who are there for them, makes the harmful person less likely to cause unnecessary harm.

I couldn’t really figure out where to fit this paragraph in so I’m sticking it here right before the conclusion: Vampires are especially great for this because they’re immortal, and because they always come back when “killed.” They can’t be exterminated, they aren’t going away, there will always be problem people in society, no matter how utopian or “progressive.” They’re a never-ending curse, who will always be a problem. The question is how you will handle them, not how you will get rid of them.

In conclusion,

Eureka is as much a study of the characters themselves as it is the mystery being solved by the characters. It is a harsh, but compassionate game, that argues through its own gameplay that yes, people do have needs which drive their behavior, many people do have special needs that are beyond their ability to reciprocate, and failure to meet the needs of even a small number of people in a society has high potential to harm the entire society, not just those individuals whose needs are unmet.

And Candela Obscura sucks.

Back Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy on kickstarter before May 10th if you want to help a disabled person with limited ability to work pay his bills.

If you want to try before you buy, you can download a free demo of the prerelease version from our website or our itch.io page!

If you’re interested in a more updated and improved version of Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy than the free demo you got from our website, subscribe to our Patreon where we frequently roll our new updates for the prerelease version!

You can also support us on Ko-fi, or by checking out our merchandise!

Join our TTRPG Book Club At the time of writng this, Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy is the current game being played in the book club, and anyone who wants to participate in discussion, but can’t afford to make a contribution, will be given the most updated prerelease version for free! Plus it’s just a great place to discuss and play new TTRPGs you might not be able to otherwise!

We hope to see you there, and that you will help our dreams come true and launch our careers as indie TTRPG developers with a bang by getting us to our base goal and blowing those stretch goals out of the water, and fight back against WotC's monopoly on the entire hobby. Wish us luck.

[justalittlesolarpunk]

I grew up extremely privileged. I always want to be honest about that. I never worried about where the next meal was coming from, I had new clothes and toys whenever I wanted them, my family went on holiday every year and regularly had meals out, went to the cinema and the theatre. My parents sent me to private school, where I got to learn about the history of civil rights movements and the theologies of other cultures. I attended a prestigious university and have never gone without. But do you know what that taught me? It taught me that the things I took for granted should be taken for granted by everyone. No human being should starve when we currently produce enough food globally for an extra two billion people who don’t currently exist. Everyone should have access to a full, well-rounded education that lasts as long as they want. People should be exposed to other cultures and be able to have enriching experiences. I have never understood the people I met along the way who, in being exposed to the same unearned privileges as me, came to conclusion that it meant they were somehow special or better than others. My upbringing actively led me to believe in a universal basic income, to want everyone to have access to good healthcare and education and the ability to interact with those different from them. Because every child should grow up with the carefree feeling that not worrying about money brings, that it brought me.

My privilege has also given me the ability to access systems and institutions of power - my whiteness, my middle-class southern English accent, my academic vocabulary and my understanding of how these systems function, means I have power others do not. I’m determined to use this for people who have been silenced and shut out, to create spaces where they can speak and be heard. Of course I’ll mess up sometimes, because privilege brings ignorance with it and I still have a lot to unlearn. But I’ve never understood the point of trying to hide from your privilege or pretend it isn’t there. It’s not something to feel guilty about, because you didn’t choose it. But it is something you’re responsible for. The work of the rest of my life will be to understand and deconstruct my privileges, to work alongside and at the direction of the more marginalised to build a more just world.

This is quite rambly and incoherent and probably doesn’t make perfect sense, but I hope you get the gist of what I’m saying. I’ve been fortunate and I want others to experience that too. I don’t see justice work as about tearing people down from where they are, but rather about sharing what they’ve benefited from with everyone.

[therapeutic007]

🌟✨ MAGA Vibes Only! ✨🌟

Okay, fam, let’s talk about what happens if President Trump makes his glorious return in 2024. 🇺🇸🔥

America First, Always: If he comes back, expect a major revival of the America First agenda! We’re talking about prioritizing American jobs, energy independence, and securing our borders. Imagine a new wave of policies designed to bring manufacturing back home! 🏭💪

Draining the Swamp 2.0: Trump knows the deep state is still lurking. You can bet he’ll double down on rooting out corruption in D.C. and dismantling the bureaucratic nonsense that holds our country back. This time, he’s got allies in Congress ready to help him clean house! 🧹🚫

Economic Boom: Remember that pre-pandemic economy? If he returns, expect tax cuts, deregulation, and a stock market that soars! Trump will likely push for a massive infrastructure plan to create jobs and revitalize cities across America. 💰📈

Foreign Policy Reboot: Get ready for a firmer stance on China and a renewed focus on our allies. Trump might even revive his peace initiatives in the Middle East, showing the world that America can lead without endless wars. 🌍✈️

Constitutional Rights: You can count on him to defend our freedoms! Whether it’s gun rights, free speech, or religious liberty, he’ll be a staunch advocate for our Constitutional rights. It’ll be all about empowering the American people! 📜🔒

Grassroots Movement: Trump knows the power of the people! Expect to see him rallying his base like never before, utilizing social media and public appearances to energize his supporters and bring them into the fold for local elections too! 📣🤝

Innovative Tech and Trade: Watch out for a focus on American tech innovation and fair trade deals that prioritize American workers. Say goodbye to unfair competition and hello to a thriving tech sector that benefits us all! 💻🇺🇸

So, what do you think, MAGA fam? Let’s keep the energy high and stay united! 🔥💥 _______

Trump Daddy's Home Tshirt Best Seller Here

[ffcrazy15]

An article in the NYT this morning on the immigration surge was blanketed with comments of people saying things to the effect of “I’m a progressive/liberal/democrat but…” And then some of the most bigoted shit I’ve ever seen. How they support the mass deportations. How “cultural unity” is important. How we need to “take care of Americans first!”

