#'We need some kind of social structure. We need some kind of government because people are just like that. They need someone to lead them.'

[drdemonprince]

do you consider exorsexism to be an accurate/coherent concept in terms of describing structural discrimination against nonbinary people?

when i first encountered the term i thought it made sense, but now i’m wondering how it potential could tie into the ways transmisogynists use “binary trans woman” as a kind of dogwhistle. i have certainly encountered interpersonal bigotry from fellow trans people over my being nonbinary… but none of them had any structural power over me, so i tend to not feel particularly threatened by whatever “binary” trans people may feel about me. on the other hand, i do face a lot of structural barriers in a cis-binary world; but is that experience actually distinct enough from transphobia or cissexism to warrant its own term?

There is definitely a structural oppression of nonbinary people that exists and we need better tools to talk about. To this day a nonbinary identity is not legible to basically ANY government ID office, insurance provider, employer, school, hospital, or other large institution, that gender neutral or unisex restrooms and locker rooms seldom exist, and so many other public spaces & institutions are so rigidly gendered, such that nonbinary people are not allowed to functionally exist in society.

And speaking as someone who has inhabited both nonbinary and more binary trans identities, people absolutely do comprehend and honor the familiar binary options more, gender you correctly more often if you are binary, include you more often in social spaces and events, and are flat out more comfortable around you if you are easier for them to parse. It infuriates me when trans people shit on nonbinary folks as being self-centered and fake oppressed. This stuff is so clear.

And none of that erases the fact that TME nonbinary people often harbor deeply transmisogynistic views -- we live in a transmisogynistic society! all people are inculturated into those views and anyone who is not a trans woman does not get targeted by systems of transmisogyny. trans men are just as bad or worse wrt to all of this, so if anything the singling out of nonbinary people as fake, entitled not-really-oppressed trans people who are somehow uniquely bad to trans femmes is itself a manifestation of anti-nonbinary prejudice. theres nothing the "theyfabs" are doing thats any worse or an different from what you see from just about every trans man and cis woman.

Trans men often DO hold power over our nonbinary siblings, because we are men, often with many of the privileges attendant -- but also a group does not need to be positioned below another group on some straightforward hierarchy in order to experience a genuine and distinct loci of oppression. (see for example the differing experiences of bisexuals and gay and lesbian people). Lateral aggression is a thing, cissexism and coercive gender assignment at birth is to blame for virtually ALL of this, and of course, a lot of nonbinary people do in fact transition in some way (not just medically) and so moves to exclude them from discussions of trans oppression are a bad move.

[honeyblockm]

YOU MADE THE CANONICAL ANARCHIST PRO GOVERNMENT?????

[qqueenofhades]

-Quickly skitters into the inbox, with a boom box and an increasingly bass boosted version-

🎶I PUT MY HANDS UP THEY’RE PLAYING MY SONG THE BUTTERFLIES FLY AWAY-🎶

- Party In The USA anon, on the recent glorious news

Look. LOOK. I know we've had technically bigger fish, but the Georgia case is a Big Fucking Deal. Because:

It is a MAJOR indictment both in terms of scope and seriousness of charges. Not just Trump, but *eighteen* of his allies and cronies got charged with RICO (anti-racketeering, often used against mob bosses) felonies, including Rudy Giuliani (I repeat, HAHAHAHAHHAHAHA), Jeff Clark, Mark Meadows, and other high-profile Trumpworld enablers

No Lindsey Graham (at least yet) but I guess we can't have everything

It encompasses both in Georgia and other states where Trump illegally tried to alter election results (Michigan, Arizona, and Pennsylvania), as those activities related to a conspiracy centered on Georgia/Fulton County

This is the big whopper: TRUMP CANNOT CANCEL THIS INVESTIGATION EVEN IF HE GETS RE-ELECTED. He can shut down the federal Special Counsel investigations run through the DoJ, but this? Bupkis. And Georgia governor Brian Kemp, another of the Republicans who dutifully continues to defend Trump even as Trump slanders him up and down, CAN'T PARDON HIM.

That drives the Republicans NUTS. So nuts that they were, you guessed it, already on Faux News whining about how they should make Georgia change that law.

Boo-fucking-hoo, you absolute fucking wankers.

Also: we need to remember that Trump rose to political prominence by being wildly racist and xenophobic about America's first Black president. He has coddled and exalted white supremacists and white supremacist rhetoric at every turn, it has been the central defining feature of his campaign, and his election subversion efforts were chiefly aimed at canceling the votes of heavily Black cities (Atlanta, Philly, Detroit, etc.)

Trump also won in 2016 thanks to the Electoral College, itself designed as an element of structural racism, by defeating probably the most qualified and beyond any doubt most historic candidate there has ever been, after it was revealed that he was a serial sexual assaulter and after he screamed for months about LOCK HER UP (every Republican accusation is a confession, etc)

All that said, with Trump's vile, derogatory bile spewed at everyone, but especially a) Black people, b) women, and c) powerful Black women, it is a Big Fucking Deal that a powerful Black woman, aka his worst nightmare, pulled this trigger on him.

Don't get me wrong. I deeply appreciate me some Jack Smith. But he is also a white male special counsel appointed by the Department of Justice, and who used to work for the Hague prosecuting war crimes (true story). It's in his brief to do this.

Fani Willis is a county district attorney AND a Black woman, as Trump's nonstop shitgibbering on Truth Social just can't help himself from pointing out. This kind of sprawling, country-wide investigation against a wildly corrupt ex-president and his cohort of equally corrupt cronies is not something she is, in the normal course of things, ever expected to do, but she did it.

NINETEEN DEFENDANTS, Y'ALL. Including Trump. On 41 different charges. That's a hell of an indictment, and she knows it puts a target on her back, while (as noted) she doesn't have the resources and protections of the federal government/DOJ to do it.

Let's hear it for Fani Willis (and Judge Chutkan, who informed Trump the other day the more he runs his mouth, the faster she will proceed to trial) y'all.

Black Women Get Shit Done.

[anarchotolkienist]

Lenin-heads correct me (because I haven't actually read Imperialism - The Final Stage of Capitalism, but the following is what I have picked up from osmosis), but as I understand the basic argument it goes something like what follows:

- Capitalism is victim to a law known as the Tendency of the Rate of Profit to Fall (TRPF), which means that Capital needs to expand in scope, to capitalise (lit. Make capital) out of more and more things that used to exist outwith capitalism, in other words to expand geographically into non-Capitalist (usually understood by MLs, following Engels, as either primitive communism, slave societies, or feudal systems) areas. The way this is done is through imperialist conquest and incorporation in the capitalist system of imperialist states. Therefore, by consciously opposing imperialism the communist is denying the system a way to resolve the TRPF and exacerbating the contradictions within it, accelerating its inevitable fall (into communism).

This actually makes some sense at the time it was written (while the TRPF itself is questionable and the emphasis on purely geographic modes of capitalised expansion would quickly be outmoded, and Engel's idea of the stages of society is racist at best, the basic notion that Western imperialism happened in order to expand capitalist forms of existence and exploitation is undeniably and obviously true). But the idea that imperialism in the current day is based upon expansion in this fashion is deeply silly. Societies governed by non-Capitalist social relations have, with very few exceptions, long since been wiped out and incorporated. There is no geographical area not incorporated in capitalism - 20th century Marxism made sure of that, by being the foremost vehicle of Development into modern capitalist societies for non-capitalist societies.

The idea of many Communists, therefore, that by opposing imperialism they're opposing capitalism becomes much less clear given this. What has replaced Lenins insight there is a kind of Moralist anti-Imperialism, much more similar to the buergois nationalist revolutionism of 1848. We should oppose imperialism because imperialism is evil, it kills thousands of people every day and denies certain nations their God-givennatural right to self-determination. It is Wrong, and since communists are people who are Right, we hate it, and therefore since we are too weak to deal with capitalism we need to ally with the nationalistic local buergoise/developmentalist military leaders/whoever else in order to fight it.

This is a far weaker case IMO, and while I by and large agree with the basic tenent (that imperialism is a morally repugnant social structure that must be opposed), I find it interesting that anti-Imperialism as a political tendency has replaced one for the other without seemingly noticing themselves.

[henrysglock]

Wonderful! A group of rich people died! Let’s dance on graves; I’ll get my good shoes.

But first, tell me:

Did the accident redistribute their wealth to the masses?

Did those deaths take out a harmful corporation in a way that makes life markedly better for those it was harming?

Did it enact any kind of helpful policy, regulatory, or socioeconomic change?

Or:

Are they just going to replace that CEO?

Is that wealth just going to get passed to their next of kin, remaining withheld from the masses who both need and deserve it?

