#{opinions}

[procrastiel]

You just proved my point. I never once said I agree with the Republicans, or that Trump “isn’t that bad”. Listening to someone with an open mind doesn’t mean you accept or excuse their behaviors. You can still arrive at the conclusion that they’re full of shit. What I’m saying is this: I may not agree with what you have to say, but I will fight for your right to say it. And that goes for you as well as Trump, even if I don’t like it. It’s not about me, it’s about respect, and free speech.

You can’t expect a fascist to accept you if you aren’t willing to accept their right to say whatever the fuck they want to say. Does that mean you shouldn’t fight for your rights? Absolutely not, quite the opposite! You should stand for what you believe in! Just like I stand for what I believe in. But turning people from “the other side” into monsters is a horrible idea. All nazis were humans, and if you understand that all humans have the capacity to do evil, then it will be a lot easier for you to spot the red flags.

Also, it is possible for people to change. Someone can go from conservative to democrat. And someone can move from a liberal perspective to a radicalized mindset. People’s opinions aren’t set in stone.

Listening to someone who hates you is never easy. I have experienced that, I know. But you still live on a planet with Trump et al. at the end of the day. If you’re saying that being civil is the wrong approach, then what would you suggest instead? Kill Trump? Stop talking to someone as soon as they mention a conservative or uneducated opinion like “I don’t see how a man can become a woman”? I see that as an opportunity for dialogue.

If someone was to kill Trump now, don’t you think that another guy will take his place immediately, and spew the same crap, like a hydra?

It sounds like you’re at the point where you think violence is the only answer, because the Republican agenda is aggressive. I agree that you have to meet a force with the same force. But I disagree with closing yourself off to other people’s opinions, just because they go against yours. That is the one of the first steps of fascism, as others have pointed out above.

Reading the beginning of the thread again, if it’s true that “art should be wholesome” is a sign of fascism, then so would be statements like “anyone can be trans even without transitioning” if you put yourself into the shoes of a conservative thinking person. The question is: what do you want to focus on? Do you want to focus on hating x group of people for their x beliefs or do you want to dismantle the premise of hate in general?

Hate begets hate. They hate you. If you hate them back, do you think they’ll stop hating you, or do you think they will hate you even more? I assume you can see how easily this way of thinking can lead to a war.

Also, listening to someone’s concerns underneath the hate they spew is important if you really want to make a difference. I absolutely respect your opinion, even if you are being rude about it.

There’s a great video that might help illustrate my point a bit better, but it’s 2 1/2h long. If you don’t have the time, it’s about a black man, Daryl Davis, who befriended a KKK member. And in the end? The white man left the KKK. But Daryl had to endure some intensely disrespectful behavior to get to that point.

And I’m afraid not a lot of people have the strength of character it takes to do that, and thus affect real change.

Compromise means that no one will be entirely satisfied, but also no one will be entirely left out.

it's true and you should say it.

[wronghands1]

[theanticool]

One takeaway I have from all this noise around Imane Khelif is that a lot of grifters and TERFs had to make up a trans person to be mad at, which is really sad and funny. I feel awful for her.

My second takeaway is people think sports are about fairness? What? Since when?

[yougetme-closer-togod]

Apathy is distinctly un-sexy. Passion is in (and passionate guys should be in(side me))

Fuck nonchalance—I am obsessed with you.

[tuulikki]

The thing is that the portrayal of Neanderthals as having been inherently grotesque and alien to H. sapiens is something we will never have proof of. But we do have proof that, in different locations and in different populations across time, we all found eachother desirable. We saw eachother and wanted to touch. And the offspring were held by their mothers and raised and had their own offspring in turn.

When you look for the first proof that H. sapiens found Neanderthals repulsive, you have to wait until the Victorian era, when the white masters of empires were busy portraying Neanderthals as stupid, brutish, and (of course) dark-skinned.

In more modern times, we’ve had people arguing that instead of seeing Neanderthals as Benighted Savages, they should instead be seen as Noble Savages, (allegedly) cruelly destroyed and driven from their lands by H. sapiens. Which one of their two you believe says more about your modern political views than it does about ancient H. sapiens.

And, whether we construct Neanderthals as Savage or Noble Savage, the fundamental assumption we project into the unfathomably distant past is still that H. sapiens saw Neanderthals as an Other, with the language we use being almost explicitly that of modern racial dynamics.

But we have no proof of any of that. We have no proof of hostilities. We know we co-existed and we had sex. That’s it.

Humans obviously have sex with some humans and kill others. We also know that, when small groups of humans occupy vast spaces with infrequent contact with others, unique cultures will always form, some more hospitable, some more neophobic/xenophobic. But many cultures of small settlements placed among huge unpeopled landscapes place supreme emphasis on hospitality to strangers. Plus, we fucking love other social animals, as evidenced by how we befriended wolves.

