#(and i mean this for all political/social propaganda not just one side or the other)

[nyx-lyris]

this is beautiful

[infiniteglitterfall]

OMG, COULD EVERYONE PLEASE STOP IMMEDIATELY BELIEVING AND REPEATING DISINFORMATION?!

Sorry, I just. Was just on Twitter, and I snapped.

I literally haven't seen one true statement about Israel on social media in MONTHS.

It's gotten to the point that I'm seriously considering starting a sideblog fact-checking all of it.

PLEASE STOP BEING GARFIELD I AM BEGGING ALL OF YOU

BE NERMAL FOR FUCK'S SAKE.

I've written at least one really long post about fact-checking things before. I have another saved as a draft somewhere.

But all you really have to do at this point is GO LOOK AT AN ACTUAL NEWS SOURCE.

What do I mean by an Actual News Source?

An actual news source will tell you where it's getting its information.

Basically: Wikipedia rules apply at all times. Citation. Fucking. Needed.

Except with news articles, I don't mean a detailed footnote.

I mean, if they say, "Rosco Flubberish reported seeing a pig fly across Whatever Place. 'It was a flying pig,' he said," they're fine.

If they say, "Sources close to the President reported that the Department of Farmland Creatures launched a pig into the air this afternoon," they're fine.

If they say, "There have also been reports that pigs flew," they are purely making shit up.

Just check CNN or something. CNN checks their shit, and they're very quick on the draw.

NBC has been very reliable too, in my experience. So have ABC, Newsweek, the Jerusalem Post, the Guardian, the New York Times, the AP, PBS, the Washington Post, and Reuters.

You can break through most paywalls by putting archive.is or 12ft.io before the https:// of the URL. Or just go to either of those sites and paste the URL in the box.

Nobody is perfect. I've seen some articles from all of the above that were accurate, but left things out that I personally thought were important.

Journalists are humans, humans fuck up.

(Also, NONE OF THIS APPLIES TO OPINION PIECES ON ANY TOPIC. Opinion pieces are exactly that: opinions. They don't seem to be fact-checked anywhere, as far as I can tell. They range from super-accurate and informative to complete nonsense.)

(Surprisingly unreliable sources in my experience: Democracy Now, Jacobin, Workers World Party. The latter two act like news sites but are basically running nothing but opinion pieces; Democracy Now can do important deep dives, but I've also seen news coverage from it that was wildly misinformed in that same way.

On the flip side, Slate and the Atlantic are largely opinion -- the Atlantic more than Slate, maybe -- but they often have really well-researched analysis of political situations. Ditto Teen Vogue, and sometimes Vox.)

You don't have to read CNN or the NYT or whateverfor fun. You don't have to make it one of your news sources.

Just. Do a quick check on Google News before you assume anything is true, and then run it through a bullshit filter as described above.

You are being actively lied to, all the time. So am I. We all are.

And people will believe and repeat literally anything that sounds about right.

That's just human nature.

That is WHY none of us are immune to propaganda.

if you want my personal shortlist of Bad Sources, as in Sources That Consistently Publish Absolute Falsehoods:

Any and all state-owned or state-controlled media. For example:

Al Jazeera is owned by the Qatari government, and so are a bunch of other news sites.

Mehr News, the Tehran Times, Al-Quds TV, and Al-Alam are owned by the dictatorship of Iran.

Oops. Looks like every form of broadcast Iranian news media is owned by the dictatorship of Iran, which has a monopoly.

Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation, Palestinian News and Info Agency, and Al-Hayat Al-Jadida are owned by the government of Palestine (the Palestinian Authority)

Al-Aqsa TV and Felesteen are owned by Hamas.

TASS / Russia News Agency, Russia Today, and a fuckton of others are owned by the Russian government.

State Media Monitor seems to do a pretty great job of tracking and listing these things. Check out your own country there!

I specifically listed those ones because some of them (especially Al Jazeera, Mehr News, and TASS) are sites I've seen come up frequently on Tumblr, or in my attempts to fact-check what people are saying here and on Twitter. The rest are just more examples from the same governments.

Al Jazeera deserves special notice because it's become a very popular leftist news source. Believe me, I used to read it all the time too.

It can be reliable and accurate sometimes. But:

It consistently tweets things that are unsourced, never appear anywhere else, and that would be big news you'd expect it to follow up on if they were true. It seems to be following a strategy of "tweet every rumor you hear in case it's true, so you can get the scoop."

It also does this with its liveblogs of the war. And ALL its coverage of the war at this point is liveblogs. So things that are verifiably true will run right next to things that are complete hearsay, but are too long to just tweet.

This is especially dangerous because as far as I can tell, Al Jazeera doesn't delete anything that turns out to be false.

I've also seen regular news articles in Al Jazeera, on multiple topics, that veer from Absolutely True Statements to Wildly Exaggerated Numbers and Speculation. Stuff you wouldn't expect a source on, like statistics or descriptions. And there's no way to tell the difference unless you already know a topic really well, or are fact-checking them while you read.

One especially terrible example, from Gazan activist Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib:

Al Jazeera has never posted or published a correction.

Alkhatib has also blamed it for destabilizing the region, although he's exaggerating about it being Hamas's official propaganda outlet:

TL;DR: If you see a Tumblr post making any kind of factual news statement without a link, at this point you need to assume it is absolutely not true. And either scroll on past, or go check Google News.

If there IS a link, you need to click through to see what it's from and what it actually says.

(Honestly, you need to do that with Wikipedia too. I've repeatedly clicked through on citations that absolutely did not say what the article implied they did.)

And pro tip: on mobile, you can just smack a button to sort Google's news results by most recent, and it helps A LOT. There's gotta be a way to do the same on desktop, but if there is, it's not immediately visible, which sucks.

[horreurscopes]

So, I could be out-of-bounds here since I think you meant it as dark humor, but what did you mean in the tags of that 'israel-hamas war' post? I suspect you(and op) are criticizing that framing because Israel is obviously demolishing much more than 'Hamas'(and probably doing a terrible job of actually targeting terrorists- they seem content to reduce Gaza to rubble even if the brass of Hamas escapes). I'm guessing that by saying "joining the Israel-Hamas war on the side of Hamas" you mean, if they're going to conflate Palestinians with Hamas unilaterally, then you're saying, whatever the media wants to call Palestinian civilians- you still support them. I am asking anyways though bc, given reports of increasing antisemitic activity in the US and Europe, I am worried about the potential for blurring lines between the cause of Palestinian civilians and the alt-right individuals who are likely masking their antisemitism in the context of being anti-Zionist. Although Israel's government has been the source of Palestinian loss for decades, (it seems to me that) even joking about supporting terrorism is enough to reinforce the persuasion that Israeli/Palestinian Jews and Palestinian Arabs must be mutually-exclusive peoples. I don't think it's fully rational per se(tho I'm not claiming to have all the relevant information myself, and I'm white US American goyim so like- grain of salt-), but I think that existential fear is the incredible hurdle facing Zionist Jews. (Idc too much about the opinions of non-Jewish Zionists bc I don't grant that they are dealing with the same emotional complications at this time, although that doesn't stop me from arguing w my acquaintances abt their callous acceptance of US/Israeli propaganda.) I just think..... isn't it overall harmful to allow anti-semitic rhetoric, even used sarcastically, to enter the genuine humanist cause for Palestinian liberation? Or, have I misunderstood, and you actually are not in opposition to Hamas, or something else I didn't think of?

hi! thank you for approaching the question thoughtfully and with curiosity, i really appreciate it. i was being kind of flippant with that meme, but this is the only ask i'm going to reply to on the matter given that i am neither jewish nor arab, so i'm going to answer in earnest:

hamas is a political resistance movement with an armed wing, much like the black panthers party was, and like the bpp, a large part of the organization is dedicated to social welfare and civic restoration.

they have stated that they are not against judaism, but against the zionist project. they openly support political solutions.

labeling hamas a terrorist group is a propaganda tactic used by the united states and israel to justify the horrors of settler colonization.

hamas is palestine, a part of it, even if palestinians like any other demographic on earth, are not a unified, single-minded people. to declare hamas a separate entity falls prey to the imperialist lie that there is an enemy to fight "fairly" within the people they are displacing and exterminating.