Is this whole thing going to be forgotten by the next news cycle?

Is our collective glee just ‘bread and circuses’ type behavior that gloats over useless and frankly stupid deaths without any actual impact being made?

“People are justified in their lack of pro-social response to this event because of the socioeconomic state of the world.”

Okay, so show me where any of this changes the socioeconomic structure of the world. Show me where there’s anything worthy of “I hope they all die a slow, agonizing death for,” [checks notes], “hubris, a typical characteristic in most humans at some point in their lives.”

Was it all incredibly stupid? Absolutely. Did most of the dead have it coming? Absolutely. The tragedy in it is that there were no regulations in place to say “Uh…no?” when that voyage was in its planning stages.

And the worst part is? Nothing. Changes. So far, these are meaningless deaths.

Imagine we’re in ancient Rome. The CEO of Oceangate has convinced a group of his buddies (and the kid they dragged along) that “Hey, y’know what would be really fun? If we all dressed up as gladiators and paid to tussle with the lion. No, no, yeah there’s a chance you could die, but trust me, it’s gonna be so cool.” And then we all fucking ate it up, half of us cheering on the lion while the other half wept for those poor, poor rich people (yeah I know, I’m rolling my eyes too)…all under the watchful eye of our royal highnesses who put on the show: The Corporate System and The News Cycle, who both stood to profit whether the group of idiots lived or died.

Did the rich folks have it coming? Absolutely. Is it still horrific that it was allowed to happen at all? Yes.

This is why they don’t broadcast the other tragedies. It’s not good for them as a partnership. Those gut wrenching tragedies, the ones with true injustice? They don’t placate us, they upset us and turn us against those in power.

But dumb rich folks dying? On my TV? Oh goody, my fave show is on. Let’s see if it’s started another useless internet war, creating low-level enemies for us inside our screens so we forget about the real enemies for a while longer.

Not only that, but killing a CEO won’t change anything. That’s a replaceable employee, and the corporation as a unit cares about that person about as much as it cares about the rest of us (which is to say: not at all). That CEO’s wealth will just be given out to their relatives, and the money will stay contained within that family unit. The CEO will be forgotten in the next news cycle, when their death is no longer profitable for the news industry and the internet has moved onto its next useless spiral.

Guillotines in France worked because they dismantled the government, which also happened to consist of all the rich folks, to enact socioeconomic change. Thus: people celebrated the deaths of the rich, and rightfully so.

That’s not what this is. This isn’t “eating the rich”. This just the joy of entertainment, a good show.

Nothing ever changes. We stay entertained, temporarily placated by the deaths of a couple rich people.

Bread and fucking circuses.

[drzootsuit]

Been watching through Samurai Champloo recently and man this shit slaps.

What if there were two warriors of equal skill but differing principles who were color coded red and blue and who constantly came into conflict because of their differing temperaments and views, with one being a cold stoic and the other a hot-blooded wildman... and then both of them, in time around each other and with the audience, reveal themselves to be more, with the stoic revealing himself to be deeper and more emotionally vulnerable than he wishes to be, and the wildman revealing himself to be detached in his own ways, both reflecting the emotional landscape of what it means to be a dedicated warrior and how such a life weighs on the soul. I also really like the structure of the stories. Most episodes deal with some kind of injustice, be it xenophobia, human trafficking, abuse of government power, lack of divorce, or what have you, which I feel like is meant to make a particular point about the ways modern societies are constructed. The show is intentionally anachronistic in small places, and while one could see it as being stylistic, I view it as a way of saying "here is the past. Historical period Edo japan. Here is all of the injustice, both personal and governmental, that this era labored under in a burden of hypocrisy where the continuing modernization of the formal systems and life sits in relief to antiquated forms of violence and control. How does that differ from our modern world?" A world where, at the end of things, violence is still the root of all social control. Where injustice of the sort we picture romantic knights and samurai as fighting still exists. Every story the show has, of whores and bureaucrats and artists and criminals and tourists and blowhards and stoics and wildmen... all of those people still exist today. The same stories play out. You could move Jin and Mugen to the modern world, put them in some Pulp Fiction suits, and they wouldn't need a single adjustment to their personalities to work. The incredible hip-hop soundtrack that underscores the show makes this point too, I think. It takes a highly modern sound and says "this is the sound of this story. this is not a disconnected period drama where this injustice is a maudlin thing to click our tongues at as advanced space people. this is the sound of our modern streets, and the sound of the Samurai. Your world and theirs are the same." Anyway I think Jin and Mugen should fight until they're half dead and then kiss passionately with tongue and then refuse to ever acknowledge it if asked.

[eatmangoesnekkid]

On Covid and the next thing coming 🪶🕊️🪽🪞🫀

I generally don't post about things like this on my blog but I also feel that it's important to name and square up on the monster and the future monsters to come. I am overjoyed that this kind of information is finally coming out about the vaccine. If you have some intuitive awareness, you, like me, probably felt that there was something not right about it. Personally there was no way on earth I was going to inject this vaccine toxin into my body even when people were trying to make unvaccinated people feel ashamed about our decisions, called us "selfish," and accused us of not looking out for vulnerable people. My goodness! We definitely need more Priestess women in the world and it's one thing I'm looking forward to about my online school and high-gated online temple space. People are going to have to remember how to trust those who can 'see' in the dark so that we can teach them how to access their seer qualities too or give them some deeper intelligence that will help them to make a more thoughtful decision. People whose mind have been trained on how to think and process information like in the medical, academic/higher education, social justice, corporate, leadership/managerial, or political system will especially need support, alongside any other people who have worked for long hours and haven’t had the time, resources, space, or ease to open up their minds to different ways of thinking and sensing beyond the programming and conditioning. In other words, those who have lived a lot of their life and lifetimes being busy, in their heads or behind computers, will especially need support.

There are many cases of people who died right after being vaccinated or developed neurological disorders when they were perfectly healthy before. It's fucked up how many well-meaning people were trying to force people like me to get vaccinated against our better judgment on how to care for our bodies and the bodies of our love ones. When this kind of evil happen again, or something similar that may not be related to a vaccine but something else, we do not need to separate and point fingers at each other like children but to come together as divine humans. People have learn to trust those of us who have deeper intuitive gifts, and not merely blindly hand their trust over to the government and do whatever they tell them to do to their body. Because most things on the news have an agenda that doesn't support the health and wellness of any of us. And whatever narrative the government and status quo culture is pushing is usually not healthiest option. Education on how to build up the quality and frequency of the immune system is the Priestess path.

If you want to elevate in your female tissues, whatever the government says begin to question it and in most cases, do the opposite. What I hope people take away from experience is the need to wake up and become more aware of the slick manipulation that is coming down the pipeline in the future. If you are still listening to everything in the news and not listening to your own mystical female body, you will never be sovereign and autonomous enough to find real solutions outside the oppressive inhumane structures we have been taught to perceive are on our side.

Never forget that they are more likely than not NOT advocating for your wellbeing and the wellbeing of your loved ones. *The only exception to this would be an elderly or immune-compromised person in your family who really feels that they need to be vaccinated. Some people need to be vaccinated and that vaccination will be helpful to their wellbeing. Do not fight against what is living in a person‘s mind i.e. reality because it will be what they need to be well/better and more relaxed and calm, although you may feel differently about your own body.

I know we won’t see the totality of the effects of this vaccine for years to come, but what’s also true is that everyone is different and some won’t be adversely effected at all. If you were vaccinated, do not feel shame or guilt. Unchecked or unresolved frequencies of shame or guilt comprises the wellbeing of the body. Instead talk to your body. Ask/decree it to break up and dissolve the vaccine out of your nervous system and tissues. People often say you won't receive if you don't “ask.” I find the opposite is true. Asking can leak away a helluva lot of energy…like people who beg when they pray. I find that when I say NO to nearly everything, and make a clear decree on what I expect to happen, blessings come POURING and LEAKING IN because the universe that within us all finally realizes that I will neither be played with; nor am I playing.

Sweating and opening up the body’s detoxification pathways in other ways can also help. Many people are mentally unwell for many different reasons and their state of mind informs why they ‘see’ and the choices they make. A parasite cleanse will greatly help to open up your mind to trigger more mental clarity and access your God energy, intuitive qualities. Build heaven on earth around you—this is the purpose of true beauty. If you can not build it, begin to imagine it. Attract a lover and/or friend you can experience an amplified heaven on earth energy with. Source money and resources in ways that amplify your heaven. If you can’t, imagine what it would be like to do so. -India Ame'ye, AUthor

ETA: While I didn’t personally need any confirmation, Mama Delores affirmed my words. Consciously speaking to different parts of my body everyday is part of my spiritual practice. My most spoken to parts are my breasts which I imagine is the reason I feel so much love effortlessly around being alive at this time. 🥰🫀❤️

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[isagrimorie]

So I was just reading through a Daystrom post about Voyager, I like Daystrom on reddit because it goes in depth and posters there don’t go off the rails with vitriol (it still happens though).

