#80 (Country Code)

[onlyfr8love]

Graffiti in Köln/Cologne 2015 by kami68k [Graz & Allover] Via Flickr: Artist(s): Stero

[blackbloodedisabel]

was tagged for 6 albums I have been listening to recently by @antlerslayer<33

was quite hard as recently I've been listening mainly to my oc playlist over and over again (me? self-obsessed?) or to general country playlists BUT violá

tragic kingdom (no doubt)

the record (boygenius)

country sweet (stella parton)

dykttatuob (lana del rey) (no, I'm not typing out the full thing I cba and also don't like her enough as a person)

let go (avril lavigne)

lush (mitski)

wondering if @sickfade or @gamyrmaiden would be up for it?👀 (no pressure obvs <33)

[inklingofadream]

periodic reminder that 4thewords is great :) never timed well bc it never occurs to me to say this in november when they offer a month of free subscription time, but! it is making the process of catching up on polychives more satisfying. finishing this chapter is like fighting a literal beast, rather than a metaphorical one, because for $4 a month (or slightly less, I buy the end of year bundle) 4thewords will provide Beasts

[sayruq]

Biden's visit has concluded. Israel has spent his entire visit trying to muddy the waters of what happened to Al Ahli Hospital and despite their cartoonish efforts, it hasn't worked

The Global South and especially West Asia know who is responsible for the bombing and no amount of AI voice recordings of 'Hamas operatives' can change that.

Israel war crimes continues to backfire on them even in America

Biden backing Israel has had an impact on America's image. Here's a Wall Street Journal article warning that America's continued support is turning countries towards Russia and China which is code for turning countries against America

An EU official said that the EU will pay a heavy price in the Global South for its continued, unabashed support for Israel

There's also speculation that the Biden administration knew about the bombing before it happened.

Countries that were/are allied with Israel continue to distance themselves from Israel like Russia. The reason I keep highlighting Russia is because the West has been running out of ammunition due to the Russia-Ukraine war and that includes Israel which is rumoured to have sent 80-90% of its ammunition to Ukraine. If this conflict lasts a long time, Israel will need to buy weapons and ammunition and Russia would be one of the countries they would turn to (same with China)

So, where are we in terms of the conflict? After days of waffling over a ground operation in Gaza, Israel postponed it until some time after Biden's visit and now we're back here again

Now I'm no military expert but constantly going back and forth on whether or not you'll invade Gaza is bound to do damage to your troops' morale. No wonder they're dealing with mass desertions while their citizens demonstrate on the streets. The Israeli leadership has no plan besides bombing Gaza.

I've seen people on twitter say that the hospital bombing was done deliberately to normalise IDF soldiers to mass civilian deaths in places like hospitals, schools, places of worship, etc. I don't know if I believe that - I think they wanted to push Iran and Hezbollah's buttons before hiding behind Biden. I don't think these people are thinking strategically.

As far as the possibility of regional war is concerned, all indicators show that the West preparing for the war to escalate

Seems to me the Israel has seen what Ukraine has received in just a year and a half of war. They're done receiving a paltry 3.8 billion every year and now prepared to drag out the conflict and I can't say I blame with Biden proposing a 100 billion package for both Ukraine and Israel. This will stretch America too thin as far as funding in concerned. Cracks are already showing

There are parts of the US government that is unhappy that the Ukraine war is losing attention. During the Ukraine war, you had parts of the government that wanted focus to shift from Russia to China. Because of that, the US government has spent the past year alternating between hostility to Russia and threatening to go to war with China over Taiwan. When Niger expelled France from within its borders, America was preparing to join that conflict until Mali and Burkina Faso declared they would fight with Niger. Now they're entering a third front in West Asia. In short, the mighty empire is expending a lot of resources right now and it is not the threat it was when it invaded Iraq and Afghanistan in the early 2000s.

At any rate, the ground invasion of Gaza won't go the way Israel and America hopes it will

The coalition of Palestinian resistance fighters are still patiently waiting for the IDF to come meet them. Their allies aren't backing down either

The reason I keep making these posts is to remind people that, while the genocide of the people of Gaza is horrifying, the war for the liberation of Palestine has not yet been lost.

Do not lose hope. From the river to sea, Palestine WILL be free

[mazzystar24]

Hi guys and welcome to Addie’s research spiral into the gay moustache:

Moustaches have always been a symbol of masculinity, sexuality and social standing

Like legit dating back to the 1800s we had the whisker and beard movement which started pushing the idea that facial hair can be masculine and sophisticated and not just a sign of lacking in morality and uncleanliness like the victorians used to think and you can actually draw a direct line to men feeling threatened to the patriarchy in those times and the prevalence of facial hair- this assertion of dominance and masculinity being seen similarly in ww1 soldiers, where facial hair became the accepted norm then post ww1 it went out of style again then this cycle repeats again with most wars.

There is also within the later 1800s and early 1900s links to sexuality and rebellion because younger men not having a full beard and instead having clean shaven faces or moustaches was seen as a sign of rebellion against older generations , also the need for maintenance of this style made it viewed as effeminate

Someone put it as the moustache has always been tied with the three fs: fops, foreigners and fiends meaning it was perceived that men would need to be well groomed or gay, foreign (particularly from Latin countries) or lacking in morals and evil to have a moustache

Okay so the origin of the gay moustache aside from the connection to the well groomed element

So post stonewall riots the gay moustache became a real thing like one qoute I found that was funny was arnie kantrowitz saying it was a requirement in the gay community, you needed a a flannel shirt, mustache or beard, bomber jacket, jeans and boots. We were dressing like the blue-collar men that turned us on." And a lot of it stemmed from what was dubbed the Castro clone look

Okay so Freddie was not in fact the originator of the Castro clone look

The castro clone look basically took all the really masculine and macho staples and made it extremely gay

The look originally being inspired by the men of the Castro neighbourhood in San Francisco in the early 60s and THAT actually comes from the “greaser”/hood look inspired by the 50s Italian American men and Latinos who also their subculture was born from their stereotypes

The Castro clone look doesn’t have one distinct origin but its popularity was fuelled by gay artists like Tom of Finland, and musicians like the village people and Freddie and gay pornstars like al Parker

And Parker was one of the big names in the Castro clone look this in particular not only explains the reason for his look well but also peep the “pouring beers over eachother” line and let me take you back to bachelor party buddie

And now I hear the republican man and Gerrard mentions and to that I say that’s the whole point of it

Like the hypermasculinised look was meant to not only play the macho aesthetic and be a form of queer signaling but it was also meant to subvert gay men stereotypes by instead doing this like extreme portrayal of masculinity

It’s drawing from straight men but making it’s undeniably queer

Like wife beaters, moustaches, denims and flannels were so tied to het males that they took that and still found a way to make it so undeniably queer that it became a form of queer signaling

