#11 november 2018

[wiiildflowerrr]

@Calum5SOS: Shoot ur shot

11 November 2018

[rabbitcruiser]

One World Trade Center officially opened on November 3, 2014.  

[brian-in-finance]

Screenshot: Outlander-Online

S04E02 America The Beautiful • 11 November 2018 Official Script

Outlander Rewatch 2023 Countdown To Season 7

Favourite Word

And you and your wife may join them for commission of the same crime, Mr. Fraser, for if your intransigence persists, I will insist Mr. Campbell draw up a warrant for your arrest. — Lieutenant Wolff

Screenshot: Outlander-Online

Favourite Line

Jenny was right about you. You are a peculiar lass. — Jocasta

Gif: @fraserstanclub

Favourite Image

I was no more than a bairn when last you saw me. Had nowhere to go but up. — Jamie

Gif: @scotsmanandsassenach

Remember… I am now gifted with hearing that would be the envy of many a gossip, and the ability to scent truth from lies, if ye catch my meanin'. — Jocasta Cameron

44th of 75 • Tuesday, 16 May 2023

[screenshotfolder]

[redgoldsparks]

I wrote a 12 page epilogue to my 2019 comic "Harry Potter and The Problematic Author" because I found, in 2023, that I had more to say. You can also find this comic on my website, and I have PDF copies available on etsy. I may sell print copies at some point in the future.

instagram / patreon / portfolio / etsy / my book / redbubble

Full transcript below the cut.

PAGE 1

Part one: Ruddy Owls!

I was in fourth grade when the first Harry Potter Book was released in the US.

Panel 1: Sometimes our teacher would read it aloud in class. “Mr and Mrs Dursley of number 4 Privat Drive were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much…”

Panel 2: I was 11 years old when Harry Potter finally broke through my dyslexia and turned me into a reader.

Panel 3: Every night in the summer before sixth grade I waited for the owl carrying my Hogwarts Letter. I cried when it didn’t come. “I have to go to Muggle school!”

PAGE 2

Part Two: Hats

I dedicated myself to being a fan.

Panel 1: I began collecting Harry Potter News article.

Panel 2: I asked my relatives to mail me ones from their local papers. I filled a thick binder with clippings.

Panel 3: I wrote my own trivia quiz

Panel 4: and participated in the one held annually at the county fair. “Next contestant!”

Panel 5: I usually got into one of. the top five spots. I won boxes of candy, posters, stationary, and once a baseball cap. (Hat reads: I survived the battle of Hogwarts).

Panel 6: In high school I sewed a black velvet cape and knitted many stripped scarves.

PAGE 3

Part Three: Double Trouble

Watching the last film in 2011 felt like the final note of my childhood. 

Panel 1: I remember driving home from the midnight showing thinking about the end of 13 years of waiting; wondering what would define the next chapter of my life. 

Panel 2: That same month I heard of something called Pottermore. “Okay, so there’s a sorting quiz… I already know my house! Patronus assignment? Mine’s a barn owl. Duh!" 

Panel 3: You can read the books again but with GIFs? Why? 

Panel 4: I lived in a place with very slow and limited internet at the time. Pottermore sounded inaccessible, but also boring. I never joined. 

Panel 5: "I’ll just read the actual books again, thanks." 

PAGE 4

Part Four: Sweets

In 2016, a series of short stories titled "History of Magic in North America” were released on Pottermore to pave the way for the first Fantastic Beasts Film. These stories display an extreme ignorance of American history, culture, and geography, but the worst parts are the casual misuse of indigenous beliefs and stories. Fans and critics immediately spoke up against this appropriation. Some of the most quoted voices included Nambe Pueblo scholar Dr. Debbie Reese who runs the site “American Indians In Children’s Literature”; Navajo writer Brian Young; Johnnie Jae (Otoe-Missouria and Choctaw), founder of A Tribe Called Geek; Dr Adrienne Keene (Cherokee Nation), a Professor at Brown University who runs the blog “Native Appropriations”, and writers N.K. Jemison and Paula Young Lee.

PAGE 5

Rowling is famous for responding to fans directly on twitter, yet she did not respond to anyone calling out the damaging aspects of “Magic in North America.” Her representatives refused to comment for March 9 2016 article in the Guardian. She has never apologized. All of this, plus the casting of Johnny Depp and the specific declarations of support by JKR, Warner Brothers, and director David Yates left a sour taste in my mouth.

For further thoughts on the new films read The Crimes of Grindelwald is a Mess by Alanna Bennett for Buzzfeed News, November 16, 2018.

PAGE 6

Excerpt from Colonialism in Wizarding American: JK Rowling’s History of Magic in North America Through an Indigenous Lens by Allison Mills, MFA, MAS/MLIS (Cree and Settler French Canadian)

Although Rowling is certainly not the first white author to misstep in her treatment of Indigenous cultures, she has an unprecedented level of visibility and fame, […] One of the most glaring problems with Rowling’s story is her treatment of the many Indigenous nations in North America as one monolithic group. […It] flattens out the diversity of languages, belief systems, and cultures that exist in Indigenous communities, allowing stereotyping to persist. […] It continues a long history of colonial texts which ignore that Indigenous peoples still exist. […] In the Wizarding world, as in the real world, Indigenous histories have been over-written and our cultures erased.

from The Looking Glass: New Perspectives in Children’s Literature Volumn 19, Issue 1

PAGE 7

Part 5: Music

Panel 1: Also in 2016 I discovered two podcasts which radically altered my experience of being an HP fan. The first was Witch Please created by two Canadian feminist literary scholars Hannah McGregor and Marcelle Kosman.

Panel 2: “If it’s not in the text it doesn’t count!” “Close reading ONLY!”

Panel 3: They talk about Harry Potter at the level you’d expect in a college class with particular focus on gender, race, class, and the troubling fatphobia, fear of othered and queer coded bodies, violence against women, white feminism, gaslighting and failed pedagogy in the books. They bring up these issues not because they hate the series, but because they LOVE it.

PAGE 8

These passionate, joyful conversations went off like fireworks in my mind. I had never taken a feminist class before. I gained a whole new vocabulary to talk about the books- and the world.

PAGE 9

Panel 1: The second podcast I started that year was Harry Potter and the Sacred Text, created by two graduates of the Harvard Divinity School, Vanessa Zoltan and Casper Ter Kuile.

Panel 2: They read one chapter per episode through a theme such as love, control, curiosity, shame, responsibility, hospitality, destruction, or mystery. Like Witch Please, they are interested only in the information on the page, not thoughts from the author. The delights and failures of the text are examined in the context of the present day, and new meanings constantly arise.

PAGE 10

What does it mean to treat a text as sacred?

Trusting that the more time we give to it, the more blessings it has to give us.

Reading the text repeatedly with concentrated attention. Our effort is part of what makes it sacred. The text is not in and of itself sacred, but is made so by rigorously engaging in the ritual of reading.

Experiencing it in community.

“To me, the goal of treating the text as sacred is that we learn to treat each other as sacred.” -Vanessa Zoltan

PAGE 11

Part 6: Tooth and Claw

In October 2017, Rowling liked a tweet linking to an article arguing that trans women should be kept out of women’s bathrooms because of cisgender women’s fears. In March 2018, she liked a tweet about the problem of misogyny in the UK Labour Party which included the line “Men in dresses get brosocialist solidarity I never had.” The author of the tweet had previously posted many blatantly anti-trans statements.

Rowlings publicist claimed she had liked the posted by accident in a “clumsy and middle-aged moment.” Yet, in September 2018 she liked a link posted by Janice Turner to her column in the Times UK titled “Trans Rapists Are A Danger In Women’s Jails.”

Screencaps of these tweets can be found in the article “The Mysterious Case of JK Rowling and her Transphobic Twitter History”, January 10 2019 by Gwendolyn Smith (a trans journalist), LGBTQNation.com

PAGE 12

Excerpt from: Is JK Rowling Transphobic? A Trans Woman Investigates by Katelyn Burns

Ultimately, the answer is yes, she is transphobic […] I think it’s fair that she receives criticism from trans people, especially given her advocacy on behalf of queer people in general, but also because she has a huge platform. Many people look up to her for creating a singular piece of popular culture that holds deep meaning for fans from different walks of life, and she has a responsibility to handle that platform wisely. (Published on them.us March 28, 2018)

PAGE 13

Part 7: Home

At age 30, I’m still not over Harry Potter.

Panel 1: I’ve recently found a local bar that does HP trivia nights. “Poppy or Pomona?” “Poppy!”

