#the red market

[badolmen]

Everyone talking about adopting Palestinian kids needs to read Scott Carney’s The Red Market and a brief definition of genocide outside of the physical destruction of lives.

[hellenic-whore]

Thinking about how many refugees are having their organs trafficked solely because of the effects of US imperialism and colonialism on SWANA countries and many,many others

You all should read the red market by Scott carney

People don't talk about how much refugees and people in similar situations are taken advantage of in ways like this.

Linking to a post I made about this issue earlier as well

[theartofmadeline]

wizard husbands go to the farmers market

[khruschevshoe]

You know, it's rather interesting to me that Taylor Swift's parasocial relationship with her fans is honestly more akin to a YouTuber than a writer's. When I scroll through her tag on tumblr/Twitter, it's far more regarding the connection to her personal life/relationship developments than the actual metaphors/fictional story she might be telling. Everything comes back to how her songs reflect back on her relationships with Joe/Matty/Travis/Jake/insert ex-boyfriend here. And what fascinates me about it is that even though she complains about it, she leans into that very perception because it strengthens the parasocial bond.

The marketing for TTPD so clearly being about Joe Alwyn and the songs to Matty Healy. The marketing/video for Red TV so CLEARLY being about Jake Gyllenhaal, with so many of the new lines in All Too Well specifically being digs at him (I'll get older but your lovers stay my age, casting an actor that looks like him for the video, specific lines in I Bet You Think About Me). The fact that songs like Getaway Car and Bejeweled and Gorgeous and London Boy and Lavender Haze being picked apart at time of release and long after for signs of relationships crumbling. The way she uses surprise songs in relation to her relationship development with Joe/Matty/Travis. The damn TTPD "stages of grief" playlists where she deliberately undid/changed the meanings of old songs just to keep her audience speculating on her love life.

It's not sexist to point out that her wielding her love life is a marketing tool and that the strongest connection to her audience isn't the strength of her writing/the composition of her music- it's her deliberate crafting of a connection between her music and her personal life, leaving the audience invested in her music as an extension of Taylor the Person/Girlfriend rather than Taylor the Artist.

[radiofreederry]

Pixar taking a deep long look at themselves and deciding that they need to pivot to slop

[sexybritishllama]

strap in folks it's time for another neopets drama update

some background reading before we begin: back when neopets wanted to introduce customisation (i.e. dressing up your pet) in 2007, they decided to 'convert' all existing pet art to align with a rigid body structure, rather than all having unique poses. it was just not feasible to create new pieces of art for hundreds of different pet poses every single time they released a new clothing them

customisation had been highly requested up until this point. however, the conversion was NOT popular. in some cases, particularly for basic colours, the change wasn't huge, but in other cases.... uh....

you get the idea. the more expensive colours like plushie, faerie, grey, royal and darigan got the worst of it because they had the more unique poses pre-conversion, and therefore it was largely agreed that the change to the stiff 'samey', frankly kinda goofy converted look did not look great

most users did not get a choice in having their neopet converted and it was done automatically, but if you had one of these colours where the change was huge, you were given the choice of converting or retaining the old pose (but not having the option to customise your pet). those pets that retained the old, pre-conversion poses are therefore referred to as 'unconverted', or UC for short

once a pet is converted, there's no returning to UC. you also couldn't create UC pets anymore, making UCs a limited resource that would only increase in value with time, particularly as people abandon their pets, leave the site, get frozen, etc.

i could write an entire dissertation on the drama that UC pets have caused for the pet trading economy, the neopet account black market, and general retention of the userbase, but to sum it up, people REALLY want UC pets. they are the single most coveted status symbol on the site

we skip forward now to 2023

the neopets team are planning to introduce UC pets back to the site, so that people will be able to create their own UC pets again for the first time post-converstion (legally at least)

they drip feed bits of information over the year about what this will look like. the main points are

changing a pet to UC will be done via some kind of item bought with neocash, the premium currency on neopets that you need to spend real money to get

putting this item on your pet will give it the UC art style appearance

so. not much really known. but expected release is set for january 2024

yesterday, they hosted an AMA focusing on the new UC pet system and how this was going to work. noticeably absent is any explanation of how much this is actually going to cost and whether it is going to involve any kind of gatcha mechanic, so that's causing our first lot of concern

second lot of drama is that the new UCs aren't actually going to be COMPLETELY the same as the old art, as they're making some small changes for style consistency, see below (old on top, new below):

the biggest drama, however, comes from how they're dealing with the 'original' UC pets. ALL pets will be getting forcibly converted on the 23rd, with anyone who has a pet that is already an original UC immediately receiving the UC neocash item. there's mention of possibly some kind of trophy or badge recognition for particularly old pets, but it's vague, and generally seems like it won't be possible to distinguish between the original UCs and these new ones

the people who already have OCs are not happy about this

people are allegedly pounding their pets, cancelling their premium, and quitting the site in protest. the boards are flooded with people complaining about the changes and laughing at the downfall of the 'neo-elite' in equal measure

it's t-minus 5 days until the second great conversion goes live. let's all pray for our souls

[xamag-draws]

[OCs] [NOT hom3stuck] october is her month 💀✨

[thethoriumreactor]

so like….. chaggie college au anyone

I’m thinking designs based on their demon forms instead of like human before dying give me ur thoughts yeah

