#violent dog attacks by cops

[ausetkmt]

Police dog attack leads to $325K settlement

[androcola]

i fucking hate anti pitbull people I hope they all kill themselves and die forever and go to hell all the time

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How the NYPD defeated bodycams

Anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. When American patience for racial profiling in traffic stops reached a breaking point, cops rolled out dashcams. Dashcam footage went AWOL, or just recorded lots of racist, pretextual stops. Racial profiling continued.

Tasers and pepper spray were supposed to curb the undue use of force by giving cops an alternative to shooting dangerous-seeming people. Instead, we got cops who tasered and sprayed unarmed people and then shot them to pieces.

Next came bodycams: by indelibly recording cops' interactions with the public, body-worn cameras were pitched as a way to bring accountability to American law-enforcement. Finally, police leadership would be able to sort officers' claims from eyewitness accounts and figure out who was lying. Bad cops could be disciplined. Repeat offenders could be fired.

Police boosters insist that police violence and corruption are the result of "a few bad apples." As the saying goes, "a few bad apples spoil the bushel." If you think there are just a few bad cops on the force, then you should want to get rid of them before they wreck the whole institution. Bodycams could empirically identify the bad apples, right?

Well, hypothetically. But what if police leadership don't want to get rid of the bad apples? What if the reason that dashcams, tasers, and pepper spray failed is that police leadership are fine with them? If that were the case, then bodycams would turn into just another expensive prop for an off-Broadway accountability theater.

What if?

In "How Police Have Undermined the Promise of Body Cameras," Propublica's Eric Umansky and Umar Farooq deliver a characteristically thorough, deep, and fascinating account of the failure of NYPD bodycams to create the accountability that New York's political and police leadership promised:

https://www.propublica.org/article/how-police-undermined-promise-body-cameras

Topline: NYPD's bodycam rollout was sabotaged by police leadership and top NYC politicians. Rather than turning over bodycam footage to oversight boards following violent incidents, the NYPD suppresses it. When overseers are allowed to see the footage, they get fragmentary access. When those fragments reveal misconduct, they are forbidden to speak of it. When the revealed misconduct is separate from the main incident, it can't be used to discipline officers. When footage is made available to the public, it is selectively edited to omit evidence of misconduct.

NYPD policy contains loopholes that allow them to withhold footage. Where those loopholes don't apply, the NYPD routinely suppresses footage anyway, violating its own policies. When the NYPD violates its policies, it faces no consequences. When overseers complain, they are fired.

Bodycams could be a source of accountability for cops, but for that to be true, control over bodycams would have to vest with institutions that want to improve policing. If control over bodycams is given to institutions that want to shield cops from accountability, that's exactly what will happen. There is nothing about bodycams that makes them more resistant to capture than dashcams, tasers or pepper spray.

This is a problem across multiple police departments. Minneapolis, for example, has policies from before and after the George Floyd uprisings that require bodycam disclosure, and those policies are routinely flouted. Derek Chauvin, George Floyd's murderer, was a repeat offender and had been caught on bodycam kneeling on other Black peoples' necks. Chauvin once clubbed a 14 year old child into unconsciousness and then knelt on his neck for 15 minutes as his mother begged for her child's life. Chauvin faced no discipline for this and the footage was suppressed.

In Montgomery, Alabama, it took five years of hard wrangling to get access to bodycam footage after an officer sicced his attack dog on an unarmed Black man without warning. The dog severed the man's femoral artery and he died. Montgomery PD suppressed the footage, citing the risk of officers facing "embarrassment."

In Memphis, the notoriously racist police department was able to suppress bodycam disclosures until the murder of Tyre Nichols. The behavior of the officers who beat Nichols to death are a testament to their belief in their own impunity. Some officers illegally switched off their cameras; others participated in the beating in full view of the cameras, fearing no consequences.

In South Carolina, the police murder of Walter Scott was captured on a bystander's phone camera. That footage made it clear that Scott's uniformed killers lied, prompting then-governor Nikki Haley to sign a law giving the public access to bodycam footage. But the law contained a glaring loophole: it made bodycam footage "not a public record subject to disclosure." Nothing changed.

Bodycam footage does often reveal that killer cops lie about their actions. When a Cincinnati cop killed a Black man during a 2015 traffic-stop, his bodycam footage revealed that the officer lied about his victim "lunging at him" before he shot. Last summer, a Philadelphia cop was caught lying about the circumstances that led to him murdering a member of the public. Again, the officer claimed the man had "lunged at him." The cop's camera showed the man sitting peacefully in his own car.

Police departments across the country struggle with violent, lying officers, but few can rival the NYPD for corruption, violence, scale and impunity. The NYPD has its own "goon squad," the Strategic Response Group, whose leaked manual reveals how the secret unit spends about $100m/year training and deploying ultraviolent, illegal tactics:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/07/cruelty-by-design/#blam-blam-blam

The NYPD's disciplinary records – published despite a panicked scramble to suppress them – reveal the NYPD's infestation with criminal cops who repeatedly break the law in meting out violence against the public:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/07/27/ip/#nypd-who

These cops are the proverbial bad apples, and they do indeed spoil the barrel. A 2019 empirical analysis of police disciplinary records show that corruption is contagious: when crooked cops are paired with partners who have clean disciplinary records, those partners become crooked, too, and the effect lasts even after the partnership ends:

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2378023119879798

Despite the risk of harboring criminals in police ranks, the NYPD goes to extreme lengths to keep its worst officers on the street. New York City's police "union"'s deal with the city requires NYC to divert millions to a (once) secret slushfund used to pay high-priced lawyers to defend cops whose conduct is so egregious that the city's own attorneys refuse to defend them:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/26/overfitness-factor/#heads-you-lose-tails-they-win

This is a good place for your periodic reminder that police unions are not unions:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/07/28/afterland/#selective-solidarity

Indeed, despite rhetoric to the contrary, policing is a relatively safe occupation, with death rates well below the risks to roofers, loggers, or pizza delivery drivers:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/01/27/extraordinary-popular-delusions/#onshore-havana-syndrome

The biggest risk to police officers – the single factor that significantly increased death rates among cops – is police unions themselves. Police unions successfully pressured cities across American to reject covid risk mitigation, from masking to vaccinations, leading to a wave of police deaths. "Suicide by cop" is very rare, but US officers committed "mass suicide by cop union":

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/12/us/police-covid-vaccines.html

But the story that policing is much more dangerous than it really is a useful one. It has a business-model. Military contractors who turn local Barney Fifes into Judge Dredd cosplayers with assault rifles, tanks and other "excess" military gear make billions from the tale:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/07/10/flintstone-delano-roosevelt/#1033-1022

It's not just beltway bandits who love this story. For cops to be shielded from consequences for murdering the public, they need to tell themselves and the rest of us that they are a "thin blue line," and not mere armed bureaucrats. The myth that cops are in constant danger from the public justifies hair-trigger killings.

Consider the use of "civilian" to describe the public. Police are civilians. The only kind of police officer who isn't a civilian is a military policeman. Places where "civilians" interact with non-civilian law enforcement are, by definition, under military occupation. Calling the public "civilians" is a cheap rhetorical trick that converts a police officer to a patrolling soldier in hostile territory. Calling us "civilians" justifies killing us, because if we're civilians, then they are soldiers and we are at war.

The NYPD clearly conceives of itself as an occupying force and considers its "civilian" oversight to be the enemy. When New York's Civilian Complaint Review Board gained independence in 1993, thousands of off-duty cops joined Rudy Giuliani in a mass protest at City Hall and an occupation of the Brooklyn Bridge. This mass freakout is a measure of police intolerance for oversight – after all, the CCRB isn't even allowed to discipline officers, only make (routinely ignored) recommendations.

