#to the point of enabling each others worst attributes.

[opal-owl-flight]

I depend on you.

[fuckyeahisawthat]

@spectraling I feel like you have blown my third eye wide open with the idea of the Hexcore taking on some of Viktor's personality and attributes. Like. The idea of Viktor creating a thing that shares his goals, that genuinely wants to help him help people, at a time when he's starting to feel like maybe Jayce doesn't share that goal with him anymore? I think he's doing it all subconsciously but. Creating a thing that's a reflection of his own mind, an echo instead of another truly autonomous human that can challenge him when he starts going off the rails? An endless feedback loop of yes-and, supporting and encouraging him but also enabling his own blind spots and increasingly extreme ideas?

But also. Creating something that's not just using him for its own ends but that genuinely cares for him, that comforts him, that loves him?? (Except that love is a terrifying unstoppable force. Love that wants to crawl inside you and consume you. Love that says we'll die if we are parted from each other. Separating us will be like ripping a hole in your own body. But maybe there is something he recognizes about that kind of love.)

All that is SO much more interesting than Magic Orb Evil. It fits so much better with the themes and parallels of the show. "I only wanted to help." The darkness of love. Devotion that enables someone's worst impulses. It's so much more twisted and tragic and in keeping with the tone of the show than the idea of the Hexcore just controlling him or manipulating him for its own ends. It's Viktor all the way down and also he's created this thing that has a will of its own and there will be unintended consequences.

It makes a lot of the Sky stuff snap into place for me too, if you think that Sky is a manifestation of the Hexcore. I still think she works equally well as an expression of Viktor's connection to his humanity, which he finally allows to burn away during his final transformation. And tbh I prefer symbolism that's open to multiple interpretations. But things like Sky reminding Viktor that "all systems have limits" make a lot more sense if you think of Sky as an avatar of a Hexcore that genuinely cares about him, that's protective (if maybe also a little bit possessive.) Because frankly, this doesn't sound like something Viktor would say to himself. Nor does it sound like something that a Hexcore bent simply on relentlessly consuming everything in its path would encourage him to believe. It sounds like something his PARTNER would say.

(There is a whole other post to be made about Viktor and Sky in the astral plane and how astral plane Viktor is much more free with both giving and accepting touch than we ever see him in the physical realm, and astral Sky is MUCH more touchy with Viktor than the real Sky ever was: clasping his hands, sitting draped against his back. Something something inventing a ghost to soothe the gaping wound of loneliness inside you by accepting casual intimacy in your mind palace where no one can see. ANYWAY.)

The idea of the Hexcore being willing to protect him at the expense of others also fits with one of my pet headcanons, which is that the reason everybody in the commune reacted like that when Viktor got shot is that the Hexcore reflexively took a giant schlorp of everybody's life force, in a desperate attempt to keep Viktor and/or itself (is there a difference at this point?) alive.

Even the line about the "recursive impulse," which I've seen a lot of interpretations of but we never really know what it means. What if it's because the Hexcore is already a little bit Viktor and now it's inside him and that's just a hella confusing sensation to describe, like staring into a hall of mirrors?

But most of all I love this because holy fuck it is SO MUCH SADDER than any other interpretation I have seen. HE MADE HIMSELF A PARTNER. HE MADE HIMSELF THE PARTNER HE THOUGHT HE DIDN'T HAVE!!! WHEN JAYCE WAS RIGHT THERE THE WHOLE TIME!!!! Augh jesus hexcore christ I'm eating glass about it.

[sol-draws-sometimes]

Unrelated to this episode but as a twin, everytime I remember Lark had an affair with Sparrow’s wife, I’m just… in disbelief. Like, I hate when people ogle at my twin and I, and are like “WHAT’S IT LIKE BEING A TWIN!” “I WISH I WAS A TWIN!” “WOW! HAVING A TWIN IS HAVING A BUILT IN BESTFRIEND!” However, weird objectification aside, they’re not wrong. I DO have a close bond with twin that I don’t with anyone else. For most of my life (and all my childhood), we were on the same wavelength emotionally speaking. Obviously we had put diffrences, but the way we viewed the world and reacted to things emotionally was almost the same. In middle school, we both were struggling mentally, but we understood each other, she felt like the only irl person who truly understood what I was going through, because she was going through it too. To me, our relationship is taken for granted. No matter what happens, how much we fight or bicker, I have never once in my life doubted whether she loved me or not. Her love has always been, and still is, the strongest constant in my life. And even though the way we view the world and act emotionally is no longer exactly the same, she is still the one person I feel understands me the most.

And that’s why, I can’t wrap my head around the fact that Lark did that. How could he have done that. I could NEVER, see myself betray my sister like that. And yes I’m young, and ace (and on the aro spec), so you could argue it’s not the same but like, even if I were allo, I just, can not see myself having an affair WITH MY TWIN’S S.O.! (also I just hate the idea that cheating is just a thing that happens sometimes like, I’m sure there are relationships that recover from that, but come one, seriously it’s so easy to not cheat) The worst part is that I still think Lark loves Sparrow. Scratch that, I know he still loves Sparrow. I’m not good at wording it, but the best example I can think of, is Lark pretending to be Sparrow so that he could fix Sparrow’s relationship with Normal, so that Sparrow doesn’t have a bad relationship with their son. I’m thinking of that person who made a post about how Lark shows love and I wish I could remember so that can point to that, but it mentioned Lark sewing bulletproof into Normal’s suit. Anyway, Lark LOVES Sparrow, and they are each other’s world. The problem is that they’re codependent with each other, which can make them enable their worst attributes, or let them brush things off that shouldn’t be brushed off.

I can’t imagine doing what Lark did to Sparrow, to my sister. Idk how my sister could EVER forgive such a betrayal. I know some romantic couples can genuinely work together to overcome an affair, so I guess that can be applied to platonic and familial situations as well. But still, Sparrow TRUSTED Lark more than anyone else in his life, for Lark to break that that trust, it just… idk. Also, I definitely understand why Sparrow forgave Lark, they can’t lose their only family left. They are each other’s world. Especially after everything they’ve gone through. Tho I will say, I don’t think Sparrow’s just completely over it either. His wife and brother had a fucking affair together. That has to hurt. Plus, there are little lines when referring to Normal that Sparrow’s said that leads me to believe that Sparrow has some unprocessed feelings about the affair pushed deep, deep down to keep peace.

I wonder how much thought Anthony put into to that plot point. Most of the times it’s played as joke but if you think about it for 2 seconds it’s so fucked. But Anthony cares too much about the kiddads for me to believe it was just a joke, like the Hermie’s dads situation. I wonder what made him think this is a thing Lark would do.

This isn’t supposed to be an “I HATE LARK” post. I think he’s a very interesting character, the way he’s reacting and processing to everything that happened in S1 and S2 is fascinating. And just to reiterate, I know he still loves Sparrow. But still, I keep thinking about how do you betray the person who’s your whole world, who you arguably love the most. Or guess, my real question is WHY. What has going on in his head that led him to doing that. Even from a more selfish standpoint, I don’t think Sparrow currently trusts, or will ever trust Lark the way he did pre-affair. And I don’t think Lark is stupid enough to believe having an affair with Sparrow’s wife wouldn’t irrevocably change their relationship.

I wish I could be more eloquent, but I always forget and every time I remember what he did I just don’t know how to feel about it. Idk, I just keep thinking about them. I can’t help it, I’m a latino twin, they were handcrafted for me.

If you have any thoughts on this, PLEASE DO SHARE THEM WITH THEM WITH ME. (also idk if this conversation’s already been had but I haven’t engaged)

Ps: something, something Lark hates himself so much he tries to ruin his relationship with Sparrow because he feels like he doesn’t deserve love, not even from Sparrow. Yah started thinking about it outside my perspective. I can see that being his reasoning, but still…I just, I can’t image actual doing that. But yah, I think I’m satisfied with that reasoning.

[limeade-l3sbian]

I don’t think people talk enough about the shocking fact that you are the problem sometimes. Not you limeade but like you as in yourself when you stumble into issues.

I recently had this realisation in terms of all my relations. I’m the only issue in common with all of them falling apart. I’m not trying to play martyr and say the other party never did wrong, but I’ve come to realize recently I’m not a person that’s very easy to like. Not out of malice but because I’m too odd. Not in a oh i’m so unique and quirky way but in a oh i’m actually a really hard flavor for most to stomach type of way.

We on here and elsewhere often talk about how to deal with others making a relationship turn sour, how to cope with the emotional hurt, how to work towards meeting friends who appreciate us. But I haven’t ever seen the conversation of the reality sometimes simply being that we ourselves can be the recurring issue in the failings of friendships and family relations.

It’s a kind of hollow feeling tbh. I’m not crying over it and I wouldn’t say I hurt. But my issue is that I don’t know how to go about changing because finding out something deeply intrinsic to you as a person is what’s causing it is practically impossible to fix. I have of course been able to acknowledge fault in myself before this realisation but because my friends I made through my life and some of my family members are so vastly different all from each other, I didn’t make the connection that I’m probably the continuing issue to all.

My question is, do you think it’s possible to fix parts of your person, parts of your being and way your mind works, that has been present since the time you formed an identity of your own as a child? Or should I accept that I might just be made for a life of solitude? Sorry if this comes across as self pitying, i’m trying to ask a real question of advice.

First of all, you are 200% correct.

I think this has been a neglected point of this present wave of self-help. I know of two family members of mine that have never once admitted fault. I, myself, look back on situations where my aforementioned grumpiness and past anger issues hurt people in my life. And no amount of self accountability or apologies will change that moment in their lives, regardless of if they remember it or not.

Sometimes, the misfortune in our lives, recurring or otherwise, can only be attributed to us. You can't "circumstances" it away. It is one of the hardest pills to swallow but I think you making this point is very important, since certain notions can reach the wrong eyes and only further enable a detrimental lifestyle.

Do I think it is possible to fix parts of your person, parts of your being and way your mind works, that has been present since the time you formed an identity of your own as a child? I absolutely do. I think it is grueling, humbling, lifelong work, but I think it is necessary and 100% possible. I think that's how you get former extremist racists who are able to come out of a lifelong lesson of hate from those around them.

The thing about about this sort of self-work is that you must acknowledge that you have the capacity to do the thing you've done in the past. To say, "Oh, I could never do that now," I feel, is harmful. You have, and you can again in the worst or "right" circumstances. I had terrible anger issues in the past. To imply that I am no longer able to reach that level of rage is both false and insulting to those who were hurt by it in the past. It insists that they are holding a grudge against someone who doesn't exist anymore and will never exist again.

I think a great deal of the work to be done is to actively work against yourself. Similar to the way recovered addicts will tell you everyday is a fight against the impulse. This isn't to say to be fake just to fit in, in your situation, but to alter the parts of yourself that you know are objectively unsavory and understand why you are changing. It means nothing if I only try to change to appease those around me. My strongest changes came when I understood why this new version of myself was better than the past version - better for myself and for those around me.

For me, I didn't want to be angry anymore. I didn't want to lash out and make people shirk. I wanted people to feel comfortable around me. I wanted people to feel like they could tell me uncomfortable truths without having to do it from a distance (figuratively. I wasn't hitting people lol). That was my incentive to change. I still have that anger in me at times. I still feel it in my moments of overstimulation. I've just learned to outweigh it with my incentive.

It can be done, anon. It can. It will not be easy, it will not be fun, it will not be comfortable, and it will not be fast. But it can be done. 💜

[recordsofelysia]

The Descension (Part 2, The Fell Gods, The Descension, and The Seven Saints)

Right, so, where we left off, strong wizards are trying to become gods, cool, got it.

During this time, the age of ascent, a particularly powerful group of wizards arose in the land that would become Parthus. Very little is known about this group, and almost all history pertaining to them has been erased. Purposefully. So if you wanna know more there is shit to be found in the campaign.

Anyways, all that is truly known about this group is that they were attempting rituals of divine ascension, and, at some point, something happened/worked/arose. No common people are really sure why it happened, just that it did.

7 godlike entities were "awakened", and rose from the ground beneath Parthus. These entities would be named "The Fell Gods" in subsequent scholarship. The general idea is that these "gods" were minor incarnations of the worst aspects of mortal beings. Sins. If you will. (subtlety is my speciality).

The latent divine power in these deities was great enough to shift the balance of the cosmos, and broke the seals that had been placed upon the Malevolents at the end of the Divine War (oh no).

What resulted is commonly known as The Descension, but is also called the Second Divine War by some. This war saw a three-way battle, between The Architects, The Malevolents, and the newly awakened Fell Gods, alongside their respective followers. The Descension lasted decades, and saw the heights of the Age of Ascent utterly decimated, and over half the mortal population killed.

The end of The Descension is attributed to legendary figures of Elysian history. They consisted of 7 individuals, who each wielded what are known as The Divine Weapons. This group was known as The Seven Saints, and with the power of The Divine Weapons, the Fell Gods were destroyed, turning the tides of the war.

The rest of the Malevolents were, ultimately, unorganised and isolated from each other, lacking true unity or allyship, enabling them to be picked off by the Architects, and The Seven Saints.

The Age of Ascent came to an end, and with it, the Architect gods made a decision. To seal themselves away, as well as the Malevolents, to prevent such powerful magic from reaching the hands of mortals ever again. Thus, the age of magical prosperity ended, and the gods could now only influence the world of mortals through their most devout followers, or through pact magic.