Panel 2: I currently own an annual pass to Universal Studios so I can visit Hogsmeade.

Panel 3: I love talking to kids who are reading the books for the first time. “Who’s your favorite character?” “Ginny!”

Panel 4: And I’m planning a relisten to the audio books to next year to help me get through the election cycle. “Jim Dale, I’m going to need you more than ever…”

Spoiler from 2023: I did not do this. By mid-2020 JKR had posted her transphobic essay; we were in covid; I never visited Universal Studios again.

PAGE 14

But I do want to learn from her mistakes. I never want to repeat “Magic in North America.” As I write, I will do my research. I will consult experts and compensate them. If a reader from a different culture/background than me speaks up about my work, I will listen and apologize. I KNOW I WILL MAKE MISTAKES. But I will own up to them and I will do better.

PAGE 15

Excerpt from Diversity Is Not Enough: Race, Power and Publishing by Daniel José Older

We can love a thing and still critique it. In fact, that’s the only way to really love a thing. Let’s be critical lovers and loving critics and open ourselves to the truth about where we are and where we’ve been. Instead of holding tight to the same old, failed patriarchies, let’s walk a new road, speak new languages. Today, let’s imagine a literature, a literary world, that carries this struggle for equity in its very essence, so that tomorrow it can cease to be necessary, and disappear. (Buzzfeed, April 14, 2017) 

PAGE 16

Harry Potter is flawed, & JK Rowling is problematic. But the books helped me learn a lot: 

*One of the greatest dangers facing the modern world is the rise of fascism 

*The government cannot be trusted 

*Read and think critically

*Question the news: who paid the journalist? Who owns the paper? 

*Trust and support your friends through good times and bad

*Organize for resistance

*Educate and share resources with peers

*The revolution must be diverse and intersectional

* We are only as strong as we are united

*The weapon we have is love 

MK 2019

PAGE 17

PART 8: EPILOGUE

In 2021 I removed a Harry Potter patch I sewed to my book bag over a decade ago. I took 15 pieces of Harry Potter fanart off my walls. I got rid of my paperback book set, 2 board games, and 8 t-shirt. [images: a Hogwarts a patch with loose threads, a pair of scissors and a seam ripper]

Panel 1: Maia holding up a shirt with the Deathly Hallows logo on it. Maia thinks: “Damn, this really used to be my entire personality.”

Panel 2: The t-shirt gets thrown into the Goodwill box.

PAGE 18

I wrote my zine wrestling with JKR’s legacy in 2019, after her dismissive and racist reaction to indigenous fans and critics of “Magic in North America” and after she had liked a couple transphobic tweets. Since then, she has gotten so much worse.

A Brief Timeline (mostly from this Vox article)

June 2020- JKR posts a 3600 word essay making her anti-trans position clear

August 2020- The Robert F Kennedy Human Rights Org issues a statement about her transphobia, JKR doubles down on her position and returns an award they gave her

December 2020- JKR claims 90% of HP fans secretly agree with her anti-trans views

December 2021- JKR mocks Scottish Police for recognizing transgender identities

March 2022- JKR criticizes gender-inclusive language and legislation

December 2022- JKR retweets trans youtuber Jessie Earl’s critical review of Hogwarts Legacy, starting an onslaught of transphobic harassment towards Earl

December 2022- JKR removes her support from an Edinburgh center for survivors of sexual violence with a trans-inclusive policy and funds her own center which explicitly excludes trans sexual assault survivors

January 2023- JKR tweets “Deeply amused by those telling me I’ve lost their admiration due to disrespect I show violent, duplicitous rapists.” It got nearly 300K likes

March 2023- One the podcast “The Witch Trials of JK Rowling”, hosted by a former Westboro Baptist Church Member, JKR compares the trans rights movement to Death Eaters.

PAGE 19

What are The Witch Trials of JK Rowling?

Panel 1: Maia speaking. “It’s a 7 episode documentary style podcast hosted by Megan Phelps-Roper. Nearly every episode contains interviews with JKR as well as critics, journalists, historians, protestors and fans.

Panel 2: Maia speaking. “In episode 1, JKR speaks more candidly than she has previously about being in an abusive marriage. Her ex-husband hit her, stalked her, broke into her house overlapping with the time she was writing the first three HP books.”

Panel 3: Maia speaking. “What she went through genuinely sounds horrific. I have a lot of sympathy for the kind of life-long traumas those experiences leave.”

PAGE 20

HOWEVER.

It is clear from reading the June 2020 essay on her blog and listening to the podcast, that JKR still to this day feels unsafe. Despite her wealth and privilege she moves through the world with the mindset of a victim. And the group of people she finds most threatening are trans women.

Or rather, she is afraid that allowing trans women in women’s spaces invites the possibility of male predators entering those spaces.

Here’s a direct quote: The problem is male violence. All a predator wants is access and to open the doors of changing rooms, rape centers, domestic violence centers [...] to any male who says “I’m a woman and I have a right to be here” will constitute a risk to women and girls. - from The Witch Trials episode 4 as transcribed by therowlinglibrary.com, March 2023

Image: A stem of Belladonna with flowers and berries.

PAGE 21

Let me introduce here the term: TRANSMISOGYNY. The intersection of transphobia and misogyny, this term was coined by Julia Serano in 2007. Scout Tran, on tiktok as Queersneverdie said: “Transmisogyny occurs in people who have been previously hurt by traditional misogyny. Who have been driven to hate men or at the very least to be scared of men. They will sometimes take out that rage on trans women. (March 2023)

JKR claims to care for trans women and understand they are extremely vulnerable to assault and violence. In her 2020 Essay she wrote: “I want trans women to be safe. At the same time, I do not want to make natal girls and women less safe.”

So she cares about trans women… just less than cis women, and she’s willing to throw all trans women under the bus because of her unfounded, prejudice fears.

PAGE 22

Panel 1: Maia speaking. “JKR claims to have seen data that proves trans women have presented physical threats to other women in intimate spaces, but never cites sources. She also uses “producer of the large gametes” as a definition of “woman”.

What about transmen and nonbinary folks?

Panel 2: Maia leaning on a stack of all seven HP books, the first four Cormorant Strike books and The Casual Vacancy, gesturing to a series of quotes with a tired and disgusted expression.

I’m concerned about the huge explosion of young women wishing to transition and also about the increasing numbers who seem to be detransitioning. * [...] If I’d been born 30 years later, I too might have tried to transition. The allure of escaping womanhood would have been huge. -June 10 2020 essay

I don’t believe a 14 year old can truly understand what the loss of their fertility is.

-Witch Trials episode 4

I haven’t yet found a study that hasn’t found that the majority of young people experiencing gender dysphoria grow out of it*. -Witch Trials episode 7

*No sources cited

PAGE 23

It’s hard to over emphasize how fixated JKR has become on these topics. As of the date I’m writing this, 14 out of her 20 most recent tweets (70%) are in some way anti-trans. She tweets against Mermaids (a UK based trans youth charity), against trans athletes, against gender neutral bathrooms, and in support of LBG Alliance- a UK org that denies trans rights while upholding gay rights. Here are some gems from her archive:

“People who menstruate.” I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud? -June 2020

War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength. The Penised Individual Who Raped You Is a Woman. - December 2021

And in response to someone asking “How do you sleep at night knowing you lost a whole audience?”

I read my most recent royalty cheques and find the pain goes away pretty quickly. -October 2022

PAGE 24

Hashtag Ruthless Productions a queer nerd podcast company created a great guide on ethical engagement with HP. Image: the two hosts of Hashtag Ruthless productions, Jessie (They/she) and Lark (he/him).

Stop buying all official HP Products: books, movies, games, toys, etc, Universal Studios tickets, food, merch.* Boycott any new TV series or movies. Instead: buy the books and DVDs used. If you still want to wear HP merch, buy fan-made. Engage only with fan content: fic, podcasts, fanart, wizard rock, etc. Show transphobia is bad for business. None of this will change JKR’s mind. But the Fantastic Beast series was canceled and after record Pottermore sales in 2020, they fell in 2022 by 40%.

*She gets a portion of ALL tickets. In 2019, this was her largest income source. Read the full guide: hashtagruthless.com/resourceguide

PAGE 25

As late as 2019, I was still reading JKR’s murder mystery series. But by the fourth book my experience began to sour.

Panel 1: Maia holding a copy of Lethal White. “The only gay character in this book is a government official who gropes his staff?”

Panel 2: “The only genderqueer character is misgendered and portrayed as a whiny faker?”