Kerry Sweet was the NYPD lawyer who oversaw the department's bodycam rollout. He once joked that the NYPD missed a chance to "bomb the room" where the NYPD's CCRB was meeting (when Propublica asked him to confirm this, he said he couldn't remember those remarks, but "on reflection, it should have been an airstrike").

Obvious defects in the NYPD's bodycam policy go beyond the ability to suppress disclosure of the footage. The department has no official tracking system for its bodycam files. They aren't geotagged, only marked by officer badge-number and name. So if a member of the public comes forward to complain that an unknown officer committed a crime at a specific place and time, there's no way to retrieve that footage. Even where footage can be found, the NYPD often hides the ball: in 20% of cases where the Department told the CCRB footage didn't exist, they were lying.

Figuring out how to make bodycam footage work better is complex, but there are some obvious first steps. Other cities have no problem geotagging their footage. In Chicago, the CCRB can directly access the servers where bodycam footage is stored (when the NYPD CCRB members proposed this, they were fired).

Meanwhile, the NYPD keeps protecting its killers. The Propublica story opens with the police killing of Miguel Richards. Richards' parents hadn't heard from him in a while, so they asked his Bronx landlord to check on him (the Richards live in Jamaica). The landlord called the cops. The cops killed Richards.

The cops claimed he had a gun and they were acting in self-defense. They released a highly edited reel of bodycam footage to support that claim. When the full video was eventually extracted, it revealed that Richards had a tiny plastic toy guy and a small folding knife. The officers involved believed he was suffering an acute mental health incident and stated that policy demanded that they close his bedroom door and wait for specialists. Instead, they barked orders at him and then fired 16 rounds at him. Seven hit him. One ruptured his aorta. As he lay dying on his bedroom floor, one officer roughly tossed him around and cuffed him. He died.

New York's Police Benevolent Association – the largest police "union" in NYC – awarded the officers involved its "Finest of the Finest" prize for their conduct in the killing.

This isn't an isolated incident. A month after the NYPD decided not to punish the cops who killed Richards, NYPD officers murdered Kawaski Trawick in his Bronx apartment:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/04/kawaski-trawick/#Kawaski-Trawick

The officers lied about it, suppressed release of the bodycam footage that would reveal their lies, and then escaped any justice when the footage and the lies were revealed.

None of this means that bodycams are useless. It just means that bodycams will only help bring accountability to police forces when they are directed by parties who have the will and power to make the police accountable.

When police leaders and city governments support police corruption, adding bodycams won't change that fact.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/13/i-want-a-roof-over-my-head/#and-bread-on-the-table

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

--

Tony Webster, modified https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Minneapolis_Police_Officer_Body_Camera_%2848968390892%29.jpg

CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en

[transhuman-priestess]

I grew up in a town in the Midwest with an actual, honest-to-god crime problem and it really affected the way I view news coverage of crime and violence.

Like everyone in Portland loses their minds over stabbings downtown and such but nobody really understands what it’s like to live in a violent place.

Because, mostly, it’s fucking boring. Oh, the house behind us got shot up. Oh, little Susie brought in the buckshot the vet took out of her dog. It was just something that happened.

And the other thing is like, nobody I ever knew got randomly attacked. That’s not to say that nobody got hurt. But the people that hurt them were their family members. Susie’s dad threatened her with a pistol. Steve’s grandparents beat him. This was the violence I grew to fear. The violence of adults in charge of me.

You are always in more danger of being hurt by someone you know than by a stranger, regardless of what the news tells you.

P.S. also, cops. Cops are way more dangerous than “drug addicts.”

[midnightexpressproductions]

Demo (TBA)

Content warnings (This IF has situations and themes that might be distressing to others): mentions of death, depictions of bodily harm, body horror, gore, anxiety/panic attacks, stressful scenes, claustrophobia, violence, car crashes, amaxophobia, astraphobia, use of weapons (guns, knives, etc.), explicit language, and sexual content though this is optional.

Dark smoke curls all around you, the black ash clogging up your nose and choking your throat. The sound of sirens is muffled in your ears. The base of your skull feels like it's split in two, a sharp pain blooming on the back of your head. Your eyesight is blurry but you can just make out the body writhing around on the ground.

You're hurt and blood seeps out of your wounds. You should be dead. You shouldn't be able to move, but here you are struggling to breathe. The acrid air in your lungs burns. Your vision tinges red. You can't help but watch as the body across the street from you sits up, rotten eyes fixed on your own.

It's jaw unhinges as it lets out an unearthly scream. It's hungry– no not hungry, ravenous– filthy drool dripping down it's chin. In a flash it descends upon you.

Starving.

Yearning for something to eat.

Desperate.

Yearning for food.

Famished.

Yearning to tear your flesh apart.

------------------------------------------------------------------

In your senior year of high school, you remain the sole survivor of a brutal car crash that kills your father. Grief stricken, your mother decides that it's time for a fresh start. You soon find yourself shipped away to the other side of the country in bustling New York City; a completely different world from your previous rural Louisiana town.

A fish out of water, you're content with staying in the comfort of your own bedroom, living out your life in complete solitude. However, fate has other plans and after four years of isolation, you are forced to leave your room and venture into the outside world.

You just had to pick the day when everything goes to shit, didn't you?

The dead have begun to rise, violent and angry and desperately ravenous for human flesh. Finding yourself separated from your mom, you team up with an unlikely group of survivors as you begin your journey across a ruined New York in hopes of safe haven.

Who knows what might happen when the dead wake?

Play as male, female or non binary; you have the chance to set your own pronouns.

Play as straight, gay, lesbian, bi/pansexual, demi/asexual or aromantic.

Customize your MC's personality and appearance.

Choose from five RO's (plus a sixth RO who you'll meet at the end of the game) to romance or befriend. Or betray.

Build up your stats.

Make alliances or enemies with rival gangs.

Steal a cop car.

Adopt some dogs.

Your choices matter. You and other characters from the main cast can die.

Javier Delgado | he/him | 23 | ISTJ-T | Puerto Rican American

Javier has short, dark brown hair that curls just slightly around the edges. His down turned eyes are light brown and speckled with green. His golden tawny skin is lightly smattered with freckles across his cheeks. Javier is 5'10" and he has a thin, lanky build which makes him seem much taller than he really is. A pair of plastic-rimmed, light green glasses sit on his hooked nose. He says that they're just for reading but in truth, his eyesight just really sucks. His thick eyebrows are almost constantly furrowed, causing people to think that he’s always upset. Javier favors more muted, earthy toned colors in what he wears. He's not particularly fashionable however, wearing whatever is clean and comfortable.

Carmen Bautista | she/her | 23 | ESFJ-A | Filipina/Brazilian American

Carmen has long, wavy hair that stops just below her shoulder blades. Her hair is dark brown turning into a blonde ombre the further down it goes. She normally keeps it pulled back into a low bun or a French braid. Her wide eyes are almond shaped and dark brown. Carmen’s olive skin is completely flawless. Her full lips seem to be set in a perpetual smile, showing off the deep set dimples on her cheeks. She is 5'9" and has a plump, hourglass figure. She can normally be found wearing jewelry. However, Carmen doesn't wear rings, saying that she prefers to keep her hands free of any obstructions. She does have her nails painted a bubblegum pink though. Carmen favors pastel colors and soft clothing that she can easily move around in.

Max Friedman | she/they | 22 | ISTP-A | Jewish American

Max has wildly curly, dark copper hair that reaches just below their ears which is choppy since they cut it themself. Their eyes are a pale stormy gray and droopy, giving them a sleepy appearance. However, paired with her thin lips that seem to be constantly set into a scowl, it only highlights Max's less than friendly demeanor. Max has pale skin with warm undertones. She's covered from head to toe in freckles. They have a small cut on the right side of their upper lip. Their nose is slightly crooked, having broken it from a skateboarding accident. She's the shortest out of the group (not including Gwen), standing at 5'2" and she has a lithe build though the baggy clothes she wears make it seem that Max is skinnier than she really is. They carry around a skateboard wherever they go. 