The Seven Saints would go on to establish the continent of Elysia, and its nations. Two would settle in the north, the land that would become Ferox. Two would settle in the west, which would become the Kingdom of Parthus, and the remaining three would settle in the south, which would be established the Paxian Halidom, but would eventually become The Elysian Empire (I'll make another post about that whole Halidom-Empire deal, I swear).

So, that is most of what I can say about The Descension, and how most people in the world of Omnia regard it, as far as they are concerned. If things seem off or unexplained, fret not, it'll probably come up later.

[warrioreowynofrohan]

The Four Loves - Philia and Fandom

Lewis, in his section on philia, or friendship - love grounded in common interests and pursuits and purposes - says that (as of 1960, when he wrote the book) friendship has been comparatively neglected and devalued in literature relative to familial love (affection) and romantic love (eros).

I think that, sixty years later, this has very much changed. Some of this change is attributable to Lewis’ contemporaries - Frodo and Sam are one of the more memorable pairs of friends in the literature of the latter half of the 20th century - but the change has been far more extensive than that, and has especially encompassed TV and film as well as books. Harry, Ron and Hermione (the latter two have a romantic relationship, but it is much less important to the story than the Trio’s friendship); Kirk, Spock, and McCoy; Buffy & the Scoobies; various pairs and combinations of Avengers in the MCU - these are only a few prominent examples. Lewis writes that philia, going beyond companionship in enjoyment of similar activities, can be expressed as seeing (or caring about) the same truth, or “agreeing that the same question, little regarded by others, is of great importance”, and certain TV shows, like The West Wing, are engaging precisely because they show a group of friends who aren’t just “hanging out”, but engaging in a common cause about which they are passionate.

The growth of social media has enabled a massive expansion in both companionship based on common interests and in the closer bond of philia. This relates especially to two specific points in Lewis’ writing about the nature of philia and how it can go good or bad.

First, philia is intrinsically exclusive to the extent that people who do not care about the interest, pursuit, or conviction that the friends have are not part of the group. In Lewis’ terms:

Even if the common ground of the Friendship is nothing more momentous than stamp-collecting, the circle rightly and inevitably ignores the views of the millions who think it a silly occupation and of the thousands who have merely dabbled in it. There is no offence in this. People who bore each other should meet seldom; those who interest one another, often.

...The particular and defensible deafness [to those outside the circle] was based on some kind of superiority - even if it were only a superior knowledge about stamps. The sense of superiority will then get attached to [a] total deafness: the group will disdain as well as ignore those outside it.

There is an additional stage to this: the circle may come to disdain those outside the group to the point that they are suspicious and hostile even to ‘outsiders’ who who are newly picking up the interest, or to people who share the interest but are not off the ‘class’ that they self-identify as being. Rather than taking joy in new people being added to the circle, they build walls around the group. In fandom, this manifests as gatekeeping.

My second point involves the impact of the Internet and social media on fandom more broadly. The moment of mutual recognition and joy at meeting a new friend who shares your views and interests - what Lewis describes as “What? You too? I thought I was the only one.” - has far more opportunity to occur when our circle of contacts is not bounded by workplace or family connections or geography, and we can instantly connect with people across the world who share a common, even very niche, interest. My discovery of the online Silmarillion fandom has been a delight precisely because of those moments, the moments of yes, exactly, that’s just what I was thinking! or, even better, I never thought of that before, but it fits perfectly!, and equally delightful, seeing someone else have that reaction to one of your ideas. People who might have gone a lifetime without finding anyone who shared a particular interest, idea or perspective can now be easily connected.

And this goes beyond fandom. Browsing through tumblr makes it very clear that social media enables that kind of connection and mutualy support, that realization that you are not “the only one”, for a great many people when it comes to mental illness, sexual orientation, and a whole host of experiences of discrimination, isolation, and loneliness. There is scarcely any experience for which you cannot find others who have shared it and can empathize and commisserate.

This increase on the universe of possible friends has been a boon and a joy to many. No matter how specific your interest, you can find at least some others who agree with you and think that you are exactly right about it. And this is also the peril of social media, because it is the exact same qualities that enable the mass expansion of fandoms - the ability to find like-minded people and ignore the opinions of the far wider world, the validation of “What? You too? I thought I was the only one.” - that have also enabled phenomena like the rise of the far-right and of conspiracy theories. Opinions that were widely and correctly understood to be false and cruel and that therefore remained for the most part either rejected or deeply buried can, no less than any other opinion, rapidly find others who agree with them online, and intensify in respinse to that validation. This is something Lewis also writes about, though on a smaller scale:

Friendship, I have said, is born at the moment when one man says to another “What! You too? I thought that no one but myself...” But the common taste or vision or point of view which is this discovered need not always be a nice one...Surely most of us have experienced the ambivalent nature of such moments in our own youth. It was wonderful when we first met someone who cared for our favourite poet...But it was no less delightful when we first met so eone who shared with us a secret evil. This too be ame far more palpable and explicit; of this too, we ceased to be ashamed. Even now, at whatever age, we all know the perilous charm of a shared hatred or grievance.

Alone among unsympathetic companions, I hold certain views and standards timidly, half ashamed to avow them and half doubtful if they can be right. Put me back among my Friends and in half an hour - in ten minutes - these same views and standards become one more indisputable.

...Friendship can be a school of virtue but also a school of vice.

This gets at a broader concept that reoccurs throughout Lewis writings (both in The Four Loves and The Great Divorce): our worst impulses and inclinations are often not the opposite of our best ones, but misdirections and misuses of things and ideas which are best. Anything truly great is at more risk of producing an idol than is something trivial. The best and worst of humanity are far closer to each other than either one of them is to the commonplace. And so it should be no surprise that the very same tools that can create great new scope for friendship and connection and shared ideas can also foster the worst misdirections of that.

[suffering-and-happy-about-it]

Nicole’s rambling: The Watch Dogs Problem

Hey, welcome to my TedX talk about one of the most ambitious games Ubisoft had ever released... And which, for most of the parts, flopped majestically - yet still has players who love it. One such player am I as well. (And I’m not coming back to the game because Raymond Kenney is my first VG crush, shut the hell up.)

I won't be dipping into the side activities (digital trips) and online mode, because I never clicked with it and I don't know much about these parts. And I don't wanna throw shit at the game because of something I don't know a single thing about. Here are my three biggest negatives in the game and the three biggest positives you should play it for.

Also: remember, this is my opinion and my opinion only. It's sure biased, non-professional, but I've played WD more than five times. FIVE. So it's not just blatant nitpicking, because, in its core, WD Is a game I love dearly.

@march-moon​, here you go! :)

Let’s sort out the negatives first so we can later praise the game for what it did well:

1. Predictable and dull AI of enemies (aka going John Wick mode).

Sure, the variety of said enemies is impressive, but... When you get a grenade launcher and some good shotgun, which you can do in the first hour of gameplay if you already know your way with the ctOS bank account system (LOOP IS WHERE THE MONEY'S AT), you're more or less untouchable for the rest of the game. Most conveniently, you're starting with a silenced gun and when you know around your way with the stealth system and focus, which slows time big time for those who might not know, you can clear out Rossi Fremont under two minutes. Why? Because the AI is just dumb and stupid most of the time.

Like, sure, the big-armed guys can be a pain in the ass for the first few encounters, but when you realize all you have to do is throw two grenades at them and fire as many bullets as you have at your disposal, they are dead immediately. And the same goes for the car chases. Until you unlock the almighty power of raising the bridges and blowing up the steampipes, these are just pain in the ass.

The first few ctOS scans and police chases, as well as the enemy chases, are fun. But when ctOS finds you after ten minutes of driving around like a mad man to dodge the shit, sending you off on a ten-minutes lasting chase which simply repeats itself. Let alone that you kill half of the city's population because you fuck up to turn your car.  

To close this point, it gets repetitive, especially with the gang hideouts fuckery.

2. Ubisoft lying not only about the game features, but also about the overall graphics.

This point kinda explains itself, doesn't it? It's a known fact that studios have tendencies to change their games/movies for marketing purposes - for example, Disney and Infinity War or Naughty Dog's 'The Last of Us (Part 2)'. But this being a usual marketing tactic doesn't mean that the consumer should keep their mouth shut when they don't agree with it.

Most noticeable Watch Dogs' fuck-up was an overall graphic downgrade, which, sure, is completely understandable when you have such a huge open-world game, but... Ubisoft showed you a potato mash and all you got was the potato (The biggest point that is made fun of are the trees - those who played the games know what I'm talking about.). 

Also, the enhanced graphics ARE coded in the game, but are not used due to something signed off as ‘playable compatibility’ as far as I can understand, so??

But... They did lie about the in-game features too. They promised a lot more than they delivered, like the bounty hunts and stuff... Where did that go, Ubisoft?

3. The side missions and the story.

Don't take it as such... In my opinion, some of the side missions are fun - at the start. We've talked about gang hideouts, but you have fixer-car-related gigs as well and the first ten of them is very immersive since you don't already know which type of the mission you're up to. Will you be pressured by the time limit? Will you have to race through the city in a car that you can't destroy too much, otherwise it can't be sold on the black market? Will you be a decoy for some other bad people doing bad things? But when you get through this phase... It's the same game system again and again, for 46 times, I think? And the villain convoys... Well. These are fun and refreshing each time, I have to say.

Every time, you can choose a different tactic to toy around with - will you catch up with the baddies sooner, turning this mission into an intense, tight chase experience? Or will you wait for them further on the road, toying around with explosives and guns? Sometimes, they slip past you, which leads to a chase around the city, sometimes you blow up all of the cars perfectly on time, A+. But... You mastered 1/3 types of side mission content.

As for the story, it's not the worst, but it isn't something super-memorable, lifechanging. I am not talking about the idea behind the story (the utopia of having the whole city lead by a system, which enables the corporation to control people's lives without them even knowing), I am talking about the Damien-Aiden-Lena revenge story. It's your daily revenge plot based on Aiden's niece dying in a car crashed after the car being shot at because of a failed job.

The first story mission is mind-blowing. You're thrown into the game and the first thing you have to do is to infiltrate a whole-ass stadium, which feels good, not gonna lie. And the 'prison-break sequence' is also memorable as well. But other than that, it gets real repetitive real fast. 'Follow this person', 'hack this thingy', 'kill this guy', 'tilly that person' and so on is present in every act of the story, which makes things kinda come across as boring after some time. It is what it is.

There are exciting in-game moments, like when Defalt is introduced to the bunch and hacks into the Bunker base, stealing all of your data. But sadly, these story masterpieces tend to be overlooked and not acted on, which takes off some of the immersion potentials. (I know that Defalt's story was saved for the DLC, so it's not the best proof.)

! BUT THAT DOESN'T MEAN THAT THE STORY DOESN'T HAVE GOOD BEATS !

Now, the well-made things for which you should DEFINITELY play this game:

1. Chicago being a videogame city that is alive and the 'collectibles' are extra fun.

Okay, okay, let me explain. Sure, Watch Dogs' Chicago isn't the best area ever constructed in an open-world game. But... The city feels alive, it is changing around you, it never stops. You can find people making out, talking bad about their friend who is not there, you can look into their day-to-day life via something called 'privacy invasion', where you just hack into a camera and... You hear mommy calming down her kid who is crying, you can watch two girls playing Wii, presumably, and many other every day encounters.

NPCs are answering to you being into the city - asking questions on the range from 'Is that the guy from the news?' to straightaway call the cops because you are a mass murderer probably. When you stand in the middle of a road, they honk at you; when you accidentally bump into them, they call you names. It's amazing... And profiling them is even more fun. You can find profiles ranging from 'author of poetry' to 'clinically confirmed pyromaniac' and 'searches for 'feet' on the internet'. This shit is just ridiculous.

But... It's the smallest details you'll fall in love with. You can get on the "L" and it takes you on a ride. You can ride in it for the whole day, or you can get off on the next stop. When you're in the Wards or near Rossi Fremont, you can find dudes just listening to rap, chatting. Some guys force flyers into other people's hands. You can have coffee. The rain somehow feels real, and the nighttime just steals your breath away - and so do the sunsets. There's a part of the city called 'Hobotown', where the local hobos live, there are secret poker tournaments.

Chicago in Watch Dogs is a city with so many minor details that you cant find each of them in one gameplay. In each gameplay, you'll find something new, something that just makes you chuckle - but it's so thoughtful of the developers to even put it in their game. These small details are the ones that make you feel as if you were inside the game, convincing you that the Chicago you're looking at is, indeed, alive.

Then, there are the 'collectibles'. I didn't know how to call it other than that, so bear with me for a minute. There are minor 'side-missions' - for example, you're going after a killer, who is leaving you audios on the places he left one of his victims. There are QR coded which unlock audios that talk about the DedSec hacktivists. In the small 'hack 5 routers in a time limit' quests, you are unlocking one of the Blume's employees audios (Angela Balik's), talking about the files Raymond Kenney had hidden in the code back in the day, talking about the uprising of the Bellwether 'crime' prediction system.

The collectibles aren't everyone's thing, of course, and it won't take any of the Chicago experience when you don't listen to the voicemails or if you simply don't collect them. But, they can immerse you in the game world even more. And to be honest, this is one of the few games that had my ass shook about collecting the additional thingies.

2. The character cast.

Let's be honest, Aiden Pearce on his own isn't the best protagonist in the world. Don't get me bad, I like this game a lot, but he can come across as boring at times. And that's exactly when the character cast comes in to balance Aiden's character. Most of the cast has some sort of an attribute which compels to Aiden's personality very well, completes him in some way.