am i rejoicing in the deaths of israelis? of course not. killing civilians and taking civilian hostages is a war crime, whether it is committed by the opresor or the oppressed. the israeli government is not its people, and many jews, within israel as well as in the US, are bravely risking their lives to publicly dissent the criminal acts of the israeli government. all loss of human life is a tragedy.

no one should ever be faced with the choice between annihilation and murderous violence after exhausting all other forms of peaceful protest and being massacred like animals.

but why is it that we consider a resistance group formed within a population with a median age of eighteen a terrorist group, and not the IDF, a US-backed military force with an annual budget of twenty billion dollars?

i am currently reading hamas and civil society in gaza by sara roy to learn more about hamas and the history of israel in palestine. i'll remember to post more excerpts which i am admittedly terrible at.

but all of the information above can be found by reading wikipedia. investigating with duckduckgo searches (not gonna pretend google isn't prioritizing propaganda, to be fair), and reading reliable news coverage like aljazeera and the many journalists who are at risk of, or have lost their lives, reporting on the ground.

i have also appreciated reading posts from @determinate-negation @opencommunion @fairuzfan @ibtisams and @bloglikeanegyptian amongst others

in conclusion:

[mightypurplethunder]

I don't want to see any of you usamericans talk about "punching nazis" ever again. I don't want to hear yall pat each other on the back and say shit like "If I had been alive during the holocaust I would have done something about it", or any other white savior shit like that.

You don't care about jews, you didn't care about them back then, just as you don't care about palestinians now. Yall repeat and repeat "the holocaust was terrible, we should condemn it", not because you care, but because it lifts yourselves up. Because it's the only war that the US won where they just happened to be on "the good side", so it portrays you as heroes, warriors of justice, which happens to be excelent propaganda material, so you exploit it. You make memorials, you make films, hundreds of them, fetishizing the jewish suffering and portraying yourselves as the force of good that saved them all. Meanwhile, dozens of other genocides - many of them even bigger and bloddier than the holocaust - happen around the world, many of them endorsed or supported by your government. But yall don't care. It's not the holocaust. You're not the good guys in this one so why bother making a movie, why pay atention to it at all? It's hard to keep track of everything happening in the world, it has nothing to do with you. So you just keep scrolling your socials paying no mind to whatever fucked up shit is happening out there, until you run into some fucker from the global south posting something mildly critical of israel, or about how the United States shamelessly exploits jewish history for the sake of warfare, or how victim mentality is a dangerous thing for a marginalized group to hold on to, and you get furious. How dare they say things that don't align with the narrative I've been fed my whole life?? They are anti-semitic!! They hate jews!! They are nazis!! And you tell them so, you put them in their place, because you are a democrat and a good guy and you won't tolerate nazis. And then you reblog "support our troops" posts and write letters to your president begging him to bomb brown people on the other side of the planet because they are terrorists, I think. And I'm here to tell you that you are not the good guy, you are not a hero. You are a victim of indoctrination and an idiot, and your domestic white politics mean absolutely nothing to the rest of the world.

Yes, I did watch Schindler's list. No, I don't hate jewish people. Yes, I'll aggresively condemn Israel's actions and anyone blind enough to say that one genocide justifies another, and I will always support palestinian people. And if you happen to be a jewish person that has somehow found themselves in the center of a conversation that isn't even about you, and getting negative attention you don't deserve, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that no matter what you do or where you live, you keep being used as a scapegoat and your life and history exploited for colonialist propaganda, your heritage is worth more than that.

So keep calling yourselves the good guys, keep pulling the anti-semite card or the "Palestine is homophobic" argument. Keep playing your white politics in your white country that you stole from non-white people. The rest of the world is watching you and history will remember you as what you are and always have been; fucking colonizers.

[comikadraws]

Hello. I really like your analysis of the political stuff in naruto, and I just read your latest one in regard to Hashirama's odd neutrality towards 'the curse of hatred™'. But I kind of want to know now: could you say the same about Kishimoto himself? Does he agree with the 'curse' in a simular vein as H.? Or is H. a deliberately flawed character rather than something that the narrative primarily sides with? (because that's the impression I've got but it's been a while, so idk, I didn't really get the nuance of the plot in the way that you explore when I first watched it)

Authorial Intent and the Curse of Hatred

Okay, so I've got like ten other Naruto asks in my inbox but I will prioritize this one real quick because it is actually very central to a lot of my posts. I already went a little bit into this mess when I analyzed the "Curse of Hatred", but I feel like this topic deserves a post of its own.

This particular part of the discussion leaves the confines of Naruto as a fictional universe entirely and instead delves into the realms of authorial intent analysis and criticism.

My TL;DR is Kishimoto very much intended for the "Curse of Hatred" to be real and the narrative sides with Hashirama and Tobirama (and that is problematic). In the longer version, I am particularly focusing on Tobirama as he is the founder of the Uchiha Clan Genetic Theories™.

I also apologize in advance because pointing out Kishimoto's shortsighted writing is something I have gotten harassed over in the past. Hence I believe some theoretic knowledge is needed.

<Analysis under the cut>

Note: As always, blue links are external links or other people's posts. Red links are my own posts that add context to my thought process.

The problem with Kishimoto's intent is that the guy almost never explains the intention of his writing. This is why discussions like "Was Itachi retconned" or "Does Kishimoto hate Sakura" persist to this day. The only thing we are left with is to instead infer the meaning from other sources (such as the manga itself or minor remarks from interviews).

My conclusion is influenced mainly by four things: The social and political context behind Naruto, Kishimoto's usual treatment of sensitive topics, the narrative of the manga itself, and fantasy genre conventions.

But before all that, here's a little info dump.

Death of the Author

In opposition to the idea that the "Curse of Hatred" is real in canon stands the idea that it was just Tobirama's racist propaganda piece - and this is actually a fairly widespread thought. Not necessarily a misconception, however, as it depends on your school of thought when it comes to engaging with fictional text - Extreme intentionalism (full submission to the author's intent), Anti-intentionalism (complete disregard of the author's intent), or anything in between. While extreme intentionalism can probably be considered the "truest to canon" (as opposed to anti-intentionalism, which is more like a subjective interpretation or "headcanon") it is also incredibly limiting to our fandom experience.

Before I continue this, I need people to understand that both approaches are valid. Especially in instances in which the author's intent translates very poorly into our contemporary understanding of the world, as is the case with the "Curse of Hatred". Both authorial intent and the audience's interpretation are vital puzzle pieces when engaging with a piece of media critically.

To clarify, I do not support Kishimoto's writing decisions in this. I am not pushing an anti-Uchiha clan agenda. What I am going for is analyzing Kishimoto's intended canon. As I have already pointed out, it is a canon that is problematic and nobody should be forced to submit to.

With that out of the way, back to the main topic.

Social and Political Context of Naruto

Personally, I believe it is possible that Kishimoto intended to portray themes of prejudice in his story. Mostly in the sense in which people get defined for their worst character traits (as we can see when comparing Tobirama's and Hashirama's characterization of the Uchiha Clan) or for their affiliations (as is also the case with Jinchuriki). I do not believe, however, that he was aiming for racism specifically - and definitely not for scientific racism, let alone eugenic ideologies. And this has a lot to do with Japan's lack of sensitivity when it comes to racism.

For starters, Japan has a very ethnically homogenous society with about 98% of its population being ethnically Japanese and therefore having one of the lowest diversity scores in the world. On top of that, Japan has no national human rights institutions or laws against racial discrimination. The Japanese population is rather unsensitized to themes of racism.

To not turn this into a fallacy of composition, a different user pointed out that Naruto (as a story) was possibly influenced by Japan's reactionary right-wing movement (possibly revealing Kishimoto's own political standing). The movement responded to an increase in anti-Japanese sentiment across Asia. Said sentiment was sparked by a controversy in which Japan omitted its war crimes (which is a well-known pattern in Japanese politics).

At the very least, it is correct that Naruto is very pro-state in its way of protecting the state's reputation by hiding its crimes from the public consciousness. Kishimoto himself demonstrates an incomplete understanding of Japan's war history by unintentionally paralleling WW2 crimes in his story or claiming that the war was the result of mere grudges when, in reality, it was racism and imperialist ideologies.