Thus taking the power away from the macho hets and forming a new subculture

The gay moustache only started seeing its end around the 80s AIDS epidemic because the moustache aimed to make a person look older but as queer communities became more sick or perceived as unclean or sick the need to look clean and young grew and clean shaved faces became the trend again

So Eddie having the moustache isn’t some tie to Gerrard or straight people it’s actually so queer coded and a form of rebellion

And btw this isn’t even a niche thing it’s like a widely known queer thing to the point that one show got slammed for having a gay club scene set in that time and not having any Castro clones in it

[nieves-de-sugui]

A Quick History of BL

As someone who wrote a thesis on this very subject a few years ago, here is the short version of how BL has evolved throughout the years. For the new comers ❤ 

a minute of silence for the original form of this post that tumblr decied to not save right after I saved it

I am going to go with a chronological approach. Unfortunately, I cannot put everything in one post so if there’s any questions about this or that aspect of the history of BL that you want to know and it’s not talked about here, you are welcome to ask me directly :)

Context and influences - Japan in the 60′s

Before the US forced Japan to open its borders to the outside world in the 1800s, homosexual practices were common place between budist monks, samurais and kabuki actors. During the Edo period (1600s to 1800s) there was a very rich amount of poetry, art, books (such as Nanshoku Okagami (The Great Mirror of Male Love) by Ihara Saikaku) and codes of conduct about how to have a good master/aprentice relationship, kinda like the greeks if you know what I mean. However, with the arrival of western influences, in order to become a more “civilized” country, it was all put in the closet. 

Yet, in the 60′s Japan started to pick it up again through literature about young androginous beautiful boys (aka bishounen). On one hand, in 1961, the novel Koibitotachi no Mori (A Lover’s Forest) by Mari Mori was published. It tells the story of a young and beautiful 19 year old worker and a half french half japanese aristocrat, and their tragic romance. On the other hand, Taruho Inagaki wrote Shounen ai no Bigaku (The esthetics of boy-love), an essay on aesthetic eroticism (of which he wrote a lot of). All this was know as Tanbi (lit. aesthetic) literature. It generally refered to literature with implied homosexuality and homoeroticism such as works by Oscar Wilde, Jean Cocteau, etc. And of course, Mori and Inagaki. 

In chinese tanbi is read as danmei (term used to refer to BL novels in china today, ie: The Untamed it’s all connected friends).

From the birth of Shonen Ai  to Yaoi - 70′s to the late 80′s

Around the beginning of the 70′s, shoujo was being revolutionized by the Year 24 Group, a generation of women manga authors (mangaka) who started to explore new themes. Among them, their interest in tanbi gave birth to a new subgenre: Shounen ai. 

Their most known manga were:

Kaze to Ki no Uta (The Ballad of the Wind and Trees) by Keiko Takemiya, and Toma no Shinzo (The Heart of Thomas) by Moto Hagio

Their stories are characterized by having suffering eurpoean bishounen in boarding schools, living an idealized perfect love (meaning passionate) that, despite the tragic end of one of them, lives forever in the other. 

As this genre starts getting popular, more and more fans of these stories start making their own self published manga, aka doujinshi, of the genre. It is around this time that the term Yaoi is coined. Meaning “YAma nashi, Ochi nashi, Imi nashi” (no climax, no fall, no meaning). Basically PWP fanfiction, for the most part. Doujinshis could be considered an equivalent of fanfiction in manga form.  It is also here that the term Fujoshi (aka Rotten Girl, for liking rotten things) starts being used to refer to women readers of yaoi. 

With this rise in popularity come the start of the commercialization of the genre. Which meant the publication of magazines dedicated solely to yaoi/shonen ai/BL. The most popular yaoi manga magazine at the time was June. The common trait of their stories being the therapeutic power of the love between the mains. The traumatized character would heal throught this newfound love.

Most of the stories at this time happened in the West (Europe or the States) as the exploration of these dark themes intertwined with homosexual romance and homoeroticism still feel safer to explore as a foreign concept. One example would be Banana Fish (1985).

Commercialization and Yaoi Ronso -  90′s 

As more publishing houses pick the genre up, the term Boys Love is used to include every type of manga about homosexuality made for women. 

The increasing amount of BL series sees a changes in its themes: 

the start of the “gay for you” trope where one mantains their heterosexuality despite being in a homsexual relationship, 

the uke/seme dynamic (mirroring hetero realtionships) also relating to physical appearence (one being more feminine, the other being more masculine), 

the use of rape as an act love (sexual violence has always been present but here it becomes a staple),

anal sex as the only type of sex, 

older and more masculine men start to appear 

they now happen in Japan

Good examples of the presence of these themes in manga are Gravitation (1996) or Yatteranneeze (1995).

However in 1992, Masaki Sato (a gay activist/drag queen) wrote a letter in a small scale feminist magazine attacking yaoi and pointing out how it “represented a kind of misappropriation or distortion of gay life that impacted negatively upon Japanese gay men”. The female readers of yaoi responded, defending the genre as a means to escape gender roles and explore sexual themes that was never meant to represent the realities of gay men. This is know as the Yaoi Ronso (Yaoi Debates).

The debate ended with both sides understanding more of each other, with mangakas starting to include queer views in their works. It also started the academic reasearch of BL. 

Yet, it is a debate that has been restarted more than once, as it is still relevant despite the evolution of the genre.

more on this on another post

Globalization and coining of BL - 2000′s 

By the beginning of the 2000s BL is being sold all over the world (like all manga), and has become a stable industry. We could say it has finally become it’s own genre. 

Some of the most well known manga series, to us (in the west), of the time are:

Junjou Romantica 2002 Koi Suru Boukun 2004 Love Pistols 2004 Haru wo Daiteita 1999

all of these have anime adaptations for the curious ones

We also start seeing short anime adaptations or special episodes of the most popular series, with questionable themes, such as: adoptive father x adoptive son  (Papa to Kiss in the Dark 2005), father x son’s friend (Kirepapa 2008), etc... 

However the themes remain more or less the same. Junjou Romantica’s love story starts with a non-con sex scene by the older one (masc, seme) to the younger one (more feminine, uke) addressed years later in the manga btw. Koi Suru Boukun’s love story is triggered by aphrodisiacs and rape. They’re still very present in the stories but slowly going away. A mangaka that represents this era could be Natsume Isaku (Candy Color Paradox 2010).

Change is slow in Japan. Even though the voices of LGBT+ people started to be taken into account in the genre it is not until later that we see it reflect in the mangas themselves. However, we can already see the start of this in Doukyusei (Classmates) (2006) by Asumiko Nakamura. Also Kinou Nani Tabeta? (2007) which is actually part of a more mature genre: Seinen.