Panel 3: “The only Muslim character is disowned by his family over gay rumors?”

Panel 4: “Even the women aren’t portrayed very well…”

Panel 5: “Why is the main female character defined by the rape in her past?”

Panel 6: “Wait, what happens in the rest of this series…?” Maia scrolls on eir phone.

Panel 7: “Is the series heading towards an employee/boss relationship?”

Panel 8: “And has a man wearing women’s clothes to commit assault?”

Panel 9: “Yeah, I’m done. I’m never reading a new JKR book ever again.”

PAGE 26

And as for JKR herself?

As tempting as it might be to tweet your frustrations at her, I don’t recommend it. In 2021, she tweeted, “Hundreds of trans activists have threatened to beat, rape, assassinate and bomb me.” Getting hate online feeds her sense of victimhood and she waves it as proof of her moral high ground. Instead I suggest you block her on twitter, then delete twitter, go to the library and try to find a new book that feels magical.

Stack of books: In Other Lands by Sarah Rees Brennan, The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater, Gifts by Ursula K Le Guin, Deep Wizardry by Diane Duane, A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik and Gideon the Ninth by Tamsin Muir.

PAGE 27

In “Emergent Strategy” adrienne maree brown writes: You do not have the right to traumatize abusive people, to attack them, personally or publicly, or to sabotage anyone else’s health. The behaviors of abuse are also survival-based, learned behaviors rooted in pain. If you can look through the lens of compassion, you will find hurt and trauma there. If you are the abused party, healing that hurt is not your responsibility and exacerbating that pain is not your justified right.

PAGE 28

Seeing anyone over age 12 wearing HP merch now makes me uncomfortable. Are they ignorant or actively a TERF? I hate wondering how much money JKR has probably poured into anti-trans legislation… This zine is a culmination of my slow breakup with a story that once brought me joy. Now it just makes me angry, tired and sad.

Image: Candle in a fancy holder burned down to less than an inch.

Maia Kobabe, 2023

[chatsukimi]

ʜᴇʏ ʙᴀʙʏ, ʙᴀʙʏ

featuring: gojo satoru x reader. humour + hurt no comfort. synopsis: a collection of you and gojo's voicemails/calls to each other throughout the years. masterlist

july 7th, 2006. 11:23am.

"heyy babyy, you miss me?"

cringing to yourself, you listened to your classmate, gojo satoru's, first voicemail to you. the windows were open in the classroom, summer wind blowing in. the heat was almost as annoying as the blondie's voice. gojo and geto are staying at some estate in okinawa to catch some special grade curse.

oh, and for the record, he was not your boyfriend- whatever pet names he constructed for you were his business only.

you'd tried and failed for him to stop.

"... geto says it's a huge curse we're catching. pfft. i think it's easy peasy. and-"

you heard very distinctly geto's voice hollering at gojo on the other line. pinching your lips together, you resisted a smile. what a menace, leaving his friend in the midst of battle just to send a voicemail to you.

it almost warmed your heart.

"-ok, looks like he's having trouble. aww, suguru, do i have to hang up?" a cacophony of harsh bangs and shouting later, you were furrowing your brows and gojo was back on the line. "ok, he thinks you aren't important enough to voicemail right now-"

"i never said that you stupid-"

"harsh," gojo retorted in a strangled tone right back, the faux offence grating your ears. "he doesn't think i should be calling you right now. inconsiderate." then, in a breathless whisper, he said, "call me later, mk? don't forget to congratulate your boyfriend. i expect a hero's welcome!"

the line cut short.

you texted him straight after: i am not in a relationship with you.

september 1st, 2006. 9:49pm.

"hey baby, i'm out on a mission right now. what's your favourite sweet? they've got mochi, mooncakes, and some pocky. chocolate, strawberry and cream flavoured. tell me and your beloved will bring you his war spoils."

at this point, you'd gotten used to his endearments already.

in your room, all cozied up in your blankets with a hot cup of honey-water in hand, you stared out the window, admiring the nighttime stars. somewhere out there, gojo was fighting.

"you've got to start answering my calls." you could hear him pouting so vividly it chilled you. "wanna hear your voice, baby."

his voice, you realised, was a nice accompaniment to your nighttime routine. he spoke neither too slowly nor too fast. nice and smooth too...

wait- what? you snapped out of it. no way you just complimented gojo satoru.

you dropped the phone on your bed, resolving to ignore him this time.

and the way he haunted your sleep.

may 25th, 2007. 2:00pm.

"baby baby baby, i'm this close to killing all the higher ups," satoru was mumbling against the phone, the usual smoothness of his voice sunken into callousness. you still couldn't believe he was talking to you like you're there with him; he's miles away. "a two week mission. what were they thinking?

"hmph. it's not even a curse i'm suited to." suddenly realising what he insinuated, gojo added, "easy to exorcise, of course, but so troublesome. they should've hired someone with a slower, more detective-heavy technique. they're keeping me away from you... god, are you forgetting me?"

you listened to him while standing outside a classroom at jujutsu high. geto gave you a wry smile: can't get enough of him, mm? you shot him an angry glare.

it didn't prepare you for the sound that slipped out of the phone.

a whisper.

"do you think i should?"

then you were clutching the phone to your ear, fighting the urge to put his voice on speaker to hear properly, clinging onto every word that escaped him.

"d'you think i should kill the higher ups?"

for the first time since being forced to receive gojo satoru's number, you pressed call.

"... hey bab-"

"gojo satoru," you said his name with a meaning, like you knew exactly what it was meant for, to strike him at his very core. "i like you. stop thinking about murder."

november 20th, 2018. 5:24pm.

"babe... talk to me. i'm sorry, didn't mean to get trapped in that box in the first place. it's just part of the job. it's nothing. i'm the strongest. plus, i got out just fine.

"i..." careful and slow, his tone resumed a certain responsibility. it showed that he was trying. "... should've been careful, for you. i know that now.

"just come back and talk to me."

november 20th, 2009. 6:30pm.

"babe babe babe babe baby. please..."

november 28th, 2018. 10:23pm.

"hey baby, i'm thinking of taking a break from the jujutsu world after this. let's go on a nice holiday, just you and me. god that'll be fun... m'thinkin of you on the beach." a cheeky lilt crossed his voice. "hah- just joking... maybe. hold on a little more, mk? year's nearly over. i'll pay for it all, the trip. and, well, you know what we were saying about getting married... yeah. okinawa's a pretty place, isn't it? i overheard nanami talking to his friend bout it just then actually."

december 1st, 2018. 00:58am.

"hi baby. it's late. i know. i've been busy." he paused.

silence flooded the line for about five seconds. it was as though his lungs were convulsing in bursts of breath under the weight of things unsaid. he kept quiet.

then, he was moving around, shifting uncomfortably. he wanted to end the voicemail, didn't know why he started it to begin with.

all you heard before the voicemail ended was:

"stay safe."

december 24, 2018. 4:35am.

"hey baby, i just wanna say... i love you."

you lift your hand up to your mouth, bottling the cry that aches to get out of you. the brutally familiar voice of the white haired sorcerer rasps against your ear. then he breaks out in a dazzlingly clear laughter.

"i... really do. this isn't a joke or anything. i know you know already, but i wanted to tell you." you could guess the ensuing words straight from his mouth. "i don't know if i'll win."

there it is. despite yourself, you smile, treasuring the vulnerability he's shown.

"sorry, i'm not sure why i said that. of course i'll win." you can imagine him puffing his chest out on the other line, confidence filling up his voice once more. "but maybe... in case i don't...

"we had a good run, didn't we?"

you let out a shaky breath.

yeah. we did.

"when i come back, i expect a hero's welcome. ok, babe?"

you're chuckling to yourself as he rambles on and on about kikufuku mochi and a holiday in okinawa, just him and you. no higher ups allowed. no responsibilities. you enjoy the lilt of his voice, terrifying smooth and there despite no real presence.

at last, you put down the phone. a low static drones throughout the apartment.

your photo albums collated on the cupboards, the messy unmade bed, just as you'd left it. two mugs in the kitchen. two pairs of slippers at the doorway.

your thumb drifts away from the replay button. you close your eyes, willing his stupidly annoying voice to haunt you one more time. to taunt you, to tease you, to tell you what you want to hear.

not gojo's very last voice message.