Anyway this was a years old post about a realistic take on Voyager and through most of it I find it interesting and then hit this:

In keeping with the idea that the Maquis would have a much more (for lack of a better word) down-to-Earth perspective on going it alone in a hostile environment, I could actually picture Chakotay or even Tuvok advocating for regime change against stronger hostile alien powers that Voyager might be dealing with for an extended period of time. This wouldn't come from a place of inherent violence or bloodlust from either man, but from a simple place of it being their best chance for survival. For example, in "Year of Hell", we learn that Krenim space extends for 5000 parsecs - that's 16,000 light-years. It would take Voyager well over a decade to clear it (almost two decades). In a situation where the leader of the Krenim government was actively aggressive against Voyager, and the crew had an opportunity to replace him with someone more friendly, I think Chakotay or Tuvok might push Janeway to authorize a CIA-like operation to do it. Of course, making friendly contact would always be the preferred option, but for the more hostile and extreme situations Voyager's foreign policy may end up looking more like that of Section 31.

Ex. Cuse. Me????

You mean war crimes?? Actual war crimes!

Trek folk always accuse Janeway or Voyager of not going fast as possible or breaking the Prime Directive and then suggest this!

Also, Chakotay and Tuvok? LOL. I don’t know if OP was paying attention closely but neither men have the stomach for such actions.

The time they convinced Janeway to roll around in the mud with the Kazon, both Chaktoay and Tuvok balked at the dirty work that had to be done. It’s why after that moment whenever they brought in some morally questionable but logical tactic Janeway’s shuts them down. She knows them, loves them, and know they would have cold feet immediately.

And then the OP added things from Ron Moore, the vaunted What He Would Change— there were some good ideas but also these are the takes that made me realize I would hate his version of Voyager.

Much like I ended up disliking most of BSG.

"When we were talking story before the season began, I thought, 'One of the shows you should do is the trial of Captain Janeway. You should have the crew, one day, put her on trial.' That would be a real major thing in [the] life of the ship, if the crew can do that, if they really have the power to take command away from her at any moment. If they are really willing to put her under that kind of microscope, it calls into question the entire structure of the show, the entire social fabric, the command structure. Why are we behaving in this way? Why do we hew to these rules anymore? Do the rules still apply to us? What do we find within the rules that work? What do we find that doesn't work? What does it say about Janeway? I thought that there is ground to play there."

I’m glad this didn’t happen because this is another show entirely— it belongs on a different franchise.

I don’t mind Janeway being questioned and challenged and Trial episodes would be good and some friction would be good. But a full scale mutiny? On the first woman Captain? The Optics would be terrible, and putting Janeway on trial for what??

Didn’t Sisko, on his watch Poison a whole damned planet and didn’t even get a slap on the wrist? He got celebrated for it.

And I love Sisko but every-time people mention Janeway never faced the consequences of her actions away with everything… this is the kind of thinking that got Janeway killed in the Litverse because the writers thought she needed to be brought down a peg.

So no thank you on that.

[variousqueerthings]

happy aromantic awareness week!

I've been slowly exploring and poking at my aromanticism throughout the last year or so. while I've been happy to id as such for about 10 years (however long it was after I learnt the term) I definitely felt a certain reticence about thinking too much about it, and mostly deep-dived into other facets of my self -- aromanticism makes even other queer and lgbt+ people uncomfortable, and since I was living my life as I wanted to anyway, I was able to be open about it without insisting on understanding (call that a mix of internalised aro-phobia, fear, and probably just not being ready)

I think as I get older the aro part of me feels like it's coming to the fore as the constructs of society affect me more and more. it's not easy being a part of the world without conforming to normative ideas about relationships and family

this has made me both more radical in my aro-based politics, while also asking more questions on a personal level: what do I want out of my time around other people? what matters to me about connection?

it's been leading me to exploring the term "loveless" -- a pretty heady word I think, a lot of people have a kneejerk reaction about it, but it feels good to me. this could be something in flux (similar to how i inhabited what I call a void space in terms of gender before feeling comfortable exploring masculinity-as-drag, and with asexuality before I started poking at kink), but honestly I've never understood the term or its apparent accompanying feelings. I enjoy the company of other people, I like sharing things with them, and I have connections that for one reason or another have shared more than others due to the ways we've met and our history together, but I'm also not deeply emotionally affected by people on the whole, nor do I feel like I'm "missing" a certain kind of connection that I need to pursue to feel whole

I mostly spend time with others through the lens of specific community spaces, in which we have the same goal (be that political, artistic, fandom-based, sharing rent, etcetc.) and that's really what I want -- shared goals, having a fun time, building spaces, communally caring for one another

so that's where my aro-based poking has lead me so far. it's still a tad reticent, because... well I do worry. I worry that people in my life will take this to mean I'm uncaring about what we've done together or the plans we've made, or that I'm in need of some kind of fixing, and I'm worried as I have been since I was a kid that in the next 10, 20, 30+ years I could really be struggling to survive, because I'm not able to create the kind of social safety nets that are "acceptable" in the eyes of government structures

I do have a safety net currently, and it's a good one I think, with people I really like, and who care about me, but its legal ins and outs, as well as my internal being that will always have this particular lens through which I experience the world, make it less stable than if I'd been in a romantic relationship or even if I experienced "love" in some other way (and tbh ending up in this scenario was pure happenstance and I'd never have been looking for it otherwise)

so to think about the future: what forms of connections do we value, materially? what kind of people do we allow to thrive and under what structures? how do we build (queer) community spaces in which we provide care for one another that aren't predicated on finding the exact special person/s that potentially leave others behind? how can this kind of ethos on a massive, societal scale, potentially make us more able to care for people with no social safety nets, especially homeless, disabled, elderly, and underage people, who get stuck in systems that can't -- and often won't -- adequately support them?

and what sort of connections do you like forming that aren't strictly romantic or fall under "the special person" categories? personally I just joined the local theatre group and am going to their social events and it's been a massive boost to my self-confidence

[yourgamemasterthewhiterabbit]

There is a level of 'anarchy' that crosses the line from being leftist RIGHT THE FUCK into a "survival of the fittest" [or socially fittest] that -sorry not sorry- is actually very 'right wing' in the core underlying beliefs that you aren't examining, very ableist in ideology, and I am very much starting to get the sense that a lot of you 'leftists' are way too sheltered to be able to tell where that line is, or tell one kind of anarchy from the other.

I don't want to have to be the guy to point this out, but the people in society who are currently cops, in a world with no government, no policing force, will not vanish, lose their social privilege, or change their ways. They will still be socially privileged men with guns and certain beliefs, and now with no governing body to answer to and no accountability except to people surrounding them who hold the same beliefs that they do now. And you certainly aren't going to rise up and overpower them any more than you are doing now.

So maybe you personally aren't benefiting from social services or a disability pension... But I am sure you can see how if we eliminate government altogether, instead of restructuring it, that removes social services, that eliminates pensions and welfare. That eliminates taxes and the potential of UBI. That eliminates my means of survival.

A government -should be- at it's core the elected management of shared infrastructure and publicly shared services. Laws should be a standard we all agree everyone should be held to equally for our collective safety. A policing force should only be responsible for stopping people with expressly malicious intent that cannot reasonably be dealt with by other means [aka not a tantruming autistic man but a school shooter, someone willfully raping people at knife point, stop making strawman arguments about this that willfully ignore that some people are bad on purpose]

There ARE examples where a trained social worker would be better, YES, I Agree! But to imagine we live in a world where bad actors with guns don't exist is a daydream, the problem is addressing how the public service -police in this instance- is allowed to operate, what is left up to them instead of alternative services, the issue is not that we shouldn't have police of any kind. The issue is what we allow the government to govern [ie: what we do with our bodies], not with having any form of government. The issue is with how we allow laws to be used [ie: to disenfranchise black voters], not with the very concept of having laws.

And -follow me on this- all the social issues making those things issues the way they stand now, make a lawless ungoverned alternative WORSE actually, because racism, sexism, ableism, christianity, and etc will not vanish once you abolish laws and government. People will not suddenly find the extra energy or social ability to strengthen community ties in a way they don't find manageable now to any notable degree, and being forced to, under the duress of "well otherwise who would defend me" is uh... Do I have to point out how that's a recipe to push a lot of people further into abusive circumstances?