It is my personal (subjective) theory that the BL of this era was the one that got popular outside of Japan, which is why we see lots of references to the themes, tropes and dynamics of this time in today’s BL series. 

The LGBTzation of BL and the rise of webtoons - 2010′s to 2020′s

Slowly but surely LGBT characters and themes enter the scene of BL. Existing simultaneously with the previous tropes and themes, we start seeing a shift in these stories. We now see:

characters that identify as gay or some type of queer

discussions about homophobia

more mature themes about life and romance

At the same time as we get the usual love stories with the usual themes, a new trend starts to take over. And we get simultaneously, cute, sometimes questionable but light love stories:

Love Stage 2010 Ashita wa Docchi da! 2011 Kieta Hatsukoi 2019

More profound stories and darker or more complex themes:

Blue Sky Complex 2013  Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai 2011 (mafias) Given 2013 (suicide) Hidamari ga Kikoeru 2013 (deafness)

And others that adress the queer experience in a more mature way (which might actually fall into the Seinen genre)

Itoshi no Nekokke 2010 (slice of life, queer characters) Smells like Green Spirit 2011 (two ways to deal with a homphobic society) Strange 2014 (relationships between men) Shimanami Tasogare 2015 (an LGBT group helps a closeted gay) Old Fashioned Cupcake 2019 (you know this one 😉) Bokura no Micro na Shuumatsu 2020 (the end of the world)

As queer stories are explored, BL mangakas and mangakas from other genres start to consider more stories about queer people such as the Josei Genderless Danshi ni Aisaretemasu (My Androgynous Boyfriend) (2018) by Tamekou, or the Shoujo Goukon ni Itarra Onna ga Inakatta Hanashi (The story of when I went to a mixer and there were no women) (2021) by Nana Aokawa. 

Still, we can see two realities live side by side. Doukyuusei gets adapted into an impactful animated movie in 2016, meanwhile Banana Fish gets an anime adaptation that keeps the homoeroticism but not the homosexuality.  

For those who might be interested. Here are some of the authors that represent the first half of this era, where they start to include newer points of view:

Scarlet Beriko, HAYAKAWA Nojiko, KURAHASHI Tomo, OGERETSU Tanaka, Harada, KII Kanna (Stranger by the Sea), etc...

And authors that while keeping classical themes break the stereotypes in a subtle manner:

CTK, ZAKK, Jyanome, Cocomi, Hidebu Takahashi, SUZUMARU Minta, etc...

Mangakas also no longer stick to one genre only. They explore whichever of them they want, from BL to Seinen to others. 

ie: Tamekou, 

or Asumiko Nakamura

The curious case of Webtoons

With the digitalization of mangas, throught Renta and Lehzin, it has become easier (and more expensive) to access these stories. Korea makes and appearence with their webtoons. Through the lack of piracy protections and the majority of them being digital, manhwa (korean webtoons) sees a rise in popularity. Through the digital medium the influencee can be the influencer.

However, like many other East Asian countries they have consumed BL, without hearing about the conversations about BL. So they end up mantaining the older themes and stereotypes that newer BL is trying to leave behind. Therefore, we end up with a mix of old and new, ie:

Killing Stalking 2016 Cherry Blossoms After Winter 2017 Painter of The Night 2019

Additionally, it is also thanks to the easy access to internet that Omegaverse, with its higher dramatic stakes (that parallel hetero dynamics), enters the mangasphere in 2016. It has grown in popularity ever since.

With the Thai BL Boom of 2020, Japan rediscovers its own BL market and starts investing in it more. Which is why we get live action adaptations of BL manga that was popular years ago (Candy Color Paradox was a manga from 2010), the more recent ones (The End of the World With You) or new anime adaptations (Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai in 2020). 

more on this in my japanese live action BL post

What has it become now? is it BL? ML? or Seinen? Or is it all just gay manga?

It is clear that Shoujo manga (with BL, Josei and Seinen) is exploring queer themes such as gender and sexuality more and more. Japan is interested in this conversation, not only in manga (Genderless fashion). Which brings up the current question in BL studies: Does it make sense to keep these categories?

As a response to BL, ML (Male Love), which is made by gay men for gay men, started happening (around the 70s too). And Bara (gay manga porn) in response to Yaoi. However both gay men and women read BL and ML. We also see other themes being explored through BL, such as friendship (in BL Metamorphose), food (in Kinou Nani Tabeta), male relationships of all kinds (in Strange), and different queer views on life and its challenges (in Shimanami Tasogare). More and more what is LGBT and what is BL is merging, the line is blurred. 

Conclusion

BL has been in my life for longer than it hasn't. It is through shoujo and BL that I have come to understand people and romance.

It is flawed, like everything else this life, but it's flourishing in many ways.

The genre feels old and new at the same time. 

We can still find shounen ai/tanbi elements in more modern manga (All About J). Or the gay for you in a new light (Itoshi no Nekkoke). Or more educational manga on queer issues (My Brother’s Husband by Gengoroh Tagame). BL has around 50 years of existence but it is also being born anew in Thailand and Korea. 

BL manga will continue to evolve in acordance to Japanese tastes, as it is still a local market. Hopefully the korean webtoons that get popular will be the more daring ones in their themes. Who knows where it will go from here? The only thing we know for sure is that it will continue to change. Isn't it exciting?

A post on the evolution of live action BL in Japan is coming, to complement this post.  As well as a more detailed explanation of the Yaoi Debates and gay manga.

[mewvore]

you do realise that anyone capable to taking out the fascist fucks is going to be smart enough not to openly plot on the internet right?

and that openly and seriously calling for people to be killed runs a real risk of being hauled off by the cops or the feds? people arnt cowards they just dont want to get their door busted at 4am by arseholes with guns and no sense of humour

my point was that if your response to someone saying "the Democrats are capable of snatching loss from the jaws of victory" as a joke is to bring up how fascism will come if you don't vote for them, you're being a little absurd. ANY kind of "but the nazis" type of response to dunks like "dems could find a way to lose a game where they're the only players" is in my opinion ridiculous because a joke at the expense of some of the most wealthy people in the country who barely have to even interact with the public isn't always some 4D chess level psyop to get people to not vote. Sometimes its just an expression of frustration and irritation from a person who has so few options to even choose from. Like full transparency I'm not trying to start an ANTIFA militia I'm a poor artist who draws porn for a living and I'm making jokes at the expense of an 80 year old politician almost fumbling his re-election odds because his political party couldn't find anyone else to take his job. and yet people are imagining "haha democrats" is code for saying the words "don't vote" and going okay get ready for the nazis then if you don't vote. because rather than look at the DNC and chastise them for their absolutely piss poor offerings its easier to blame any potential loss on the sway of public opinion from jokes on a dying social media website

[cer-rata]

TW: racism

I think the way that comic book media has uncritically pushed anti-Arab racist propaganda (among other kinds) for decades upon decades is an important thing to acknowledge. Like it's not just a couple of bad apples here and there, it's always been pervasive. So many stories, so many villains, so many Arab coded fake evil countries. That kind of thing desensitizes people, dehumanizes entire groups. The politics of media designed for young men and boys (and not just them but for years that was the only audience that mattered, thanks sexism) has consequences.