Eun-Woo Park | he/him | 20 | ESTP-T | South Korean

Eun-Woo has short, pencil-straight black hair that's been styled into an undercut, his bangs left longer than the rest. Thick eyelashes rim his monolid eyes. The irises are a brown so dark that they're almost black. Eun-Woo's milk white skin is spotted with moles, the most notable being the two that sit underneath his left eye. His hands are covered with old calluses and jagged scars mar his knuckles. Eun-Woo stands at 5'7" and has a sinewy, toned build. His ears are double pierced and he has a helix piercing on his right ear. Eun-Woo's nails are painted black. He likes wearing black clothing however, he always wears a red SSG Landers cap along with a NY Yankees letterman jacket.

Derek Campbell | he/they | 24 | ISFP-A | African American/Caucasian

Derek has dark brown, shoulder length dreads. The ends are dyed a light honey brown though he's constantly changing the color. He normally keeps his dreads tied back in a loose ponytail or bun. Their full lips seem to always be set in a sweet smile. Their dark brown eyes are round and wide set, emphasizing their friendly demeanor. Light stubble softens their sharp jaw. Derek has light brown skin, having two scars on his face: one that runs down the corner of his left eyebrow and the other running across the bridge of his nose. He's the tallest of the whole group, standing at 6'5" and his chubby, thick-set build seems imposing at first. They're really just a big marshmallow though. Derek seems to favor more athletic wear, though they'll wear whatever feels comfortable to them. They like bright colors, especially pink and yellow.

Elijah/Elizabeth Watts | he/him or she/her | 26 | ENTJ-A | African American

Eli has dark umber skin with cool undertones. Jagged, old scars crisscross all over their body. They have a full sleeve tattoo of a snake surrounded by lotus flowers on their left arm. F!Eli has long, tightly coiled black hair which she normally keeps tied back into a low ponytail or a braided bun. M!Eli has short, tightly coiled black hair that's cut into a fade, his coils either left free or tied back into cornrows. Even if they're not upset, Eli's eyes seem to be constantly narrowed, the warm honey brown irises standing out against their dark skin. Their full lips hide a gap-toothed smile. Both M!Eli and F!Eli stand at 6'0". They have a toned, muscular build. They wear no makeup or jewelry, other than the dog tags that they keep hidden underneath their clothes.

Gwen Nguyen | she/her | 10 | Vietnamese American

Gwen has warm toned, honey skin and wide, black eyes. Her chubby cheeks are dusted red, only further highlighting her innocent appearance. However, the sneaky rude gestures and hidden eye rolls show that she's much more cheeky than she looks. Gwen likes to wear anything soft and pastel colored. She always has her favorite pink bear plushie with her. Gwen is also deaf, so she wears a pair of sparkly hearing aids. Other than using sign language, she also communicates with a small whiteboard that she keeps tucked away in a pastel yellow backpack.

Pa and Ma Hazel:

Pa is a 10 year old German shepherd and Ma Hazel is an 11 year old cocker spaniel. Pa is short coated and his fur is a dark sable color with his underside being a honey brown. His muzzle is also lightly streaked through with gray. Ma Hazel is medium coated and her fur is a brown roan. Her muzzle is also slightly graying and her nose is spotted. In lieu of collars, Pa wears a forest green bandana around his neck. Ma Hazel doesn't wear a collar at all.

[dykelawlight]

L and Light for fear?

L

L is scared of weird shit. L is not scared of practical, realistic shit like the risk of his being assassinated by a criminal syndicate or taken out by Kira (the latter of which he's kind of into, honestly). He is not scared of heights. He is not a trypophobe. He does not have a fear of any particular animal (though he doesn't love dogs) or bugs or the ocean. L is very very scared of ghosts and gods of death and like, the Jersey Devil. I think a lot of people interpolate L's cryptid energy into an affinity for cryptids and such and I genuinely think he is Not About It, like he is NOT trying to get put in a situation where he encounters a chupacabra. Watari read L the poem The Pobble Who Has No Toes by Edward Lear when he was a small child and he sobbed inconsolably for an entire night and into the next morning even though Watari assured him Pobbles were not real and he was not one and and would not lose his toes to mysterious forces of the sea and thinking about it still freaks him out to this day at his big age.

Light

I think Light, much more than the narrative and fans give him credit for, is a fear-driven person. He holds up okay when being accosted by an insane guy with a gun on a bus (which he orchestrated and knew he would survive, but still), but the second you get remotely near to actually harming him, he fucking crumbles. He rigs a makeshift bomb to blow up his parents' house if anyone rifles through his desk wrong. He is hugely avoidant of anything that he can see through his own ego enough to perceive as legitimately dangerous to him. I think he can be prone to panic attacks and insomnia but is also incredibly resistant to talking to anyone about his fear of anything, except when he thinks it will make him look more relatable or human. He'll admit to having a weird thing about rats easily and even laugh about it but cannot confront his fear of being killed or publicly destroyed or actually imprisoned by another person in any legitimate or meaningful way, and it very much hampers his ability to be a normal guy. I think this is still true in a universe where the Note doesn't exist and I think it's partially because he grew up having a cop who handled a lot of violent crime for a father, and therefore is somewhat prone to the various anxieties about the world that police work tends to foster in officers.

[nerdyqueerandjewish]

obviously these things are not all on the same scale but the compounding of personal, communal, and global events just have me 🫠

- End of Sept my beloved childhood dog had to be put down

- October 7th, Hamas attack

- October 9th, get a call from my dad that he’s flying in because grandma unexpectedly took a downturn

- October 10th, nervously waiting for my dad’s update all day. Finally get it and hear that things are critical but stable. He feels optimistic after talking to the doctor. He was able to talk to her too. She’s too tired in the evening because dialysis is tiring,but I should visit tomorrow.

- October 11th wake up early and can’t go back to sleep. Go get coffee just for something to do. Gets call at 6:58 from my dad and I know it can’t be good. Go to the hospital. See her. Give the doctors permission to start palliative care so she’s more comfortable. Hold her hand. Give her so many forehead kisses. She cant talk, but she tears up when I tell her how much I love her and my future plans. My dad is wearing a stupid fucking pro-cop shirt and I can’t help but be angry about how clueless he is and for adding this stupidity to a day that’s going to be etched into my brain for the rest of my life. Every 15 minutes or so when the nurse checks in, they remind us that there no rush, but we can take her oxygen mask off whenever we are ready. When are we ready? How are we ever ready? We know she doesn’t want to be kept on life support. Are we ready? We know she is experiencing some discomfort all hooked up like that. Are we ready? Let’s wait for one more person to get here. Are we ready? We wish she could tell us what she wanted. Are we ready? After everyone got to say goodbye. I think my partner was the one to finally suggest that it was time and I agreed. Or was it me who said it? My dad was looking for any input. An only child, not wanting to make these decisions alone. I slip into my historic role of eldest daughter, not even much younger than him anymore, knowing a decision is better than no decision. My sister and I each have one of her hands. As soon i can no longer hear her last exhale, the doctor comes in to declare her time of death. People spend different amounts of time after. My sister has to go back to work. My dad stays around, then says he’s going to grab his sweatshirt from his truck, then texts and says he’s going to find somewhere for us to get brunch. I spend about an hour with her after she was gone. Holding her hand, kissing her forehead, rubbing her arm until it’s completely cold. It takes longer than I’d thought. I keep a lock of her hair. It’s hard to leave her bedside. Next time I touch her body it will be pulverized bone that I’m trying to scoop into a locket. My partner and I get brunch with my dad.