Charlie fell first vaggie fell harder it’s canon

[begaycommittreason]

somewhere in my heart i know this exchange has taken place while batman is busting a weapon dealers warehouse

rogues, buying discounted explosives: uhhh

batman, who was expecting jason: Red Robin.

red robin, clearly also there as a customer, entirely unabashed: this is where i get my groceries B

red robin: ooh 45% off the mini land mines if purchased with any 2 weapons containing a hidden retractable blade!

one of the rogues already tied up in the back: oh get that one now, the deals marked purple are limited time, i’ve made that mistake before

red robin: thanks greg i’ll remember that

batman, internally: i’m worried about the wrong child

[saydesole]

Strawberry Picking 🍓

[ishouldbedoingalright]

saw a review saying red white and royal blue is predictable and cliché. yeah it is.. AND? straight films and straight audiences have had cliché films made time and time again and everyone laps that shit up. FOR ONCE we get that and it's suddenly bad storytelling and bad film making? just admit it's double standards and move on.

[goldengirlgalaxy]

Munch, Munch, Munch

So a lot of people like to say that Kryptonite is Ghost Rock Candy.

And a lot of people like to say that Jason Todd (AKA Red Hood) has at least some level of liminal nature, if not full on half ghost.

Therefore, Jason eats Kryptonite.

The first time it happened, Jason was feeling Hangry while in the Batcave and, in his anger, mistook some crystals sitting out as rock candy. It's only when Tim finds him right as he's finishing off the last piece that he learn that it was, in fact, not rock candy. However, Jason keeps craving it, to the point that the Bats have to keep any Kryptonite under lock and key or else Jason will instantly consume it.

Batman eventually has to figure out why his son is craving Kryptonite and if there's anything he can do to replace it because he can't keep having his son eat his contingency plans.

[hellenic-whore]

Had to draw a thing about organ transplants and trafficking. Took some notes about it too cause why not.

Did this partially because of the meat garden episode from the Magnus archives.

It was mostly about the middle east as it was for my middle eastern literature class, so yeah.

Notes and some interesting quotes are down below. The main source I used was "The Red Market:On the Trail of the World's Organ Brokers, Bone Thieves, Blood Farmers, and Child Traffickers" by Scott Carney.

If you want to read it yourself it's a pretty good book, you should be able to find a PDF of it pretty easily!

_____________________________________________________________

•Organ donors oftentimes are impoverished and sell their organs commercially to make money to feed themselves, afford rent etc.

•A migrant put the issue this way "If you cannot find work when you get to Egypt, you will not find mercy. This is why people sell their kidneys."

•In Egypt, an organ seller will receive 2000$ while a buyer will pay 2000$.

•Refugees are especially vulnerable to organ trafficking because of a lack of legal protection.

•People in underdeveloped countries often view their organs in the same way one might view social security or unemployment benefits- as a safety net.

•One woman who was, in essence, scammed out of her kidney, alleged a police complaint about the fraud. When the police attempted to arrest the broker for organ trading, the police also tried to arrest the donor for selling her kidney. The broker was let off with a warning.

• "Flesh... Moves up the social hierarchy, not down" (Carney 53)

•"In America, it is taboo to suggest US transplant centers are in the business of buying and selling organs. They're here to save lives." (Carney 56)

Stylized gore warning for all of you that are new to here.

Sources and the picture are under the cut.

Here are my sources in big fancy mla format cause why not

___________________________________________________________

Carney, Scott. The Red Market: On the Trail of the World’s Organ Brokers, Bone Thieves, Blood Farmers, and Child Traffickers. William Morrow, 2022.

“Human Trafficking and Trauma in the Digital Era.” Google Books, Google, books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=2PtWEAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA159&dq=organ%2Btrafficking%2Brefugee&ots=D-PcbX-U0k&sig=2Fv19I115KGwnpgjAHCaq_LAIO4#v=onepage&q=organ%20trafficking%20refugee&f=false. Accessed 13 Dec. 2023.

Lesniewski, Matthew James. “Monitoring Human Trafficking in Displaced Populations.” eTD Explore, 1 Jan. 1970, etda.libraries.psu.edu/catalog/21347.

“Organ Trafficking in Egypt: ’they Locked Me in and Took My Kidney.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 9 Feb. 2019, www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/feb/09/trafficking-people-smugglers-organs-egypt-mediterranean-refugees-migrants.

Osmandzikovic, Emina. “How Conflicts Turned the Middle East into an Organ-Trafficking Hotspot.” Arab News, 10 July 2020, www.arabnews.com/node/1701871/middle-east#:~:text=The%20protracted%20conflict%20in%20Syria,the%20region’s%20red%20market%20hotspots.

[sylvies-chen]

they just had to casually throw in the cutest most amazing clip of my pookie bear henry fox mountchristen windsor being happy and in love and now I’m going into multiple organ system failure I can’t fucking take this anymore

[layla-carstairs]

thought about the livvy & jace/janus parallels again 378 dead 2992 injured... like wdym they were killed by the exact same sword, with jace being stabbed in the back & livvy stabbed in the front. wdym they were raised on the shores of the exact same lake almost exactly five years apart. wdym they were both came back wrong. the way livvy and janus share the common goal of just wanting to get what they lost too, and they both spend their gotsm stories watching their loved ones with no way to properly interact with them despite how badly they want to.

it's arguably one of the things that terrifies me the most going into twp like literally what does it all mean... what does this mean for livvy...

[front-facing-pokemon]