Seriously, what was this:

As far as I'm aware this never even got an explicit retcon.

I was a little Muslim boy in the mid 2000s reading a Death in the Family because I wanted to know what happened to Jason Todd, and I didn't understand the depths of the propaganda that was being fed to me. I was so desensitized to hearing about terrible things happening in the middle east, and evil terrorists that I didn't question it. And my parents talked to me about what was going on and how it was wrong. But I was still a little kid and I loved Batman and I wasn't at the point where I could really look at the narrative critically, to realize that the authors have worldviews that are biased. I don't think I even grasped that different people wrote the characters. Iran electing known super-terrorist-serial killer-baby eating clown The Joker to represent them because he understood their values is yes, notably crazy, but most of this stuff isn't so loud and obvious, and we didn't leave it in the 80s. Just look at what happened to the depiction of Talia and Ra's post 911 and how they progressive became less human. So just think about the generations of kids reading this crap who had no counter messaging at all. Where does that leave their empathy?

I'm not saying that everything we're seeing is the fault of comic books, that's stupid and reductive and insulting to the complexity of the reality. But what I'm saying is that a lot of these narratives are actively complicit in the kinds of inhumanity we're seeing. Marvel thinking it's appropriate to throw Sabra into a movie in current day is a glaring transgression but it's not some kind of strange outlier. Lots of those films are actively funded by arms of the American military, just look at Captain marvel and Iron Man. And if anyone likes imposing an agenda onto the narrative, it's the military. A lot of this is baked into the fiction, and we owe it to ourselves and others to actively contend with what that means.

I dunno I'm just mad, and disappointed and maybe a little guilty that it took me this long to really realize the full state of things. I spent a lot of time blindly consuming. Like these books were created to be aspirational, to show good people trying to make a better world. But as always happens when art is completely beholden to money, they still serve the politics of the ruling class at the end of the day.

[project-sekai-facts]

idk if this has its own comprehensive post on here or not but can you explain in depth how rui is gay coded

yeah okay

i think what you'll see people bring up most often is the fact that he has his right ear pierced (see above). incredibly brief queer history lesson for anyone who is unaware: back in the 70s & 80s when it was still illegal or otherwise heavily looked down on to be gay, wearing a single earring in your right ear became a non-verbal identifier amongst gay men in America. As far as I'm aware, identifiers did actually vary between areas, but it became far more publicly known that the right ear was the gay ear and the left ear was the straight ear. Even today when the stigma has worn away a decent amount, you still hear people bring up the term "gay ear" and the fact that the right ear is the gay ear is fairly common knowledge. This is also a known thing outside america, i'm not sure how far the spread is outside america and other english-speaking countries but it is definitely known in a fair amount of places, including Japan (also it should be noted that a right ear piercing can have different meanings in different cultures that predate this meaning, and nowadays people are more likely to get whatever ear pierced they want regardless of sexuality).

obviously anyone can have any ear pierced that they want but things work a bit differently with character design. the only other MCs who regularly wear earrings are An (left ear) and Akito (both). For both of them, this is definitely done to make them seem more cool, which makes sense given they're in the street music scene and following the fashions. As for NPCs there's Nagi (left), Arata, Ken, Tatsuya, Iori, Saku, and Yuuka (all both), which again is probably just to fit the fashion of those characters. Okay, Yuuka just has regular old earrings but as for the others you've got street and punk rock styles which both incorporate piercings as a big part of the style (especially with Saku's punk look).

so all that considered, Rui's earring just sticks out, I guess? it's not really a fashion thing, it's pretty plain and just kinda there, and very conveniently happens to exactly match up with an old way of signaling in the gay community instead of being in his left ear which is the far more common ear for guys to get pierced if they only have one earring. also he almost always only has the one piercing in his right ear in trained cards, the only exceptions being his cheer squad (earrings in both ears) and his canary card (three piercings but still in his right ear).

like i said though, it doesn't have to mean anything but talking from the perspective of character design, sometimes if you want to communicate something about a character then you put it in there. however, as stated earlier, this is something that originated in America and it doesn't hold nearly as much weight in a Japanese game as it would if this was an American game, especially since piercings are a fairly common fashion accessory for men over in Japan. That said, you will still sometimes see Japanese players or other players in the east asian fanbase bring this up.

this one is more of a matter of perspective, but you're gonna have to sit through it or skip this section because like most other characters in the game some of Rui's queercoding comes through shiptease interactions. Rui has a few interactions with Tsukasa that could definitely be read as flirting. it's kinda ambiguous though, which does make sense given the type of game this is; idol-adjacent games like this very rarely make anything concrete so that people who are fans of a pairing can enjoy the teasing and people who don't like it can simply move on. first thing that comes to mind would be the part where he invites Tsukasa to his house in wonder halloween (above), mainly because his L2D uses his smile expression that has a blush with it and that was a choice that someone on the L2D team had to make but didn't have to - they could've easily just kept his usual teasing expression he had at the start of the interaction there was no need to change it.

There's a couple other interactions but this is probably the most obvious outside of that one scene of Rui volunteering himself to play Juliet so Tsukasa could rehearse the proposal scene of his R&J adaptation, despite the fact that Nene was in the room, in Kamikou Festival!. Also, these scenes I mentioned would have been written before the pairing between the two characters gained massive popularity in the fandom, so they were written just because the writers wanted to rather than because they were intentionally targeting a certain group.

There's more recent interactions too. The section of the Tales of Detective Tenma after live where he spends about 20 seconds imagining what Tsukasa would look like if he were more muscular can definitely fall under this, especially since based on Rui's description, he probably wasn't imagining Tsukasa with a shirt on. However, attraction isn't necessarily implied and this dialogue is played as a joke anyway, being a callback to an earlier gag area conversation where he was teasing Tsukasa. Although you could counter-counter argue that the original area conversation had Rui talking about Tsukasa building muscle for show-related purposes, and in the after live, it was just because Tsukasa exercising more came up in conversation, and the show ideas didn't come up until after all this was said and done.

There's also multiple instances of him accrediting Tsukasa for his enjoyment of things, such as in KAITO's Kamikou Festival card story, Thrilling White Day's after live, and chapter 8 of Pandemonium, but this is a lot more speculative ship talk than I wanted to be on this blog so I'll be leaving this section here and moving on.