This grief is by far the most difficult thing I’ve had to deal with in my life, and I don’t think my life has been particularly easy. She was the source of unconditional love I could depend on in my life. She was only 68 so I took for granted there would be more time. I’m able to cling to knowing that she was ready even if I wasn’t, that she had a peaceful death with people she loved. Meanwhile I’m seeing headlines every day grief multiplied over and over again, learning more about the attack, learning more about the Israeli military response escalating, bombings, bringing more and more death and grief. Violent deaths with last moments that haunt and terrify me. Deaths where the mourners do not get the comfort that I’ve been clinging to. Grieve for Jews and I have people who I consider my peers deciding that this means I’m some sort of right wing nationalist who doesn’t give a shit about Palestinians. Grieve for Palestinians, and people in my community think I’m some sort of self hating jew who believes terrorists attacks are justified. Feeling rejection on multiple fronts when shit is real. Even writing it I can hear a response of “really, feeling rejection is hurting you? People are dying!” And it’s like YES- people dying doesn’t mean that suddenly we no longer experience the human need for connection AND the thing that’s causing this rejection is seeing people’s humanity and CARING ABOUT THOSE DEATHS.

Really I just don’t know how a person can’t see their own grief and pain reflected back again and again in other people.

Don’t really have a point to this aside from the fact that this is definitely warping my brain in new and exciting ways but just shout out to people who are dealing with Major World Events and Major Life Events at the same time time. It sucks ass.

[wrestlersownmyheart]

"Her Outlaw Hero" (Sons Of Anarchy-Chibs Chapter fic) Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the Original Characters in this story. I am only using Kurt Sutter's characters from Sons of Anarchy. He created the characters and the show—I am in no way taking any credit for his creations. This story is for entertainment only. Content/Warnings: Violence against both men and women including rape. Summary:

Adelaide Watson is fleeing Tennessee—on the run from her violent past.

When she has a car accident on a lonely road in Charming, California, she has no choice but to walk to town for help. But help comes to her instead. In a very unexpected way.

Chapter 4

Adelaide paused a moment to try and catch her breath before she continued her long trek down the silent, empty road. She heard a vehicle in the distance and glanced behind her. Her breathing quickened as she recognized the same dark van from earlier. Apparently, the men found their dog and were returning from where they'd originally come.

Trying to ignore her pain and dizziness, Adelaide set about walking again, hoping against hope the two men would just pass by and leave her alone.

They frightened her. They looked more than a little rough around the edges with their leather vests and longish hair. The one that spoke to her sounded kind and had an attractive, thick Scottish accent, but…

That's irrelevant, Adelaide told herself. Liam is handsome—a cop for crying out loud! And I should have stayed far away from him. I've learned my lesson—the hard way.

She shuddered as her thoughts returned to the men's van.

They could be hiding several victims, she thought. Or more scary men, for that matter.

Needless to say, the thought didn't calm her nerves the tiniest bit.

Trying to breathe through the nagging pain in her ribs, Adelaide managed to take a few more slow steps before suddenly crumpling to her knees again. Pain surged down her shin as her knee connected with a rock. She was vaguely aware of the sound of an engine revving and tires crunching over clumps of dirt and rocks.

"No," she whispered, fear engulfing her. Her heart-rate sped up as her chest heaved for air. So the men do have plans to attack me! She pulled the small pocket knife from her jeans pocket and flicked it open. I wonder if this is random or if Liam sent them. Trying to manufacture an adrenaline surge, she climbed unsteadily to her feet. "Please, just leave me alone…" she thought aloud, as she resumed her feeble walk. "Just drive past me…"

She had no recollection of stumbling but in the next instant, she was on her knees again and staring at the ground.

A car door slammed and then strong hands suddenly pulled her to her feet.

"Are you okay, lady," a warm, accented voice asked.

You're mine, Laidey…

"NO!"

The scream tore from her throat and she flung her knifed hand out, attempting to stab or maim, but a man's hand caught her wrist and prevented severe injury. Her ribs screamed in protest as she was grabbed and held tightly.

"Let…m-me…go…" she sobbed, glancing up as she felt herself being pushed backward. Liam's face glared down at her fiercely. "God…no…" she whispered. Then his face shifted and changed completely. An older man looked down at her, a mixture of alarm and unease on his handsome face.

The Scotsman from the van, she realized in fear.

A black goatee and mustache speckled with gray adorned the lower half of his face, and he had a scar slashing up each of his cheeks. The man's eyes were so dark they could only be referred to as black—and despite his dark gaze burning into hers, he wore an expression of deep concern.

Gently, but firmly, he nudged her up against the driver's side door of the van and pinned her arms to her sides. In the next instant, the other man inside the van leaned out and clasped his hand over her mouth.

"Easy, lady," the guy said softly. "We're not going to hurt-" He cursed loudly when Adelaide's teeth sunk into the tender flesh of his palm.

She began fighting furiously with the Scotsman in the hopes of an escape. But his solution to her struggle was to press his body firmly against hers so as to stop her squirming. Still trying to fight him, she quickly exhausted herself and slumped against her captor.

"Please…" she sobbed. "Please, don't hurt me…"

To her surprise, she felt the Scotsman's hand tenderly touch her forehead, then her neck.

"She's burning up," he said to his friend who'd emerged from the van holding his injured hand. "Her pulse is racing. And I'm willin' to bet she's hallucinatin'."

Adelaide felt herself fading and slid down the side of the van, till a pair of strong arms held her up.

"She needs a hospital."

"NO," she gasped loudly, as she had a sudden adrenaline rush. She struggled against the man some more. "Please… No hospital… I just… need a hotel… room… some sleep…"

"You need a lot more than that, lass," came the soft, Scottish-twanged reply.

Adelaide felt her arm being draped around the man's neck, and then the sensation of being lifted and cradled against his strong chest.

"Please, don't hurt me," she whispered, and sobbed softly. She grasped at the Scotsman's shirt collar as if to get his full attention. "Please…" Her head grew fuzzier till she had no choice but to let it fall against the man's shoulder.

"We're not gonna hurt ya," the man drawled with his accent. "We're gonna help ya and keep ya safe. Just stay calm, lady."

"No…" she mumbled. A cold shiver racked her slender frame, "Please, don't call… me that…"

"All right. Shhh," came the soothing reply. She felt herself being carried then, "How about tellin' me your name then, lass?"

She was laid down in what she guessed was the inside of the van. "Can I… sleep first? So… sleepy…"

"No, try to stay awake lad—Try to stay awake for me, okay?"

Adelaide was unable to answer as she drifted into a black oblivion.

00000000

Chibs cursed under his breath as he watched the young woman's eyes dim and grow heavier, till they finally closed completely.

"Tig, drive," he ordered urgently, "Get us back to the club house. I have some supplies there. And keep the dog up there with you. I have to see what I can do for the woman."

Wordlessly, Tig climbed behind the wheel and was barreling down the road only seconds later.

Chibs pressed his fingers to the side of the woman's neck and counted her pulse.

One fifty-two, he thought to himself. At the very least. That's not good—at all. Her skin was flushed, dry, and blazing hot—which meant she had a huge fever that was yet to break. "Sunstroke," he murmured to himself as he recalled her long walk from her car. I'd bet money on it.

"What," Tig called from up front.

"I think she's had sunstroke," Chibs called back.

Tig growled a curse and sped up the van, "How do you treat that?"

"Ice-water bath and IV fluids," Chibs replied, "But I may need meds too. When we get there, call Tara. See if she has time to come help me treat a sunstroke victim. In the meantime crank up the A/C full blast."

Tig obediently turned up the air-conditioning as high as it would go. "What was she thinking…walking out in this heat? Why didn't she call 9-1-1 or something?"

"Don't know," Chibs answered, dousing a cloth with a bottle of water and applying it to her scorching forehead. "Not important right now." He heard her whimper softly as the cool cloth touched her scorching head. A shiver racked her slight body.

"She's having chills, Tig, hurry."