While this is just my hypothesis, Kishimoto's lack of political and social awareness could easily influence his perception of social injustices, such as racism. Insensitivity, meanwhile, might reduce any motivation to engage with such themes.

Inadequate Realization of Sensitive Storylines

So about insensitivity... This might actually be less of a hypothesis when we look at Kishimoto's repeated failure to address sensitive topics in his writing with dignity and/or a critical lens. I've also ranted about this in an older post.

We are talking about child soldiers and death matches between children (Chunin Exams), slavery (Hyuga Clan), human experimentation (Orochimaru), human trafficking (Kushina and maybe Mito) genocide (Uchiha Massacre), and the invasion of neutral territory (Amegakure). In all of these cases, crimes are not further acknowledged than a brief admittance of "damage was done" before the plot forgets about them entirely.

Chunin exams? Never talked about again.

Slavery? Naruto promised to change the Hyuga clan but never mentions it again.

Human experimentation? Orochimaru is welcomed back after his exile.

Human trafficking? The Jinchurikis got stockholmed, so everything's good!

Genocide? Addressing that might tarnish the Uchiha Clan's reputation. So we don't.

Invasion of neutral territory? We never see Amegakure again after Konan's passing.

It is a larger pattern in which social injustice is primarily introduced to add flavor in the form of "tragic backstories" but not actually to resolve it. We are supposed to condemn those tragedies, to feel sympathetic - but we are not supposed to criticize Konoha as a main perpetrator, enabler, or apologist.

To me, it doesn't seem like Kishimoto ever truly cared about those social issues. He knows they are bad, yes, but they were never the focus of the story and Kishimoto barely even stops to consider the implications.

The Manga's Narrative

The story does not engage critically with itself. And frankly, it also does not demand such critical thinking from its readers either.

In the manga, we are often presented with incorrect or incomplete exposition from unreliable narrators. Obito lies all the time, Madara gets the wrong story from Zetsu, Itachi gets the wrong story from who-knows-where, and Sasuke doesn't know what's going on half the time. The interesting part is how the truth behind those lies is usually uncovered.

Usually, we do not know that any of them are perpetuating a lie until said lie gets corrected by another character. Said character is usually a "source" in the sense that they have personally experienced the (until then) falsified events.

It is very rare that the audience gets to pick up on little clues to realize that a character is lying. One such instance is when Obito directly contradicts Itachi in his rendition of the story. But even then, the conflict between their two renditions gets resolved by a "source" character in the form of Kushina retelling the events from sixteen years ago.

Now, let's compare this to the "Curse of Hatred".

I have already mentioned this in another post (where I analyzed the curse and its contents), but the "Curse of Hatred" is first officially introduced by Obito. He focuses on the Uchiha's war-torn history and how that influenced its members. Tobirama more or less builds on that, adding his hypothesis about the Uchiha Clan's Sharingan and its effect on the user. Then Hagoromo adds some things about the reincarnation cycle that might play into this. In the end, Zetsu wraps it all up by revealing that he manipulated the Uchiha Clan for centuries.

The problem is that not one of these puzzle pieces directly contradicts the other and instead, they appear to complement each other. Therefore, no lie gets officially "disproven" in the story itself. Tobirama's Theories are treated as though they were perfectly fine fact that does not require revision.

We can further infer Tobirama's credibility on the matter by judging the present characters' reactions.

Hashirama, as explained in my previous post, tolerates if not accepts Tobirama's ideas. Orochimaru shows himself hostile toward Tobirama but does not take the chance to contradict him. Sasuke, who is an Uchiha and has personal experience with the Sharingan, shows no signs of protest. Skepticism, yes, but it slowly fades away until he seemingly accepts Tobirama's words as truth. He does not even attempt to argue against it.

Add to that that Tobirama is generally presented as a truthful character, described as "rational" and "principled" in the databook. He regularly criticizes or insults other characters without the bat of an eye, seemingly having no problem with tarnishing his own reputation, unconcerned with keeping up false appearances. He is not the type of character to lie.

Yes, Tobirama comes off as a bigot regardless, but that's because he's essentially an asshole and not because he is actually intended to be racist. Even in the event that what he says is non-factual, he fully believes it is. But also, the possibility that Tobirama is talking nonsense is not even hinted at (again, he is described as "rational" and no character seems to disapprove of the Uchiha Clan Genetic Theory TM).

Fantasy Fiction Conventions

In fantasy writing, none of what Tobirama says is actually uncommon. In fact, if anything, his theories concerning the Sharingan resemble popular fantasy tropes.

In Anime, many powers are awakened through trauma. This is called "Traumatic Superpower Awakening". The Sharingan is just one of many offenders, even in the story of Naruto. This reflects Tobirama's idea that the Sharingan is triggered through great emotional pain.

It is also a common trope that characters who gain too much power eventually go insane. This is called the "With Great Power Comes Great Insanity" trope and reflects the Uchihas' to essentially take away psychic damage alongside each newly awakened Sharingan power. Kishimoto just specifically linked that insanity or pain to the Sharingan (which represents the power of the Uchiha).

Yet another trope is the "Personality Powers" trope. This one can be seen in the Uchiha Clan's tendency to feel deep love and hate - at least one of which is essential for the awakening of a Mangekyo Sharingan (and, depending on the circumstances, a regular Sharingan). Hence Tobirama calls it "the eyes that reflect the heart". In other words, the personality facilitates the power.

Last but not least, we've got the fantasy races trope. The author invents a race and then assigns it distinct characteristics (both physiology and behavior-wise).

In its most extreme cases, this can be used to create an "enemy race" (such as orcs, vampires, demons, etc.) for the good guys to fight. It usually removes complexity from the story by dumbing down the enemy to simply just being "born evil".

Now, notice how the Uchiha Clan's Hatred could be considered a personification of Kishimoto's idea that wars are caused by grudges? Furthermore, Kishimoto makes that comment at a point in time (February 2012) when all three main antagonists of the story are Uchihas (Madara is revived in chapter 559, which was released October 2011), and then releases Tobirama's theory a year later (February 2013).

This one, unlike the other three, is particularly controversial as fantasy races often get conflated with real-life ethnicities. This is not always the intention of the author, however, as they often never intended to portray racial stereotypes. For two particularly popular examples, take a look at Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings" or Itagaki's "Beastars".

On one hand of this debate, you have that fantasy races are unlike human ethnicities and do not necessarily reflect reality, simply because the author decides what is real in canon or not and because fantasy is always a lie from a real-world perspective. Hence the Curse of Hatred, or rather, Tobirama's Theory is canon.

On the other, fiction does not exist in a vacuum and it is impossible not to apply our contemporary understanding of racism and ignore what are otherwise screaming red flags of racist ideology. Hence we recognize Tobirama's explanation as racism and wish to reject the Curse of Hatred as a concept.

But these two ideas can coexist.

The problem is just that Kishimoto likely only accounted for one thing and not the other. His intention translated very poorly into our contemporary understanding of the world, making Tobirama (and therefore, Hashirama as well) the victims of short-sighted writing.

Who cares anyway?

In the beginning, I explained that regardless of what Kishimoto intended for his story, any interpretation is valid. So why should we care about what the author thinks?

In my analyses (which are separate from my headcanons), I will usually take an "Extreme Intentionalism" approach in which I prioritize the author's intent over the reader's interpretation. Not because I am opposed to the idea that the reader's interpretation is relevant to the meaning of a text but because readers' interpretations are unique to the individual. Focusing on such an individual interpretation can easily alienate those who don't share it. Hence I like to focus on something that is more informative, almost objective in nature, such as the author's likely intended canon - which people can then mould into whatever suits their headcanon best.

I have also noticed that, sometimes, anti-intentionalist takes will devolve into full-blown lies (sometimes with the purposeful intention of omitting canon). This lie can then be upheld in an attempt to condemn or rather bully those with intentionalist interpretations. This unwittingly protects the writer (as well as problematic writing conventions) from criticism.

This is why I think even Anti-Intentionalists should inform themselves of an author's intention. This is, more or less, an aspect of media literacy as it allows us to identify biased or manipulative narratives and take purposeful action. In our case, this involves questioning and criticizing Kishimoto as an individual, raising awareness about his writing's shortcomings, and learning from his mistakes.