You have Raymond Kenney, who is a paranoid, rowdy, alcoholic genius who helped with creating ctOS - but has remorse about his history, because he caused the Northeast blackout 2003, killing eleven people. Which can show Aiden how bad can the power over the ctOS system be.

There's Jordi Chin, a prestigious assassin/fixer, who uses the game's darkest humor. Every fucking second Jordi is on screen, it's captivating, immersive and you'll find yourself chuckling at Jordi's jokes, which are definitely out of place. But he still keeps reminding you that he's in for the money, which, in the end, turns against Aiden in a way.

Clara Lille, otherwise known as BadBoy17, is a hacktivist working for the rebellious DedSec who are rebelling against Blume, the company behind ctOS. She seems to be innocent of the violence of getting revenge, but later in the game, Aiden discovers how deeply she was invested in the whole story about Lena.

Each of the characters has a personal connection to Aiden, widening his personality in various ways. Which is funny to watch throughout the story - and there's a ton of other characters I didn't even get into, like Lucky Quinn, Nicky, Jackson, Bed Bug... The characters are simply terrific.

3. The overall soundtrack.

Hear me out, this point is kinda tricky, yeah? I am not talking about the official soundtrack. The radio has some blasts I fell in love throughout playing the game - whether it introduced me to song 'Ms. Crumby' by the Audition, or made me fall in love with the Vampire Weekend, Kid Cudi, or The Vindictives. Yet, in the case of the radio, I tend to sort out a playlist consisting of 4-6 songs (YES? YOU CAN MAKE PLAYLIST INSIDE THE GAME???) which I play on repeat throughout the game.

There's also this masterful thing about the soundtrack sometimes 'forcing' itself into your gameplay, maybe more like 'self-inserting' into the game if you will. The two most memorable encounters of this are when: a) when you're helping Ray Kenney leave the junkyard and Pawnee behind and the 'ring ding piety pow' hardcore metal song plays throughout the final encounter (Jesus Built My Hotrod by Ministry) and b) when you enter Rossi Fremont, the whole time you're going through the building, the rap/hip-hop is playing, making you feel gangsta. (I think it's a song by Wu-Tang Clan, not sure tho).

But... Then it hits you. The in-game hidden soundtrack that sadly wasn't released. At least not officially. It has a reason, worry not - this in-game soundtrack reacts to the player's progress throughout the missions, so it basically plays on a loop. Which is understandable.

The most standing out instance I can talk about is when you enter the small island where the old Blume secret place is hidden on. You and Clara are on a mission searching for legendary sacred place (at least for the hackers) called 'The Bunker'. And my friends... This is when it hits you. The soundtrack feels familiar even when you're playing the game for the first time. This piece just hits differently than any other soundtrack I've heard. Not even Time by Hanz Zimmer has this effect on me, and I LOVE the Inception.

And there's more - the piece of the soundtrack which plays when you're going after Jackson is probably another great example.

BONUS ROUND: 4. The Bad Blood (DLC)

Okay, this had a lot to do with my love for Raymond Kenney and I am not worried to say it out loud. But this DLC is truly a DLC. It only uses the WD world, which was set up in the OG game, as its base - but it isn't its main focus at all. This DLC introduces us to new characters as well as to some we knew already we knew.

In the OG game, Tobias is the mad hobo who sells us cool thingies to play with - and in they managed to show Tobias' full potential, showing us how smart and hilarious, as well as paranoid, this guy is in reality. It deepened Ray's character, revealed Defalt's motivations and the history that tied both of them to the Northeast blackout.

There are also new areas to explore, new things to play with and even if the DLC doesn't do anything too revolutionary with the game's world, it's the best DLC I've played. And I may have enjoyed it more than Aiden's story. But again, I'm pro-Kenney biased, so that's kinda expected of me, ain't it?

PS: I hate Sitara or whatever her name is.

[aliveinthenorthfield]

The worst thing about being naked—and then being hit by a car—is that road rash is a problem for skin. Why was I naked in the middle of the road at noon? I am glad you asked, imaginary other half of this conversation! I have no idea! Some characteristics of bipolar disorder include dissociation, hallucinations, and fugue states, so sometimes I wake up in places I didn't go to sleep! So. There I am. Nude. Splayed out on a car like a slutty chicken, and I'm screaming about the government conspiracy to take away my feet. Not my real feet. Just my brain feet. I'm about six inches away from the concrete when I realize, in slow motion, like the exact opposite of a rhinoceros attack, "This is not how I imagined my life would turn out." When I was young, I broke both my ankles jumping off a roof because I was sure a cape would enable me to fly. My parents attributed this to my strong imagination. Last year, my therapist called it a delusion. I fail to see the difference. Also, I really can fly and see the future and make stupid people leave coffee shops with my mind. Forty-three percent of the time. Sometimes I see people as colors. For instance, this guy right here is purple, which means he just got a promotion. Or a blowjob. A blowmotion, if you will. The point is, here is a list of things my brain has told me to do: join a cult; start a cult; become a cabinet maker; kill myself, so, in essence, become a cabinet maker; break into, and then paint, other people's houses; have sex with literally everyone who reminds me of my mother; fight people who are much fightier than me, like the cops, so, in essence, kill myself. I think a lot about killing myself, not like a point on a map but rather like a glowing exit sign at a show that's never been quite bad enough to make me want to leave. See, when I'm up I don't kill myself because, holy shit, there's so much left to do! When I'm down I don't kill myself because then the sadness would be over, and the sadness is my old paint under the new. The sadness is the house fire or the broken shoulder: I'd still be me without it but I'd be so boring. They keep telling me seeing things that aren't technically there is called "disturbed cognitive functioning." I call it "having a superpower." Once, I pulled over on the 110 freeway and jumped out of my old Jeep because I saw it burst into flames twenty seconds before it actually burst into flames. I knew my girlfriend and I would be together because she turned bright pink the first time she saw me. I know tomorrow is going to come because I've seen it. Sunrise is going to come, all you have to do is wake up. The future has been at war, but it's coming home so soon. The future looks like a child in a cape. The future is the map and the treasure. The future looks just like gravity: everyone is slowly drifting toward everyone else. We are all going to be part of each other one day. The future is a blue sky and a full tank of gas. I saw the future, I did, and in it I was alive.

-The Future, Neil Hilborn

[hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger]

‘The Absent Father and Spider-Man’s Unfulfilled Potential’: Rebuttal Part 1: Introduction

Master Post

Back in 2012 I read a very interesting book called ‘Webslinger: Unauthorized Essays on your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man’. 

As the title suggests it was an anthology book made up of several different essays about Spidey (and edited by Gerry Conway himself).

The essays are an interesting read, though there are questionable points made and some inaccuracies. 

Today though I’d like to debunk some points made in the essay titled ‘The Absent Father and Spider-Man’s Unfulfilled Potential’.

The reason for my desire to debunk parts of this essay is partially due to my inherent instinct to debunk problematic or misinformed stuff surrounding Spider-Man generally. However it’s also partially due to the author, J.R. Fettinger.

Fettinger is the creator and author of the essays found on ‘Spideykicksbutt.com’ and a regular panellist on the Spider-Man Crawlspace podcast. I respect both and the content they provide though there have been times I’ve disagreed with both and other times where quite frankly I think they’ve put forward statements that are outright wrong.

Fettinger and his work was the inspiration to an extent for me even choosing to write so much about Spider-Man, helped bring me back into fandom and his work helped me reconcile some things that I had felt made me an uninformed minority within fandom.

However, there have been times, more and more as the years move forward, wherein my eyes have narrowed at Fettinger’s statements regarding Spider-Man.

He once said something to the effect of ‘alcoholics are just stupid people doing stupid things through no fault but their own’.

He has repeatedly attested that it is morally wrong for Spider-Man and Batman to not simply murder characters like Joker or Carnage.

He has said that Otto’s actions towards Peter in Superior Spider-Man render him the worst enemy Peter has. This is in spite of him being a huge Norman Osborn fan.

He has essentially stated criminal killers like Shriek or Vermin (who suffer from severe mental disorders) deserve no sympathy.

He has said Kraven’s Last Hunt was flawed (to put it more delicately than he did) because Peter ‘never settled his score’ with Kraven.

He has even said that whenever DeMatteis gets into the psychological aspects of the characters he ‘goes off the deep-end’.

These views are most especially chronicled in his on-going segment of the podcast ‘Spider-History’ wherein he takes a month’s worth of (usually 616 Peter Parker) Spider-Man comics from a bygone month decades ago, recaps them and analyses the stories.

However, what is so frustrating to me about these segments as time has gone by is that Fettinger is overly critical and incredibly cynical. He has put forward his opinions as fact with little analysis or consideration of an alternative point of view.

To be blunt with relatively few exceptions he surmises each month in this section as mediocre-bad unless it contained something by Marv Wolfman or Roger Stern, two of his personal favourite runs.

Even then he puts across reductive summaries of the events of the book, in particular phrasing things to make certain characters (like Spider-Man himself) come across as worse than they actually are in the stories in question.

This is particularly a problem in my view because Fettinger’s status as a long read, knowledgeable and analytical fan confers onto him a certain degree of authority in regards to his statements about Spider-Man.

And you know what? It should.

He really does know A LOT about Spider-Man and he has made some incredible assessments about stories and characters related to the wall-crawler.

I cannot recommend you check out his website Spideykicksbutt enough.

But here is the thing...I do not advocate blind trust in his word, or anyone’s for that matter. Not even my own. I know A LOT about Spider-Man but I’m far from infallible.

Think for yourselves, do your own research, present your own arguments and counterpoints.

It’s what I do and why Fettinger frustrates me. Because he’s so belligerent to changing his views, most of which are adamantly cynical and judgemental.

Some people I’ve spoken to about this attribute this to his age. Most of his writing and podcast work has been produced when he was in his 40s or 50s.

It is often said that everyone becomes more cynical, grumpier and more stuck in their ways as they age.

I disagree with that in so far as not everyone becomes like that. And 40-60 is not a point when you are ‘done’ becoming who you are going to be and beyond changing.

It is the prerogative of old men to speak their minds but the WISE men are not adverse to changing them.

This is the root of my problems with Fettinger and his cynicism. Not to mention, I find cynicism simply lazy and foolish under most circumstances. Much as I find Fettinger’s ‘kill all criminals’ mentality to crime to be lazy and foolish.

These thoughts struck me when I re-read his essay from Webslinger. I read the essay upon first discovering his work but I apparently have changed in 6 years as I find much of it ill-considered, cynical, judgemental and problem riddled.

Hence my desire now to debunk it.

The gist of the essay is Fettinger talking about how Spider-Man has lots of unfulfilled potential and attributing this to the loss of his father figure Uncle Ben. He goes on to list off different father figures Peter has had and what the end result of their roles in his life might have been. For context this was written around the time of Civil War 2006.

My first and probably biggest bone of contention lies in how Fettinger frames Peter’s ‘unfulfilled potential’.

It’s here where you start to see his overly cynical and judgemental side.

I will not quote him word for word here because it’d take too long. But early on he writes that Spider-Man’s powers come at the price of his happiness, peace of mind and the normalcy that we all take for granted.

This is partially true but still misinformed.

Peter’s mind is most definitely not peaceful most of the time and his life not normal. But there is that key phrase ‘most of the time’. Not all of the time.

Even during his career Peter has had several moments of grace. Most of the stories transpiring in the immediate aftermath of Mary Jane’s return to his life in ASM v2 #50 come to mind issue #51 even calls out that nothing bad has really happened to get in the way of Peter and MJ’s reconciliation.

This oversight is particularly egregious since that period had only been a few years before the writing of this essay.

But it’s not as egregious as the other thing Fettinger said. That being Spider-Man has cost Peter his happiness.

Er....no.

There have been many things that have made Peter unhappy in the course of his superhero career but as ASM #500 clearly confirmed for us Peter, in spite of all that, is  ultimately happy. Which was a big deal as Peter had just relived all his old battles at once.

The omission of ASM #500’s ending is telling because Fettinger actively dislikes the story and the scene with Uncle Ben particularly. He’s labelled it as ‘banal’ and essentially said if he could talk with his own deceased father the conversation would’ve gone very differently. Problem is the the story was not about him and his family but about Spider-Man and HIS family!

Fettinger then asks if when Peter dies he’d be labelled as someone who fell short of his potential. He illustrates the point by comparing 15 year old Spider-Man to adult Spider-Man circa 2006.

He claims Peter made few adjustments to his fighting skills. Not true. The older Spider-Man beyond the Silver Age did in fact adjust some of his fighting skills, noticeably in regards to ramping up his speed during combat.

He also took martial arts lessons from Captain America in FNSM v1 #1, putting the techniques he learned from that into practice in the very same issue. That issue was published just a year before Fettinger’s essay by the way.

Granted these do not seem particularly significant.

But let’s flip the script a little bit. Let us presume Fettinger to be correct, Spider-Man between 1962-2006 had never evolved his fighting style significantly.

Is that really   an example of Peter doing himself a disservice, of not fulfilling his full potential...or is it that the fighting style he had was not only adequate for the life he lived but in fact optimum?

Spider-Man after all has an incredibly effective and sophisticated fighting style. It is impossible to truly replicate by anyone exempting those of similar powersets to himself.

His immense strength allows him to plant himself on the ground and exchange simple punches, kicks, etc. with a lot of power behind them.