"yuta..."

you couldn't bring yourself to look up. the height, the weight, the figure. shoko had told you to prepare yourself to see the exact replica of your lover before you.

you know that is impossible... nothing could replace satoru.

your resolve is knocked out of you when you see him. only a glimpse... but the same face, same lips and nose and hair and- oh, your breath catches. same eyes. maybe you couldn't... maybe you couldn't tell the difference after all-

"y/n?"

finally you gather the courage to study him properly.

"yuta," you acknowledge.

you know for certain this is not satoru.

for your satoru had a different voice, clear and powerful as the ocean waves. your satoru spoke with purpose, the undeniable confidence he was right, always, and could not be knocked down. your satoru had a penchant he would not let go of calling you baby.

[michaelnordeman]

November observations. Pictured birds: Eurasian Treecreeper/trädkrypare, Coal Tit/svartmes and Marsh Tit/entita. Värmland, Sweden (November 11, 2018).

[reasonsforhope]

"In a 4-3 decision released on Friday afternoon December 22, the Wisconsin Supreme Court held that Wisconsin’s voting maps as currently drawn violate the state constitution and must be redrawn in time for the 2024 election.

Under the Wisconsin Constitution, state legislative districts must consist of “contiguous territory.” [Meaning: continuous] Yet, the majority opinion states, “the number of state legislative districts containing territory completely disconnected from the rest of the district is striking.”

“At least fifty of ninety-nine assembly districts and at least twenty of thirty-three senate districts include separate, detached territory,” states the majority opinion, written by Justice Jill Karofsky.

Contiguous districts are a safeguard against gerrymandering and help keep together groups of voters who live in the same areas and have the same interests, explains the decision, which includes maps highlighting the islands of noncontiguous voting areas in the state’s current districts.

The voters who brought the lawsuit, Clarke v. Wisconsin Elections Commission, argued that the current districts violate the constitution and asked the court to  order the adoption of remedial maps. They also asked the court to declare the November 2022 state senate elections unlawful, and to order special elections for state senate seats that would otherwise not be on the ballot until November 2026.

The court’s ruling agrees with the petitioners that “Wisconsin’s state legislative districts must be composed of physically adjoining territory,” and enjoins the Wisconsin Elections Commission from using the current legislative maps in future elections. But it declined to invalidate the results of the 2022 state senate elections.

Acknowledging that it is the legislature’s role to draw voting maps, the majority opinion urges the legislature to draw new maps that comport with the constitution. However, it also states, since the legislature might not draw such maps or the governor might veto them, the court will plan to adopt remedial maps that can be used in time for the 2024 elections and unless and until new, constitutional maps are enacted through the legislative process...

Wisconsin’s voting maps are widely considered among the most politically gerrymandered in the country. This was reflected in 2018 when Democrats swept every statewide election and earned 53 percent of assembly votes cast statewide but only 36 percent of Assembly seats went to Democrats. Voters in Wisconsin are evenly split along partisan lines, and statewide races are often decided by slim margins. Currently, however, Republicans hold a 22-11 supermajority in the state senate and a 64-35 near-supermajority in the state assembly."

-via The Progressive Magazine

Note: Article is a bit wordy but this is a Big Deal. We're going to get fair election maps in an important swing state. The maps thrown out by this decision were deliberately designed to give Republicans a massive advantage in the election.

This WILL make a huge difference in who's elected in 2024.

[dnpbeats]

Why I Don’t Think the Secret Project™ Is a Tour—This Time With Facts!

Let me start out by saying I do think they’ve brought up another tour enough that it will happen at some point, I just don’t think it will be this soon! (Also keep in mind Dan did imply there are two things coming up in his Tweet.) That being said, obviously I could be totally wrong. But hey, if they do announce a tour in a couple of weeks, there has to be someone that gets clowned by the announcement, and I’m happy to take the fall <3 Post under cut as it's long (1.3k words 💀)

The main reason I don’t think they’re announcing a tour is timing, but I do also have something to say about the hints they’ve been dropping and why I also don’t think it necessarily points towards a tour. So, to start, let’s look at how long they spent planning TATINOF and II. In “The Making of TABINOF,” Phil says they are releasing the book (on October 8th 2015) after working on it for a year and a half, which would be April 2014. Presumably, this is around the time they started working on TATINOF as well because they were supposed to be companions. TABINOF and TATINOF were announced together on March 26th 2015, so almost exactly a year after they started planning them. Even if you want to guess that TATINOF planning started a few months after TABINOF planning, keep in mind that they originally only planned the UK leg and planned the US tour after that. The UK leg ended November 15 2015 and they announced the US leg February 26 2016. So that’s a little over two months of them planning the US leg alone, when they already had the show itself all sorted.

With II, we know they were actively planning it for about a year. Phil follows that up to say they planned it for “the majority of this year [2018],” so let’s just call it 10-11 months. More so than that, Dan said that they realized they wanted to do a second tour “halfway through” TATINOF, which in my best guess places that decision around summer 2016. This means they seriously considered doing a second tour for ~6 months before they even started planning it. 

Now, if the new project coming up is a tour, they’ve only been working on it for 6 months max. They only brought back the gaming channel 7 months ago, and we know from the end of Dan’s bday live stream that they didn’t start working on this project until they realized how many people still liked their content: “We were so shocked about how much people care about this light entertainment, sat-in-this-chair-ass content. [...] It took us by such surprise, and now we’re like, where is this going. [...] It was supposed to be a ‘let’s just do this for a bit and see what happens.’ [...] So now we find ourselves going, well okay, this channel, this content, the people, the future of it. What else are we gonna do? 'Cause it seems like there's a thing here.” 

So it’s up to you to decide when they realized that, but I think it was probably sometime in November at the absolute earliest, and then they still needed time after that to decide what they’re going to do, and then actually plan it. (And honestly, I doubt they started actively planning anything in December during gamingmas, but you never know!! Also like I said in my original post about this, Dan was still doing WAD stuff up until February and then some book promo stuff after that, so he was busy with that as well.)

So, that’s all to say, I really don’t think they’ve had time to plan an entire tour. At the very least, not a world tour, but I don’t know if they’d announce a UK-only leg and plan the worldwide tour later based on what they said about choosing to plan II all at once, rather than the split up way they did with TATINOF (also keep in mind that Dan announced WAD all at once, like d&p did with II). Idk I just don’t think they’d announce a tour without having it all planned!

Okay, so, besides the random hints that they’re busy planning something, we also have Phil’s comment about saving money in his Cactus Club post. He wrote “I also just wanted to make your cactus a lil more affordable as Dan and I get busy on what is …. next… ??” Now while this seems to imply saving up for something (hence why the membership needs to be affordable), he doesn’t outright say that. Then in his Q&A vid, he answers a question about what he’s cooking that specifically asks, “Should I save my money?” And interestingly, Phil doesn’t address the money part of the question. Now maybe he just couldn’t say anything about saving money, maybe it would've been too on-the-nose. But I’m also sure plenty of other people asked that question without asking about saving, which means he chose to specifically ignore that part. To me, it seems kinda weird to outright exclude that if the project is something people will have to pay a lot of money upfront for (i.e. tour tickets), but again that’s just my opinion.

(Also just a secondary note on Phil’s answer—he actually says, “Look, I can neither confirm nor deny something might happen in the next month.” I find the phrasing he chose really interesting. He didn’t say an announcement was coming, he said something was going to happen. Dan also never explicitly said to look forward to an “announcement,” he just said they’ve been cooking and to give it a couple of weeks. Obviously this could all mean nothing and maybe it is an announcement (whether it be for a tour or something else), but I actually think whatever the project is might be getting released not just announced. But idk!)

A moment of me speculating based on vibes (that also negates the note I just made about this potentially being a release rather than an announcement): part of me thinks this project might be something/similar to something they tried to get off the ground before but then never came to fruition! This gifset by @reunitedinterlude got me thinking about projects that they didn’t get to do for various reasons (namely COVID lol). I think one of these (either one of Phil’s ideas that he’s now brought Dan onto, or something they were trying to do together from the get go) would actually make a lot of sense for what’s getting announced. It would be something that they had already started work on, so it doesn’t take as much planning as something brand new, meaning it could be announced sooner. Additionally, I just feel like they’ve been so vague about what’s coming up, but they’ve also been super excited! They seem really proud about whatever they’ve been cooking. While I obviously think they’d be excited to do another world tour, part of me just feels like they might be this excited because it’s something new that they’ve never done before. Also, if it’s some kind of game show type thing, it would make sense that Dan said the project is a “celebration” of the gaming channel. But again this is just based on vibes lol.