[weeb-polls-with-pip]

Morally Questionable Anime Milfs Side B Semifinals

Propaganda:

Ah-Duo -

"It is heavily implied that she switched her baby with her mother in-law's baby (mother in-law being the Empress) to give him a higher chance of survival after a hard and negligent birth that left her without a uterus. Kind of a cuckoo bird trick. Though it was for the good of her child in an era where children were political commodities, this is still a questionable thing to do. I know I would definitely feel some type of devastation and confliction if I found out my baby had been swapped with another right under my nose. Also, the other baby died. That part wasn't Ah-Duo's fault by any means, but I do think I should mention it. As for milf, have you SEEN her? She's so fucking hot c'mon. Even women in-canon swoon over her androgynous charms."

Eva -

"AVOIDING SPOILERS AS FAR AS POSSIBLE, her moral ambiguity is a deeply important part of the story. Like Episode 3 is in some ways a battle between her better and worse nature, between her love for her family and her resentment and bitterness to her brother.

As a mother to George, seemingly she's raised him very well, turning him into a perfect gentleman and preparing him for a successful life. However, this was all part of her scheming against her brother, trying to mold him into a suitable heir for the Ushiromiya fortune and usurp her nieces position. She made sure he spent every waking moment in study, leaving him socially stunted and resentful of his peers who knew how to make friends. In a way she's using him for her own petty resentment against her elder brother, but she's also trying to set him up for a good life in the only way she understands.

With Ange, things get both harsher and more complicated. Yes, after the horrific tragedy of 1986, Eva becomes a cruel and abusive adoptive mother to Ange. But, it's possible that, at first, she made a sacrifice on Ange's behalf that slowly twisted her into the monster she became. And part of episode 8 is showing the possibility of Eva becoming a good foster mother to Ange, and genuinely loving her, (and raising the question of whether that love was really in Eva's heart, or if it's just a comforting fantasy)

I know I'm saying "just trust me" because of spoilers, but this is a big part of the ending of the story and the overall theme: ambiguity, and the difficulty in knowing another's heart, and what we should believe about others given that. Maybe her actions (and her possible or alleged actions) are too evil to call her morally questionable. Maybe there's enough goodness in her to be in the poll. Hopefully I've expressed some of it in less than one million words. I'll leave it in your hands."

[elliespuns]

What is your perspective on tlou2 being inspired by the Israel-Palestine conflict? It didn't register with me at first but I've gotten too attached to the characters by the time that I discovered it and it is genuinely disappointing HOWEVER I have separated their narratives from the political dimension of the game by just focusing solely on the individual emotional journeys that each of the characters go through and I never really bought the games myself first hand except get them second hand but is it still wrong to adore the characters?

Not happy about it. I mean, who would be?

I wasn't aware of it at first either; it just didn't click, and then I started seeing the rumors, and well, it all made sense. I am disappointed. Not at all for Neil Druckmann, though. I don't really care about him (except for his amazing mind, where he created Ellie and Joel, the only fictional characters that I've got to love so much). What I am disappointed in more is that almost everyone thinks that once you continue to love this game, you support the evil too. Which is not how I feel about it.

But then again, does even my opinion matter? I've already got a lot of anon messages throwing hate on me for managing a blog about TLOU and supporting the evil. And I sit here and wonder... where did I ever say that I supported the bad side of the conflict? I don't think I ever did. Why? Because I don't talk about politics on this blog. This blog has been made to share love with all TLOU lovers, not to support Neil Druckmann or anyone else's political views or to even share about politics in general.

People are quick to judge. They go and preach to stand with Palestine and then go hate on the people who chose to stay quiet. People should realize that individuals managing fandom blogs and not sharing politics doesn't automatically mean that they support the evil. We (bloggers) have our own personal lives out of our blogs and our own personal accounts. Many of us are posting about the conflict on our personal social media. People should think about this before making bloggers feel like shit for managing silly blogs where they don't want to discuss what can be discussed elsewhere.

I have a deep bond with this game; I had it a long time ago before any of this was happening (everyone knows I will always prefer the first game over the second). This is not something I can just throw away. I have memories connected to it, feelings, emotions... it's not like I can tell myself 'fuck the game' now just because of the news I got. I guess it's easy for others when the bond is not so strong, but this game has been in a better part of my life for so long, and believe it or not... when I think about how Ellie and Joel make me happy, I don't have fucking Druckmann in mind or any of his political views.

I will never mix my admiration for this project with politics. Me not agreeing with Neil Druckmann's political views won't change the fact that I've already fallen in love with this game years ago. I am not loving Druckmann; I am loving something he once created. That is a big difference. Especially if you've already loved the game before the conflict.

I say, unless you're actively supporting the propaganda and throwing your money at it, you are not hurting anybody. You, being emotionally connected to the story of this propaganda's project or its characters won't really change a thing. Not for good, yes, but not for bad either.

Anyway, this is my opinion. I think people should stop judging those who are not sharing politics on their fandom blogs because they never know what these people share on their personal accounts. We are here to enjoy things that are free; love and joy for fictional characters we've adored for too long.

Sorry, I got a bit carried away. This is probably the only post about politics I'll share, so this needed to be said.

Anyway, you don't need to feel bad for loving the characters. You are not doing anything wrong. I think every one of us who still loves TLOU to this day is able to detach from the fact of who's behind the games. We're here for Ellie and Joel. They don't care about Druckmann either.elliespuns answers

[fanfic-obsessed]

Tug of War

Ok everyone,  here is another weird one.  Let’s get some house keeping out of the way first. 

This is set mid clone wars, where Palpatine does not quite have enough support to change the republic into an empire. 

For this, either there are no chips (and no order 66), or Palpatine does not want to activate the chips until the appointed hour, when his Empire is truly ready. Either way the clones side, pretty much exclusively with Jedi. 

This is very much an AU idea, with little connection to canon. 

Now the base of this is that Jedi finds out that Palpatine is the Sith Lord, however the twist is that (because Palpatine has been in charge of the laws for over a decade, plus the work of the other Sith before him) being a Sith Lord is not actually illegal. In addition Palpatine has been exceedingly careful about his conduct and contact with the separatists. Nothing he has done is illegal (practically nothing is illegal for him, due to his position as Supreme Chancellor, not even treason). Finally most of the galaxy, including most of the senate consider the Sith/Jedi split religious differences (Also from generations of careful Sith propaganda).

I want it clear that this take is not correct. Sith are evil, Palpatine very much included. It is only the result of centuries of work that ensured that this even happened.

All of this means that the Jedi very much are not able to oust Palpatine legally, and killing him would see the entire Order being classified as a terrorist organization, which is an automatic execution order for every member regardless of age.  

Now for twist number two. Due to the fact the Jedi were the founders of the Republic, declaring them traitors (an actual attempt to kill the Chancellor being the only exception,due to the Ruusan Reformation treaty) would destroy the Republic. And not in the way it will eventually become an empire kind of way. Instead whatever the power base (political and otherwise) the republic laws are built on, it is intrinsically tied to the Jedi Order’s existence. 

Look I am not sure how exactly it would work but work with me here.  Also this entire idea is meant to poke fun at the idea that laws are anything more immutable than a social contract we all agree to follow. 

All this means that until Palpatine is ready for his Empire to Rise, he cannot destroy the Jedi Order.  And he is found out to be a Sith just a little too early for that to happen. 

So now we have the Jedi on side, unable to eject the overt Sith in the Senate (also not able to leave due to their ties to the Republic).  On the Other Side we have an actual Sith running the government  but unable to kill the Jedi until he is fully ready to launch his empire.  Both still have to deal with a Senate that on a fundamental level does not understand goals, the methods, or the beliefs of either group (Jedi or Sith). 

And they still have to work together.  They still have to make plans and fight a war and deal with the Senate. Palpatine's entire schtick means that he has to keep up appearances, particularly since the Jedi have outright, and publicly, stated to him that the moment he is not the supreme chancellor (and thus it is no longer terrorism and treason to kill him) they are going kill him for being a Sith.  

