#And this is just the tip of the iceberg

[metamorphesque]

BRIEFLY ABOUT WHAT'S HAPPENING IN ARMENIA

The present government of Armenia, under the leadership of the infamous madman Nikol Pashinyan, has made the decision to cede some Armenian territory to Azerbaijan, a neighboring country that has relentlessly waged war against Armenia for decades, leaving scars of loss and anguish in its wake. On April 19, the Armenian and Azerbaijani border demarcation commissions agreed to initiate border demarcation proceedings starting from the Tavush region. The delineation of the border sections will be based on coordinates clarified through geodetic measurements on-site, with completion expected by May 15th, 2024. Representatives of the Armenian Prime Minister announced that, as a consequence, Azerbaijan would gain control over 2.5 villages, purportedly leading to a reduction in security risks for the Republic of Armenia. This decision has been likened to extending a hand to a voracious beast in the hope that it will miraculously abandon its predatory instincts and refrain from further aggression. Those familiar with the historical tensions between these nations recognize this as the initial step toward Armenia's capitulation. Since April 19, residents of Tavush border villages, supported by demonstrators from across the country, have been staging protests along the Armenia-Georgia interstate road. Despite these protests, 35 border posts have already been erected along the Armenia-Azerbaijan border. Opponents of the border delimitation, led by Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, head of the Diocese of Tavush, are marching from Kirants—one of the affected villages—to Yerevan in an attempt to halt the border demarcation process. Archbishop Bagrat Sacrosanct previously declared that the movement would reach Yerevan by the afternoon of May 9, where they will present specific demands to the government. The participants demand an end to the concessionary policy and unilateral concessions endorsed by the government, which will, without a shadow of a doubt, endanger the safety of Armenians and Armenia as an independent country. Hence, every single one of us needs to be politically conscious. Who knows? Perhaps one day your leader, too, will decide to sell parts of your country to your enemy.

[doortotomorrow]

memori - dnr

[t3acupz]

hannibal when he’s asked if he will condemn cannibalism

[joyridingmp3]

remember that time my ex boyfriend fucked someone else without telling me while I was dating him? he literally sent me home from his house to invite a girl over to hook up with that night. but I was the asshole for saying without judgement that i personally didn't want to be around drugs. because we never did anything together. just sat on the couch and i was constantly ignored for hours on end. and then his roommate yelled at me and he just sat there knowing i have ptsd. and then asked me to keep making him dinner. yeah I'm such a huge asshole.

[gvenevera]

I put together some clips from the BNHA Hero Stage previews to one of the music pieces: Class A was lit but especially Bakudeku - look at the energy, the synchronization! They surely choreographed the two of them as a pair, that’s how well they know the source material!

[astral-catastrophe]

I’m normal and mentally stable

[awwfullybigadventure]

My sister-in-law also showed me this, this is important to watch regardless how much like or dislike HP books, this is just important things to know and to think deeper.

hey do you think you could expand a bit on separating the art from the artist? clearly you’ve done it with jk rowling but what are your thoughts on it as a general idea?

okay, but you’re not going to like the answer.

here’s the truth: you can’t separate the art from the artist. not entirely. HP Lovecraft was an incredibly talented, but much more incredibly racist man. It would nice to say you don’t agree with his views but you can enjoy his works without that leaking in but…. well, I’m afraid that would be misunderstanding his books entirely.

Consider, for a second, that Lovecraft’s works were horror stories about extradimensional alien monsters having mutant children with humans, they were about invasions from distant monsters, they were about the purity of quaint European towns being tainted. Consider how this may have all been inflicted by the fact that he just simply despised anybody who wasn’t white. Consider how is opinions on “mixing the races” might fight into this; consider why being unable to maintain the “purity” of white Europe was the scariest thing of all to him.

This extends to Rowling too.

I would love to say we can just acknowledge that she is an awful, racist, antisemitic, transphobic person and then say “but at least her books are good,” because, well, they are, aren’t they? I would say so, for sure. But to suggest that one can separate her from them is…. ridiculous.

Consider why an antisemitic woman wrote about a species of goblins who live among us, but who for the most part keep to themselvesand are maybe a little bit oppressed by the institution, but also hold all the cards, all the money, run the banks.

Consider why a racist woman would write about a species of slaves who loved being enslaved, who enjoyed working for no pay, and cleaning up after humans, with the only small caveat of that they didn’t want to be beaten. Imagine that only the most radical of their species wanted to be free, and he still spent the rest of his life working for no pay and helping out a little white boy and his friends wherever he could. Consider why the only person in the story who thought they should be free, that they should have rights, was treated as an overzealous joke, who was acting against the wishes of those slaves who really LOVE being enslaved. Consider that Rowling went on to say that she kind of considers that girl to be black, now.