But with more room to manoeuvre his speed, wall crawling, web-slinging and agility allows him to augment that raw power to deliver a lot of hits in a short space of time from a near 360 degree axis. See his battle with Firelord above)for proof of this. 

His webs can be used concussively, to distract, to incapacitate and can even act as a defensive shield.

(I know the Spider-Girl image isn’t 616 but it might as well be if you know the contex behind the story) 

And then there is his ace in the hole, the Spider Sense. This ability is linked to his reflexes and intuitively enables him to know an attack is coming. It almost automatically makes him adjust his movements accordingly in conjunction with his immense reaction speed and agility.

This fighting style had been enabling him to defeat a wide variety of foes across what was then 44 years of published stories.

So was it really that Peter was slacking off in not evolving it? Or was it more that he early on developed something extremely effective that didn’t need any real reinvention?

Moreover isn’t it impressive (rather than a point of condemnation) that Spider-Man essentially figured out the best way to fight with zero instruction or training when he was just a teenager. That’s incredible so it’s far from something to chastise him for simply because he hadn’t radically altered it.

What’s worse is Fettinger claimed that Peter ‘continued’ to rely upon sheer strength, raw intelligence, dumb luck and the stupidity/lack of imagination of his foes to win the day.

Let’s put aside for the moment how Peter has whipped up gadgets or chemicals when needs be.

Let’s also ignore how his foes even upon trying new tricks have more often than not met with defeat anyway.

Let’s also entertain the idea that Peter truly does rely upon his foes stupidity and dumb luck in battle. Let’s do that even though he absolutely doesn’t, he’s very rarely just presumed he can win because a villain is dumb, but he has exploited that fact when presented with it; see 99% of Rhino fights. Hell let’s even ignore how Spider-Man uses his speed, and agility and webbing and spider sense in battle as much as his strength.

What exactly is Spider-Man supposed   to rely on besides  his sheer strength and raw intelligence?

Fettinger is calling Spidey out for relying upon his raw physical powers and his intelligence.

Like...what is an MMA or boxer supposed to rely on besides their muscle and their mind to strategize before and after a fight?

Fettinger continues to point out that exempting his Iron Spider outfit or his alien costume Peter has continued to rely on his ‘wash n’ wear red and blue pajamas’.

There are two waysto view this statement. Either Fettinger is being critical that Spider-Man has not opted to alter his costume aesthetically ever or else never opted to alter it in terms of being functional. That is to say it’s still just a piece of cheap cloth.

Both arguments are invalid criticisms.

Peter has changed his look more than once throughout the years, noticeably he wore a cloth version of his black suit, used two rubber insulated outfits to fight Electro, made an armoured costume in Web of Spider-Man #100 and used four different costumes when he adopted four new identities for himself, all of which were used for different functions.

The black costume however served no function beyond enhanced stealth and Peter retired it due to him and his wife not liking how it reminded them of Venom, a notorious publically known homicidal maniac.

The Armoured suit was only created with access to ESU’s scientific resources, was destroyed on its first mission and realistically was compromising to Spidey’s fighting skills (hence Slott’s version was redesigned). It was also impractical as it was composed of a new hardened version of Peter’s webbing meaning it was never going to last anyway.

His rubber suits were similarly impractical for continual use and severely damaged during battles with Electro. They could not be worn as casually as his standard suit, realistically would’ve impeded mobility to a certain extent and were designed for one specific foe anyway. In fact Spidey usually ran into Electro by chance or else with limited time to intervene in his crimes. Meaning he’d not have the time to locate the rubber suit anyway. Besides...he usually managed to beat Electro without it anyway. After all rubber gloves would be a fairly effective defence and his webbing was itself an insulator. That was his go to in Electro’s debut in ASM v1 #9 and brought up in New Avengers v1 #4.

True Spider-Man trashed his original rubber suit for seemingly no good reason, but since this so aggressively makes no sense I think it’d be safe to presume Peter’s rationale was that the suit itself was ineffective (it didn’t provide full insulation) and was literally held together by glue. The suit was likely unusable after the battle hence why Spidey trashed it.

The four new identities he created though are the hardest to defend. It really doesn’t make much sense for him to have retired those identities beyond the simple fact that, well...the book is called Spider-Man not Hornet/Ricochet/Dusk/Prodigy. I suppose you could go so far as to say pretending to be other people and not using his web-shooters compromised his fighting abilities as he had to consciously move and talk differently as well as use different weapons and tactics. Also maybe he heard about how well multiple alter egos went for Moon Knight. The costumes were to be fair stolen from him and used by other people meaning he’d have had to come up with entirely new identities for himself and ultimately Peter would prefer being Spider-Man having come to see it (for all it’s burdens) as part of who he is.

So contrary to Fettinger’s criticisms, Peter HAS changed his costume, but from a practical/functional point of view there really is little reason for him to permanently make any changes. Or else when he has done so extenuating factors have compromised his attempts.

Meaning all that’s left is Fettinger’s complaint that Spidey never changed the outward aesthetic. Which is not a legitimate complaint about his ‘unfulfilled’ potential. I’ve kept the same posters in my room for many, many years. It doesn’t mean I’ve failed in my potential. It just means I can’t be bothered to change them/I have grown attached to them.

Fettinger continues his train of thought by talking about how Spider-Man’s webbing and web-shooters have not significantly changed since his early days barring his adoption of organic webbing.

I will give Fettinger some leeway here. He never said the webbing/webshooters have remained totally unchanged, just that they’ve mostly remained unchanged. So stuff like Peter equipping a spider tracer trigger to his web-shooters, sedative stingers, impact webbing, an LED light to tell him when he’s low on ammo and adjusting the design and formula of the webbing over time I am lumping all under ‘mostly not changed’.

Even though objectively by 2006 the web-shooters had changed.

But again why does this demonstrate unfulfilled potential?

Spider-Man’s web-shooters are a brilliant feat of scientific engineering/chemistry and have served him well across the decades.

They didn’t need to be radically re-invented.

True, Ben Reilly found ways to improve upon them which Peter later incorporated. Does this not prove Peter was slacking off, of failing to live up to his potential?

Yes and no.

Yes because there WERE improvements he could have made.

But no because Ben had access to Seward Trainer’s scientific resources, less social responsibilities, a lot more time on his hands and was in many ways far less stressed out. As such he was better able to spend time dreaming up those improvements.

Said improvements by the way equated to wearing the web-shooters on the outside of the wrists, sedative stingers and impact webbing and he had FIVE years to dream all that up.

So you know...hardly him re-inventing the wheel.

The truth is if Peter had been in a similar position to Ben, he would’ve likely dreamed up the same improvements.

But he evidently didn’t need to since the web-shooters worked just fine. Ben himself didn’t spam the stingers or impact webbing during his career as Scarlet Spider or Spider-Man. Nor did Peter in the years after he integrated most of Ben’s adjustments into his own web-shooters.

And he did just fine most of the time.

Any further upgrading to his web-shooters, like the kind we saw in Parker Industries, would’ve required access to resources Peter simply didn’t have.

Fettinger continues that Peter’s relationship with the public he serves is tenuous at best.

Again, this is not an example of unfulfilled potential. This is the result of Spider-Man’s reputation being slandered by Jameson and the wider press getting in on the act. This was proven in ASM v2 #39 wherein Aunt May, decades after Spidey began his heroic career, attempted to find a newspaper that didn’t  have a negative bias towards her nephew and struggled to do so.

In New Avengers v1 #15 the Avengers attempt to win Jameson over due to Spider-Man’s involvement with the team only for him to turn on the team collectively.

Combine that with:

 a)     The numerous times Spider-Man has been framed for crimes he was guiltless of

Or

b)     The instances where he was deliberately painted in a negative light, such as when he assaulted a seemingly innocent Norman Osborn in Spectacular Spider-Man #250

 And it was summarily not  Spider-Man’s fault that in his 15 year history his public relations had never been great. Nor was it a negative reflection upon him that he’d been unable to improve them in that time

The public have been fed a particularly strong and buzz worthy narrative for so long that it’d be difficult for him to ever rehabilitate his public reputation without working for the authorities legitimately, being pardoned for any real/perceived crimes he’s been accused of and unmasking publically. Even then it’d be no guarantee.

Not to mention (though Fettinger could be forgiven for not taking this into account from a 2006 perspective) in the world we live in today it’s sadly apparent that news stories about how bad  things are simply sell much more than stories about something positive.

Fettinger continues to say that in spite of Spider-Man’s dalliances with team membership his stubborn independence and feelings of inadequacies ensure he remains a loner and at times a fugitive with many heroes regarding him as poorly as the villains he fights.

This for me was possibly the greatest ‘what the fuck’ moment in this essay.

Stubborn independence. Okay, maybe? Although the message of his role in the then current ‘Civil War’ storyline was that surrendering his independence was a bad thing! By unmasking, surrendering some of his independence to Iron Man and working for the government Peter found himself in an inevitable position. He was trapped from doing the most good by a corrupt system. A system that was actively demanding he help do bad things by rounding up fellow heroes and removing their civil liberties. And in the process he made his friends, family, colleagues, students and general acquaintances targets!

Fettinger didn’t know this at the time, but in truth when you follow the chain of events, joining the Avengers is what led to One More Day.

If Peter hadn’t joined the Avengers and let them know his identity, Charlie Wiederman wouldn’t have gotten approval for his experiments from Iron Man.

If he hadn’t performed his experiments he’d have never become a freak.

If he hadn’t become a freak he wouldn’t have eventually burned down the Parkers’ homes.

If they hadn’t been homeless Iron Man wouldn’t have offered them Avengers HQ to stay at.

If they hadn’t been living there Tony wouldn’t have taken Peter under his wing.

If Tony hadn’t done that, if the Parkers weren’t beholden to him for the roof over their heads and if Tony didn’t know who Peter was, there’d have never been an issue about Peter unmasking publicly in support of the Super Human Registration Act.

If Peter hadn’t unmasked publicly Kingpin wouldn’t have put a hit out on his family.

If Kingpin hadn’t put the hit out Aunt May would never have been critically injured.

If Aunt May hadn’t been critically injured there’d have been no need for a deal with Mephisto to save her life.

Joining a team led to one of Spider-Man’s darkest hours and ultimately his greatest defeat.

So you know…maybe there is something to be said for ‘stubborn independence’.

Moving on…feelings of inadequacy? That’s heavily debatable. Again, see ASM #500. Peter was an ultimately happy person. He had a firm sense of pride throughout his life as much as he’d beat himself up. His inadequacies always came in the form of ‘I could/should have done more to help’.

Typically inadequacies manifest as ‘I’m just not worth it’. Even if you disagree and argue they are more like ‘I’m not good enough’ the context is still different. Whenever someone laments ‘not being good enough’, it’s almost always coming from a selfish mindset. Peter in AF #15 was frustrated about his inadequacies before going off on a power trip. But the older Peter’s frustrations were about his inability to do more for others! Superficially they might be called the same thing, but the internal psychology behind them is very different. Fettinger is attributing the former mindset to the latter iteration of the character.

It didn’t even really apply in the early years of the character. After all his problem in ASM #1 when he tried joining the Fantastic Four was about being too cocky (understandable given his age and experience as a performer) than about feeling himself to be somehow ‘not good enough’ for the team.

But then you get to the part here Fettinger claims these inadequacies and independent streak ensure Peter will at times be viewed as a fugitive. And that’s the point where I began to question near damn everything Fettinger has ever said about the character.

That’s not about Peter.

That’s the result of Jameson and super villains. If he wasn’t so independent or felt so ‘inadequate’ then I fail to see how that’d change his situation beyond other heroes disbelieving the news and vouching for him. But his various friends in the superhero community for many years never fully believed such slander anyway, especially since some of them had been victims of similar stuff themselves.

For instance, circa 1996 (let alone 2006) I find it fundamentally unbelievable that Daredevil or the Human Torch of all people would ever honestly entertain the idea that Spider-Man simply assaulted an innocent man in Spec #250 or (beginning in Peter Parker: Spider-Man #88) that he actually murdered low rent thug Joey Z (a crime Osborn framed him for).

More mind boggling though is Fettinger’s assertion that Spider-Man was (and always had been) a loner precisely due to his independence and inadequacy. This is utterly inaccurate because by 2006 Spider-Man was (to much consternation within the fandom) a member of the Avengers!

He’d been one for 1-2 years at the time of this essay’s writing and it’d been a MASSIVE deal. With hindsight we know that to some extent Spider-Man more or less held some form of Avenger’s status up until 2019, around 15 years after he first joined.

The idea of Spidey always being a loner was also aggressively contradicted by Spectacular Spider-Man #75-100. In those issues Peter and his girlfriend the Black Cat formed a crime fighting partnership. Yes they were lovers but the point is Peter was more than capable of accepting an on-going team arrangement. True their team fell apart with the end of their romance, but that had little to do with his independence or his feelings of inadequacy. Peter broke up with Felicia because she’d lied to him and didn’t value him beyond his Spider-Man identity.

That doesn’t touch on his independence at all and more importantly is an example of Peter doing something because he had too much self-respect to continue to be with someone who didn’t value him properly. Which is the opposite  of things failing because he had issues of inadequacy.

Heck Spidey at one point tried to form his own superhero team, the Outlaws.

What’s worse is that Fettinger himself wrote a detailed essay about Spidey’s history as a team player.

I’ll leave it there for now. We’ll continue covering the introduction next time.

Master Post

[flappingbrickwings]

Code zero

Hi friends! Holy shit, right? 