What we need to do is dismantle the ASPECTS of the system that are allowing it to function as a POWER STRUCTURE, not eliminate having any means of systemically holding each other accountable, or eliminate the infrastructure and social services provided by having a council of elected officials.

I am on board with releasing all non-violent offenders over night, tonight, the stats on recidivism are clear and more robust social services are the answer... But I am sick of the straw-man arguments some people are making where i am somehow only arguing against releasing violent offenders over night because I "imagine my opposition in the debate doesn't know what it's like to experience violent crime u.u". I only know that you don't know what it's like to be ME in MY POSITION experiencing a violent crime, which is a very different thing, and the reason I know you don't understand my position, is that all of your assumed solutions DO NOT APPLY to me in my life, and your proposed alternatives leave me to suffer and die. The thing is, you need to have a replacement system in position before abolishing prison entirely for those people, because just handing them back open access to their victim pool because "incarcerating people is bad actually" isn't the acceptable solution. What you are arguing for will get society's most vulnerable raped and murdered in an awful hurry. If you don't think that's going to blow back on every vulnerable group you claim to be protecting first and foremost, you aren't thinking rationally.

Societal biases, racism, sexism, transphobia, ableism, homophobia, antisemitism, etc all may be a part of the system as it is, encoded in it, but they all exist without that system. Without government, laws, prisons and police of any kind, you are still at the mercy of the same people with the same biases and the same intentions. The goal should be to remove those biases from the system, not take any system away from a society that will still have those biases. Groups like the proud boys, the kkk etc... Will still all exist as organized groups without government.

The goal should be removing unfair power structures, or any power structures, without removing accountability. We need MORE accountability, actually, and that doesn't happen en-mass without a system of enforcement. The 'system' is needed for accountability. This idea you have where everyone deserving can somehow appeal to their community and be treated fairly is uh... delusion. My lived experiences tell me this is very much delusion, and with the use of no straw-man arguments whatsoever, just talking about my own life, I can tell you exactly how/why if you stopped avoiding the direct conversation and making separate vague posts about people like me, and started actually directly answering to the protests of the people you claim to be helping.

This goes for pretty much everything. The path to a better way of doing things isn't to remove all restrictions and systems with the faith that people will 'sort themselves out somehow', accepting that society's most vulnerable are just acceptable sacrifices. The path to a better way of doing things is to make policy changes and replacement systems until we get to what cooperative society should ideally look like. And I will gave you a hint, making people rely on their personal social connections in order to have any recourse against abuse AIN'T FUCKING IT.

And yes, that means FUCKING VOTING.

That means voting as far left as you can, not criticizing the leftiest candidate during election season, and then holding them accountable the rest of the 4 year term, or whatever your country does.

There are a lot of government systems or interference in our lives I think should be abolished or completely overhauled, but if your brand of 'leftism' or anarchy leaves me to be raped to death unless I can "appeal to my 'community' for help U.U", because you can't be bothered to examine or care about the real world implications of what you are arguing for, fuck your entire self.

Because I can tell you EXACTLY how your vision for my future will work out for me, and you haven't been listening.

When I make a post about how I am unsafe in my surroundings, or the ways in which I cannot access help from the system as it is, I DO NOT need to be told "Oh in anarchy we have a solution to that U.U It's called, 'get to know your neighbours better' u.u" Only to have people rage-quit being my friend when I want them to engage with the reasons I gave for that not being an accessible solution for me. Or gods forbid, ask them to only reblog the version of my post with MY ANSWER on it, instead of the one where someone is glazing me out of my own picture.

For me this isn't just a social performance and a debate about theory, this is about my life and my right to safety.

Believe it or not I understand anarchy, and many of the different types of it, and also what people actually seem to mean by it when they make arguments online... And I do already get along with a lot of anarchists, actually. I understand that a lot of this is why people found bodies of political thought that incorporate communism and anarchy together. I do not need this shit 'explained' to me. The point of contention is that the particular blanket arguments you are making are completely ignoring that people like me exist and also deserve safety, not that I am just not understanding you. The issue is I am trying to discuss specifics and you are trying to hand me blanket placations for social clout instead of actually engaging with any practical question of how we can get from here to a better world without throwing people like me under the buss in the process.

Understanding broad strokes anarchist theory isn't ENOUGH actually, you have to have down to earth conversations with real people, who are actually the most impacted, about how to actually -apply- that theory in a way that doesn't FUCK THEM [unsexily].

I shouldn't HAVE TO have friends, or appeal to my birth family, or make niceys with my neighbours in order to afford the right to basic safety and survival. Some people aren't found to be likeable people, Karen, and the punishment for that shouldn't be rape and death.

And my tone shouldn't have to be apologetic and soft in order to be dignified with a response. Even with my friends. Especially with my friends.

What the fuck ever happened to "any system that doesn't protect the most unpleasant, inconvenient and unconnected person, is a failure of a system and we should do something else."? It stops applying the moment I am an inconvenient person and things start requiring more thought from you than just shouting about 'anarchy'... IG.

Idk how to tell you this, but a stubborn and willful lack of officially coded system for doing things is still a system actually, and can be critiqued by the same measures.

All arguments of "we should eliminate the system instead of trying to work with it" are literally just "we should burn down the current system before replacing it with anything and if people die in that harsh transition then that's an acceptable cost to me".

If you want 'anarchy' whatever that means to you, the way to get there is through consistent policy changes until the government and police etc... is backed out of anything you don't want them in. That IS social revolution. It's just done in a way that's sustainable and actually gives people like me a shot at surviving it. It isn't glorious and violent, or fast, it is slow, hard work. It is voting, discussing things in detail, hashing out a firm plan and organizing to stick to it. It is paying attention to little policy decisions and doing the work of designing the new systems to take the burden off the ones we have, in specific details, and implementing changes.

Not hammering on about broad strokes ideology to talk over anyone raising concerns, for clout, and then refusing to vote.

And yeah, it's going to require listening to people with perspectives outside your own instead of stubbornly refusing to engage with potential allies and friends because they don't believe in the exact same pure thing as you. It's going to require setting your feelings aside sometimes when people don't grovel while telling you why they have a problem with what you just said. It is going to require actually understanding other people.

Because this violent or sudden over night revolution you think needs to happen instead will make sacrifices of all the most vulnerable. All the minorities, everyone you claim to be protecting or fighting for. The groups of men with guns will still be groups of men with guns. Your violent anarchist revolution is a pipe dream, a child's daydream with a bunch of willfully ignored skeletons collecting at the bottom.

Laws, administrative bodies, enforcement, accountability, a system of justice and, yes, currency, unfortunately are all actually necessary for society to function well with this many people and are not -inherently- evils, and the things that can turn them into evils are there regardless.

The fact that so many people see 'government' as somehow being opposite of collective cooperation is uh... A symptom of having a lot of bad policies. And maybe we should collectively agree to change those policies. Maybe.

[sedoretu]

Holy shit I need everyone to listen to the first half of this 15-minute podcast and the absolutely depraved, horrific things that Republican convention-goers say into a microphone with a smile on their face.

RAMEY: You know, I believe in some aid to other countries, but, you know, we need to support our allies. Ukraine is not really our ally. So - Israel's our ally and always has been. And when you turn your back on Israel, you're turning your back on God. So that's just the way I was always brought up. Israel's God's chosen people. The Jews are God's chosen people. And, you know, they need to be taken care of. They didn't ask to be assaulted. They didn't ask for people to come in and steal their women and children out of their homes. So I know, in West Virginia, if that would have happened, it would have been a war. So - right there in my own backyard. You're not stealing somebody's child or their sister or their brother or their grandma and torturing people without getting some repercussions. So I just believe people need to love each other more and more, you know? They need to read the Bible or whatever faith you belong to and figure out that, you know, we're all in this world together, struggling every day, trying to make it. Be kind to people, you know? Give the kindness, and the kindness will come back to you. I believe Donald Trump loves our country. I believe he - I know he loves our veterans. I know he loves our military. I think he loves me, you know? To be honest, I think he truly cares about the American people. Joe and Kamala - I get no warm, fuzzy feelings at all from those two.

or

KHAN: Well, coming from India, culturally, I'm pro-life. India has 1.4 billion people. And secondly, you know, I support - see, our foundational values are - in America are freedom and liberty and free market enterprise structure - capitalistic structure. It's not the perfect model, but it's an optimal model. I didn't come here for socialism or communism. And out of - you know, I don't want to disrespect any gender thing, but I did not come here to support the LGBTQ rights, to be very honest. Culturally, we don't do that. So my values resonate more with the Republican Party, which happen to be our foundational values as well.

or

DONNA VAN AUSDALL: Aloha. I'm Donna Van Ausdall. I am a kupuna, which is senior in Hawaii. I'm 71 years old. Well, I've been involved with the Hawaii Republican Party since I became a Republican back in 2016. I'm just so thrilled to be here. To see President Trump in person is a huge honor. KHALID: You said that you've been involved with the Republican Party since you became a Republican in 2016. So were you not always a Republican? VAN AUSDALL: No. I was a hard-core Democrat. And JFK was my childhood hero, like many of my generation, right? But my husband and I are devout traditional Catholics, so we made a heartfelt choice to become conservatives because of the abortion issue, you know? President Biden is a Catholic, and I'm very disappointed at his pro-abortion stance, you know? So - and I love the conservativeness of Republicans. You know, we want our country to continue to have its constitutional freedoms with the Second Amendment rights. You know, a lot of states are enacting gun laws that I think are too stringent.