(TL by pjsekai eng)

there's also that 1koma that I posted about a while ago. you know, the one where he asks for people to call him the "modern day Hiraga Gennai"? Hiraga Gennai as in the 18th century Japanese inventor who was also gay and wrote multiple works about it. However, Gennai is well renowned for his genius and contributions to science, and is also known for his eccentric satirical writings, and kabuki theatre he wrote under a pseudonym, which fits Rui's personality very well. That said, it is very easy to interpret this 1koma's joke as being about the fact Gennai was gay, considering it's the thing he's most known for after his scientific achievements, and especially considering Tsukasa's comment (even if it's not in the best taste).

The 1komas are played for jokes though, and especially the original ones are quite hard to call canon due to some of the scenarios and character interactions not making sense. But then again, someone on the writing team decided to write a gay joke around Rui for whatever reason that may be and it got passed by higher ups and put in the game (or, 3 versions of the game. the joke didn't make it to EN due to Gennai not being very known amongst the audience and was edited to fit the new context). Definitely one of the strongest pieces of evidence here.

the only other thing i can think of (and arguably like, the biggest bit of evidence for this theory (? Idk if I should call it that)) is that he doesn't really show any interest in women.

First off, the Valentine's Day 2021 vlive. Quick note that in Japan, Valentine's is traditionally a holiday for girls to give chocolates to boys (while white day is the reverse). You can give platonic valentines too, which is what happens in-game... for the most part.

Those chocolates Rui got could easily just be platonic chocolates from other students, but then you have a few factors to filter in. 1) this is very early into the game, back when his only friends were WxS and Mizuki and 2) Those chocolates aren't from WxS, since Emu and Nene give the boys sweets offscreen after the vlive, and Tsukasa is on the receiving end for this holiday. Of course, one box could be friend chocolates from Mizuki, but that leaves more chocolate boxes than friends to give him chocolates.

Immediately after this, Tsukasa gets jealous that Rui got chocolates and tries to brag that he got some too, before saying too much and revealing he got friendzoned by multiple girls, heavily suggesting that Rui's chocolates were given with some sort of romantic intent. I guess you could say that these were chocolates given out to everyone in 2-B, but then why would they leave it anonymously in his locker? The only reason I could think of is that people don't want to associate with him, which is canon admittedly. However I think the romantic intent or at least attraction option is more likely, especially given Tsukasa's jealousy and also just the anonymous valentine romance trope. This is almost word-for-word from that post I made about the in-universe attractiveness of every character so sorry I made you sit through that again.

Getting back on track, Rui seems very neutral about the fact he got given multiple boxes of what was likely confession chocolate. He just briefly mentions that he forgot the holiday was even happening until he found chocolates and then never brings this up again. I think it's worth comparing his reactions to Tsukasa, who seems to care very much about his abilities (or, lack thereof) to attract women. Obviously Tsukasa is the big reactions/brag about a lot of things guy, but Rui does not really seem to care about the fact that multiple women find him attractive, or just the holiday where he’s supposed to get chocolate from girls in general. But this whole interaction is just for jokes anyway so you don’t have to think too much of it if you don’t want to.

Second sub-point: Shizuku. Shizuku can be considered as the most attractive character in-universe given the sheer amount of characters that have been shown to be attracted to her or at least comment on her looks (currently at least 8 MCs if not more and a few named side characters). Admittedly none of those MCs are male, but it isn't like it's impossible for people to be attracted to the opposite gender in this game, like we just established that Tsukasa says he's interested in women, so the point still stands.

(TL from Tsukasa's #3 fan on YT)

Specifically I would like to point out a scene in A Once-In-A-Lifetime Pandemonium, when the 2-B trio first meet the Miyajo 2nd years. The three of them immediately recognise Shizuku and Airi and then Ibuki describes Mafuyu as "a beauty". Shizuku gives them her idol smile which in their POV has the same sparkles that often (not always, but definitely in this context) show up when characters are attracted to another character (like how Haruka has this effect on Minori and Kohane, and An has this effect on Kohane). Like it's very, very obvious that Rui's friends are attracted to Shizuku and the other girls and they're pretty surprised that he's hanging around with them.

But Rui never acts like this around Shizuku at all, nor does he ever even address the fact that she's good looking. He doesn't even bring it up in their earlier interactions back in the Picnic event or any events after, when a lot of other characters (e.g: Emu, Ena, and Mizuki) commented on her looks almost immediately after meeting her (they did first meet in a pretty stressful situation if you want to argue that, but it still stands that he's never been attracted to her). Similarly in The Tomorrow we Hope for, he does not have any reaction to meeting Haruka for the first time, unlike how we see other characters who are attracted to women (Kohane/Minori/debatably Nene it’s up to interpretation) act around her at first.

at the end of the day i think you could definitely make a case for it. like it's harder to make a solid argument in comparison to say, Kohane, An, Saki, or Minori who are outright attracted to other girls and say as such on-screen, but there's definitely some more subtle hints and stuff to work with still and it was actually quite fun to compile them (i took the in-depth part to heart as always sorry anon).

[bignaz8]

D-DAY ANNIVERSARY

“You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you…” With these words, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower issued the “Order of the Day” just before the 1944 Allied assault on Normandy Beach. It’s been 80 years since that historic day, and less than one percent of Americans who served in WWII are still alive. However, the impact of their service and sacrifice will live on forever.

Code named Operation Overlord, planning for D-Day began after France fell to the Nazis in 1940. It involved Allies from several countries and was the largest amphibious invasion in military history. As H-Hour approached (5:30 a.m. local time) on June 6, 1944, demolition teams had already blasted out underwater obstacles planted by German forces. Rangers were already scaling the cliffs to knock out coastal guns, and American and British airborne divisions had been dropped in hedgerows behind the beaches overnight. Soon, the first waves of Infantry would hit the beach.

Leonard T. Schroeder, Jr. served in the 2nd Battalion, 8th Infantry, Fourth Division, where he was the commanding officer of Company F. 

He has the distinction of being the first man ashore at Utah Beach, the first beachhead, landing fewer than 60 seconds after H-Hour. Recalling the day, Schroeder said that Allied aircraft had bombed the beach heavily, creating craters that could be used as cover. Some of those craters were offshore and hidden by water. When Schroeder’s landing craft pulled ashore, he jumped off and into a water-filled crater six feet deep. He came up sputtering and struggled to rush ashore. Working his way up the beach, he was wounded by shrapnel but continued to fight. He commanded his company for three hours before collapsing into unconsciousness. He woke up at an aid station and was later evacuated to England. Schroeder received the Silver Star.

