#this is not my best analysis! it has flaws! I need to clarify some points here!

[write-it-right-2]

Picture the force as an ocean. the surface - the ‘light’ side - is calm, is easy to navigate. as you sink deeper and deeper, it gets darker, it is harder to navigate, and the pressure means it is harder to even hold on to your mind, your identity. you need something to guide you. you need a tether, or many tethers, or a full submarine or other habitat to protect you. It is not inherently safe at the surface - waves still crash, and great destruction can still happen, but the deeper and deeper you get, the more dangerous it becomes. 

What if you filled yourself with all your anger, all your hate, what if you used pure will and pain to bend the waters around you, the nuclear equivalent of force use? These waters could drown you, you need something - so what will you use?

What if you did not go alone? You could bond yourself to others, allow the tension of this descent be spread amongst many - but if you go too deep, put too much pressure on those lines, or if you were at max tension and then one line snaps - you go spiraling off. All of that tension ricochets back onto you, suddenly in deep waters you are drowning. In that case, it’s easy to see why you might say it is just safer to never try and tie at all, when a break can ruin the whole network, when the tension could tear the whole thing down. More powerful, but more fragile.

The only thing left is to learn how to swim. But - more importantly, to let the waters flow around you, over you, to stay calm as they bob and weave. Panic is one of the greatest killers of drowning people. Don’t make waves, it’s such an easy visual - but how quickly does the meaning become lost? How soon do you end up applying it to everything else? When do you realizes you are still everywhere, everywhere in your life, except for these waters of your mind, the only place you are unseen, and the only place you are roiling. 

Go back. The waters could move around you. What does that mean? How does the water move around you? Forcing yourself perfectly still in water causes more ripples than moving along with it. You need to let the water move you, just a little. You are in the water. You are the water. Do not fear the water, it is not easy to move against but it will not hurt you, not now, not to move with it.

What if you are already deeper? What if by your very nature, you could never reach that place on the very surface, not without support, not without ties. What if you are told to ‘let the waters move around you, and move you with them’ and they do not see that you swim in deep water, you are not near the surface and you do not know how to reach it. The waters could tear you apart with one wrong move, you can feel it, and this doesn’t work right - why doesn’t it? The metaphor breaks down here. I’m not sure why. The problem is not the power - it is something else, it is letting the water move through versus trying to force it to move as you wish, but neither quite work.

Stop. Go back. No, further, we talked about going together. It is not safe to tie a few - you could be pulled back so easily, the tension snaps and it hits everyone - but what if you had more? How many could you have? 

It is something about will. It is about how much will you have behind your actions. How easily could you be led off this path?  There is genuine importance in being able to let go, to not bash your head against a single wall for all eternity, to not pick every hill as a hill worthy of dying on. You can not die for every hill. It is so dangerous to put all of yourself behind an idea, and the more of yourself, the more power it has. You must have some method of measure. How do you teach children what hills are worthy of dying for? You try to teach them to be good, to be kind, but when it is so easy to find yourself burning down hills for the sake of your beliefs, when a single missfire can burn down worlds, do you not end up teaching caution, before all else? Do you not end up saying to temper those flames, to never let them burn so high as to truly change the world, because every single one has the power to change the entire universe. And you know it. And you have no idea how to teach them to change it for the better. Who even are you, to try and determine that?

So what if? What if, by your nature, you are told you are going to change the entire universe. But the people you are raised by do not know how to teach you. You need to know how to stay yourself, how to stay true to your ideals, how to remember love, and compassion. Hope, and kindness. But they have spent all their time teaching themselves how not to turn the world over themselves, too scared, for such very good reasons, but they have forgotten, and they no longer know the things they would need to teach you. You need to know safety exists. All they can teach you is that you have to make it yourself.

To go in small groups, they have learned, is so much more dangerous than to go alone, or in pairs that can still divide. They still have these remnants of connection, but they are trying so hard to leave them behind. What they have forgotten is that many hands, working together, will do so much more than one person ever can. Many hands, working together, and protecting each other. In a desperate bid to not drown, tangled in snapping webs, they have banned them altogether, not understanding that it is by the very construction of these webs that we learn these things, of hope, of faith, love, and kindness, and compassion, and a belief that holds these, without reward, without payment, simply because it is, as all important. They understand what it means to care. But scared, so understandably scared of these deep waters, they no longer sink, they no longer let the water run through them, they no longer act.

[fangirlblogger]

Fangirl Analysis Three: Bill Skarsgard's double chin.

Okay girlies, this one is close to my heart. In fact, it burns my heart and starts this fire that never dies out. Bill Skarsgard's Double Chin is a character of its own. It deserves the world's standing ovation for eternity. Yes, some might say his eyes are the main character but for me personally (and to the girlies who also find double chins gob-smackingly sexy), his double chin when he smiles is a whole dinner table I want to devour eternally. Let's dissect these sets of images that vividly displays the previous information provided.

Image 1 Analysis

Firstly, look at how gorgeous and adorable he looks with that cute smile on his face. I simply can not BREATHE, but I will try my best to because I have to make my point. Secondly, this image has so many gems to analyze, and girl, I have my panties off, legs spread open and I'm ready to play.

To clarify things, I'm not a Bill Skarsgard obsessed fan girl (not that I have anything against anyone who does - I love that!), I recently just hopped on the train after watching Hemlock Grove (mind you I'm aware of his existence - Pennywise duh - I just never paid any attention to him because I had some other celebrity white men with brunette hair and blue eyes in my pants [I will get more into that this semester]), so I wouldn't know much about him as someone who has love him since day 1. To add on, I instantly fell in-love with him after the blood scene (I've mentioned this in the previous post but I'll say it again:

Roman Godfrey had my pussy by the clit the moment he sexually devoured that blood.

Back to the analysis. I do not know where this image of Bill was taken or when, but I'm pretty sure this was taken during a press conference of the John Wick 4 movie. Girl, his whole demeanor had my pussy throbbing and craving his slickness. After the movie, I felt like I was pregnant with his baby. His whole appearance was a breeding session for me, and I dropped from heaven when the movie ended.

Case study question: Why is this image devour worthy?

Firstly, it's Bill Skarsgard. He is devour worthy. Secondly, his smile isn't too wide to hide away his double chin. You can see that he has more meat to his cheeks which makes the smile more heavenly. I must say, having a kid does make him more daddyfied not that he wasn't before but all that daddy weight just makes me want him to daddy me.

Moving on, his eyes are literal definition of perfection. If he smiles and looks at me like that, the eggs in my ovaries would automatically be fertilized, conceived and I'd be ready to birth his kid in a few seconds after all that interaction.

Finally, I love this picture because it makes him human. You can see his perfectness and you can also see his flaws. Others might consider the hairstyle unattractive, I find that attractive. It makes him more human, imperfect and real.

Image 2 Analysis

Okay girlypops, I'm just going to come out and say it. I don't care how many people are sitting with him at whatever event this is, if I was there, I would literally get on my knees and start giving this man the gluck gluck three thousand. While doing that, I'd command him to just sit like that with his arms crossed, with that smile and look on his face, til I make him come with my mouth. I need to worship this man. My desires for him are cannibalistic and religious at this point. And, this image right here heightens those desires and urges for me.

Case study question: Why is this the sluttiest image of Bill?

As a girly that finds men rolling their sleeves to their forearms slutty, I also find men in turtle-necks, sweaters and textured long coats slutty and horny as hell. If this image of Bill was a dildo, I would fuck myself with it till Satan repents. The way he leans back on his chair, with his arms crossed below his chest that is not too firm to have his clothes looking too tight but enough to see that he is comfortable. This sight is such a fine art. Forget about looking at Renaissance paintings, this is all the renaissance you need to have your pussy coming over and over again.

Finally to the best part: His double chin. His jaw is so perfect that when leans back and smile, his double chin becomes too perfect. Just the perfect amount of mound for a Bill Skarsgard fangirl to devour eternally. The double chin is a god in this image. Everything else comes second. The double chin also enhances his emotions, therefore making his smile more bubbly, cheerful and innocent. It's inviting and it speaks to the viewers or whoever he is interacting with that he is comfortable with the conversation and the environment he is in.

Image 3 Analysis

Girlies, this image here is a real one. I adore this image. It shows how authentic, flawed and real Bill is. It shows him in the act - that is him interacting with people as he always does. His hair, eyes, nail, neck, double chin, teeth, nose, cheeks and forehead looks so organic. I love that. In a world that has a lot of people playing around with their looks to look so perfect, this image here is a breath of fresh air.

Case study question: How perfect can this image be?

This image is already perfect because everything in this image is not perfect. Yes, I meant NOT PERFECT. Once again, images like this make me desire him more. His humanness makes him more devouring and attractive (this sounds so cannibalistic but if you get the metaphor, you understand). The most vital part of his face that is so slutty is his double chin. My pussy is getting sluttier just looking that double chin (if only I can sit on it).

A special gem that I have identified from this image that makes my heart and pussy throb at the same time is the smile wrinkles at the side of his eyes. If I was given the chance to build a house and live on those wrinkles, I would definitely take that chance. I honestly think they enhance his beauty and his smile and make him more divine and desirable.

Conclusively, I am a whore and slut for Bill Skarsgard's double chin. I am also a whore for men with double chins like Bill (not Bill being an influence lol). I also go slutty for his cheeks when he smiles. His smile make my panties soak and the wrinkle at the side of his eyes make me want to go sexually feral for that man.

The point here is that women find the non-sexual things about men sexual. Sometimes it's the least attractive thing on a man that makes a woman go feral for him. Other times, it's the small movements that the man does that make the woman wet for him. Ageism and a bit of body changes such as weight gain can enhance those physical features of the man and make him 20 or 30 times attractive. That is why some of us girlies have daddy issues. It's not our fault the man we like are older, authentic and more enhanced.

[pearl484-blog]

An Uncommon View of the Bible

WARNING: Contains religious themes and possible blasphemy

One of the best pieces of advice that I have ever heard about reading the bible is from my religious studies professor. He said the Bible isn’t like a lot of other religious texts. You need to read it as a collection of the Jewish (and later Christian) people’s growing relationship with God as it changes and evolves. 

Now, before we begin, I must clarify that I will be using He/Him when referring to God. It’s traditional in my neck of the woods to use capitalized masculine pronouns regardless of where it is in the sentance. I will also refer to Him as a character later or a person. Yes, He is a deity, so neither of these are accurate descriptions, but we will be viewing the Bible not as a religious text during this analysis, but as a literary one. This anaylsis is not intended to attack anyone’s faith or religion. It is just another lens to view the Bible through. 

The following is not a common interpretation near my region where I live, but I like this view and have not seen enough of this view in any Judeo-Christian media that I encounter, and that’s a shame. Also, although I reference the Bible, please understand that I am working with multiple translations, not just King James, and some details may be wrong. I am not a theologist. This is for fun.     

Now, through the lens of God as an evolving Character, we can see that while God is all-knowing (several people try to lie to him and fail, and at several points he calls people out on their actions) and all-powerful (he did create the universe after all), he’s not all understanding. Nor is he in any way perfect. 

In fact, early God has a lot of flaws. For starters, God at first seems to have a bit of trouble disproportionate retribution. When sufficiently motivated, typically by anger, God seems to have a tendancy to overdo his reactions. For example, in the early Bible, God destroyed multiple cities for being bad, commiting genocide, and also caused a massive flood for 40 days and 40 nights. He also turned a woman into a pillar of salt for disobeying him, and when people joined together to build the Tower of Babel and offended God through their boasting, He broke the tower, and scattered the people, also causing them all to have seperate languages. 

However, this isn’t just limited to anger. When exiling Cain for being the first murderer, Cain asked for mercy as people were going to get revenge on him for his infamy. God decides to perform an act of mercy, and gives him the mark of Cain, a mark that identifies him and will notify all people that any harm done to Cain will spring back on them seven-fold. 

This is actually a fairly important part of God’s character arc early on, as it shows that despite God’s temper (by this point He has flipped out on Adam and Eve for eating from the forbidden tree of knowledge, banishing them from Eden, cursing Eve and her descendents with painful childbirth, and stripping the snake of its legs) He does still contain a merciful streak. Yet even this mercy is a bit dramatic and still reflect His tendancy of disproportionate retribution. 

God is also shown to be proud and vain. He greatly admires people showing him respect and worship, demanding it often, and becoming upset when He feels it is not shown. Going back to the Tower of Babel, God is offended by the people boasting about how tall the tower is going to be, how great it will be, and how it will reach Heaven. (In some translations the boast also includes something akin to “God can’t wreck it”. “It’s greater than God’s work.” Or something of that nature for extra annoying God points.) So, He wrecks it and makes it so that people cannot try that again. 

He also seems to get super enraged by people worshipping other gods. He makes multiple repeated statements to not do that, and whenever someone puts up his power against other gods, He gets downright boastful about His power outshining them, and will often do things deliberately to spite whoever or whatever the people are worshipping. Like when Moses transforms his staff into a snake using God’s power, the Egyptian court also does the same, and the snake staff eats the others. He also flips out when the freed Isrealites start worshipping a golden calf, and has to be talked down by Moses from doing some serious smiting. He also turns a king to madness for worshipping other gods after he swore to worship God.   

God also seems to enjoy obedience.  He tests Abraham by nearly having him scarfice Issac to him. Then sends an angel to tell him “Good job. Here’s a lamb to sacrifice instead.” He also shows great fondness towards Job and brags about him and his loyalty to Satan. Then after Job is tested harshly and still keeps faith, God rewards him very well. He also starts talking to Soloman while he’s sleeping, and doesn’t explain what he wants or why he’s talking to Soloman until after Soloman proclaims his devotion to God. In general, He has a repeated pattern of testing people just to see if they’ll stay loyal and obedient to Him.

Yet, as the Bible goes on, we see more and more moments of softness from God. For example, he promises Noah that He’ll never do a flood again and seems genuinely remorseful for His actions. To Abraham, when He realizes that Abraham is truly loyal and is fond of Abraham, He knows that to Abraham, children is super important to him and swears that one day, his descendants will be as numerous as the stars along with several other promises. He expresses genuine pleasure at Soloman asking for wisdom, and protects His followers from extreme acts of persecutions and grants improbable victories to them. 

Although we see less and less miracles as the Bible continues throughout the Old Testament, and the miracles themselves start being less and lessflashy, God seems to slowly start placing more value on cunning, wisdom, and community, with less of a, for lack of a better word, God complex and a need for worship. 

By the time we reach the New Testament, God has really mellowed out. Through Jesus’s teachings, we see that He tries to emphasize that being kind is more important than intolerance, that He does not appreciate his worshippers for being judgy about others, and he seems to place a large emphasis on trying to understand others’ perspectives and just being kind and forgiving, even to people who you don’t feel deserve it. He also seems to have stopped favoring one people and expresses love towards all people. 

Of course, He still has a bit of his old personality. He does demand that Jesus act as a sacrifice before no one else has to, so there’s still that same demand for obedience, and He also urges the Disciples to spread the word of Christianity, thereby showing He still has a need to be worshipped. Yet, for the most part, He seems to have overcome his anger issues, and the reaction He encourages for the Disciples towards people who spurn their teaching is basically “Don’t get mad. Keep being kind, dust yourself off, and walk away.”

In the end, I think a version of God who sees you, understands what you’ve been through, knows all your sins and forgives you anyways is more powerful when it’s someone who in their own past has had to overcome their flaws and still has them to an extent, but has learned how to go on and tries not to hurt people as much rather than someone who’s been perfect all along. But that’s just me. 

[beauty-and-passion]

My True Identity: foreshadowing and cruel irony

I promised this analysis long ago. I promised I would have finally started the rewatch.

And here I am. After all this time, it's finally rewatch time.

Before proceeding with this, let me clarify a couple points:

These analyses won't have a clear schedule. As you know, some episodes take a lot of time, while others are much simpler and/or shorter. I will just post every time I finish an analysis.

Not all episodes might be worth an analysis. Some might be fused into one post, others might be completely ignored. That doesn’t mean they’re useless, but only that I personally have nothing to say about them.

For now, I don't plan to talk about episodes I talked about, like DWIT and POF. But who knows, maybe there will be something else to add, when I'll come back to them? Still, for now don't expect anything new for these two episodes.

These are all my personal thoughts, so I could be completely wrong about everything. If you disagree/agree/want to add something, please feel free to do it.

As always, I might talk about all sorts of themes, so read at your own risk.

And now, let's begin.

_______________________________

An unclear plan

When he looked back at the first episode of what would've become Sanders Sides, Thomas himself admitted he had no clear plan about what he wanted to do. Would he film just a bunch of vlogs with these characters taken from his Vines? Would he do silly, funny sketches and talk about some random theme every time? He had no idea.

And this episode shows it: it really looks more like a simple, light-hearted vlog with funny characters, rather than what it would've become.

And this is probably what makes it a very intriguing start. Looking at it in retrospect, you can find a lot of stuff. You can see a lot of cruel irony, considering what these characters are saying and who is saying what. You can see a lot of points that will actually be discussed throughout the series. And you can even notice a lot of foreshadowing.

_______________________________

The main point of Sanders Sides

[Thomas]: Do I really know myself as well as I should? (...)  I need to have a sit-down with myself, figure myself out, and maybe come to a better understanding that we all could learn from! Let’s do this!

This first episode might not take the future developments of the series into consideration, but the main point was still here.

Thomas doesn't know himself well enough. There's a lot he has to figure out. He needs to talk with himself and learn more.

Considering who are the last two sides Thomas learned about, this is just adorable. Look at this young Thomas, so cute and naive, thinking: "Oh yes, I will learn more about myself and it will all be fun and games! :DDD". So adorable, he has no idea what the future has in store for him.

This also connects to another point I mentioned in my analysis about the Dark Sides: before starting the series, Thomas didn't know his sides well enough. And we can see it in the way they interact between them and with Thomas.

For example, this part:

[Morality]: And no matter what, no one knows you better than yourself. Am I right, Tony? [Thomas]: Not my name. [Morality]: Then what is it?

I know it was a joke, but it was also a confirmation. Not even his own heart knows him well. Thomas never truly spoke with his sides - and they never truly spoke between them. They've always played a role - the teacher, the prince, the dad. Now they can start knowing each other.

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Possible foreshadowing about Roman's arc

[Thomas]: Like, okay, relationships (...) where do I stand in those regards? [Princey]: I have a pretty ideal vision of love... There's someone out there for me... One true love... [Logic]: But you tend to overthink things, rule out possibilities with logic, dream up obstacles with each new connection you make... [Thomas]: And that when the anxiety kicks in. Maybe that’s why I haven’t found a person for me yet.

Oh boy, I can feel the last episodes and Asides looming over me.

Let's analyze each part of this conversation:

1) Thomas (and Roman) has a pretty ideal vision of love. One true love waiting for him. And now, guess what? Thomas is in love with Nico. And we all remember how Roman welcomed the idea of this new love in their lives.

[Roman]: I so... SO badly want this. I- I'm desperate for it...

And also how amazed he was, when they came back home:

[Roman]: A POET! To top it all off, he's a poet!

Considering the above premises, would it be so difficult for Roman to start idealizing this relationship with Nico? To consider Nico the “one true love” he talked about? To put him on a pedestal and, at the same time, search inside him all the characteristics the one true love should have?

This could lead to a very interesting possibility: Thomas putting Nico under the pressure of being his perfect man, to have all those characteristics his dreamy, romantic side wants to see. All while considering him incredibly perfect to the point of becoming inhuman.