In conclusion, I do think we’ll get a third Dan and Phil tour, I just don’t think it’s what’s getting announced(/released?) in the coming weeks. But I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the next thing they announce after whatever this upcoming thing is! If you think I’m dead wrong and actually other people have planned world tours in <6 months please let me know, I’m happy to be proven wrong bc I would love another tour :)

[putschki1969]

KALAFINA REUNION 📢IT'S TRUE📢

Why did I even go to bed last night??! Damn it, I lost precious time. Anways, many of you must have seen my post last night about that ominous Nikkan Sports article speculating about a possible comeback of Kalafina. I honestly thought it was fake news since it contained a ton of unconfirmed/uncredited information. However, there was lots of interesting stuff that kept me from dismissing it entirely. I mean, who would go through all the trouble coming up with details such as specific quotes or exact concert details? Turns out they mostly got the dates mixed up but the rest was true. At noon Japanese Standard Time, we got all of our official announcements. Here's the gist of it〈(•ˇ‿ˇ•)-→

Kalafina Staff Posts 1 & 2 on Twitter

Announcement of "Kalafina Anniversary LIVE 2025" Date: Wednesday, January 15, 2025 Open at 17:30 /Start 18:30 Venue: Tokyo Garden Theater Performers: Kalafina (Wakana, Keiko, Hikaru) Music Director: Takebe Satoshi

To everyone who loves and supports Kalafina We have decided to hold a "Kalafina Anniversary LlVE 2025". We want to sing together as a trio again, knowing that you all have always cherished Kalafina, even while we are doing solo activities. We look forward to seeing you there! Kalafina (Wakana, Keiko, Hikaru)

Ticket sales are scheduled for the following dates: ■Wakana/KEIKO Fan Club Advanced Lottery October 10, 2024, 11:00 - October 20, 23:59 ■Hikaru X (formerly Twitter) Advanced Lottery October 25, 11:00 - November 4, 23:59 ■General Ticket Lottery November 9, 11:00 - November 11, 23:59

Keiko Posts 1 & 2 on Twitter & Fan Club Site & Tristone & Instagram post

To all our supporters We have decided to hold a "Kalafina Anniversary LlVE 2025". Through my solo activities and activities with FictionJunction, I have had many new encounters and taken on new challenges, and I am where I am today thanks to the support of many people. This is a personal matter, but the reason I took a break from singing and then decided to sing again was because of Yuki Kajiura's music. And it was the feelings of everyone who has supported us up until now that led to this event. I am grateful for those feelings, and I am simply happy that the three of us can deliver Kalafina's music again. I am truly looking forward to seeing you all next year. KEIKO

Hikaru's Post on Twitter and Instagram

To everyone who always supports us We are happy to announce that we'll be holding a "Kalafina Anniversary LlVE 2025". Even during my solo activities, I always got a strong sense of everyone's love for Kalafina. I'm grateful we are getting this opportunity to sing together again as a trio and to perform all those treasured songs which Yuki Kajiura has written for us. I hope we can raise a new flag together with all of you. I look forward to seeing you there that day! 2024.10.03 Hikaru

Wakana Posts on Twitter & Botanical Land & Instagram post

(We finally have an official statement from Wakana on her Insta) It has been decided that an "Kalafina Anniversary LIVE 2025" will be held on January 15th next year. From 2018 to the present, we have each pursued our own music, but we have decided to sing together again. I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all of you who always think of and love Kalafina. I am very much looking forward to meeting you all.

Satoshi Takebe Tweet 1 & Tweet 2 & Tweet 3 (deleted)

Today I had a meeting with some artists I truly respect and had a beer in the middle of the day 🍺 We had a fun afternoon. I hope there will be lots of fun things to do next year too. I can't say anything yet, but I'm already working on some exciting projects!! (Tweet 1)

I believe that my mission is to support artists. It is never my intention to betray or hurt people. That is the one thing I have always stayed true to, and I will continue to do so. It may sound naive, but I believe that sincerity and passion are what motivate people. (Tweet 2)

Due to confidentiality obligations, I cannot explain the situation. However, Kajiura-san is an artist I respect, she's a wonderful musician, and I am a fan of the music she creates. I would like to support the three members with the utmost respect. (Tweet 3 - deleted)

Tweet by Yuki Kajiura & Tweet 2 & Tweet 3

Regarding Kalafina I've received some inquiries in relation to the most recent announcement of an upcoming Kalafina Live Concert so I'd like to use this opportunity to clarify that I, Yuki Kajiura, will not have no involvement whatsoever in this concert. Furthermore, I have not received any advance notice or explanation from the organisers or any of the group members. Given the situation, I am therefore unable to answer any questions. I apologise, but any future inquiries regarding Kalafina should be directed at the organisers and official agencies of the group members.

I believe the members of Kalafina have decided to step away from me as their producer to go on a new path that is not related to me. I had been searching for a way to work together again in the future to create new Kalafina music but that will no longer be happening. It is very unfortunate but this is the road that each member has chosen. We are all individuals searching for our personal musical path so things like this happen.

As you all know, the three of them are truly wonderful singers so I have no doubt that they will continue to deliver amazing vocals and music to their fans. I would like to express my sincere gratitude once again for the privilege and happiness of having been able to create music together with them for nearly ten years, and I wish Kalafina continued success in the future.

Yuki Kajiura (Tweet 1)

I hope for a great success regarding the upcoming concert, and that's all I can say about this. I hope to continue making music in a cheerful and fun way in the future (^^). (Tweet 2)

This may be an unnecessary remark, but… there's no way that Kalafina will no longer be able to sing their past songs just because one producer has left, and I personally don't wish that upon them.

I'm sure they'll create a wonderful harmony at their live show in January, so I hope you'll give thunderous cheers and applause to Kalafina's singing and to the musicians who support them on stage. Once again, I wish them all the success in the world. (Tweet 3)

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───── ───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ────────── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

Wow. All of this is wild. I don't even know what to say. I can hardly believe it. On one hand, I am beyond happy and excited. There's no way I will not be there for this concert and everything beyond that. But on the other hand, all the announcements make this feel a little bittersweet. The personal statements by Wakana, Keiko and Hikaru don't necessarily feel disingenuous but they sound a bit flat and forced. Sadly, there's no personal statement from Wakana yet. Obviously, the elephant in the room is Yuki Kajiura's statement and her exclusion from the entire project. The way her statement is written comes off as quite bitter, passive aggressive and honestly a little petty which doesn't bode well for the future (maybe her manager Mori asked her to phrase it in such a way to make the organisers look bad. And I can understand why she would feel frustrated at being excluded like that). Mostly, I interpret her standoffish attitude as a knee-jerk reaction or as a way to strongly distance herself from the whole thing and not so much as an attempt to bash the members (the latter half of the statement would indicate that at least). Also, she already seems to regret posting such a harsh statement and posted a couple of follow-up tweets. I truly do not understand what is going on behind the scenes to cause so much hostility between Yuki Kajiura, her management and whoever is pulling the strings for this Kalafina reunion (presumably Space Craft's management). My best guess is that Space Craft is at least somehow involved in this project since both Wakana and Satoshi Takebe are able to participate (Takebe is not affiliated with Space Craft but he's been in charge of almost all of Wakana's solo work so maybe there are some ties to the agency).It looks like Space Craft are adamant about not working together with YK (same old childish attitude). Then again, Satoshi Takebe has enough influence in the industry to organise a project like this without the help of Space Craft. Maybe Sony is also involved? I have no idea. Hope we are getting more details once the ticket lotteries start. A new Kalafina website (still being developed) has popped up and it's run by Space Craft so that's probably proof enough that they are one of the main players in all of this.

I wonder if this was a spur of the moment thing once they realised how much hype there still exists for Kalafina after that "ring your bell" performance at the FSN event...Overall, the timing is so weird, Why now? I mean, this doesn't sound like it has been in the making for a very long time based on the fact that Yuki Kajiura didn't even know about it. Keiko and Hikaru literally collaborated with her a couple of weeks ago so how did this topic not come up even once???! Wonder how it will affect future collaborations between Yuki, Keiko and Hikaru? They still have the Asia tour dates coming up in November so I can imagine it would be kinda awkward to work together after this bomb has been dropped. Will they still be covering Kalafina songs? Either way, I refuse to believe tha there has been a real falling out between any of them. It comes across like a series of unfortunate events. Maybe some miscommunication and rushed action but nothing that couldn't be cleared up with a proper conversation.