Within a couple minutes, Tig pulled the van up to the clubhouse and got out to open the doors for Chibs. As he was leading Daisy to her tie-out, Venus Van Dam, his old lady came running out of the clubhouse.

"Oh, thank goodness you found her," she cried, running up to Tig. "Juice called me and said she ran off!"

"Relax, baby," Tig said, hugging his woman closely. "We got her back. And she helped us save a woman who was in trouble," he reported proudly.

"Oh, my," Venus drawled in her thick Southern accent. She looked over Tig's shoulder to see Chibs climbing out the back of the van. She watched as he tugged a woman's limp frame into his arms, and prepared to carry her inside. "The poor thing," she gasped, placing her hand over her heart. "What happened to her?"

"Long story short—Chibs thinks she has sunstroke."

"Tiggy! Call Tara," Chibs reminded him as he carried the limp woman toward the clubhouse, "I need her—like, ten minutes ago."

"Right," Tig said, and pulled out his cell. "I'm on it, brother."

"I'm going inside to see if there's anything I can do," Venus said, squeezing Tig's arm. She hurried back to the clubhouse to lavish the unconscious woman with her special gift of Southern hospitality.

She entered the clubhouse just ahead of Chibs, and waved her arms in a scatting motion, "Clear a path boys," she said loudly, clapping her hands. "There's a lady in need of medical attention here."

"Whoa," Happy exclaimed when he spotted Chibs carrying the female. "What's this," he asked, lunging forward and holding the door open for him.

"She crashed her car and was trying to walk somewhere. Sunstroke," Chibs explained. "Get the pool table cleared. I need to examine her and see what she needs." He heard Tig reenter the building as he carried the young woman to the pool table and waited while Venus and Juice hurriedly began clearing the table of the balls and cue sticks.

"Tara's on her way, Chibs," he reported. "What else can I do?"

"Grab a pillow for her head," Chibs began to toss orders, getting fully into medic-mode. "And I need ice. LOTS of it—everyone chip in with that. Make ice packs and someone else run a tub of cool water in one of the dorm bathrooms—dump some ice into that too." He cursed lightly then when the woman began convulsing. "Go BUY ice if ya have to boys. I'm gonna need a ton of it."

"I'll go get the bath drawn," Venus announced, once the pool table was cleared off, and hurried back to one of the dorms. Chibs gently deposited the shuddering woman onto the pool table's surface while everyone else went to raid the refrigerators' ice bins for the much needed ice. Bobby grabbed his key to the van and left to go purchase some as well.

Careful not to bump her head against the edging of the table, Chibs situated the woman so he could examine her to the best of his ability. She looked as though she'd already taken a blow or two to the head, judging from her bruises, so he didn't want to make any possible head injury worse.

And I don't think the bruises are from the accident, he thought, eyeing her damaged pale skin. They're not fresh enough. Most of them are at least a couple days old.

Tig returned with a pillow and gently lifted the woman's head so he could place it beneath her. She whimpered softly, but otherwise didn't stir.

"It's okay," Tig told her softly, brushing her hair away from her face. "We're taking care of you."

Chibs had grabbed a blood pressure kit and temporal thermometer and began to check her vitals. A minute later, he released the air valve on the inflation bulb and frowned from the results. He pulled the stethoscope from his ears and glanced at his watch.

"How is she," Tig asked.

"Not good," he replied, taking her pulse again. "Her temperature is 106.7, blood pressure is 216 over 118, and her pulse is so fast I can't count it. I hope Tara gets here soon." He looked at Tig then. "Go get the coat tree and a coat hanger to hang an IV on, okay?"

"You got it," Tig answered, and went to round up the items.

Chibs headed to one of their medical supply closets to get the materials he needed to start an IV and then hurried back to the woman—who was convulsing again. Tig already had the coat tree and hanger set up for him. Chibs quickly hung up the bag and did the necessary checks on the bag and tubing to make sure no air bubbles were present, then began the task of inserting the needle and getting the IV to delivering fluid to the woman. "Hold her in case she starts convulsing again," Chibs ordered. "I have to hit the vein just right."

"I'm here," came Tara's voice from the front of the room. "How bad is she?"

"Bad," both men answered in unison.

"She's had a couple of convulsions," Chibs said, and reported the woman's vital stats to her. "Have you got any meds with you that can help with any of that?"

Tara immediately opened her bag and pulled out some vials of medicine and syringes.

"Phenobarbital should take care of the convulsions," she said, drawing up a dose to inject into the IV. "It'll sedate her enough that she won't suffer through the ice water baths either. For her pulse and heart I'll give her some Inderal and Dobutimine, because if we don't slow that pulse down soon, her heart will fail."

Bobby entered then patted Chibs on the back, "I have a ton of ice in the van, brother. We should have all we need."

"Thank you," Chibs said. "Ya mind helping me dump some into the tub?"

"No, no," Tara interjected. "I might need you." She looked up at Tig. "Could you go help Bobby?"

"Sure thing," Tig replied, and followed Bobby into the dorm to get the ice bath ready.

Tara tried counting the woman's pulse again and looked up at Chibs, "She's definitely bad off. She really needs to be in a hospital, Chibs."

He nodded, "I know. But she refused it. Something happened to her—someone attacked her or was after her. She was scared to death when I mentioned a hospital."

"Well, we'll do the best we can then, and if she gets worse… We'll have to come to a decision," Tara replied, rechecking the woman's temperature. She cursed softly. "Ugh. She hit 107. We've got to get her in ice. Now."

Tig and Bobby reentered the room just as she finished speaking. "It's ready" Bobby announced.

"And we have a ton of ice packs ready when you need them. We stuffed them in the freezers," Happy reported from the kitchen area.

"Great, thank you everyone," Chibs said appreciatively.

Tara glanced up at him again, "Help me undress her, okay? We need to get her down to her underwear. Any excessive clothing will prevent her from cooling properly."

They both began working at pulling the woman free of her shoes, jeans and t-shirt, and then gaped at the sight of her ribs. One whole side had blackened.

"No wonder she seemed in so much pain," Chibs thought out loud.

Both his and Tara's eyes scanned over the woman further, and they noticed more bruising at her inner thighs.

"Oh, God," Tara murmured.

"Mother Mary," Chibs whispered. "Anyone who'd treat a woman like that doesn't deserve to live."

Tara tried to clear her head of what the woman had been through.

"I'll tape up her ribs once she's through with the ice baths and her temperature is stabilized. That's about all I can do for them besides get her some pain meds."

Chibs stooped down and lifted the woman up and then carried her back to the dorm, as Tara followed behind with the makeshift drip stand and IV.

Once he reached the tub of icy water, Chibs instructed Tara to set the IV stand next to the tub. "Support her head, okay," he asked. "I don't want her to bump it on the edge of the tub."

Tara reached forward and held the woman's head till Chibs had her settled into the ice water. The woman didn't even stir.

"That's good," Tara said softly, "She won't be feeling any discomfort right now."

"What about later," Chibs asked, concern creasing his forehead.

"She's going to have some later, yes," Tara clarified. "She'll have to be packed with ice off and on till we see if her temperature is going to stabilize. Also, with her ribs and all that bruising… Well, I can't write her a prescription without knowing her name."

"It's Adelaide Watson," came a soft reply from outside the door.

Tara looked puzzled, and Chibs actually gave a small laugh. "Chucky, get in here. How d'ya know her name?"

Chucky walked into the room sheepishly holding a wallet.

"I was folding her clothes for her, and this fell out of her jeans. Her ID is in there."

Chibs took the wallet and looked for himself, "Well, I'll be… He's right. Adelaide Watson." Chibs gave Tara a dimple-inducing grin. "Can ya write that scrip now, Doc?"