All of this could end up only one way: scaring Nico. Maybe to the point of driving him away from Thomas.

2) Thomas overthinks, “rule out possibilities with logic” and dreams up obstacles. Could this also be a possible foreshadowing?

At the end of FWSA, when Thomas asked if they were ready for this relationship, Virgil stopped smiling, all while the camera slowly zoomed on him. The message was clear: Virgil isn’t ready for a change yet.

So we have Roman, who sees Nico as the perfect, ideal man of his dreams. And we have Virgil, afraid of changes, overthinker by nature and prone to self-deprecation.

The ingredients are all here: it is very possible that Thomas/Roman will put Nico on a pedestal and, the moment Nico is scared by Roman's adoration, Virgil starts to freak out and to talk bad about himself, because why someone so perfect and dreamy like Nico would ever love someone like Thomas?

This could potentially lead to a heated confrontation between Virgil and Roman that could be the metaphorical last nail on the coffin: Roman is already hurt because Patton sided with Janus. Nico drifting away from Thomas and Virgil's self-deprecation might convince him that yes, Thomas is truly bad and unworthy of love like Virgil says. He himself is bad and unworthy because he's not the perfect Creativity he should be.

And this can be a great starting point for his character arc.

  _______________________________

OH THE IRONY part 1: no one learned anything (yet)

[Morality]: But that’s okay. The important thing to keep in mind is nobody’s perfect. Everyone comes with their own flaws. [Thomas]: Including me. [Princey]: Yes, someone will accept us, flaws and all. Until that day, I shall learn to love... myself. 

Oh hey, look: the end of POF and Roman who still hasn't learnt nothing.

Jokes aside, I love how Patton is the one who says that everybody has flaws, but he excludes Thomas. It's Thomas himself who says he has flaws as well.

Doesn't that remind you of anything? Like this moment in SvS?

[Patton]: Well... Nobody's perfect... Except for Thomas! He loves his friends!

Patton saw Thomas as perfect and pure from the start. I love this, because it's very subtle and you don't notice it - until the events of SvS and POF.

But while Patton is finally learning (after almost 30 episodes) that Thomas isn't perfect, Roman is still very far from his goal of loving himself.

That's probably why he needs a romance this much: by focusing on someone else, he can easily ignore how much he doesn't like himself and his flaws.

And hey, I can even guess the name of these "flaws" he doesn't like so much.

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These words are not foreshadowing at all

[Logic]: Um... Are we bringing up flaws now? Because if so, get ready to take a lot of notes. [Thomas]: Oh, uh... [Logic]: -continuing- Okay, you ready? Here we go. You procrastinate A LOT. [Morality]: You can be a bit selfish with your food and your other belongings... [Princey]: You’re definitely not the most adventurous person... [Thomas]: Okay, maybe this was a bad idea if I'm supposed to be learning to love myself. [Logic]: Ah, but remember, everyone has flaws.

Let's not forget that Thomas still had no clear plan, while filming this episode. This was supposed to be just a vlog.

But look at how the universe made these characters say these things. Look at dear sweet Patton, bringing up Thomas’ selfishness. How cute, he really has no idea what episodes are waiting for him.

And Roman brings up Thomas’ fear of changes. Awww, how cute, he has NO IDEA of the guy that will become his worst nightmare and his bestie at the same time <3

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OH THE IRONY part 2: just look who's talking

[Morality]: Well, it’s important to be nice to ourselves and cut ourselves some slack every once in a while... [Princey]: Wouldn’t want to be our own villain, would we?

LOOK WHO’S TALKING.

Just look at the absolute irony of Mr. Selflessness talking about the importance of being nice to ourselves. Mr. Thomas-Should-Be-A-Martyr saying that cutting us some slack is good.

All while Mr. I-Thought-I-Was-Your-Hero tells us that we don’t want to be our own villain, right? Right?

_______________________________

Three fundamental questions

[Princey]: Well, what do you wish to look for in a relationship? What are you hoping to gain from having another person in your life? [Thomas]: Um... I don’t know. Someone who’s a nice compliment to me... someone who wants a long stable relationship... someone who indulges in the same sense of humor, and um... someone who can binge-watch cartoons with me.

This might be considered another foreshadowing of Thomas and Nico's relationship - maybe even the solution of the drama that will take place, after Roman and Virgil's fight we suggested before. The best solution: not putting Nico on a pedestal and seeing him as the perfect man, but appreciating him for who he is, for the normal guy he is - a guy Thomas loves and nothing else.

[Logic]: With everything you've learned, what do you wish to do with your education? [Thomas]: Ooh... I am not sure... I’d love to figure out ways to help the environment. Science was always my strong point and I love chemistry.

As I said multiple times, I think Thomas' decision to leave chemical engineering and become an actor will play a huge role in Logan's arc. And this question slighty hints at this.

At this point in time, Thomas still wants to use his education in a fruitful way. He still wants to use science, it's still his main goal. Doing silly videos is just an addition. "A good start", as he said:

[Thomas]: I think just being able to put out silly light-hearted content into the world is kind of a good start. It makes me really happy to do that. [Logic]: Well there you go. A good foundation.

And that's how Logan considers it as well: just a foundation. Not something that will take a huge part of Thomas' life. These videos are just a start.

This explains his reactions in the following episodes, especially how much he insisted on Thomas having a real job: after all, these videos are not something serious. Why focusing so much on them?

This could potentially be the starting point of Logan's increasing frustration and the reason of his final snap in season 3, that would also start his character arc.

But Patton’s question is what really surprises me:

[Morality]: What positive impacts do you inevitably hope to bring to this world?

Not only this screams POF, but it shows something for the first time: that Patton is silly, but he’s also clever. He’s not a complete idiot. He likes to be silly, he IS silly, but this question proves he's a lot more mature than he seems.

And if you think this is just a one-time thing, don't worry, we'll see it again in the future.

Is this a foreshadowing of my next analysis? Well, the episode was all foreshadowing, why can't I foreshadow something as well? ;)

( Support me on Ko-fi )

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[thesublemon]

on reviewing

Watched a documentary on Pauline Kael a couple nights ago. It clarified for me why I always find her reviewing refreshing and frustrating by turns. Refreshing because she doesn’t tend to treat genre or subject matter as something sacred. She will watch many kinds of movies with the same degree of curiosity and judgment. Her instincts about whether a movie is working, or lying, or doing something new are also often very on point.

But she falls prey to the two big things that I think make reviewing a flawed, sometimes maybe even useless endeavor. Especially if the goal is to accurately describe what a work is.

1) An inability, or disinterest, in modeling why artistic choices work or don’t. For instance, at one point in the documentary she complains about artists and critics equating repetition with lyricism, and states that repetition in movies simply annoys her because it feels like belaboring a point that she’s already gotten. But that complaint misses out on an opportunity to explore why people would think that repetition is lyrical, or why an artist would reach for it as a choice. And whether, once you’ve modeled what the goal of repetition actually is, maybe there are good and bad versions. If it were me, I would argue that when repetition is good, it doesn’t actually feel like repetition. It feels like riffing. The artistic impact comes not from reiteration, but from reframing—and if it does feel like reiteration, then it’s probably weak repetition. If I were to make a similar complaint about a movie, I might instead complain that a motif did not add or gain complexity each time it appeared. Or I might complain that an attempt to convey monotony by unchanging repetition did not feel worth it, because I didn’t find the underlying point insightful enough to justify the experience of slog. Whatever my exact argument though, the point is that there would be a curiosity and emphasis on what the artist was trying to accomplish. And a generosity about what they could accomplish. As well as a self-awareness about my own values (like “density” and “coherence”) and the fact that I judge works by those values. Without this sort of meta-level mindset, reviews seem to quickly descend into authoritative subjectivity. Kael was good at viciously panning things, but how can a pan help the artist make better work unless it’s accompanied by some sort of model or rationale? Why would an artist listen to your opinion unless you first prove that you understand what they were trying to do? Without a level that exists outside of the reviewer, a review runs the risk of simply being an exhortation to appeal to that reviewer’s taste.

2) A love of saying things that sound good, regardless of whether they’re actually meaningful. At one point in the documentary, Renata Adler, another writer, attempts a takedown of Kael. But ends up making the exact mistake that Kael does.

RENATA ADLER: [Kael] has, in principle, four things she likes: frissons of horror; physical violence depicted in explicit detail; sex scenes, so long as they have an ingredient of cruelty and involve partners who know each other either casually or under perverse circumstances; and fantasies of invasion by, or subjugation of or by, apes, pods, teens, bodysnatchers, and extraterrestrials.

Compare to Kael’s own style of evisceration. Here’s her on The Sound of Music.

PAULINE KAEL: What is it that makes millions of people buy and like THE SOUND OF MUSIC—a tribute to "freshness" that is so mechanically engineered, so shrewdly calculated that the background music rises, the already soft focus blurs and melts, and, upon the instant, you can hear all those noses blowing in the theatre? […] And the phenomenon at the center of the monetary phenomenon? Julie Andrews, with the clean, scrubbed look and the unyieldingly high spirits; the good sport who makes the best of everything; the girl who's so unquestionably good that she carries this one dimension like a shield. […] Wasn't there perhaps one little Von Trapp who didn't want to sing his head off, or who screamed that he wouldn't act out little glockenspiel routines for Papa's party guests, or who got nervous and threw up if he had to get on a stage?

Having read both pieces, I think both writers identify something true about their subject (Adler even makes remarks similar to what I’ve already said). But are the pieces useful? Or accurate in a more total sort of way? Kael had particular kinds of movies she loved, it’s true, and tended to be bad at self-criticism about whether her preferences actually indicated any sort of objective reality. But Adler’s criticism of Kael is no more interested in modeling than Kael’s reviews are. It isn’t interested in an evenhanded consideration of what Kael gets right and wrong and why. What unites Adler’s takedown of Kael and Kael’s takedown of The Sound of Music is that they want to be takedowns. They want to be stylistically rollicking reads that create the aesthetic experience of nailing something to a wall. But the thing about wanting too badly to make an argument “aesthetic” is that it becomes tempting to gloss over anything that would ruin the aesthetic flow. Adler devotes a long paragraph to identifying all of Kael’s tics, and the wall of text is certainly rhetorically effective at making you feel like Kael is some sort of dirty-minded one trick pony. But at the end of the day, it’s rhetoric. Not really argument. Similarly, Kael is so delighted to be able to use phrases like “glockenspiel routines”, that it gets in the way of saying anything more considered. Which isn’t to imply that I think the writers don’t actually believe what they’re saying. On the contrary, I think they hold their opinions powerfully and sincerely, and are trying to identify something wrong in their culture by singling out and drilling down on the sins of one thing in particular. But nonetheless, by caring so much about being good bits of writing—and they are good bits of writing; there’s something juicy and relentless about Kael that sticks with you—they end up empty on the level of argument.

These two failure modes highlight the central problem of reviewing, I think. Which is that reviews tend to be three things at once: ekphrasis, analysis and evaluation (which implies some sort of rubric of quality, whether personal, cultural, or “objective”). This is partly understandable, given that art is an abstract, experiential thing and therefore difficult to evaluate or analyze without some degree of ekphrastic description. It if was easy to say what a work was doing, the artist wouldn’t have needed to make art of it in the first place. So it makes sense that the process of making a work legible enough to opine on would have to trade in artistry itself. It makes sense that in order to show an audience what a work feels like, a review would have to poetically reproduce that feeling. Similar to the way that the translator of a poem needs to be a good poet themselves in order to make the meaning and experience of a poem accessible to an audience in a different language.

The problem is that ekphrasis, being expressive, is also necessarily subjective, and not primarily concerned with logic. Which on its own, is perfectly fine. I’ve written a ton of ekphrasis on this blog. I’m pretty pro-ekphrasis. When it’s done right, there isn’t much like a bulls-eye poetic description of a work to make you feel like you get it on a level you didn’t before. But when that sort of writing is also trying to say whether or not a work is “good”, the expressiveness frequently gets in the way. It’s easy to state or promote an opinion expressively. It’s harder to defend an opinion that way. In good faith, anyhow. Which results in all of these reviews that succeed in observing true or true-feeling things about art, and do so in a sometimes deliciously readable way, but don’t leave me with the feeling that the writer has any consistent or defensible take on how art works. I can’t help thinking that I much prefer reading writing about art that keeps its purpose siloed. So either a piece that tries to poetically explain how a work affected them, or an academic work that tries to argue for an interpretation, or something more philosophical that puts forth a theory of what makes things good and bad and explain why a work does or doesn’t live up to that. I don’t want this to be the case. I think writing that can blend those three modes together is some of the best possible writing about art. But the average reviewer is not really up to the task, despite the fact that the review is probably the most common and widely-read type of writing about art.

(None of which is to say that I’m free of sin these regards. One of the reasons I try to keep the tone of this blog casual is because I want to be able to be able to play with these different modes of writing about art. And see where and when and how I can get away with blending them. It’s a practice space.)

[serpentsapple]

(This post includes major spoilers for The Grisha Trilogy and the Shades of Magic series.)

@dykeblight replied to our introductory post with the following:

alright bud since u decided to put this in the main tags of the books ur critiquing ur ready to hear my take on this. first of all the wording in this post is pretentious as hell and it bothered me all thru out reading it. second of all, let’s lay some shit down: the only books ive read discussed in this post are adsom and tgt, and while i agree that tgt isn’t the most radically feminist book series out there, i have to ask: why are u focused on women writing this? why is this post generalizing

horrible male authors but name dropping female ones? alinas journey was largely about her realizing that she could make her own choices. about her not needing to be queen or supreme ruler or some shit. about how she could literally settle down with the worlds most boring dude and still be happy. anyways, beyond that: adsom. first of all, whenever someone pulls the “not like other girls” card for lila, i have to pull the “she’s genderfluid” card. it wasn’t Explicitly stated in the series, and v

has expressed regret for that, so it’s probably going to be more obvious in the next series. also, adsom is very much a period piece. you couldn’t be a woman in the early nineteenth century doing what lila did without like, yknow, *not being a woman.* the threat she got on that first ship— a period piece! if it was a male author, then that’s gross. but it’s not, a woman wrote it! lila also proceeded to burn the whole goddamn ship down. sometimes authors don’t want to write traditionally feminine

characters!!! sometimes women want to write about what THEY can relate to! and ve schwab, as a queer woman, probably did that. so now we come back to the question of WHY are you calling out only female authors for this? you could have accomplished the same goal by just including books and authors that you deemed Respectable. not to be that bitch, but there was literally no reason for you to post this lmfao. i think we should first tackle the issue that is men having access to keyboards, and

maybe then we can broaden our horizons by critiquing everything women do thats decidedly not perfect.                            

We created this blog to discuss these topics, so we welcome other opinions and interpretations!

To reiterate our goal and perhaps clarify... male authors already receive enough publicity and analysis - to the point they eclipse, at times, their female peers, even when it comes to writing female characters. How wonderful of them to treat fictional women as fellow human beings! (How shameless of others to treat them as their personal sexual fantasy!) Yet we would like to hear what women have to say about themselves. It is why we focus exclusively on their works.

Furthermore, we believe these works as worthy of analysis as any text written by a man. And it is precisely because of this conviction - their books potentially as grandiose, as mediocre as any man’s - that we will not refrain from criticising them. To treat them differently would be implicitly agreeing with the notion they aren’t as intellectually engaging as men’s writings.

Moreover, we are not advocating for “feminist” books from women. In fact, we dislike this qualifier: too often misattributed, rarely useful, always commercial. We desire convincing female characters, as talented as they are flawed, as just as they can be immoral. Thus, while we have grown tired of uncreative, unnecessary sexism in fantasy, we are not expecting perfect little militants in every story. We expect to be moved and stunned, to be left inspired or reflecting on what we read.

I hope this has cleared up our intent with the blog. Now, for the specific series discussed...

While I could see this be Bardugo’s aim for Alina’s journey, I disagree with it being well executed. Narratively speaking, I do not think Alina was treated fairly and was able to make true choices. Throughout all three books, Alina remained unobservant and somewhat self-centered, never challenging the affirmations of others and instead regarding them as truth. Let’s take the example of the Darkling: she accepts his supposed initial good intentions and views him, to the very end, as some kind of lost and anguished “boy”. Yet that isn’t what the text shows - on the contrary, the Darkling is a hollow character that spent centuries sitting on his behind, doing nothing for his fellow Grisha. Alina is never given the chance to realise this and reevalute what happened to her.

Beyond this, I feel like Alina’s journey was contrived from the start. Bardugo does not allow her to see beyond the words of others, nor does she allow her to actually grow. Alina’s crush on Mal and her fixation on remaining with him - despite him disliking what she is! - stems from a child’s anxiety and solitude. Instead of becoming her own woman, making her own choices and yes, having to face losing relationships, Alina regresses to the safety of her childhood, powerless and normal, just like Mal. Let us remember that, to remain with him, she sealed her powers within herself, endangering her health! So symbolically, it is a slap in the face: just when she embraced her powers - meaning letting go of her fears, of Mal -, she loses it all and go back to square one.

This is why I don’t find Alina’s journey satisfying. Even if it hurts, I wish to see female characters confronted to their fears and their flaws, and grow from them*. That is not what we witnessed with Alina. And: why is it that female characters must be “depowered”? Why does the Darkling (and Ilya Morozova) get to keep his immense powers, must live with his guilt, yet Alina loses every and any scrap of magic? Why is she punished for her greed so much, when she hardly is the greediest? (This echoes also Genya’s “punishment”, so heavily tied to her being a beautiful woman and beauty being, in Bardugo’s world, a key quality for women. Nikolai’s monstruous transformation is cruel but never specifically targeted at his sex.)

Why is it female characters only whose “happy” ending involve going back to their boyfriend’s house, complete with potential children? In a fantasy world, is it the best we can offer to these characters? Why does “making her own choice” usually involve them being unambitious and - I am barely caricaturing - happy housewives? Where are the female characters being greedy, powerful to the point of madness, and fascinatingly ruthless? Where are the genius, the good but scheming inventors and princesses? Where are the female Darklings and the female Nikolais?

Yes, it may not be Alina’s story and that’s alright. But reading the story she received, I could not help wondering: is it truly her story, or is it her story in a narrative unfair to women?

As for Lila... what Schwab stated confusingly in interviews or twitter threads cannot be used to analyse the text itself, though it may help. In this case, it holds a very different perspective from what she may affirm outside of it, so let’s keep close to what she wrote.

I disagree that it is a period piece. Her series is firmly set in a fantasy version of our world, with four alternate but equally real Londons, and with interactions between them that differentiate her England from ours. She chose to keep this England similar to ours, so the departure from it could be obvious; she chose, again, to have Lila threatened with rape by sailors even in Red London, her full invention. She chose, still, to never mention the miserable reality of lots of poor women like Lila in our England - namely, prostitution. She picked what suited her, as authors do, yet could not come up with any other plot than sexual assault. That she is a woman does not excuse her utter lack of imagination on that front! I find the notion that female characters are condemned to sexual threats depressing, on top of insulting towards authors who still strive to be creative.

And this is all ignoring what Schwab forced her other female characters to endure, which is sexual slavery, somewhat coerced pregnancies and social isolation, plus being sexist caricatures and butchered so men could be sad about it. In that context, what is Schwab exactly saying about women, if even her heroine is misogynistic and desperately trying to escape this reality? If Lila isn’t a woman - which she is in the text, she never denies being one, she only affirms being different, meaning a full human being! -, does that mean women’s place is in caricature and distress and death? If she is, then must they reject their womanhood and deride other women to be in the spotlight?