One thing I'm also curious about is whether or not Satoshi Takebe will take on the role as producer for future music (if they are even planning to go down that route?? It does sound like they might have new projects/releases in store for us...I do feel a little conflicted about that since Yuki Kajiura is such an important component of Kalafina. This is basically what I thought would happen back in 2018/2019. With someone else coming in to take charge of the music production. Back then I wasn't completely against the idea since I was convinced the girls could make it work (especially with the help of someone as established and competent as Satoshi Takebe) but it certainly wasn't my preferred option. Ughhh, I will remain open-minded for the time being. My love for Wakana, Keiko and Hikaru goes beyond anything so as of right now, I feel happy and excited. The live in January will be a celebration of Kalafina so there's no way I'm not going. If they continue to hold "tribute" concerts like this, it will mostly be a nostalgic cash-grab but hey, I'm the target group for that. They can have all my money. And I can definitely see myself supporting them in future projects even with Yuki Kajiura out of the picture. Takebe has been engaging in some surprisingly frank one-on-one discussions on Twitter and so far, it looks like certain confidentiality agreements keep him from going into detail in the matter but his involvement as of right now is limited to being a director/producer for the concert on January 15.

It goes without saying that I will not tolerate any hate towards the girls on this blog! If you are bitter that Yuki Kajiura is not involved, that's your prerogative, I'm sure this will antagonise quite a few hardcore YK fans. But please, don't shit on the members for making this decision. I'm sure they put a lot of thought into it and felt like this course of action was in everyone's best interest. They are clearly thinking about the fans, their own passion/love for Kalafina's music and obviously their careers within the industry.

[pinkieribbons]

Some of my fav mods that I use in my game ♰౨ৎ

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2. Lighting mod ౨ৎ: GENTLE CAS LIGHTING MOD

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5. Sliders ౨ৎ: Chin slider (remake), More sliders for the face!, eye size slider + head size slider, The Perfect Doll Sliders, Hip Shape Slider, Leg length or hips height slider, DEFAULT MOUTH SLIDER, DEFAULT BROWS SLIDER, Shoulder Height slider / male + female versions, Height Slider

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[nikadd]

im going to the spn picket on thursday (before any bad faith piss on the poor readers start, ive been going on the other days as well, not just for spn), but i've just been thinking abt the importance of letting a show live and develop and not cancel it after the first season. like, many of us got into spn many years after it premiered, both bc of our ages but also maybe just bc what the show was in s1 wasn't for us. anyways all that to say is this:

[thinking-emoji]

Photo-spoiler free PEOPLE article

wonderful article by the amazing Raven Brunner, but it unfortunately includes extremely cute photos of dnp on stage and in their stage outfits. So here's the spoiler free version for all you hardcore spoiler-fighters

Dan Howell and Phil Lester Say Seeing Fans on Tour Now That They're 'Older and Bit Gayer' Has Felt 'Radical and Freeing' (Exclusive)

Dan Howell and Phil Lester are currently one month into the North American leg of their tour Terrible Influence and PEOPLE has an exclusive first look

By Raven Brunner | Published on November 1, 2024 11:00AM EDT

Dan Howell and Phil Lester are cruising through the United States! 

The two British YouTubers are currently one month into the North American leg of their third joint tour Terrible Influence – and PEOPLE has an exclusive first look.

The duo will continue with stops in Chicago, Toronto, New York City, Nashville and more, before bringing their show to Australia in December. 

"Being able to see our audience in real life, now that we're all older ... and we're a bit gayer, feels so radical and freeing," Dan and Phil said in a statement shared with PEOPLE. "We've had so many people joke [that] this tour has felt 'healing' and to see people from all different walks of life feel like they are welcome at our tour makes us so happy."

They added, "Getting to perform a new show that contains so many spicy personal and professional revelations is a thrill. It's truly a DGAF new era and to see people hollering at some of the controversial moments and shedding a tear at the end makes it feel so good every night."

When it comes to traveling the states, the two continued, "The U.S.A. is so huge, we can't believe driving across the middle takes so long. From Texas and the midwest to the upcoming east coast leg - our propaganda is spreading across the nation and we're so happy to be here saving democracy, one brainwashed viewer at a time."

The show sees Dan and Phil on tour together for the first time since their 2018 hiatus from their shared YouTube channel DanandPhilGAMES, during which they both came out as gay and grew their personal brands. During this time, Dan wrote the #1 New York Times bestselling mental health book You Will Get Through This Night and embarked on a solo comedy tour We’re All Doomed, while Phil continued to grow his own YouTube channel AmazingPhil. 

In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE ahead of their arrival in the U.S., the two – who have been on YouTube together for over 15 years – spoke about the reactions to their first few shows as they began their tour in September with a stop in Belgium.

"We have had so many funny memes and reactions to it," Phil, 37, told us at the time. "Seeing the buzz on social media the first night we did the show, because no one knew anything about it or what it was going to be, was just a reminder of how hilarious our audience is.”

Dan, 33, added that the show is helping people come to terms with their past and also their future. 

"It has also been amazing seeing all the different kinds of people that come to the show because we have had people that are like, 'I’m old now and identify as a real person' – not someone that spends all their time on YouTube," he said. "All these people have grown up and gone on so many different journeys in the direction of their lives, and yet it feels like they all got to come together and feel like they were welcomed."

Dan continued, "They all got to laugh and feel like they could have some weight taken off their shoulders for who we were, for who they used to be [and] for how scared they should feel about the future. The fact that everyone’s left feeling invigorated about themselves for what the next chapters of their lives could be, I think we are really proud of that."

The new territory of the show also poses new "danger," as Dan said.

Phil has experienced two accidents while working on the show, the first of which occurred during a rehearsal and resulted in a broken rib. Then he fell off the stage during a tour stop in Sweden, after which he wrote on social media, "people think ‘phil is going to fall off the stage’ is an old joke until i actually fall off the stage."

"We joke about this,” Dan explained. “People are like, 'Dan and Phil need to stop exaggerating.' But you don’t even know the extent to which we don’t tell people half the stuff Phil has done."

"I need to be wrapped in bubble wrap at all times," Phil agreed, before adding, "To be fair, it is very dark on the stage. I thought I was leaning over the edge. There was no edge. I did a very stylish barrel roll off the front of the stage and thankfully it wasn’t very high."

He continued, "But the rib was another thing. I won't say much because it'd be a spoiler, but we were rehearsing a very active part of the show and I bent myself in a way I should not have bent myself."

Beyond the challenging physical aspects of the show, Dan noted that the specific scene also includes an emotional element where they are "jokingly being quite confrontational about a lot of things that would have, in the past, been considered sensitive topics – whether it is about us and our audience, or just like people on social media and what this culture is."

As for what the duo enjoys most about touring the United States, Dan quickly noted that "Phil is looking forward to sugar."

"Yeah, I have a sugar issue,” Phil confirmed. "Everything in the U.S. has more sugar in it. So that’s always quite exciting. The pancake stack I am going to get as soon as I arrive in America is going to be legendary."

Dan added, “You’ll find that’s essential. If someone wants a free selfie with Phil, just turn up to the local IHOP at 2 a.m. and see Phil just going, 'More maple syrup.'"

The two shared a story from their 2018 tour Interactive Introverts where their bus broke down "in the middle of Texas" and the only place nearby was a Denny’s. "So we ended up going there having a Breakfast Slam at like 3 a.m. I was like, 'I think I get American culture,' " Dan explained.

"This is it. The Slam,' " Phil added.

Meanwhile, Dan is most looking forward to "bus life."

"A lot of people go, ‘Touring! Don’t you just hate it? Imagine being on a bus cramped up with all those people?' And I’m like, 'I love it.' Get me out of the house," Dan shared. "We are not meant to just be spending all day in our head, being anxious about stuff. We are meant to go outside. And I found that the only way I can do that is to book a tour and commit to dragging myself outside of the house.'

Following their return to YouTube and their joint brand, Dan said that they are living "in this radical present where we are just seeing how things go." However, they are still aware of the demand for them to take on more big projects, particularly in relation to their former jobs as presenters on BBC Radio 1 where they hosted a weekly radio show and interviewed A-list celebrities like Taylor Swift and Fall Out Boy at special events.

"Yeah, that was really fun," Phil recalled. "I think there was a lot of anxiety for me doing the radio because you have to press a lot of buttons, you are live – so I can say anything. Anyone knows that me, unfiltered and live, is a dangerous mix, especially when you are the BBC."

Dan added, "People keep asking us. They are like 'Dan and Phil, we need you to get back doing these presenting jobs. You want to come back? Do the radio, do this award show.' We are like, 'Oh, my! Maybe we’ll do it for the people.' "

He continued to note that people are also "begging" him to return to his solo YouTube channel, but for now, they are focused on the tour. 

