justapotato89

[justapotato89]

my kid has started to write stories and like, no lies, they’re funny as fuck

[justapotato89]

bro😆

bro, dude, my guy (time to get political sugar bear)

this is the country that for the past 4 years, was bombarded with every evil thing Trump did, was presented with all the evidence of all the laws he broke, watched him become a felon and SO MUCH MORE

and still he got voted back into office. Years of overwhelming evidence meant nothing my man

you bet your fucking sweet can that people will say ah heck with it

[justapotato89]

[justapotato89]

Luigi Mangione’s manifesto (allegedly) - in completely unrelated news, have you all heard of jury nullification?

[justapotato89]

I know this isn't gonna help anyone on the Luigi Mangione jury, but I feel like I see a lot of people throw around "Jury Nullification" without actually understanding the responsibility it entails.

Jury Nullification is NOT your explicit right. It is a legal gray area that rides on the back of your explicit rights. Specifically, a jury has the right to

Return any verdict it sees fit.

Not be punished for the verdict it selects.

Not have their verdict challenged or directed.

For these reasons, you (as a Juror) and the people (as a Jury) have the right to vote whichever way they see fit for whatever reason they may choose. That includes voting "Not Guilty" in a situation where the defendant has broken the law, but the circumstances or law, itself, require an alternative verdict.

However.

Just like you have the right to return whatever verdict you choose, a judge has the right to remove you from the jury if they feel you are being deceptive about your impartiality. The point of a trial is to be as neutral and impartial as possible. After all, a trial with biases is not a "fair" trial. Jurors who have prior knowledge and opinions about a case and its circumstances must be removed from the case and relieved of their jury duty. Jurors who intent to disregard the letters of the law in favor of opinion, morality, whatever, must also be relieved of their jury duty and replaced. Therefore, if you approach your fellow jurors and tell them about Jury Nullification and your plans to utilize it, someone may very well tell on you to the judge. It is then that judge's obligation to remove you from the jury and replace you with a more impartial juror (one that may not know about Jury Nullification). Therefore, if you openly support Jury Nullification in a court room, you can (and will) be removed from it.

So, even if it means hanging the jury with a non-unanimous vote, you cannot inform others about your intentions, and you cannot encourage others to utilize Jury Nullification, too. It sucks, but it's reality. Court rooms are very disapproving of Jury Nullification to the point that they have (wrongly) charged individuals with Contempt of Court for telling jurors about it. Lawyers are even forbidden from telling juries they can use this right, in the first place. That's how disliked this ability is. So one more time:

If you intend on actually utilizing Jury Nullification, you have to be completely silent about it. Period. You cannot inform your fellow jurors about it, and you cannot inform anybody in the court room about your plans to utilize it. That is it. That is how things work, and you have to tread lightly and carefully.

[justapotato89]

‘tis the day, etc etc

[justapotato89]

there's something about the intense popularisation of the uhc assassination and the suspect, so much so that it crosses borders via social media to gain international sympathy about the suffering of the american people due to unaffordable healthcare. Obviously there's some part regarding how america has great contributions to the international market and so on and how any mishap may indirectly affect the rest of the world, but there's the story too. The romanticism of class consciousness, a revolution happening in front of our eyes, the martyred suspect who's an ivy league graduate.

There's also the extremely sensitive deliberation that kids who are getting tablets and phones and access to the internet for the first time will see these memes and jokes made across the world. These kids probably have read hunger games, and harry potter, and a whole world of fantasy revolutions, their revolutionaries and the selfless act of igniting one. Their parents have probably told them at some point that these people are rarer than the children think they are, and that the world rarely lines up together for such a mass act.

Then they open google, and see one star ratings on mcdonalds. They open their parents youtube accounts and see news reporting about how prisoners from inside jails are shouting for luigi's freedom. They see how the media celebrates this incendiary and (necessary) violent action and the similar, incendiary rhetoric in mangione's manifesto. Then they find out that the guy who was killed was the same guy who denied treatment to their grandmother, or their best friend's cousin and i cannot imagine the brilliant joy these kids felt that their parents were "wrong".