Based on the current state of my neck (i.e., seized up on one side like an engine without oil), I’m pretty sure my subconscious mind is spending all the time worrying about the both the short term (i.e., people we love might die) and long-term (i.e., every we know might be completely fucked) implications of this still-pretty-fucking-new new world order, and I imagine yours is too. But I’m finding great comfort in the stories from all over the world of people pulling together to help each other, as well as those of the “penguins touring the aquarium” variety. So rather than cracking another “I may never wear a bra again” joke or telling a “wow, turns out I’m really bad at second grade math” tale, here’s a completely unrelated story that involves me humiliating myself again (bonus points on this one for also traumatizing my closest friends) in the hopes that it might take your mind off things for a minute or two. Please enjoy.

Take yourself back to a simpler time: February 2020, when my primary concerns included how to get two kids to overlapping soccer games, whether to go to Din Tai Fung or Damon’s for dinner, and if I should invest in a new pair of checkered Vans or throw caution to the wind and buy the python print ones. My three best ladies and I had planned a much-needed spa day. Much-needed because, despite all our high hopes, 2020 had already not gotten off to a fantastic start (I know, I know), and because life is hard, and because we’re all busy (correction: we were all busy) and only get together sans hanger-oners (spouses, children, dogs) once or twice a year at most. So we blocked out a whole day, a Sunday to be precise, all to ourselves. 

For weeks, months possibly (maybe even years), our iMessage thread was peppered with excited variations of “Calgon, take me away!” followed by counting down the sleeps, until at last our day arrived.

We piled into my friend Allison’s car (actually her husband’s truck because her sister was in all seriousness almost fucking killed in a car accident two days before and her miraculous survival and minimal injury was attributed to her sturdy Toyota pickup – see previous comment re: 2020) at 9am, rolling in deep athleisurewear (Rebecca was particularly impressive in head to toe Adidas, prompting her 13 year-old son to ask her not to get out of the car when she dropped him off at baseball practice that morning - rude) and cackled our way out to the spa. Upon arrival we checked in and donned our squishy bathrobes. Robyn and I also downed a mimosa. We discussed, with some disdain, how we would definitely not be using the plastic phone case necklaces provided to all patrons, presumably to enable easy selfie-taking (i.e., free marketing for the spa). We would not, we assured each other, be taking any bathing suit selfies, thank you very much. Then we hit the pools, feverish with excitement at all the hours of unbridled relaxation that lay ahead of us. 

We squeezed into the mineral tubs first, where we rubbed elbows with fellow bathers for the prescribed 20 minutes. Then we walked casually (as casually as one can walk in one’s bathing suit) to the next pool, which was shaded and infused with epsom salts, apparently. It was also quite crowded. It was also, unbeknownst to me, the hottest pool on the grounds. We found a spot near the stairs and soaked in the heat and saline for a while, still babbling excitedly, planning our route for the day. Around the time we started discussing lunch (the text-thread plan that morning was to “fuck up some nachos” when we got there), I also started looking around for something cooler than shade, feeling like I was maybe getting a wee bit hot. We agreed to move on. 

As soon as I stood up and started heading for the stairs, I felt it. That cold tingling sensation in my spine followed by a blurring on the edges of my vision. I remember looking over at the lounge chairs where we’d left our stuff, which were probably about 15 feet away but felt to me at that moment a thousand miles out of my reach, and thinking to myself, “Just get to the chair and put your head between your legs.” My brain screamed, Be cool, bitch! I even managed to say to my friends, “I feel a little bit like I might pass out.” 

And then I passed the fuck out. On the concrete. In my bikini. In front of about 5,000 people.

The worst thing about fainting is that you wake up with no idea what’s going on, wondering how you managed to have an impromptu nap in whatever random location you happen to find yourself in. You may remember my tattoo shop incident a few years ago, which was equally humiliating. That time I woke up lying on a tattoo table vaguely confused about what was happening. 

This time, I woke up to complete pandemonium. 

I was in the vicinity of the lounge chair I’d been aiming for, but not on it. Rebecca and Robyn were propping me up by my neck and elbow (I think – there may have been a leg involved) while some guy named Brian, who I suspected was a cop but who turned out to be a particularly dedicated spa employee, threw cold water in my face. My friend Allison was running around in her bathrobe screaming, “A phone! A phone! I need a phone!” at anyone who would listen, while another spa employee with a radio kept saying, “Code zero!” and several unfamiliar women in bathing suits were shouting my name and some other things I couldn’t understand in my general direction. (These kindly bathers turned out to be nurses who had jumped out of the pool when I dropped, as my husband would say, like a bag of shit. Bless them.) 

My first thought was, “Wow, how did I fall asleep in all this excitement?” followed closely by, “Wow, what is all this excitement about?” And hot on the heels of that thought came the realization that - oh, hey, it’s me. Clearly, I hadn’t made it to the lounge chair in time. I almost fainted again when I heard someone nearby announce excitedly, “The paramedics are on their way!” Fortunately, Robyn’s alter ego, Reggie, took over at that point, holding her hands up and saying, in the manner of one totally in control of the situation and not, as she actually was, freaking the fuck out, “Hold on, hold on – she has a history of fainting. She does this. Let’s just give her a minute.” 

Moments later another spa employee rolled up with a wheelchair and I really thought I would die. As Brian, Rebecca, and Robyn, my “triangle of support,” discussed how to best transfer me to said wheelchair (sidenote: Rebecca later informed me that it turns out I weigh 250 lbs when unconscious), Robyn casually leaned down and said, in a voice so low not a soul but me could hear, “Wait, before you stand up – did you shit yourself?” 

Friends, friends. My wish for you is this: I hope you have someone (or three) in your life who, should you ever pass out in a crowded public place wearing only a bikini, will have the foresight to tell your to check yourself in case you wrecked yourself before you stand up in front of a gawking crowd. If you accomplish nothing else in life, let me tell you – this is something. 

I looked up at her, a little bewildered, and said, “I have no idea.” 

Spoiler alert: I didn’t shit myself. (Who says I have bad luck?) I was successfully transferred to the wheelchair. Someone (probably Brian) gave me two cups of cold water and told me to put my hands in them, which was surprisingly effective at waking me up. We were whisked off to the “medical room,” which turned out to be a closet housing an industrial ice machine, with an examination table and one folding chair. After reluctantly answering some questions (I was still convinced Brian was a cop – don’t ask me why, maybe lack of oxygen to the brain?), a giant plate of nachos appeared as if by magic and we were escorted via several wrong turns, which meant doubling back to pass curious spa-goers for the third or fourth time, to a small private dining area that was shady and quiet. Brian pushed the wheelchair, Robyn, Rebecca, and Allison followed, and the guy carrying the nachos brought up the rear.

Did I mention, this all took place within half on hour of our arrival? So yeah, kind of put a damper on the hours of unbridled relaxation. 2020 is really not fucking around. (Also, did I mention this is not the first time I fainted at a spa? Last time it was at Burke Williams in Hollywood and I was wearing a bathrobe with nothing underneath when I keeled over in the co-ed waiting room. No triangle of support.)

So, however worried you are about the current state of affairs, just remember – one day we’ll all be back out there in the world, standing within six feet other humans and being grateful we didn’t shit our pants in public. And if we’re lucky, being escorted by a plate of nachos.  

You’re welcome. 

My triangle of support - that day, and every day.

[duncepatrick92]

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Pluto and the Creative Arts by Anthea Head

“Let love melt into memory and pain into songs.”

from O Beautiful End by Rabindranath Tagore, Indian poet and mystic. Tagore had Pluto on the Sun/Mercury midpoint in Taurus.

The arts have the power to raise the spirit of their audience, they move us, transform us, excite our passions and our feelings. They make us laugh or weep, lift us to great heights or fill us with compassion. They provide a vehicle through which we can gaze upon both the best and the worst in human nature and in some mysterious way they make us more than we are.

Pluto is the planet of transformation and of regeneration. Where there is transformation through suffering, loss or psychological breakdown, the efficacy of the therapeutic use of the arts is now recognised. Therapists and those who work in mental health increasingly use painting, music and drama as effective therapies for deep-rooted trauma which cannot be expressed in any rational or verbal way. As for regeneration, stories, colours and sounds have the power to touch something deep, reminding us of our true purpose or opening our hearts to the commonality of human experience. They have been an essential part of civilisation since the earliest of times.

Hades/Pluto was the god of the underworld. The earliest known examples of art of any kind were discovered in caves and tombs. Archaeological finds show that dance, theatre, music, literature, poetry, painting and sculpture have their origins in ritual. Evidence suggests that the arts were an intrinsic part of symbolic and spiritual life of the community; midwife to the human-cosmic relationship. From the very earliest known examples, dating back some 40,000 years or more, skilled workers have created musical instruments, effigies and images whose purposes we can only surmise as being of a transpersonal nature. The time, skills and investment needed to produce these marvellous objects and paintings suggest that they were considered essential to the well-being of the community, this at a time when simple survival itself required huge efforts of energy and courage. The artist, the creator of form, colour or sound would have been regarded with respect. He/she was something of a shaman, maintaining the psychic health of the community. Creative expression was then, and remains always, essential to civilisation.

A tiny planet (and yes, I still call it a planet), Pluto is a little smaller than our Moon, yet symbolically it is a powerful point of focus, a mediator between ourselves as human beings and the overwhelming and impersonal vastness of the Universe, the Divine Cosmos. It is dangerous ground to draw parallels between the physical attributes of the planets and astrological symbolism. Nonetheless, as Pluto inhabits the farthest edges of our solar system, ‘facing’ outwards to dark and mysterious regions, so also does its astrological parallel draw us inward to those hidden places within the soul. Just as there is no absolute scientific theory of the nature of the Universe, so also are the realms of Pluto (within the human psyche) anathema to reason or materiality. Mythologically, Pluto is god of the underworld, of elimination and regeneration. Psychologically, it signifies passion, obsession, the instinct for survival (or lack of it) and those raw, gut feelings that put us in touch with our true values.

Pluto exposes us directly to transpersonal forces which may overwhelm us personally, but which nonetheless connect us inextricably with all humanity and the human condition. It illumines the darkest side of our natures while simultaneously offering the possibility of transcending base desires and rising on the wings of the Phoenix to the highest good. Pluto represents not only the darkness of human nature but the potential for the greatest healing once the confines of self-centredness have been broken. Pluto’s nature is to transform; and transformation is a creative act: it is the creation of a new state of being out of the ashes of the past.

Creative work produced under the influence of Pluto is powerful, unforgettable and deeply moving and speaks directly to the core of ourselves.

Pluto has dominion over all creation myths in which light, order and a meaningful existence come forth from conditions of darkness and chaos. Most of our contemporary blockbuster films and the novels on bestseller lists evoke the hero's journey to the underworld and his/her subsequent redemption and gaining of wisdom. Popular culture succeeds not just because of the beautiful people it portrays (the glamour of Neptune) but also because it holds out the promise that we too might be transformed into something greater than we are.

That no matter how difficult our circumstances are, there remains the possibility of redemption.

The theme of transformation is epitomised in the Greek myth of Persephone. Her abduction to the underworld domain of Hades (Pluto) speaks of the transition from innocence to experience, symbolised by the change of name from Kore to Persephone. The story of her conditional release from Hades is said to have initiated the pattern of the seasons. As she descended for one-third of each year to the underworld, winter came to Earth, bringing cold and sadness. After her sojourn, her return to the meadowlands above ground brought spring and the coming of joy. An element of this story is concerned with the creation of the cycles of the seasons: the new growth that bursts into life with the spring and the autumnal dying back of the plants as the life force once more returns below ground. As Earth has its seasons, so do our own lives. Our own rites of passage and initiations into adulthood, maturity and wisdom are transformative times of life. Often painful and involving great depths of emotion, these are the recurring themes in drama and literature.

Writers: Greene, Salinger, Golding

The creative arts have always had a role to play at such times. Who does not remember some music or novel which accompanied a major transition in their lives and made sense in a way nothing else could? For me, J. D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye and Graham Greene’s Brighton Rock both had a profound influence when I was a teenager. Unable to externalise my feelings at the time, these authors confirmed the validity of my emotional life. Salinger, born on 1 January 1919, had the Sun in opposition to Pluto; Greene, born on 2 October 1904, had an exact square between Mercury and Pluto. These Pluto aspects signify a quality within their own lives which enabled them to touch the depths of the loneliness and confusion of adolescence. As a result, they were able to write stories which became touchstones for several generations of young people.  

The work an artist produces under Pluto’s influence cannot be cosmetic or superficial; it will touch on something essential and is an active, dynamic response to life. For them, the necessity to create is a compelling force and, at its most overwhelming, this creative energy represents the awakening of the divine fire of life, kundalini.  

These primal forces with which Pluto is associated can manifest on any level of human experience. Its lowest expression is an animalistic energy, devoid of reason, pure instinctual power. In literature this irrational and shocking impulse within human nature is powerfully portrayed in William Golding's Lord of the Flies – a story of shipwrecked children. Left to their own devices in the absence of adults and seeking to find a means of survival and order, these hitherto well-behaved schoolboys become increasingly terrified and feral, dividing into tribes and reverting to violent and cruel power struggles. Golding’s Sun in Virgo was squared by Pluto in Gemini suggesting that he was aware on some level of the potential for order being overturned by chaos and darkness. The Scorpio South Node and Jupiter in Scorpio in a t-square with Saturn and the Moon also point to an understanding of the psychology of the breakdown of relationships and the painful consequences.