I know some of y'all have beef with Democrats but if we don't organize and turn out the vote in November the government will be run by and for these hateful people

[the-legendaryphoenix]

I honestly don't usually talk about serious stuff, but I feel I need to say it. Ive been having thoughts bottle up for the better part of a few months, and I have to put them all somewhere.

This will be somewhat disorganized, but I need to get my thoughts out there. These are also the deranged rantings of a college student that is up at 3 am due to an inability to sleep, so feel free to take all this with a grain of salt.

I talk about capitalism, socialism, power structures, future worries, AI, emotional issues, climate change etc in this essay here. If you're sensitive to those kinda things, feel free to ignore this/block me/avert your eyes. I won't mind.

Yall are not beholden to magically change the world. It's nearly impossible to. Mass societal change almost always come from grassroots movements. There's ... no other way to change society otherwise.

Take generative AI and all. Before 2023, it was just this novelty and a toy that only a few people took seriously. Fast forward a bunch of companies tinkering with it and more eyes slowly getting drawn to the tech and boom suddenly we got trade unions like SAG AFTRA having to throw the video game voice acting industry to the wolves in order to get protections for actors and writers. We didn't get that outta thin air. It was a thing that was built up over time, before suddenly exploding like this.

I'm not entirely convinced AI shit is purely a product of capitalism. AI is just another step in humanity's forever quest to optimise the fuck out of everything regardless of whether or not there's a soul left at the end of it. This would happen under capitalism or socialism. The government - no matter how many social programs they have - is not your friend. Corporations are not your friend (we're in this kind of AI mess because corporations wanna make a quick buck remember?) If it weren't to make money off the backs of artists under capitalism, AI would also be used to generate endless propaganda and distractions by socialist states in order to stop the transition to communism & remain in power. (Think something akin to 1984) Both corporations and the government are wolves in sheep's clothing at absolute best.

Im not saying socialism couldn't work or that it's worse than capitalism. I just dont think socialism would magically solve all the worlds problems at the snap of a dictator's finger. Alotta that has to do with power structures that will be talked about shortly. Also, socialism cannot exist in a democracy. If the people choose their leaders, then the leaders have to constantly farm support from those that help them get elected. And it's not really socialism if some people are getting more than others. That's just our current system but you got authroitarianism instead of democracy. And don't point to systems like those in Scandanavia. Those are capitalist countries. The amount of government safety nets does not change the fact that unless the government has complete control over the entirety of a country's economics, its not socialism.

Due to how power structures work, I don't think violence and/or revolution against the elite will solve anything. Violence would only give them a reason to pull one of their many strings to get a government or private organization to crack down on the rest of us. No one rules alone. There's always got to be others that do the work that leaders cannot physically do themselves. This means that Authoritarian leaders must always give money/favor and or turn the other cheek to the ones that help them rule, and that represenatives must be open to favoring their supporters. If that means the government/leader/whoever ignoring obvious problems, then so be it. And for revolutions, the citizens cannot complete one on their own. The millitary has to allow it. And the citizens do not exactly get to choose the next leader. The Americans won the revolution only because the British had to deal with economics and morale. Had they had unlimited money in their vault and the troops were always raring to fight, the Americans would have lost.

Anarchism would circumvent a lot of the needless power structule bullshit. But as long as humanity has desires, there will always be some method of control over a group of people. Anarchism and communism are amazing ideas on paper. I just cant see them working.

Going back to my main point, its likely that none of us will be able to change the world. At the same time, the world can change you. A lot of my views on politics, friendship, and life in general have shifted since I started studying at college. Through this, Ive come to also realize that getting all worked up about stuff is an exercise in futility. Reblogging posts doesn't change the world. Doomscrolling through reddit and tumblr hashtags doesn't magically solve all problems that you see in the world; it just makes you lie awake at 1:45 AM feeling horrible and all. Wondering if living is still worth it gets you nowhere. It just makes you feel like complete ass when the anxiety passes and you wonder why you were considering such things after seeing an image with impossible geometry/the wrong amount of fingers/inconsistent everything.

You're not given the secrets to life, the universe, and everything on a silver platter. You have to find them yourself. Even if the world/circumstances are determined to make you miserable. You still have to find what's important to you. Ironically, I did get that from somewhere else, namely Pokemon Scarlet... but I also practice Catholic Nihlism, so its also an independent thought I came up with myself. [God gave me the right to choose what meaning I derive from life so I'll do it damn it!]

To clear up worries AI, there's always going to be human soul in some form of art. Think of indie productions that literally do their own thing; regardless of what the market dictates. Think of local artists that perform in your local theater, make paintings for your local museum/gallery, and writers that just sit down one day and write down what's on their mind. In that regard, AI's a tool. Genuinely.

Ive witnessed my friend use it to brainstorm/assist in some pretty difficult narration/dialogue for their fanfic. Ive used it myself to brainstorm some of the more complicated logic for some of my programming projects. You can use it for good things actually.

It's like a hammer. You can use it to help you build a house. You can skip the hammer and use screwdrivers and also get a good house. But you wouldn't want to build a house entirely out of hammers for multiple reasons. If AI doesn't prove to be a passing fad, market forces might start working against it. Think of how many people are fed up with disney and marvel's bland formulism that still has humans behind the wheel. If they add AI to rush things to the big screen at breakneck speed, people are prolly not gonna waste their time anymore. They're probably just gunna not give studios their money. AI is extremely controversal too. The fact that alotta people aren't just rolling over and taking it is a good thing. [The deal SAG AFTRA signed sucks I get it but its kinda easy for VA's to just... strike. They can deny the use of AIs trained on their voice. That's ... something.] (There's also the whole studios pushing for NFT thing and how that was a collosal failure. Its kinda an apples to pears comparison, but I'd thought it was still relavant.)

I know Ive been kinda hard about human nature too; but cmon. Most people are great once ya hear them out. I met my 2 best friends from all of us willing to listen & work through the others' problems. Even strangers can be great. I can randomly spark up small talk with people Ive never seen before at college, and it always comes out great. Most peeps aren't chronically online! they love talkin in person!

Humans have the power to work through a lotta stuff too. Hell, even the most frog-in-a-boiling-pot thing known as climate change is being worked on. Assuming no further reductions in emissions are made, we'll end up 3 degrees warming at the end of the century. That's ... dangerous, but it's an improvement from Around the 2010's when climate change WAS apocolyptic. We were on the 4 degrees timeline, and we will not go back there unless we ACTIVELY try to. Even in the worst case, humans and nature are very stubborn. Things absolutely have been worse in earth's history. Things just happening faster that's the problem.

Though if you do wanna make an impact, local politics and conservation are your best options. You may not be able to change stuff nationally or globally, but local stuff does make a difrerence. (Also the point above about local indie artists :P local really is the best huh?)

Starting local also has the advantage of being grassroots. People respond better to changes in their local community than those from the feds. It also affects how they vote, which in turn affects who leads nations and all.

Hence, my point about grassroots, huh. full circle.

You don't have to change the world as you don't owe it anything; but if you feel like it, go for it! Form a small group! Be a force for change!

I know its a bit contradictory to originally say stuff about posting doing nothing, and then for me to turn around and do all this; but I make my own meaning :P. (Ain't nihlism awesome.) I also just mostly needed to collect my thoughts to share with my friends.

I don't have anything else to say right now, so thank ya if you read this far. Means a lot you took the time to read all this.

yeah, have a wonderful day. :3

[dailyanarchistposts]

Deserting Social Media, Keeping a Low Profile

As anarchists, we are all aware of the risks that new technologies can involve. It is no surprise that our phones and computers can be tapped and that our favorite websites and social media platforms are monitored by the authorities. This is why, for strategic reasons, we believe that we should minimize our dependence on social media and new technologies in general. How many times has online information—statements, posts, pictures, friendships, events—been used against us in court to add more charges to our cases? We need to be more cautious with these tools in order to protect others and ourselves. As younger generations of activists are joining us for actions like those of May Day, we have to find ways to pass on proper security practices to new participants before they get themselves into trouble.