Following this declaration there was a brief but intense debate in the Senate regarding this declaration and if it counted as threatening a government official/head of government.  It was eventually decided that the clarifying statement that they would only kill him when he was no longer in office meant that it was acceptable, since the Jedi are allowed to kill Sith (that is one of the oldest laws on the books, it fall in the ‘cannot change without destabilizing the Republic’), they just can’t kill a Sith that is also the Supreme Chancellor.  Unfortunately it was also decided that the Jedi, or Jedi allies, could not have any part of removing Palpatine from office; due to the declaration. 

So there is a small amount of ‘race to the finish line’ where the Jedi are still very much trying to end the war and/or maneuver Palpatine out of his position of power, so they can eliminate the Sith.  And Palpatine is working to extend the war, and thus his power, until he had the support needed to unveil his empire (he was set back quite a bit by the revelation that he is a Sith, enough people become suspicious of his motives that he can’t just declare an Empire) so that he could then kill the Jedi. 

The Jedi have an advantage in that there are 10,000 of them and they can trust each other and work together.  Palpatine is not able to trust anyone with his plans, not even his minions or other Sith since they all plan to betray each other. 

Palpatine has an advantage in that he, and his minions, will do things that no being with morals ever could. Not that being restricted by morals is a bad thing, but it does mean that Palpatine can take any action he wants to advance his plans with little concern with collateral damage. There are some days, particularly when that same collateral damage spends hours telling the Jedi that saved them exactly why the Jedi Order are baby stealing monsters, where various Jedi are slightly jealous of Palpatine’s lack of morals. 

Even weirder are the times when both the Sith and the Jedi agree on something, or their short term goals align. Neither group ever forgets that they are enemies who ultimately want to eliminate the other, but there are some days where Adi Gallia has been dealing with idiots in the Senate all day and wants to drink with possibly the only other Force user who deals with the same volume of Senate idiots in one day (look, Palpatine may capitalize on the fundamental misunderstanding the galaxy at large-and the Senate in particular-has about Force use and the difference between Sith and Jedi, but even he is going internally ‘I am trying to subjugate all of you and the Jedi are trying to stop me from subjugating all of you. These goals are not the same.’-I personally head canon that Palpatine is self aware enough to know that he is objectively evil, and is quite proud of that. I just want my bad guy to be an unrepentant ass, be aware that he is an unrepentant ass, and not feel any kind of guilt about that- ). Or every so often for the first year after the reveal Palpatine invites Obi Wan Kenobi to drink with him because Anakin has done something so ridiculous again (while trying to save Pame from something she had already taken care of) that it has managed to accidentally derail six of Palpatine's plots,  endanger two Jedi missions, injured no less than 50 troopers across three battalions, and almost took out the economy of a mid rim world.  Obi Wan goes because after the reveal Palpatine stopped trying to kill him personally (though he still go caught up in the occasional plot), and the Sith has surprisingly good taste in liquor (It should be noted that most of the friendly interactions with Palpatine seem to include heavy drinking and commiserating).  Or Mace Windu catching Palpatine’s eyes from across the Rotunda or some foolish gathering as some being is blathering on and they have just a moment of understanding and commiseration pass between them. 

It is only for the first year because that is when Anakin finally stops hanging around with Palpatine. Anakin also did not have a great grasp of the difference between Sith and Jedi and had bought fully into ‘Palpatine is my friend’.  Then one day they were talking about various Sith and Palpatine made the mistake of sharing a bit too much about drawing power from being in pain, and his (Palpatine’s) plans for the Vader suit.  He never said that the suit was for Anakin, but he was just a bit too gleeful in describing causing another being pain and it freaked Anakin out. 

After the reveal and this holding pattern there is at least one scene where Dooku pouts because Palpatine can drink with Jedi, but Dooku cannot have Tea with Jedi any longer. And it is not because Dooku is a Sith and only partially due to the fact that Dooku is the head of Separatists (thus the enemy). No the real reason that Dooku can not have tea with he Jedi any longer is because Jocasta Nu was told at the beginning of the war that Dooku had removed information from her archives and he knows that no one, not even Yoda, would keep his location a secret from her and risk her wrath. 

He had felt her wrath in the Force as soon as she was told, and that wrath had lingered. Very occasionally Palpatine considers trying to lure her to his side by telling her where she can find Dooku, but figures that she would usurp him and rule the galaxy with an iron fist within a standard week. 

And Palpatine had put far too much work into everything to be a minion again.

[hadesoftheladies]

i've been on radblr for a while, and maybe it's because of the specific users i follow being woc or disabled, but recently i've been seeing more ableist and racist radblr users crawl from whatever hole they've been molting in

in light of a recent conversation thread between @menalez and two whitefems, i've come to see the issue other radblr users have been talking about

radblr lacks a culture of intersectionality. there are many white/straight/abled women here who think solidarity means we only cater to their liberation, and they can ditch us whenever they please. it is one-sided support, and isn't solidarity at all. they are used to being centered, used to seeing themselves as default woman, used to seeing themselves as the standard of feminism and womanhood. their problems as more deserving.

i'm not going to use this post to diagnose radblr, but to say why these women are insanely stupid

racist and imperial radfems have been bold in their assertion that their empires are somehow benevolent, neutral, helpful to outsiders. they have endorsed their militaries, asserted that they are genetically and intellectually superior, and that they're oh so tired of stupid, backward women from stupid, backward countries whining about how colonization improved their society. (and some western black users have agreed).

and it's so STUPID because . . . how do you not see you're approving of the structure of your own oppression while complaining about the injustice of it?

you can acknowledge that men have misattributed women's achievements to men, that they have destroyed, twisted, and erased their history. you can acknowledge that the reason there weren't as many women geniuses as men was because of the brutal subjugation and social, economic barriers women faced, or some just had their ideas stolen and died unnamed and unattached to their invention. you understand how women's language, spaces, and philosophy have been hijacked by the male perspective in everything, from religion, to education, to literature. in marxist or materialist analysis, you understand that economy creates culture.

but you can't understand any of that when it comes to majority world countries? you mysteriously lose your capacity to analyze culture when you're at the top? your countries are rich because they're just so gosh darn good at being rich, aren't they? stolen wealth and labor doesn't give you a head start at all! and if money is power, and you have the money, you can get away with stealing even more, but that only applies to men, see? not our nice, lovely, governments! colonization and war aren't actually that bad or brutal and don't have any lasting negative effects! neocolonial systems don't exist! it's not like our beloved empires have anything to do with killing the cultures of billions because they can, they have, and it is in their best political and economic interest to. black people never did anything significant! this is a fact, and has nothing to do with deliberate propaganda from imperial countries! imperialist propaganda, ha! imagine that? african and asian people can't be smarter than white people, because . . . . genetics! whitefems on radblr care so much about science when it comes to transwomen, but their brains turn to mush when it comes to thinking whiteness somehow genetically increases intelligence. biology, everybody!

it's honestly funny. like you're trading one regime for another, congrats! you're anti-revolution! you can get off our backs and stop using our plight as examples of your oppression.

and to the british storm trooper that claimed her intelligence was genetic--if you truly believe that, you've got two options:

consider that this statement is unscientific, racist, and false, or

take an ancestry DNA test and find out if you're adopted :)

[rockofeye]

the hell is going on with these folks (and the cat accusation is downright insane): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvZTr3F_YZI

This is purposefully targeted hate speech and propaganda, and it is not new to the US political field. This is part of the racist Great Replacement conspiracy theory, and the same statements have historically been said about folks immigrating for Asian countries, from the Middle East, and even folks coming from Central and South America. I hope it's no longer a common thing said, but there were racist 'jokes' when I was young that if you went to a Chinese restaurant, you were getting cat for dinner.

These are tactics attempting to demonize an extremely vulnerable and marginalized community in the same manner that Jews and other 'undesirable' groups were demonized at the end of the Weimar Republic as the Third Reich rose in Germany. This is a tool of a political party that is trying to seize power by fearmongering, which requires a scapegoat to be successful. Recently arrived Haitians are that scapegoat, and it's dangerous.