Consider why JK Rowling, an open and proud transphobe, wrote Rita Skeeter as having a large square jaw, thick “manly” hands, and dressing incredibly gaudily with the most obvious fake nails and fake teeth and fake hair and fake everything. Consider why a woman who tweets about how trans women are “foxes pretending to be hens to get in the hen house” might write this Rita Skeeter to then illegally transform her body in order to spy on children.

Harry Potter is full of Rowling’s bigotry, start to finish. Not even tangentially, like, “oh the goblins are bad, Rita Skeeter is bad, the house elves are bad, but most of it’s good!” because the deeper you dig and the longer you think the more you realise the entire story is based on her prejudices.

Harry Potter pretends to be an aracial story about found family, but if that were true, why are Harry’s distant ancestors important to who he is today even in the seventh book? Why does Harry have to live with his cousin and aunt and uncle? Because magic inherently prefers blood ties. Whilst Rowling was writing a story that seemed to say, “your heritage is not that important and doesn’t make you better than others” she was still writing a story about a boy who got all of his money through his bloodline, who was protected by living with his bloodline, no matter how evil, who was uniquely able to stop Voldemort because his bloodline passed down the invisibility cloak for generations and generations. Any step Harry takes he is compared to his perfect parents who were exactly like him — he looks just like his father, but he has his mother’s eyes, you know! — consider WHY a woman who is racist might’ve written a story like this. A story that on its surface, condemns a blood caste, but still in every step it takes, validates the idea that blood is thicker than water, and your geneological origin is what makes you special.

You can enjoy Harry Pottwr, of course you can. There are fantastic parts. I love a small group of teenagers deciding to become anarchies rebels and train to fight against fascism in secret. I love the murder mystery plots, I love how the series tells kids that it’s a good thing to be brave, and a good thing to fight injustice, and a good thing to challenge the government. But I cannot separate it from its author because it is such a product of its author. All of the structures of the world, the way things work in the universe, and drenched in Rowling’s beliefs, her bigotries. Of course they are: she made them.

Again. This doesn’t mean you cannot enjoy it. But I think we are past the day where we can pretend that disavowing a bigoted author is enough, and that that somehow separates the text from its bigotry. I think we are past the day where we can pretend that Harry Potter isn’t a deeply, inherently bigoted piece of media. Even the bits we love. I think we are beyond the day where we can truthfully pretend to separate it from her, because she is present through all of it. We MUST recognise its flaws. We MUST admit that she is in every part of it.

[skylertheminish]

So I've been seeing a fair bit of amazing work done by talented artists and all of whom said they didn't win this competition The Pokemon Company was holding. I can't help but feel a little bitter about it because some asshat managed to get nominated a few times in this competition and with AI no less.

Least folk are covering it on YouTube but this is frankly disgusting. We genuinely cannot have nice things in life and AI tools like this seriously need to be governed by laws, acts and regulations.

Want to know a way of spotting ai slop? Just grab the colour picker/eyedropper tool and go to a highlight. If this was done by a human the colour would be consistent. Using this ai generated Pikachu for example you'd expect all of its highlights to be in the same yellowish orange range wouldn't you? If it's wildly inconsistent between literally two pixels then it's AI rubbish.

Things like Nightshade and Glaze need to be more accessable to folk so they can protect their work.

[fernsnailz]

hello everypony it’s time for my yearly oc redesigns/reboot yaaaay :] and by reboot i mean like. FULL fuckin reboot. basically forget anything i've ever said about these guys in the past because just about everything has changed in some way LMAO

these three are part of a story i’m currently calling Junkyard Phantoms! they're a trio of mechanics (well. two mechanics and one robot who isn't particularly good at anything) trying to rebuild their lives and explore the solar system after living as outcasts on the moon Callisto. ok cool bye (explodes)

[angstandhappiness]

BAH HAH

Okay, I can see why people ship Bruce/Hal now.

[ceaselesslyinlove]

absolutely obsessed with the fact that colin and penelope are the cutie patootie dorky couple who are going to be the biggest freaks in the sheets that we’ve seen so far on this show

[tributary]

if i controlled hollywood there’d be so many more films and shows set in precolumbian mesoamerica, the byzantine empire, and a few sitcoms about a neanderthal-denisovan hybrid struggling to fit in. also a typhoid mary biopic or twelve and an anthology show about the lives of famous poisoners.