A Facebook event entitled “May Day 2018: A Day in Hell” and a call for a “revolutionary, determined, and fighting procession” were posted online before the eyes of the world. Our point here is not to attack the authors of this call, but to consider the use of social media as a platform to announce actions. What is the goal of advertising such an event online? Publicity, certainly. It is true that we need to announce events in order to draw people to them who are not already involved in our circles, but perhaps there could be a way to do this that would not also forewarn the authorities as to the character of our plans. When we do so, it enables them to prepare strategies for media narrative and repression in advance. Of course, the authorities already suspected that we intended to join the traditional procession and unleash hell, as we did in the past; but we should not make it easy for them to predict where and how we will strike, nor to identify the most confrontational elements. Regarding such press statements from our side, they may sometimes be necessary, but we should avoid publicity stunts of all kinds, and we also have to consider what the process is by which it is determined which actions are announced and how. These announcements can make things possible, but they can also make things impossible. One of the greatest structural challenges of organizing in the 21st century is how to resist the dictatorship of those who have the most media access.

Because we openly announced our intention to carry out a frontal assault, the authorities had plenty of time to prepare a trap for us. They used this call to warn trade union leaders and to stir up the tensions that exist between them and some individuals in the leading procession. We should take care not to use rhetoric or publicity strategies that will leave us more isolated and vulnerable in the end. There is no doubt that the government is increasing its pressure on us, and an approach that works once may not work so well the next time. Michel Delpuech, the Police Commissioner of Paris, reported that the police and government officials were generally pleased with the results of the law enforcement strategy they used on May Day, and that they already knew in advance what our main targets were: the train station and the district police station.

All this raises a lot of questions regarding our discretion, our ability to stay under the radar while getting organized until the day of the action, and also our ability to remain unpredictable. We should not depend on social media to communicate among ourselves, and we should be intentional in determining which information we share in different venues. There have to be other safer ways to reach out to others—especially newer generations—without having to rely on social media or voluntarily drawing attention to ourselves before an action. For us, the solution lies deeper underground, in our informal assemblies, gatherings, meetings, and parties, where real human interactions and affinities can flourish. It is there, and through meeting new people in the streets or during actions, that we can develop and extend new informal connections and solidarity while escaping as much as possible from the constantly increasing state surveillance.

[magnetarbeam]

Voices of the Force: Brainstorm Notes 1

The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of bringing the Empire of the Hand back out of obscurity as an antagonist for the Galactic Alliance.

Their status since a little before NJO is an almost total mystery, but we know they still exist in some capacity because of that scene in I think Apocalypse where a fleet from them shows up to help Jag against Daala for some reason.

Because we've heard so little about them for so long, it seems to me that there's no reason not to flesh them out as kind of a dark mirror to the Alliance.

The ideological basis of the EotH is the same as that of the GA: A more centralized government providing a more efficient military to put against a superior force. One of the differences is that the Hand used it as a justification for colonialism and stuff before the Vong actually showed up in any meaningful force.

The reveal here would be that the reason we didn't hear much from them in NJO is that they were busy defending their own territories from the Vong. I'm not sure if the Vong should have actually had any particular advantage, but in any case events prompted the Hand to centralize their command structure more, and at least all their military forces are now under a single command.

Actually, I think the entire government structure becomes more centralized in a more Imperial structure, and the thing that makes it different from Palpatine and whatnot is that there actually are still threats around that... hmmm. Unlike the Galactic Empire in the Palpatine era, there are still plenty of threats around in the so-called-Unknown Regions that would be doing some fucked-up shit to people if the Hand didn't provide the strength to stop them. On the other hand, I think I could establish that many of those threats may have listened to reason to get them to stop, and instead the EotH just wiped them out.

And I don't expect anything they fought after the Vong would actually be strong enough that a completely centralized command structure is needed to fight it.

Metaphorically speaking, to a hammer, everything looks like a nail. That's also summarily part of why things eventually escalate into war with the Galactic Alliance.

I'm not even sure why the EotH would help Jag fight Daala, at least in a canonical context. Maybe the Hand, or at least that fleet, is led by one of Jag's immediate relatives, who thinks that he's redeemed his family name and stuff between Alema and his actions as Head of State of the Imperial Remnant, and that the family owes him or, like, some kind of something to that effect.

In this AU, Abeloth's tendrils stretched just as far in that direction, and it stands to reason that the powers in what people mostly still call the Unknown Regions out of habit would want to know what the hell that was. The GA has at least astrographical maps of most of it at this point, but the HoloNet and other facilities for distributing information like the story of the takeover aren't in place in those areas.

The fact that Force-sensitivity can occur in almost any sapient life form, mostly at random, means that organized institutions for management of it would spring up just as naturally as other forms of societal command structures and stuff.

I know in Disney canon the Chiss have their navigators or whatever, but they don't have any kind of Force group in Legends, as far as I'm aware. My best guess is that it was seen as a threat to their social order and was therefore suppressed.

An idea I've had since before I even conceived Voices of the Force is that Thrawn saw Vader and Palpatine and the Empire's various other darksiders doing stuff like choke people from across the room and shoot lightning out of their fingers and realized the Force, whatever it is, could possibly be very helpful for his own ends. So he scraped up a surviving Jedi or two and brought together representatives from all the local Force traditions of the maybe early-interstellar-stage species that he unified under the Hand's leadership, and created an official Force group for the Empire of the Hand, which is aware of a shitload of powers developed by those local traditions in their former isolation, many of which were meant to deal with specific environmental conditions (like the storms on Dorin), and all of which are unknown to the Jedi and the other Force groups on the other side of the hyperspace barrier.

I'm starting to think that the plot of Ahsoka and Jaina and Ben, accompanied by Jag and Zekk, continuing to retrace Jacen's sojourn doesn't start until a little bit later. They want to do this, but they have no more leads. There's a line in Omen about Ben having known all the places Jacen went, but if that was the case - actually, hang on.

Even if Ben knows all of the places Jacen went, he doesn't necessarily know the order he went in, which is also important for an attempt to retrace the path he took, and that would be why they always have to ask if the various beings know where Jacen went next. So they know the names and maybe locations of all the places Jacen went, and they don't know what order he went in.

The Ascendancy now has to deal with the Force existing.

I've started to worry about Abeloth getting into people's heads on that kind of scale because you could definitely argue that it means all other stories, even those meant to have nothing to do with it, have to deal with it on at least some scale. In FotJ, Abeloth's control is portrayed as a pretty subtle thing, and not the kind of experience that would necessarily traumatize everyone that experienced it. I think if, like.

I had to think about this because of Mercy Kill, the only novel that's set after FotJ in canon. That book is sacred to me and I absolutely do not want to fuck with it here. If all of those people had Abeloth in their heads, compelling them to vote for the senator she possessed, I at least would be able to read that book without questioning why it didn't come up.

The Empire of the Hand's Force tradition - the Clasping Hand, because those people are not subtle in their names - is established as a place Jacen went, and that Ahsoka, Jaina, Ben, etc eventually show up to in the effort to retrace his path. The Hand has records of Jacen's interactions with their central administration, and what specific powers he was most interested in learning.

Of particular interest to me in terms of Caedus' weird powers is the ability to literally take away and then just as quickly give back someone's Force-sensitivity, an ability that Vergere also knew. I have no idea where that came from, and if I establish that it came from some obscure planet in the Unknown Regions that was later absorbed into the Hand, it also could go a long way toward patching up the continuity, or rather the lack thereof, about Vergere. The idea would be that she was a Jedi from the Old Republic, and everything she said about her involvement with the Vong's discovery of Zonama Sekot is true, but at some point in the next twenty years or so she was able to see this specific weird planet and learn their Force powers, and the stuff she learned there caused or contributed to her Falling and then secretly becoming a Sith, and the Vong didn't know or care at all.

Because taking away a person's Force-sensitivity does strike me as a very Dark thing to do. Jacen would have been willing to learn it because he thought there was no dark side, and for obvious reasons that ability and any others he learned on that specific planet can't have immediately caused him to fall, but it might have immediately caused Vergere to fall.

I have to wonder what role that power would have played in its society of origin. Can you give Force-sensitivity to someone who didn't have it at birth? Is it, like, something you're supposed to prove yourself worthy of through accomplishing things in life?