That video is really sad, and it's a masterclass in how racism is both a class issue and is used as a tool to divide. The statements about how recently arrived folks supposedly get so much money for the government, but we can't...this is manipulating working class, blue collar workers, and folks living at or under the poverty line, and it is exactly the tactics used in the building of race and racism that the United States was founded on. Instead of white folks who fall into working class, blue collar, or poverty categories realizing that the government is the problem in that basic needs of every day persons are absolutely ignored under our so-called democracy, they are being told that it is the people who are leaving a literal war zone to try and stay alive who are the problem. At base, racism is capitalist divide-and-conquer; if working class/blue collar/poverty level white folks united with Black folks, immigrants, and those seeking asylum, this country would be on it's knees...but instead, capitalism has manipulated vulnerable citizens to believe that outsiders are the problem with claims that are absolutely out of hand

Some of this is lack of education and critical thinking skills; basic research can show people that what people claim as fact is not at all true. People who are arriving from the border or arriving via the Biden parole program are in the United States legally but honestly...who fucking cares? It is a factual inaccuracy to believe that individuals who are not citizens and/or have not passed the 5 year mark if they are legal permanent residents have access to federal benefits earmarked for citizens or folks with sufficient residency. They do not qualify for SNAP, most Medicaid, social security, federal financial aid, and on and on. When they work, they pay taxes but they do not reap the benefits--there are no tax refunds and they do not benefit from social security, which means even if they work for 30 years in the US on a work permit, they can never access social security retirement benefits.

The rest is political strategy, wag-the-dog style. This bluster distracts from the fact that the Republican candidate is a fucking lunatic who cannot string together a single coherent thought and who is able to be provoked to anger with a single side eye. This is a distraction to remove pressure and attention.

Moreover, if it was true that recently arrived Haitians were left to steal domestic pets or wild living birds to survive, the shame is on our hands, as US citizens, for allowing people to starve when there is so much food available. How would a country with one of the highest GDPs allow people fleeing terror to be reduced to stealing pets to eat? That would be disgusting and a terrible indictment of who we are as a country, not that many of us don't already see it.

The other statements about Haitians being filthy etc are just poorly informed or purposefully aimed to be harmful. Anyone who has lived with or around Haitians in any significant way knows how a Haitian home is kept. Anyone who has spent any significant time with Haitians understands how, even if someone is living in poverty with nothing, there is still pride in themselves and how they live...and that is a huge reason, all other things aside, why folks are not out stealing Fluffy to have dinner. Those things are without pride, and folks would rather starve.

There is also the purposeful misunderstanding of how immigrants acclimate to a new place. Folks coming here from the border or via the Biden program are on pins and needles because they know their situation is wobbly, and they are smart. No one is going to be knowingly acting in a way that is going to upset where they live or who they live around, and Haitian culture contains nothing that would be super out of the ordinary in the US.

I am glad the reporter spoke to local Haitians and made the effort to get accurate translations of what folks were saying. How some questions were answered gives a clear picture to folks who know that they know they are under a microscope, both in the US and with the situation in Haiti; did you catch how, when questioned about gangs and violence, the one guy knew nothing about nobody? That's not accidental.

This will also target Vodou and Haitian vodouizan as well. I have already seen commentary on social media about how Haitians who are eating all these animals--dogs, cats, ducks, rats, etc--and doing 'rituals' with the remains. This is a dangerous and slippery slope, particularly if the party supporting these statements retakes the White House.

So...pay attention. This is a masterclass in the deployment of classism and racism to create distractions ahead of an election that feels very important to many people. Don't let them control your attention.

[just-some-guy-joust]

Just Some Guy OC Tourney - Side B: Round 2

Rules:

do NOT be mean to anyone or any characters in these polls. you MUST clarify if you are joking/teasing or you will be blocked. if you are someone who entered an oc into this and you are mean to other contestants you will be disqualified

do NOT claim a character doesn't deserve to be here. yes including your own. be nice

if you are posting propaganda you have to @ tag us, including if your propaganda is in the reblogs. it is difficult to tell when something is or isn't propaganda. anything not tagging us will likely be missed

please don't hesitate to let me know if i messed something up!

have fun, hype each other up <3 thank you

Zena | She/her/hers, it/its/its, and ze/zir/zirs, but all pronouns are acceptable | @spark-ocblog (CW: mentions of blood and murder on this blog)

Zena works a variety of retail jobs and lives in a boring, cheap, low-quality apartment. She is entirely oblivious to the various supernatural happenings in the town she's in, despite being one of the oldest supernatural creatures in the area. It likes to participate in mundane human activities for fun, such as "Lie Down On A Cushion For Eight Hours With Your Eyes Closed," and "Pet Animal." Zir biggest worries are busy shifts and managing human finances.

~

Levi | He/him | @cyikess

An unwilling chronic isekai protagonist. He can't catch a break! He keeps getting thrown to new and different fantasy/sci-fi/whatever worlds when all he wants is his normal life back. He's just a guy!

~

Full images and descriptions under the cut!

Zena is an immortal plant spirit who really wants to participate in human life. After zir move to the city, ze hops from job to job trying to sample the human experience as best ze can. She tries to keep a houseplant and care for it manually (without any magic) and it dies immediately. She's aromantic and orchidsexual, but alloplatonic. It's very awkward trying to socialize with its coworkers, especially because its first language is not a verbal one. Ze's very easily tricked and oblivious to many things... including the many witches in the area that stop by the cafe ze waitresses at. The cafe is perfectly normal, but its primary clientele is criminals and illegal magic users from the surrounding area (just because of where it's situated, locationally). She sticks out like a sore thumb because her human disguise isn't particularly stealthy, but most people politely assume her appearance is due to some sort of curse and avoid commenting on it. It likes reading corny romance novels and hanging out with people in its spare time. It's autistic and obsessed with puns, and fascinated by human languages. Zir whole entire aspiration is basically to be just some guy.

He is one of the guys ever tbh. All this crazy shit happens to him/around him and he stays normal! This crazy shit includes being sent to other worlds again, and again, and again. He does not know why this is happening. And in all these worlds there's cyborgs, and non-humans, and all sorts of people and then there's him. With his stupid glasses and failboy energy. Love him. All my friends love him too. He's even on my water bottle!

[deathlygristly]

I saw a post on here that I saved as a draft and I'll reblog it later. It was about how so much of political discussion on here is social performance and trying to fit in and look like a "good" person to others.

Which, like I've said before, I can't get into that mindset at all. Not sure if it's the autism or the circumstances of where and how and when I grew up or a combination. Well, it's probably a combination because most things are the product of an unknowable number of random events and the circumstances produced by the random events.

Something I'm struggling with right now is how much weight to put on people's voting choices.

Because for me, with my autistic brain operating differently in social contexts than neurotypical brains and also my lifetime of reading about fascism and propaganda and genocide started by reading all those books on the Holocaust when I was 9, it seems like a pretty obvious choice. To me, the consequence of your vote on other living beings is extremely easily knowable and predictable, and therefore it is a heavy moral weight on your soul.

But reading that post about politics as social performance on here, listening to that interview with the child of the man who created Stormfront on the cult survivor podcast, the podcast I'm about to listen to on why people deny climate change, reading stories on the leaving MAGA site, and reading some of the political threads that I've seen in state and local social media that I'm keeping up with for Helene news....

I think there are a lot of people who aren't really capable of fully understanding the weight their choices have on the reality of all living beings on the planet. If they aren't capable of that easy knowing and predicting, how morally responsible are they?

Like I tend to think that other people know what they are doing. I guess maybe this is what they mean by lacking a theory of mind? Because hey, not all of us are professional Holocaust scholars like the one person I follow on here is, but we all have pretty deep knowledge of it still, right? We all get the basics of propaganda and bigotry and violence and hate and how people in power can use that power for incredibly evil ends, right?

I am learning that no, we do not all have pretty deep knowledge of the Holocaust or a real understanding of it and what it meant. We do not all know the weight of our actions on the world.

And maybe I can't really blame people for that. Maybe their brain just randomly got wired more for fitting in socially with a small group no matter the cost than mine did. Maybe they didn't have the right configuration of circumstances to learn how to read when they were very young so they weren't capable of reading those books when they were a child and so it didn't make a deep impression on their soul. Maybe they were capable but they didn't have access to the books. Maybe they were randomly born to parents who are deep in a cult and they haven't been able to leave the cult and deconstruct yet.