And this is all, again, ignoring that Schwab who, yes, admitted wanting to write a female character she wished to see in fiction, that resembled her... had Lila’s whole development derailed in favour of male characters. Lila’s ambition and excessiveness vanished in a third book dedicated to temptation! Lila’s anger and recklessness receded in front of Holland, all so we could learn about his sad backstory. Which involved, as salt to the wound, the stereotypes of a greedy girlfriend and the ever failing mother Schwab is so fond of.

Our post never suggested that women should not write non traditionally feminine women. Rather, that would be quite refreshing! I would love to read about these women that we hardly see.

Is it what Schwab wrote, though? Lila indeed crossdresses and appears androgynous enough to sometimes pass as a man (not always, in a manner that is most convenient to the author). Yet: she constantly mocks other women for being vapid, gossiping, feminine, in a word weak. Yet: Schwab has her, in the second book, attend a ball dressed femininely and feeling insecure about it, all to state she is - quoting! - “not most girls” and have Kell, her love interest, compliments her. She has the happy tomboy reaffirmed as able to be feminine and beautiful that way! How is that not depressing for every woman and girl who never want to be feminine? Why did Schwab choose to have her in a dress instead of a suit, like Lila would probably have preferred? Why did Schwab choose to strictly divide women and men into two categories, dress-wearing and not-dress-wearing? Why is Lila alone in her plight as an androgynous woman? Why didn’t this fantasy world have women and men dressed in a way they felt comfortable with?

This isn’t a period piece. Schwab was free to make that choice... and she did not. I would add, too, that women in real life have always struggled and fought against misogyny. They were women and they were still complex human beings and they still tried to live as comfortably as they could. Sometimes they failed, yes, because society wouldn’t want them to. But women like Lila have existed, and behaved like her, and dressed like her, and dreamed as big as her. Why should not we expect as much of fiction, then?

Sidenote: I am especially critical of that awful “tomboy turns into a lady” trope that fandom will seize it and run. It is disheartening to see countless edits and fanarts of Lila depicting her as feminine instead of androgynous as she was written, and often in feminine clothing at that. So if even the narrative later ends up confirming it...

*Or perhaps spiral down, willingfully blind. Alina’s story isn’t supposed to be a tragedy, however, so this does not apply here.

(If you don’t mind, I would like to hear why you found the post’s wording pretentious?)

[you-turn-it-into-light]

Kalafina Singing Analysis

I have been watching a lot of Kalafina live recently, and I thought it would be fun to analyse how the girls sing, and how their abilities have changed throughout the years of them being in Kalafina. I will be covering each of the girls (in order of Wakana, Keiko and Hikaru). I would love any constructive criticism or any other points. 

Note: I am not a professional singer or a singing teacher. I just thought it would be interesting for analyse each of Kalafina’s members singing techniques, the good and the bad, with what knowledge I do have about singing. I have been singing for 7 years, been in many choirs both in school and out. I have been taught by different singing teachers. I am also not perfect, I have many flaws in my singing as well, but myself pointing flaws out in the girls does not mean that I am saying that I am any better. 

In order to clarify for later parts:

For the voice range information, I have recorded instances of all the girls singing not just in Kalafina Songs, but in FictionJunction songs and lives, as well as covers on TV, Kalafina Club Openings, and Wakana’s Solo Album With that, let’s get started.

Wakana has always been a soprano. There are lots of different sources on what the range of a soprano is, Choirly.com says that the soprano range is B3 - G6, but both wikipedia (including a cited source) and musicnotes.com says that the soprano range lies between C4 and C6. The highest notes I have recorded Wakana reaching is G5# in her falsetto/head voice and I’m sure she can reach higher. The lowest note she has been recorded to reach is F3 (in Kioku no Hito) but I do not consider that a low note she can reach comfortably, the note is very breathy and weak and barely audible, especially later in the song. The lowest note I would consider Wakana to somewhat comfortably reach, even though it is breathy, is A3. In terms of range alone, Wakana could be considered a Mezzo-Soprano, but I think her timbre is what sets her apart. Wakana’s voice is quite high-pitched. Even when she hits notes that are not particularly high for a soprano, it sounds high and impressive because her voice is so high pitched. This is a bit random, but a lot of people say that they believe Wakana’s voice took a full 180 in 2012, but I argue that it had been getting more high pitched for a while before then. Compare Wakana’s voice in ARIA from their Live in 2008 to the Red Moon Live in 2010, it does sound more high pitched.

More on tone, Wakana’s voice used to be a lot fuller than it is now. It had a lot more strength and power in earlier songs and lives, it has became a lot weaker over the years and I think this shows especially in the most recent lives, when her voice would almost jump off in between notes as if it was barely holding on (I take serenato and Kizuato from the 10th Anniversary Live as examples). Her voice is a lot quieter than Keiko and Hikaru’s even at her most powerful. Wakana’s voice was full because of her tone, but then her power became backed by a overuse of nasal placement. In the After Eden Live and Kalafina’s performances in the Type Moon Fes. 2012, Wakana’s higher pitched voice accompanied by a honky tone was there for a while until late 2012 to 2013, where her voice almost seemed to lose power almost completely. Wakana’s voice is incredibly thin and weak during the consolation live and similarly in the 2014 live tour and the FictionJunction elemental tour. Her voice has somewhat recovered since then to a place where she sounds mostly comfortable in her current voice tone. She still has some honky moments, which I don’t think sound nice at all, but when her voice is clear I find it to be the most beautiful (i.e. most of Ai no Hana). I disagree when some people say that her current voice sounds like her ‘old voice’, because there are so many things that are different and she will probably never be able to sound like how she was back in the early Kalafina/FictionJunction days, but that’s not a bad thing necessarily.

Now let’s talk about technique. There are some parts of her technique that I find professional, she doesn’t move around a lot when singing particularly hard parts, her feet are always grounded and her posture is straight. However there are some parts (a few actually) of her singing technique that bothers me. Her breathing is quite loud and inconsistent. When breathing in between lines, you should keep your shoulders level and your breath sharp, almost as if you’re gasping or yawning so that you can open your diapghram and breathe deeply, but Wakana usually lifts her shoulders and her chest is shown to expand more that her stomach area most times when she takes a breath, this leads to her voice being strained and weak in certain instances and isn’t good for professional singers. Additionally, Wakana keeps her face quite strained when she sings. Her eyebrows are almost always furrowed. I don’t know if it’s just a habit that makes it easy for Wakana to sing or if it’s a sign that that she has trouble singing, but it can cause trouble for her. Wakana also tends to keep her head down when she sings particularly high notes, both in her high voice and falsetto. This is NOT a good way to sing high notes, your head needs to be level so that you’re not straining your vocal chords. And especially because she mostly sings from her chest, this can be very straining on her voice. Whenever she is singing, Wakana is usually still. Her feet stay in place, but she is constantly moving the top of her body as she changes lines and hits certain notes. She can move rather violently whenever she breaths quickly, especially because it’s from her chest. This causes a problem in control.

I know my analysis does sound mostly critical (maybe a bit petty) and negative, but I do think Wakana has come strides and I still love her voice most of the time. I’m very proud of Wakana for overcoming her obstacles and being mostly comfortable with where she is now, both voice and career wise. In fact I think she sounds the best now than she has in years.

Keiko’s voice is the only one of the three members to have not changed drastically over Kalafina’s career. Based on range alone, I would consider Keiko to be either an alto or a mezzo-soprano. She can reach notes in a chest voice that mezzos or sopranos can reach. The highest note in her chest voice I have recorded is an E5 from Yuki Kajiura’s Vol #1 Live almost 11 years ago, but her chest voice range has decreased about half an octave since then. Keiko has the widest (recorded) range out of the three girls being 2 and a half octaves (Wakana being 2 octaves and Hikaru currently being 1 and a half). However based on timbre, Keiko is very obviously an alto or contralto. Her voice is very deep and it is her most distinguishing feature, it can make notes sound lower than what they actually are. For example, her solo notes in 'to the beginning’ range from C4 to E4 and you wouldn’t be able to tell those notes are in her middle range unless you measured it (As a soprano, I certainly think they were low).

Keiko’s voice is incredibly versatile. She can sing very quiet or very loud and everything in between. Her voice is very full and her belting is incredibly powerful, but she can also pull her volume back and sing very delicately. Keiko can sing happy songs, dark songs, sad songs and so much more. Although she can sing low, her voice gets breathy below E3. Her falsetto is also quite full, probably the best out of the group; Keiko uses lots of support and it is very resonant. Keiko’s voice has not changed very much throughout her years in Kalafina, except becoming more full and controlled. In the studio recording of 'Kaze no Machi e’, her voice is quite breathy. I’m not sure if this was a stylistic choice, but she has certainly changed it. About 4 years into Kalafina’ career, from around 2011 - 2012, Keiko started singing in a kind of 'shouty’ way. This is especially evident in the After Eden 2011 Live, very much so in 'Mune no Yukue’, 'destination unknown’ and 'fantasia’ which is very belted and loud (almost unnecessarily so), this has most certainly been changed in later years with later performances being much more controlled. Keiko also frequently does what’s not professionally called 'vocal hiccups’, which is where you end a note with a squeaky note (it’s really hard to describe but she does it a lot). This is usually used to express emotion and in my opinion she does this a little bit too much, she has been shown to do it when the notes are in her middle to low range (I use the second chorus of 'destination unknown’ from the Blue Day LIVE 'stone cold’ from the Yuki Kajiura LIVE Vol.9 as examples). 

I think that Keiko’s techniques are very admirable (except the vocal hiccups I mentioned earlier), She exercises a lot more than Wakana and Hikaru and she certainly has a lot more stamina and can afford to exert a lot more energy and power in not only her vocals but in her stage presence. Keiko’s energy has changed quite a bit over the years, she has become much more reserved in her energy when singing energetic songs, but she is still able to run and jump across the stage while singing even though she doesn’t do it much anymore. Her stance while on stage is usually good; Her posture isn’t perfect but it is usually very consistent, along with her breathing. Whenever Keiko breaths it is usually very sharp, quiet and even across her chest and diaphragm. I have seen her sometimes breath only through her nose before a line and I find that very interesting. Her diction isn’t very consistent though, she usually smiles to get a wide sound on her 'a’ and 'e’ sounds and makes her mouth narrow for 'u’ and 'o’ sounds, but she is very quick to change the sound of the vowels when she gets happy and really smiles and her 'u’ becoming tight. Normally this is a stylistic choice; her vowels get more narrow when she sings happier or poppier songs ('Samidare’ from 9+ONE LIVE, 'Kimi ga Hikari ni’ from Type Moon Fes. LIVE), and when she sings dark songs she lowers her jaw significantly in order to get that dark sound ('lirica’ from 10th Anniversary LIVE 'Kagayaku Sora no Shijima ni wa’ from Lisani LIVE 2017 w/ LiSA). The only times these choices really bother me is when they aren’t necessary for the tone of the song, which some people call her 'cutesy voice’ (she also makes her pitch higher when singing like this), especially during sad songs and honestly it bothers me sometimes as well. 

Overall, I don’t think there is much to criticise when it comes to Keiko’s singing. Her voice is certainly my favourite because of its deep and powerful tone and how versatile it is and I think her techniques and consistency is a lot to admire. I certainly look forward to what she does in the future. 

Hikaru’s singing voice is an interesting case of almost a complete 180 in tone and range, both good and bad. Near the start of Kalafina’s career, I would consider Hikaru a mezzo-soprano based on her range (she is still considered that , but Hikaru has been an alto in my eyes (and ears) for almost 6 years now) Hikaru used to be able to sing up to almost an E5, but now she can barely reach an F4 or higher without sounding strained. This is almost an octave erased from her chest voice range in six years. She does sing notes higher than this but they are in a region that sounds too strained and almost like she’s shouting. It certainly isn’t a comfortable range (I take 'Manten’ or 'Hikari no Senritsu’ from the 10th Anniversary LIVE as examples of how strained her voice sounds). The tone of Hikaru’s voice has changed a few times over the years. At the very beginning of Kalafina, her voice was high pitched, but from around 2009 - mid 2012, her voice deepened. After late 2012 - present, her singing voice has returned to being much more high pitched as her chest voice range has decreased. I would consider Hikaru an alto, because even though her low notes don’t sound as deep as they used to, she cannot sing nowhere near up to Keiko’s head voice range. I hate to compare her to another singer, but to someone who used to be a mezzo-soprano compared to someone who’s supposed to be an alto, even contralto, these differences cannot be ignored. 

Continuing with the tone of her voice, Hikaru is able to be quite loud. I have not heard her sing live myself but I think through what I’ve seen, when she sings notes in her comfortable range she can almost belt the notes. When singing in a range that she’s not comfortable in, she becomes a fair bit quieter because she isn’t able to back herself up and it becomes almost like shouting. Hikaru’s control of her voice has remained mostly the same throughout her career. It seems quite hard for her to lower her voice when she is singing in her higher comfortable range (I use 'Tonbo’ Studio Version, 'Gogatsu no Mahou’ from 9+ONE LIVE as examples and 'Haru wa Kogane…’ from the Red Moon LIVE as examples). I really hate how she just belts out random notes sometimes when they get to be a little higher instead of keeping a controlled tone, I think it’s the weakest part of her technique and is one of the main reasons why I hate listening to 'Tonbo’ so much,One thing I think has improved in her voice is the nasality. In the early Kalafina years, her voice was very nasally and that was where some of the support for her high notes came from. You can hear it sometimes when she sung 'n’ sounds, the note was almost completely omitted. As her voice range changed over the years, so did her use of nasal in her voice. It is still there sometimes, but more in the background. A point of interest for many people for Hikaru’s voice is her falsetto and it’s interesting, she basically doesn’t use any support in her  voice when reaching those notes. This leads to those falsetto notes being light, airy and very quiet. I think this is very strange in a professional singer, but it could be just a stylistic choice. I think it is one of the weaker aspects of her voice. 

In a technique aspect, Hikaru has both strong and weak points, much like Wakana. Her breathing is very even across her diaphragm and her chest, and so her breathing is quiet (except for when she’s tired, obviously). Her stance is mostly very still and although she does move around a lot during energetic songs, her feet stay grounded no matter how she’s standing. Hikaru used to keep her head very level as she sung, but now she sings with her chin way up, which is a little weird but I can’t really comment on it because I’ve heard both good and bad things about it. Her facial expressions are interesting. Her eyebrows are usually furrowed in order to display emotion when she’s singing (and even when she’s not), her face is rarely relaxed. I have heard some criticism about Hikaru “focusing more on looking angry rather than singing” and I think that’s true to an extent. It seems really important to Hikaru to convey emotion to the audience in any way she can, and it doesn’t seem that it particularly bothers her. In many other songs when she struggles on a verse or a line, her facial features slacken a little so a neutral expression, so its almost like she focuses when she really needs to. On the other hand, Hikaru tends to scrunch her face up when she’s straining high notes sometimes, which is a little worrying, so overall its a bit of a mystery to me. Additionally, her dictation is good, not too wide and not too small - overall pretty consistent. Although one part of Hikaru’s technique that has formed more recently is her posture. Hikaru used to stand up straight, but she has started to sing with her back hunched over, and this is a general 'no-no’ when it comes to singing techniques. Singing with a hunched back results in a lack of control and she has been doing it for a few years now (I use sprinter from the Arena Live as an example).

Overall, I don’t like Hikaru’s voice as much as I used to and that’s mainly a matter of preference. However I do believe that she can improve and sing songs that are more in her comfortable range so she can work to improve her technique and not damage her voice in the long run. My analysis of Hikaru has been quite negative, but I still love her to pieces!

————————————

Thanks for reading this far! If there is anything I’ve said that’s wrong or you would to offer any criticism, I would love to hear what you have to say :)

[naruhearts]

OKAY SO I've just spent the best part of an hour scrolling through your blog and reading a bunch of your destiel meta and I HAD to message you... I was one of the many people who STRONGLY believed destiel had a chance of being canon after season 8 (more like season gr8 am i right), but throughout the years I slowly lost all hope. However, S14 has made me 110% invested in the show again and YOUR META IS GIVING ME HOPE FOR DESTIEL, which is TERRIFYING. Your writing is wonderful and I'm STRESSED.

Got back from Washington late last night!

Oh my gosh @alovelikecas, your message really made my day and I’m SO glad you enjoy my meta xox (even when most of my meta looks like, to me, sloppy-ass writing, haha! I’ll probably make an end-season meta post after 14x20 — if I have the time — that touches upon SPN’s current and repeating themes since Season New Beginnings S12/Dabb Era, not to mention I have, like, some more unfinished meta in my drafts >.>)

Yeah I mean, I didn’t join Destiel land until Summer 2016, and before that, I was late to the Season 11 party, so I basically had no narrative context for anything, and I’ll copy-paste what I said here: 

Looking back, one significant thing I recall? S11 gave me a sense of Destiel’s true narrative validity (as not a ‘fanon’ ship but organically developed in the canon) when I perceived it as a season that was ‘missing something’. Keep in mind I had no idea about Destiel yet while watching S11 at the time.

I was literally asking myself — repeatedly — why Dean/Amara seemed to contain odd narrative holes, considering A. Dean explicitly said that the non-consensual attraction he felt for Amara was NOT love and “it scares him”, B. Amara told Dean that ‘something stops you - keeps you from having it all’, C. Djinn!Amara stated that she can: ‘feel the love [Dean] feels, except it’s cloaked in shame,’ and D. Mildred’s iconic ‘You’re pining for someone’ —> which did not logically correlate with A and C, meaning: since Dean doesn’t freely love Amara and thus isn’t possibly pining for her — with female love interests as currently non-existent (I remember crossing off the dead/gone girls on a piece of paper lol) — who the hell was he pining for, then?

Originally posted by elizabethrobertajones

Obviously, without writing long-ass paragraphs of meta about it again in this post, S11 made sense as soon as I watched it within the Destiel context (especially after I read up on some grandiose pieces of Destiel meta (@charlie-minion was the very first person who inspired me to write meta; I followed her once I joined the fandom Oh my god, here we go, holy crap this subtext – I’m invested in this godforsaken ship because they’re in love with each other and I’m not getting off any time soon. The rest is history.

I’m aware that I do come off as positive (and I’m still Destiel-positive; whatever happens in 14x20 this week may or may not change that), but I hope you don’t mind if I use your lovely ask as an additional opportunity to clarify my meta standpoint: no one’s saying Destiel WILL become text. 

The general Destiel meta community (all subfactions: Destiel-positive, -negative, -neutral, and in-between) is not the Most Holy Canon Word, and we aren’t SPN writers, and again, we can’t actually speak to the veracity of Destiel as guaranteed-gonna-go-textual, but we — a diverse pool of critical thinkers from all walks of life: particularly those who have some degree of experience in literary academia/English literature studies (fun fact: I was actually pursuing a Minor’s in English until I changed my mind - my first love’s Health Science/Biology, which I stuck with, but here I am doing lit-crit analysis on the side *wink*) — can speak to the veracity of Destiel as a real, palpable, and ever-substantial long-running romance narrative aka the love story between Dean and Cas IS THERE. I see it. We all see it. We didn’t pluck it out of the random ether one day. It naturally evolved across the show’s overarching narrative like some vast spiderweb, linked together by numerous character arc amalgamations of Dean Winchester and Castiel as separate individuals who were then brought together — who brought themselves together, by the sheer force of free will and choice — and are now inherent parts of the other’s story (and respective character progression).