[justapotato89]

man my tumblr is so goated i wish i was who my tumblr made me out to be

[justapotato89]

A Bug’s Life, 1998

[justapotato89]

"I’m very concerned about my client’s right to a fair trial in this case.  He’s being prejudiced by some statements that are being made by government officials. Like every other defendant, he’s entitled to a presumption of innocence. But unfortunately the way this has been handled so far his rights are being violated. And as you know, Your Honor, there’s a wealth of case law guaranteeing his rights to a fair trial, but none of the safeguards have been put in place yet here — in fact it’s just the opposite of what’s been happening. 

He’s a young man, and he is being treated like a human pingpong ball between two warring jurisdictions here.

These federal and state prosecutors are coordinating with one another at the expense of him. They have conflicting theories in their indictment, and they are literally treating him like he is some sort of political fodder, like some sort of spectacle. 

He was on display for everyone to see in the biggest staged perp walk I’ve ever seen in my career. It was absolutely unnecessary. He’s been cooperative with law enforcement. He’d been in custody for over a week. He waived extradition. He was cooperative at all accounts. There was no reason for the NYPD and everybody to have these big assault rifles — that frankly I had no idea it was in their arsenal — and to have all the press there the media there. It was perfectly choreographed. 

And what was the New York City Mayor doing at this press conference, Your Honor? That just made it utterly political. And as your honor knows under Loro v. Charles, the Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit has held it to be clearly established that these staged perp walks to the media unrelated to a legitimate law enforcement objective is unconstitutional. And I submit that there was zero law enforcement objective to do that sort of perp walk. There’s absolutely no need for that whatsoever. 

And frankly, Your Honor, the mayor should know more than anyone about the presumption of innocence that he, too, is afforded dealing with his own issues. And, frankly, I submit that he was just trying to detract from those issues by making a spectacle of Mr. Mangione. 

And there are consequences to this. 

He has a right to a fair trial. And I just want to put on the record statements that the mayor made publicly about my client. Nothing saying “alleged” for example. And he said “I wanted to send a strong message with the police commissioner that we’re leading from the front. I’m not just going to allow him to come into our city. I wanted to look him in the eye and state ‘You carried out this terrorist act in my city, the city of New York that I love.’” And he wanted to show symbolism. 

Your Honor, he’s not a symbol. He’s somebody who is afforded the right to a fair trial. He’s innocent until proven guilty. And the mayor was talking to jurors — future potential jurors that elected him. Those are the people that elected him that he is talking to and calling this man a terrorist.

So, Your Honor, I just want to make a record of this and put everyone on notice that this has to stop, and my client is entitled to a fair trial and the presumption of innocence."

From the CNN stream (weird video)

[justapotato89]

This woman was arrested for WORDS.

We should rally for her as much as the guy who actually shot someone. Push back.

[justapotato89]

love how the media is posting excessive coverage about Mangione when all it does is fuel the amount of memes and X posts.

You'd figure they'd have accepted it by now that public opinion is in favour of him instead of against, but they continue trying to sway it. They really think that they can undo the effect of decades of denial of basic healthcare facilities and corporatisation of health care with a few extra hours of video coverage of reporters being sarcastic and condemning the popular support of the youth.

Do they have like zero idea of how social media works or-? Every single hour of footage adds like 10K+ memes across the world. The fact that he's the alleged assassin of Thompson is what makes him so appealing to the public. The algorithms are going to recognise the more popular posts, and show them in the feeds. At this rate, finding a jury that is not in favour of him is almost impossible.

[justapotato89]

holy FUCK dude.

Oliver's monologue is the stuff epic love poems are made of.

Every "I hated him" being over Oliver's villain persona, only to be interrupted by moments that Oliver loved Felix so much that it hurt.

The way he barely gets it out the first time, but keeps saying it over and over as if it will get easier to say if he just keeps repeating it.

Every "I loved him" being over shots of Felix looking happy and beautiful and radiant.

The "I loved him"s being said over the shots of Felix, mostly in the light, and the "I hated him"s being said over shots of Oliver, mostly in the dark.