I’m a humourless weirdo and a wet blanket about popular constructions of Neanderthals as “monstrous”, and I freely admit it. But that’s because it’s tied up in legacies of imperialism. Not only that, but it also privileges one culture (yours, mine, modernity’s) as being most human by implicitly assuming we can project it onto people in the past. Since you don’t pretend that all global cultures share exact same values as you do, it doesn’t take more than a few moments’ reflection to realise you can’t do that to the past.

[writing-with-olive]

So i'm working on a project that involves looking at people's opinions on public transportation, and something that keeps coming up is that a lot of people like the idea of public transportation but ridership is at the same time low, so I wanna figure out what stops people from riding.

If you could reblog this for bigger sample size that would be so so appreciated

[transexualpirate]

with the new pjo show im hoping the percy vs harry debate will finally die since it will become increasingly obvious that it actually does not matter who would really win in a fight cuz percy is simply so much cooler anyways

[jdragsky]

the "perfect" apology as taught in a libleft social justice context is bullshit — it's an etiquette ritual designed to prove your loyalty to a community, and isn't any better than any other way to apologize.

it's also invoked in contexts where expecting it is deranged (i.e demanding someone profess full culpability and acknowledge harm without providing an explanation or trying to defend themself, immediately, the moment they've done something which might be wrong? is a cruel burden to place on someone's shoulders)

i cannot stand how much of a cultural expectation people place on it and how weird people get when the etiquette ritual is violated

[sw33tm0urningl4mb]

Deep/Fun Questions to Ask!

Do you like watching sunsets?

Have you ever started a rumor?

What makes you laugh hard?

What's the last concert you went to?

If you believed in it, what would you be reincarnated to?

What's your current vocal stim?

What shirt are you wearing?

Who or what is on your mind?

What are your favorite pair of shoes?

What would easily win you over if someone gave you it?

What three words describe you?

What's a funny memory you have?

Do you have any drunk stories?

What's one thing you own that you're sure no one else has?

Do you have any superstitions?

What is your guilty pleasure?

What weird thing do you do when you're alone?

What is the worst food you've ever had?

What fictional character would you bring to life if you could?

If you could join a career immediately, what would it be?

What keeps you going during the day?

Current song on repeat?

Funniest inside joke?

What's your favorite piece of jewelry you own?

Favorite niche topic?

What fandom are you currently in?

Most controversial take?

Favorite ship and why?

Do you have any piercings or tattoos, and what are they?

What is your worst & best quality?

[itsraining-honey]

hot opinions straight off the stove! 🥘🔥

[non-beanary]

Do you think it'll creep the aliens out when we're really good at spotting ai or robots, like the uncanny valley. Maybe they don't have that and they're like wow you're so good at spotting the difference and oh wow how come your species' eye for detail dramatically got better in the 2020's and we're like haha yeh idiots on our planet used ai to take away one of our authentic human joys instead of using it to allow us to have a better life so we can pursue art ourselves, crazy right? anyway do you want the blargelsnarf or the lemon flavoured donut?

[philosophybits]

If you live in harmony with nature you will never be poor; if you live according what others think, you will never be rich.

Seneca, Moral Letters to Lucilius

[pink-pavlove]

Buckle up babe, I’m ranting again.

MASTERMIND SPOILERS!

okay so I haven’t seen anyone else say this yet so here it goes.

Stolas song in mastermind was obviously him putting on a character, playing a role so Satan and the court would believe he was to blame, not blitz. He plays into the social hierarchy of hell and basically says to satan, you really believe this imp could go behind your back and fool you for so long? If that’s what you want to do, okay blame him.

Pretty expected, self sacrificing stolas stuff.

BUT THEN stolas says something that makes the gears in my brain whirl.

The scene change to give us a glimpse of imps at home watching, they all stare and blink like they are realizing something. Like things are clicking into place. Like SOMEONE just told them to do something and they thought, “hey, that’s a great idea, let’s do that.”

Stolas is not only painting a picture of what went down with the grimoire to trick satan and the court, he’s also playing toward the camera, talking to the hellborn who are watching this unfold from the tvs in their living rooms.

Stolas is basically serving a martyr to them on a silver platter. To me he’s saying, hey! Look! One of your own was about to be murdered for no good reason because people like me are willing to sacrifice your kind for their benefit.

He’s inciting change, revolution. And I think he’s doing it on purpose.

Stolas is the one who inspired the imps to support blitz, to idolize him. STOLAS IS THE REASON FOR BLITZ’S SUDDEN COME UP!

Which gives the line “thanks for saving me stolas.” “Always.” Even deeper meaning because not only has stolas saved him physically, he also just saved his life by giving him the one he always wanted. The life of the most famous imp of all time.

And all Stolas had to do, was lose absolutely everything he ever had. 😭

I am not well. Everything is going to get worse before it gets better. My poor bird boy!

[incognitopolls]

We ask your questions so you don’t have to! Submit your questions to have them posted anonymously as polls.