In the story, the children gradually become alienated from civilised behaviour and their primitive, tribal instincts take over. The relinquishment of self-control and personal responsibility, and their abandonment to the powerfully irrational forces of barbarity, is signalled when one boy, Jack, decorates his face with red and white clay and charcoal.

He looked in astonishment, no longer at himself but at an awesome stranger. …Beside the mere, his sinewy body held up a mask that drew their eyes and appalled them. He began to dance, and his laughter became a bloodthirsty snarling.1

This face paint is strongly symbolic of primal energy. The mask gives them permission to take on new, more fearsome identities and forms a barrier between their inner childish vulnerability and the ruthless warriors they are play-acting as being. Play-acting or truth, it is a matter for analysis.

Golding (birth time unknown) himself seems to have been a gentle man, a poet and a teacher of music and English. During WWII he saw active service with the Royal Navy, involved in D-Day and in the sinking of the Bismarck. The writing of Lord of the Flies, and other novels, provided the outlet for his Virgo Sun/Gemini Pluto square. It was written as tr. Pluto was semi-square Sun, and solar arc Pluto was semi-square natal Mercury (and possibly conjunct natal Moon). This story is a disturbing evocation of what lies beneath the veneer of civility. The boys survived shipwreck and drowning, but with no moral compass or adult support, they find themselves overwhelmed by plutonic forces. The novel has made a huge impact and is a standard text on school and university courses.

Masks invoke spirits

To return, briefly, to the subject of masks, our face is what we show to the world. In the Greek myth, when Hades/Pluto roamed above ground, he wore a mask of invisibility. People with Pluto on or near the Ascendant often shy away from revealing too much of themselves. Our face reflects our feelings, our compassion; and through lines of ageing, it says something of our experience of life and our humanity. To paint the face or wear a mask, de-humanises; it sets the actions apart from the personality, suggests a transpersonal force taking over and abnegates personal responsibility. This was the theme of the film, The Mask (1994), in which the lurid green mask has a compelling life force of its own, fixing itself on the face of the unwitting hero (a shy and awkward man played by Jim Carrey) who is transformed into a mad daredevil, a foolhardy and romantic figure. (Carrey has natal Sun in Capricorn with Scorpio rising; radical Pluto is conjunct draco Sun.)

In primitive societies, the mask (which often included a covering for the body) took on the vital energy of an ancestor or bush spirit and concentrated the power upon itself. Masks were considered so powerfully magical that someone was employed to follow the masked figure to collect any pieces of fallen garment in order that these not be used by others for magical purposes. In tribal societies, only a select few dignitaries would be permitted to wear masks. Even when not in use, they were regarded with great respect and locked away and kept in secrecy. The Etruscans and Romans, who used wax masks of faces for the purpose of ancestor worship and family cults, were also known to have kept them in special shrines in their houses.

Masks not only invoke spirits through imitation but at the same time protect the wearer from the direct force of Pluto's influence; they de-personalise the energy, focusing it on the purpose desired. In many cultures, the ritual wearing of masks signifies the laying aside of reason and enables the wearer to access the universal cosmic forces of creation. Music and masked dance may accompany ceremonies at turning points of the year, propitiating the spirits for the purpose of good harvest, good health and victory over adversaries.  

Artists such as Picasso, Matisse and Modigliani (all with strong Scorpio/Pluto contacts in their charts) were inspired by the African mask. Through use of pure and vibrant lines, they produced memorable and intensely beautiful drawings and sculptures. Artists working under the influence of Pluto often use line sparingly, making pure and strong statements. Pluto pares away the inessentials, in art as well as in life. Picasso's well-known sculpture of the head of a bull (1942) was a simple but effective mask formed from one bicycle seat (the face) topped by a pair of handlebars (the horns). Pluto as god of resourcefulness and recycling!

And what of the artists themselves? To pursue a creative life often demands much personal hardship; it can be a lonely and difficult path, of continual striving for expression of the inexpressible. It is a well-known phenomenon that many creative people tend to suffer from mental health problems, notably manic depression. Considering the vital role artists and craftsmen had in early societies and the forces they were manipulating through their skills, it is no wonder that today, endowed with this creative and imaginative gift, the artist may carry something of this ancient experience within him/her and it is a heavy burden. For such people a ‘normal’ life is difficult; the road they travel can indeed be lonely and one of obsession – if there is an affliction to a sensitive point in the chart from Pluto.

However, when the Pluto/Scorpio energy is strongly marked in the lives of artists their work has frequently left a meaningful legacy which has resonated through the years to give us symbols, metaphors or images to describe the heights and abysses of experience. Their work is powerful, memorable and often iconic. Their work is fierce, painfully truthful and a cri de coeur for love and compassion.  

The psychologist Carl Jung described the artist as being filled with “the divine gift of Creative Fire” for which they must pay dearly. According to him, the desire for expression is often of such urgent need that unless he can bring his consciousness fully into the light (we are reminded of Persephone escaping from Hades) he may otherwise suffer from great distress.

Art is a kind of innate drive that seizes a human being and makes him its instrument. The artist is not a person endowed with freewill who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realise its purpose through him.  …He is a collective man – one who carries and shapes the unconscious psychic life of Mankind.2

Astrologically, one may expect such an artist to have an aspect between Pluto and the Sun, Moon or Mercury, or Pluto ruling the 3rd house. Scorpio on the cusp of the 3rd house often corresponds to a Virgo Ascendant with Gemini on the Midheaven. Virgo (the craftsman) and Gemini (the communicator) are essential tools for the writer/artist. I have been surprised by how many examples I have come across (in some cases Scorpio is intercepted in the 3rd house, depending on the house system). To name just a few: Ernest Hemingway (For Whom the Bell Tolls), Albert Camus (The Plague), Oscar Wilde (De Profundis), John Cage (4’33”), Mozart (Piano Sonata No. 8 in A Minor), Igor Stravinsky (Rite of Spring), Olivier Messiaen (Quartet for the End of Time), Amedeo Modigliani (numerous paintings and sculptures inspired by masks). The combination of Virgo rising/Gemini MC/Scorpio 3rd house does not (of itself) make one an artist but will enable those who are creative souls to work in a particular way.

The influence of Pluto in the charts of all these souls deeply affected the path of their lives yet also endowed them with the ability to tap into something within the human psyche, evident in their paintings, music or writing but also inevitably reflected by some personal suffering or vulnerability in their private lives. Nonetheless, this sensitivity, this ability to be open to the voice of the unconscious, is vital. Jung believed that all creative work arises from the depths of the unconscious, the conscious ego being “swept along on a subterranean current”.3

For writers, Pluto’s influence can be signified by deep psychological insight, clarity of vision and directness of expression. The philosopher Nietzsche (Sun in Libra in close opposition to Pluto, with Pluto on the Moon/Venus midpoint; possibly Scorpio rising) recorded his own experience of this. Speaking of his Thus Spoke Zarathustra he wrote:

If one had the slightest residue of superstition left in one, one would hardly be able to set aside the idea that one is merely the mouthpiece, merely the medium of overwhelming forces.4

Another author, George Eliot (author of The Mill on the Floss and Middlemarch) (Scorpio rising, Scorpio Sun trine Pluto/Saturn conjunction in Pisces, 5th house) wrote that she “felt her own personality to be merely the instrument through which this spirit was acting”.5

Why is it that some works of art, literature or music strike a resounding chord with us?  Jung believed that art must touch on some fundamental truth of human experience. In his book Modern Man in Search of a Soul he describes the poet as someone who assimilates the deepest feelings engendered at moments of destiny and who can, through his skill, “raise it from the commonplace to a level of poetic expression”.6

For such a person the need to allow the creative spirit to find outward expression is a necessity. Often, they cannot live by the accepted standards of society; their choices make little sense to others. That which is buried deep within the soul must come out into the light of consciousness in a creative manner. It is Neptune which elevates the imagination to visionary levels. Pluto, however, is the passion and obsession of the artist which demands a voice, and which sees clearly into the depths of the pool of the human psyche. Such artists express universal truths which have a message not only for their contemporaries but for future generations.  

An example of just such an overwhelming outpouring of feeling is expressed by Dylan Thomas in his poem Do Not Go Gentle into That Goodnight:

Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day Rage, rage against the dying of the light… 7

The poet's passion is indicated astrologically by Scorpio Sun trine Pluto/Saturn conjunction in Cancer and a Mercury/Mars conjunction in Scorpio. T.S. Eliot, author of The Waste Land, also had a close trine from Pluto (conjunction Neptune and in the 8th) to his Libran Sun.

There is no doubt that the influence of all three outer planets (Uranus, Neptune and Pluto) may raise the consciousness of an individual above and beyond the purely personal. The creative soul under the influence of Uranus will be in some way rebellious and non-conformist but also humanitarian and often intellectual (Anton Chekhov, Boris Pasternak). The influence of Neptune is transcendental, visionary and subtle (Neptune/Venus aspects are a signature for music). Where there is a raw compulsion, the direct expression of emotion pervading the work the influence of Pluto is undeniable. Pluto is not a theorist or a philosopher: he reflects the human condition, without condemnation (except notably, of hypocrisy). The darkest conditions of Man's soul can be portrayed with the greatest empathy and understanding. The penetrating insight into human nature of which Pluto is capable shocks us because we can so easily identify with the breadth of human emotions displayed.

Painters: Picasso, Matisse, Goya, Hogarth

This is evident in the early work of Pablo Picasso (Sun and Mercury in Scorpio, Mercury opposition Pluto). As a young man seeking to study art, he found himself in Paris. With little money, he frequented the poorest areas of the city. And the paintings of his now famous Blue Period were inspired by the lives of the prostitutes and down-and-outs he came to know well. These works have a poignant honesty about them and radiate a profound compassion for humanity without resorting to sentimentality. They invoke a sense of the suffering passion of Mankind and the images hover between despair and redemption.

Picasso was a skilled craftsman and his work challenges with its power and vigour. Born at the time of a Jupiter/Pluto conjunction in Taurus (the Bull) opposing his natal Mercury, Picasso's bold and daring images frequently focus on his fascination with bullfighting and with the figure of the Minotaur. The powerful sexuality of the god-like figure of the male/Minotaur was a theme to which he returned throughout his life in his brilliant, semi-pornographic drawings. One wonders what sort of man he would have been had he not had this outlet for his imagination!  

Picasso produced one of the most moving and powerful anti-war paintings of our era. The huge, monochrome Guernica (1937), created when his progressed Sun was exactly (to the minute) quincunx natal Pluto, was his immediate response to the terrible bombing by General Franco's forces of the Basque capital on a market day. It is an image depicting the horror of war and its effect on innocent victims. Chaos and fear fill the picture as mothers scream for their children and people die. A huge, raging bull towers over the image symbolising the forces of brutality and darkness while a screaming horse cries out in terror. Images seem strongly to relate to Picasso's chart; the Scorpio Sun in the 4th house of homeland, the Jupiter/Pluto conjunction in Taurus (the bull) in the 10th, Moon in Sagittarius (the horse) in the 5th quincunx a 10th-house Saturn in Taurus. Guernica was recognised as such a powerful image that, for political reasons, it was kept in America until after the death of Franco, at which time it was returned to Spain. It remains to this day a seminal work and in the UK has been chosen as one of the ubiquitous Masterpieces of the Millennium.8 A tapestry copy hangs in the United Nations building in New York. Significantly, a blue cloth covered the tapestry when Colin Powell stood in front of it to announce war with Iraq, so that the brutal images of war and suffering were hidden from view.

Henri Matisse, Picasso's friend, had a gentler aspect, a trine, between Pluto on the Midheaven and a Capricorn Sun in the 5th house. Matisse’s cool Capricorn Sun was less vehement than Picasso’s Scorpio, but he was just as focused and dedicated to a clarity of expression. Born twelve years apart, they both had Jupiter/Pluto conjunctions in Taurus. For Matisse this conjunction manifests through the exuberance of his colours, the sheer abundant sensuality of his patterns and his religious faith. He created vibrant images from simple lines and clear colours. Picasso fought the image of God (Jupiter), Matisse praised it. Restricted by illness towards the end of his life, Matisse worked in reduced circumstances simply with coloured paper (the resourcefulness of Pluto), creating his famous, huge, beautiful collages. His drawings became sparse, pure and deeply expressive. Pluto desires to get to the root of the matter – whether it be the root of emotion or the pure essence of light and colour.

The work of an earlier Spanish artist, Francisco de Goya, born on 30 March 1746 (time unknown), is also notable for the power of its imagery. His Sun/Mercury conjunction in Aries is sesquiquadrate Pluto in Scorpio, giving a potent Mars/Pluto mix with Saturn in Libra opposing Sun/Mercury, and semi-square Pluto. As we saw with Picasso, Pluto afflictions in the charts of creative people can be expressed in deeply disturbing works. Goya was no exception. His work is full of plutonic imagery. The masked carnival dancers in his Los Caprichosetchings are both demonic and satirical, and his portraits of the Spanish royal family are filled with deep psychological insight (which apparently his sponsors failed to see because the paintings were heralded as masterpieces of royal portraiture but are devastatingly incisive in their portrayal).