I am trying to reply sometimes. To ride through the initial nervous system rush and then try to reply in a non combative way, because I know that's what works. It doesn't always work. It probably doesn't even work the majority of the time. But it at least has a higher chance of working than being combative and insulting. Although I imagine being combative and insulting does work occasionally though, because that's how everything is, but my strengths lie more on the trying to not be hateful side.

How do you help people cross the bridge from "I am performing for acceptance in this small group and I am quite ignorant of the world and my weight on it through no fault of my own" to "Okay, I can see the world and the weight of my steps on it and I will do my best to not harm others?"

[cookinguptales]

...well, to start with, because this is tumblr and I'm mostly here for tarot, memes, and silly vampire porn. The things I discuss IRL, the things I donate to, and the things I support are not always reflected in the social media where I come to unwind.

The second reason is because I was literally in another country for over a month. I have multiple chronic illnesses and I've barely been keeping my head above water and the last thing I wanted to do was post about international politics. The fact that you think it's appropriate to just go up to random people that you may or may not even know and demand that they weigh in on important issues in the manner, environment, and time period of your choosing is uhhh bizarre!

In fact, I debated replying to this at all just because it is such an out-of-line demand to make on fucking Tumblr of all places. But I do actually have thoughts on the subject, and I guess it's as good a time as any.

The third and honestly most important reason I haven't said much publicly is this: there has been a lot of misinformation spreading about this issue. It's quickly become apparent to me that this is a fight that's being fought through propaganda, and it's not always been easy for me to figure out which news articles are accurate. I see an article go up, then an article criticizing it, then a retraction, then a retraction of a retraction. I see horrifying videos being posted, then it coming out that they're from a completely different conflict. Hell, I've seen people I used to respect quoting straight-up conspiracy theory weirdos because they agree with what they're saying on this particular subject.

(Yes, I did notice the person who put fucking RFK Jr. on my Tumblr dash like he was a hero.)

As a general rule, I am against the slaughter of innocents, which is why I have been historically against many of Israel's actions in Palestine. It's why I am against the actions they are taking now, which, no matter how you slice it, seem to be using a terrible tragedy as an excuse to enact one that is several hundred times worse.

But I have to admit that I've also been looking at several of my acquaintances very differently as they talk about how the slaughter of other innocents is ideal, and I've gotten really uncomfortable with the implications of some of their posts.

(And to be very clear, when I talk about posts celebrating the deaths of civilians, I'm not talking about things that are pro-decolonization or anything, I'm talking about people I know who, when the news first broke and very little was known, explicitly said that being against the murder of non-combatants means that you are not acceptably dedicated to revolution. And like... no, I do not believe that's an acceptable (or even effective) way to achieve peace.)

Plus, I do not believe that all criticism of Israel is antisemitic, but several posts I've seen lately have been very undeniably antisemitic. (And yes, others have been islamophobic as well.) I've seen people attributing the actions of Israel's government and military to all Jewish people worldwide. I've seen people who are boosting the voices of literal Neo-Nazis. I've seen conspiracy theories that are honestly just straight-up rehashes of blood libel. And I've seen a lot of posts, far too many posts, that seem happy to indulge in old tropes about Jews controlling the media instead of looking at the political effects of mainstream Evangelical eschatology.

Like... I've seen a lot of well-meaning people post things that are inaccurate, misleading, or straight-up hateful propaganda. Against either side, really. Against both.

And frankly, I am afraid that, through ignorance, I might do the same. I've seen posts that seem normal to me, only to be shown how they contain dogwhistles or inaccuracies that feed into longstanding stereotypes. I've seen news articles (supporting both sides) that seem accurate only to turn out to be sloppily reported inaccuracies, if not straight-up lies.

While I've been supporting human rights organizations IRL, I do not feel as if I am so qualified to speak on this subject that I won't accidentally do harm. While I am usually content simply boosting others' voices, in this situation I am afraid that I might spread misinformation that might hurt Palestinians or Jewish people that have nothing to do with the conflict. Hell, there are a lot of other groups that are getting caught in the crossfire, too. Even people who live in Israel who aren't politicians/combatants aren't people that I want harmed.

(Like... I wouldn't want to be judged based on what my country's politicians, military, and most outspoken racists have done, either, y'know? I do not believe that there is any country where every person in it is bad.)

Honestly speaking, there are a lot of subjects that I think are important that I don't talk about publicly. I talk about things like queer issues and disability issues because I feel like I have firsthand knowledge of those things and am unlikely to accidentally post like... fucking alt-right propaganda or something. But with... really probably most issues, I tend to keep quiet and do my best to listen to people who know better than I do.

Which is not always a fucking bad thing!

So... you might have noticed that I screencapped this ask rather than answering it. This is because I wanted to be able to block you from my inbox after answering your concerns. Like damn, learn some fucking social skills.

[badolmen]

I think one of the hardest things for privileged leftists have to learn is that they can’t just automatically agree with the majority. They can’t just automatically agree with the opinion of the POC, the queer, the Jewish person they’re interacting with in the moment because ‘they’re the experts in their own life.’ Which is true! But there is no monolith. POC and queers and religious minorities are not some mystical pure hivemind that always agree on everything and have correct opinions all the time. People are people. What one person finds offensive another might not care about.

I feel like it’s very evident these days where you have some people of a minority saying x is bad and some people saying x is good. Which is correct? Well, you have to educate yourself and make a critical assessment of the arguments before coming to your own conclusion. But now you have leftists who are desperate to be the most agreeable person in the room with the ‘right’ opinions who waffle and fail to organize in any meaningful way because they refuse to let the subject at hand have meaning for them, personally. They’re so busy ‘listening’ to minorities they’re not actually thinking about what they’re hearing, they’re not processing the biases underprivileged people can still carry, they’re not critical of reactionary politics or propaganda so long as it’s what the people immediately around them agree on.

Grow a spine, pick a side, and actually have a framework for your political and social involvement other than ‘let’s be real niceys with everyone :)’

[woodsfae]

B5 s03e10 Severed Dreams table of contents - previous episode

Londo fully deserves all the inconvenience that an extremely pedantic Narn security force can muster against him. It's the least his genocidal, fascist ass deserves. I hope many more little miseries for him. 

"This never would have happened if the humans hadn't started fighting each other!"

This also would never have happened if Londo hadn't thrown the entire fucking galaxy under the bus in exchange for temporary political cred. 

Having moral qualms about firing on one's own people mid-civil-war does seem like the sort of emotions one would have as a member of the military that's schisming against itself. 

Psst, while the opening is playing, I have a secret. I'm 100% going to count these words towards my NaNoWriMo count. Probably am not going to make it, since I didn't write at all from the 11th to the 26th. But I did write more than 14k words in the last two days so ya never know. I could whip out 11k a day for the final two days of November. No I'm not lingering over this paragraph to inflate my word count, how very dare?

General Hague's ship is coming to B5. It's called The Alexander, which is a pretty obvious allusion to Alexander the Great, although the Rangers haven't been conquering any vast tracts of land lately in B5.

I fucking LOVE G'Kar helping with the Rangers now! He's like "I AM A GOOD ALLY JUST LIKE I ALWAYS KNEW. Watch me carry this slender little Minbari as far as you'd like." 10/10, no notes. I think he might be my favorite character overall. I mean, Susan is the BEST, but I think G'Kar might be my favorite, yanno? There's a difference. 

"Our humanity got us into this. It's our humanity that's going to get us out again." 

I certainly do hope so, John Sheridan. Because as always, this show is eerily prescient about our present, when it was intended to be a social commentary on the socio-political state of the 90s. 

This side character Minbari is a kickass actor. He welled those tears up no problem. Also very lame that there's even more instability that'll inevitably benefit the Shadows. How much more bleak does it need to be for them to have a satisfying, underdog victory? They're already under, dawg! 

General Hague is dead.  Most of General Hague's fleet is destroyed. And Earthforce is bombing Mars. The plea from Mars not to fire, that there's women and children, is chilling. But the random Aflack commercials on Tubi are great about lightening my mood. /s 

It's so funny that Delenn makes sure to tell Lennier she will support any decisions he makes in her absence, because I just know she's about to go fuck shit up on the Grey Council. 