If you want on my tag list just let me know! 🙂

Tagging:

@mrsfilipchibstelford @ravennaortiz

[doberbutts]

This conversation makes me more and more wishing I lived in a country where protective items were legal - not even pepper spray is legal here. We mostly have blade crimes, I live in a rough area, thus far my big, protective dog has been enough to ward people off but I wish there was more legal options. If a dog (on its own accord, not ordered to) bites someone to defend the owner here, it’s a real hazy area legally, however but generally looked at better than if you had spray or a weapon. Sorry not much to add, venting a little, a very interesting conversation to read

I know people from other countries look at Americans as gun-obsessed and mock us for it, but this is the conversation I see brought up every time there is an honest discussion of why an American may need to carry a weapon for their own protection. Unfortunately living in a high crime area where there is a lot of violent crime is common enough that people need the reassurance of having something in their pocket or strapped to their hip that will help them out of a tough situation. Cops are useless even moreso than usual in these areas and politicians don't care unless they can use these areas as talking points for debates. So it is up to us to defend ourselves from harm.

I bought my first weapon and attended self defense classes to learn how to use it when I moved out, because I moved into a higher crime area (only place with rent I could afford at 18) and I was walking home after class or work often very late at night (11pm-3am) and several of my classmates who lived nearby had been attacked doing the same thing. Being visibly queer, ambiguously gendered, blatantly young and black, hauling expensive art supplies everywhere I went, I knew there was a target on my back and I was not willing to become a statistic.

I was followed. I was confronted. The last couple months of my time at my first apartment someone tried to break in through my fire escape almost nightly, which is why I moved and immediately got a doberman and some roommates. But it's also why I armed myself and made sure I did my best to learn what to do in a fight.

I saw this post that was like "Americans buy guns saying they need protection and I wonder how they'll pay for the hospital when they accidentally injure themselves" and it bothered me so much. The Americans that need to arm themselves for protection aren't the ones at fault for our backwardsass healthcare system. If anything they're also the ones who the healthcare system fucks over the worst. Self-inflicted gun-related injuries are preventable with gun safety but some asshole killing or raping you in the street is a reality for our most marginalized populations and we deserve the ability to protect ourselves from this.

[vague-humanoid]

The arrested officers include a K-9 handler named Morteza Amiri, who is accused of inducing his Belgian Malinois, Purcy, to bite 28 suspects over three years, and Eric Rombough, a member of Antioch’s SWAT team and Gang Unit, who allegedly shot eleven suspects in one year with a “less lethal” launcher. The launcher is a shotgun-like device that fires 40mm impact rounds, about an inch-and-half in diameter — designed to bludgeon and bruise, rather than kill. According to the indictment, Rombough blasted suspects from close range, often hitting “potentially lethal” areas of their bodies. The alleged conspiracy includes a third cop, Devon Wenger, who, according to the charging document, cheered on Amiri as “my hero,” and also used a 40mm launcher to shoot a suspect in the chest who’d raised his hands in surrender.

The indictment paints both Amiri and Rombough as twisted: they allegedly collected “trophies” to memorialize their uses of “excessive force.” Amiri bragged he took “gory pics” of each K-9 bite for his “personal” collection, while Rombough allegedly collected his “spent 40mm munitions” for an art project: a hand-crafted American flag collage. (According to the indictment, “the munitions were used among the stars and stripes to commemorate” his shootings.)

These cops were remorseless about their bad actions, according to the indictment; Rombough even bragged about his unconstitutional actions, as in this text exchange:

Unidentified officer: What’re you guys up to?  Rombough: Violating civil rights

Officers Amiri and Rombough also sent texts indicating racial animus, repeatedly referring to city residents as “gorillas”; Rombough texted of another suspect: “I seriously want to beat his black ass.” 

The alleged sadism of Amiri, the K-9 handler, is presented in excruciating detail across the indictment, which reproduces texts to his fellow officers gleefully recounting his violent exploits — e.g. “that shit is fun” — and includes snapshots he sent of the wounds left by Purcy’s bites. He’d send such messages from his personal phone, along with the numeric tally of how many times he’d used the dog to attack someone. For example: “#4 on fire rn.. Lol.” (According to the indictment, the bite count rose above two dozen before Amiri was removed from the Canine Unit in 2022.)

@chrisdornerfanclub

[ausetkmt]

1960's civil rights protestor attacked by k9

[apricotbuncakes]

Welcome Home AU Info & Masterlist

The At Dead of Night Au (or ADON AU for short)

This AU is based on the game At Dead of Night! The game and my AU have themes of Suicide, Child Neglect, Child Abuse, Child Death and Murder so please be cautious when reading/engaging with this AU! All posts I make about this AU will be labeled with appropriate warnings (based on the content of the post itself.

I’m do not have the energy to digitalize and color these yet so have my sketchbook sketches for now (color to be added later). I’ll draw better sketches later too.

Summary: The ADON AU follows Julie as she navigates an old and barely upkept hotel trying to free her friends (Eddie, Howdy and Frank) from locked hotel rooms. As she does so, she must help ghosts haunting the premises remember what happened to them, all while getting chased around by Wally (and the ghost possessing him)!

Wally Playfellow (Alive): Son of James Playfellow and Poppy Partridge (the latter by marriage). When he’s not possessed, he is a gentle and loving person. Although not very outgoing, he does love to preform on stage, preforming for children before bedtime and having a more adult themed show later in the evening. His stage name is Wally Darling.

James Playfellow (Dead): Father of Wally Playfellow and deceased husband to the late Poppy. He was manipulative to Wally and often used him for personal gains. His tactics grew to be more violent overtime, which resulted in his death where he was killed by {REDACTED}. The image above shows his form when he was alive. His mother was a puppet and his father was half puppet, resulting in him having more human features such as skin and a nose while still retaining black eyes and blue hair, like his mother's. His hair, despite being naturally blue, does grey as a human's would.

Poppy Partridge (Dead): Poppy is the mother of Wally Playfellow and deceased wife of James Playfellow. Although not biologically related, she considers herself to be Wally’s only mother (his previous one passing on after birth). Wally sees her the same way. After the death of her husband, she struggles with major anxiety and depressive episodes that leave her staying inside the hotel most days. She has to hire the help of Harvey Home, who then goes on to be the proprietor of the hotel. She takes the free time she has to be a doting and devoted mother to Wally.

Dr. Barnaby Beagle (Dead): A therapy dog that was hired by Poppy when Wally was a teenager to help him after his violent outburst got too much for Poppy to handle alone. Barnaby is genuine in his attempts at helping Wally, though in the end is unsuccessful in changing Wally’s mannerisms.

Fun Fact: Barnaby is the only Ghost to be still have his legs! It’s his personal choice to appear as such.

Harvey Home (Dead): Mr. Home was hired by Poppy to run the hotel since she was unable to. He and Wally rarely get along. When Wally was younger, Harvey simply dealt with the disrespect. As he got older he started to tolerate it less and less. Although incredibly patient under normal circumstances, Wally seems to bring out the worst in him. After all his hard work, Home was appointed the proprietor by Poppy. He gets to enjoy his position very little since he dies soon after he is appointed.

Sally Starlet (Dead): Sally and her family were frequent patrons of the hotel since her father traveled for work and often brought his family with him. Sally was familiar with the hotel and Wally. They used to play well together in the stage area. This is how Wally learned to love the spotlight. After Wally’s behavior begins to change, Sally drifted apart from him and often preferred to play on her own.

Julie Joyful (Alive): she is set to meet her friends Frank, Eddie, and howdy at the hotel before they go on a trip. Julie is the last to check in with her friends. She sees Wally attack Frank and runs downstairs to make it called the cops. The phone doesn’t work. She finds a scrying mirror, a compass and ghost speaker. The adventure begins.

Frank Frankly, Howdy Pillar, Eddie Dear (Unknown): All three arrived before Julie and were attacked one by one after a gentle refusal to watch Wally’s show that evening. Just like the friends in the original game, they are only a background motivator for Julie, and make no significant contributions to the series of events.