[justplaggin]

endless list of fascinating ding yuxi facts in no particular order

his ideal job besides acting would be museum guard bc he'd get to admire the exhibits all day for free

majored in directing at shanghai theatre academy

gets embarrassed when dubbing his own scenes

used to be a lanky little dude and thus thought dayu (big yu) would be a fitting nickname to use. now he's all buffed up and goes by xiaoding (little ding)

named his fandom haitang bc there's an animated movie called dayu haitang (big fish & begonia)

irl disney princess: animals inexplicably swarm him no matter where he goes (real)

self-proclaimed disney princess

has insane chemistry even with inanimate objects but apparently it's because he's severely nearsighted

thinks his best angle is the back of his head

had to explain slang words and exemplified by looking straight into the camera and saying *in perfect english* "you look SNATCHED in that t-shirt"

played a white cat demon

adopted a white cat and named it after his character

played another white cat demon

adopted two more cats off the street by putting down his backpack and waiting to see if they hop in or not (they did)

adopted a puppy from one of his shows when it grew too big and had to be replaced for continuity

checks fandom posts and questions for him daily and replies with puns so elaborate they require time to be deciphered, memes and/or pictures of his pets

early in his career won an acting reality show

played (among other unhinged characters) a zebra on said show

fans made throwbacks to it to celebrate his recent surge in popularity, newer fans were horrified and said they were worse than antis. he promptly went online to defend his longtime fans by saying they're 'old friends that his journey couldn't have been possible without'

recognizes fans irl and stops to chat with them

used to write down fans' usernames for live q&as

an ai cover of him singing went viral so he recorded his own cover and released it

generally does things his fans ask him to/don't even ask but he sees online and thinks they'd enjoy. even went bungee jumping bc he promised to

hyperaware of his surroundings to the extent that he's the first to catch anyone who stumbles in a 10m radius

gets shoujo vision whenever he sees a plushie and can't help petting it (well-known fact but also. caught in 4k on national tv)

pranks other actors he's traveling with by mingling in with the paparazzi and pretending he's one of them

was often spotted eating alone in restaurants, famous celebs commented saying he should tell them if he wanted to hang out, he was genuinely baffled bc he didn't see why being by himself would be such a big issue

got his driver's license at 29 and now can't stop bringing it up in every conversation

when asked to drive he said he doesn't dare go over 10kmph

his english name is ryan. who even is that. every time he's called that a fan gets a jumpscare. but! on extra cool occasions, he is very much a ryan

has his big break in a hit series every other 4 years (the real deal this time though 🙏)

likes getting new acting jobs bc it means. haircuts for free!! (he thinks spending pocket change on himself in his free time isn't a priority but bought on sight 1218 magazines featuring a co-star just to show support)

shocked veteran actors with his dedication after getting near-drunk in order to make such a scene more convincing (he's allergic to alcohol)

bawls his eyes out at wrap-up ceremonies because after months of filming he'll miss being called by his character's name all the time

whenever a series of his finishes airing, he tries to learn a new craft in order to make an art piece as a send-off gift (recent ones: clay pottery and sand art)

has a beautiful singing voice and loves ballads but never really gets to officially sing, recently bc of his newfound success he was invited to perform on a music show and during the stage he was more scared than when bungee-jumping

thinks acting is like borrowing someone's life so he wishes to help his characters live to the fullest

in the last 2 months covered the entire scale of: [no bodyguards] -> highest popularity level possible on weibo, achieved only by 3 other much more famous actors -> brand event of his supposed to be held in a mall had to be urgently moved to the nearby 60.000-seat olympic stadium because the fans kept coming; the stadium reached max capacity and the brand had to state that it wasn't a concert (🆕️)

is a cat

[widgenstain]

HOW THE FUCK DIDN'T THIS GET NOMINATED FOR A STUPID FUCKING SHOVE-IT UP-YOUR-ARSE BAFTA???!?!?!?!?

ANDREW SCOTT | All of Us Strangers (2023)

[clawed-sapphic]

The idea of werewolves having a “weakness” to silver really is a fun thing to play with, especially with low enough quality silver where it just burns the skin. A werewolf who has a scar from her favorite necklace, whose hand has a mark from all the silver rings she has to shake hands with, stuck in a silver chastity cage while her mistress hold the key, the possibilities really are endless!

[edwardian-girl-next-door]

The thing I love about Victorian and Edwardian fashion is that even if I don't like a piece of clothing, even if it's an affront to God and the most unfortunate combination of colours and drapery, I am ALWAYS stunned into appreciation when I see the details. The amount of minute, manual attention paid to each square centimetre of cloth is mindblowing. I can just imagine someone stooping over that corner of sleeve sewing on each individual bead or lining up the waist tape in a work dress or arranging the frills with a host of finicky pins. I wish each piece of my clothing was as unique and full of dedication and character