My current conception is that the Jedi don't have any idea where to continue retracing Jacen's sojourn for maybe a year after the story starts, and in that time Jaina and Ahsoka and our other heroes are mostly doing regular Jedi shit. Probably unraveling some evil plot by a major corporation of the Alliance that has holdings outside of its space so they can get away with illegal shit, and that corporation makes an attempt to influence the GA government to stop the Jedi from exposing their schemes, but that attempt fails because I really do want to portray a largely competent Galactic Alliance.

As far as I can tell, FotJ wasn't even trying very hard to push the idea that the government was corrupt at large. Just that Daala was an ass. I don't believe for a second that these groups would be directly represented in the Galactic Senate like their PT-era counterparts, and I think in the fallout from the collapse of the Treaty of Vontor, at least the corporations that were suspect in slavery would face some pretty severe repercussions from Wynn's government.

Also, Wynn and Gavin are the only people outside the Jedi and the people that live with Jedi who know of the fact that Jedi Shadows are being placed into undercover positions in the Alliance primarily to thwart any further attempts at infiltration by the Sith, but the Shadows are also instructed to help root out regular corruption wherever possible. For Alliance political figures, I think letting yourself get bribed is... not treasonable, exactly, but punishable on the same level.

I think the Alliance would dedicate as much of their fleet as possible to actually conquering what's left of the Hutts and bringing their territory and former slaves into the Alliance, as a response to the stuff about the Treaty of Vontor. This is probably where the new Rogue Squadron roster with Syal and Vestara and whatnot gets their first action together. It wouldn't take much of their strength.

[kagedbird]

Idea based on friend of mine suggesting ideas of modern Kaidan….

Imagine reverse scenario of allora au, modern skyrim and she came from skyrim era earth. Or shes from skyrim and got plopped into modern earth

God, do you know how overwhelming that'd be?

There's no magick in our realm, so I don't think I'd keep whatever magick I did have, so like. That's all ready overwhelming. Secondly, no gods?? What?? Like, no one to directly commune with or anything like that. Akatosh?? Mara?? Where are you?? Who is this Jesus- why is he dead?! WHAT DID YOU DO TO YOUR GOD?!??!? (AND WHY ARE SOME WAITING FOR SOMEONE TO PROCLAMATE THEIR GOD-)

Secondly the TECHNOLOGY. THE ADVANCEMENTS. You see all these people living in thatched roofs, stone and wood houses. It's a little cold and drafty sometimes but it gets the job done. DO YOU KNOW HOW OVERWHELMING AC AND HEATING WOULD BE?? Instant spoiled cat. I'd never leave the house. OR THE PLUMBING-

God there's just so much. That's not even getting into the politics, economy, infrastructure (kind of)- it'd be weird to see so many people homophobic too, given the world of Skyrim is essentially full of bi / pan people. And I consider Interesting NPCs to be canon- IDGAF- that beautiful trans darling asking for aid for you to help her transition makes me cry. Not being able to magically transition?? Being GOUGED for prices to feel comfortable in your own body?? A travesty.

Kaidan would likely have to hold me back on storming up to the White House or whatever official in the area he lived in and giving them a piece of my mind. I do enjoy the idea of the boys being like, college roommates or something, that's super cute. The three of them having to hide me because I just question EVERYTHING and EVERYONE. None of them can EVER let it get out that I just fell outside from the SKY, I'd be taken by the government somewhere and tested by various scientists.

Kaidan would probably be really concerned about me a lot of the time- all ready stressed out from faltering on his grades for college courses and now he's gotta keep a random woman who fell into his lap safe?? STOP TOUCHING THE ELECTRACAL SOCKETS WOMAN- this man needs a nap. But he'd be really sweet about educating me about life around the area for sure. Street smarts, definitely thinking his weaknesses in school is that he was homeschooled his whole life maybe? And the overwhelming college transition is making it more difficult? The pressure, the costs, the amount you have to deal with; it'd be a lot for sure. But I'd help with what I could, even if it's just a rubber ducky moment where he reads stuff out to me just to find what in what is wrong.

And I know you specified Kai, but I do enjoy thinking about what my other husbands would do with me around 😊😂 Lu-Lu would be pestering me about magick versus science and, me being me with loves for both, would go back and forth about discussing the utility of both in the world, despite how little the advancement is in society. Definitely talks about the Dwemer- probably asking if THEY were Dwemer and wondering if I got shunted by the Heart somehow, despite being no where near the Tribunal or Solstheim. He'd be all over learning about various aspects of Skyrim, the gods, the social structures, the wars- horrified of course of the ongoing war, but all the more curious to how people handle it.

Inigo and I would be fast friends, as always in every universe. We both have that sense of humor that most people find a little kooky but we fit like a glove together! And I could definitely see myself opening up to him about the horrors of war that had been going on, worrying about my family and if they were okay, etc. He's very relaxed but also has a lot on his shoulders, and I'd definitely wanna be there for him too.

OH but man that raises the question about Bren- would he be in this universe? If he is, I feel like he lives nearby and finds me after I get lost around the nearby area, takes me in, takes care of me for a while until the boys find me. I don't want to leave him behind in another universe, thas my uncle. Him family.

The biggest question would be why was I sent here? Because I all ready have that figured out for TESSDE, but in a modern setting, in this world, what would the gods have for sending lil ol me a whole world- an entire universe- away? That's the big one. I don't want it to be a punishment because TESSDE is about finding your place in the world no matter how much it seemingly doesn't want you, and I'd wanna keep that. But I'm not sure how I could twist it for a real world.

(Maybe watching the Barbie movie could help.)

Sorry for this HUGE blurb 😂 Not what you were expecting I'm sure, but it is always so fun to think of AUs!! Thank you for asking!

[a-dragyns-reflections]

A Year in Review - 2022

This past year has been such a wild combination of opportunities, personal development, and professional development, as well as finding out more about myself and who I am. Let's begin shall we?

My year started off with me continuing to work overnights in retail. I had taken an online grocery picker job back in mid-2020 to just start earning some sort of income and opportunities in teaching were surprisingly few and far in between for that solid 2 years I worked there doing this kind of work. It was an okay job, but I missed out on so much working overnights- I was not able to keep up with current events, could not make plans with people, and just had to basically survive in that role instead of enjoying it. Fortunately, I would leave this role this year- thank goodness for that too because I was not sure how much longer I could handle such a job any longer than I did.

It's funny because I knew I would be leaving this role or doing this role in a smaller capacity as early as November of 2021 because I had been accepted into my school board- it was just a delayed start date by months due to constant chasing of paperwork from previous teaching opportunities both in my current city and in the UK. I finally got word in March of this year that I can start to substitute teach in April. That word and news finally was what I needed to change my overnight availability to just weekends, then spend the rest of my week doing my best to accept whatever substitute role and job was available on their platform. It was a welcomed change, but definitely an exhausting adjustment when I started the 2nd/3rd week of April- why did I start so late one might ask? Well, I had a vacation planned that was another amazing highlight to my year.

In early April-ish, my dear friend Darryl, after a long 7.5 year friendship, finally was able to safely travel up to my part of Canada from California. It was so so so fucking amazing to see him again as it had been a long time since I went to California for a long 2 week adventure back in 2015- long overdue to finally see the bestie again. We went all over my city in the 3-4 days he was here for- from seeing his reactions to poutines, Tim Hortons, and how my city had some surprising unique buildings, structures, and even venues to go visit. He had heard about these places all the time from me over the years, but to see him take it all in, in person, with him beside me? So incredibly special. I was an emotional mess for a week after he left; but I know he is going to be coming back to my city this year most likely for a convention I will be talking about later on in my year: Animethon.

Substituting then started shortly after he had to leave and it was wild jumping back into the classroom again, in person, not online. At this point, most people had stopped wearing masks as the government dropped the mandate due to insane protests for months on end. It was terrifying being there and still to this day, I am constantly aware of students and staff in schools I go too working while sick and have to be diligent and safe myself while others have stopped caring or cannot be safe any more...it is a heavy feeling, but nonetheless I made many connections immediately upon substituting, especially at my old high school oddly enough. I had been to a few schools downtown in my city, but it was near the end of April I went back to my old high school twice for social studies cover, and then near the beginning of May, I went back a third time to cover Spanish- an whole long story in itself as another opportunity came my way from accepting that first, one day job.