NOTES: Not all of the back stories from the games will transfer over identically to this AU. While a lot of the themes and ways of dying do indeed transfer over, this AU is not identical. A handful of things mentioned in the original game are not themes I want to add to this AU for personal reasons.

Boundaries for my AU

ADON AU Fanfiction

Chapter 1 Cover Art

Chapter 1 Funny Moments

[conjoinedpubes]

an addition to the earlier post…

I played Harry as the worst kind of cop; a corrupt facist thug, nothing more than an attack dog of capital interests. Then, the mercenary tribunal happens… And you realize that each one the mercenaries is 'the real deal'; seasoned war criminals decked out in state-of-the-art military tech - the true knights of capitalism, colonialism and the military industrial complex You're just a run of the mill, 'more violent than usual' cop with delusions of grandeur. And they don't see you any differently to the locals they're killing.

At that moment, a great empathy for all the people in the god-forsaken city washes over you. Both the ones that loved and hated you. The union enforcers, the fishing villagers, the bookstore 'woo' lady, the weird racist on the bridge.

To the Coalition - we are all just impoverished savages in the backwaters of Revachol

[ruledbyscorpio]

peaceful protest is just never going to work anymore. i keep thinking about this as i watch youth climate strikes and marches for abortion access and the modern things that have gotten groups of people together peacefully. not to disregard the work of these organizers! they’re doing what they feel is right and, unlike most, they’re doing something.

that doesn’t change the fact that the efficacy of such protests is next to nothing. i’ve been in rooms with politicians and business leaders and you have to understand: they’re laughing at us. behind closed doors where decisions are actually made they see us in the streets and they laugh about how fucking pathetic it is.

let’s talk about history for a moment. the common example of effective peaceful protest that people in the US give is Dr. King and the earlier wing of the civil rights movement. peaceful protest did work there, but it was because of a collection of factors that we simply don’t have in the modern day. in the case of early marchers, they were clearly in the right. the cops gassing and beating teenagers for ordering a soda were fucking comic book villains. also, there was enough support from within the political establishment that someone was listening and receptive to demands. the movement had a deeply charismatic spate of leaders in Dr. King and his co-organizers. it was also the boundless fifties and activist sixties; a time in history when things were changing and people could see their lives meaningfully impacted as a result. there was also simply massive numbers of people mobilized consistently, giving them an ability to sustain pressure across time and locale. the work of the movement was important and groundbreaking and i by no means dismiss its efficacy and importance.

they still killed Dr. King. they killed generations of leaders after him, too. it took miles of effort and too much blood for grudging concessions of bare-minimum legislation. the lesson to be learned from this period is not that peaceful protest works, it's that even so-called peaceful protests are never peaceful for the oppressed. was it peaceful for the students sprayed violently with firehoses? for the victims of retributive violence? i apologize if this sounds callous, but was it peaceful for Dr. King?

beyond the misnomer of 'peaceful' protest - has there ever been a movement that wasn't brutalized by the long arm of the state? this question is especially important when the state is a vehicle to protect capital. beyond the fact that peaceful protests are only ever peaceful by the oppressed, the other lesson is that they still only work when the stars align into a perfect storm of factors. had even one thing been different there's a nonzero chance there would never have been civil rights laws federally in this nation. even the ones we have today still fail to meaningfully liberate people who aren't white. even effective peaceful protest is neither peaceful nor entirely effective.

let's do another, more modern history lesson. harken back to summer of 2020 and the massive wave of protests that swept the country in the wake of continuous and sustained racist violence imposed on the people. remember what happened in Portland? at the first hint of protests becoming non-peaceful we were gassed, shot at, beaten, kidnapped off the streets, killed by proud boys who were usually off-duty cops. a member of my community committed suicide after being taken in one of the unmarked Fed vans and mercilessly interrogated and harassed. and the cops shot first. they simply did. they were the ones who turned the protest away from peace.

the reason this response was so extreme is because we actually posed an organized resistance. the action on the streets that summer was enough to scare powerful people so much that they called in the fucking federal attack dogs on their own city. to this day, more than three years later, much of the downtown is still boarded up. and then, of course, most of the media about the death of Portland and how unsafe this city is was planted by cops, business owners who wanted more cops, and politicians who wanted anything other than change. if this city is dying it is because they nailed up plywood over the beautiful displays and made it impossible to exist publicly in peace if you're anything other than well-dressed and white. in their desperation to hold onto power they kneecapped their own businesses and bought policy that made the city even more dangerous than it was. the extreme policing of poverty only serves to make poverty more visible.

the point i'm trying to make with this anecdote is that peaceful protest will never work. furthermore, they let us protest peacefully. it's a release valve allowed by the powerful so we don't organize into a real, organized movement.

my second point is that they're really fucking scared of even a few thousand people in one city. so scared that they'd shoot themselves in the foot to hit us with the shrapnel. to me, the extremity of response demonstrates the efficacy of tactics. compare the few bored cops at a youth climate strike to the wholesale military that came down on a protest that broke a couple windows.

at this day in age in the fight against climate change and capitalism we don't have the numbers, momentum, charismatic leadership, policy support, or visible cartoon villains to make a mass movement of nicely asking for change feasible in any way. i would take critique on the cartoon villains point - thanks elon - but the fact of the matter is we don't have the same social factors now as the more successful peaceful movement did.

additionally, capitalism persists as it has the power to absorb and assimilate any challenge to itself. consider the recent movement for Black lives. it did have meaningful impacts, such as a greater awareness of racial justice, or the rare defunding of a police department, or a broader culture of DEI in companies and institutions. these are all important, but they're also tiny in comparison to original demands. and look how police funding has spiked since. saying #blm became normalized and acceptable to placate us away from real change. because of this absorbent power of capital, any protest of the status quo and its hydra head of evils that does not seek wholesale dismantling of the system will not succeed. of course, wholesale dismantling of the system will not be peaceful. this is the other meaningful critique of peaceful protest; was it coincidental that backlash against the civil rights movement had an extreme uptick when it started challenging the capitalism within white supremacy? of course it wasn't. nicely asking the people who hold the world in a chokehold to loosen their vice grip doesn't work when we can't speak via a throttled neck.

i hate violence. i can't kill a spider in my apartment. i am deeply fucking sensitive and soft and emotional. i have no desire for martyrdom. few do. but i look into the eyes of the world and it breaks my heart. i will probably never have children even though i have always wanted to. how could i ask a child to live in a world that burns around her? burns hotter and longer and fiercer than it does around you or i now. and the flames are already pretty high. as much as i hate violence i will throw a brick that is placed into my hand because i hate the theft of my hope and my future more. and i believe with my entire soul anymore that nothing will change until we start picking those bricks up.

when i indulge in fantasy i want them afraid. i don't want the ceo of shell or chevron or exxon or the politicians they own to have a single restful night of sleep. i want them so afraid that changing their policy seems like the better option. i want them to fear us more than they love their paychecks and dividends and yachts and shares in a colony on mars. when i die of cancer from the microplastics in my bloodstream i hope i can breathe my last on one of their doorsteps. i hope i remind them of their daughters, their grandkids, the future they've sold to buy another fucking house. they will burn in the next life. i wish they didn't leave us here to do so in this one.

i feel as though i should end this essay on a hopeful note, on community building and knowing your neighbors and growing a produce garden in your street's empty lot. i should exhort my peers to organize and meet me in the streets. but the truth is, i don't feel very hopeful. hundreds of thousands of years of humanity and i feel like i'm living in the third to last generation. none of you reading this may live to see the end of life as we know it, but i fear it is coming. and it's none of our faults. there was, in fact, nothing we could have done. yes, there are things we can do now! and we should do them! i am not giving up. i hope you don't either. but how can i not buckle under the weight of the immense cruelty of a selfish few?

desperately i want to be wrong. i dream that peaceful protest wins out. i pray that we can lean into the deep well of human compassion and ingenuity. i'm not a natural cynic - quite the opposite! i do, in my heart, hold onto deep hope that this entire pessimistic view of the world will be misproven.

i don't think it will. i think the powerful will still eat cake in versailles while the bombs fall.

i am also deeply committed to living as whole and fulfilled a life as i possibly can. barring a chance to personally [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] this is how i protest. i choose joy. i am alive here, and i will wring every piece of love out of this world and this life that it has to give me. i have always been deeply idealistic. i won't let them strangle that out of me. and, to return to the original line of thought, i will viciously fight for my right to the future. i will not ask nicely for that to which i am entitled as a living thing, not when it has been stolen and ripped away from me by other people. i will not extend the healing grace of peace to those who have the blood of the entire world on their hands. nor should you. i hope to see you on the streets someday.