"This Dan and Phil comeback was so lowkey," Dan said. "Literally we had no plan for it. Phil was like, 'Just sit down, play The Sims, play a little card game,' and it is the most light, casual content ever. People were so enthusiastic about it and now they are like, 'What is the future?' People are begging us to do radio, they want us to do a podcast, they want us to do all this other stuff that their favorite YouTubers are doing. So now, we are like, 'Okay, we hear you, Dan and Phil 2.0 when we get back from this tour.' Honestly, it sounds like a threat."

"Yeah," Phil agreed. "What is it going to be? We are not sure but we are excited about it."

Tickets for Terrible Influence are now on sale.

[screenshotfolder]

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The FTC has Big Pharma’s number

On November 27, I'm appearing at the Toronto Metro Reference Library with Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen.

On November 29, I'm at NYC's Strand Books with my novel The Lost Cause, a solarpunk tale of hope and danger that Rebecca Solnit called "completely delightful."

The most consistent bright spot in the dark swirl of US politics is the competence of the Biden Administration's progressive enforcers: people like Rohit Chopra, Jonathan Kanter and Lina Khan, who keep demonstrating just how far a good administrator can go. Anyone can have a vision, but knowing how to execute is the difference between hot air and real change:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/23/getting-stuff-done/#praxis

Take a minute to contrast Biden's administrators with Trump's: Trump's administrators had an ideological vision just as surely as Biden's do, and Trump himself had a much more pronounced and explicit ideology than Biden, whose governance style is much more about balancing the Democratic Party's blocs than bringing about a specific set of policies:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/06/personnel-are-policy/#janice-eberly

But whatever clarity of vision the Trump administration brought to DC was completely undermined by its incompetence (thankfully!). Apart from one gigantic tax break, Trump couldn't get stuff done. He couldn't deliver, because he'd lose his temper or speak out of turn:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/14/when-youve-lost-the-fedsoc/#anti-buster-buster

And his administrators followed his lead. Scott Pruitt was appointed to run the EPA after a career spent suing the agency. It could have been the realization of his life's dream to dismantle environmental law in America and open the floodgates for unlimited, wildly profitable corporate pollution and pillaging. But the dream died because he kept getting embroiled in absurd scandals – like the time he sent his staffers out to drive around all night looking for a good deal on a used mattress:

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/epa-s-pruitt-told-aide-obtain-old-mattress-trump-hotel-n879836

Or his insistence on installing a CIA-style "Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility" (SCIF) so he could play super-spy while reading memos:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/26/politics/epa-administrator-scott-pruitt-sound-proof-booth-scif/index.html

Or the time he sent his security detail to the Ritz-Carlton to demand that they supply him lots of little bottles of his favorite hand-cream:

https://www.vox.com/2018/6/7/17439044/scott-pruitt-ritz-carlton-moisturizing-lotion

There were other examples in the Trump administration, but Priutt is such a good case-study. He's like a guy who spent his whole life training to compete in the Olympics, and finally got a shot, only to be disqualified for ordering too much room-service in the Olympic Village. Priutt was wildly ambitious, but he was profoundly undisciplined – and wildly incompetent.

Compare that with Biden's progressive enforcers and agency heads, who showed up on the first day of work with an encyclopedic knowledge of their administrative powers, and detailed plans for using them to transform the lives of the American people for the better:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/18/administrative-competence/#i-know-stuff

The Biden administration's competence translates into action, getting stuff done. Maybe that shouldn't surprise us, given the difference between the stories that reactionaries and progressives tell about where change comes from.

In reactionary science fiction, we enter the realm of the "Competent Man" story. Think of a Heinlein hero, who is "able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyse a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly."

In Competent Man stories, a unitary hero steps into the breach and solves the problem – if not single-handedly, then as the leader of others, whose lesser competence is a base metal that the Competent Man hammers into a tempered blade:

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/RobertAHeinlein

Contrast this with a progressive tale, like, say, Kim Stanley Robinson's Ministry For the Future, where the Competent Man is replaced by the Competent Administration, in which people of goodwill and technical competence figure out how to join forces to create population-scale architectures of participation that allow every person to contribute their skills and perspective:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/03/ministry-for-the-future/#ksr

The right's whole ideology insists that the world can only be saved by Competent Men. As Corey Robin writes in The Reactionary Mind, the unifying factor that binds together conservative factions from monarchists to racists to Christian Dominionists is the belief that a few of us are born to rule, and the rest to be ruled over:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/05/25/mafia-logic/#mafia-logic

The Reaganite insistence that governments are, by their very nature, incompetent and malign ("The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I’m from the government, and I’m here to help'"), means that conservatives deny the possibility of a Competent Administration.

When conservatives take office and proceed to bungle the most basic elements of administration, they're fulfilling their own campaign narrative, which starts with "We must dismantle the government because it is bad at everything." Conservatives who govern badly prove their own point, which explains a lot about the UK Tory Party's long run of governmental failure and electoral success:

https://apnews.com/article/uk-suella-braverman-fired-cabinet-shuffle-7ea6c89306a427cc70fba75bc386be79

There's a small mercy in the fact that so many of the most ideologically odious and extreme conservative governments are so technically incompetent in governing, and thus accomplish so little of their agendas.

But the inverse – the incredible competence of the best progressive administrators – is nothing short of a delight to witness. Here's the latest example to cross my path: the FTC has intervened in a lawsuit over generic insulin pricing, on an issue that is incredibly technically specific and also fantastically important:

https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/ftc-blasts-pharmas-abuse-fda-patent-system-sanofi-mylans-insulin-monopoly-lawsuit

The underlying case is before the FDA, and it concerns the dirty tricks that pharma giant Sanofi used to keep Mylan from making a generic version of Mylan's Lantus insulin after its patent expired.

There's an explicit bargain in patents: inventors can enlist the government to punish their rivals for copying their ideas, but in exchange, the government demands that the inventor has to describe how the invention works in a detailed patent filing, and when the patent expires, 20 years later, rivals can use the patent application as instructions for freely copying and selling the invention. In other words: you get 20 years of exclusive rights in return for facilitating your competitors' copying and selling your invention when the 20 years are up.

Pharma doesn't like this, naturally: not content with 20 years of exclusivity, they want the government to step in and punish their competitors forever. In service to that end, pharma companies have perfected a process called evergreening, where they dribble out ancillary patents after their initial filing, covering minor reformulations, delivery systems, or new uses.

Evergreening got a moment in the public eye earlier this year, with John Green's viral campaign to shame Johnson & Johnson out of using evergreening to restrict poor countries' access to TB medication:

https://armandalegshow.com/episode/john-green-part-1/

The story of pharma is that it commands gigantic profits, but it invests those profits into medicines that save our lives. The reality is that most of the key underlying pharma research is publicly funded (by Competent Administrators who apportion funding to promising scientific inquiry). Pharma companies' most inventive genius is devoted to inventing new evergreening tactics:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/19/solid-tumors/#t-cell-receptors

That's where the FTC comes in, in this Sanofi-Mylan case. To facilitate the production of generic, off-patent drugs, the FDA maintains a database called the "Orange Book," where pharma companies are asked to enumerate all the ancillary patents associated with a product whose patent is expiring. That way, generics manufacturers who make their own version of these public domain drugs and therapeutics don't accidentally stumble over one of those later patents – say, by replicating a delivery system or special coating that is still in patent.

This is where the endless, satanic inventiveness of the pharma sector comes in. You see, US law provides for triple damages for "willful patent infringement." If you are a generics manufacturer eyeing up a drug whose patent is about to expire and you are notified that some other patents might be implicated in your plans, you must ensure that you don't accidentally infringe one of those patents, or face business-destroying statutory damages.

So pharma companies stuff the Orange Book full of irrelevant patent claims they say may be implicated in a generic manufacture program. Each of these claims has to be carefully evaluated, both by a scientific team and a legal team, because patents are deliberately obfuscated in the hopes of tricking an inattentive patent examiner into granting patents for unpatentable "inventions":

https://blueironip.com/patents-that-hide-the-ball/

What's more, when a pharma giant notifies the FDA that it has ancillary patents that are relevant to the Orange Book, this triggers a 30-month delay before a generic can be marketed – adding 2.5 years to the 20 year patent term. That delay is sometimes enough to cause a manufacturer to abandon plans to market a generic drug – so the delay isn't 2.5 years, it's infinite.