I say this too many times to count: the entire point of writing meta? Personally, it enables me to appreciate the literary gorgeousness of Dean and Cas’ relationship as, first and foremost, a tentative alliance offset by the very moment Cas raised Dean from perdition (it’s a poetic beginning). Their alliance then inevitably proliferated into a rocky — at times, necessarily turbulent — friendship, then a deep profound bond…one that crossed platonic boundaries since S7/8 and is, ultimately, indelibly rooted in romance. Together, Dean and Cas build up each other’s strengths, complement each other’s flaws, and narratively motivate the other to self-introspect — to become the best version of themselves that they were always meant to be: self-actualized entities who let go of their painful, horrifying, psychologically/emotionally destitute pasts.

These above reasons and more are why I think Destiel belongs right up there on the shelf of Ye Olde Classics, similar to epics by John Milton, Shakespearian tragic dramas, Homeric characteristic cruxes, and the great Odyssey journey: a legendary journey, fraught with circumstance, that finally ended with Odysseus (now an enlightened man) returning to Penelope, the love of his life.

Channeling the scope of Homer’s Odyssey, Destiel is an incredible storytelling feat of obstacles, both internal and external, romance tropes, mirroring, foreshadowing, and visual cadence/emotion, enhancing SPN’s already character-driven main plot in that Dean and Cas try to make it back to one another; like Penelope, their love holds true despite everything. If Destiel were an M/F couple, we all know their love story would be absolutely undeniable to the GA.

I do understand the bitterness S14’s fostered in some viewers, though. I do understand that Dean and Cas seem distant (and yeah, it’s a noticeable difference compared to S12/S13), but I believe the Destiel subtext is still heavy and holds steady.

Right now, at this point, there remains multiple personal issues for the characters to solve, you know? Dean and Cas aren’t talking properly; their love languages stay mistranslated, although we’re persistently shown that they still understand each other on a certain level that no one else can, and the visual narrative keeps framing them as on-the-nose solid counterparts: a domestic-spousal romantic unit independent of Sam.

Originally posted by incatastrophicmind

They want to be there for the other. They need to quash the final remnants of their respective internal loathing (Dean’s self-worthiness, Cas’ self-expendability) before they’re able to give the other 100% of their time, efforts, attention, and love (as flawed and complicated but compellingly beautiful as it can possibly be). During the times Dean and Cas do try to talk shit out, extraneous issues continue to get between them.

As other friends/meta pals discussed with me, S14 is like S10 in that it’s confusing the cast/audiences. And exactly: S8, besides S11/S12/early S13, also belongs in the close-to-canon serious Destiel narrative transition! I can discuss the showrunning/writer problem of SBL (Singer + Bucklemming; @occamshipper hits the nail on the head) that tugs subtext – especially subtext linked to Destiel – back and forth, sometimes in the weirdest nonsensical ways, but I won’t go too far into it here. I agree, however, with the recent idea that Jensen does seem a bit confused as to where he should bring Dean emotionally this season (don’t get me wrong, I do NOT believe Dean is OOC; OOC is a completely different concept vs expected character behaviour). And if Dean’s consistently romance-coded past interactions with Cas are any indication, Jensen would also — in the same vein as all of us — want Dean and Cas to start getting their shit together. Long-running fictional characters like Dean and Cas, conceived over 10 years, are so well-written to the point where you, the author, can predict what they’ll do even if you just plop both of them inside a room and give them no direction, and I personally feel that nowadays Jensen is prevented from achieving Dean’s further internal growth/unsure how to act in the moment because of some dumb SBL scripts saying one thing while his character’s heart says another. Wank aside—

Season 15 should hopefully convey a much more logical subtextual perspective e.g. unbelievably amazingly cohesive Season Destiel 11 that aired after choppy S10. Not all hope is lost!! I also want to clarify that I personally LOVED Season 14 in general. It’s been mostly Emotion-centric constant, with Yockey, Berens, Perez, and Dabb usually making my top-rank SPN writer list.

Currently the narrative’s still allowing pretty significant (imho) wiggle room for the lovers to fracture apart and get back together, where their miscommunication comes to a dramatic head. We just saw Dean and Cas argue over Jack’s well-being in 14x18 and 19. Dean — besides putting Cas at the top of his You’re-Dead-to-Me-Because-You-Lied-but-I-Still-Love-You-Goddammit hitlist (for clear spousal-coded reasons) and taking Cas’ actions to heart (he’s the person he trusted the most who lied to him) — no doubt blamed himself for what happened, and Sam was, like I said, the mouthpiece of truth. TFW were all culpable. They all failed Jack in some way, shape, or form.

I’m not expecting anything for 14x20, but I’m nervous either way! Thanks for sticking with my long answer

[fictionerd]

A Response

This post is going to be super long. Hence why it’s not a reblog itself. You can see. If you’re not the initial repsonder you can see that post: Here. @knightofbalance-13

I am going to attempt to go through this and acknowledge your counterpoints the way you you have picked apart my original post. First though, I feel like I should address some context. The first two proper paragraphs of my post go entirely un-remarked by you. These are my statement that I stand by my defense of the series up to this point, and clarifying the context that this episode in particular pissed me off.

*Sigh* …

Squad 13 had nothing to do with what happened in Episode 13. We only ever saw Ichigo and Goro and they barely did anything. The episode was focused on Zero Two and Hiro so your point here makes no sense.

You seem to be misconstruing my actual statements here. This post is about Episode 14. I’m discussing Squad 13′s actions this episode not last one. I specifically say that I’d expected the forward progress from last episode to carry over into this one.

*raises hand*

I know i’ve argued like this before but let me explain the different context:

In my context, I was debating over my own personal interpretation of Ichigo’s actions and how iffy she was being to me.

However, here this is an anaylsis of the show which means personal interpretation shouldn’t even be a major factor, rather looking at both sides of the issue and understanding them both.

To them, Hiro was hopelessly infatuated with a shown to be dangerous person trying to take away his humanity. They couldn’t know his backstory with Zero Two or that she wasn’t trying to be a threat, especially since Zero Two wasn’t explaining things (which even THEN makes sense as she’s never trusted anyone enough to show that much vunerability towards them aside from Hiro and even then, that was only for sometime. She has been isolated and tortured: Her communication skills are gonna be pretty crap).

What you and I feel on this matter don’t factor into them: Squad 13 are their own people with their own stakes in the matter, their own way of looking at things and with their own ways they are affected by this. For this to be bad writing, their actions needs to contradict what THEY would want, not us. And with their situation, this makes perfect sense.

Okay, I’m about to say something that’s going to be repeated a lot here.You bring up good points that, had I been in any different a frame of mind when I wrote the initial impressions, I would have likely stated myself.

I was angry. Angry that they wouldn’t even let him speak to her. I get not wanting him to pilot with her again. The source of the actual issue, but they wouldn’t even let them speak? With the rest of the squad present? It’s this reversal of their attitude back to the state it was in when she first appeared that was frustrating and led me to having this reaction. That coupled with me having prior made an ass of myself.

Now, I bolded some text in here because I need to respond to it directly above all else.

My response: Bullshit. Author and Audience have equal agency in a story. This is why, normally, I’m all for people seeing elements in a narrative that may not have been intended to be there. The problem I had with critics of FranXX beforehand was that many seemed to have read unintended content into the show while ignoring what was there.

Furthermore: Analysis is always done through a personal lens. Regardless of how objective you attempt to be. Regardless of how you try to understand both sides.Recently some one said in a stream I watched “It’s impossible to be objective. And even if it were possible - it’s more important to be fair.” Right here and now I freely admit I’ve been neither.

In my coverage of FranXX up until this point I’ve been more spiteful towards the series’ detractors than I should have been, and in this post my impressions swung a little too far to the opposite side.

That’s the thing.

They were his friends since childhood…

And yet he has NEVER mentioned Zero Two before to them, never mentioned this past to them and they never saw her before then. To them, Hiro would be just spouting crazy nonsense and making them distrust Zero two even more by making it seem like she was messing with his head. To make matters worse, if the adults happen to learn about this: Poof! Another mind wipe, back to square one for Hiro. After all the pain and suffering he went through to get to that point: it’d make even LESS sense to slip up like that, especially since that happened to him BEFORE.

Again, compelling arguments. Arguments that, with hindsight, make a lot of sense. But also make a lot of sense since I addressed some of them. My problem is that Hiro didn’t even try to talk about it with Ichigo. Even if her response had been to tell him he was crazy then at least he would have tried which seems, to me, more consistent with his character rather than jumping straight to prison-escape tactics. Though you make an equally compelling point about one slip-up meaning that he’d go through a mind wipe again. I admit I hadn’t thought of that in the haze of my frustration at their behavior.

The fact that their behavior is justified doesn’t mean I have no right to be frustrated by it. In a way it’s the story doing its job.

…And? You don’t think this was INTENTIONAL? That showing Zero Two didn’t fully understand what it meant to be human was an INTENTIONAL character flaw? That this might be something that was intended to be in her as a character and to be something that has to be fixed?

And why would anything Hiro has done before do anything for her? She didn’t know who he was and she only trusted the Hiro she knew out of ALL HUMANITY. Again, due to torture, isolation, manipulation and desperation. This makes total sense given her character and history. Just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s bad.

You are correct here. Down to the last detail. I have next to no rebuttal for this one. At this point I was largely just pissed off at all people concerned. Moving on.

Gee, doesn’t that sound familiar? *cough* EVERY HUMAN CONFLICT IN HISTORY *cough*.

yeah, from the enslavement of the Jews in Egypt to the political strife in present day America: Every single human conflict is made by people being idiots and getting their idiot asses handed to them.

And while you may say “Entertainment doesn’t need that much realism!”: Entertainment is made to sell you an illusion and the best illusions are the most realistic. the purpose of writing characters is to make them emulate people as closely as possible, flaws and all.

Such conflict is caused by some people being idiots. Not all of the people all of the time. Fiction DOES need realism, but there’s a difference between realism and the entire cast reverting straight back to beginning-of-series attitudes. That strikes me as less of a stumble and more of a reset, but I’m willing to concede the point anyway.

In all honesty, You should have done that in the first place.

Again, entirely correct... So much so that I said as much in the post to begin with. Though I can’t tell if you mean I should have watched their coverage of Episode one or if you somehow think I haven’t watched the first episode of the series. 

… Have you now?

See, here’s the thing: different types of stories require the world and characters to grow at different paces. More drama and horror based shows like Franxx require it to be done slowly to build up suspense whereas more action and triumphant shows like Franxx’s brother, Gurren Lagann require it be done faster. It depends on the show. So if you don’t like the pacing, ask yourself: is the pacing done badly for this type of show? or do I just not like this pacing?

Also: Character development isn’t always positive. Characters, like people, can and will regress. Again, it just has to make sense given the context. In this shows case: it does.

My quibble here is this. You NEED to care about the characters in ANY story you are audience to. REGARDLESS of genre. Even at the time when I was covering the early episodes I felt they were lacking until we hit episode four, and my comment was primarily addressing my understanding of why people left due to lack of development in the extended cast.

Okay-

Would it benefit the SHOW in the long run for Eren to change?

Or would it benefit YOU?

It it’s the latter: you need to be aware of your biases.

And there you go: confusing development and change with being positive. People don’t always move forward: they stumble back or stop along the way. It happens and even if you don’t like it, you need to accept it.

Would it benefit the story in the long run for Eren to show that his experiences since the attack on his hometown had changed him in any way? Yes, it would. It would take the largest millstone off the show’s neck.

Does it benefit the plot for Eren to change? Absolutely not. They need to keep him an angry little hypocrite for as long as humanly possible in order to keep forward momentum. Or so it seems anyway.

By extension of it benefiting the story, it would benefit me because I wouldn’t have this one black hole of empathy sitting in the middle of the show. Eren honestly comes across more as some one you’re meant to hate, while the writing seems to imply you’re supposed to be rooting for him and his cleanup-squad. Which I did. I did root for Eren all through season One, but the best parts of Season Two were the parts where he wasn’t present. Which, admittedly, was a lot of it.

I’m well aware of my biases. I was throwing them in the faces of critics of FranXX up until this episode, and I still stand by the disagreements I had with them. I feel my biggest problem here is a severe case of over-correcting.

Good…but you need far more than that. Every step I’ve seen you take here has been a step in the wrong direction. You need to learn to understand both sides in both reality and in the show. You need to learn that just because you don’t like it doesn’t make it bad. You need to learn some basic lessons for being a good critic.

Never claimed to be a critic. I’m only a critic in so far as EVERYONE is a critic. The name of the series is Let’s Talk Anime (Which, by the way, thank you for actually engaging me in conversation xD) I’m here to give my impression, not an “Objective” review. I’m a writing guy with my own biases, lenses, and desire for speculation. That’s why you don’t often see me commenting on animation or shot framing unless it’s so amazing or so terrible that even I sit up and take notice.

Not everyone is trying to be a “good critic”. Some of us are just contrarians who, when proven wrong to a certain degree, proceed to over-correct themselves.

While I understand your actions: I don’t excuse them. You should have done better.

Seeing as you ignored my opening paragraphs it seems you could have ignored the apology directed at a specific group of people. As you did not: Yes! I should have done better. That was the point.

Fine. Just don’t make me do this again.

I didn’t make you do it this time. Just like Anime FMK or other detractors of the series didn’t make me write my previous posts on the series. Since I apparently didn’t make it clear enough originally. I LIKE Darling in the FranXX. I DIDN’T like this episode.

[misscrawfords]

Well, I saw The Last Jedi...

HERE BE SPOILERS

(Also - I will be tagging all posts with “spoilers” and “tlj spoilers” for you to avoid. However, from now on this blog is NOT SPOILER FREE and I can’t guarantee that something might not slip past by accident. Proceed at your own risk.

Okay, I’ve just got back and my head is whirling so don’t expect complex analysis.

However, I’ve been chatting with the lovely ladies in the spoiler zone of the Reylo discord chat and that’s helping me clarify my thoughts a lot.

So basic reactions first in no particular order:

- I am now in love with Poe Dameron. I now ship Damerey. I don’t know how this happened. 

- There’s a bit in the soundtrack that is basically the finale of Sibelius’ 2nd Symphony. No1 curr I know but I’m intrigued.

- There was way too much going on in this film. It was like a later HP book - some great things happening individually but overall I just want to kick it because there was too much and it was easy to lose sight of the heart of it and its message because there was YET ANOTHER BATTLE and yet another subplot and character development for a minor character. I’m really frustrated.

- Since when was Hux such an awesome character!? I loved how he was played for laughs but honestly this is absolutely Draco-in-leather-pants. Kylux is literally a Cassandra Clare fanfiction. What is life.

- Several deus ex machina moments that made me go “hmm”. Floaty sky princess? Um, okay. That was unnecessary and a bit weird. Felt like a cringey tribute to Carrie Fisher and then she was knocked out for most of the film. I have problems with that entire narrative arc. To be explored later. Also Force ghost Yoda. Really? 

- WTF was that child doing at the end? I’m so confused. My instant reaction is to be suspicious and annoyed. If that child grows up to have the Force and takes away from Rey then I will be so annoyed. Also, we don’t need more characters. We really, really don’t!

- I was disappointed in Rose and Finn. I just... I just didn’t care. Because, once again, there was too much going on. Their whole storyline felt tacked on. Like, there were elements I really liked. I loved the whole weapons dealing in space concept - it was blatant but really good. We were basically in space Saudi Arabia and I loved that and I loved the code breaker who betrayed them for money. It was a more interesting and morally grey update of the bounty hunter concept and I really loved it. Also it fitted very well with the overarching theme of both sides being flawed and the profit of war and it all being kind of pointless in a way. BUT there was too much of it and I feel like they could have shown that message and done Canto Bight somehow without so much subplot that really distracted from the main heart of the film. I’ll need to think about this further and how I would have preferred it to go. Also at the end, I was really annoyed at Rose for saving Finn. Like, I 100% did NOT want Finn to sacrifice himself - NO SIR - but Rose stopped him potentially saving the whole Resistance by taking out that gun. Like, strategically it was dumb since Finn had committed to doing that. (I’m sorry, I’m such a cool-headed Slytherin, but it’s true!) I don’t know where to go from here for these two characters and I didn’t really buy the romance. Perhaps I would have done if there HADN’T BEEN SO MUCH DAMN STUFF GOING ON.

- It was really funny. Like, I was not expecting the humour. Especially over the First Order. But seriously, the FO run by played-for-laughs Hux and emotionally unstable Kylo is not exactly going to be a slick administration, right? It’s a recipe for disaster! (Sorry, Hermione Granger brain taking over again.)

- SHIRTLESS KYLO FANSERVICE. what even

- Every single “inappropriate use of the Force” fic is now canon.

- I kind of need to do a separate post about my Reylo thoughts and feelings, but suffice to say I am actually very conflicted, as I am about most of the film. Everything that happened made total sense in terms of character development and as a continuation of TFA and I applaud that and yet I feel uneasy. I also felt a lack of romantic/sexual chemistry between them that the film could have built up with music and other techniques, even despite shirtless Kylo and the HANDTOUCHING SCENE OMG WHAT IS LIFE. I’m not saying that there isn’t a basis for something to develop in IX but I was left feeling... I don’t actually know. THERE WAS TOO MUCH GOING ON AROUND THEM. I need to watch it again. I may pick up on things on a second viewing I didn’t see this time.

- SAVE BEN SOLO. Honestly, I have no idea what is going on. The film is massively pushing a redemption arc in its plot and what everyone around Kylo is saying. And every time he has the opportunity to fall in with this, HE DOES THE EXACT OPPOSITE. He’s not the only one being torn apart tbh. I don’t understand what the film wants me to think about this. (This isn’t about me analysing it, it’s about an initial reaction to feeling that I don’t know what the film is doing. It seems to be saying “Redeem Ben Solo! It can happen! That’s where this is going!” at the same time as “Kylo Ren is a monster and is turning into the Big Bad of this trilogy” which I don’t really believe but also I just do not see how he can come back from where he is.) But oh my goodness, his was the performance to watch. And he is still the centre and heart of the trilogy, as he should be as the new Skywalker.

- Speaking of Skywalkers... I loved Luke. He was so incredibly “Luke” and yet different. Is it what I’d expected? From what I’d heard and the marketing, yes. From his character as I previously understood it, I’ll have to watch the OT again. I think it probably works. It’s interesting. And Mark Hamill was absolutely fantastic. I really loved the flashbacks and the explanation of the destruction of the school and how it was a horrible, horrible misunderstanding. Best way out. Really tragic. And I like how the adults are taking responsibility for what happened to Ben. But also, like, the choices he makes now are his own. And they are terrible, terrible choices??? Not just morally terrible but also just, like, terrible. Poorly thought out...

- And yet, to me, the most true thing anyone said at any point was Ben’s speech to Rey when he asked her to join him about needing the whole old order to be swept away and replaced. It just... it really does? I felt such a feeling of relief. Like, the legacy is so strong in these characters. They need to get away from their past and the mistakes of the past and the burdens of the past. And that’s shown with the Resistance story but also with the Jedi story. Kylo’s way of doing this is all wrong, of course, but his ideas and vision is right and true. And I feel like this needs to happen! I don’t know HOW Ben can be pulled back from all the awful decisions he is continually making and the fact that he is squandering every single chance he gets, but I just feel like the only ending that is truly satisfying is Rey and Kylo starting from scratch again with a clean slate.