[room-surprise]

New Ryoko Kui Interview from Anime Expo 2024 (Summary/Commentary)

This interview is unintentionally hilarious. It's much shorter than the other interview, and every question was met with either a polite non-answer or a flat-out "No." Kui embodied this elf lady she drew for the entire thing:

Kui really wasn't having any of it. Every time the interviewer tried to ask a leading question about things the fandom thinks are extremely central to the manga, Kui basically answered no/I don't care/You're overthinking it/I wasn't suggesting what you're assuming I was suggesting.

My summary/commentary of the interview under the cut.

Please keep in mind these are my opinions, based on my knowledge of Japanese social conventions, and how I personally read the interview!

Q: Dungeon Meshi is about the power of eating in groups/family, do you have any food memories or recipes you can share with us that are important to you? A: No. (In other interviews Kui has stated that she doesn't like eating, other people seeing her eat, or watching others eat, and that she used to eat her meals in the toilet to avoid being around other people during meals. This is a common thing people who are shy, bullied, or socially avoidant do in Japan.)

Q: What meal in DM do you want to eat? A: None of them, I'm a picky eater.

Q: You obviously love TTRPGs. A: Uh...Not really... I've never played one, I just read about them for research purposes. (In other interviews Kui has stated she's never played a TTRPG because she doesn't have friends she can do it with. The fact that so many people in the world do have that many friends they are that close to was very shocking to her. She was amazed that people would actually role-play in front of other people. This, plus other things Kui has said in the past ("I'm not good at human relationships"), suggests that she's not very socially active.)

Q: Your fantasy ecosystem is so complex, how did you build it? A: I though about it, and then I used my imagination. (This is kind of an ice-cold burn. Like a writer saying "I wrote one word, and then another, and then I kept adding words until the book was done.")

Q: Do you love monsters as much as Laios? A: No. But I do like them a lot, and I've loved them since I was a kid.

Q: How'd you design Laios' ultimate monster? A: I used the childhood memory of wanting to design the coolest, strongest monster.

Q: A lot of fans think Laios is autistic, especially because of his fight with Toshiro. A: I wrote him to be a normal guy that anyone can relate to. I don't think he's special or unusual. Both he and Toshiro have problems and they both need to work on communicating better. (Kui saying she didn't write Laios as autistic doesn't mean you should shit on other fans who read him as autistic. All it means is that he's not canonically autistic, and you can't say "Laios being autistic is the foundation of the entire manga." Kui saying that she didn't intentionally write Laios as autistic doesn't invalidate the interpretation, it just means saying Laios is autistic is an interpretation, and not a concrete fact. Also worth noting that labeling Laios as autistic might come across as very rude for a Japanese person. Kui may not want to call Laios autistic due to social stigma.)

Q: Tell us about the Senshi fanservice. A: Calling it "fanservice" feels wrong to me. He's just an older man who doesn't care if people see his underwear, something I've experienced in real life. It might make some people uncomfortable but Senshi's just living his life, I thought that was funny. Laios is a bit uncomfortable seeing people in their underwear. (Holy shit. This answer is the equivalent of Kui firing a shotgun directly in the interviewer's face and screaming "it's not fucking fanservice." She's being VERY direct for a Japanese person, and implying that she doesn't like people calling the Senshi pantyshots fanservice, that she sees them as comedy.)

Q: But Senshi's handsome isn't he? A: All dwarves are handsome :) (This is a complete non-answer, and after that previous answer, it's very likely Kui is trying to brush the interviewer off. This is most likely Kui saying "Please stop this line of questioning/I don't want to talk about this anymore.")

Q: What inspired Marcille's dungeon lord dress? Her friends all make fun of her but I thought it looked nice. A: There's no specific reference. I made it up to look like her mom's dress and added a childish head covering. The dress is totally normal, her friends making fun of Marcille is a joke. They're just not used to seeing Marcille in that kind of clothing, so it seems weird to them. They don't actually think the dress is that strange or uncool.

Q: Did you expect the strong fan reaction to Marcille and Falin's relationship? A: I don't think about how the fans will react when I'm writing. (Another complete non-answer. She doesn't want to discuss the topic of Farcille and avoids it like a landmine. Honestly, good for her. She wants fans to feel free to think what they want and have their own interpretations.)

Q: Will you write a spin-off about Izutsumi getting revenge on the person who made her? A: Maybe, maybe not. Probably not. I think Izutsumi's pretty happy as she is and just wants to live her life.

In short, Kui's reaction to a lot of the fandom opinion questions was:

EDIT: Also, looking at the headline/page summary for the article, it's uh...insanely misleading.

"We sat down with Kui-sensei at Anime Expo 2024 to discuss the community of food, why Senshi is so sexy, seeing neurodivergence in Laios, and more." Kui literally said no in response to all of those questions, this summary of their own interview implies that there was anything discussed, and not just Kui telling them "no" to each question.