Pvt. Carlton W. Barrett served in the 18th Infantry, 1st Infantry Division and participated in the Normandy Invasion. His unit was in the third wave of Allied soldiers to come ashore at Omaha Beach, landing at about 10:00 a.m. Germans had planted mines on the beach about a foot apart, and the beach was strewn with bodies of soldiers. Barrett landed under heavy enemy fire, wading through neck-deep water. He noticed fellow soldiers around him floundering in the water and rushed to save them from drowning. Once on the beach, Barrett carried dispatches back and forth along the exposed beach while under heavy fire. He also carried wounded soldiers to an offshore evacuation boat. For his dauntless courage, Barrett was awarded the Medal of Honor.

The Allies landed over 160,000 troops on June 6, 1944, with an estimated 10,000 casualties, more than half of which were American. Today, a visit to the Normandy American Cemetery is the final resting place for 9,387 Americans and a sobering reminder of selfless service and the ultimate sacrifice made 80 years ago. 

[onlyfr8love]

Graffiti in Köln/Cologne 2015 by kami68k [Graz & Allover] Via Flickr: Artist(s): STERO

[onsunnyside]

ok so i've been trying to come up with a mafia trope for this ask by the bestie @bimbofawn: now this isn't a full-blown mob fic, but it has a few elements

The Camerons have all the wealth, influence and success anyone can dream of. They come from a long lineage of fame and riches, now running the parent company of many subsidiaries with power all across the country. It's no surprise they're involved in a few shady businesses, yet it's all kept tightly under wraps.

As the heir to a vast dynasty, Rafe grew up under a lot of pressure to be the best in what he does, and his ego is proof of that. He's in the tabloids, the ivy league graduate by day and the wild bachelor by night, landing himself in more scandals than ass-kissing articles.

The Camerons are known for their prestige and (heavily manufactured) picture-perfect image. So Rafe's sleazy, immature behaviour just won't do. Although he's doing good with the shady side of the family business (bc ofc he's into violence and drug trafficking/manufacturing), he needs to do better with the public side. To give his son a motive for cleaning up his act, he gives him an ultimatum: lose it all and get disowned or settle down.

Now, he has a few months to find someone, but his ego won't let him settle for just anyone. The headlines aren't any comfort either: Pleasure Over Business: Is Rafe Cameron responsible for the fall of the Cameron dynasty?

This is very off-to-the-races coded: you drift into his sector on his friend's arm one night. He shrugs you off, expecting there to be a different girl the next time they go to the clubs (because there always is) but nope, you show up again and again.

It’s hard for him to ignore someone so kindhearted and naturally alluring. He can’t look away from you sipping on the straw, your calm gaze locked on his, making him stumble over his words like a teenager with a crush. He dreams of you every time he falls asleep, your pretty face burned on the inside of his eyelids as if you belonged there.

But one night his friend shows up with a different girl.

"Her rates got too high, and my folks were getting suspicious so I had to let her go, unfortunately." He exhales, his arm around the other woman kissing up his neck.

Now, did he predict you were an escort? Not at all. It catches him off guard and he almost spits up his drink. "You paid her to date you?"

Topper glares, "you don't have to say it like that. We did more than just make appearances together if that's what you're asking. All consensual, of course, but you do have to pay extra for private um... sessions."

me senses... a sugar-baby proposition: "I'll take care of everything, all expenses, your rent, and an allowance on top of that. Anything you want you can have."

You're still apprehensive, you've taken clients who've heard of you from word of mouth before, but this was new. They were best friends who routinely saw each other, you'd hate to stir the pot. "Won't it be weird?"

"You with Top was just business and so is what I'm offering." Perhaps that was a little white lie, but you didn't need to know that. "No harm, no foul. In my hands, you could live better than this."

"I like my home." You mutter, hugging a pillow to your chest, it was one of the many mismatched cushions that littered your old couch. "I worked hard to get it this way."

He nudges the wobbly table by the door, the picture frames rattling on the surface. "For thousands of dollars a night, I would've expected some sense of luxury, or a stove with actual knobs." He says and quirks a brow, "where'd all that money go?"

"Oh... I had to give my boss his cut."

"How much is that?"

"80 percent." You admit, ducking away when Rafe frowns, "I know, I know... It wasn't my fault, my daddy—" Your voice cracks, "My daddy got involved with a bad man after he gambled away all our savings and my college fund. And he still couldn't stop after my mama left. I had to—I had to help somehow."

You still remember returning from campus to see him bruised and battered on the living room floor, crying for your mother who was halfway across the world, now a happily divorced woman. The memory brings tears to your eyes and they stream down your cheeks.

Rafe bites his tongue, rethinking his decision to show up here in the first place. Your unlucky life only made you more perfect, and as terrible as it sounded, he knows he won't find anyone more fitting for his circumstances.

He refused to leave until you agreed.

"What's his name?"

You don't hear him over your sniffles and rub your nose into your pillow, "huh?"

He crouches by your feet, placing a hand on your thigh. "What's the big bad man's name, sweetie?"

"Why—Why are you asking..."

The blue in his eyes seems darker, but it could just be the dim lightbulbs you haven’t changed yet. He blinks up at you with thick lashes, a slow smile crawling onto his face.

"I'm going to prove to you that when you're with me, you've got nothing to worry about."

And the next night, he shows up at your door with a fresh bouquet of flowers and bruised knuckles. You don’t get one word out before drops a heavy duffel bag on the floor, “here’s the money you deserve for your work, and extra for your troubles.”

You glance at the bag and then his face, your toothbrush hanging out of your mouth. “What—What did you do?”

He smiles, cocking his head to the side. “Nothing you have to worry about, sweetheart.” He says, wiping toothpaste from the corner of your lip. “Now, are you going to invite me in?”

Rafe is very possessive, he doesn’t care that you dated/slept with his friend because you belong to him now. He buys you a gold necklace with his initial on it, parades you around the city for all the nosy paps to see, and brings you home to meet his family. And yes, you do get the gold seal of approval from his father.

well this is just a mash-up of different tropes 🫡 fake relationship, sugar daddy and mob, with rafe's signature "you're mine" mindset. me has a few slutty and soft ideas for this au too hehe

[newsfromstolenland]

I don't think white people realize how recently interracial marriage was not allowed, and how long prejudice against it continued (or continues)

canada has never specifically had legal bans on interracial marriage, but the KKK would proselytize against interracial marriage:

Unlike the United States, Canada had no blatant laws banning interracial marriage. But while the stigma was more informal in this country, it could be just as terrifying. As Backhouse describes in her 1999 book, Colour-Coded: A Legal History of Racism in Canada, 1900-1950, much of this terror was at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan. In 1927, Klansmen congregated in Moose Jaw, where they burned a 60-foot cross and lectured a large crowd on the risks of mixed-race marriage.