Taking that Spanish cover job would lead to a long series of insanely amazing, yet stressful events. During my first day covering for the teacher, she reached out to me to ask if I could come back the following day, potentially two days. I said yes because the more you cover for a teacher, the more pay you get in my school board so I was like, sweet- yes please! Cue the next day and again, the teacher asked if I could stay the rest of the week and potentially Monday as well- shortly after that, the department head came and spoke to me seeing if I would be interested in remaining covering for this teacher for two weeks as the teacher needed more time away. I said yes, I would need resources and some help adjusting, but sure. It's an amazing opportunity, why would I turn this down? On the third day of covering for this teacher, after some observations from the department head, I was asked to come see her after the work day was done. it was that meeting that she offered me my temporary contract to remain teaching Spanish full time until the end of the school year- a 7 week temp contract that would change my life so much. It led for me to quit my overnight job on the spot that Friday night, left me scrambling to lesson plan, get resources and guidance from all kinds of people like my department head, the teacher I took over for a bit, and even my old Spanish teacher that taught me at that very high school I was now teaching at. I worked 7:30am - 5pm most week days, and worked those similar hours on the weekends at times as well as I took over everything; lesson planning, teaching, marking, assessing, etc. It was a lot and most days I felt the weight of it all, never took lunch breaks, and just kept going and going and going until the exam break hit and I could breathe a bit. My biggest win from that experience was connecting with the students to receive the kindest of emails and cards at the end of the period, and even one student thanked me so profusely for working with her to bring her mark up 30% to pass the class and move on to grade 12 this year. It was a whirlwind of stress and fear that I was failing these kids by jumping in so late and not sorting myself out right away, but in the end I did not fail them, they got to know me and i got to know them, and I gave these students opportunities to improve their marks after an awful first 2/3 of a semester with constant substitute teachers who did not know the language. We managed and got through it together; to everyone's relief. Whenever I do go back to my old high school as a substitute again, I still have some of those previous students stop by if they see me in a classroom or even ask how I am doing if I am teaching them that day. I would call that a successful experience with that reception I get going back there to this day.

Another highlight to this year was actually coming out as demisexual and pansexual. I was questioning my identity a lot during the pandemic as many failed dates and people pushing physical acts on me left me so uncomfortable I felt broken and wrong. Why wasn't this working? Why was I failing at dating and finding the wrong people? Was it because I refused to put labels on myself as a stubborn person who originally thought labels would limit myself and my experiences to what those labels were only? It was a lot of those thoughts that led me to talk to new friends and explore so many websites that shared so many positive ace experiences with great break downs of everything under that identity. In May, everything I read and experienced and talked to people about just clicked and ta-da! I am demi, I am pan, and I am so happy to be both. My first Pride ever was my first out Pride and despite knowing the stereotypes people had about ace people in the 2SLGBTQIA+ community, I felt so incredibly accepted, welcomed, and celebrated in June I still get a little emotional about this to this day. Now my family do not understand or even want to know more about this part of me, so that was a bit weird to like be out, be proud, but had people ignore me that were supposed to be my loved ones and such, but honestly? Fuck them. I know who I am and do not need approval from people who are not invested in my life any more.

It was also around this May/June period I entered a mentorship program that featured all mentors from the 2SLGBTQIA+ community. I was amazed at all I had done leading up to June, but I as confused about what I should do next; do I continue to try to grow my community on Outschool and be an online teacher? Do I look for more permanent, stable work? What about the queer community and where do I or could I fit in? I met so many amazing potential mentors, but Josh was phenomenal. He had me share about my passions in that first meeting and found things for me to do to work on immediately; create business cards for substituting and my queer D&D classes on Outschool, join local queer FB groups and events, and make some new connections in my community. I worked so hard on all of these things and my August was so successful with gaining more students, going to variety of events, and planting some seeds for connections to continue to grow what I was doing- showing how inclusivity can be accessed in such fun, creative, and personal development ways. It was working, but now what? September started and things slowed down immensely Outschool wise. The second meeting led for us to discuss making a business profile of all the classes I offered as well as workshops I could offer using this inclusive lens in gaming, as well as reaching out directly to local organizations such as the Pride Centre here in my city. Receiving the next steps and reflecting on how much my work meant to me, I had the confidence to start doing these bigger things that led for me to receive paid opportunities to teach Queer D&D sessions at the Pride Centre! Those went so well and bringing in the fun, quirky, and respected queer NPCs I had developed for my students led to amazing success. 2023 they want me back fairly regularly and we will be sorting out a contract on that in the New Year! I have also been asked to work on ensuring curriculum is inclusive in both Toastmasters and in another opportunity I will be talking about a bit further down. Not only did I find myself as a queer person, I found my community, and I am helping to ensure these communities are well respected and represented in every aspect of gaming and education. What a year! Thank you Josh, you were the greatest mentor I could have ever had this year.

Now back to the summer a bit- not only did I attend Pride, but I volunteered and attended so many other events. I volunteered at Pride where those connections first began and started. Also, I volunteered at the Heritage Festival in my city that brings so many people and cultures together in a large park outdoors where over a 130 countries had pavilions/tents selling food and so many amazing other things they could share about their culture. It was hot, it stormed, but I enjoyed helping people find the tents they wanted to go too and learning so much about different cultures there as a volunteer- the best way to travel to a country without actually going there. Worth the sunburns and rain soaked clothes that weekend. I also attended a TikTok Marketing Conference that summer as well- which was valuable and insightful as taking on a new Public Relations role in Toastmasters for my one club. Learning the peak times to post clips, what tags to include, how many times to post any content in a week would lead to the amazing success of ExtraLife this year (see my last post for more details). While I may not use TikTok that often any more- I can see the value of it and hope to explore more in the New Year after that event. I then attended Animethon and it was amazing- the cosplays I saw and took photos of, the people I met, the artists I adored and their work, plus discovering new shows and characters made that event amazing for me. I also recognized that going to an event like that by yourself is very difficult- surrounded by people, being pushed around, feeling lost, and the anxiety of, again, many people unmasked, left me having a few anxiety attacks that con, but at least there were quiet anime viewing rooms where I discovered SpyxFamily and Scarlet Nexus- my two favourites of the year. Hence why, hopefully, Darryl can come to Animethon 2023 with me so that won't happen again. Last but not least, I then attended and volunteered at my city's Fringe Festival. It was an 11 day festival with so many different plays, shows, acts, and more. I volunteered for 4 days, but also went for an additional 4 days to support so amazing acts such as yegDND, Iago vs. Hamlet, Mark of the Minotaur, Queer History: A Queer Musical, Undead Newlyweds, Mi Habana Querida, and many many more shows. Being an Ambassador, it was almost expected for us to go to as many shows as possible so we could hype up local and international acts, help people find venues, and hand out little stickers that made both kids and adults so excited- a beautifully busy event but I so so so enjoyed it, every moment and every show.

The next big opportunity that came my way in 2022 was becoming a Public Speaking Coach for a start up company called TalkMaze! It started out as teaching only one group class every Monday evening, to then teaching two students 1-1, and as of this past month, being promoted to being a Coach Coordinator for the company that has so many aspects to the role on top of continuing to teach public speaking and confidence as well. The goal of this company is to help youth develop a sense of self-confidence through public speaking, debate, and eventually through model UN as well. I currently am working on the public speaking and speech classes to help these students achieve this goal, but my more recent role is also becoming very valuable as well. As the Coaching Coordinator, I am currently developing and revamping the 1-1 Program curriculum to ensure that every lesson does add value to the student in regards to building communication and public speaking skills, as well as developing their sense of self-confidence. When this development and revamping is finished in a few months from now, I will also be helping to hire new coaches, train them, develop SOPs for their various roles, and even provide feedback to the coaches on how well their lessons are going as I get to observe them as well. Such a valuable role and if I continue to do well, there is a chance to jump to full time and lead the entire Education side to the company- a goal to achieve in 2023!

2022 has given me so much in so many unexpected ways; from finding my confidence in teaching again and leaving a toxic overnight work environment, to even finding myself and creating a safe community for myself as demisexual and pansexual, to so many opportunities in teaching D&D, teaching public speaking, and now developing curriculum that gives me so much meaning and purpose in my life, to also hitting an amazing fundraising goal for ExtraLife 2022.

What does 2023 look like for me?

Hopefully working hard and becoming that Education lead for TalkMaze, travel at least once this year somewhere again as I miss traveling a LOT, have Darryl come visit me for Animethon, continue to offer inclusive gaming and education workshops in various capacities, fundraise $1250 USD for ExtraLife, and make so many new friends. I want to do so much with my life, and if I do not aim high? I will get stuck, and what fun is getting stuck when I now know how much I can offer to the world, and how genuinely proud of myself I am. Hopefully you all will be here with me during this journey and I cannot wait to see where 2023 will take all of us.

Happy New Year everyone and stay golden~

PS. Toastmasters reflection will come in June of 2023 as Toastmasters goes from July-June year wise! Stay tuned~