As with Picasso, Goya was compelled to reflect the human condition as he perceived it, notably through his series of etchings Disasters of War which present a profound anti-war sentiment and are deeply discomforting to look at. Another well-known image, the etching entitled Reason Asleep, shows a sleeping man slumped at a table while around his head fly bats and other frightful creatures of the dark: it is a striking evocation of the dark side of Pluto. As progressed Sun came to exact quincunx natal Pluto, Goya painted Saturn Devouring his Son. A shocking image executed when Goya was aged 73 and made to hang on the wall in his home. Like many artists working under this influence, he was skilled in etching, creating powerful black and white images through the manipulation of light and dark.

Goya and Picasso are just two examples of painters whose work graphically depicts the powerful influence of Pluto. Matisse and Amedeo Modigliani, with beneficent Pluto aspects, were also masters of line and expression, able to catch the dynamics of form using the minimum of strokes but their work is less tormented, more transcendent. Piet Mondrian, who reduced the Manhattan road plan to a series of beautifully abstracted and colourful grids, was born with very close aspects between the luminaries and Pluto (sextile Sun in Pisces, square Moon in Aquarius).

Examples of other painters who employed their skills to make social criticism include the French artist Honoré Daumier, born with a New Moon conjunct Pluto in Pisces in the 8th house, whose work exhibits the clear, transparent morality of a great satirist. The English painter, William Hogarth, born 10 November 1697 (time unknown), with Sun in Scorpio and a Mercury/Jupiter conjunction in Scorpio square to Pluto, is also notable for his humorous but biting depictions of English society. Of his etchings, A Rake's Progress and Marriage A-la-Mode are his most renowned. Pluto no doubt would also figure prominently in the charts of contemporary political satirists and cartoonists.

Having studied the charts of many writers, composers and artists and using an orb of 2 degrees to Sun, Moon or Mercury, there seems to be a remarkable predominance of close Pluto aspects in the charts of writers and these far exceed those in the other two categories.

Pluto’s insight: Thackeray, Zola, Hugo, Miller

Why is this? Pluto (and planets in Scorpio) seeks to expose what lies behind things, to get to the root of things. It can be wonderfully helpful for research, seeking hidden motives or undiscovered facts. Researchers with a strong Pluto will go back to source material, to original documents and not be content with second-hand opinion. Most importantly for dramatists and novelists, there is the ability to create suspense and stir emotion. Of course, Pluto’s influence bestows the ability to draw compelling psychological portraits of people.

It is not unusual to hear a novelist speak of their characters as though they were real people.  However, for some, this seems to be a phenomenon akin to mediumship; the characters they create seem to take on their own life force. The English writer William Thackeray (born in 1811), with Mercury in Cancer in an exact trine to Pluto, wrote: “I have been surprised at the observations made by some of my characters. It seems as if an occult power was moving the pen. The personage does or says something, and I ask, how the dickens did he come to think of that?”.9 Thackeray was, of course, the creator of that wonderfully scorpionic anti-heroine, Becky Sharpe in Vanity Fair.  

The 19th century French writer Emile Zola was publicly criticised for the immorality of his novels.  In his defence he claimed that he could not be held responsible for the morality of his characters!

Zola’s novels explore the underworld of human life and emotion. Born on a New Moon in Aries, with a tight stellium of five planets (Sun, Moon, Pluto, Mars and Mercury all within eight degrees) in Aries in the 4th house, he was passionate about his subject and both obsessive and fastidious in his research. His huge series of twenty novels about life under the Second Empire in France deals with the darkest and most fateful aspects of human nature. His thesis, that Man is a victim of his heredity, is explored through the lives of several generations of the same family. His stories deal with fate, power, sexuality and the will to survive. The thirteenth novel,Germinal, begun on his 44th birthday with the precessed solar return Ascendant conjunct the natal Mars/Pluto conjunction, and tr. Pluto semi-square his Sun: it is the story of a mining village in Flanders. The action takes place underground – truly in the realm of Hades. The final showdown, full of Pluto symbolism, takes place in the bowels of the earth in a black-dark mine which is rapidly being swamped with flood water. This is where the hero faces his dark rival.  

Germinal is a powerful novel revealing the terrible conditions men and women lived under. Since childhood, Zola had had a terror of being underground and was plagued by recurring dreams of being buried alive. Nonetheless, in the course of his research, he went to the mines in Flanders and wrote that he felt he had crossed the “Stygian divide to live briefly among the damned”.10 The tiny glimmer of light at the end of the novel, the sign of redemption, has to be searched for but it is there in the form of a handshake. A barely visible sign of the hero's progress.

Another 19th century French writer, Victor Hugo, had Scorpio rising in his chart with a stellium (Venus/Pluto/Sun within four degrees) in Pisces in the 4th house. Hugo, of course, was the author of Les Miserables, a vast novel subsequently made into a film and, surprisingly, a hit musical nicknamed ‘Les Mis’. In his foreword to the book, Hugo wrote a passionate condemnation of the social policies of his day which allows “the child to atrophy in darkness” and “create a human hell within civilisation and complicates with human fatality a destiny that is divine”11. In his horoscope, Uranus (disposited by Venus) is exactly quincunx Pluto and both planets closely aspect the Ascendant. Hugo was politically active and humanitarian; and his skills as a writer and storyteller (Mercury in Pisces in the 5th) brought the suffering of the poor to the attention of the world and continues to do so. Like Zola, he was exiled for political reasons for a while.

American playwright Arthur Miller, born with Pluto in Cancer trine a Mercury/Venus conjunction in Scorpio, is also remembered for his empathetic portrayal of human beings who come face-to- face with the forces of destiny. His plays are a vehicle for a profound reflection on the nature of the individual pitched against transpersonal forces. They rail against powerlessness and promote the dignity of the human spirit. Miller wrote Death of a Salesman and The Crucible and his work continues to stir up strong emotion, inspiring us through his sense of justice and compassion.  

Other writers whose charts show a significant plutonic influence include Maya Angelou, Lewis Carroll, Arthur Conan Doyle, Herman Hesse, Henry James, D.H. Lawrence, Lewis Sinclair, Jules Verne, W. B. Yeats and others. Obviously, this is only the very briefest of surveys and there is much more interesting research to be done for a thorough insight into Pluto’s workings. Nonetheless, the works of all these writers encompass an aspect of the Pluto energy, some through mystery and myth, others through wonderful character portraits. The significance of such books, written with the profound understanding of life which Pluto unveils for us, is that they have the power to change our perception of life.

Pluto’s influence never ceases to put us at the core of human existence. It rips away the veneer of status, etiquette, material comfort to expose the underlying motives and presents us with what is left. It is only then that there can be a realisation of what is truly essential to life – love.  

Pluto, comedy and taboo: Monty Python

Fortunately, amidst the shambles of life and the horrors that could render it unbearable, we have the capacity for humour. As the comedian Eric Idle has astutely commented, humour offers a healthy response to ghastly problems: “If comedy is to function in some way as a safety release then it must obviously deal with these taboo areas. This is part of the responsibility we accord to our licensed jesters”.12 Here is Pluto manifesting through black humour.

Eric Idle (Pluto rising in Leo trine an Aries Sun on the Midheaven) was one of the ‘Pythons’, the group of five writers/performers who devised the extraordinary Monty Python’s Flying Circus. It was a British ground-breaking TV series described by Eve Jackson in Transit in November 1983 as a “wonderful vehicle for a Pluto looking for expression, revelling as it does in such taboo areas as sex, violence, death and the generally disgusting”.13 It is no surprise that Pluto is emphasised in all the Pythons’ charts.

The most renowned Python was John Cleese, with his Scorpio Sun and Mercury in the 3rd house. The Sun is exactly square Pluto while Mercury squares Mars. Cleese has confessed to a personal problem with suppressed rage. The roles he has written for himself, notably Basil Fawlty in the British television series Fawlty Towers, have given him a means of exorcising his anger in the healthiest of ways. He not only provides himself with some sort of emotional release but also gives his audience the chance to laugh at the ludicrous and embarrassing situations which arise through his repressed fury. For Cleese, the influence of Pluto is also apparent in his desire for self- understanding. He has a deep interest in psychotherapy and has undergone therapy for many years. He co-wrote (with his therapist Robyn Skinner) Families and How to Survive Them.14

As for music, examples of composers with significant Pluto aspects are less common than writers or painters. Puccini had Pluto in the 7th house, which is interesting when one considers the heroines of his operas: Tosca, Madame Butterfly, Turandot. Olivier Messiaen, who wrote the Quartet for the End of Time while incarcerated in a German POW camp, had Sun opposed to Pluto and a Venus/Mars conjunction in Scorpio in the 3rd. Mick Jagger has a stellium in Leo conjunct IC which includes Sun, Jupiter, Pluto and Mercury – which makes sense both in his private and professional lives! John Cage, the American composer who wrote a piece of music entitled Silence 4’33”,had a conjunction between the Moon and Pluto in Gemini square a Venus/Mars conjunction.

Mozart and Schubert…

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, perhaps the most famous composer of all, had a very close Moon/Pluto conjunction in Sagittarius in the 4th house. This had tremendous significance during his early years as a child prodigy when, under the direction of his father, he was escorted throughout Europe to perform in front of kings and courtiers. He forfeited his childhood to music. He had a great sense of humour (which bordered on the obscene: possibly he had Tourette’s syndrome, although this is unconfirmed). He also admitted to having a preoccupation with death. His friend, Da Ponte, wrote that: “Mozart's real existence remained hidden like a precious stone buried in the bowels of the earth”.15 Mozart was a member of the Masons, and while much of his work was written on commission as entertainment, his operas Don Giovanni and The Magic Flute have definite occult subtexts.

In his early twenties Mozart visited Paris, escorted by his mother, to make money. Life was hard. Because of their poverty, his mother died (Moon/Pluto in 4th). The A Minor Piano Sonata was written in 1778 and a deep sorrow invades the work. There is a profundity about it which is not present in other pieces and it has an underlying pattern which one reviewer equated with the recurring rhythms of the cycle of birth and death.

Interestingly, as Pluto transited Mozart's natal Sun in Aquarius, he married and changed his first name to Adam. Adam, the first born in the Bible, of course had no biological father; he was created directly by God. Mozart sought to liberate himself from his past, to be “reborn” – a wonderful signature for a Pluto transit of the Sun.

The Austrian composer Franz Schubert, well known for his song cycles inspired by the poems of Goethe, was born with Mercury/Pluto conjunct in Aquarius in the 9th house close to the Midheaven. The conjunction is within orb of the Sun/Moon midpoint. He was a lonely, rather melancholic man who detested the superficiality of Viennese society yet depended on commissions to earn his living. With a complex personality he could at times be a simple, honest and straightforward man while at others he seemed to be plunged into darkness, driven to excess by mood swings. He could not write during the summer months, but each autumn felt compelled to return to composing, perhaps prompted by the Sun in Scorpio (transiting his 5th and 6th houses) at this time of year. There are two pieces, a piano sonata entitled The Wanderer Fantasy and the song cycle The Winter Journey which stand out as evocations of the Mercury/Pluto conjunction in the 9th house.

I first heard The Wonderer Fantasy about forty years ago. I was only just married, and we unexpectedly found ourselves in London in rather dire circumstances, sleeping on a friend’s floor and jobless. The friend had a piano. My husband, a pianist with strong Pluto aspects by transit and progression to his natal chart at the time, taught himself the first movement of this work and its thunderous notes became an intrinsic part of our lives during those months. It was composed by Schubert as progressed Mars was sextile natal Pluto, and tr. Pluto was semi-sextile its natal position; and it stands as a musical outpouring of the disturbed moods and aggressiveness which he was prey to. It is a virtuoso piece, wildly energetic and full of turbulent rhythms, devastatingly difficult to perform. The psychologist Anthony Storr has described as “manic defence” a tendency to respond to depression with a fierce and ambitious outpouring of energy.16 Schubert could never master the piece himself and furiously abandoned his only public performance with the words, “Let the devil play the stuff”.17 The Wanderer Fantasy, with its explosive passion, is a very clear example of the necessity of the creative process in the soul struggling against a dire inner distress.    

Five years later, in 1827, with progressed Sun quincunx natal Mercury/Pluto, Schubert wrote his song cycle entitled Winterreise (Winter Journey) as a means of expressing his own sense of isolation. Its lyrics are the poems of Wilhelm Müller which are rooted in despair: the traveller journeys through a frozen wilderness, shunning other people and taking hidden paths. His journey leads him to a graveyard. He seeks refuge in an inn but is turned away and later has a vision of three suns in the sky. He hears a hurdy-gurdy man playing in a village but “no one wants to hear him, no one looks at him and the dogs snarl about the old man”.18 It is enormously sad. Schubert's final illness dates from this time. He died in November 1828 suffering from both typhoid fever and syphilis.

Oscar Wilde and De Profundis

To conclude, there is one document in literature which cannot go unmentioned in any study of Pluto and the arts. It stands as an astounding testament to the power and significance of a Pluto transit and in my opinion should be on the reading list of all advanced students of astrology. This is De Profundis by Oscar Wilde, written in response to his imprisonment for homosexual practices.

Wilde is best known as an author and playwright. His witty and astutely observed plays, such as The Importance of Being Ernest and An Ideal Husband, are incisive commentaries on Victorian society. He is said to be the most quoted playwright after Shakespeare. With his Virgo rising and Sun in Libra, he had Mercury in Scorpio in the 3rd house. Pluto in Taurus in the 8th is on the Sun/Mercury midpoint.