They would also kidnap people to prevent said marriages:

Three years later, on Feb. 28, 1930, some 75 Ku Klux Klan men dressed in white hoods and gowns marched into Oakville, Ont., and burned another massive wooden cross. They had arrived to intimidate Isabel Jones, a white woman, and her fiancé, Ira Junius Johnson, a man presumed to be black but later found to be of mixed Cherokee and white descent. The woman's mother had summoned the KKK to separate them.

The Klansmen kidnapped Jones, 21, and dumped her off at the Salvation Army, where they would keep surveillance on her for days from a car parked outside. In front of the couple's home, they burned a cross and threatened Johnson. During the invasion, the police chief recognized many of the Klansmen as prominent business owners from Hamilton as they plucked off their hoods to shake his hand.

This continued into the late 30s and the 40s, and often involved law enforcement:

Four months pregnant and eating breakfast with her fiancé in their pyjamas at their Toronto home, 18-year-old Velma Demerson was confronted by her father and two police officers. Demerson's father had sicced the cops on his daughter for what was scandalous behaviour at the time: Demerson, a white, unmarried woman, was living with a Chinese man, Harry Yip, and was carrying his child. Under the Female Refuges Act, Demerson was deemed "incorrigible and unmanageable" and incarcerated for nine months at Toronto's Andrew Mercer Reformatory for Women, where she was locked in a seven-foot-by-four-foot cell.

source for all

This was all within my grandparents' lifetimes. And the harassment and KKK and police involvement continued well into the 60s and 70s.

And there was the extremely confusing system of whether or not Indigenous people lost their "Indian status" based on who they married, which was all based on gender and blood quantums. This was under the Indian act, and you can read about the marriage discrimination in it here.

And it never really ended, not socially.

My parents got together as an interracial couple in the 80s. My mom's aunt (that's the white side of the family) refused to attend their wedding. In the 90s they got pulled over by a cop who asked if my dad was keeping my mom in his car against her will.

Just a few months ago a white woman refused to believe that my mom is my mom, because that would mean my mom fucked a brown person and that couldn't be right! My mom is so pretty, surely she didn't have to settle for a brown immigrant!

I know this post is long but I think that you should read this. I see people crack jokes about interracial marriage a lot, but I doubt many Canadians know its history on this land.

[jinwoosbabyboo]

I want to ask why you chose Aaron Warner, Christian Harper, and Rhys Larsen as a good comparison to Sylus? I want an essay!! I LOVE Aaron Warner but honestly haven't yet read the twisted series. Also, I don't mind spoilers so... excited to see what you come up with!

You want an essay??? Please 🙄 ….. No problem lets get it 😘

bear with me I read the twisted series over a year ago

‼️SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS‼️

Aaron Warner [Shatter Me Series ~ Tahereh Mafi] - This 5'9" golden haired military assassin with a heart of STONE. Yea you thought I was gonna say heart of gold huh? Nah this boy was trained to be a killer from birth. However when it comes to Juliette/Ella she is quite literally the only thing he cares about and is also the only girl he's ever loved.

He will quite literally sacrifice the world if it means she will be okay. His memory was erased multiple times, but he fell in love with her every. single. time. If it's for Juliette/Ella he's a goner because she is his only weakness in the world. He wants to love her and be loved by her and only her unconditionally.

“The reason why he had to keep wiping their memories was because it didn’t matter how many times he reset the story or remade the introductions— Aaron always fell in love with her. Every time.”

Christian Harper [Twisted Lies ~ Ana Huang] - Now this man stalked his girl for I think 5 years before making himself known. He's a billionaire who runs a security/tech company and he can hack into anything. He's a modern day genius obsessed with this girl Stella. They finally met in person when she moved into one of his apartment buildings with her friend Jules. He really slipped into her life though when Jules moved out and she couldn't afford the rent. He made a deal with her by letting her stay for a lower price and these were high end apartments (At least like 80% off the listing price). He also happened to live just one floor above her. The deal was she would take care of his plants in exchange for the low cost. He claims he isn't a jealous man yet he's jealous of every person she smiles at, every laugh that he didn't cause, etc he's completely and utterly obsessed with her from page one.

He will do literally anything for her including pretending the be her man for her social media platforms oh yea she's an influencer/model. Stella also likes being tied up and Christian happily obliged to tying her up ON A YACHT and was a real pussy pleaser. He supported her in her fashion designer endeavor and married her ass and IMMEDIATELY put a baby in her.

Oh one more thing Stella got kidnapped while her and Christian were fighting (this man was SICK) he sent a Code Black Out to all his agents in the area to find her and code black out if for extreme emergencies. Let’s just say her kidnapper is having a nice nap. A permanent nap. (Reminds you of a certain someone who turned MCs kidnapper into fucking black and red mist huh?)

Rhys Larsen [Twisted Games ~ Ana Huang] - Forget Prince Charming give me Mr. Scarred Knight Rhys Larsen 😮‍💨. He's ex-military and works as a bodyguard now (He works for none other than Christian Harper & they're in a sense friends) This man and his girl Princess Bridget who is a literal Princess. He was her bodyguard and she was forced to step up and become Queen because her brother married a commoner so he couldn't become king and Eldorra (their country) needed a ruler.

She basically starts acting up and Rhys is like girl wtf is going on?! She ends up wanting to do everything on her bucket list before becoming Queen so Rhys takes her to Costa Rica to do it. They fall for each other but it's a forbidden love so they can't really be together because she's royalty and he's a commoner. He fell in love despite him telling her he doesn't get involved with his clients. Him and Bridget were blackmailed by someone close to her which caused him to be terminated as her bodyguard. This man never drank in his life, but the minute he had to let Bridget go he drank himself stupid.

He was down bad for her (and so was she). They went through hell trying to get a centuries old law overturned so he could marry her. He didn't care about the fame or the royal title he just wanted to be with her. This man broke every single one of his rules that he'd set for himself for her. He never really opened up about his scars to anyone, but her (and I think Christian).

He's rough around the edges and can be a dom daddy made her stir down to her heels and said "Crawl to me" (SCREAMING WHINING AND RUNNING AROUND THE ROOM) He's also VERY possessive I quote...

"From this point on you're mine. No other man touches you. If they do I know seventy-nine ways to kill a man and I can make seventy of the look like and accident. Understand?"

I hope after reading all that you can see the similarities that I see. He's not dark romance he's just romance sunshine x grumpy basically.

I say all that to say this....

Sylus is morally gray like these characters above and he has a soft spot for MC (& the twins) he'll do anything for her and protect her at all costs. He's been through hell and may be a high functioning sociopath due to that trauma, but he still has a heart and is selective with who he's vulnerable with. He's not out here murdering people because they looked at MC. He knows his girl fine as hell, but he gets to touch while they hopelessly gaze.

[bisphenol-a]

Tomorrow, Friday November 17, the German Bundestag will vote on a draft law that could decide that naturalization for residents would be dependent on a commitment to Israel’s right to exist.