This is a highly technical, highly consequential form of evergreening. It's obscure as hell, and requires a deep understanding of patent obfuscation, ancillary patent filings, generic pharma industry practice, and the FDA's administrative procedures.

Sanofi's Orange Book entry for Lantus insulin listed 50 related patent claims. Of these, 48 were invalidated through "inter partes" review (basically the Patent Office decided they shouldn't have allowed these claims to be included on a patent). Neither of the remaining two claims were found to be relevant to the manufacture of generic Lantus.

This is where the FTC's filing comes in: their amicus brief doesn't take a position whether Sanofi's Orange Book entries were fraudulent, but they do ask the FDA to intervene to prevent Orange Book stuffing because "improper listings can cause significant harm to competition and consumers."

This is the kind of boring, technical, important stuff that excellent administrators can do. The FTC's brief is notice to the FDA that it should amend its procedures to ban (and punish) Orange Book abuse. That will make it possible for you, a person who needs medicine, to get that medicine more cheaply and quickly. In America's pay-for-use privatized healthcare hellscape, this could be a life-or-death matter.

There's plenty of things the Biden administration is getting very, very badly wrong, but we shouldn't lose sight of how its progressive wing is making real, lasting change for the better. Competent Administrations are the true peoples' champions. They beat Competent Men every time.

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

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/23/everorangeing/#taste-the-rainbow

[lilyrizzy]

max & daniel's relationship, told through 13 years of max's google searches. thank you to @catofthecanals289 and @lajnias for reading through this for me!!! also on ao3

2010-2015

IP: 84.195.208.79 Location: Maaseik, Belgium. 4th-5th November 2010

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IP: 84.195.208.79 Location: Maaseik, Belgium. 14th December 2011

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2016

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IP Location: 173.176.160.149 Montreal, Canada. 12th June 2016

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IP: 162.89.0.47 Location: Austin, TX, United States of America. 21st October 2017

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IP: 116.229.74.4 Location: Shanghai, China. 16th April 2018

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IP 86.167.142.227 Location: Milton Keynes, United Kingdom. 30th April 2018:

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IP: 195.78.0.67 Location: Monaco. 3rd August 2018

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IP: 195.78.0.67 Location: Monaco. 3rd December 2018

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IP: 195.78.0.67 Location: Monaco. 25th December 2018

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IP 46.17.160.235 Location: Silverstone, United Kingdom. 11th July 2019

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IP 37.77.109.233 Location Sochi, Russia. 30th September 2019

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IP 132.248.80.172 Location Mexico City, Mexico. 28th October 2019

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IP 162.89.0.47  Location Austin, TX, United States of America. 1st November 2019

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2nd November 2019

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3rd  November 2019

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IP: 34.95.186.29 Location: São Paulo, Brazil. 14th November 2019:

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IP: 217.164.96.105 Location: Abu Dhabi United Arab Emirates, 1st December 2019

10:13 - how soon after you start dating can you introduce them to your family?

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IP: 84.192.119.8 Location: Hasselt, Belgium. 21st December 2019:

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24th December 2019

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31st December 2019

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2020

IP: 195.78.0.67 Location: Monaco. 18th March 2020

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20th March 2020

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22nd March 2020

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1st April 2020

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5th April 2020

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18th April 2020

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20th April 2020

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IP 46.17.160.235 Location: Silverstone, United Kingdom. 5th August 2020

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IP: 46.179.240.255 Location: Spa, Belgium. 28th August 2020.

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IP: 82.113.214.148 Location: Monza, Italy. 9th September 2020

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IP: 87.183.156.211 Location: Nürburg, Germany. 11th-12th October 2020.

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IP: 195.78.0.67 Location: Monaco. 18th March 2020

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IP: 84.195.208.79 Location: Maaseik, Belgium. 21st December 2020

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2021

IP: 94.79.192.0 Location: Bahrain. 27th March 2021

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IP: 37.143.177.64 Location: Styria, Austria. 28th June 2021

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IP: 46.17.160.235 Location: Silverstone, United Kingdom. 18th July 2021

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IP: 109.237.223.112 Location: Zandvoort, Netherlands. 5th September 2021

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IP: 82.113.214.148 Location: Monza, Italy. 12th September 2021

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IP: 162.89.0.47 Location: Austin, Tx, United States of America. 21st October 2021

11:02 - how to tell my boyfriend in a nice way that his beard looks terrible

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IP: 34.95.186.29 Location: São Paulo, Brazil. 14th November 2021

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IP: 217.164.96.105 Location: Abu Dhabi United Arab Emirates. 12th-13th December 2021

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IP: 203.19.158.31 Location: Perth, Australia. 16th December 2021

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29th December 2021

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1st January 2022

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2022

IP: 217.13.124.105 Location: Barcelona, Spain. 11th March 2022

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IP: 50.73.157.178 Location: Miami, FL, USA. 6th May 2022

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IP: 217.13.124.105 Location: Barcelona, Spain. 22nd May 2022

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IP: 195.78.0.67 Location: Monaco. 28th May 2022

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IP: 195.78.0.67 Location: Monaco. 13th July 2022

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IP: 219.75.27.16 Location Singapore. 2nd October 2022

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IP: 217.164.96.105 Location: Abu Dhabi United Arab Emirates. 19th November 2022

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& 2023

“Max,” Daniel calls to him from the bedroom, just as he is rinsing the shampoo from his hair. Not wanting shampoo in his eyes or his mouth, Max keeps them all firmly shut.

“Baby?” Daniel says again, louder.

The warm water is a gentle relief running over his sweat sticky skin, nowhere near the scalding temperatures Daniel sets their shower to at home. It’s why Max had insisted that they clean off separately, the Austin heat far too much for Max to endure boiling water too, despite Daniel’s pouting and dramatic insistence that Max couldn’t just ‘fuck and flee.”

“Yes,” he calls when all the suds are safely sliding past his shoulders, but he didn’t need to shout. When he opens his eyes he sees Daniel leaning against the doorway with a smirk, still wearing his unbuttoned satin shirt, cowboy hat and nothing else. His wedding ring sits heavy on his finger, and Max thumbs over the matching one on his own hand.

Max’s come is a shiny presence he can still see smeared between Daniel’s thighs.

The sight of him makes Max’s dick twitch. Daniel notices and his grin only widens.

“Baby,” he says again, too sweet. “Baby, why is your most recent Google search is it weird that my husband saying yeehaw makes me come?”

And just like that, Max suddenly longs for a hot shower, an excuse for why his cheeks start to burn red.

“Why are you snooping through my phone?” He demands, forcing himself not to turn away casually and instead keep rubbing the hotel’s own body wash under his armpits.

“I wasn’t snooping,” Daniel says easily, “I was looking to get us some ribs delivered, my phone died at the track, remember?”

Max makes a noncommittal noise because vaguely he does remember Daniel saying he needed to put it on charge. That was before Max started pawing at him the moment the hotel door shut behind them though, and then it had been forgotten by both of them.

There’s just the noise of the extractor fan whirring for a moment, but Daniel doesn’t move. When Max sneaks a glance at him, he’s still leaning against the door frame looking amused.

“Sooo.” He drawls out the word in the stupid Texas accent that Max wishes he didn’t find so strangely sexy. “Are we going to talk about this, little lady, or-“

“Nope,” Max says firmly, turning off the shower.

Daniel nods. It makes the lights of the bathroom catch on his chain and Max- Max really wants to fuck him again.

“What about the one below it?” He asks, “Daniel Ricciardo Austin 2023 photos?”

“Nope,” Max says again, stepping out of the shower and reaching for his towel. He’s smiling now too, because he knows that beneath Daniel’s teasing that one will have made him happy to see.

“Okay,” Daniel says, then he unlocks Max’s phone. “What about how to ask my husband to-“

“Daniel,” Max interrupts, taking the phone from his hand and putting it into the empty sink. “Do you want to read more of my internet history, or do you want to get back on the bed and play good cowboy, bad cowboy again?”

Daniel grins, takes the cowboy hat from his head and puts it onto Max’s. When his arms wind around Max, the silky fabric of his shirt presses cool against Max’s shower-warm skin, his nipples.

“Well, when you put it like that,” Daniel says, leaning in to put his mouth on the skin just beneath Max’s ear. “Yeehaw, baby.”

Max laughs and pinches Daniel’s ass, at the same time as his dick twitches again. Backing him out of the bathroom, towards the bed, his phone is forgotten in the bathroom.

Google never had all the answers when it came to them, anyway.