- Which is why Rey Nobody is so important. Whether Kylo is telling the truth or not about her parentage, she’s not a Skywalker. Or a Solo. Or anyone from the OT. And that is so necessary and important.

-  I have no idea whether to talk about Kylo Ren or Ben Solo.

- Before watching it I kind of wanted Rey and Kylo to leave together on nobody’s side but their own but watching I realised that she would never leave with Kylo. She will only leave with Ben. But he is refusing to be that person so I don’t know if it can happen. But it also has to happen. Because if Kylo dies in an act of redemption (which is what I always thought would be his fate after TFA) then Rey is left alone again and there is no balance. Sure she has her Resistance friends whom she loves and who love her and that is GREAT, I’m not knocking it, but they don’t understand her. They build up the Force bond, they build up the fact that neither is alone because they have each other, they see their future with each other (and even if that is a manipulation of Snoke’s, he is showing them what they want to see so it is still true) - and then Kylo dies and Rey is all alone as the Last Jedi after being alone all her life. And like, yes, found family and all but... it’s just. Why set all of that up? I’m just incredibly conflicted.

- I’m going to spend the next two years trying to understand all of this by writing Poe/Rey/Ben love triangle fic. Because I loved that moment of chemistry between Rey and Poe and I think he is kind of like the hero she wants but she’s got this connection to Ben and she’s got to deal with that but I think a transitional period in which she awakens to romantic/sexual feelings via Poe would be very important to her. Because I think one of the issues I have with seeing Reylo in this movie is that Rey is just so forceful and determined on one thing that she is not thinking in terms of romance or anything like that at all. There’s just nothing coming off her in that sense - until she sees Poe. And I’m conflicted between what the symbolism is in the film and what the characters actually do. Symbolically and mythologically Reylo is the only answer. But the acting and the characters of them as psychologically realised individuals is problematic to me. I don’t know if any of that makes sense, it’s 1.33am now.

- So on the topic of Rey will only go with Ben and not with Kylo, Ben has to save himself. Rey MUSTN’T, for the sake of feminist narratives everywhere, this cannot become a “bad boy saved by the love of a good woman” story, and I don’t think it is because Kylo is rejected every attempt Rey is making to change him. When he does do something “good”, it is of his own volition. The throne room and killing Snoke, for instance, (also, I totally called that as something that could happen, not that I did it here so I can’t prove it - ah well!), he didn’t do because of Rey directly. So he has to work that out for himself but I have no idea how he is going to do it. I mean, sure Rey can be part of this process and even the catalyst, but she can’t do it for it.

- I’m still so confused by the ending. Were Rey and Kylo looking at each other? I’ve seen people say he was kneeling in front of her, but I’m confused because I thought he was in the main part of the base and they were in the Falcon somewhere in the salt mountains? And also I thought Leia was still on the ground and I was convinced she was going to stay behind and see Kylo but then she was on the Falcon and were Kylo and Rey just staring at each other? I’m confused. I think this may have been a meaningful moment but I was just trying to work out where they all were and what was going on.

SO over all. Overall, I enjoyed lots of it but I don’t think it was a great movie. There was simply too much of it and ultimately I think there was a really fascinating and subtle story surrounding Luke, Kylo/Ben, Leia and Rey with juicy goodies like Force Bonds and grey morality and growing up and growing old (for all that Yoda’s appearance made me roll my eyes, I loved the line about the roll of the master being to be outgrown or whatever it was because as a teacher it’s just, yeah... it meant a lot). But this great and interesting and new take on the SW universe was being lost in battle after battle and confusing Resistance politics and overlong subplots that went nowhere (Finn and Rose didn’t even succeed?! What was the POINT) and an attempt to shoehorn in this fascinating story into a generic SW movie about the plucky band of Resistance fighters and the big bad Empire that we’ve seen too many times before.

LET. THE. PAST. DIE. I’m over that plot and I’m just annoyed because it has the makings of a great movie but I’m just left feeling too much was going on and I’m confused about the bits I really wanted to focus on and linger over.

Anyway, going to see it again on Wednesday with school and I am going to really, really focus on Reylo and trying to find the possibilities for romance so that if nothing else I have fodder for fanfic!

[johnmauldin]

Economics Is Like Quantum Physics

I often say a writer is nothing without readers. I am blessed to have some of the world’s greatest. Your feedback never fails to inspire and enlighten me.

My last week’s That Time Keynes Had a Point letter brought many more comments than usual. Apparently Keynes is still provocative 73 years after his death, no matter what you say about him.

But my real point was about the twisted economic thought that is having dangerous effects on us all. And we can’t blame it just on Keynes.

Today I want to share some of the feedback I received, add a few thoughts, and then show you some real-world consequences that are only getting worse. But first, let me wax philosophic for a minute.

Economic Dispute

This economic dispute is, at its core, a very old argument about how we understand reality. The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle might agree with some of today’s economists. He taught deductive reasoning with the classic syllogism:

All men are mortal

Socrates is a man

Therefore, Socrates is mortal

In other words, Aristotle said to move from general principles to specific conclusions. That’s what the bulk of modern macroeconomics does, using their (much more elaborate) models to deduce the “best” policy choices.

Centuries later, Sir Francis Bacon turned Aristotle upside down when he advocated inductive reasoning.

Rather than start with broad principles and apply them everywhere, he said to presuppose nothing, observe events and move from specific to general as you gather more observations… what we now call the “scientific method.”

Today’s economists may think that’s what they are doing, but they often aren’t. They begin with models that purport to include all the important variables, then fit facts into the model. When the facts don’t fit, they look for new ones, never considering that the model itself may be flawed.

Furthermore, as I have shown time and time again, they assume away reality in order to construct models that are in “equilibrium” with themselves. This is supposed to give us insight into the reality that has been assumed away.

That process isn’t necessarily wrong, but it’s not science. It is the opposite of science. Bacon would be horrified to see this. He tried to show the world a better way and now, centuries later, some of our most learned professors still don’t get it.

This is sadly not just a philosophical argument. It has real consequences for real people, including you and me.

Uncertainty Principle

Speaking of science, I received this note from an actual scientist (i.e., not an economist).

Dear John, having been an avid reader of your articles for many years now I wanted to write to say how much I tend to agree with your commentary, and in particular how much I enjoyed this week's article. I'd like to make a couple of comments about this week's material.

Firstly, reference was made to comparing economics with physics, and how economists suffer from "physics envy" (I should say that I have a PhD in physics from Oxford and subsequently worked as a physicist at the European Center for Nuclear Physics Research (CERN) in Geneva, Switzerland, although I left behind my career as a physicist a long time ago.)

Economies and financial markets are much more like the world of quantum mechanics than the world of classical physics. In classical physics there is complete independence between the observer and the system under observation. However, in the realms of quantum mechanics, the systems under observation are so small that the act of observation disturbs the system itself, described by Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle.

This situation is similar to that of financial markets, where the actions of market players is not separate from market outcomes; rather the actions of market players PRODUCE the market outcomes.

Betting on financial markets is different from betting on the outcome of an independent event, such as the outcome of a horse race or a football match. The latter are akin to classical physics where there is independence between observer and observed. Whilst actions in the betting market change the odds on which horse/team is favored to win, they don't impact the outcome of the event, which is rather determined by the best horse/team on the day. —Paul Shotton

Thank you, Paul, for pointing out this important distinction. I can’t pretend to understand quantum mechanics but your point about independent observation is profound.

Economists don’t just build models; they (and all of us) are parts of the model. We are the economy and the economy is us. While discussing it, we also affect it.

George Soros calls this the principle of reflexivity, the idea that a two-way feedback loop exists in which investors' perceptions affect that environment, which in turn changes investor perceptions. (Here’s his essay explaining more.)

That means these macroeconomic models, which with their Greek letters and complex equations look very scientific to a layperson, are often at odds with the scientific method.

You can’t conduct independent observations and experiments on an entire economy. That doesn’t render the models completely useless, but greatly limits them.

Borrowing from Clint Eastwood, this might be fine if those who use these models would respect the limitations. All too often, they don’t. And this is where it gets a little complicated.

I confess that I use models. I build them and work with others who build even better ones. Models can help inform us of potential outcomes and better understand risk and reward.

But there are clearly inherent limitations on using historical or theoretical observations to predict future results.

(Dis) Equilibrium

Here are a couple more letters, taking issue with my comments on equilibrium.

Just to clarify… Even if the economy can be modeled in some sense by a sand pile that will ultimately collapse, that does not mean that the economy is, at any point in time, not in equilibrium. In fact, it must be in equilibrium in order to form the sand pile! You could argue that the equilibrium is “unstable,” perhaps, but it is certainly a (possibly unstable) equilibrium. —John Bruch

***

John, I’ve been a reader for years and love your letter. But your comment today is over the top; “The entire premise of equilibrium economics is false.” Efficient market hypothesis is over the top but the premise of equilibrium is perfectly modeled in your sand pile letter. Cycles have always existed and always will exist.

Natural market forces will always move markets towards equilibrium but government interference slows the process making the sand pile grow in size and magnitude. To say that the principle of equilibrium is false is just ignoring reality.

The economy is like our forests. When a fire starts in the forest you let it burn so that nature’s cycle can run its course. If you keep putting out the fire you build excess fuel and then at some point you have a catastrophic fire that no humans can control. Mother Nature eventually steps in and puts out the fire and puts life back into equilibrium.

I agree that we need to rethink economics. But the principle of equilibrium, however short lived that moment in time is, is a sure reality. —Dennis Carver

John and Dennis raise an interesting question. The mere fact that the “sand pile” exists intact for some period of time means that equilibrium exists for that interval. Fair enough. The grains of sand do, in fact, line up so that they don’t collapse.

But we are constantly adding more sand and each additional grain changes the equilibrium. The previous equilibrium ends at that point, having been so brief as to be meaningless.

Eventually a grain of sand will create an unstable equilibrium, causing the pile to partially or completely collapse (and then be in equilibrium once again). So if no single state of equilibrium can exist for more than an instant, I would argue it’s not really “equilibrium” for any practical purpose. We can’t rely on it to continue. Every moment brings a new, unknown situation.

Let’s look at it another way. The sandpile model assumes there will be moments of instability. In economic terms, we are experiencing transitory equilibrium. The sandpile model is inherently unstable, a perfect example of Minsky’s Financial Instability Hypothesis: Stability leads to instability and the longer the period of stability, the greater the instability will be at the end.

(Nassim Taleb’s Antifragility Principle is important to understand when we think about equilibrium, or rather the lack of it. His book Antifragile is important and you should at least read the first half.)

My old friend and early economics mentor Dr. Gary North sees this idea of “equilibrium” as not just wrong, but downright evil.

In his 1963 textbook for upper division economics students, [Israel] Kirzner wrote about the assumptions of economists regarding the use of equilibrium as an explanatory model. They use it to describe the system of feedback that the price system provides the market place. “The state of equilibrium should be looked upon as an imaginary situation where there is a complete dovetailing of the decisions made by all the participating individuals.”

This means not only perfect knowledge of available economic opportunities, but also men’s universal willingness to cooperate with each other. In short, it conceives of men as angels in heaven, with fallen angels having conveniently departed for hell and its constant disequilibrium, where totalitarian central power is needed to co-ordinate their efforts. “A market that is not in equilibrium should be looked upon as reflecting a discordancy between the various decisions being made.”

The heart of free market economic analysis is the concept of monetary profits and losses as feedback devices that persuade people to cooperate with each other in order to increase their wealth. “But the theorist knows that the very fact of disequilibrium itself sets into motion forces that tend to bring about equilibrium (with respect to current market attitudes)” (Market Theory and the Price System, p. 23). Presumably, even devils cooperate on this basis. They, too, prefer profits to losses.

Biblically speaking, this theory of equilibrium is wrong. It is not just wrong; it is evil. It adopts the idea of man as God as its foremost conceptual tool to explain people’s economic behavior. It explains the market process as man’s move in the direction of divinity. Economists are not content to explain the price system as a useful arrangement that rewards people with accurate knowledge who voluntary cooperate with each other. They explain the economic progress of man and the improvement of man’s knowledge as a pathway to divinity, however hypothetical. The science of economics in its humanist framework rests on the divinization of man as a conceptual ideal.

Setting aside the theology, the point here is that economists assume human beings are perfectly rational and consistent, or at least wish to be. That’s what makes equilibrium possible.

But we know humans aren’t perfect or consistent. So how can we have equilibrium? We can’t, unless we assume markets are in equilibrium because they act in a manner we deem appropriate or ideal.

Insane Ideas

Again, this isn’t an academic argument. People who believe these ideas either hold seats of power or have influence on those who do. They truly think they can twist some knobs on their models and make everything better.

If we just had better monetary or fiscal policy, if the government could tax the right people and distribute the money correctly, everyone would be so much better off. And of course, their highly complex models and theories will conveniently lead to their desired political conclusions.

It is increasingly obvious that conventional monetary policy is useless now that rates have been so low for so long, and everyone believes they will remain low.

Nothing the central banks do incentivizes anyone to make immediate growth-generating decisions. If you need to borrow money, you likely did it long ago.

A new Deutsche Bank analysis says the major world economies now have government debt, on average, exceeding 70% of GDP, the highest peacetime level of the past 150 years.

Source: Financial Times

This is obviously unsustainable but the economics profession (and the bankers) desperately want to sustain it. With monetary tools no longer useful, they are turning to fiscal policy. Serious people are mapping strategies like helicopter money, debt monetization, MMT, and worse.

These all, in various ways, essentially say that government debt doesn’t matter, and in some cases we actually need more of it. Historically, the only way that can be right is if we are on the cusp of another WW2-like crisis.

This horrifying but well-researched Bloomberg article is chock full of links to insane ideas. Some look superficially attractive, especially to those unfamiliar with even basic economics. Many have familiar, heavyweight names attached to them. All have, to me at least, a whiff of desperation. They are frantic attempts to make the world stop spinning.

I don’t think these ideas will work. I think we are beyond the black hole’s event horizon. Bad things are going to happen, culminating in some kind of globally coordinated debt liquidation I have dubbed the Great Reset. I really see no other way out.

Every day brings more signs of the impending crisis. Duke University’s latest quarterly CFO survey found more than half of finance chiefs foresee a US recession before the 2020 election. Possibly worse, they project only a 1% increase in capital spending over the next 12 months.

An economy in which near-zero interest rates can’t spur more investment than that is an economy with serious problems. And I expect them to get worse, not better.

Furthermore, an increasing body of evidence says that increasing sovereign debt is a slow but inexorable drag on GDP. It is like the frog being boiled in water, but so slowly that we as citizens don’t really understand what is happening to us. We do sense something is wrong, though. Hence today’s worldwide populist movements.

The driver for 1930s populism was the Great Depression and unemployment. Now the impetus is rising debt and underemployment, with people unable to improve their lives as past generations did. Millions no longer expect to be better off economically than their parents. That frustration is sparking unproductive political partisanship and has the potential to bring political chaos as governments try to protect their own technology and businesses.

The world in general has clearly benefited from globalization and automation, but that is a hard argument to make as jobs disappear. And more jobs will disappear as technology increasingly lets businesses replace expensive humans with cheap robotics and algorithms. Sigh… I wish I had answers. Well, I do, but I don’t think they’ll going to get a great deal of traction.

This won’t be the end of the world. I really do think there are ways that you can properly position your portfolio and your personal life to not just survive but to thrive. We will get through it and be better on the other side. But it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

The Great Reset: The Collapse of the Biggest Bubble in History

New York Times best seller and renowned financial expert John Mauldin predicts an unprecedented financial crisis that could be triggered in the next five years. Most investors seem completely unaware of the relentless pressure that’s building right now. Learn more here.

[michin--yeoja]

So, I held off on doing a critique on Criminal Minds until I finished episode 2... And all I can say is that it’s again very underwhelming. I was not invested at all in the case and what was occurring throughout the investigation. Most of my attention was focused on the awkward acting, poor chemistry and illogical flow of the plot.

First of all, I want to clarify that I do not expect the Korean version to be anything at all similar to the American version. I knew there would have to be major differences just due to the structure of Korean dramas. This is 20 episode drama that will have a conclusion, whereas the American one is 12 seasons and counting (although, maybe the writers were thinking it could have multiple seasons if the drama is popular? The format would call for this possibility). 

However, comparisons are almost impossible to ignore just because of how similar the writers are trying to make this to the American version. They have copied many of the same characters, apparently they’re copying the cases (as this is the same case as the pilot of the original), as well as copying lines word for word. If the writers wanted to do this, than I don’t think it’s too much to expect the quality of the drama to match that of the American version. Furthermore, the writers have 12 seasons of source material from the American Criminal Minds, of which they could watch to do their research and ensure their profiles are logical and make sense throughout the progression of the case. 

Maybe one of my biggest flaws is that I nitpick at plots because I want everything to make sense, to understand why something is happening and how conclusions are reached. This is even more so in suspense/police procedurals because I want to be able to follow the case. I saw a comment where someone said the Korean version is focusing more on showing what’s happening, instead of telling it; however, I don’t see this. In the American version, the profiles are created on evidence that viewers see, the deductions are made in a manner where the viewers can follow the logic and I think it “shows” more than it “tells”. In comparison, the Korean version comes to these conclusions and profiles in a very random manner with no evidence to back up the claims, so it seems like these conclusions have been reached out of thin air. All of a sudden the suspect has OCD, but what indicated this? Kang Ki Hyung randomly knows to look for a missing victim, but what lead him to do this? There was no victim profile, no explanation given to why his hunting grounds are second hand sale websites, and overall no concrete profile of the suspect. If you ask me, I could not tell you comprehensively the profile of this suspect, whereas in the American version I could. 

There were two really ridiculous conclusions that were drawn that are so unbelievably illogical. First was when Kang Ki Hyung miraculously gave an approximate height and weight of the suspect. How in the world did he deduce that? They had no images of the suspect from which to extrapolate this data, nor was there any evidence such as footprints to help form this opinion. What is he, psychic that he knows this? The second conclusion was when Ha Seon Woo told Kim Hyun Joon the name of the suspect. How did the team manage to narrow it down to just one person? What criteria did they use? How were there no other possible matches? In the American version, they generally have at least a handful of possible suspects and then they narrow it down from there with other factors, if possible. However, here we just see the final result. They spread this case over two hours, whereas the American version only has about 45 minutes to do all this, and they couldn’t spare the max 5 minutes it would have taken them to show this process of elimination?

The biggest issue in these two episodes is that they skipped essential scenes that would help formulate the background of the suspect/case and thus provide a better flow in their investigation. Instead we have a bunch of disjointed scenes, with random conclusions made with no evidence shown for them or which are only revealed later on.

Another issue was I felt that the writers just threw in as many psychological jargon they could fit into these episodes. There was no rhyme or reason to half of what was said regarding the psychology of the suspect. Lee Han mentioning Dissociative Identity Disorder when the fifth (or fourth?) victim was discovered when they found hesitation marks was random and honestly, very pointless. (Which also brings up the question of where were the autopsies on the bodies? Valuable information tends to be discovered there as well.). What made you think of DID? And if the suspect had DID, why would a different identity emerge during the process of killing the victim? I could understand if it emerges after the fact because different emotions and thought process could trigger that. Also, why only now did this other identity emerge when it didn’t during the previous four cases? Then, when Kang Ki Hyung said it’s due to there being two suspects... Again, why did the alpha randomly allow the beta to participate in the murder? There needs to be explanations given for these conclusions! The whole point of the show is behavioural analysis, and yet that was the most absent aspect of the investigation!