The bill, which includes a law that would change the criminal code, was submitted by the Christian Democratic Party’s (CDU) parliamentary group.

It would impact individuals seeking residency, asylum, and naturalization, and its intent is to “provide better protection against the further entrenchment and spread of antisemitism that has “immigrated from abroad.”

“Since the day of the attack,” the law states in its introduction, “disgusting rallies and demonstrations have also taken place on German streets, expressing unconcealed joy at the deaths of Jews and revealing an alarming level of antisemitism.”

A majority of protests across Germany have not only been peaceful but have only called for the German government to back a ceasefire to stop the genocide of the Palestinian people.

I attended multiple demonstrations across Germany, and the only visible threat to public safety has been from the police. In fact, I was a witness to one demonstration in Frankfurt where the police banned it from taking place mere minutes before it was about to begin. Hundreds of people were met with water cannons, extreme levels of police presence, and kettling by law enforcement that led to the detainment of over 300 people.

In another I attended in Mannheim, the only act of antisemitism committed was a man on the sidelines of our protest raising his hand in a Nazi salute to antagonize and intimidate pro-Palestinian demonstrators. He was arrested soon after, and local publications reported he was, in fact, not a part of our planned demonstration.

In 2022, over 80 percent of all antisemitic crimes in Germany were committed by the German far right, according to the federal police. However, the new draft bill does not include these statistics. Instead, it attributes violent antisemitism with sympathy with “Hamas terrorism,” which they claim is “cheered and propagated on German streets and schoolyards.”

The bill clearly singles out Arabs and migrants, claiming antisemitism in Germany is now only “imported.”

“A significant portion of those are obviously immigrants from countries in North Africa and the Middle East, where antisemitism and hostility towards Israel have a particular breeding ground,” the draft law states, backed by no concrete evidence for such remarkable claims.

It continues: “as well as their descendants, the instruments of residence, asylum and citizenship law must be used more consistently than before- in addition to general means such as criminal law- in order to combat antisemitism in Germany more effectively.”

In summary, the law not only creates a prerequisite where a citizenship application will only be granted if the individual declares a commitment to Israel’s right to exist and swears that they did not pursue any endeavors directed against Israel, but it can also strip the residency status and the citizenship of dual nationals who have been convicted of an antisemitic crime. This would also include a prison sentence of at least one year.

“Maintaining the legal status quo is not an option,” the draft law says, “as the current legal situation is clearly not suitable for effectively combating the specific antisemitism that is widespread among some foreigners in Germany.”

In Germany, what constitutes an “antisemitic crime” is extremely ambiguous. In 2017, the federal government officially adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) Working Definition of Antisemitism. Advocates, scholars, and legal experts at the European Legal Support Center (ELSC) as well as other organizations for example, have long criticized the IHRA definition, arguing it redefines antisemitism by wrongly conflating criticism of Israel with anti-Jewish racism.

According to a report conducted by ELSC and published earlier this year, the invocation of the definition almost exclusively targets Palestinian rights advocacy, harming Palestinian and Jewish activists in particular.

Now that Germany has specifically labeled the protests as examples of antisemitism that should be criminalized, there is much cause for concern for pro-Palestinian activists. Already, there have been examples such as the stripping of refugee status from a Palestinian activist from Syria and denying residency to Palestinian doctors who have only been a part of a Palestinian cultural group.

...

“Violent excesses at demonstrations- such as the pro-Palestinian demonstrations in October 2023- must be appropriately sanctioned. However, the increasing abuse of the right to demonstrate can often not be adequately punished,” the draft law says. “The regulation of breach of the peace is too narrow.

We have already witnessed banned demonstrations in cities and violent police arrests detaining people only carrying flags and wearing keffiyehs or simply holding anti-war signs. In Berlin, home to one of the largest Palestinian diasporas in Europe, there have been regular police presence and clear examples of racial profiling, and harassment against anyone who might “look” like they are attending a previously banned demonstration. 

[nancynancydrewdrewdrew]

The Olympic Sports I Think Nancy Drew Characters Would Play Based on Vibes

Ned: swimming. Oh man he has big swimmer energy. I will not elaborate. Daryl does too.

Kiri: rugby. In fact she was on the women’s NZ rugby team that just won gold. If you didn’t see her you weren’t watching hard enough not my problem

Jane Penvellyn (in a few years): DRESSAGE. Oh my god. All the Penvellyns are dressage. It’s a linage of dressage. That whole family is so dressage coded. Except for Alan, he did modern pentathlon.

Katie AND Jenna: they both do canoe and kayak slaloms and they are big rivals and lovers. Also Holt does sailing.

Tex: I know you think I’m going to say an equestrian sport but that’s WRONG he does shooting. Try to tell me that man has ever missed a rifle shot I dare you! (Ollie has though lol)

Mary: you may think I’m going to say an equestrian sport and you are RIGHT. She does cross country with her horsie :)

Isis: she is a wolf so unfortunately she can’t compete. But long jump.

Connie: Judo duh

Pua: surfing duh

Hulk: he’s actually not in the Olympics. They have rules against steroids sorry Hulk

Rick Arlen: he’s not in the Olympics either but he bought beach volleyball tickets and the cameras keep cutting to him in the stands before going to commercial

Jacques: he’s not in this Olympics. Check back in two years

Yanni: him too. You know if I had a nickel for each time a Nancy Drew game had an asshole Olympic skier as a character…

Jim Archer: fencing. He wins gold. I know you think I’m joking but look up the president of the IOC who won gold in fencing like fifty years ago and you will see that they are the same man.

Frank: mountain biking. He just gives me that vibe and this is based on vibes so there you go.

George: heptathlon!! She’s ripped and also good at cardio!

Henrik: he was a pole vaulter in the 60s. Look at how tall and skinny he is. If this was real life they’d be calling it the Van der Hune flop not the Fosbury flop.

Harlan: wrestling. Search your heart, you know it to be true!

Minette: she switched martial arts to Judo but she loses her first match and gets kicked out of the tournament because she announces every move she’s about to do.

Niko Jovic: unfortunately he is dead so he’s not gonna be participating.

Brenda Carlton: rhythmic gymnastics. The US does not perform well in that sport and she’s going to do nothing to change it.

Helena: triathlon. Imagine it. She can swim and bike and run, I’m sure of it.

Niobe: did you know that up until the 1940s they had art categories in the Olympics? Unfortunately that was like 80 years ago so sorry Niobe it isn’t happening for you.

Elka: she seems short. Gymnastics. She’s not coming anywhere near team USA though.

Anja: oh my god shot put. The lady is made to be a shot putter.

Leela: actually she’s not going to the Olympics because she spends all her time playing air hockey instead of training. Bummer. Kim and Rachel are synchro divers though.