This journalist is so brave! The journalists were lying, spreading earthgov propaganda, but it didn't matter. The government still came to take them down in the coup because they weren't extreme enough. 

The Agrippa and the Roanoke are coming to seize command of B5....Agrippa was a general, but I don't recall what he is most known for. Roanoke is famous in the USA for being an early colony, which the colonists all disappeared from in a fabricated mystery, when it was obvious they had joined the nearby Roanoke tribe. I wonder if the Roanoke is going to switch sides at the last moment in this episode, or go fuck off to do their own thing or something. 

John giving his senior staff the same inspirational speech he uses for himself because it's 100% "Do it for Delenn!!!! And freedom. But mostly Delenn!" It's extremely cute. 

tHe CoUnCiL wIlL NoT sEe YoU. - useless Minbari dude

"Then I will see them!" 

Yes you will, Delenn. That whole speech is excellent. and wasted on that little pissant. But her speech to the Grey Council is even better! 

Mira Furlan delivers this speech, as all of her speeches, so powerfully. 

And she has such pointed things to say to each of them. Yessss be shamed!! Delenn you badass. Shattered that staff literally with her bare hands!! Was that the strength of prophecy, or her mad grip strength? She got five of them...are there nine on the Council at a time? I can't recall. 

It's very endearing that John called home to make sure to check in with the folks before he can't do it easily for awhile. 

"Where's Mom?" "Oh, she went to town....errands to run. You know how it is."

Actually, in this family, I do know how it is. Is Mom Sheridan in jail for protesting or agitating or something? 

I remember liking the design for B5's little fighter holds when the series started, but I like it even more now. It's just so smart. They're stored so there's easy access with the spin-gravity, and so they can't deploy accidentally. And then they get whooshed out to space when the pilot is in. I'm sure the new opening which highlights it in such crisp, remastered HD helps a lot with my newly arisen appreciation for their fighter deployment systems. 

It pleases me greatly seeing Sheridan using DraalPlanet's hologram! I'm a sucker for continuity. 

Susan Ivanova is right, damn it! One of them, her or Sheridan, does have to be out there, fighting with their people against the rest of EarthForce. And it does have to be Ivanova: Sheridan is the captain. He can't captain while he's starfighting. 

OK they're here! The Churchhill - authoritarian leader who speaks first and deploys their fighters first. Sheridan speaks eloquently. The Agrippa and Roanoke fall silently in line. I'm so curious to see how this plays out. Ivanova is engaging with the Churchill. The Alexander comes out as well! And there's a breaching pod on B5 - something for the B5 security forces to do so Garibaldi doesn't feel left out! 

It's horrible to see the Narn security forces going in without armor, ahead of the humans in armor. At least give them some protective gear, damn! So many of them went down, and idk if their blasters even have stun capability. I'm assuming they're all dead. Which, fuck. 

I think Hiroshi rammed the Roanoke? Ah, and the Roanoke is destroyed. I think all three of the attacking ships were straight up destroyed. I'm usually able to track the B5 battles, but this was the largest and most complicated one.  And I am also kinda crossfaded. 

"If you value your lives: be somewhere else." 

Delenn is getting all the best speeches this episode, as she deserves. Really, excellent Delenn episode all around! She is a badass. Love to see more aspects to her badassery highlighted. 

Zack Allen is now a paragon of helpfulness and loyalty. And Garibaldi got injured again. 

It suddenly sounds like the Churchill was on B5's side which...I definitely misunderstood part of that battle, if so. But at least B5's fighter crews are at full strength since they're taking the Churchill's survivors. 

John Sheridan has a good conversation with the Major whatshisface, and I am charmed again by his deciding not to wear his uniform till he can be proud of it again. Will he extend that decision to every personnel on board? Is everyone about to be running around in civvies? Soace fashion! Space business casual!  

Dang, Delenn's "Hello, John," was sultry. And her dress is much simpler and akin to a human wrap-dress than her usual, structured Minbari robes.

"I don't know how much this cost you personally, and I suspect I never will. But I want you to know that seeing your face is that moment was the finest moment of my life." 

cute, but I think Delenn heartily enjoyed ripping the council a new one.

I am glad Sheridan got applauded by all his B5ers at the end, and the pan over to the partially torn down Nightwatch poster was c h i l i n g

want another one?

[tiodolma]

Hello. I have seen your Merlin crit posts and they seemed to be really interesting. However, I wanted to ask your opinion about something in the show (not anything political or such)

What is your opinion on the fact that in s5, the friendships Merlin had in the previous seasons with Gwen and the Knights are non - existent? Who do you think would be capable of helping Merlin during the season, apart from Gaius and Killgarah (he was mostly useless but still)?

What is your opinion on the episode "Lesson in Vengeance"?

@fanficwritinggremlin

At s5x07, merlin is running on fumes and is directionless.

See s5x05: The Disir MERLIN It won't always be like this. One day we will live in freedom again. MORDRED (looks up hopefully) You really believe that? MERLIN I do.

He has A Political Goal which is "one day we will live in freedom again" but still has no idea of the following:

(1) how to get there:

(2) what it actually looks like.

-->By s5 Merlin still has no concrete plans nor timeline and no step-by-step agenda to achieve his Political Goal™

And due to various previous circumstances, he had been cut off socially (or by rank/class), emotionally, psychologically and physically from everyone who used to genuinely care about him or want to see him at his best.

Now... how is someone else supposed to help the dude:

who have been conditioned in the past 8 to 10 years that he alone could fix thirty years of worth of genocide, the propaganda surrounding the genocide and its far-reaching side-effects?

who've had everyone he loved dead because they protected him or he have had to sacrifice them (without their knowledge) for the greater good?

who even now, never tries to negotiate properly with his opponents on equal and honest terms?

who has lied to the state repeatedly and thus destabilized it from the inside because of his withholding of important state secrets?

..........................

The only thing Merlin had left was a real show/display of his own power in public. A magic reveal.

why?

because Merlin does not have any real court power. He was never advanced socially in rank by his sovereign bosses. He has no true allies who can actually help him get near his Political Goal.

Merlin really really needs to have political power if he wanted his Political Goal to be achieved. Since his sovereign king and queen never gave that to him, at season 5, then he needed to show why he deserves some.

Therefore at s5x07 the only one who can actually and efficiently help him is himself.

.....................

Consider his narrative equal and foil, Morgana.

What they both have in s5x07

advanced use of magic

dragons

fortified kingdoms under their control

justification

What Morgana had that Merlin didn't have

name, reknown, fame, a political kind of "brand"

support of almost all armed non-magic and magic factions and entities that want to destroy camelot

legitimate claim to the throne

money, machinery and people after 1-2 years of regaining everything from scratch

What Merlin had that Morgana did not have

just some vital pieces of information.

support of a dwindling indigenous faction who will never take up arms

You see what I mean? Morgana had allies, strong allies, who helped her plan her strategies and support these plans at every aspect. This is because they knew her and they trusted what she could do. And she got to trust them too.

Morgana did her best to gain as many allies as she could through any means, because Morgana knew she could never overthrow Camelot on her own.

Merlin had none. Even in his relatively safe location inside Camelot, he never built a network of other entities who can actually support him. Gaius kept forbidding him to reach out to others. Kilgharrah advised against it many times. Merlin was made to believe that fixing everything thru only his own power and alone was the best way to do things.

That's why Morgana was perfect foil to him. She had huge political influence and power. Moreover, she was systematic and delegated a lot of revolutionary/rebellion tasks and activities to her allies. They were empowered and did well because she rewarded them too.

Merlin had a lot of advantages as her but Merlin's indoctrination and training did not allow for him branch out and step into a prime political position just like Morgana did. He took the lone wolf path too far and was surprised when over time, nobody in Camelot was truly left in total support for him.

......................

The bottomline is... Merlin reveals himself -> he gains much needed political power and court influence -> he is closer to his Political Goal.

............

addendum you might ask: what if arthur executes him??

-> that's merlin's problem for being so treasonous in the first place. if he's really destined to become the most powerful warlock kingmaker and advisor, then he can talk and live through any threat arthur would give him.