Wilde was a refined and cultured man, an aesthete who took pleasure in beauty and sensuality and who mixed in the most fashionable society of his day. Bisexual, he flaunted his affair with Lord Alfred Douglas at a time when homosexuality was a criminal offence. In 1895 he was put on trial and, with tr. Pluto within one degree of his Midheaven on 25 May, he was sentenced to two years’ hard labour: this meant the treadmill, literally powered by men. They trod endlessly, their bare feet turning the massive wheel. It is hard to imagine how someone with Wilde’s background could physically survive the rigours of prison life.

De Profundis was written in prison and is a deep reflection on his life. He had lost everything: his reputation, his wife and sons, his home, all his worldly goods and most of his friends. He was effectively plunged into an abyss of despair. The theme concerns sorrow and loss and reveals the values that he discovered to be at the core of existence. “Suffering”, he wrote “is one very long moment...the very Sun and Moon seem taken from us”. He talks of his shame and guilt: “I had disgraced my (family) name eternally. I had made it a low byword among low people. I had dragged it through the very mire”.  He speaks of a realisation: “Where there is sorrow there is holy ground. Someday people will realise what that means. They will know nothing of life till they do”.19 As he comes to understand the true meaning of forgiveness, he discovers what he calls a “Vita Nuova” (a new life) which would have been impossible before his imprisonment. In this essay he explores the meaning and the gifts of suffering. It is an extraordinary chronicle of the redemptive qualities of Pluto.

Pluto afflictions in a chart can signify distress arising from profound trauma which results in a silent conspiracy engendering guilt, loss of power or fear of victimisation. The arts stand alone in providing a non-intellectual medium through which one can access these otherwise inexpressible emotions. The growing acceptance of art, music and drama therapy as wonderfully effective tools for healing deep-rooted problems are examples of the way in which the creative arts can be used to unblock deeply rooted problems. When Pluto is activated by transit or progression, such feelings long buried in the unconscious may come out into the light. It is at such times that the healing power of the arts can provide a vital channel for the expression of these irrational and overwhelming forces. Many healers also work with the vibrations of colour and sound to rebalance the energies within their patients, disciplines that we are only just beginning to really understand.

This essay is intended, partly, to demonstrate the significance of the arts in our lives, as an essential component of a psychically healthy society. My intention has also been to show that the works artists create under the influence of Pluto may not only reflect the imbalances, injustices or brutality that exist in the world but shine a light on the possibilities within humanity to demonstrate love and compassion, and thus play a healing role in our lives. They can act as abiding reference points, for example, politically (Guernica), socially (Les Miserables), emotionally (Madame Butterfly). For me, those works produced under Pluto are immediately recognisable.  They are also eternal images and ones that can be related to decades, or centuries, after their creation.

From our viewpoint in the 21st century, art is very far removed from its original magical purpose.  With the secularisation of life, few meaningful rituals remain to honour the crises experienced when we are touched by the transformative powers of Pluto. Once a midwife to the great initiations of life, the artist today should still have a central role in the community.

Notes and References: Author’s note: This essay considers the role of Pluto in the charts of artists, writers and composers. Pluto aspects alone do not signify that a person will be an artist. This text is based on a talk given at the White Eagle School of Astrology Annual Conference November 1999. All data has been taken from Astro-Databank or Solar Fire.  Where birth time is unknown, birth dates have been gleaned from the internet. 1.  William Golding, Lord of the Flies, London & Boston: Faber & Faber, 1958, p. 69. 2.  C.G. Jung, Modern Man in Search of a Soul, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976, p. 195. 3.  Ibid, p. 197. 4.  Anthony Storr, Solitude, London: HarperCollins 1997, p. 199 quoting Friedrich Nietzsche’s Ecce Homo, translated by R. J. Hollingdate (Harmondsworth, 1979), p. 48. 5. Anthony Storr, Solitude, London: HarperCollins 1997, p. 198, quoting George Eliot’s Life as Related in her Letters and Journals, Edinburgh & London, 1885, pp. 421-5.   6.  C.G. Jung, Modern Man in Search of a Soul, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976, p.179. 7.  W. Davies & R. Maud (ed), Dylan Thomas, Collected Poems 1934-1953, London: J.M. Dent & Son Ltd., 1988. 8.  A. S. Huffington, Picasso: Creator & Destroyer, London, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1988. 9.  Anthony Storr, Solitude, London: HarperCollins 1997, p. 198 quoting W. M. Thackeray in Some Roundabout Papers. See also The Works of William Makepeace Thackeray with Biographical Introductions by his daughter, Anne Ritchie; (London 1903), XII, pp 374-5. 10.  F. Brown, Zola: A Life, London: Macmillan 1996, p. 119. 11.  Victor Hugo, Les Miserables, London: Penguin Books 1982, p. 17. 12.  Eve Jackson ‘Monty Python, Pluto and the Fool’, Transit,issue No 43, November 1983. Astrological Association. p. 13. 13.  Ibid. 14.  R. Skynner & J. Cleese, Families and How to Survive Them, London: Mandarin 1993. 15.  M. Solomon, Mozart: A Life, London: Hutchinson 1995, p. 93. 16.  E.N. McKay, Franz Schubert, A Biography, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996, p.148, quoting Anthony Storr’s The Dynamics of Creation, London 1976 p. 112. 17.  E.N. McKay, Franz Schubert, A Biography, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996, p.148, quoting O E Deutsch, Schubert: Memoirs by his Friends, trans. R Ley and J. Nowell, London 1958. 18.  S. S. Prawer (editor and translator), The Penguin Book of Lieder, London: Penguin 1964, p. 61. 19.  Dr T. Gaynor (ed.), The Works of Oscar Wilde, London: Senate 1997, pp. 748-798.

Published by: The Astrological Journal, Jul/Aug 2019

Author: Anthea Head, Dipl. WESA, has been involved with astrology since the 1980s, gaining her diploma from the White Eagle School. As one of their astrologers, she went on to teach their advanced course and became a long-standing member of the School Council. Her main interest is in the profound energies symbolised by astrology and what they may mean within an individual’s life. She lives with her family in north Oxfordshire where she teaches and consults. She may be contacted at: antheahead@phonecoop.coop.

© Anthea Head 1999/2019

[rooflinetips-blog]

Understanding Roofline Replacement

Your roof is one of the most important structural parts of your property. Assuming that it’s nicely preserved and very well appeared just after, it can safeguard your property from rain, snow, wind and the worst in the British weather conditions. However, as roofs are exposed to The weather daily, they are able to deteriorate over time. If it’s not fixed rapidly and also to a higher normal when destruction is finished, your roof could leak and not guard your property as well as it must. 

The easiest method to maintain your dwelling along with your roof in excellent condition is usually to maintenance any damage, faults or routine maintenance issues as promptly as possible. Staying on top of your private home upkeep may help your assets to remain searching good and operating effortlessly for longer. 

Loads of time, the main part of a roof that commences to degrade could be the roofline. This is the aspect that runs round the edge of the framework and guards the walls of your house in the worst in the weather. The main reason this A part of the roof often has upkeep troubles is the fact it’s subjected to the worst of your temperature. All of the rain that falls onto your roof are going to be funnelled down in direction of the roofline which is frequently also where frost sorts and debris accumulates. 

In addition, the roofline is in which all the different aspects of the roof come with each other. The guttering is almost always Found within the roofline and this is also wherever the fascia boards and cladding meet the tiles, slates or other roofing supplies that make up the bulk with the area. 

The joins and seams which are fashioned by the Assembly of those products can normally be weak points inside the roof’s area. After some time, drinking water can perform its way in by means of these joints, damaging the framework and most likely creating major troubles. 

In case you don’t exchange your roofline when it begins to degrade, it might result in a lot more severe structural difficulties Later on. If water finds its way to your roof beams or into your partitions, it might cause the structure of your residence to start to rot. As time passes, This may significantly destruction your property and bring about the house requiring pricey repairs. 



Changing a roofline as quickly damage starts to show should help to prevent these problems and allow you to keep your home in excellent issue. The faster you act, the greater economical your roofline substitute will probably be. 

Sometimes, homeowners choose to interchange their roofline for aesthetic instead of structural motives. Replacing an ageing roofline with a contemporary new style can assist to give a property a refreshing new glimpse, Increase its suppress enchantment and enable to modernise the constructing’s exterior. Should you’re hunting for an affordable but helpful way to alter the appear of your private home, replacing your roofline might be just the solution you’re seeking. 



The expense of roofline replacement will rely upon numerous variables. The much larger your roof is, the greater gentleman hrs and resources are going to be required to switch the roofline and get The work finished. The scaled-down your roof is, the faster and more affordable It will likely be for you to swap the roofline and obtain the framework looking as good as new.

You’ll also require to consider the use of your assets. Sometimes, firms changing a roofline will require to use scaffolding to entry the eaves of your respective setting up. If many scaffolding is necessary, or if you will find other challenges with obtain, it would push up the price of your roofline alternative. 

A further component that may have an effect on the cost of roofline replacement would be the ailment of one's existing roofline. If it’s presently in bad problem, the corporate you employ to finish The task might need to perform some fix work right before they can begin over the substitute. 

The easiest method to Discover how A lot your roof repair will Price is to speak to a business that specialises in this type of perform. They’ll be capable to look at the sizing of your roof, the problem of the existing roofline as well as usage of your home and place alongside one another a detailed estimate on your position. 

Occasionally, homeowners having their rooflines changed plan to use the opportunity to increase their roofline. There are a selection of main reasons why you may want your roofline extended. For just a get started, a good deal of individuals choose the seem it gives their assets. 

Extending your roofline will help to produce your private home glance a lot more modern and turn its exterior right into a actual attribute. 

Next, extending your roofline might help to more protect your assets. An extended roofline can protect against rainwater from hitting the walls of your property and assist to keep your Home windows dry all Winter season. Find out how to increase a roofline by receiving in contact with a neighborhood contractor. 

Previous but not minimum, the materials you employ will have an impact on the price of roofline substitution. Pick low-priced, lightweight products and your job is going to be pretty reasonably priced. Nonetheless, your new roofline may well start to deteriorate following a several years. If you employ substantial-quality, strong resources, your quotation is probably going to become slightly larger. 

[svonava]

Manage for impact, not performance

A peer-driven performance feedback is the key mechanism to how talent is managed at some of the largest tech companies today. The interpretation of this feedback by a calibrated committee drives compensation, career progression and improvement interventions. The effort that goes into planning and executing the work such that it resonates with the committee is substantial. At best, this pushes the naturally disorganized people towards structure, at worst it is just a marketing exercise that costs companies weeks across all talent every year. Either way, companies place a huge bet on this system driving their workforce towards improvement, and ultimately, impact.

What’s wrong with this?

If you read a book about competitive differentiation (e.g. Different), you find that a set of products within one category gets more homogeneous over time. Basically, they all copy each other's unique selling points and address their weaknesses until the difference is superficial. This is facilitated by a set of metrics all products within the category get judged by - over time all metrics of all participants converge to the mean.

When we manage performance along a set of defined criteria, we get the same effect - a homogenous workforce, where innovation and playing to one's strength just doesn’t happen. Now - this is exactly what we need if we are trying to squeeze out percentage points of efficiency. But when you listen to the CEOs of even the largest tech companies today - they talk about crazy new opportunities on one hand and existential fear on the other. In an environment like that, we shouldn’t be trying to optimize for the lowest common denominator of our collective weaknesses - but rather equip our employees to play to their strengths and take bold bets.

But how do we do that?

At Google, I kept hearing the same story over and over again - a senior engineer, pushing for promotion, but too heavy on leadership with not enough code output. A Front-end engineer driving a ton of value in their product, but not solving ‘complex enough’ problems. Here is a story of a Googler who contributed to multiple projects, drove a ton of impact - but had trouble because his work didn’t conform to the rubric. The current performance review model forces all of these people to switch their focus away from where they have impact towards where they have a weakness.

Why is the system set up this way?

I think that we are afraid to measure impact. We also want to reward good process, not just good outcomes. But at the end of the day, if a person can create value in the internal ‘marketplace’ of a company - that’s a key signal. We are afraid that maybe all engineers just want to go around and lead - so we push them to also produce code. The thing is, if, for example, there is enough opportunity for engineers to write simple frontends and deliver a ton of value - then this is the right thing for them to do, instead of chasing ‘enough complexity’ for a promotion.

The fix: Impact management.

Sure, let’s run a basic performance review, so people can keep track of their blind spots. But we should spend more effort on an impact review with a less rigid structure, with a constant and opportunistic data collection, instead of a regular cycle. Did you fix a legacy pipeline with no direct monetary implication - but now a ton of dependent engineers have 1 thing less to worry about? Get a few testimonials where they try to quantify how much you help them. Did you spend a month on gruntwork, documenting an obscure sub-system and now a few teams hit their OKRs because they could build their integrations much faster? They should give you credit.

Then, when you accumulate enough impact, you get promoted. If even after a year your impact isn’t there, you should get coached to lean more into your strengths and identify opportunities. Your manager might also need help in enabling you. The current half-yearly cycle is absurd when some folks need just a few months to accumulate 2 promotions worth of impact.

In many companies, there are fragments of this already in place:

Internal recognition systems (‘kudos’ at Google).

The currency of impact is quantified and attributed with OKRs.

The unstructured part of the performance review where people write a long prose months after they worked with you which is nice, but not like a testimonial extracted at the value delivery time.

With most of the building blocks in place and the huge energy already going into performance reviews, implementing something like the above is feasible.

What do you think? Join the conversation on twitter!

[babcockdylan95]

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