Felix being synonymous with love, and Oliver, the one who couldn't measure up, the one who had to keep lying about everything and throw away parts of himself in order to measure up, being synonymous with hate.

"I hated him." No, Ollie. You don't. You know you don't. You know there's not one split second that you hated Felix. And that's terrifying.

"You loved him. You loved him. You loved him. By god, you loved him."

You loved him so much that you hated yourself and everyone around you. For not being what Felix wanted. For being what Felix wanted. For coming between you and Felix. For trying to take you away from Felix. For being the reason that you'll never have Felix.

It's everyone that wasn't Felix that you hated, because all your love was reserved only for him and you didn't have a drop to spare for anyone else. And even the torment of feeling this way was a privilege, because it was for Felix. He was worth it. All the tears. All the degradation. All the times you had to cultivate a false image of yourself to avoid losing him.

You loved him so much that he was your whole world.

You loved him so much that it broke you bit by bit until all you could do to survive was become him and his entire family.

Sir John rolling up his sleeves to do business and protect the family legacy. Elspeth with her shallowness and fake niceties. Venetia with her bitterness and selfishness, wanting to play with others' toys. Farleigh with his drug habit and cruel snark.

You'd absorb them all for every moment that they burdened Felix. For every moment they made him act cruel or shallow. For every moment they made him justify them to other people. For every moment they made him unhappy.

So that only pure Felix would remain. Felix without the weight of everyone's jealousy and expectations.

Because you loved him and nothing can bring him back and this is all you can do.

[justapotato89]

i probably realised this subconsciously but seeing it written broke me

Anyone else noticed the way Felix is always baring his neck?? Like even the first time he meets Oliver he's doing this:

Like literally just tossing his head back and exposing his throat. We get this shot of Felix so many times that it's almost a motif lol he does it again here:

And of course he does it in the tub:

And again, for the very last time, in the maze :

Any time I see an image repeating like this over and over again I start wondering how it is significant. If we're reading Saltburn as an non-supernatural vampire story, which imo it absolutely is, we can see Felix's repeated vulnerability. He's exposing his life force to Oliver. We see the pulse in his neck, thinly veiled and beating under his skin. We see his fragility and his exposure and Oliver sees it too. Oliver, functioning as a 'vampire' of sorts, just wants to take. And take. And take from Felix. His obsession with consuming Felix in turn functionally consumes him. He never kisses Felix, he never gets that "bite" Felix is opening himself up to in these moments and I don't think any amount of Felix would be enough for Oliver. Further, i think Oliver actually recognizes his own insatiability in those final moments in the maze and decides that he is going to take Felix in the only way he knows will be complete and absolute. The utter finality of death appeals to Oliver in that moment because he wants everything to *last* and if he can end Felix's life, he knows at least he can do something to Felix that will be eternal.

Which leads us to see Felix hanging his head. He has no life force left to bare to Oliver anymore. He slumps his shoulders and crouches in on himself in these final moments. Oliver has finally drained him.

[justapotato89]

saltburn is a romcom btw sorry to those who don't get it. pin in the bike tyre is just intentionally spilling a drink on your crush for the chance to touch their skin while wiping them down. embellishing a story so they find you interesting? been there. who hasn't drugged a bottle of champagne to kill them with when they don't reciprocate your feelings. that's what young love is all about

[justapotato89]

no you don't get it felix becomes upset with oliver cleaning his dorm because he's breaking the rules. the people who serve felix must do so invisibly because to do otherwise would force felix to confront how much others have to pick up after him and oliver comes in and demands: look at yourself, look at who you are and what you do, and this is the first time that felix resents him

don't make me acknowledge the ways you serve me. don't make me think about it. don't make me look.

[justapotato89]

watch people score higher on psychopathic tests and score more and more left in political compass tests as the baseline average shifts towards people who'd do anything to achieve what they want but are also leftists, with consideration for society. Those two goals are not complimentary, but they are the only two lifelines that they have. Either they are considered as a part of the greater society which deserves equality and they will fight for it through anarchy as a unit, or they will oppose the government with anarchy being concentrated to the individual, the driving force being only survival.