All this makes me think the writers were lazy and sloppy in their research; that they assumed they didn’t have to put as much thought and detail in their scripts because they’re essentially copying the American episodes. If anyone watched OCN’s Tunnel, then you would see what good profiling looks like and how it’s achieved.

Another glaring flaw in the drama is the awkwardness of the actors. Excepting Kang Ki Hyung, Ha Seon Woo and Kim Hyun Joon, the rest of the actors do not seem comfortable in their roles and are beyond awkward (although these three are awkward at times as well). Seriously, don’t get me started on Lee Han because he’s just ridiculous. Another thing missing is the chemistry between the team. They do not seem like a team that has worked together for a long time, rather they act like this is their first case together. There is some chemistry between Ha Seon Woo and Kim Hyun Joon, but it’s sporadic. All in all, the acting falls flat and leaves something to be desired. 

And now, on to my biggest personal problem with the drama... The characters themselves. Honestly, I like Ha Seon Woo and Kim Hyun Joon the best because they are the only original characters in the drama as neither one of them has overt similarities to any of their American counterparts. 

My question to the writers is, why did you have to copy the same characters? Why couldn’t you create original characters who would fill the same roles as the American characters? You can still have a hacker without trying to copy Garcia, a team leader without imitating Hotch, but you didn’t and you compounded that mistake by getting actors who cannot do these characters justice. My common complaint with the portrayal of these characters is that it looks unnatural and forced for them all.  Kang Ki Hyung/Hotch is semi-decent, but he’s an awkward family man (at least in the few minutes he’s in that role) and he lacks the charisma of the original Hotch. When Kang Ki Hyung tries to be as intense as Hotch, he ends up looking stiff. Na Na Hwang/Garcia, of what little we have seen of her, does not have Garia’s seemingly effortless talent, verve and uniqueness. Yoo Min Young/JJ is really actually not even like JJ. She’s supposed to have a really close relationship with Lee Han/Reid, sort of like an older sister, and a very maternal personality, but this was not what they achieved with Yoo Min Young. This makes me wonder if this was an attempt at creating an original character, but they tied in enough parts of JJ to confuse this. Last of all, the biggest disappointment, Lee Han/Reid. Oh the mess this character is... He is just plain awful. Yes, Reid is a genius, but he’s not the kind of snobbish intelligent that Lee Han is, nor is he quite as idiotic. In my opinion, everything about Lee Han is wrong and a poor imitation of Reid... But I admit, I may be incredibly biased as Reid is my baby and he is one of a kind. 

In conclusion, I think viewers who have not seen the American Criminal Minds would be the ones to enjoy this version the most because they won’t be subconsciously making comparisons between the two. For those of us who have watched the American version, it is impossible to not make these comparisons and find the Korean version lacking because of the glaring similarities. I think if the show was unique enough, but maintaining that similar premise, it would have been better received.

I am extremely tempted to drop the drama, but I’m really intrigued with the Killer Reaper case, and the Nadeul River Murder which hints at a connection between Ha Seon Woo and Kim Hyun Joon. Also, I really like Lee Joon Gi and seeing him in modern clothes and hearing his voice just tempts me to give it one more chance. Also... I really want to see him in those glasses.

[ladydragon1316]

Some of the DA Inquisition Crew discuss Assassin’s Creed

(Modern-ish AU. Just something that came out of my brain while both Fandoms were knocking around in there at the same time. Enjoy!)

Aurora threw back the last of her rum and coke and lurched forward over the table. “I just don’t get the whole Connor thing. I mean, apparently so many of those ‘confessions’ are about him pinning them to a tree, but I just don’t see the appeal. I mean, he’s an idiot. He spends the whole game fighting Western Progress only for it to steamroll his own tribe anyway. He strives for freedom - kills the entire Templar chapter to do it - but completely overlooks the fact that freedom does not equal security. And his people pay for it.” She looked desperately up and down the table for support. “Tell me I’m not the only one who sees that. Please.”

Dorian took a sip of his mojito, shamelessly toying with the little umbrella under his pinky, “It’s not that we don’t see it, my dear. It’s that that isn’t the point.”

The woman across from him slammed the heel of her cup onto the table, demanding, “Then what is the point, then?!”

“The point,” he stated, extending his pinky finger in her direction, “is those broad shoulders and that Native American motif.” His hand swayed just slightly atop his resting elbow, evidence of the previous three drinks he’d imbibed in rapid succession.

“It’s not a motif; it’s his culture!”

A dismissive gesture from the Vint. “When it comes to kinks, the difference is negligible.”

“No, it’s not!” Aurora yelled, slamming her cup down a second time. She was far too worked up about this topic for a Friday night.

Blackwall avoided eye-contact, strategically excusing himself to get another drink. Which gave The Iron Bull a few seconds to lean in and ask, “So you want me to wear some war-paint next time?”

Down the table, Sera blew a massive raspberry at the debate. “Ass-in-creed don’t have near enough of the right ass. Needs more tits.”

“It has tits, darling,” Dorian pointed out. “Did you even play Ezio’s first game?”

“Not tha’ rite tits! I mean ass’kickin’ tits. Evie tits! I want ta’ see Evie’s tits!” More than a few heads turned in the direction of Sera’s shrieking. Not all of them at the group’s actual table.

Dorian took a breath...and found his original thought veering off on faulty evidence. “Alright, I’ll give you that. Not nearly enough female protagonists for the series. But that’s the fault of the medium at large. You can hardly single out the Creed as the ur-example.” His hand shot up to cut off Aurora’s tirade before it could start. If he let her start off on Feminist representation or equal opportunity depictions, they would be here all night. “We’re getting off topic. This is not about fatal character flaws. This is about white-hot-sex-appeal. Which of these darling creatures you feel compelled to seize by their sculpted packages and posteriors, and have your way with.”

Another violent raspberry from down the table, as Sera slid down off the front of her seat, landing somewhere at their feet. They’d need to remember to pick her up later before they left.

“And you think character flaws don’t factor into that?” Aurora demanded. She made to take another drag from her glass - only to find it empty. Right; that had happened. “Varric, help me out here,” she pleaded. He was their resident author. This was practically his job.

“Sorry, Bright Eyes. I don’t do Sci-Fi.” Apparently not.

“It’s not Sci-Fi!”

The man cocked a well-practiced eyebrow at her. “A machine allowed people to explore memories stored in their DNA, which reveals the existence of ancient, highly advanced beings who created humans and whose remnants gave rise to biblical depictions of god and miracles, which actually turn out to be technological artifacts that survived the disaster that wiped out the race in the first place.” He snorted softly. “Yeah, that’s Sci-Fi.”

Aurora scowled at him, “Traitor.”

Blackwall reappeared with drinks in hand: two beers - the one for Bull in a pint-sized glass -, and another rum and coke. Which Dorian snatched up before Aurora could get her hands on it.

“Dorian!”

“Ah-ah,” he teased, holding it above his head and well out of her reach. “I’ll have your prefered Assassin ass, and I’ll have it now.”

“You’re an ass!” she yelled, climbing half onto the table after her drink. Dorian only leaned further back, grinning like a jackal.

“And a fine one. But that doesn’t answer my question.”

“Dorian.”

“Spill it.”

“Give! It!” She flailed forward, and the kick he was getting out of this was obvious.

“Ass! Whose!”

“Shay Cormac!” Dorian gave a faux gasp of shock, but with enough dramatic zeel that his companion managed to snatch her drink from his hand, splashing soda and rum on his cuff in the process.

“Well, well, well,” Dorian schmoozed, shaking off what drops he could. “A Templar? You naughty girl.”

“Shut up!” He wasn’t even phased by the accompanying death glare.

“Now Haytham I could understand. I always suspected you might have a ‘daddy’ kink-” He narrowly avoided the spray as Aurora choked on her drink and continued on, undeterred. “-But a traitor?” He tutted, gazing off at a far wall while smoothing out his mustache. “I’m not sure we can remain friends. Disparaging Connor and fantasizing after a turn-coat. Your allegiance is clear as day. Am I to suspect a dagger in the back? Are you hiding a red cross somewhere on your person?”

Aurora clutched her drink with both hands and wailed plaintively, “He’s hot!”

And there it was.

Dorian practically squealed - how did he make even that seem suave? - and surged up onto the table, leaning heavily on his elbows, all up in Aurora’s personal space and absolutely latching onto her admission. “So there is some sexual desire buried under all that character analysis mumbo-jumbo.”

Aurora cast around. “Varric?” she whined, pleading for some kind of support.

He snickered, “Did you notice she said ‘Shay Cormac’. Not just ‘Shay’.”

“Oo!” Dorian’s glee surmounted itself. “First and last name on an impulse declaration. There is something here.”

Aurora shot a glare at Varric before zeroing it in on Dorian. “You’re a menace.”

“Ah-ah. Back on track. Shay. Hot. Explain.” This man was not going to be deterred.

And with no visible means of avoidance, “Well, he’s a good man.” When Dorian’s eyes rolled into the back of his head, she redoubled, “That’s important! He’s principled. Honorable.”

“Aurora, darling, honorable assassins make up over half the cast -”

“But how many of the Assassins put their morals above the Order?”

Dorian gave her a long, level look, followed by an elegant cocking of eyebrow.

Aurora’s brain caught up with her statement and she flapped her hand around dismissively, “Okay, okay. Evie and Jacob and Arno do, fine. But the Fryes go behind the Council’s back and go to London, and Arno pursues missions getting clearance first. But those are both still within the Order. And, yeah, Arno gets kicked out. But the Fryes don’t receive any negative repercussions within the Order for going off on their own. At least not that we see. Shay straight up turns his back on the Order when they’re methods go against his own moral code. With full knowledge of what he’s doing. He knows it will turn the Order completely against him. And he does it anyway. Because it’s what he believes is right. Even if it means betraying the organization he’s been apart of and loyal to for years.”

Her best friend blinked at her from across the table. He gave his head a sharp shake. “I’m sorry. I don’t believe I heard the world ‘hot’ even once during that whole monologue.”

“Dorian!”

He threw his arms out, dramatically, “Is it really so hard to discuss attractive physical attributes of fictional characters in public? Truly?”

Aurora jabbed a finger at him. “The character of a character is what makes them attractive.”

“But give me something!” Dorian pleaded. “Some indication that my best friend has a sex drive!”

She rolled her eyes, but acquiesced. “Fine. His haircut.”

Dorian’s head cocked like a confused dog. “Scruffy? Maker, I think that’s worse than the ‘daddy’ kink.”

“Post-Lisbon,” she clarified sharply, at last lifting her glass to her lips. “After his make-over.”

Dorian got a wistful look, completely with a dreamy ‘into the distance’ gaze. “Ah yes, that’s more like it. Proof-positive a good haircut can take you from ‘meh’ to ‘fuck me, please’. And those shoulders!”

Aurora swallowed a mouthful quickly to agree, “Oh yeah. That coat does wonders for his physique. He’s all sharp angles and broad. And that accent…” Aurora let a pleasant shudder run visibly up her spine for effect, making most of those still listening laugh.

Bull took a swig from his own mug, getting a gleam in his eye. “So you like the moral pillar, tall with broad shoulders, a smooth accent, good hair and a choice coat.” His grin broadened and he didn’t even bother hiding it. “Add some survivor’s guilt, and a military history with the organization he dumps on principle, and I’d say we’ve found your type, Boss.”

This time it was Aurora cocking her head in confusion. That was a little on the nose for Shay’s ‘type’. “I guess.”

Then The Iron Bull’s eyes ticked up over her head, the gleam in his eye turning at once innocent and diabolical. “Hey, Cullen.”

Aurora swiveled around to see the man take the last few steps to reach them. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”

“No, no,” Dorian assured him. “Just discussing our sexual preferences as applied to the cast of a fictional setting based around assassination.

Cullen froze halfway down onto Sera’s former seat, looking like a deer in the headlamps. Aurora grabbed a handful of his fur collar and gave him a good tug. “We can change the subject.” The relief on his face was near-comical. “Watch your feet. Sera’s still under there.”

He had a couple minutes to arrange himself while Bull made the next run for drinks, getting one for Cullen and refilling his own mug. Aurora settled comfortably in place. Sera’s seat stayed where it was. But with Cullen having a wider frame than her, that meant Aurora and Cullen sat close enough together their shoulders brushed occasionally when they shifted. She made a point to pick a position and get comfortable. Which was, in fact, quite easy with the given company.

Dorian gave them about fifteen seconds of said comfort. Long enough for Cullen to take a drink from his cup before the other man picked things back up with, “I can’t remember: did we actually establish you have a ‘daddy’ kink, or not?”

Cullen sent a spray of beer across the table and proceeded to start choking. Aurora pounded on his back while yelling across the table at Dorian, who had burst out laughing alongside The Iron Bull. Even Blackwall had a hand curled over his mouth, trying desperately not to give his chuckle away. Sera kicked the underside of the table, demanding they ‘keep it down up there’ so she could sleep. And Varric scribbled hurriedly in his notebook with tears in his eyes, and the declaration that ‘You can’t make this shit up’.

[guyinlovewitheremika]

Dude serious question here : how are you still single ? Judging from your blog you seem so cute and friendly and an overrall fun person to be around. I for one would have loved to get to know you irl. But well keep up your amazing blog, I wish you the best in life

Aww anon that’s really sweet of you haha. Hope you have an amazing life too.

I used this opportunity for a little bit of self-analysis, which I’m keeping under-read since it’s not the main content of this blog. Quite frankly it failed and I don’t recommend reading.

THERE IS NO POINT TO THIS POST. I started writing with a huge plan, it didnt work out and now only half the thing is here, and by itself, it makes no bloody sense. I still wanna keep it here simply for myself, but anyone reading this rn will probs only get an incomplete and thusly inaccurate picture of what I’m trying to paint. 

Okay, so here’s the thing. I started writing this huge thing with a clearly mapped out thought process in mind, it had structure and whatnot. Unfortunately an event I even described in my analysis, a change of my mental state, prohibited me from finishing my writing---this is thus very incomplete, lacking many arguments and most importantly an actual conclusion. I doubt I’ll ever reconnect to this particular text anyway, but I still felt like sharing it as I considered it to be a very accurate depiction my head up until the point where I got lost. So even though it’s totally lackluster and incomplete, I’m still sharing it here because I feel like I owe it to myself. Anyway. After this follows the introduction I had originally written. Since I posted this for myself, the chance of me answering asks, replies or messages about this is very little, partially for reasons explained below. AnYwAY

Le forum ofdeath and sucks balls what the fuck

You'reprobably just a lovely anon who wanted to say something nice and cheer me up,and believe me, it's appreciated^^ This extended response shouldn't be takenpersonal by you in any way at all, I simply saw an opportunity for me to writethings down I've been meaning to write down for a long time. Thing is, there'sabout a 0% chance of me talking to over people what's really going on in myhead unless I'm prompted to do so--unless there're huge indicators of therebeing legitimate interest in my psyche, I aint talking, and even then, the chancesremain slim. Granted, your message wasn't really a direct inquiry or whateverbut I've had this shit in my system so long that it's more than sufficient forme to let lose. Warning: basically everything below (and even above) are mypersonal observations of myself, and most likely don't make a ton of sense foranyone who isn't, well, me. "Translating" all of this into anythingcomprehensible outside of my head is gonna be tricky enough, but I still feellike doing it. The purpose of this text is ultimately for self-analysis; uponwriting things down it can clarify or explain certain thoughts, and that'sreally waht I'm after. I don't want to shove my own analysis of my mentalsituation down my followers throats, I'm writing and posting this only for myselfto be affected by the process of doing so; thusly, once more, this will potentiallybarely make any sense for anyone, but it's not supposed to for anyone exceptme, so in essence, don't read too much into this post.

Long assintroduction

Damn

Anyway, let'sget started, and back to the original question, how are you still single.

BecauseBOI, there's a plethora of reasons, mostly tied to my relationship with myselfand my surroundings, and that's what I wanna talk about here.

First ofall, yeah. Guy does seem like a fun, sweet person to have around here, doesn'the? You're not the first person to tell me that, and I'm not saying that tofeed on my ego or whatever, but because this perception of Guy isn't unique. Iget nice and lovely anons, Barely and hate towards me as a person despite arather rapidly growing follower count, I've even made a ton of onlinefriendships over the span of months, and those folks generally don't seem tohate Guy either, for similar reasons. That's all good and fun, and ofc Iappreciate people who're sympathetic towards me, but that's because here ontumblr and over on discord, I'm Guy. The dude who absolutely loooves snk, whoknows a lot about the series, who tries to help people out and is pretty wankfree (that's an over-the-top, stereotyped description simply for the sake ofgetting the general point across).

The problemis that "Guy" is a periodic, temporary and very much incompleterepresentation of my identity. Now of course, the following dialogue can quicklyfall into the "edgy-teenager-YouKnowMyNameButNotMyStory" trope whichtypically disqualifies any rationality accompanied by the claims, but for thesake of argument, I'd like to give my analytical skills more credit than a 21stcentury stereotype. The basic point I'm trying to make here is this: the"real", "complete" version of myself has more to it thanjust the blogger you know as "Guy", and that's simply because myonline presence is very filtered. Whenever I'm posting on my blog or talking tomy friends on discord, I'm being Guy. My mental state, my thought process, andmy emotional balance is that of SnK loving Guy. The thing is, whenever there'sa change in my mental state, a variation, one that differs from who we know as"Guy", Guy shuts down, and so does my activity. I'm not blogging24/7, I'm not being constantly Guy. And I'm not chatting 24/7 either, myfriends may confirm this: I often stop talking in the middle of conversations,stop responding, reduce or cease my current activity all together. Occasionallythat's caused by irl disturbances, but for the most part, the issue lies in avariation within my mental state, one that disrupts my situation of being Guy,causing a discrepancy between my activity and my thought process concerning myactivity. In simpler (and seriously overblown) terms, I temporarily stop beingthe person I just was (this being Guy), and swap to a different mental state, onethat differs from being Guy.

This allprobably sounds ludicrous and absolutely over the top, and I apologize for that.It's not as if I have "multiple personalities" in my head, orschizophrenia, or whatever. These varying mental states I'm describing aren'ttotally different people, but...different facades of myself, if that makes anysense.  It probably doesn't, so let meprovide you with a possibly explanative analogy, to visualize everything. Letssay you're playing and RPG, and you have your core character. You level him up,gain experience, skills, and whatnot. That's default form of your character,lacking equipment and whatnot. However, in order to adapt to the constantlychanging environments and opponents you face, you need equipment, and the onlyoptions you have are various, predetermined armor and weapon sets. There's adifferent, unique type for every situation-one for each environment and eachenemy. The only problem is this: they come with a predetermined set of statsand skills. Parts of the sets cannot be exchanged with one another, and youcan't use multiple ones either. What's worse is that, despite the varyinglevels of skills you may have obtained on your core character, these arepartially or even entirely overwritten when donning one of the sets--you can'tverify or even use these stats and skills of your core character, as they'relocked away by whatever set you use. Only in down times, when in your hideout,all by yourself, can you take off the sets and access your stats andskills--only then does the experience you obtained when using the sets actuallyappear, only then can you observe your core character as a whole. That's moreor less what my head looks like, from my POV. Granted, this by no means is atotally accurate representation--it's flawed, it ignores certain other aspects,doesn't universally apply to me either, and ultimately, has no proof. However,I feel like this is the closest approximate description I can offer at themoment, and ultimately just am example to allow for some visualization--not auniversal truth or affirmation.