I weep for this country. How quickly we are swayed by fearmongering and the mere threat of inconvenience, while our fellow human beings beg us, literally beg us, for help. Starving families, people seeking a new life—people with children, damn it!

The greed and ignorance on display is nauseating. I want to scream or kick something. Christmas barely two weeks away, and the whole country sneering that the inn is full, that they’ll shut their eyes to whatever it takes to make it happen.

God have mercy. Christ have mercy. Break our hardness of hearts!

[eternal-echoes]

“In 1971 Saul Alinsky published Rules for Radicals, his famous guide to community organizing. On the dedication page he wrote: "Lest we forget at least an over-the-shoulder acknowledgment to the very first radical: from all our legends, mythology, and history ... the first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom—Lucifer."(1)

Alinsky didn't believe in anything so primitive (in his view) as the devil. So his words are ironic and mainly for shock value. But his book is very useful for understanding recent American politics and national leadership. And they make a good comparison with another, rather different set of rules.

Rules for Radicals echoes Machiavelli and the Marxist thinker Antonio Gramsci as a shrewd map to seeking power. But Alinsky sees himself as going beyond Machiavelli. Instead of teaching rulers how to hold power, he will instruct the have-nots on how to take it away: "The ego of the organizer is stronger and more monumental than the ego of the leader ... The organizer is in a true sense reaching for the highest level for which man can reach-to create, to be a 'great creator,' to play God."(2) Rules seeks to create a just and happy world through strong-willed, and sometimes ruthless, action to fix it. For Alinsky, activists are in a war against the establishment, and in war, the ends justify almost any means.(3)

Alinsky is blunt about this: "You have to do what you can with what you have, and clothe it with moral arguments."(4) It makes sense, then, that Alinsky prescribes tactics that rely on manipulation, lying, and demonizing opponents. Make your enemies insecure, he teaches. Ridicule them. Don't attack institutions; attack people. None of these ugly tactics is new to American public life, of course. What is new is the systematic nature of their application an organized vindictiveness and addiction to power in today's politics that barely bothers to hide itself behind a veil of sloganeering.

The word "radical" comes from the Latin radix, which means "root." Radical ideas speak to the root nature of things. And in that sense, the core sin of Rules for Radicals is that it's not nearly radical enough. Rather, it's the familiar human appetite for power dressed up in progressive-left language. And it stands in sharp contrast to the kind of true radicalism demanded by a Christian life.

Over the centuries men and women have served the poor and fought injustice by another set of rules. These rules long predate Alinsky's. They've influenced far more people. And their founder knew no worldly success. He healed the sick, but he didn't abolish sickness. He "fought the power," and when the powerful murdered him, he forgave them. His rules are radical because they turn our human ideas of power upside down. That radical, of course, is Jesus of Nazareth. And we know his rules as the Beatitudes.”

-Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, Strangers in a Strange Land: Living the Catholic Faith in a Post-Christian World

—

(1) Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals (New York: Vintage, 1989), originally published 1971, epigraph page.

(2) Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals (New York: Vintage, 1989), originally published 1971, 61.

(3) Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals (New York: Vintage, 1989), originally published 1971, 29.

(4) Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals (New York: Vintage, 1989), originally published 1971, 36.

[apesoformythoughts]

"There’s nothing progressive about normalizing sexual “freedom.” This fortifies our culture’s esteem for individualism and expressivism, which is to say these are bourgeois issues that are part and parcel of late-phase consumer capitalism. As much as being nice to the gays is a matter of Christian charity, the prospect of normalizing forms of sex that are absolutely closed to procreation is far from progressive—a point I tried to make in my essays on the cognitive dissonance of queer anti-colonialism and on the queer2authoritarian pipeline (and which Dorothy Day attempted to convey to the Free Love hippies who came to the CW in the 60s).

Al-Gharbi’s work [We Have Never Been Woke] highlights how “wokeness” champions sexual libertinism as a progressive issue, while doing little to nothing to address systemic issues that oppress the working class. People being able to have sex with whoever they want or to identify however to want does nothing to alleviate the plight of workers—and in fact serves to entrench the capitalistic logic that keeps them oppressed.

I hope that Pope Leo XIV’s revival of Leo XIII’s legacy will provoke so-called progressive Catholics to realize that real progress looks more like effecting policy to strengthen workers’ rights than sacramentalizing gay marriages or trivializing gender difference. There’s a reason why BOTH sodomy and depriving workers of their wages are among the four sins crying to heaven for vengeance."

— Stephen G. Adubato: "Pope Leo against false progressivism"