[dandunn]

If your still taking prompts, how about werewolf Jigen or Zenigata or merman Lupin

Tw: small animal death, blood

The worst part of being a monster isn't the pain and terror of transformation. It isn't the claws and teeth and itchy flea-bitten fur.

It isn't even the constant hunger gnawing like a rat scraping its long teeth against the stomach lining.

It's loneliness.

It's losing what little friends you had.

It's the cold, the rain, the bitter ruffle of cold wind through shaggy black fur. It's the lack of a safe shelter for the night. It's being stuck between here and there, without even the option of a friendly chat with a stranger.

Anyone who glances at you is either fixed in place with terror, or they run. In (thankfully) rare cases they become violent and try to fight you. 

Jigen thought that becoming a wolf meant the usual; changing from man to beast under the full moon every month like clockwork. That once he transformed he would eventually change back into his human skin.

But then he didn't shift back. Either it was permanent or he could change back at will and just didn't know how.

Sometimes he wonders which is worse. At least if it's permanent it means that he'll have to get used to the idea one way or another. But the faint hope that he could be human again…

It's enough to drive an old dog completely insane.

Jigen noses the lid off of a trash can and tips it over, snapping up scraps of whatever looks half-edible. It's putrid, but he's desperate -  can feel his ribs poking through his skin and ragged pelt. And it's the only way he can survive without resorting to killing. 

Even though the hunger never stops and he knows only something the size of a human would be enough to leave him fully sated. Frequently the thought passes through his mind of pulling down one of the sorry SOBs that kick him, scream at him and call the cops (or animal control) on him. If they attacked first he wouldn't even have to feel bad about it. But he can't. After all he was human too, not long ago. Eating a human would be crossing a line he wouldn't be able to come back from. 

Something small moves through the litter and detritus, tiny claws scraping against asphalt.

One movement of Jigen's head and the rat is in his jaws, squeaking a death knell as his teeth bite down on its spine.

Bones crunch and crack. Warm blood and juices drip down Jigen's gums and a purring growl of pleasure hums a vibrato through his chest. It's the best thing he's tasted in days, hot and fresh food…

And it's a fucking dirty rodent.

He spits out the sharp claws and tail, the taste of blood only stirring his hunger further.

How long?

How long is it going to be before it gets too much? Before I give in to it and kill someone? It's not like there's any deer loping by.

The best he can hope for is maybe booking it and making a beeline for the country where there's wild game, and probably meeting his end at the end of a hunter's gun as some kind of trophy. 

That would be a hell of an end, stuffed and mounted on some redneck's wall.

These past few nights though, misery and fear of being seen have kept him hunkered unmoving in the shadows of alleyways and underpasses. That and hunger. It's easier to preserve energy if you don't move.

His belly full of garbage and fresh rat, Jigen turns in a circle and hunkers down in a corner, hoping no curious eyes will look past the trash cans to see the enormous beast curled up there.

…

Then he awakens, ears and nose furiously working together as he senses someone approaching. He can smell cigarettes and cheap alcohol, instant noodles and wet fur. An odd combination of smells. He starts to growl, the sound of an animal who doesn't want to bite but will, given half the chance.

Another wolf stands at the mouth of the alleyway, brown fur and a long bushy tail standing up in the air.

There's… more like me?

Jigen stops growling and the other wolf regards him with a long-lashed golden brown eye. "Come with me." He gruffs, half turning away when he stops again. Jigen isn't exactly raring to follow the stranger.

The other wolf's eyes glance towards the pile of rat entrails on the ground. "There will be better things to eat, I promise."

Whining, Jigen uncurls his cold, battered body and limps off after the other wolf.

(To be continued?)

[cursedchildofchaos]

Be Warned...If You’re Reading This, It’s Your Fault

He climbed out of the water, his tiny arms struggling, sopping wet. The sun glistened against his scaly chest.

Learn How To Dino T Rex was alive.

6 months later

Mr. T Rex was sipping on the blood of his enemies…not Sword Lady and Pikaman. They were there with him. They had become friends. In fact, they started a cult together.

But they had new enemies. Every day it seemed that a new evil force was trying to take over. The birds? As pretty as they were, they were vile. 

The little frog. He may look trustworthy, but he took all the vanilla extract from everyone else. Despicable.

And don't even get me started on the dogs with human faces. That shit was weird. 

They would not succumb to the new Cult of Ads. They all had to be taken out. Thus, that's what was in Mr. T Rex's drink.

Why had he paired up with Sword Lady and Pikaman? Because of the other way worse cult. 

The Gummy Bears.

When the attack happened…it was awful. They drowned a poor cat who wouldn't join their forces. Mr. T Rex knew his power was truly over. He saw the light of Sword Lady and Pikaman's ways. But this new power? They had to stop it. They had to work together.

And now he was in love with Sword Lady, too, which complicated things. I mean can you blame him? Her soft gentle silvery locks? Her smoldering eyes. If you'd seen her wearing her bunny ears fancy corset, you would fall for her looks, too.

But it wasn't just looks. It was her soul. But her soul belonged to Pikaman, who had recently proposed marriage…

Mr. T Rex couldn't betray Pikaman by stealing Sword Lady from him. Pikaman was his best friend. The light of his life. His buddy old pal. The Ice Pick Joe to his Goncharov. 

No, that wouldn't be right. But he would fight by their side.

He was thinking about this as he drank the blood of one of the Gummy Bears. It tasted like fruit punch Powerade. Suddenly, more Gummy Bears attacked.

Sword Lady violently slashed about slicing heads off and screaming (it reminded Mr. T Rex of Steve in the Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs movie).

Pikaman was pretty useless since he was just some guy in cosplay (all he could do was nibble the foot of a gummy bear he caught).

Mr. T Rex wasn't the greatest help either, due to his arms being so small. His only hope of help was catching the wretched things in his mouth without drowning.

Finally, they had caught them all and dumped them in a lake.

A threat was still in the air. Could the cult stop them? No, but the Communist pigs from Animal Farm could. No more gelatin for the Gummy Bears!

And that's how the Gummy Bear War ended. The cats all died, or so we thought…a little cat named Princess was rumored to survive and that's why we still have cats to this day.

Beware…there are rumors of not all the Gummy Bears dying either. You can usually spot the Gummy Bears though because they’re always singing “Oh, I’m a Gummy Bear! Yes, I’m a Gummy Bear!”

But back to the past. The Cult of Ads continued after this. They worshiped the Sword Lady as their queen. 

But it was painful for Mr. T Rex. He decided he was gonna go on a spiritual journey alone before returning to the cult.

That's when he went to England and fell in love with Tea, a glass of tea. They are happily married (It was a double wedding with Sword Lady and Pikaman, now Sword Man and Pikalady as they took each other’s last names). 

Tea perhaps is one of the most devoted cultists even though Tea can't read all the passages and must have someone read to her cuz she's illiterate due to being a glass of tea…

Or maybe that's what she wants us to think…maybe…she's been an undercover cop this whole time!

Dun, dun, dun!