But let'stake a closer look at these equipment sets, or mental states, as I like to callthem. One of my favorite movies over the past years was the sci-fi flicArrival--Denis Villeneuve's thought provoking tale about extraterrestrialcreatures showing up on our planet and humanities attempt to interact with them.One of it's major elements was the use of language, and one theme in particularfascinated me: the theory that speaking in another language can potentiallymodify, or even rewire your brain and thought process. It's something Icouldn't agree more with. I fluently speak three languages, and, given myliving and educational situation, typically switch between all three of themmultiple times a day. I don't want to assume anyone's thoughts or feelings, butI'm certain I'm not the only one who has different relationships with thelanguages they speak, and who feel different depending on the used language.It's a pretty natural thing. Another thing we can probably all agree on is that,depending with whom we're interacting, or under which exterior circumstances(such as location), our precise way to express ourselves may sometimes vary--youmay act in a certain way with one person in a certain place, and act verydifferently with another person in a different place. Well, of course I can'tclaim that to be a universal truth for every person on the planet, but I'vecertainly heard other people describe it before, and I've felt it from otherstoo. It's there, sometimes, to a certain extent. Maybe it's totally natural, aneveryday feeling for everyone involved, and maybe I'm just too weak to be ableto counteract the consequences, but who knows. My primary issue stems from the fact that, I'm taking this varyingcircumstances and their consequences to a ridiculous level. Depending on mylanguage, my location, the time of day and the people I'm with, my expressionof myself, my (from an exterior POV observable) personality, if you want to, isborderline subject to change. "Guy" in many ways I can't mentallygrasp at the moment is fundamentally different from the person you mayencounter under specific, different circumstances.

Now ofcourse, this probably is something felt by other people alone, I'm not somehowspecial by feeling that way, probably just too weak to deal with it. But onething I can say with absolute certainty is that the consequences of thevariations has an effect on my surrounding. An example in my family: due to hisjob, my father is rarely at home, and I'm typically left with my mother, withwhom I have a rather close and positive relationship with. On the days myfather is there however, our relationship changes, my general mood is affected,and my expression of myself heavily changes. Once again, I'm sure I'm notunique in that way, I'm sure it's a normal, human concept, it just seems toaffect me really much. This isn't just limited to important, deep relationshipslike me and my parents, but its present in really every situation. Example, Imay desire to spend time with my friends at school when there, but back home,in a different mental state, that desire disappears entirely. I often don'treply to messages for weeks, and rarely ever initiate communication by myself,which can be totally different in another mental state. See, and that's one ofthe primary issues. My relationships with pretty much everyone are heavilymodified and affected by the changes in my mental state based on circumstancesand whatnot. If we follow that logic, any intimate or romantic relationshipwould be affected too. And that's one of the cruxes here: I couldn't possiblyentertain one particular mental state throughout the entirety of anoverarching, important relationship with someone. There would be instances inwhich my mental state would vary, and I would in turn be severely affected thischange, but this non-given, non-evident relationship with a significant otherwouldn't just...stop existing, wouldn't temporarily be on hold until I've returnedto a mental state appropriate of said relationship. You can't put it on hold,you can't neglect all of that while waiting for your brain to return to anadequate state. There's continuity and effort and ultimately something enduringwithin a relationship, but that's incredibly hard to entertain if the facade ofoneself is subject to constant modification. Though that in itself is somethingI would already consider rather problematic, it's far from the end. Rememberwhen I described the situation in my head? The idea of a certain core character,unaffected by the armor sets? Let's take a closer look at that.  

All thesevarious mental states, these predetermined armor sets, caused by the varyingcircumstances I find myself in throughout life, have one thing in common: blockingout the "core character", the one that acquires the skills andexperience obtained through the life in armor, the one that has a sort ofoverseeing access to all of these obtained life experiences. That is what Iconsider to be the "purest" version of myself. The one thingunaffected by circumstances, the one at the center off all these various mentalstates. I can only be in this unaffected state when not in relation to anythingin my exterior: not being constrained to convey thoughts verbally through theuse of a certain language, not being actively in relation to another person,and being in a neutral place, unaffected by anything, such as my room.Basically, if I'm in an entirely neutral situation, not affected by anythingexterior whatsoever, my mind goes into a neutral state too. This neutral stateallows me one particular thing: introspection. Self-analysis, if you want to.Only in the neutral state can I fully reflect on my experiences and my life asa whole, only then can I attempt to understand my progression in life, myemotions, my mental situation. In fact, at this very moment, I find myself inthis neutral state--only now am I actually able to reflect on what's going onin my head, and the fact that I'm able to write it down cohesively is an enormousfeat in itself. However, this distinction between my neutral state, the"core character", and the various mental states, the "armorsets", comes with a plethora of issues, the first one being this verydiscrepancy. As explained earlier, the "sets" override the"core", and I mean that in a literal way. All my reflections, all mythoughts and questions, all my arguments, failures and progressions, areblocked out when I'm in one of these sets. For example, if I'm talking to mytherapist, it's downright impossible for me to communicate all these thoughtsobtained through introspection, simply because they're blocked out, they're notavailable anymore. They slip out from memory, I can barely grasp them at all,it feels like walking through horribly thicc mist; and even in the event that Istill can formulate some of my thoughts, I can't properly convey them. In fact,even if I write them down and try to read them out, it feels more like readingsomeone else's thesis: my brain doesn't connect to the material at all, itdoesn't understand, it can't back it up: in that situation, they're not my ownthoughts at all, but someone else's, and no matter how much I search my mindfor answers of clues, the only thing I can find is a bleak, empty void, leavingme feeling dumbfounded, with an empty head. Literally. When I later return tomy neutral state, everything returns to me, but quite frankly, that's notuseful, since I still lack the means to communicate it in a manner thatconvinces both me and party B.

Unfortunatelythe issues don't stop there. If we go by the assumption that this neutral, coreversion of myself is what you may call "the real me", I would kind ofbe in a pretty shit situation, because, quite frankly, being this neutralversion of myself is not fun at all. Maybe its related to ingrained pessimism,but all introspection, all reflection and thoughts, always go in a prettynegative way. Never once have I thought about myself in depth and arrived at anactual positive outcome: every answer is negative and spells out inevitabledoom one way or another. There's always a depressing note to everything, infact, there is a seriously ingrained tendency leading towards what may be aform of depression in all my thoughts, but I'll get into that later. The bigbad issue is that ultimately, this neutral state of mine, as well as everypossible variable mental state, lacks one primordial thing necessary to thehuman existence: life. I'm descending towards a melodramatic presentation oncemore, forgive me. It's a hunch towards excess. But here's the thing. Theneutral state is exclusively based around introspection, it can't do anythingbut reflect, and reflect in a pretty negative manner if I might add. There'snothing else to it. The "sets" are technically set in what we wouldcall life, they're all in relation with something, but inherently lack thecommon thing that is myself; they're mere facades, they're fakes, they'reincomplete, they're not ME.  Here's thething. Perhaps it was a result of all the issues mentioned above, or perhaps itcaused the issues above and originate from a certain event in my pastirrelevant for now, but one thing is certain: I'm heavily emotionally distancedfrom my own life. I barely ever feel any real, active emotions out of anythingin life, everything is distanced, bleak, unilateral. Any real, strong emotion,be it joy, hatred, sadness or whatever else you may think of, is something Ibarely ever feel these days. Even events that have an incredibly strong effecton my life struggle to bring forth an emotional reaction. Everythingstays...bleak. Unaffected. There's often a sort of distant negativity, abackground feeling of sorts, and there are occasions of limited joy or whatnotthat last a few moments, but it takes absolutely nothing whatsoever to returnto an empty or even highkey depressed state--ultimately, the sensation of"being alive" has become incredibly elusive to me over the last 8years, now nothing more than a mere distant memory. That's just how things are,and I can't deal with it.

Granted, Imay possibly be overdoing it rn. Been writing for a long time, need to makesure I don't start getting affected just yet. Ultimately, all these thingsheavily block the way for a meaningful relationship with another person. Notonly would they have to deal with the fact that the person they know seems toundergo mental changes on a continuous basis which can't be any good, their s.o.would go through constant mood changes, would often be emotionally distant fromthem for seemingly no reason whatsoever, wouldn't be able to even entertain a relationshipon a deeper level. Whatever it would be, it couldn't even be called a proper relationshipfrom my point of view. I wouldn't be able to be myself, and that's pretty mucha death sentence for anything meaningful that's supposed to last for a bit,right?

(sidenote:I feel as if I may have just exited the neutral state and am no longer able toentertain my introspection. My thoughts are literally disappearing from my mindand my memory of everything I've said so far and what I meant to say afterwardsis getting foggier by the minute. It's absolutely ridiculous and horriblyannoying, but at the very least it proves my points to myself, that's worthsomething).

After this point, I continued writing, but quickly realized I lost all connection, I had indeed gone through a change in mental state, leaving behind my introspection. Thus, this is largely incomplete, with many threads not tied together, and many arguments lacking entirely. My analysis went much deeper than what we see here, but unfortunately I don’t seem to be able to pick it up for now. What a shame. I had thought I had finally figured out some serious progress. But in a way, it’s also fitting. This major failure is evidence that the points made are very real and not my imagination. Too bad it prevented me from going further, but that’s all I can do for now. 

This is more or less the conclusion I meant to reach, but since half the arguments and reasoning are missing, it doesn’t make sense and feels like an asspull for the sake of attentionwhoring. It’s not, and I can assure you there is legitimate reasoning behind this, I just can’t access it rn:  To add more finality to the actual question that I tried to properly explain here but clearly turned out incapable of doing so, I have rather convoluted but justified mental and psychological issues for being single. These aren’t by choice, these aren’t because I enjoy being lonely, in fact I’ve desired the opposite since I was a child, but for various reasons I cannot fully explain yet, it wouldn’t be good at all for neither me nor my partner, not with the way I am right now (and this current failure is proof of that). Instead, I’ll keep sitting on my ass, waiting for a miracle that will never happen, with mental and and physical issues getting worse and worse as a consequence. But in its own way, that’s desirable for me; which is based on another issue, rooted even deeper in my psychology, one that is probably the source of all my issues. But I can’t talk about that yet.  

Other than that, there’s practical issues too. I’ll be leaving the continent this summer. I have very little positive memories about the last 8 years, the 2nd chapter of my life, but I don’t want to start getting attached to this life just as it is about to end. That would be the worst possible way to leave, and I need a clean cut at all costs. So yeah, no SO for me.

[curufinwefeanaro]

What would Fëanor say of his firstborn & His cousin together ?

|| Hello anon.

I’ve addressed this in past, but I don’t think I ever summarised it in a post, so here we go. I hope you’re ready for the read.

Firstly, something about LaCE. I think you know what it is? But if not: Laws and Customs of the Eldar is an essay/chapter written by Tolkien that you can find in The Peoples of Middle Earth (HoME 12, if I’m not mistaken, can’t be assed to check). The gist of it is: elves marry for life and are intrinsically soul-bound when they have sex, the expectation of marriage is basically bearing children, an elf can immediately tell if another elf is soul-married by looking into their eyes/spirit. There are a lot of other customs described in there (such as naming customs), but this is what is relevant to our topic. Basically, the implication is that marriage equals sex on a natural and metaphysical level and that sex can only be heterosexual. 

Now, my stance on it: LaCE does not describe the nature of elves, only, well, what the title says --- their laws and customs. They are social norms of the Eldar, aka Amanyar elves (Vanyar, Ñoldor, Teleri) and Sindar of Beleriand. Even beyond the fact that the soul-bound thing is creepy as hell, I do actually have receipts proving that LaCE is unreliable at best (this post explains the problem of its authorship pretty damn well) (and also some stuff talking about the whole text, part #1, #2, #3, #4) (and if you really wanna go wild, this is a pretty interesting take on romance or lack thereof within the context of LaCE) --- but I do still choose to follow it as a set of rules, because it gives a good (if inaccurate) insight in a society that could otherwise be entirely alien to our understanding.

I’ll get to your question in a bit, but I think it’s relevant to clarify how I believe homosexual relationships (or anything non-hetero, really) would be perceived in this context, and what is Fëanor’s stance on LaCE.

As I said, what is officially recognised (marriage that is only really “crowned” by conceiving children) is heterosexuality. But since I’m rejecting LaCE as natural laws, I do believe non-heterosexual relationships exist. I suppose, in this context, that they could be read as different things: youthful adventures, occasionally a master-apprentice relationship (which may a little more socially accepted?), dalliances, something that exists and people know, but is not made public and certainly has no kind of social significance and should not claim any, on the verge of secrecy. It’s not an ideal society by far, but Valinor isn’t one in any case, it has a lot of taboos, death itself seemingly being a not irrelevant one. 

As for Fëanor’s position in all of this, we know he has a sort of tendency to not do what is expected of him (including but not limited to marrying very young, moving out from the house of his father, marrying someone who apparently made people wonder, traveling in the wilderness a lot). On the other side his situation in terms of marriage and bonding-for-life is very delicate because of his mother’s death and his father’s remarriage. Basically, if he refuses such customs entirely, he risks to legitimise his father’s choice, or at least to make not so much a big deal out of it. 

I say that because I suppose there is evidence that the laws and customs are in fact influenced by the Valar. The Statute of Finwë and Míriel is a good example of that, but also there’s some nice analysis about how the Valar might influence gender roles in Aman. (Now you could ask me, but why should deities that come from Eru’s mind want to implement roles and customs that are so painfully and imperfectly human? Well... frankly I don’t blame it on them but on the fact that Tolkien was, in fact, human, and a man with his flaws. I, myself, am rejecting LaCE as the pinnacle of purity that it maybe was supposed to be in Tolkien’s imagination, and that means that the link with the Valar as enforcers of this “goodness” is lost. I can’t frankly be assed to rework the entire concept of the Valar’s morality and where LaCE might come from if not from them right now. Maybe I’ll do it one day but not now.)

So, in short: Fëanor rejecting the norms on marriage and couple bonding would be consistent with his rejection of the Valar’s authority from a certain point onwards, BUT it would also mean that all of his issues (which are deeply influenced by the society he grew up in) would disappear into thin air, or at least would almost be invalidated by his own claims against the Valar. And those issues are not exactly something he can shrug off, they’re not just social norms he can speak against, they are personal, very deep, very painful. So, as far as I’m concerned, his stance with regard to LaCE can only be extremely conflicted (consider: the organisation of society in Aman is not something that he challenges explicitly even in his speech to the Ñoldor. It’s only the Valar’s sovereignity and what they want from the elves. Although freedom might also include that part of the problem.)

...And now.

Back to your actual question.

What doesFëanor think of Maedhros and Fingon together? Here I assume you mean in a romantic and sexual sense, rather than in a companionship sense. If it were the latter, the text would give you almost all that you need. 

We are never told thatFëanor ever spoke against his sons’ friendship with Aredhel, or Maedhros’ specific friendship with Fingon. Absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence, that is true, but I argued before that his own relationship with Fingolfin wasn’t always so bad, and what The Silmarillion itself has to say in chapter 9 is:

But when they were landed, Maedhros the eldest of his sons, and on a time the friend of Fingon ere Morgoth’s lies came between, spoke to Fëanor [...]

There’s a before, and no indication whatsoever that, before the feud,Fëanor had anything against it (or that his opinion was even the main reason why the friendship ended to begin with, since the text pretty clearly points the finger against Melkor here, and since both Maedhros and Fingon have their own personal loyalty to their own house and can read the situation and think for themselves.)

Now, on a romantic level... well, I spent a bunch of paragraphs explaining why that’s complicated. I think he would have more issues with that being presented as something serious or something that should be made pubilc, which I don’t believe Maedhros would ask of him under any circumstance --- they are still the royal family and going against LaCE again, presenting a new set of special circumstance might not be what anyone wants to see, Maedhros least of all.Fëanor might glare a bit, because it’s technically a joining of his house with his brother’s, IF you follow the laws and customs (remember, sex=marriage here, even if that might not at all count in case of same-sex relationships) (let’s not even get into the gross assumption that only penetrative sex with a penis would count as “real sex”, following the reasoning presented in LaCE). AndFëanor might... not especially enjoy that kind of profoundly political move, especially if tied to social customs issues. He might want to see it all kept secret. Might want to have a chat with Fingolfin on the matter. And might want a sexual relationship to stop. (Which, by the way, I do think is also what Fingolfin would want, cosidering how much more he seems to care about social customs and proper politics.)

But let me tell you, I am firmly against the idea that he would be terribly strict, angry, outraged, or any other radical reaction that doesn’t take into consideration his feelings on such matters, which I’m certain they should be very conflicted. (For her piety, I actually think Nerdanel would take the news in a worse way and I’m not sure where that “supportive gay-accepting mom” trope comes from for her. But headcanons on her aren’t my place to discuss here.) And like, I specify this not just because I’m sick of that “violent father” trope which somehow, in the year of the Lord 2k17, is still around, but also because I’ve seen some shit, anon, I assure you. Even people attributing nazi philosophy toFëanor to explain why he would be Absolutely Against The Ship (unlike Fingolfin, who was somehow a progressive liberal who obviously didn’t give a shit about his social perception and all that jazz), and no, I’m not shitting you, that post was absolutely puke-worthy for the triviality with which it treated real-life issues for the sake of shitting on a character. But this is beyond the point now.

So... yeah? I think I answered your question, or at least I tried to. Enjoy.

[templardragonknight]

The Stormcloak Bible DEBUNKED PART 1 (analysis of the imperial arguments)

Stormcloaks are often biased and most tryhard ones show little knowledge about the lore (or they actually know about it and just refuse to accept the facts). The Stormcloak bible is a great example of this (if not THE BEST example) and in these posts I plan to debunk some (if not most) of the statements shown there (I do not plan to refute all points because I am not a know everything cunt. Of course somethings there may be true). The following is an update of my previous post, as I have gathered far more information since then.

In the first part of this “bible” (http://colonel-killa-bee.tumblr.com/post/68999802440/stormcloak-bible-part-1-analysis-of-the-imperial), the author makes very a superficial analysis of arguments often used by supporters of the empire, so lets take a look at this:

Well, I originally did not want to talk about the past, as many mistakes that the empire may have commited could have been overcomed by the 4th Era (and since the Stormcloaks have little to do with the Third Era, since the rebellion started in the 4th Era), but whatever, I decided to talk about it just to show how the author's statements are foolish: he citates the comments of a dunmer imperial soldier... and what? Now because a single soldier thinks that a united empire would not be a great idea this is suddently the truth? Alright, back to the 4th Era: the author says “The Empire is dying. They have Cyrodiil, High Rock and half of Skyrim. If they won, how would security in their Empire be any better, when they can’t even prevent a bandit uprising within the very heart of their establishment when there wasn’t a civil war?” well, then the author may proceed in explaining why he does not care about the fact that on Windhelm there is a murderer rampaging and the guards do not know what to do ("but they are at war you idiot, they can not do much" you are right, just like how Cyrodiil is trying to rebuild itself after a large scale war, after tons of resourecs were eighter used or sacked), and that without mentioning crime in Riften. While I do not intend to use the tu quoque fallacy here (wich, in case you don’t know, is trying to refute someone’s critique by saying “But you do it as well”) as some cities are thrown in chaos, the fact that our Stormcloak Guy used this argument shows a great chunck of bias from him. This argument can either be used to criticize both sides or not be used at all, you decide. Also what he says about the security in the empire is simply not true, as it is evidenced by one of the possble dialogues of none other than General Tullius himself (more specifically when you try to convince him to go to High Hrothgar during Season Unending): Dragonborn: The best time to negotiate is from a position of strength. General Tullius: Fair enough. We're driving the Stormcloaks back well enough at the moment, but we're already overstretched. That's what comes of trying to win a war with a bare handful of legions. If the Emperor would just give me the reinforcements I've requested! Dragonborn: Why won't the Emperor send more reinforcements? General Tullius: Most of the Legion is tied down on the border with the Aldmeri Dominion. The Emperor can't afford to risk weakening Cyrodiil's defenses. From the Imperial City, our war here is just a sideshow. An interlude before the main event against the Thalmor resumes. Also if he actually gave us a more in deep look at Cyrodiilic cities that are in chaos (but he didn't) we would actually see that it is probably one of those situations that could not be easily fixed even by a powerful Empire, well this without mentioning that assuming that a specific governemnt is inneficient thanks to chaos in some cities is to jump to conclusions as a series of factors may make administration and/or interference difficult (geographical relief, climate, how many criminal factions are using hidden locations to grow in power and influence, etc). Heck, it would be like saying that both imperial and stormcloak governments are trash because there are bandits all over Skyrim. Anyway, the journals that describe such events are Cicero's and we can see them all here https://www.imperial-library.info/content/ciceros-journal, but lets have a closer look: in volume 2 it is written "The situation in Bravil grows more dire. The city has erupted in violence, due to a war of control being waged by Cyrodiil's two largest skooma traffickers. The Listener, Alisanne Dupre, has been forced to employ sellswords to protect her own residence." Bravil is very close to Elsweyr (https://www.google.com.br/search?q=cyrodiil+map&client=opera&hs=MgX&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjaz4Pb1MnZAhXmuFkKHWZjAjEQ_AUICigB&biw=1240&bih=914#imgrc=YHy6QwKOyg8TvM: ) and this makes the activities of kooma smugglers far easier, specially now that Elsweyr is not part of the Empire (and even if it was it's harsh conditions would prevent the imperial governemnt from being omnipresent there). In fact even in during the Oblivion Crisis, the very end of what was basically the Golden Age of the Empire, Bravil was considered a poor and violent city. If You did not play Oblivion just like me, a bit of research about Bravil in the Wiki and the UESP will show it clearly therefore in Bravil's case it is not something that is fault of the Empire itself, . In Volume 4, however, Cicero says that Cheydinhal has erupted in violence and chaos, but it is never specified how. Was it a war between rival criminal factions like in Bravil? Just unhappy inhabitants of the city? Was it really a result of bad administration from the Empire? Also a book and a dialogue in Skyrim, that The Stormcloak Guy obviously did not show on his holy book, reveal that the city is not an actual anarchy as many would think. The book is "An adventurer's Guide to Skyrim" (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:An_Explorer's_Guide_to_Skyrim), wich mentions Cheydinhal and was clearly written after Ulfric’s militia took back Markarth because it mentions the Forsworn (who did not exist before Ulfric and his men drove the Rechmen rebels from Markarth), and the Dialogue betwen Ingun and Elgrim (http://pt.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Elgrim):

Elgrim: "Ingun, you clumsy fool! You've tainted our entire supply of Painted Troll Fat. You have no idea how hard that was to get." Ingun: "I'm sure my mother can compensate you for it." Elgrim: "I'll draft a letter to Rythe. If you could have it sent to Cheydinhal for me, that would make up for your blunder." Ingun: "I'll make sure it's sent right away."

As you can see an Alchemist in Skyrim uses Cheydinhal as means of getting profit, what would not be possible if the city was an absolute chaos by the year 201 of the 4th Era, wich either means that Cicero’s claims were exageratted or that the Empire managed to control the situation (at least to some degree, over the years). A stronger evidence for that is how Elgrim reveals he sends letters to Rythe, that is actually a famous dunmer painter encountered in The Elder Scrolls IV (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Rythe_Lythandas). If the city was an absolute chaos at the time, we would expect a citizen like Rythe to have eighter escaped of died.

All of that without mentioning everything that is going on on Stormcloak holds. In Riften, Maven Black Briar has the entire city in her pocket (even the jarl) and freely associates with the Thieves Guild (Laila Law-Giver does not know about that). In Dawnstar, Jarl Skald barely cares about his city and sends most of his guards to fight the imperials (and is pretty authoritarian, threatening a former legionnaire for walking around in his old armor for the sake of nostalgia) and Winterhold is ruled by a fool that barely lifts a finger to help the city and instead keeps blaming the College of Winterhold (despite having no proof of what he claims). Again: no tu quoque intended, but if you condemn the imperial governemnt thanks to what happened in a few cities in Cyrodiil but does not give a crap about the flaws of the Stormcloak holds, you are a hypocrite and a biased fool.

After that he citates Valga Vinicia, who says that she moved from Cyrodiil to escape the fighting. This is weak evidence since she never clarifies what she's referring to. She may even be referring to the Great War.

Changing the subject now: the author says that it is understandable for the Empire to not send many reinforcements, thanks to the issue about the southern border (well he basically answered his own question there) and later says "But hello they have ships”. I don’t know if he was intentionally biased or just stupid, but he cmpletely ignored how General Tullius reveals that the Emperor is not sending reinforcements thanks to how it would make Cyrodiil more vulnerable to a Dominion attack. And The Stormcloak Guy may consider taking a look at the map of an interesting continent called Tamriel: https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/elderscrolls/images/6/62/Tamriel_Map.png/revision/latest?cb=20150911030824 in order for the Empire to send reinforcements to Cyrodiil it would need to navigate trough Dominion territory, risking being taken down or at least being forced to go back to Cyrodiil, and even if they managed to get trough Dominion controlled seas they would still have to go trough Hammerfell's and High Rock's seas. It would take too long and it would be too exausting to send a considerable ammount of soldiers to Skyrim.

Ironically, Hadvar's dialogue suggests that the Imperial Legion ia actually managing to defeat the Stormcloaks after the Tullius came to Skyrim. If you follow him in Helgen and you ask who are the Stormcloaks he will say "You haven't heard of the civil war in Skyrim? I guess down in Cyrodiil people have other things to worry about.It's pretty simple. Ulfric founded the Stormcloaks years ago, as a sort of private army to advance his ambitions. He's always used the ban on the worship of Talos to stir people up against the Empire. He never succeeded in getting much support, so a few months ago he murdered the High King! That got the Empire's attention." thus revealing that the Empire only started to really pay attention to his rebellion after Torygg's death, wich occured a few months before Ulfric was captured while the war itself had been going on for years (the fact that the war has been going on for years is also revealed by Vulwulf Snow-Shod and Vignar Gray-Mane, tough Vignar does not say it directly). Now if you ask him how did they capture Ulfric he will answer with "A masterstroke by General Tullius! He's only been in charge here for a few months, but he's turned things around for the Empire. We've been trying to catch Ulfric since the war started, but he always seemed to slip through our fingers... like he knew we were coming. This time, the General turned the tables on him. Ulfric rode right into our ambush with only a few bodyguards. He surrendered pretty meekly, too. So much for his death-or-glory reputation. I thought we were taking Ulfric back to Cyrodiil, but I guess the General changed his mind. You know the rest." wich shows that the Skyrim's nord legionnaires were not able to capture Ulfric before the Empired started to really care about this war, and that General Tullius just needed a few months to capture the leader of the rebels. His dialogue actually shows how strong the Empire is, as Skyrim's legionnaires were only able to capture Ulfric after Tullius was sent to fix the whole thing (source: http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Hadvar)

Now we get to his points about the best chance for a victory over the Thalmor on a future war. In the first paragraph he talks about the redguards… and acts like if they would signifficantly increase the chance of an imperial victory over the Thalmor, but that is not the case as numbers do not win wars by themselves (some may say that numbers do help. That is right: they HELP, but they do not guarantee victory). His arguments regarding the possibilities of an imperial-redguard alliance versus a stormcloak-redguard alliance are also full of flaws, because as Zorkonov from the Imperial Knowledge youtube channel once explained the diplomatic relations between Hammerfell and the Empire are pretty stable, if not friendly, during the events of The Elder Scrolls V as it is evidenced by the content of the book “Flight from the Thalmor”, wich can be read here: https://www.imperial-library.info/content/flight-thalmor. Pay attention to the very first paragraph: Dearest reader: The work you are about to experience has been copied and duplicated, so that the story it relates can be spread throughout the Empire. But make no mistake - this is not a work of fiction. The events chronicled in this account are all true, were originally documented in a private journal (which now remains safely guarded in the House of Quills in Hammerfell) and occurred not more than a year before this book was printed. - Ashad Ibn Khaled, High Scribe, House of Quills, Hammerfell The Empire has basically allowed Hammerfell to publish a book in imperial land, wich would not happen if Hammerfell was hostile towards the Empire. Talking about the Hammerfell: before anyone says how the redguards “defeated” the Thalmor after the emperor left Hammerfell lets read the damn book about the Great War, shall we? https://www.imperial-library.info/content/great-war and see what it actually says about Hammerfell "In Hammerfell, Imperial fortunes took a turn for the better. In early 4E 173, a Forebear army from Sentinel broke the siege of Hegathe (a Crown city), leading to the reconciliation of the two factions. Despite this, Lady Arannelya's main army succeeded in crossing the Alik'r Desert. The Imperial Legions under General Decianus met them outside Skaven in a bloody and indecisive clash. Decianus withdrew and left Arannelya in possession of Skaven, but the Aldmeri were too weakened to continue their advance [...] In Hammerfell, General Decianus was preparing to drive the Aldmeri back from Skaven when he was ordered to march for Cyrodiil. Unwilling to abandon Hammerfell completely, he allowed a great number of "invalids" to be discharged from the Legions before they marched east. These veterans formed the core of the army that eventually drove Lady Arannelya's forces back across the Alik'r late in 174, taking heavy losses on their retreat from harassing attacks by the Alik'r warriors. [...] In the end, the heroic Redguards fought the Aldmeri Dominion to a standstill, although the war lasted for five more years and left southern Hammerfell devastated. The Redguards say that this proves that the White-Gold Concordat was unnecessary, and that if Titus II had kept his nerve, the Aldmeri could have been truly defeated by the combined forces of Hammerfell and the rest of the Empire.") as we can see Arannelya's Army was weakned after they took Skaven (that is located in central Hammerfell) and was pushed trough the desert by the army of imperial "invalids" Decianus left (thus showing that the Imperials were more than capable of dealing with Arannelya's army back there) to the point of being forced to the southern region of Hammerfell (as this was the devastated region after the aldmeri army withdrew from the province). In other words: Lady Arannelya's army was extremely weakned thanks to imperial veterans who managed to push her army across Hammerfell's sands... and even tough a united Hammerfell did not have progress in fighting her weakned army (remember that it said the redguards fought to a standstill) for FIVE YEARS, and did not even manage to destroy such army. Also the Dominion-Hammerfell war ended with a peace treaty, the Second Treaty of Stros M’kai, after souther Hammerfell, wich happened to be the chunk of land that was ceased top the Dominion when the White Gold Concordact was signed, got devastated by the war. The conclusions we have is that not only the redguards did not actually defeat the Dominion as technically they did not even drive the Dominion out of Hammerfell by force, but also that the Dominion did not sign the treaty because it could no longer fight, but because it had no reason to fight as southern Hammerfell was basically destroyed.

Now lets take a look about what he says about a Stormcloak victory: it is true that Ulfric wants to fight the Thalmor, but this would be suicide. Why? Because the Stormcloaks SUCK on the battlefield. They have been fighting against locally recruited and unexperienced legionnaires (this is revealed by pretty much every in game Legate), legionnaires that also are what General Tullius describes as “a bare handful of legions” and that Legate Rikke describes as “regular militia material”, for years. The Stormcloaks have been fighting these bare handful of militia like, locally recruited and unexperienced legionnaires pretty much to a standstill for years, so how on Nirn would one expect the Stormcloaks to be successful on an offensive against the Dominion? Also even a fast look at some TES: Legends cards can show you that the Stormcloaks really lack organization and discipline among their ranks (https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Rallying_Stormcloak http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Inspiring_Stormcloak http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Stormcloak_Battalion https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Ulfric's_Uprising), unlike the imperials (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Mentor_of_the_Watch http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Praetorian_Commander http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Septim_Guardsman http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Legends:Tullius'_Conscription)

Now we get to the isue of racism (ah shit, here we go again). He begins it by saying that imperialism is about a dominant culture being seen as supreme, but that has nothng to do with racism. How? One can see a certain culture as supreme and not see any race as supreme. In fact, imperialism is not even about shoving such culture down someone's throat, as countless Empires did not do that: the americans do not do it, the romans did not do it (the Jews were allowed to have their customs you know), the mongols did not do it back when they dominated modern day Ukraine and part of modern day Russia, the tamrielic empire doesn not do it (the empire did not shove Cyrodiil's culture down other provinces throats. The Empire gave autonomy to the dunmer, the Empire has no problems with nords having long hairs and beards and visiting Halls of the Dead, Bruma is a cyrodiilic city and is far more nordic than imperial in culture, etc. All of these actions were not chosen on desperate situations unlike the ban of Talos worship. In fact as long as the other provinces accept the Emperor's authority, pay the taxes and report for duty when Cyrodiil is at war, the Empire lets the local government dictate the vast majority of the rules, which is why Skyrim is still ruled by jarls and a High King or High Queen). What General Tullius says about the nords ( "The Legion's always been here. Without us to keep order, the provinces would fall into barbarism and lawlessness. Especially Skyrim. Take for example, Ulfric Stormcloak and his little "rebellion." But rest assured, his days are numbered." ) is ethnocentrism, not racism (there is a huge difference between these two). Tullius did not say that a nord is a barbarian simply for being a nord (because HELLO: Legate Rikke is a nord herself, and if Hadvar survives Tullius will be happy if you tell him that he survived, while calling Hadvar “a damn good soldier”).

The irnony is that the autjor complains about imperialism, but we can see that he is a supporter of nationalism, which sets up a dominant culture in its own nation, and the dominant culture is seen as supreme, wich is exactly what we see in game after a Stormcloak victory. But hey: who needs coherence, amirite!

Now to have an idea of how how the Stormcloaks treat non nords in Windhelm (again: in Windhelm) we can take a look at Malborn (the wood elf that helps the Dragonborn ilfiltrate the Thalmor Embassy): if he survives he will relocate to the New Gnisis Cornerclub, to the Gray Quarter in Windhelm (this is clearly documented in both the wiki both the Wiki https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/Malborn and the UESP https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Malborn). Now lets solve the puzzle: Malborn is an elf and an outsider in Windhelm. He had nothing left and he could have gone to Windhelm's Candlehearth Hall in order to live better while hiding from the Thalmor, but he actually goes to the Gray Quarrter, that is basically falling apart. One would clearly not choose to be on a place like that and therefore if the Stormcloaks were welcoming when he came into the city as an outsider with no future, he would certainly not be in the Gray Quarter (and if they think he could be a spy, they could keep him on a place were he would be constantly watched while living decently)... but he is there. Therefore the only conclusion is that the Stormcloaks, and with them Ulfric himself, did not accept him into the actual city and the Gray Quarter was the only option for him. All of this without mentioning that the argonians that live in the docks only live in the docks because they are not allowed to live in the actual city (for being… well… argonians). Heck, if Ulfric is killed and Windhelm is taken by the imperials and you ask Scouts-Many-Marshes (an argonian in the docks) if he is glad that the Stormcloaks are gone, he will say “You have no idea. Did you know it was his decree that forbade the Argonians from living inside the city walls? I hope in his next life, he’s reborn as an Argonian forced to live in a slum because of some bigoted Nord dictator. I’m joking, of course, but I’m a lot happier seeing the Empire running things in Windhelm.” This fact is also revealed by Brunwulf Free-Winter when he says “Whenever a group of marauders attack a Nord village, Ulfric is the first to sound the horn and send the men. But a group of Dark Elf refugees gets ambushed? A group of Argonians, or a Khajiit caravan? No troops. No investigation. Nothing. There’s a group of cutthroats out there right now that Ulfric doesn’t lift a finger to bring to justice, as long as they don’t threaten Nord land”.

Now about what he points about the Roman Empire, I will use the same logic with the old norse: if you, reader, joined the Stormcloaks because you like the vikings for X or  Y reasons I have no problem with that (I kinda enjoy their history myself. Heck, I could say I am more of a viking fan than a roman fan), but wanting to apply this to the Lore is nonsense because:

- DNA tests on one of the nordic countries (tough I do not recall wich one) have revealed the vikings were actually very diverse in terms of race. In other words: racism was not that common among vikings, unlike among the nords of Skyrim.

- The vikings made sure to take advantage of their ships when they raided the shores of more southern european countries, as with their vertically thin ships they were able to step on the shore right after jumping from the ship. A similar boat design is seen at Windhelm and the Stormcloaks could have took advantage of that and directly attack Solitude from the sea (as most of Skyrim’s shores are controlled by the stormcloaks at the beginning of the game) in some of the earlier years of the war, but the Stormcloaks chose to get massacred on land instead (on a dialogue with Torsten Cruel-Sea where Torsten directly mentions such navy, Ulfric says he will think about it and that is the closest we get to having an actual Stormcloak navy).

- The vikings had almost the same equipment as the rest of Europe at their time, what can not be said about the Stormcloaks in Tamriel. To give more details: during the viking age (around 800 a. C. to 1066 a. C. if I recall correctly) chainmail and shields were universally used (https://levaleur.deviantart.com/art/Armour-evolution-421878469 https://kids.britannica.com/kids/article/armor/390609) and full plate armor only became a thing by the 15th century, and in this period of time not only the design of the armor improved, but the way it was made, the way the metal was shaped in order to make it harder and more effective, combat strategies were improved, etc. In other words: a Stormcloak soldier fighting a Dominion soldier would be like a viking nobleman fighting a 15th century knight... wich would be like a World War 2 german soldier trying to fight a modern US Marine.

Now if you join the Stormcloaks thanks to Talos worship... one can worship him in secret, just like Alvor reveals the nords did before Ulfric’s Uprising (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Alvor "It's from that treaty that ended the Great War, remember, when the Emperor was forced by the Thalmor to outlaw Talos worship. We didn't pay much attention to it when I was a boy - everyone still had their little shrine to Talos. But then Ulfric and his "Sons of Skyrim" started agitating about it, and sure enough the Emperor had to crack down. Dragging people off in the middle of the night... one of the main causes of this war, if you ask me."). Ulfric’s agitating is what caught the attention of the Thalmor (since it showed that the terms of the Concordact were not being enforced in Skyrim) and the Emperor (as Alvor reveals not even the imperials were that active in Skyrim before Ulfric started his rebellion), so I am sorry to say that but Ulfric’s means are bringing the opposite of what he promises, and having noble goals means nothing if your means do not work.